Category Archives: Military

Open-Ended Stay In Afghanistan

Foreign Aid, Foreign Policy, Military, Terrorism, War

Withdrawal from Afghanistan “would be based on conditions on the ground.” That’s the latest about-face from the Obama administration. The date of departure is apparently “aspirational.”

Defense Secretary Robert Gates: “If it appears that the strategy’s not working and that we are not going to be able to transition in 2011 then we will take a hard look at the strategy itself,” he said, adding that the president reserves the right to adjust his decision. “We’re not going to just throw these guys into the swimming pool and then walk away.”

“McMussolini” has been pushing for this.

On the phone today to South Africa, I was reminded by my father of what’s at stake: the lives of some of the finest men this country has to offer; the prospect of being killed and crippled for naught.

Updated: No News On Afghanistan (Except From The Taliban)

Barack Obama, Foreign Policy, Military, War

Obama continues to conjure up “new monsters and new missions in Afghanistan,” just as he had promised during his election campaign. And just as the handful of anti-war activists on the left knew he would—everybody was well aware that Obama had staked out Afghanistan as his preferred theater of war, and had pledged an uptick in operations against the “Taliban.”

BO had already authorized 22,000 troops early this year. Now comes the no-news of his intention to send an additional 34,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan, breaking “no-news” he will announce tomorrow.

Despite the fact that the deployment details are already known, the WaPo has described White House officials as “tight-lipped” about the strategy. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has been plenty lippy about the nation building Brother Barack has planned:

The military objective, Brown said, is “to create the space for an effective political strategy to work, weakening the Taliban by strengthening Afghanistan itself.” Over the next year, he said, the Afghan army will be expanded from 90,000 to 134,000, with 10,000 of them going to Helmand province, where U.S. Marines and British troops have concentrated their fight against the Taliban. Further increases are envisioned for later.

MORE.

Update (Dec. 1): Debkafile:

“Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Omar tried to get the jump on [BO] by warning that the US and its allies faced defeat. From his new hideout, Omar Mullah warned the White House:

“‘Considering the present facts in Afghanistan, you and your allies are facing inevitable defeat which will remain whether by sending more troops or taking a series of illogical strategies.’ The Afghan Taliban leader went on to say: ‘And may you know that the logic of using force today has lost its effect, and you cannot control the Afghani people through monetary force or your satanic trickery.'”

“According to DEBKAfile’s military sources, the last sentence referred to US plans to pay out large monthly stipends to tribal and commanders in order to lure thousands of Taliban fighters into switching sides, a gambit which worked in Iraq for drawing Sunni Arab tribal chieftains into declaring war on al Qaeda.”

Update II: Make Me Thankful: Don't Enlist!

Criminal Injustice, Government, Homeland Security, Iraq, Islam, Jihad, Military, Political Correctness, Terrorism

The excerpt is from my new WND.COM column, “Make Me Thankful: Don’t Enlist!”:

“Instead of tough, immediate action against every cog in the military machine that promoted, pampered and palliated the mass murderer Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, victims got a commission of inquiry.

Or in Pentagon speak, ‘a broad 45-day review.’

The state’s response to the slaughter at Fort Hood of 13 of its own by a Muslim Army psychiatrist, who also wounded more than 30 in the shootings at the Texas military post on Nov. 5, will be met, first, with more bureaucracy – more salaries for more slackers – and, thereafter, with a brick-thick report! …

Thinking of enlisting? You’ll be fighting not for country and countrymen; but will be granting a banal bureaucrat a lien on your life.

As for the inquiry cobbled together to stop future Hasans:

Permanent Secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby, a fictitious, but oh-so-real character in the brilliant British satires ‘Yes Minister’ and ‘Yes Prime Minister,’ would agree with me when I say that government commissions are where accountability goes to die.”

The complete column, now on WND.COM, is “Make Me Thankful: Don’t Enlist!”

Update I (Nov. 27): A correction to our friends over at the Libertarian Republican’s blog post: I’ve made it abundantly clear that it is not merely the military under Obama that suffers the afflictions highlighted in “Make Me Thankful: Don’t Enlist!”, and in “Your Government’s Jihadi Protection Program”—but the military, period.

Hozanas to the generic Hasan were the norm during Bush’s reign over the Army.

Patriotic Americans, as highlighted in “Take this, Mr. President, For Ramos and Compean,” were prosecuted and persecuted with equal zeal under Genghis Bush.

In the waning years of Bush’s G-d-awful term, I offered a flip-side argument: “Support The Draft … for politicians and bureaucrats”:

Having expatiated against the illegal, immoral and unconstitutional Iraq war from its inception, I’d recommend a different course of action in furtherance of freedom. For one, crying for the carping consular staff is a bad idea. They seem to want to enjoy the favors of office without bearing the burdens—to pick and choose those policies they are prepared to promote.

Creating a risk-free workplace for the already privileged government employee will do nothing to curb the State’s endless exploits. Coddling its recruits won’t place a dampener on government’s callous, confiscatory practices. The riskier the stakes faced by the political class, the better. Let as many of them as possible shoulder the consequences of the Iraq policy. Force more of the state’s pen-pushing laptop bombardiers to the empire’s fronts. Then, perhaps, will we witness policy changes that percolate down to The People.

Update II: The response to this column, public and personal, has been better than I had hoped. To think of the filthy hate mail I used to get when I wrote against the Iraq war for all those years!

If in writing this column, I’ve helped to save one life — then that is more of a reward than I could have hoped for. As is written in the Talmud (and plagiarized by Islam), “Whoever saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world.” [Jerusalem Talmud Sanhedrin 4:1 (22a)]

Updated: Killing Accountability

Government, Islam, Jihad, Military, Propaganda, Psychiatry, Terrorism, The State

More bureaucracy—more salaries for more slackers—and less accountability. This is how the state deals with its ongoing infractions against the people. A commission of inquiry is planned—or in Pentagon Speak, “a broad 45-day review”—instead of tough, immediate action against every cog in the military machine which promoted, pampered and palliated the mass murderer, “Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist accused of killing 13 people and wounding more than 30 in the shootings at the Texas military post on Nov. 5.”

For his part, Attorney General Eric Holder promised to “work with this committee on ways in which we can prevent such a tragedy from occurring again.”

NPR’s Daniel Zwerdling has “uncovered” what was deduced from evidence already in existence a week ago in “Your Government’s Jihadi Protection Program”:

“Substandard professional performance would get one purged from the private sector. It did nothing to undermine Hasan’s employment status, rank, six-figure income, and secret security clearance in the military.”

Government committees are where accountability goes to die.

Update (Nov. 20): Read the Memorandum for the Credentials Committee written about Hasan, the army’s assassin in training.