One Hand Clapping

Anti-Americanism is the European mainstream
Robert Kagan, who lives in Belgium, explains why the eight national leaders who signed a letter of support of US policy took a politically risky position:

In London, where Tony Blair has to go to work every day, one finds Britain's finest minds propounding, in sophisticated language and melodious Oxbridge accents, the conspiracy theories of Pat Buchanan concerning the "neoconservative" (read: Jewish) hijacking of American foreign policy. Britain's most gifted scholars sift through American writings about Europe searching for signs of derogatory "sexual imagery." In Paris, all the talk is of oil and "imperialism" (and Jews). In Madrid, it's oil, imperialism, past American support for Franco (and Jews). At a conference I recently attended in Barcelona, an esteemed Spanish intellectual earnestly asked why, if the United States wants to topple vicious dictatorships that manufacture weapons of mass destruction, it is not also invading Israel.

Yes, I know, there are Americans who ask such questions, too. We have our Buchanans and our Gore Vidals. But here's what Americans need to understand: In Europe, this paranoid, conspiratorial anti-Americanism is not a far-left or far-right phenomenon. It's the mainstream view. When Gerhard Schroeder campaigns on an anti-American platform in Germany, he's not just "mobilizing his base" or reaching out to fringe Greens and Socialists. He's talking to the man and woman on the street, left, right and center. When Jacques Chirac and Dominique de Villepin publicly humiliate Colin Powell, they're playing to the gallery. The "European street" is more anti-American than ever before.

Kagan hints at the reason for this state of affairs. Here is why I think that this is so. Europeans have for centuries been, and still are, fundamentally anti-Semitic. At the root of European anti-Americanism is the rot of European hatred of Jews. American is not a Jewish nation, but we are the most steadfast political friend of Israel in the world - heck, probably the only political friend. Ipso facto, QED, in the Euro mind: the friend of the people I hate should also be hated.

That's not the only reason, but it is primary, in my view. The rest of the venom spewed against us is smoke and mirrors, I think: Kyoto, missile defense, etc. These are results of, not causes of their anti-Americanism. Another factor: Euro nations are statist in self-conception and law, including even Britain, which is a paler shade of "free" than we are. The idea of sovereignty residing solely in the people, not in the organs of government, is literally foreign to Europe. The Enlightenment, remember, was the birth mother of American democracy, and the Enlightenment was an English-speaking phenomenon.

by Donald Sensing, 1/31/2003 01:48:00 PM. Permalink |

Iraqis plan trench warfare
It seems Saddam has the fantasy that American forces will batter themselves to death forcing through lines of successive trenches. But a trench is nothing more than a pre-dug grave, says Steven Den Beste. And he explains very well why. Then, says Steven,

I have no high regard for Saddam's intellectual powers, but even he isn't this stupid. It's clear that he can't possibly have any faith in these ideas, but what he may be hoping is that they'll cause our groundpounders to stop and form up for an attack, thus making themselves vulnerable for nerve gas. It won't, though; because they won't form for attack. You don't have to concentrate in order to call in airstrikes.

Well said. The US Army in the attack does not mass in order to attack an objective. Our forces mass on top of the objective. World War II this ain't and ain't gonna be. It's not even going to be a rerun of the 1991 Gulf War.

by Donald Sensing, 1/31/2003 01:24:00 PM. Permalink |

More on human freedom, the West and Islam
Yesterday I contrasted the theological underpinning of the West's political understanding of human freedom with the theological underpinning of Islam's denial of human (hence, political) freedom, specifically in the Arab lands. In that line, I refer not to Lee Harris' thought-provoking essay, Al Qaeda's Fantasy Ideology:

Our "real" world, after all, is utterly secular, a concatenation of an endless series of cause and effect, with all events occurring on a single ontological plane. But the "real" world of radical Islam is different--its fantasy ideology reflects the same philosophical occasionalism that pervades so much of Islamic theology. That is to say, event B does not happen because it is caused by a previous event A. Instead, event A is simply the occasion for God to cause event B, so that the genuine cause of all events occurring on our ontological plane of existence is nothing else but God. But if this is so, then the "real" world that we take for granted simply vanishes, and all becomes determined by the will of God; and in this manner the line between realist and magical thinking dissolves. This is why the mere fact that there is no "realistic" hope of al Qaeda destroying the United States--and indeed the West as a whole--is not of the slightest consequence. After all, if God is willing, the United States and the West could collapse at any moment.

If you have not read his article, I urge you to do so.

by Donald Sensing, 1/31/2003 01:07:00 PM. Permalink |

Tax reform? Here's a way.
Bill Hobbs says, "Want tax reform? Get a trustworthy government." It's specifically about Tennessee, but the points apply anywhere.

by Donald Sensing, 1/31/2003 12:58:00 PM. Permalink |

Jeff Jarvis quotes Amiland, on Freeing Iraq:

At a ceremony on Sunday, Paul Spiegel -- the president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany -- criticized the German government's position on Iraq. "One can't be a priori against war," he declared. "The concentration camps weren't freed by demonstrators."

by Donald Sensing, 1/31/2003 12:57:00 PM. Permalink |

The draft: arguments for and against
Arguments for a draft
Rep. Charles Rangel got a lot of publicity when he introduced a bill into the House to restart compulsory military service, the draft. Herewith some analysis.

Support for a draft is minimal but cuts across political lines, with different motivations. Many political conservatives who tend to be sympathetic to a renewed draft grew up in the old draft era. They see the draft as a great social equalizer that brought young men together in difficult circumstances from all walks of life, all ethnicities and regions of the country. These men generally that kind of social mixing as desirable in itself. Such men (women were never drafted) also tend to be highly patriotic and think that military service is a basic obligation of citizenship. Except for World War II, the number of men actually drafted during the draft years was small compared to the pool of eligibles. But every male had to register for the draft (and still does) upon turning 18 and face the real possibility that he might be called up. That fact alone made young men ponder, however briefly, that freedom is not free. These things, so one side of the political spectrum says, are worthwhile reasons to reinstitute the draft. The draft would also free the services from the time and expense of recruiting.

Other folks say that whatever one's opinion of the military, it is best to have decisions made about its uses, funding and equipping made by a national leadership that has at least some familiarity with the military. Hence, they may support a renewal of the draft because they want tomorrow's leaders to be at least minimally aware of military life or capabilities. Some proponents also say that America would be better served with a population "salted" with more veterans than it is now, even if only a tiny number of veterans rise to political leadership.

Both these positions are based on a concern for the betterment of the country as a whole. They contrast with the left of center position on the draft. The liberals who support it (not all do, of course), claim some of the same concerns as the first two camps, but Rep. Rangel did not disguise his hope that a renewed draft would foment anti-military feeling and opposition to President Bush. This position is crass and calculating, being oriented on what will make his party prosper, not the nation at large.

Are these premises valid?
I think it is highly debatable that a term of military service by young men (or women) would mean that their later decisions, as national leaders, concerning war or military affairs would be better in any meaningful sense. Even with a draft like Rangel envisions, the number of elites to serve would be very small compared to the number eligible. It can't be reasonably expected that somehow military service, rendered two or three decades before, would make men or women of say, 45-60 years of age wiser heads in debating national security.

As a form of social policy intended to garner better-informed decision makers at the national level, the draft has little to commend it and much against it. Here are three arguments against it.

A draft would achieve low density results a great expense
Even if I grant that a term as a private in the Army by draftees would have a beneficial effect on national policy years down the line - and I do not think so - the number of men actually drafted would be a small percentage of those eligible, and the number of men who would rise to national leadership would be much smaller still. We could wind up spending literally billions of dollars in increased costs to garner a single draftee turned Senator. Does that make sense?

The US Census data for 2000 show that there are approximately 7,900,000 men aged 18-21 inclusive, the prime years for a draft. This number will stay fairly stable for at least a decade. Drafting a half-million men per year (I'll not address whether women should be drafted) takes only 6.3 percent of the eligibles. Of that 500,000 men, a significant number will not successfully complete their term; even in the all-volunteer force, perhaps one-fourth to one-third do not. Draftees may be expected to have a higher failure rate, call it 40 percent, charitably. That 40 percent presumably would not offer a national-class benefit later in life.

Of the remaining 300,000 men, how many would later rise to national-level leadership? No one can say. Some would, of course, but the presumption that their influence would be very great is not founded on anything, really, but the example of WW II vets - of which there were 16 million, all who served within a four-year span. I say that the experiences and contributions of that generation are historically unique: the Great Depression shaped their character as much as the war (Marine veteran William Manchester made this point in Goodbye Darkness) and after the war the G.I. Bill shaped it at least as much also. To expect that their model would hold true today is more imagination than well grounded conclusion.

A draft is a bad investment with no "payoff"
The armed forces are presently meeting their recruiting goals quite handily with volunteers. In fact, 2002 was the best recruiting year ever, according to a recent DOD release. If we revive the draft, draftees would either displace volunteers or require a larger military.

In the first case, we would have to tell would-be volunteers that they may not serve in order to make room for those who do not wish to serve. To me, this is self-evidently stupid, indeed un-American. It would not even accomplish the putative goals of a better informed citizenry in later years because no greater number of men and women would be serving than are serving now.

The second option is to increase the size of the armed forces extravagantly. There are good arguments to increase the size of the armed forces. I think they are too small myself. But the draft is no cure. In October 2001 I wrote that the anti-terrorism crusade "will take a new kind of national commitment. . . . It will require new kinds of armies, armies not of soldiers but of engineers, agriculturalists, financiers, administrators and educators." The draft won't do that. It will give us the wrong kind of force for the challenges we must face in the years to come. In fact, many of those skills are more suited for civil service than armed forces.

All these new troops would have to be trained, housed, equipped, transported and fed. Many of them would be married; more than half the enlisted force is now. Family-support costs would skyrocket. In the Army alone, the present basing infrastructure won't support such an expansion. The present unit structure won't support it. To reactivate old units whose colors are now furled would take years because those units would be useless without vehicles, ammunition, weapons and countless thousands of items of other equipment. The Air Force and Navy have similar problems concerning ships, aircraft and bases.

None of that can be manufactured quickly, unless substantial sectors of the civilian economy are converted as was done in World War II. You can bet that no proponent of the draft envisions that! A draft's startup costs alone would be astronomical and the annual recurring costs would be exorbitant also - all for the unreasonable expectation that the armed forces would be better off or would in later years make better national leaders.

The poor premises of a renewed draft
The whole move for a draft for its supposed social benefits is founded on fog: that a term as a draftee private makes better members of Congress or university presidents or cabinet secretaries or Wall Street bankers many years later. But there is no real evidence to support such a conclusion.

Draftee-level service is not training for national-level leadership.
The kind of education and knowledge needed at the national-policy level for the uses of the military either to preserve the nation or advance its goals is not the kind that will ever be learned by draftees or short-term volunteers. In the military education system, noncommissioned officers really never get training oriented toward national policy, at least not in any significant degree, and officers get none at all until Command and General Staff College - and then only concerning the structure of the national military establishment. Theory education, the philosophy of American way of war, pondering what a military is for in America and studies of the limits and uses of military power do not come until the War College and later schools. But only career officers attend those schools, and not all of them.

Veterans' records are decidedly mixed
Even veterans who actually served in combat are not necessarily better or wiser civilian controllers of the military later in life. Former Republican Senator Bob Dole and Democrat Senator Daniel Inouye are both WW II combat veterans with distinguished service. Maybe their wisdom about military affairs was enhanced by their service, but we really have no way to know. Many non-vets have proved pretty smart, too. Abe Lincoln is often offered as a foremost example, since he had six weeks of active duty, total, and spent almost all of it sitting in a tent in bivouac.

President Lyndon Johnson: can you say, "quagmire?" He was a WW II Navy veteran.

Robert McNamara: Johnson's secretary of defense was an Air Force veteran. He was the architect of America's agonies is Vietnam.

Jimmy Carter: US Naval Academy graduate, Navy officer, and architect of the disastrous Agreed Framework with North Korea in 1994, which haunts us today. The "hollow Army" also came to being during his terms as president.

Woodrow Wilson: No military experience, but during his term the United States decisively defeated Imperial German forces; it was the peace afterward that Wilson mismanaged.

Harry S Truman: An Army artillery officer and combat veteran during WW I, he saw WW II to a successful conclusion. The Marshall Plan saved western Europe under his administration, but he also let conventional forces degenerate pitifully. He mismanaged the Korean War at great cost to American blood and treasure.

John F. Kennedy: A WW II Navy combat vet, Kennedy brilliantly handled the Cuban Missile Crisis (but it was close!) but also started America's long tragic slide into Vietnam.

Ronald Reagan: Made training films in WW II, no other military experience. Materially ensured the defeat of Soviet forces in Afghanistan, masterminded the downfall of the USSR.

Overall, the national-security record of veterans in office is mixed at best, and so is that of non-vets. It's no basis for starting the draft.

by Donald Sensing, 1/31/2003 12:52:00 PM. Permalink |

I'll be on radio Friday morning
You can listen live online at 7 a.m. Central Friday. I'll be on Teddy Bart's Round Table, the longest-running talk show in Nashville. In Nashville, the show is broadcast on AM 1160 WAMB.

I will appear with:

Rabbi Kenneth Kanter, Senior Rabbi of Nashville's Congregation Micah. He is a popular lecturer and author of books, journals, and articles that deal with the history of the Jewish contribution to American popular music.

Dr. Richard Land
Princeton and Oxford educated, Dr. Richard Land has served as president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission since 1988.

by Donald Sensing, 1/30/2003 02:27:00 PM. Permalink |

Thanks to StrategyPage.com!
They have very kindly made One Clapping the blog of the week! Much appreciated!

by Donald Sensing, 1/30/2003 08:01:00 AM. Permalink |

President Bush's most important sentence
I haven't read or heard any commentary about the most penetrating quote in the president's SOTU speech Tuesday night. It's this one, that came in the penultimate paragraph:

The liberty we prize is not America's gift to the world; it is God's gift to humanity.

That sentence defines the chasm between the West generally, including America specifically, and Islam generally, including Arabic Islam specifically.

Islam teaches that Allah's control over events of the world and human life is total and complete. There is no human free will, there is only rebellion against Allah or submission to Allah. Yet even rebellion is, somehow, under the controlling purview of Allah. Everything that happens, without exception, is the preordained will of Allah.

Osama bin Laden bombed two American embassies in Africa killing mostly Muslim Africans by the hundreds. The Quran prohibits murder, and especially forbids Muslims from killing other Muslims. An ABC reporter subsequently managed to interview bin Laden and asked him whether he was responsible for the deaths of the other Muslims. No, replied OBL, I am a tool of Allah, and whatever I do is determined to happen by Allah. Those people would have died at that time in any event, because it was Allah's will that they die.

In Islam, Allah holds all the power marbles. Humanity has no self will or self power.

This concept of deity was prominent in Christian thought also. Classical Christian theism viewed the past and the future as equally concretized in God's knowledge. John Calvin wrote, "All events whatsoever are governed by the secret counsel of God [who] so overrules all things that nothing happens without his counsel. Events are so regulated by God, and all events so proceed from his determinate counsel, that nothing happens fortuitously." In such a scheme, human beings make no free choices. Martin Luther wrote, "God knows nothing contingently, but that he foresees, purposes, and does all things according to his immutable, eternal and infallible will. This bombshell knocks 'free-will' flat, and utterly shatters it." Luther taught that God knows what will happen next year as certainly as he knows what happened last year. Thus, God's omniscience equals his omnipotence, since "God must in fact determine every detail of the world, lest something happen that was not immutably known," as theologian Charles Cobb explained this position (not one Cobb held).

Yet in modern-day Christianity, this belief is hardly held at all. Europe can barely be termed Christian at all any more. American Christians affirm that God is in control, but even among conservative denominations this claim really serves to express and faith that nothing can shut out the God's saving power rather than claim that God micromanages every breath we take and eyeblink we make. South American and African Christianity has never embraced the concept.

Bin Laden's sort of self-justifying extremism is not the mainstream of Islam, but neither is it as far removed as we might imagine. Fatalism is a characteristic of Islam. There is no human freedom. Human liberty, especially as Americans think of it, is literally a foreign concept to Islam, especially Arab Islam.

We say that the defining idea of American liberty is "self evident:" Human beings "are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." This claim has no natural fit with Islam. The idea that humans, created by the power of Allah, could inherently possess unalienable rights of their own, which no authority may remove, would require Islam to surrender the idea that Allah enjoys meticulous control over all affairs of nature and humankind. But this notion is lethally dangerous to the defining idea of Islam itself: that Allah has all the power.

Liberty as we conceive it is at the heart of the conflict. For Muslims, the most desirable state of human society is not one that is free, in the Western sense, but one that is submissive to Allah, according to the dictates of Quran. This state of society is dar al Islam, the world of peace. Anything else is the "world of war." Hence, Islam does not use terms such as free or unfree to refer to nations, but at war with Allah or at peace (through submission) to Allah. And because of the deterministic model of Allah, any form of political repression conducted under Islam's banner is seen as Allah's will. Think Saudi Arabia, Iran and the Taliban.

Islamic countries can practice democracy. Turkey is usually offered as a prime example. Because Iraq has been mostly secularized for many decades, Islam does not present a barrier to democracy there as it would in some other Arab countries. Rooting democracy in Iraq won't be easy, but it's main barrier will probably be tribalism rather than religion. Iran might go democratic fairly easily one day, too, because the people there have pretty much had their fill of Islamic absolutism. The rest of the Arab countries will present difficult challenges.

Political liberty necessitates individual freedom and the power of self will. That means, as Mark Twain put it, that every person is free to go to Hell in his own way. But make no mistake: that concept is the very heart of our conflict with Islamists, and is the very point of contention with Arabic Islam itself.

See also my essays:

Islamic Fundamentalism Explained: The religious roots of the terror attacks against America,

The relationship between theology and American Constitutional rights.

The Soil of Arab Terrorism (PDF document).

Updates, July 11, 2003:

Lee Harris explained the metaphysics of this belief system, of which I excerpted the pertaining paragraph here.

I do not wish to give the erroneous impression that Islam formally holds that human beings are mere robots. Human free will is recognized in Islam, as are the categories of sin and virtue. The Quran teaches that at the judgment day, human beings will be judged according to their deeds. However, I believe there is a qualitative difference between the mainstream of how Christians have historically understood God's power and the way that Muslims have historically understood Allah's power.

The Jewish Scriptures show that while God's essential nature - salvation righteousness - does not change, God is significantly malleable in many respects. God repents, for example of creating humanity, bringing about the calamity of the Flood in which only Noah and his family are saved. In Jonah, God seems determined to destroy Nineveh, but clearly changes his mind when the Ninevites throw themselves at his mercy. The Gospel of Matthew (13:56) indicates that somehow the ability of Christ to do miracles in his own hometown was thwarted, or at least decreased, "because of their lack of faith."

To the contrary, nothing that human beings do or believe can affect the supreme power Allah yields. Hence, Harris is correct in assessing that at the foundation, anything that happens, whether a human deed or not, is at least permitted by Allah. The evil that men to is therefore permitted by Allah even though he could quash it at any time. Human free will, in Islam, may therefore be understood as somewhat illusory: no one can do or refrain from doing anything that Allah does not will or permit.

Christianity has struggled long and hard with this conundrum as well. If God is all-powerful, all-good, and all-knowing, how can there be evil in the world at all? The Swiss reformer John Calvin approached it from a different angle: how is it possible that so many people are undeniably resistant to receiving the Good News and do not convert to Christian faith? Calvin's development of predestination sought to solve that question. Calvin held that God's power is absolute and without limit. Therefore, God must choose who is saved and, at least by default, who is not saved. So as I showed above, Calvin and his contemporary Martin Luther both explicitly renounced the idea of human free will. But Catholicism and most of the rest of Protestantism have maintained that human free will is genuine; Methodism's main founder, John Wesley, said that the idea of predestination made mockery of God's moral commandments.

In the 20th century a great deal of theological work was done on this issue, which I made the topic of my Master thesis, using the problem of evil as a framework. You may read it online in PDF form if you wish.

by Donald Sensing, 1/30/2003 07:51:00 AM. Permalink |

This Methodist bishop does not speak for me
According to a local TV news story, United Methodist Bishop Melvin Talbert will appear in an anti-Iraq-war TV ad campaign. The ad says that an American attack on Iraq would "violate God's law."

He says Iraq hasn't wronged the United States and that would war would only create more terrorists.

The commercial is expected to be broadcast beginning Friday to New York and Washington viewers of the CNN and Fox cable news networks.

The ad was produced by True Majority -- an advocacy organization started by Ben and Jerry's co-founder Ben Cohen. It's sponsored by the National Council of Churches.

As a United Methodist, I want to explain a couple of things:

Bishop Talbert does not speak for the United Methodist Church; by our denomination's polity, he cannot speak for the denomination. Only the General Conference may issue statements of denominational positions. It meets only every four years, with the next meeting in 2004.

The bishop recently went to Iraq (December, as I recall), where he let Saddam spin him like a top. He saw only what Saddam wanted him to see, he spoke only to the people Saddam wanted, he heard only what Saddam intended. There is no account of Talbert's visit, including his own, that he attempted to give a witness to the Iraqi people or the regime's figures of the Gospel of Jesus Christ; there is no evidence or report that he challenged Saddam's regime on its tyranny and murder; there is no evidence or report that he had any real agenda other than a barely-concealed willingness to be used a dupe by the co-winner of the Gold Medal for bloodthirstiest tyrant alive today (Kim Jong Il being the other).

It calls to mind what Stalin said about certain kinds of people being useful to Soviet communism.

The TV ad ends with the tagline: "Let the inspections work." The bishop and the others of the ad obviously didn't listen to the chief inspector, Hans Blix, Monday, because Blix's own report to the UN makes it clear that the inspections are not working. The inspections have not worked at any time since 1991 when they started.

The ad betrays an utter lack of even minimum knowledge about what the inspections are, how they function, and what they intend to accomplish. The facts have been explained in detail by many blogs and some major media: the inspectors are verifiers, not detectives. It is not their job to go on snipe hunts hither and yon, trying to find fobidden arms or research and development programs. It is their job to verify that Iraq has done what the UN has required, according to declarations and records Iraq makes available.

Gary Milhollin, director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, and Kelly Motz, editor of IraqWatch.org, explained it thus:

Inspections can only do one thing well: verify that a country's declarations about a weapons program are honest and complete. It is feasible for inspectors to look at sites and equipment to see whether the official story about their use is accurate. Inspectors can rely on scientific principles, intelligence information and surprise visits to known weapons production sites to test what they are told. It is a different proposition altogether to wander about a country looking for what has been deliberately concealed. That is a task with no end.

For inspectors to do their job, they have to have the truth, which can only come from the Iraqis. As President Bush [has said], the world needs an Iraqi government that will stop lying and surrender the weapons programs. That is not likely to happen as long as Saddam Hussein remains in power.

I said more about my church's very sad record on this crisis. Please see also:

The backward thinking of anti-war religious pronouncements.

The religious fallacies of pacifism.

And here is a very good summary of Saddam's perfidy in The Washington Times regarding what the UN requires of him, and how he has defied the UN and hindered the inspectors.

by Donald Sensing, 1/30/2003 07:01:00 AM. Permalink |

Another reason the UN is a joke these days
This headline says it all:

Iraq to chair U.N. disarmament conference

by Donald Sensing, 1/30/2003 06:58:00 AM. Permalink |

Why I admire Prime Minister Blair
This segment says it all:

The prime minister was giving an impassioned defence of the government's position on Iraq during his weekly question time when an anti-war MP shouted: "Who's next?"

Replying to the heckle, Mr Blair said: "After we deal with Iraq we do, yes, through the UN, have to confront North Korea about its weapons programme".

"We have to confront those companies and individuals trading in weapons of mass destruction," he added.

To another cry of "When do we stop?", Mr Blair answered: "We stop when the threat to our security is properly and fully dealt with."

I think there's little to add to that. How fortunate is America that Tony Blair is the PM of Great Britain.

by Donald Sensing, 1/30/2003 06:50:00 AM. Permalink |

Go read Lileks.
No excerpts here, just go read it.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 01:10:00 PM. Permalink |

When does the war begin?
Austin Bay lays it all out in his usual elegant way. Hint: it already has, or did you forget?

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:21:00 AM. Permalink |

Bad joke break
The district attorney was stumped. A man had been arrested and had confessed to the deed, but the DA didn't know exactly what the crime was. The completely nude, dead body of a man had been found at the base of a high bridge. When the police arrived, a man standing nearby blurted, "I did it! I pushed him off the bridge!" So the police arrested him.

Even more incredible, genetic testing confirmed that the dead man was a clone of the suspect. Hence the DA's puzzle: Should he charge the suspect with murder, suicide or something else?

Finally the answer came to him. He charged the suspect with making an obscene clone fall.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:19:00 AM. Permalink |

Who are the inheritors of Jeffersonian liberalism today?
Dennis Rogers answers.

I have good friends who are liberals. They don't hate this country. They don't hate Israel. They don't bring up the Israeli/Palestinian conflict when attempting to discuss any other problem in the world. They may even be Jeffersonian liberals.

This creates some cognitive dissonance on my own part (except for a growing conviction that conservatism is the true representation of Jeffersonian liberalism now). And the more I think of this narrowing view of the left and its detachment from good folks like my liberal friends and public liberals like Alan Colmes, the more I think that liberals have an especially urgent calling right now.

If liberals don't want to be on the receiving end of increasing and even more scathing charges of anti-Americanism and moral equivalence, then some outspoken liberals (channeling Alan Colmes and Josh Marshall) need to start drawing a clear – very clear – line of separation between the credible left (I know some may not believe this exists . . .) and these socialist, Marxist, communist, anti-American groups that patently hate this country and what it stands for.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:15:00 AM. Permalink |

Brits start worrying more about how to tie Gulliver down
TR Fogey has a good rollup of the growing anxiety over US power in Great Britain.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:15:00 AM. Permalink |

Japan loses 25 nukes' worth of plutonium
The Japanese government said yesterday that it cannot account for more than 200 kilograms of plutonium. Authorities said that it was "highly unlikely" the plutonium was stolen, which makes for some interesting possibilities.

About 5kg to 8kg of plutonium are needed to make a 20-kiloton atomic bomb similar to the one that destroyed Nagasaki in 1945.

Experts said the missing amount was surprisingly large.

There is normally a margin of error of 1 per cent or less when measuring liquid plutonium, which can dissolve into other elements.

Japan's admission comes at a time of acute sensitivity because of the threat of nuclear proliferation in north-east Asia following North Korea's revival of its mothballed nuclear programme.

I have to wonder whether Japan will later manage to find the plutonium after it somehow has been made into atomic warheads, and oh, North Korea, you are the first ones we are telling.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:14:00 AM. Permalink |

Dave Barry explains Lord of the Rings II
His recent column will save you a lot of time because he has condensed the script down to a manageable level. And it's just as good.

(Scene 6)

LORD ARAGORN: Well, Legolas and Gimli, with the help of Gandalf the White, formerly Gandalf the Grey, also known as Gandalf the Beige, we have defeated the Uruk-hai in a giant computer-generated battle. Now we must make haste to the Really Big Rock of Karambador, before the forces of Ba'Zoot, led by the evil King Weltpimple, conquer the Mullions of Gneep and obtain the Remote Control Unit of Doom!

LEGOLAS: Now you're just making stuff up.

LORD ARAGORN: Well, it's not as stupid as the kung-fu trees.

GIMLI: I'm still short!

(Laughter)

Because he got a lot of hostile email from rabidly angry LOTR II fans, Dave was compelled to issue this apology.

To all of the irate Tolkien fans who were very offended by my column on the Lord of the Rings II, I just want to say, with sincerity and humility: Get a life.

Yes, Dave Barry now has a blog. Permalink that puppy! (via Legalbean.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:11:00 AM. Permalink |

The coming water wars?
Legal wars, that is. Geitner Simmons explains the "hydraulic societies" of the American West, and why it's already at crisis state. The drought there may be the worst dry spell in 1,400 years.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:03:00 AM. Permalink |

Why we should stop criminalizing personal vices . . .
is explained by Wendy McElroy.

The conflict between personal freedom and public policy arises when society strongly disapproves of certain moral choices, such as discriminating on the basis of race or gender. When a choice becomes widely viewed as a vice, society often tells the erring individual, "you have no right to reach this conclusion and live according to it." In other words, "there ought to be a law."

This approach assumes that personal freedom must be restricted in order to promote virtue: It assumes that the two are in conflict.

I believe the opposite is true. The freedom of individuals to choose, without intrusive state regulation, is the prerequisite of morality. A coerced "choice" does not reflect virtue, only compliance. In other words, you cannot force a person to be moral; you can only make them conform. True morality requires freedom and cannot exist without it.

Those who value virtue should be first in line to declare, "there ought not to be a law" governing vice.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:03:00 AM. Permalink |

Using WMDs against US troops is a no lose move for Saddam
WMD has become the new term of art for the weapons that the US military has always called NBC, for nuclear, biological and chemical. As a battlefield weapon, bio is unsuitable because its casualty effects take too long. Bio weapons could have some utility against fixed base operations, however.

In the 1991 Gulf War, Saddam had not nuclear arms. He did have chemical weapons, but Saddam had everything to lose and nothing to gain by them in 1991. Based on the texts of the US Congress' authorization for President Bush to make war against Iraq and the text of the UN resolution calling on UN members to eject Iraq from Kuwait, Saddam knew that his regime would not be targeted. The Congress limited its war powers declaration against Iraq to reversing the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, and did not authorize conquest of Iraq. For that matter, President Bush never contemplated doing that.

Knowing that his regime was not targeted, Saddam knew that his survival was practically guaranteed in advance. Thus, the only thing that could definitely cause his death or downfall would have been to use chemical weapons against allied forces. Furthermore, the just-short-of-explicit American threat to use mass-destructive weapons in retaliation, delivered to Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz, also served as assurance that such weapons would be use only in retaliation. Thus Saddam knew that:

he faced an entirely conventional threat, the power of which he never actually comprehended,

his personal survival and that of his regime was assured even if he lost the battle for Kuwait,

and the only way neither of the above facts would be negated was for him to use chemical weapons.

Today, however, Saddam's survival, and that of his regime, is specifically threatened. The US Congress made toppling Saddam an explicit aim of foreign policy in 1998, and the present administration has emphasized it heavily.

So Saddam has nothing to lose by using WMD against allied troops. Their use would carry great risk that many Iraqi civilians would die as collateral damage. I once believed this consideration might stay Saddam's hand, but I don't think so any more. His single overriding goal has always been personal survival and power. He is a dictator, and dictators do not rule for the benefit of the people. Saddam has no vision for Iraq that outlives him personally. It is most likely that he would sacrifice Iraqi lives wholesale in order to hang onto life and power.

As I wrote in "Fighting a winter campaign in Iraq," American maneuver units - armor, infantry and their supporting artillery units - would make poor targets for chemical attack because they move too fast to target effectively. But the US logistic tail could be an attractive target.

Saddam's use of WMDs cannot possibly assure his victory. But sadly, that fact can't be relied on to dissuade him from using them anyway.

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:02:00 AM. Permalink |

How Taxes Work
A friend emailed this to me. It is purportedly by T. Davies, a professor of accounting at the University of South Dakota. Google confirms a man named Tom Davies with accounting credentials at the school; whether he really wrote this I cannot verify. But it is an interesting analogy of the tax systems and tax cuts.

Let's put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand. Suppose that every day, ten men go out for dinner. The bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this: The first four men - the poorest - would pay nothing; the fifth would pay $1, the sixth would pay $3, the seventh $7, the eighth $12, the ninth $18, and the tenth man - the richest - would pay $59. That's what they decided to do. The ten men ate dinner in the restaurant every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement - until one day, the owner threw them a curve (in tax language, a tax cut).

"Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily meal by $20." So now dinner for the ten only cost $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. So the first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But what about the other six men who actually pay the bill? How could they divvy up the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his "fair share?" The six men realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, the fifth and sixth man would end up being PAID to eat their meal. So the restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay. And so the fifth man paid nothing, the sixth pitched in $2, and the seventh paid $5, the eighth paid $9, the ninth paid $12, leaving the tenth man with a bill of $52 instead of his earlier $59.

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to eat for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got a dollar out of the $20," declared the sixth man, but he, (pointing to the tenth) got $7!" "Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man, "I only saved a dollar too. It's unfair that he got seven times more than me!" "That's true!" shouted the seventh man, why should he get $7 back when I only got $2?" "The wealthy get all the breaks!"

"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison, "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!"

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night he didn't show up for dinner, so the nine sat down and ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered, a little late what was very important. They were FIFTY-TWO DOLLARS short of paying the bill!

Imagine that!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college instructors, is how the tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up at the table anymore. Where would that leave the rest?

Leave a comment on whether you think this is a valid analogy. . . .

by Donald Sensing, 1/29/2003 07:01:00 AM. Permalink |

This you really have to see!
Yes, you do. Really! To tell you what it is would spoil it, just hit the link.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 05:31:00 PM. Permalink |

Don't forget my essays page!
It's here. A few of the entries:

Western Law, Islamic Law and the Ordering of Society - What's at stake in the struggle with Arab-Muslim terrorists

Islamic Fundamentalism Explained - The religious roots of the terror attacks against America (I wrote this the week after Sept. 11.)

Is God the Problem? The God we worship shapes the kind of people we are.

A Brief Survey of What the Bible Says About War.

Is America Justified to Use Force?

The problem with pacifism is pacifists

An idea is not a plan! Wishful thinking passes for theological reflection nowadays

Saddam's most dangerous failure - Saddam's fundamental ineptitude as a leader is exactly what makes him singularly dangerous.

Is Christianity more user-friendly than Islam? - Why language matters

Why Iraq Will Defeat Arms Inspectors - Explained by Gary Milhollin, director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, and Kelly Motz, editor of IraqWatch.org.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 04:20:00 PM. Permalink |

New York Times column admonishes the religious Left
Reader Emily Puskar sent me the link to a NYT column that rebuts the pronouncements of the religious Left concerning potential war against Iraq. Not so fast, says Joseph Loconte:

A growing number of religious leaders have decided that Jesus would veto a war against Saddam Hussein. Back from a fact-finding trip to Iraq earlier this month, a delegation from the National Council of Churches said it harbored no doubts: "As disciples of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, we know this war is completely antithetical to his teachings." The Christian Century magazine, quoting from the Sermon on the Mount, has criticized military action by warning that "he who hates his neighbor is in danger of hellfire."

Religious liberals are making the same mistake that often bedevils religious conservatives: They're grossly oversimplifying the Bible. It's true that Jesus put the love of neighbor at the center of Christian ethics. Forgiveness, not vengeance, animates the heart of God, offered freely to any person willing to renounce sin. But the Christian Gospel is not only about "the law of love," as war opponents like to put it. It's also about the fact that people violate that law.

Loconte makes some interpretive errors, but overall he makes some good points. He does not call for war, but he does urge a some humility "among the apostles of diplomacy."

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 01:24:00 PM. Permalink |

Israelis rocket Episcopal church in Gaza
St. Philip’s Episcopal Church, located within the Ahli Arab Hospital compound, was struck by a guided missile this week. The Church sits in the center of the Ahli Arab hospital complex, all of which is surrounded by buildings flying the Red Cross and Anglican flags.

Built at the turn of the last century, St. Philip’s Episcopal Church was reconsecrated in 1996, by Bishops Samir Kafity and Riah Abu El-Assal, in the presence of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. George Carey; The Presiding Bishop of the US, Edmund Browning, and thirty-four other Primates of the Anglican Communion, along with President Arafat. It’s century old stained class windows were shattered, and crystal from it’s chandeliers littered the floor. The missile entered through the roof, and left a meter wide hole in the floor. The alter was covered with plaster and a nearby hymnal pierced with shrapnel. Suhaila Tarazi, Ahli director, said “we collected money from so many individuals who supported the renovation of the Church, and in a minute it is gone.” The building was structurally reinforced with the remodeling, but it is an old building, and the walls showed numerous deep cracks.

The destruction did not stop with the Church. The Pediatric Clinics were damaged as well, with the collapse of the false ceiling and ventilation system. Throughout the hospital; the physical therapy building, the staff accommodations, the laboratory, medical records, the morgue, the library glass littered the floors, windows were broken, doors separated from their frames by the force of the blast. The damage to the hospital is extensive, and many more old buildings showed structural cracks. Boys from the neighborhood collected shrapnel.

Everyone at the Hospital today spoke about why this happened. No one could imagine it was an accident. The area surrounding the Church was covered with the wire filaments that come from guided missiles. Hospital employees pointed out that they are nowhere near other apartment buildings, government or military facilities. Consensus was that this was a precisely targeted attack, how could it be otherwise? Apache helicopters had not only fired the missile, they had returned to film the results of their attack. These were shown on early morning Israeli television.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 01:18:00 PM. Permalink |

Rummy worries Norman
The theater commander of the Gulf War, retired Gen. Norma Schwarzkopf, says that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld worries him:

That dismissive posture bothers Schwarzkopf because he thinks Rumsfeld and the people around him lack the background to make sound military judgments by themselves. He prefers the way Cheney operated during the Gulf War. "He didn't put himself in the position of being the decision-maker as far as tactics were concerned, as far as troop deployments, as far as missions were concerned."

Rumsfeld, by contrast, worries him. "It's scary, okay?" he says. "Let's face it: There are guys at the Pentagon who have been involved in operational planning for their entire lives, okay? . . . And for this wisdom, acquired during many operations, wars, schools, for that just to be ignored, and in its place have somebody who doesn't have any of that training, is of concern."

As a result, Schwarzkopf is skeptical that an invasion of Iraq would be as fast and simple as some seem to think. "I have picked up vibes that . . . you're going to have this massive strike with massed weaponry, and basically that's going to be it, and we just clean up the battlefield after that," he says.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 01:11:00 PM. Permalink |

Iraq promises more frustration
So Iraq promises "more cooperation" with the weapons inspectors. Well, heavy sigh of relief! Silly me, I thought that UNSC Resolution demanded total cooperation.

What was written and voted as an ultimatum has become more negotiable than a clearance price at a used-car lot.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 10:27:00 AM. Permalink |

Oh, shut up!
I direct that to Richard Cohen for this piece of tripe.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 08:15:00 AM. Permalink |

The Euro-American divide
Richard Heddleson emails --

Now that the boomers are running everything everywhere, we can get back to the unfinished business of the Vietnam war. That's what I got out of this article in the NYT. Why?

The boomers, or in Europe the 68 generation, were divided into two groups, those who opposed the war in Vietnam and by extension the U. S. in general and those who did not. Those who did not were further divided in the U. S. at least into those who actively supported the war and those who, while not enthusiastic about it were not prepared to oppose it. The war ended because the ranks of those who actively supported the war dwindled and those unenthusiastic grew.

In the U. S. all groups have entered every part of society. We've elected Clinton and Bush. In Old Europe (tm) it seemed, I assert without any hard evidence, that there were far more opposed to the US position in Vietnam and far fewer enthusiastic. And because of Old Europe's sclerotic social structures, the current establishment there seems to be exclusively populated with those who opposed the war and by extension the U. S. It is ingrained into their psyche and is now a default response to any U. S. action.

At the same time, the same generation in Eastern Europe was learning how evil was the alternative to an imperfect U. S. Now that they have thrown off the bonds of tyranny, they best understand what we seek to achieve in Iraq and provide support that if not substantial in weapons more than makes up for it in spirit. Look at the countries that will support us, Poland, Spain, and the other countries that overthrew dictators in the 70's and 80's and the Anglosphere.

It will be interesting to watch the French and German Generation of 68 work out its hang-ups with their history in World War II and Vietnam, their willingness to collaborate and live with the Soviet Union. I suspect we will see a lot more revisionist history, especially about WWII coming from French and especially German authors as they seek to turn it into a justification for opposing the U. S hegemony of which they are so jealous.

Interesting times we live in.

Update:The Chicago Boyz have some insights about the Atlantic Divide as well.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 07:48:00 AM. Permalink |

More about Saddam - al Qaeda links
William Safire lays it out.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 07:42:00 AM. Permalink |

More on why there is no shortage of oil
Reader M. Simon sent me the link to this article that explains why old oil fields have refilled, and why some fields yield three times as much as the original estimate.

Astrophysicist Thomas Gold . . . says that oil and coal deposits are too widely and deeply distributed to be a function of biological processes. He got the government of Sweden to drill a hole 6.6 Km deep in quartz rock in a search for deep hydrocarbons. What did he find? Hydrocarbons and magnetite. The significance of that is that underground bacteria are eating the oil and using the oxygen from iron ore for their energy source. Magnetite is a reduced form of iron ore containing less oxygen than your typical rust-like ores. Iron ores have the oxygen less tightly bound than sand and other rocks, so the bacteria would tend to use it first.

I remember blogging something about this before, but I can't find it now. So read this article and see what you think.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 07:36:00 AM. Permalink |

Saddam may have nuke weapons already
Trent Telenko explains why. I heard a radio news report that a working centrifuge was sold to Iraq by a German company in the late 1980s. Centrifuges are used to produce Highly Enriched Uranium, which is fissionable material for an atomic bomb. According to the source, a now-defected Iraqi nuclear physicist who said he had seen the machine, and who headed a major research division of Iraq's atomic arms program, the Iraqis carefully documented in detail the specifications and assembly of the centrifuge when the German company installed it. The defected scientist says that Iraq probably built 30 duplicates during the 1990s. If all this is so, then it qwould be surprising if Iraq did not have a few operational nukes now, provided they could obtain the uranium. And I don't think that would have been terribly difficult for them.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 07:17:00 AM. Permalink |

Special Ops in Iraq and elsewhere
The National Post has a good story on the new kinds of missions US Special Operations Command is charged with carrying out. And check out the photo of the latest high-tech battlefield mobility platform - it's powered by renewable natural resources! (via Geitner Simmons)

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 07:07:00 AM. Permalink |

Do not rule out all nuclear contingencies.
A guest posting from Doug Dryden, with another point of view

During our diplomatic encounters with the Iraqis during the run-up to the Gulf War, we were explicit that if Iraq used WMD, we would respond in kind. Prior to that episode, the American military did not use the term "weapons of mass destruction" - it was Soviet terminology. We had always distinguished between nuclear weapons in one category, & chemical & biological weapons in the other. Our first use of the term during this time was a lethal hint to Saddam that we would retaliate with nukes if he used chemical or biological arms. During later talks, Secretary Baker was far more precise with then-Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz, whose reaction indicated that he heard the message loud and clear.

The reasoning for our response centers on the question of how to destroy enemy stockpiles of chemical & biological agents during a war. It has taken years for the US to proceed with the destruction of our own stockpiles because of the environmental concern (the Umatilla Chemical Depot in Oregon is a good example). The Iraqis, due to the virulent nature of these agents, have them stored in somewhat remote & heavily fortified areas (just like anybody else would do) and we surely have a good idea of their locations. We haven't published this information because, amongst other things, (1) we would jeopardize the lives of our sources on the ground and our means of obtaining the intelligence; (2) we would demonstrate the extent of our intelligence-gathering capabilities; & (3) it would negatively affect the plan for the operational use of the intelligence (you don't simply exploit intelligence, just as chess is not a contact sport).

The best and really only way to destroy these agents is to incinerate them. This frames the nuclear option - We cannot simply bomb their storage facilities with conventional munitions, no matter how powerful. It risks releasing unincinerated agents into atmosphere. We must be able to incinerate them completely. In an air strike, the problem is to crack the bunkers open so that a nuclear device can do its job. Because of the extreme complexity of modern nuclear weapons, they are too fragile to penetrate a bunker. As far as I am aware (I've been retired from the military for a few years now), there is no such thing as a bunker-piercing nuclear device. Just as our missile silos and command centers are designed to survive a nuclear blast, we must assume that theirs are designed to do so as well. So trying to pulverize the bunkers by exploding a warhead outside the bunker won't work. Nevertheless, there were ways to carry out deep penetration in the Gulf War, and I'm sure that we have refined our methods for the upcoming conflict.

I don't expect that we would use a pre-emptive strike on these facilities, unless we had incontrovertible proof that Iraqi WMD were about to be used. Even then, considering the refusal to accept anything said by the Bush administration on the part of, say (1) fanatic radicals here in the US, (2) the major media and academia, or (3) anybody from France or Germany, there would still be an impossible amount of political fallout for decades (I have yet to meet a World War II veteran - and I've known many - who wasn't delighted that we ended that war with atomic bombs, sparing hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of people on both sides. Yet consider how that topic is handled today.)

I fear that, should we need to exercise a nuclear strike, we will have to wait for a first strike by the Iraqis, then respond overwhelmingly against their facilities. By then, of course, some of their chemical and biological munitions would already be deployed, and we would have to handle those in other ways.

The other options would be (1) Iraq wisely does not use WMD, and we later seize evidence as proof to publish during our occupation; or (2) we must catch them in the process of deploying their weapons before they are used, and sufficiently publicize their actions to prevent their use and allow us to diplomatically prosecute our aims, but there are far too many variables for that to be a viable risk. We can only hope for (1), we cannot rely on (2), so we must prepare for the third. A strike of a few low-yield nukes in remote areas of the Iraqi desert would surely be preferable to a Götterdämmerung of Saddam's making.

My thoughts: As long as Iraq's WMDs stay in bunkers, they are no threat and can be dealt with after the end of hostilities. My guess is that known or suspected storage facilities are already under virtually round-the-clock monitoring by US forces, either by platforms suich as Predators or possibly US Army SF or British SAS teams inserted into the country. If there is a hint that the weapons are about to be removed, the bunker can be hit.

Remember that we don't need to destroy or penetrate WMD bunkers to negate the weapons' use. We need only destroy the entrances and exits. So a penetrating nuke is not really necessary, IMO. Large conventional bombs can do that job.

Deployed WMDs present a different challenege, for the reasons Doug explained: the risk or releasing the agent into the air. The cruel calculus of war is that it is better for that to happen behind their lnes than behind ours. But given Saddam's record, I would expect him to position his launchers in populated areas. If we struck them we would risk killing many civilians, scoring a propaganda coup for Saddam. It's a very difficult problem, and I imagine that the allies are intensively searching for both storage facilities and launch/emplyment units now -- D. S.

by Donald Sensing, 1/28/2003 05:58:00 AM. Permalink |

Rich Gannon for Super Bowl MVP
Wait, you say. Isn't the Super Bowl MVP awarded to the player who makes the greatest contribution to the victory of the winning team? Yes. So like I said: Rich Gannon for MVP. He had five touchdown passes. Two were to members of his own team.

Hey, buddy, what happened to Gannon and the Raiders tonight?

Why the Raiders lost

Yep.

by Donald Sensing, 1/26/2003 09:25:00 PM. Permalink |

There must be no Cold War re-run!
Here is Karsten D. Voigt, coordinator for German-American cooperation in Germany's foreign office, explaining why leaving Saddam alone is acceptable:

"We know about containment," he said at breakfast the other day, gesturing in the direction of where the Berlin Wall once stood. "We lived with it for 50 years. It worked. And at the end, we got regime change."

Okay, I readily concede that 50 years of the Cold War was better than nuclear war. And the USSR was obviously deterrable itself, but we fought periodic wars around the peripheries of the Cold War that cost America more than 100,000 dead, multiples more of that wounded, many multiples of that in civilian deaths, and countless billions of dollars. The nuclear peace was kept only by the threat to kill tens of millions of Soviet people, who threatened to do likewise to us.

The idea that the Cold War should form a paradigm for the struggle against Islamist terrorism is morally bankrupt. I am stunned that people who should know better, like Voigt, don't understand that the Cold War was a "close run thing," as Wellington termed the Battle of Waterloo.

There is a large, well-funded terrorist organization, active in many nations, possessed of men who will die to achieve their aims, which has already claimed the right to kill four million Americans. 9/11 proved that they have the will to do so. If Saddam and al Qaeda have not found a way to ally already, they will, especially if we give them and their successors another 50 years to do so. The campaign against terrorism is foundationally a contest of wills - dare say it, a spiritual struggle.

The real issue is whether the Western Civilization shall prevail against the last vestige of medievalism; whether the rule of men who shoot their prisoners, enslave their women and deny the rights of self-determination to their own people, shall kill us and displace us, to whom the individual and individual rights are sacred and whose laws require respect for freedom of conscience, freedom of religion and whose traditions preserve freedom from fear and cruelty. In the long history of civilization, this task is to be done now.

Toppling Saddam & Co. is not the end of our struggle. It is not even the end of the beginning of our struggle. But it is a crucial step in the beginning.

by Donald Sensing, 1/26/2003 04:41:00 PM. Permalink |

To Europeans, Bush is the real problem
David Warren wrote,

The North American media are if possible overplaying the soap operatic performances of Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroeder, as they strew thumbtacks along the road to Baghdad. If you turn to the European media, you see that the French and Germans themselves hardly take their leaders so seriously. They are used to this kind of cynical posturing, and it doesn't make the front page. What scares them is rather the American earnestness, the possibility that Mr. Bush means what he says. They expect politicians to lie to them -- it is part of the "social contract" as in Canada -- and when one of them starts putting his money where his mouth is, they are naturally alarmed.

Which corresponds exactly to what Euro politicians themselves are saying. An American diplomat said,

"Much of it is the way he talks, the rhetoric, the religiosity," he said of Mr. Bush. "It reminds them of what drove them crazy about Reagan. It reminds them of what they miss about Clinton. All the stereotypes we thought we had banished for good after Sept. 11 — the cowboy imagery, in particular — it's all back."

But in America, the cowboy is a good image.

by Donald Sensing, 1/26/2003 04:40:00 PM. Permalink |

Fires plague Australia, Canberra loses 500 homes
Australian commentator Martin Roth emailed me a couple of days ago,

As I type this it's nearly 3:30 on Friday afternoon here in Melbourne and the temperature outside is 37 degrees celsius, which is about 100 degrees fahrenheit, and tomorrow is going to be hotter. The air is full of smoke, blown in from the bushfires that are raging a couple of hundred miles away. Please pray for Australia. This weekend is going to be a critical time, with high temperatures and strong winds in many places, and a real danger of the bushfires reaching some towns. (Already Canberra, the capital, has lost more than 500 homes.)

To our Aussie friends down under, we hope your fire troubles end and additional damages are as light as possible.

by Donald Sensing, 1/26/2003 04:40:00 PM. Permalink |

US makes nuke-attack plans on Iraq, says paper
The report says that US military planners are looking at contingencies that may result in the president directing a nuclear strike against Iraq.

Although they consider such a strike unlikely, military planners have been actively studying lists of potential targets and considering options, including the possible use of so-called "bunker buster" nuclear weapons against deeply buried military targets, says analyst William M. Arkin, who writes a regular column on defense matters for the Los Angeles Times.

Military officials have been focusing their planning on the use of nuclear arms in retaliation for a strike by the Iraqis with chemical or biological weapons, or to pre-empt one, Arkin says. . . .

"If the United States dropped a bomb on an Arab country, it might be a military success, but it would be a diplomatic, political and strategic disaster," said Joseph Cirincione, director of nonproliferation studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.

I wrote about the considerations of using atomic weapons last summer.

by Donald Sensing, 1/25/2003 07:13:00 PM. Permalink |

Ignorantly running plays from our playbook
Thomas Holsinger wrote to say he read this post of whether the French are really performing a part in an elaborate deception plan. He said, "My father pointed out that the French don't have to know they're doing what we want them to." Which is an intriguing thought! Another way to put it is that the administration figured all along that the French and Germans would be oppositional, and is trying to use their intransigence to our advantage. Hmm, could be.

by Donald Sensing, 1/25/2003 03:59:00 PM. Permalink |

Emailed humor
It's Saturday. It's too cold outside to go shooting today with my arsenal-owning buddy as I had originally planned, a major bummer since I had wanted to pop off about 300 rounds of M1 carbine and other assorted calibers. So it's time for a humor break: Keeping A Healthy Level Of Insanity.

1. At lunch time, sit in your parked car with sunglasses on and point a hair dryer at passing cars. See if they slow down.
2. Page yourself over the intercom. Don't disguise your voice.
3. Every time someone asks you to do something, ask if they want fries with that.
4. Put your garbage can on your desk and label it "in"
5. Put decaf in the coffee maker for 3 weeks. Once everyone has gotten over their caffeine addictions, switch to espresso.
6. In the memo field of all your checks, write "for very personal favors".
7. Finish all your paragraphs with, "in accordance with the prophecy."
8. Dontuseanypunctuationmarksorpsacesbetweenwordsandseeifreaderscanfigureoutwhatyourewriting
9. As often as possible, skip rather than walk.
10. Ask people what the time is. Laugh hysterically after they answer.
11. Specify that your drive-through order is "to go".
12. Sing along at the opera.
13. Go to a poetry recital and ask why the poems don't rhyme.
14. Put mosquito netting around your work area. Play a tape of jungle sounds all day.
15. Five days in advance, tell your friends you can't attend their party because you're not in the mood.
16. Have your coworkers address you by your wrestling name, Rock Hard Kim.
17. When the money comes out the ATM, scream "I won!", "I won!" "3rd time this week!!!!!"
18. When leaving the zoo, start running towards the parking lot, yelling "run for your lives, they're loose!!"
19. Tell your children over dinner, "Due to the economy, we are going to have to let one of you go."

by Donald Sensing, 1/25/2003 03:29:00 PM. Permalink |

A fork in the road for Bush
Earlier this week I had an email discussion with a few other commentati over the subject of a deception plan. One man's proposition was that the intransigence of France and Germany over the Iraq campaign was really part of an elaborate deception plan by the Western powers to get Saddam to breathe easy while we dropped the noose around his neck. I disagreed then and still do.

But that makes me wonder whether the conflicting signals being reported about whether Bush will or won't give the go order soon are intentionally being planted. While I think it could be so, I don't think it is so. I think that the administration, from the president himself right on down, is really stuck on "pause" right now. It does seem that the fierceness of the genuine denunciation of the war by France and Germany caught Powell and company by surprise. And despite all the rhetoric the administration has said in the past about leading only a "coalition of the willing," I think that Bush, Cheney, Powell and Rumsfeld alike all want the major Euro powers aboard. So the administration finds itself at a fork in the political-military road.

They can't take Yogi Berra's advice, "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." The question is whether they will take Robert Frost's advice:

Two roads diverged in a wood
And I took the one less traveled by
And that has made all the difference.

Steven Den Beste says that US policy is now at an historic turning point. I agree. If we take "the road less traveled" and proceed to conquer Iraq without regard to Franco-German objections or further action by the UNSC, our political and military alliances with western Europe will probably be forever altered. What the US domestic reaction to that would be I won't hazard a guess except that on the whole, I think it would be positive. But the long-term consequences, both here and abroad, are hidden within a very foggy crystal ball.

If we pull the reins back and mark time while the UNSC and UNMOVIC waste more time, not only will our campaign to topple Saddam be badly injured, so will our efforts to combat terrorism elsewhere. If Hans Blix and the enemies of freedom in the UNSC obtain one delay now, we can look forward to nothing but delays forever, right up until the time Iraq announces it has an atomic arsenal. And that is what the temporizers want.

More and more I think that at the bottom of the resistance to the US/UK/AUS' clear intentions to liberate Iraq is deeply-rooted anti-Israeli passion. If Iraq is liberated, the West Bank issue will have its greatest chance of being resolved in a way that preserves Israel's existence as a Jewish state. An atomic-armed Iraq can threaten Israel out of political existence, or worse. And that's their goal.

The allies must act, and act quickly. The consequences of further delay are horrid.

by Donald Sensing, 1/25/2003 10:21:00 AM. Permalink |

You may have a Roman nose, but not a Roman name.
Geitner Simmons has an intriguing post about the way slaves were named in the Old South, and why Americans don't name their kids after Roman heroes.

(The old gag referred to in the title of this post: "He has a Roman nose - roamin' all over his face!" )

by Donald Sensing, 1/25/2003 09:51:00 AM. Permalink |

Bush will wait for inspectors - I mean, no, he wont't. Will! Won't! Will! Won't!
Dueling headlines in this morning's NYT:

Why Bush Won't Wait, an editorial.

U.S. May Not Press U.N. for a Decision on Iraq Next Week. Instead, administration officials said they were willing to wait possibly several weeks beyond Monday for the inspections to continue.

by Donald Sensing, 1/25/2003 09:50:00 AM. Permalink |

Quote of the day
"International opinion, for what it's worth, always follows power and success." Historian T. R. Fehrenbach in his seminal history of the Korean War, This Kind of War.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 04:47:00 PM. Permalink |

Ya gotta love - I mean just love - US Marines.
The wife of an active-duty lieutenant colonel sent this to me. It's the best thing I've read in a long time. It was originally written by a US Marine officer; I cannot vouch for its authenticity. But as Churchill said about the King Arthur myth, "If it's not true, it ought to be."

A funny thing happened to me yesterday at Camp Bondsteel (Bosnia): A French army officer walked up to me in the PX, and told me he thought we (Americans) were a bunch of cowboys and were going to provoke a war. He said if such a thing happens, we wouldn't be able to count on the support of France.

I told him that it didn't surprise me. Since we had come to France's rescue in World War I, World War II, Vietnam, and the Cold War, their ingratitude and jealousy was due to surface at some point in the near future anyway. That is why France is a third-rate military power with a socialist economy and a bunch of blips for soldiers.

I additionally told him that America, being a nation of deeds and action, not words, would do whatever it had to do, and France's support was only for show anyway. Just like in ALL NATO exercises, the US would shoulder 85% of the burden, as evidenced by the fact that the French officer was shopping in the American PX, and not the other way around.

He began to get belligerent at that point, and I told him if he would like to, I would meet him outside in front of the Burger King and beat his blip in front of the entire Multi-National Brigade East, thus demonstrating that even the smallest American had more fight in him than the average Frenchman.

He called me a barbarian cowboy and walked away in a huff. With friends like these, who needs enemies?

Mary Beth Johnson
Lt. Col, USMC

Note well: this was was a female Marine who challenged the French officer! Semper fi!

Update: Okay, this story is bogus. But I said up front it might be.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 04:41:00 PM. Permalink |

Spain gets a win for the good guys
The Spanish win a counter-terrorism victory.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 04:32:00 PM. Permalink |

What's the difference between US military units?
Jack White, who blogs Captain Yip's Journal, asks, "What is the operational difference between an armored division and a mechanized infantry division? This will be the first "blogged war," and an idea as to what everyone can do might be handy for many of us."

All Army units are configured according to a Table of Organization and Equipment, abbreviated TO&E, which is why soldiers says things like, "TeeOanEe." For divisions, the TO&E is a modification of the standard "type" division, which is an idealized manning and equipment plan. But because of mission contingencies, the type division is just a base plan, modified in actuality. Hence, an armored division in Germany will be organized and equipped a little differently than one elsewhere - not radically different, though.

Since there is only one airborne division in the Army, the 82d ABN DIV is actually the model for the "type" airborne division. So if the Army ever activated another airborne division, it would start out identical to the 82d, and would be modified from there.

I have not looked it up recently, but when I was still on active duty (until 1995), the difference between an armored division and a mechanized infantry division was fundamentally just one battalion. An armored division had six battalions of tanks, and five of mech infantry. For a mech division, the ratio was reversed. The artillery, aviation, engineer and support units were the same for both.

Here is an online DOD reference library.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 04:19:00 PM. Permalink |

No more foul mouthing
As some of you may recall, I have asked commenters not to use profanity in their comments. I do not use it on the site. On the rare occasions a commenter uses profanity, I just delete the comment.

Now the estimable Wall Street Journal weighs in on the subject. Read the whole thing. (via Richard Heddleson by email)

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 04:05:00 PM. Permalink |

What defines a coalition?
The major media and the rest of the left seem to think that a coalition, to be valid, must include all the permanent members of the UNSC, especially France and Germany. Then Europe at large. Other nations don't count.

But the fact is that there is substantial international support for a US-led campaign to remove Saddam's regime from power. I said it before, and I'll say it again, the objections the left has to the campaign along these lines are narrow and parochial. What makes a coalition? Three nations? Ten? Forty?

Anyway, a coalition is not an unmitigated blessing. Everyone who sits at the table wants to be dealt some cards. Usually, the more nations there are in a coalition, operations become more complex, not less. Even so, there are good reasons to form coalitions sometimes, but coalitions should never be formed simply for the sake of having a coalition.

Besides, we do have a coalition in place for action against Saddam. Great Britain is obviously on board. So are Qatar and Kuwait. Turkey is supporting US military operations in the area now. Reports have said that Jordan has agreed at least to limited US operations from its soil. Israel will not openly ally with the US militarily, but intelligence sharing between the US and Israel is continuous and deep. The Czech Republic has troops in Kuwait at this time. Spain will offer basing support. Poland has declared its support.

What gets the left's goat is not the lack of a coalition, because there is a coalition. It's that in their view, the coalition is made up of the wrong people.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 12:47:00 PM. Permalink |

WaPo finally says, It's not a war for oil.
Bloggers have been saying this for a long time. Finally, the Post says so, too. Can the Noo Yawk Tahms be far behind?

Um, yes, I guess it can.

Also read Charles Krautthammer's explanation of why "there's no turning back" now for the US vis-a-vis Iraq.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 10:41:00 AM. Permalink |

John Glenn now calls for a draft
John Glenn, former US Marine officer, astronaut and senator, has added his voice to those calling for a draft. Ah, how fallen are the once mighty.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 10:30:00 AM. Permalink |

A brutal death in California
My wife and I received some terrible news last night. My wife's college roommate has remained a close friend over the years. Last night we learned that her sister's husband was bludgeoned to death early Tuesday in his home in California by a hophead looking for money or goods to buy drugs.

Police said that the fight inside the house, where "Jim" was alone, was very brutal. There was a lot of damage to the house and its furnishings. Jim was a fourth-level black belt in tae kwon do, a national-class referee and an instructor. The report we got was that the police thought the fight might have lasted 30 minutes (which does not sound credible to me, but that's the report). Police said Jim was felled when his killer smashed a large flowerpot over his head, who then finished him off by means we weren't informed of.

It gets worse. The killer spent probably six hours inside the house, looking for money or easily pawned goods. He even took a chain saw and cut big chunks of wallboard out, apparently because they had spatter or palm print evidence on them. Before he left, he splashed gasoline over Jim's body and set it alight. The gas burned out before the house caught fire. The crime was discovered when Jim's wife came home from work.

The killer was captured much later that day, driving his victim's stolen car, carrying the dead man's wallet and some property.

Remember, the deceased was a fourth-level black belt in karate. Yet he lost the fight to an unarmed enemy. And he lived in a very upscale neighborhood, where "this sort of thing never happens."

People, violent criminals can hurt you anywhere. Your address cannot protect you. The police cannot protect you, all they can do is catch your killer. Only you can protect you. If you lack the implements necessary to do that, you must flee your home if someone breaks in. Don't fight, run. Go somewhere, call the cops and hope that they'll get your property back.

But don't think it can never happen in your home. It can.

Update: Having a panic room won't help you, either.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 10:21:00 AM. Permalink |

The more things change. . . .
Bill Mauldin showed 60 years ago what the Iraqi army knew 12 years ago, and will remember again:

Being captured is great!

"Luger, $100 ... camera, $150 ... Iron Cross, $12 ... it is good to be captured by Americans."

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 09:28:00 AM. Permalink |

Is the United Nations really self-destructing?
Jeff Jacoby seems to think so, saying that the UN lacks moral fiber to back US. Adds Canadian columnist Gordon Gibson,

Many people think of it as some kind of world government. It is not. The UN is simply a talking shop of great powers pursuing their own selfish interests and minor powers peddling sanctimony. The UN is not transparent, accountable, representative, governed by the rule of enforceable law. Nor has it any of the other important attributes that give legitimacy to the real democracies.

Yep.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 09:24:00 AM. Permalink |

Hey, I got yer answers right heah!
TR Fogey answers some of the objections to the Iraq campaign. And this is funny, so read it, too.

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 09:22:00 AM. Permalink |

A thesis confirmed
I earlier observed that "the far left and the far right are actually adjacent points of a circle, not the far ends of a line." Now a Berkeley professor confirms it:

Mao and Stalin both conceived of the world as divided between "less-developed nations and advanced industrial democracies" (p. 73). This gave rise to the nationalistic policies of each country which stressed revolutionary violence and submission to the charismatic leader (pp. 80-82). Since these are characteristics that are typically described as "right wing" it was "never made quite clear whether Maoism [or Stalinism] was a form of 'right wing extremism' or 'left wing adventure,' which suggests that the distinction was never really clear or convincing."

Of course, I am the latest in a long line of folks who know that ideologies can go so far left that they are right, or vice-versa, but it bears remembering that extremism, in the final analysis, is pretty much all the same. (via Instapundit)

by Donald Sensing, 1/24/2003 09:19:00 AM. Permalink |

In the six figures
The hits just keep on coming, literally .

Some time in the last day or two, my aggregate unique hit count passed the 100,000 mark, a milestone of sorts I suppose. I had about 15,000 hits on my first blog site, Gunner20. Then I switched to Blogger, where I got 71,600 hits before buying www.donaldsensing.com and hosting One Hand Clapping on Cornerhost. I started OHC on this domain name on New Years Day; since then I have received 14,000 hits. My Blogger site is still accessible, and it has gotten just under 2,000 hits since Jan. 1.

So altogether, that makes almost 103,000 unique hits, total, and just over 142,500 page views. Thank you for reading!

by Donald Sensing, 1/23/2003 09:36:00 PM. Permalink |

Iraqis see Rumsfeld speak, and he speaks about potential casualties
A couple of Defense Dept. items:

The Pentagon press briefings we all see and love on cable news channels are now being broadcast directly to the Iraqi people by Air Force psychological warfare aircraft.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has gone on the record about the possible casualties from an Iraq war and the difference between handling North Korea and Iraq.

by Donald Sensing, 1/23/2003 12:15:00 PM. Permalink |

Military uses of High-Energy Lasers - an expert speaks
Blogger Larry of Before Breakfast discusses the details of this topic and explains why their use will be very limited for years to come. He ought to know since he spent years on active military duty working specifically on laser development.

by Donald Sensing, 1/23/2003 12:10:00 PM. Permalink |

More arguments against war on Iraq
I have asked for readers to send me links to compelling arguments against military action to end Saddam's regime. I defined such an argument as one that is rooted in the present circumstances and is "serious" - meaning its premises and conclusions should be taken into account by people who don't agree.

Any argument for or against military action, no matter how well constructed, "rational" or "compelling," is really just a bottom a guess, not a certainty. There are no tautologies on either side of the issue because any premises can be contested.

Reader George Walton sent me a link to the cooperative blog The Chicago Boyz's post by Lexington Green, "Liberation or Law Enforcement?" This post critiques an essay, "An Unnecessary War," in Foreign Policy (no deep linking is permitted on that site, which is really dumb of them). In it, Professors John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt claim that Iraq can be contained, can be deterred (even if it does acquire nuclear arms), and that arguments to the contrary rest on flawed premises, which they enumerate and discuss. The two professors do indeed give a counter-war argument that is serious and compelling. Like Green, though, I find it unpersuasive, though for different reasons.

The professors claim that Saddam can be deterred just as the USSR was by a doctrine of assured destruction of Iraq by the US if Iraq ever uses atomic weapons. I long ago rebutted the idea that sauce for the Soviet goose is the same as sauce for the Iraqi gander. The threat of deterrence that worked for the USSR does not translate to an effective threat against Saddam.

The professors state that we should inform Saddam that if a terrorist-emplaced nuke detonates on US soil, we will not attempt to discern whether Iraq is complicit, we'll just nuke Iraq. So it would be in Saddam's interests to prevent such an act by non-Iraqi actors. But this is a Mafiosi protection racket, not deterrence at all. Do the authors really expect that Saddam would be willing to carry our water even with such a threat? And even if he was willing, it is not credible that his intelligence to discover such a plot and ability to prevent it would be very good. So the professors' scheme is self-contradictory: they call for deterrence by means of retaliation in kind, but seem to forget the real objective is prevention, not simple deterrence, and that slinging threats is no means of prevention.

I have thought all my adult life that Mutual Assured Destruction is immoral. That is was successful against the Soviets does not gainsay that, and there were at least three occasions when the two superpowers came within a hair's breadth of nuclear war anyway. The first was the Cuban Missile Crisis, the second was the early 1980s, when the Soviet Defense Council convinced itself that NATO was about to attack, and so the USSR nearly decided to attack first (stopped by saner heads in the Soviet General Staff, believe it or not), and the third was in 1993 (I think it's the correct year) when the US launched a meteorological rocket from Norway, of which the Russian government had been properly notified. But the military command had not been fully notified by the Russian authorities and the Russian ICBM fleet came within 15 minutes of being launched against the US.

Although the professors lay out cogent reasons that Saddam is more rational than irrational (though often miscalculating), they fail to see the forest of Saddam's entire tenure and personality for the trees of his specific actions. Regardless of whether any one or more of Saddam's individual misadventures can be seen as rational, I cannot agree that the deterrence the professors espouse can be relied upon for another reason: Saddam has no vision for Iraq that outlives him personally. I discussed this facet in detail long ago, so please read it. The money line:

The crisis point will be when Saddam knows his death is reasonably imminent. He envisions no future beyond the end of his own life, and therefore will not be dissuaded from striking the US by threats of retaliation against Iraq. The fate of the Iraqi people means nothing to him except as they are able to serve him personally. Does anyone seriously doubt that Saddam would be willing to sacrifice countless more Iraqi lives to strike America, especially if he knew that his own end was near whether he did so or not?

If Saddam ever obtains deliverable WMDs, he can be deterred only as long as he thinks his health is holding up. That is why we must act now.

Bottom line: our goal with Iraq is not to deter his use of WMDs, but to prevent them altogether. The two professors really just promote maintaining the status quo, but the status quo is dangerously unacceptable.

by Donald Sensing, 1/23/2003 12:00:00 PM. Permalink |

Bill Mauldin is dead
America has lost its greatest cartoonist ever, and the American GI has lost his best friend. Bill Mauldin created the famous fictional soldiers, Willie and Joe, while Bill was a soldier in the National Guard. He was confined to a nursing home in Orange County, Calif., for a good while before his death, suffering from Alzheimers. Until the end, WW II vets wrote and visited him. Anyone who served in the military, especially the Army, instantly identifies with his cartoons of Willie and Joe, the long-suffering but never-complaining infantrymen who stood for all the dogface soldiers who saved the world.

"Able Fox Five to Able fox. I got a target but ya gotta be patient."

Willie and Joe cartoons are scarce online because they are still under copyright. One of my favorites shows Willie (or Joe, who knows?) sitting on a bench inside a bombed-out house. Beside him is a pried-open can of C-rations. In his left hand he holds the muzzle end of his Garand rifle. He is turned to Joe, holding up his bayonet in his right hand, saying, "Hey, didja know that your can opener fits on the end of your rifle?"

Another: A bathed and pressed company clerk, incongruously wearing the coveted Combat Infantry Badge, explains to a blood-stained, clothes-torn, filthy, war-weary, battle-fatigued medic, "You don't git combat pay 'cause ya don't fight." (Stephen Ambrose said medics had "the toughest job in the Army.") Update: Thanks to Hazen Dempster for the link to a collection of Mauldin cartoons.

Farewell to Bill Mauldin, a true American treasure. (via Winds of Change)

by Donald Sensing, 1/23/2003 11:02:00 AM. Permalink |

More Chomsky fact checking; he's still telling old lies
As if that is really a surprise. Via Instapundit, we see that far-left Noam Chomsky has come under slight criticism from a left-of-center fact checker named Marc Cooper, quoted by Matt Welch.

Chomsky argues that while we mourn the 3,000 who died in the twin towers, we pay no attention to the roughly equivalent number of civilians who perished when — he says — the U.S. bombed the Panamanian neighborhood of Chorillo during the American invasion of 1989. I was in that neighborhood mere days after it was razed, and Chomsky is just plain wrong: It wasn't bombed. It burned down after a firefight between U.S. and Panamanian troops. And as reprehensible as the U.S. invasion was, Panama's own human-rights commission claims that a total of maybe 400 people -- soldiers and civilians — died during the entire conflict.

The 1989 US invasion of Panama is lived history for me. My very long-term readers may remember I have mentioned that during the operation I served on the Battle Management Cell of XVIII Airborne Corps, which headed the entire operation.

Chorillo was a poor barrio in Panama City, densely populated and consisting of poor-quality, highly flammable construction. It had also served as the headquarters of Panamanian army infantry company until October 1989, when its commander, Maj. Giroldi, was executed by dictator Manuel Noriega for taking part in an attempted coup. The company was then disbanded and its soldiers assigned to other units. However, Noriega had a private army he called "dignity battalions," made up mainly of clan members and street thugs he used as enforcers. Without them he could never have remained in power. He moved these thugs into the area vacated by the defunct regular army unit.

(The Panamanian regular army opposed Noriega bitterly, but was unwilling to engage in the overt civil war it would have required to overthrow him. Hence, they attempted the October coup, but it failed. Its participants were summarily shot. The army's senior and mid-grade officers had been trained in US schools such as the School of the Americas, long vilified by the Left because it is really the academy of democracy for thousands of Latin American military officers. If there is one thing the Left can't stand, it's democracy.

If the US had been quick-witted enough to intervene on the army's side that October, Noriega's ouster would have been quick and almost bloodless all around. But US troops literally watched events unfold to their tragic end, a terribly shortsighted day for President Bush the elder.)

Here are the facts about Chorillo's fate:

As Cooper points out, Chorillo was burned to the ground after, not during, the fight between US troops and "dignity" thugs. The US troops very quickly got the upper hand because the dignity thugs were not soldiers and had no real military training. They were a lot like the Nazi SA Brownshirts who had carried out Kristallnacht in Germany against the Jews before WW II.

Fleeing dignity thugs deliberately set fire to Chorillo to hinder US troops from pursuing. Thousands of resident were rendered homeless and some number did die in the blaze, I don't recollect how many off the top of my head. Most of the people, though, did the logical thing and ran away. As Cooper points out, in the entire operation, about 400 military and civilian Panamanians died altogether.

Chomsky and others of his stripe continue to accuse the US of genocidal murder. They have said the US killed thousands of Panamanians and buried them in mass graves to which we prevent access. These are lies pure and simple, started by Ramsey Clark before the Panama operation was even finished. There are two decisive rebuttals:

No such graves have ever been found by US or foreign journalists. No Panamanian has ever been able to direct even the harshest critic of the US to such a grave. Today, all of Panama is controlled by the Panamanians. There is no place in the country that the US could prevent access. Still no graves have been found.

There are no names to go along with the 4,000 or so people (a common number used by the Left) supposedly buried in the mass graves. If thousands of people are missing, it's fair to ask who they are. It begs credulity to believe that a nation as small as Panama could have 4,000 people disappear - and no one notice, including the mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts and uncles of the missing. Yet that is exactly what the Left wants you to believe because no one has ever identified the thousands of people who presumably were alive and well one day, and simply gone the next.

During the Argentine dictatorship of the 1970s and early 80s, thousands of people were abducted by the secret police, never to be seen again. They became known as the "disappeared ones." Yet every one of them was identified by name by family members and underground resistance cells. After the fall of the regime, many of the disappeared's corpses were found and many were not. But none were unaccounted for.

But as we have noted before, facts mean nothing to the Left any more.

by Donald Sensing, 1/23/2003 10:15:00 AM. Permalink |

The dire peril of stopping short
Canadian reader Tom Cohoe's comment to this post is so excellent that I cannot leave it hidden in the comment link. Referring to the apparent intransigence of France and other Euro countries, Tom wrote,

After reading how France and Germany positioned themselves today, I cannot but fear that a sense of growing isolation could grip the US. But I'm sure you know that you have supporters all over the world praying for the strength of your moral courage. I for one believe that Thomas Friedman is absolutely right, except that he does not go far enough in his statement of the importance of following through with American imposed regime change in Iraq.

If the United States loses its nerve now it will be a tremendous victory in the eyes of those who would emulate bin Laden. Another 9/11 type attack will be guaranteed. War against terrorism and regime change in Iraq imposed by the United States are now inextricably linked. Before the anti Saddam rhetoric by the Bush administration, they may not have been linked - but that is not to say that the anti Saddam rhetoric was a mistake. It was exactly the best possible move.

This is because - to put it plainly - after the attempted decaptitation of 9/11 - a lot more butt kicking than the knocking off of Afghanistan, a tired, peripheral state with no infrastructure, is needed to make the bin Laden emulators realize that behaving in the fashion of 9/11 can only lead to their worst nightmare coming true - the "crusaders" eventually taking over the entire "land of Mohammed". The significance of the fall of Afghanistan is far too easy to rationalize away.

Regime change in Iraq is the best possible next move in kicking the heart out of the bin Laden lovers, because no Arab nation more cries out on its own merits for externally imposed regime change.

Iraq has to fall, become democratized, and actively spread the revolution of democracy. The terrorists cannot be defeated through an ultimately debilitating defensive posture, and they cannot be defeated by chasing them down individually. They can only be defeated by defeating them in their hearts and minds, and this means that their activity must lead inexorably to exactly the opposite of what they want to achieve. The "crusaders" must become ever more of menacing in the "land of Mohammed" until the spirit of bin Ladenism is dead. When the Arab populations become sufficiently alarmed at what bin Ladenism is bringing home that chasing down the terrorists is popular, you will have won.

It won't be easy. Any visible lack of moral courage will greatly strengthen the bad guys. But you have every right. It is self defense all the way.

The United States is very important to this Canadian. Be strong and have heart. You carry the torch for many, many people around the world. Your mission is sacred.

Tom, thank you for your strong support! I have nothing to add except that I already posted why allowing Saddam to go into exile is a very bad idea.

by Donald Sensing, 1/23/2003 09:23:00 AM. Permalink |

Quote of the day
"As far as we're concerned, war always means failure."

French President Jacques Chirac, denouncing US/UK intentions to confront Saddam. Notes Best of the Web Today, if Chirac was speaking French and not German, "the statement refutes itself."

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 03:49:00 PM. Permalink |

Martians send troops to fight Saddam
Reflecting the widening concern over Iraq's attempts to develop weapons of mass destruction, President Bush announced that Mars will deploy a contingent of Heat Ray Operations troops to the Persian Gulf next month.

"We've said all along that Saddam's regime was an international threat," said the president. "Now we know the Axis of Evil is an interplanetary menace as well. Bwuhahaha!" The White House released this photo of the Martians in training:

Snake-eyed Brit tanker

In Britain, Prime Minister Tony Blair chuckled as he announced the deployment to Parliament. "Remember what the Martians did to HMS Thunder Child? Well, now the Republican Guard can just puts its collective head between its collective knees, and kiss its collective rear goodbye!"

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 08:12:00 AM. Permalink |

War for Big Oil? So what, says Friedman.
Thomas Friedman of The New York Times has a very good piece today that is really too good (and too short) to excerpt. So just go there and read it, registering with the Times if you must.

Hint: it's really about how war against Iraq would destabilize most of the Middle East, and what a good thing that would be for everyone concerned, especially the Arab peoples.

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 08:06:00 AM. Permalink |

Ted Kennedy and Pat Buchanan - soul mates!
So says the Boston Herald.

"I continue to be convinced," Kennedy said yesterday, "that this is the wrong war at the wrong time. The threat from Iraq is not imminent, and it will distract America from the two more immediate threats to our security - the clear and present danger of terrorism and the crisis in North Korea."

Just a month ago Buchanan wrote, "Yet our obsession with Saddam Hussein seems to be blinding the president and the administration to great and more imminent dangers. . . It is North Korea where the situation appears truly ominous."

At long last Kennedy finds his ideological soulmate and it turns out to be Pat Buchanan. How scary is that!

Indeed, it only proves that the far left and the far right are actually adjacent points of a circle, not the far ends of a line.

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 07:59:00 AM. Permalink |

How many leftists can dance on the head of a pin?
So wonders Michael Kelly, noting the problem that faced the Left after 9/11.

What was the left going to do? A pretty straightforward call, you might say. America has its flaws. But war involves choosing sides, and the American side -- which was, after all, the side of liberalism, of progressivism, of democracy, of freedom, of not chucking gays off rooftops and not stoning adulterers and not whipping women in the town square, and not gassing minority populations and not torturing advocates of free speech -- was surely preferable to the side of the "Islamofascists" . . . .

The debate is over. The left has hardened itself around the core value of a furious, permanent, reactionary opposition to the devil-state America, which stands as the paramount evil of the world and the paramount threat to the world, and whose aims must be thwarted even at the cost of supporting fascists and tyrants. . . .

Which is pretty much what Blogland has been saying for, oh, at least a year now, and which I most recently discussed here.

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 07:54:00 AM. Permalink |

You can clone, but you can't duplicate
An AP story in my morning paper says that the bona fide clone of a cat in Texas yielded a genetically identical animal that is very different physically. The source cat is "reserved" and "chunky," but its clone is "curious and payful" and "sleek." Both cats are calico, but the patterns of their furs' colors are different. So cloning an animal - or a human being - cannot be relied upon to give a true reproduction of the original.

The cat was cloned by Genetic Savings and Clone (yes, its real name), a business that hoped to make a gazillion dollars off the sentimental stupidity of pet owners who want a pack of Rovers, or who want Rover back after Rover gets accidentally squashed by the garbage truck.

Said Wayne Pacelle of the Humane Society, "There are millions of cats in shelters and the last thing we need is a new production strategy for cats." After the cloning succeeded but the duplication failed, GSC got out of the commercial pet cloning business.

But there is an easier way that's tried and true. Wasn't this a duplicator ray gun?

Martian duplicator ray gun?

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 07:44:00 AM. Permalink |

Bwuhahaha! I beat Instapundit to a scoop by a mile!
Megalinker Glenn Reynolds, aka, "The Blogfather," links to the story of the non-Tolkien, loathsome character to be introduced in Lord of the Rings 3. But I got there first! Two weeks ago! Hahahahaha!

Like that'll ever happen again . . . .

Update: CPO Sparkey says he beat both of us to the story. And to tell the rest of the story, I actually was emailed the link by my good friend Geitner Simmons, who did not link to it himself.

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 07:01:00 AM. Permalink |

Rummy sums up difference between Iraq's and N. Korea's threat
SecDef Donald Rumsfeld is nothing if not succinct. In a speech to the Reserve Officers Association, he said that Iraq is expansionist and very aggressive. Saddam's regime is oriented toward conquest.

North Korea, however, "is a country teetering on the verge of collapse. Its history has been one of using its weapons programs to blackmail the West into helping stave off an economic disaster. North Korea is a threat, to be sure. But it is a different kind of threat - one that needs to be handled differently."

Yep.

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 06:54:00 AM. Permalink |

Short-term enlistments for armed forces begin Oct.1
The Dept. of Defense announces a new enlistment option for all the armed forces.

The program will work like this: A recruit enlists for the option and incurs a 15-month active duty service obligation following completion of initial-entry training, for a total active duty commitment of about 19 months.

Following successful completion of active duty, service members may re-enlist for further active duty or transfer to the selected reserve for a 24-month obligation.

Once this is completed, service members may stay in the selected reserve or transfer to individual ready reserve for the remainder of their eight-year commitments.

"The unique piece of this legislation is that while in the individual ready reserve, these young people will be given the opportunity to move into one of the other national service programs, such as AmeriCorps or the Peace Corps, and time in those will count toward their eight-year obligation," Clark said.

It is hoped that the shorter term will be more attractive to young men and women who would like to serve, but are reluctant to sign up for the standard three years that has been the former term (and which will continue). Education benefits, while substantial under the short enlistment, will not be as great as under the longer term. DOD says the new program is not needed to fill the ranks because the military has just enjoyed its most successful recruiting year ever.

by Donald Sensing, 1/22/2003 06:50:00 AM. Permalink |

Al Qaeda has "loose linkage" with Iraq, says Blair

"Whenever I'm asked about the linkage between al-Qaeda and Iraq, the truth is there is information I have that directly links al-Qaeda to September 11.

"There is some intelligence evidence about loose linkage between al-Qaeda and various people in Iraq," he said. But, he told the committee that the case against Iraq and al-Qaeda have to be made separately.

The prime minister also said that "it's inevitable" that al-Qaeda will attempt terrorist acts inside the British Isles. "There are no limits to the potential threats that you could imagine." (Link)

by Donald Sensing, 1/21/2003 08:11:00 AM. Permalink |

Top 10 worst news reporting of 2002
Boy is this guy right.

by Donald Sensing, 1/21/2003 08:02:00 AM. Permalink |

Short Stuff

De-urbanization of the battlefield. Trent Telenko has an intriguing essay on how urban warfare was done in World War II.

N. Z. Bear expects a direct question to be asked by President Bush in this month's State of the Union Address.

David Horowitz now has a blog. (via Daily Pundit)

Business etiquette online quiz: I got 13 of 15 correct. See how you do (popups must be turned on).

Humor break. Sarah was the church gossip and self-appointed supervisor of the church's morals. She kept sticking her nose into other people's business. Several residents were unappreciative of her activities, but feared her enough to maintain their silence.

She made a mistake, however, when she accused George, a new member, of being an alcoholic after she saw his pickup truck parked in front of the town's only bar one afternoon. She commented to George and others that everyone seeing it there would know that he was an alcoholic.

George, a man of few words, stared at her for a moment and just walked away. He said nothing. Later that evening, George, quietly parked his pickup in front of Sarah's house. . . and left it there all night.

I am now a "noted Mississippi historian." Except that I'm neither a Mississippian nor a historian. Chris Lawrence links to an illustrated history of the flags that have flown over Mississppi and misidentified the author, David Sansing, as me.

Mr. Sansing and I probably are distantly related, though, knowing what I know about the etymology of our respective names. If you're a southerner named Saintsing you're almost certainly a cousin, too.

by Donald Sensing, 1/21/2003 07:49:00 AM. Permalink |

A case against the Iraq war
Yesterday I challenged readers to find for me a "well-reasoned case" against removing Saddam Hussein from power. I suppose I should clarify the challenge, which I extrapolated from another blog.

Probably everyone but the hard Left, who hates America no matter what, would agree that if Saddam could be removed from power for free, or even pretty cheaply in time, money and resources, there would be no problem. So the challenge is specifically this: Is there a compelling case to be made for refraining from coercively ending Saddam's regime? Note that I swapped "reasoned" for "compelling," because a reasonable argument does not mean a good argument. No doubt John Dillinger could be reasonable talking about robbing banks, but we would not find him very compelling. It is not so much the form of the argument that matters, it is the content. Such an argument will be rooted in the present circumstances and be "serious" - meaning its premises and conclusions should be taken into account by people who don't agree.

So is there a compelling (even if not convincing) argument not to remove Saddam from power coercively?

Sojourners Online offers an essay called, "Disarm Iraq Without War." It is a "Statement from Religious Leaders in the United States and United Kingdom." Readers may sign it online as a petition to President Bush and Prime Minister Blair.

The authors are all religion academics or clergy. To their credit, they explicitly regard --

Saddam Hussein and his regime in Iraq as a real threat to his own people, neighboring countries, and to the world. His previous use and continued development of weapons of mass destruction is of great concern to us. The question is how to respond to that threat.

That succinctly states the point of contention. The essay examines the potential campaign against Iraq within the framework of classical Just War Theory. As a premise, it states,

We believe the Iraqi government has a duty to stop its internal repression, to end its threats to peace, to abandon its efforts to develop weapons of mass destruction, and to respect the legitimate role of the United Nations in ensuring that it does so. But our nations and the international community must pursue these goals in a manner consistent with moral principles, political wisdom, and international law. As Christians, we seek to be guided by the vision of a world in which nations do not attempt to resolve international problems by making war on other nations. It is a long-held Christian principle that all governments and citizens are obliged to work for the avoidance of war.

Does anyone disagree with that? My difficulty with these premises is not that they are bad, but that they are flawed. Of course Iraq has a duty to stop internal repression, etc. So does Egypt. So does Pakistan. So does . . . need I go on? Of course we would like a world in which nations do not resolve problems by war.

The real premise here is that for some reason Saddam will suddenly decide to act as the essayists say he should. As Robert Heinlein once wrote, "Sure, about the same time a leopard takes off its spots and gets a job as a Jersey cow." What Sojourners does not offer is any reason to believe that without coercion, Saddam will abandon repression, stop threatening peace, stop developing weapons of mass destruction, and respect the role of the UN in ensuring his compliance. So right off the bat, this essay violates the first rule of compelling argument: no wishful thinking.

The rest of the essay is a fairly conventional insistence that the proposed campaign does not meet Just War criteria, summarized thus:

We do not believe that preemptive war with Iraq: is a last resort, could effectively guard against massive civilian casualties, would be waged with adequate international authority, and could predictably create a result proportionate to the cost. And it is not clear that the threat of Saddam Hussein cannot be contained in other, less costly ways. An attack on Iraq could set a precedent for preemptive war, further destabilize the Middle East, and fuel more terrorism. We, therefore, do not believe that war with Iraq can be justified under the principle of a "just war," but would be illegal, unwise, and immoral.

Most of the sections dealing with its (presumed) illegality, imprudence and immorality are actually pretty well done. There are some issues raised that I would like to see resolved before overt hostilities, also. For example:

To initiate a major war in an area of the world already in great turmoil could destabilize governments and increase political extremism throughout the Middle East and beyond.

In honesty we must admit that this is a real possibility. I remarked long ago that destabilizing the regimes in the Near East, almost all of which range from authoritarian to totalitarian, would be no bad thing. But we also have to consider that "starting a war is like entering a dark room" and we can engage in wishful thinking of our own: that American boots on the ground will compel the whole region to righteousness. Maybe. Maybe not.

A unilateral war would also undermine the continued political cooperation needed for the international campaign to isolate terrorist networks. The U.S. could very well win a battle against Iraq and lose the campaign against terrorism.

Again, maybe, maybe not. Some nations in and out of the region that are bilious in public opposition to American action will privately breathe heavy sighs of relief. I think that Sojourners' caution should be taken seriously, but I also think they overstate it. There may be some temporary disruptions of political cooperation with the US.

The potentially dangerous and highly chaotic aftermath of a war with Iraq would require years of occupation, investment, and a high level of international cooperation - none of which have yet to be adequately planned or even considered.

Well, no adequate plans have been made public, but we've known for months that the Bush administration has been examining the history of what America did in the early days and years of occupying Germany after world War II. However, I do think that the administration needs to address these issues with the American public.

If the military strategy includes massive air attacks and urban warfare in the streets of Baghdad, tens of thousands of innocent civilians could lose their lives. This alone makes such a military attack morally unacceptable. In addition, the people of Iraq continue to suffer severely from the effects of the Gulf War, the resulting decade of sanctions, and the neglect and oppression of a brutal dictator. Rather than inflicting further suffering on them through a costly war, we should assist in rebuilding their country and alleviating their suffering.

But if the strategy does not include massive air attacks then would the war be moral? In fact, there will be severe air attacks, but not against civilian-occupied areas or targets. The clergy authors are decrying the actual conduct of the potential war, thus betraying their total unfamiliarity with the very subject they address. They apparently envision an air campaign and ground attack resembling World War II. They learned nothing from studying the campaign in Afghanistan, assuming they did study it at all. As I wrote on Oct. 29, "It would be nice if once in awhile, before issuing pastoral letters on national security issues, theologians would consult a politically diverse, broad range of people expert in fields such as arms control, international relations, military strategy and tactics, threat analysis, etc. The dismissive way religious leaders treat other disciplines is inexcusable."

Furthermore, we will "assist in rebuilding" Iraq once it has returned to the fold of lawful nations. The writers are correct that the people of Iraq have suffered greatly from Saddam and the effects of the UN sanctions, but seem not to understand that the only real prospect of ending both is the elimination of Saddam's regime and the large-scale presence of American forces inside the country.

Although this essay makes some good points, overall it merely calls for continuation of the status quo. But the status quo is unacceptable - to us and to the people of Iraq. Interestingly, a previous article in Sojourners pointed out,

. . . anyone who opposes U.S. military action to dethrone him has a responsibility to suggest how he might otherwise be ushered out the backdoor of Baghdad.

And its authors did so, providing a springboard for my own multi-part posting on ending Saddam's regime without war, but not, sadly, without violence.

by Donald Sensing, 1/21/2003 07:44:00 AM. Permalink |

No war against the Iraqi people!
In response to the accusation that the US would be "making war against the Iraqi people" (which not even the Iraqi people believe), Rand Simberg offers a fine rebuttal.

. . . the reality, of course, is that we are going to war against the Iraqi dictator, in support of the Iraqi people. . . .

And the further reality is that not only are we not aiming violence at the Iraqi people, but we are taking great pains and expense to aim violence away from the Iraqi people, and we are doing it in order to end the violence that has been visited upon them for many years by their own rulers. That's why we spend billions developing and procuring (and restocking over the past year) the smart weapons that were so effective in Afghanistan in taking out targets with precision while sparing structures and people to either side.

However, I think Rand drops the ball when he says, "There are sincere and rational cases to be made as to whether or not we should be removing Saddam from power." Really? What are they? I haven't seen one yet. If someone comments or emails me a link to a principled, well-reasoned argument against removing Saddam et. al. from power, I will gladly post it.

by Donald Sensing, 1/20/2003 12:56:00 PM. Permalink |

The best quotes from Westerns. . .
. . . are posted by John Hawkins.

by Donald Sensing, 1/20/2003 12:36:00 PM. Permalink |

No exile for Saddam! "Don't go wobbly, George. . . ."
The G. W. Bush "Wobble Meter" is in the yellow zone.
Bill Quick has been warning for months now that the Bush & Co. are wobbly on Iraq. I have disagreed until today, when I saw this headline ion the Washington Post site: "Officials Support Exile for Hussein. Deal Could Allow Iraqi President To Avoid Charges."

What the . . . ?

Three top Bush administration officials said today they would welcome exile for Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, and one, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, signaled the United States might allow Hussein to escape war crimes prosecution if he voluntarily steps down. . . .

"To avoid a war, I would personally recommend that some provision be made so that the senior leadership in that country and their families could be provided haven in some other country," Rumsfeld said on ABC's "This Week." "I think that that would be a fair trade to avoid a war."

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, who also made the rounds of the Sunday morning talk shows, appeared as well to support the idea of granting Hussein and his closest associates some form of asylum.

This is inexcusable. Shame on the administration for abandoning the rule of law for the fix of expediency! I wrote many months ago that the US should have four national objectives:

the destruction of Iraq's capability to use nuclear, biological or chemical weapons, or further to develop them,
the destruction of Iraqi capability to launch conventional attacks beyond its borders
the final end of Saddam's regime.
the emplacement of a democratic, constitutional government in Baghdad.

Accomplishing anything short of these will not solve the problem, and will leave soil from which future confrontations will grow. We should not make the mistake of ridding Iraq of Saddam, only for him to be replaced with another despot who simply seems benign toward the United States. I think that democracy can be inculcated in Iraq, but not easily. The American people need to understand that the democratization of Iraq will be a long-term commitment.

The destruction of Saddam's regime must include the death or capture of Saddam himself. Even if he is rendered politically and militarily impotent, he will not be seen as defeated unless he is dead or in custody. No exile should be allowed. Personally, I think a Nuremberg-style trial would serve our interests best and enable the Iraqi people to learn the murderousness of the regime.

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace recently wrote,

During the twentieth century, the central purpose of American power was to defend against and when possible to destroy tyranny. American presidents have been at their best when they have embraced the mission of defending liberty at home and spreading liberty abroad. This was the task during World War II, and it was again our objective (or should have been the mission) during the Cold War. It must be our mission again. . . .

Adherence to a liberty doctrine as a guide to American foreign policy means pushing to the top of the agenda the promotion of individual freedoms abroad. . . . To promote liberty requires first the containment and then the elimination of those forces opposed to liberty, be they individuals, movements, or regimes. Next comes the construction of pro-liberty forces, be they democrats, democratic movements, or democratic institutions. [via Cato the Youngest]

But allowing Saddam to hie off to, say, Libya (where his son reputedly transferred more than $3 billion recently) rewards fascism, it does not defeat it. It destroys any disincentive for other or future dictators and mass murderers to reform or refrain from beginning. We will be signaling them that we will overlook the grossest violations of human rights, the most flagrant perfidy of international accord, the nakedest aggression against other peoples or countries - if the dictator concerned manages first to steal and loot his country, sock it away elsewhere and then volunteer for exile there when the heat gets high.

I take that back. If we permit Saddam to retire comfortably, the heat for other despots won't ever be too high. The rest of the world will know that we are not a country serious about liberty, freedom, human rights or the rule of law. Everyone will know they need not fear when 100,000 US troops gather just outside their borders; it's just a bluff.

And the Iraqi people will remain in slavery. All we will have done is replaced one dictator for another on the basis of - what? Promises that he won't develop WMDs? Promises that he won't attempt to annex Kuwait or attack Israel? Promises to respect the rule of just law and human rights inside Iraq? Promises? Where have we heard them before?

A worse possibility (I say the probable thing): Saddam leaves and civil war breaks out in Iraq because there is no mechanism in his regime for his succession. The quagmire we would both create and be sucked into in that event makes me sweat.

Act now! Email President Bush at president@whitehouse.gov. Contact your members of Congress (find contact information at www.Congress.org).

White House telephone lines:
COMMENTS: 202-456-1111
SWITCHBOARD: 202-456-1414
FAX: 202-456-2461

I wrote back in March,

I think that the core idea of the American world view must form the central message of our campaign against terrorism. We should take it directly to the populations of Iraq, Iran, North Korea and all the Arab nations. The most powerful political words ever written are these:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

So say I today also.

by Donald Sensing, 1/20/2003 12:25:00 PM. Permalink |

A recommendation!
I have avoided commercializing my site except for a tip link (the balloons in the left-hand column) and a single book recommendation on my previous blog site. Now, though, I am recommending another book offered through my Amazon Associates store. It is called, The West and the Rest: Globalization and the Terrorist Threat, by Roger Scruton. An extended review says,

If books, like whiskey, were rated according to strength, The West and the Rest would weigh in above 100 proof. It is a brief book, but concentrated. I do not mean that it is abstruse or hard to understand: on the contrary, Scruton writes with seductive clarity. But he has a lot going on in his 161 pages of text. He neatly summarizes huge tracts of Western political theory, Islamic theology, and the history of terrorism.

What I find so compelling about Scruton's work is that he encapsulates many of the themes and stories I have been writjng of for 16 months, beginning with my first post-9/11 article, "Why We Were Attacked: Religious Motivations for Anti-Western Violence." I also explained "Why the West is free and prosperous and the Middle East is not," focusing on economic development of the Near East and Europe.

But the greatest convergence between Prof. Scruton's work and my own is my June 2002 essay (three months before his book's publication), "Western Law, Islamic Law and the Ordering of Society: What's at stake in the struggle with Arab-Muslim terrorists." I wrote,

Westerners (meaning Europeans and later, Americans) developed the idea of citizenship. They began to think of themselves as having a special identity that was defined in space and time. Within that geographical space non-arbitrary law permitted greater freedoms than before, because differences could be negotiated and similarities assumed. Certainly the citizens of Europe before the American Revolution were not politically free in the sense that we think of freedom. But at the time the distinction between the authority of the secular state and the authority of religious leaders became well defined. Civil law ceased to make religious demands on its subjects.

By the time of the American revolution, the separation of church and state was nearly complete. So legally marginalized from the regulation of daily civil affairs was religion that when speaking of the canons of the faith, one had to say, "church law" to distinguish it from secular law. The religious affiliation of a society's members did not have serious sway over their treatment at the bar. The common object of loyalty of the members was not a religion, but the nation. The law served to bind the citizens together into a common political heritage that protected the rights of the citizens. None of this was absolutely true anywhere, and the effect was not uniform across all the nations of the West, but it was sufficiently true everywhere in the West to make a distinctive kind of society and politics replicated nowhere else on earth, save where Westerners proselytized it.

However, in the Arab-Islamic states, this kind of arrangement is not true to a meaningful degree. Islamic law, Sharia, and it does not recognize that there could be any law apart from Islam. Nor is Islamic law territorially limited as is Western law. Sharia is universal and binds all Muslims everywhere. Sharia admits no theoretical limits in regulating human affairs and denies that secular law can limit it. In Sharia, the state is not an independent object of loyalty. Sharia can be, and usually is, claimed to be identical to the will of Allah. To disobey the edicts of the Sharia is to risk the wrath of Allah. Sharia thus makes no accommodation of differences as does Western law, since the discipline of the Quran is binding upon all people everywhere, including non-Muslims.

Western law intends to keep civil peace over all the territory where it holds sway. Personal religious beliefs are not relevant to the workings of the law, because religious beliefs are not the point of the law. In Islam, though, religion is the whole point of the law. Compromise is not a feature of Sharia because you cannot compromise with Allah; you can only submit or disobey. When, but not until, everyone submits to Allah, there will be peace, but until then conflict is both inevitable and even desirable between the submissive and the non-submissive (the infidels - that's you and me).

The enemy of Islam is an enemy of Allah, which no one has the right to be. Sharia thus denies that the another way of ordering society can possibly be valid. The Western way of life inherently permits its citizens to accept or reject Allah, but such a freedom is impermissible on its face.

As the long review of The West and The Rest puts it,

The secular idea of citizenship that is the special achievement of the West coincides with "the emergence of a special kind of pre-political loyalty, which is that of the nation, conceived as a community of neighbors sharing language, customs, territory, and a common interest in defense." The nation state, which, to some observers, has seemed to be an impediment to democracy, turns out to be something closer to its precondition. A recurrent theme of The West and the Rest is that Western civilization depends upon an idea of citizenship that is "not global at all, but rooted in territorial jurisdiction and national loyalty." Islam, by contrast, is a global ideology in the sense that it regards secular authority by definition as without legitimacy. The sharia, the revealed will of God, is the only sanction for law. There is no space left over for politics, for dissent; all dissent is a form of heresy.

So I highly recommend now two books, available at my Amazon Store:

The West and the Rest: Globalization and the Terrorist Threat, and

Shadow Warriors: Inside the Special Forces, by Tom Clancy and General Carl Stiner (ret.), former Commander in Chief of US Special Operations Command, with whom I served at Fort Bragg, NC.

by Donald Sensing, 1/20/2003 11:18:00 AM. Permalink |

"Before I drove a Suburban . . ."

Before I drove a Suburban, I drove a small, politically correct car and looked up at all the scary, aggressive drivers coming at me from all directions on the road.

Now I sit tall in my cozy leather driver's seat above the heavy, substantial weight of my Suburban, and look down on all the other drivers, who wisely stay out of my way. This feels good.

(Link)

by Donald Sensing, 1/20/2003 10:16:00 AM. Permalink |

"Smoking gun"? Heck, the whole of Iraq is a smoking gun.
David Kay, chief nuclear weapons inspector of UNSCOM, the U.N. Special Commission on Iraq in 1991 has little patience with the state of the UN weapons-inspection program in Iraq today.

by Donald Sensing, 1/20/2003 09:30:00 AM. Permalink |

"The facts don't matter. . . ."
Andrews Sullivan's essay on Britain's New Clout first discusses why the facts don't matter to knee-jerk America haters.

Speaking of America-hating, Reid Collins, a former correspondent for major media, wonders why the major print media wrote only puff pieces about the weekend demonstrations. Noting that opposition to war with Iraq was only one piece of the total agenda of the hard-left organizers - the rest being various radical causes of different stripes - Collins says,

People with heartfelt opinions who are in disagreement with the policy that leads inevitably to war with Iraq but who have no desire to add their bodies to the numbers calling for freedom for Mumia Abu-Jamal or for the destruction of the current form of American government. They resist having their honest sentiments subsumed by purveyors of other agendas. They want to change minds, not governments. And they wonder of events such as the antiwar demonstration of Saturday, January 18 -- "were it not for C-Span, how would we ever know?"

by Donald Sensing, 1/20/2003 08:49:00 AM. Permalink |

Despite the marches, the Left may be coming to its senses.
Slowly, to be sure, and in bits and pieces. But when the UK's Guardian/Observer endorse, however regretfully, the use of force as a last resort to remove Saddam (see post below), when Christopher Hitchens makes as clear a case as can be found, then a sea change may be starting.

Now Johann Hari writes in the Independent, after spending a lot of time in Iraq interviewing ordinary folks, that it is clear to him that the Iraqi people cling to the hope that America and the UK will liberate them.

The moment they established that I was British, people would hug me and offer coded support (they would be even more effusive towards the Americans I travelled with). They would explain how much they "admire Britain - British democracy, yes? You understand?" . . .

We do not need President Bush's dangerous arguments about "pre-emptive action" to justify this war. Nor do we need to have the smoking gun of WMD. All we need are the humanitarian arguments we used during the Kosovo conflict to remove the monstrous Slobodan Milosevic - and this time, we can act in the certain (rather than probable) knowledge that the people being tyrannised will be cheering us on.

As I wrote in, "The backward thinking of anti-war religious pronouncements,"

There are three broad areas of moral reasoning about war, and first and foremost is reasoning about the facts and circumstances that make continuing the status quo so unacceptable that war seems preferable. . . . To recognize that sometimes a nominal state of peace can be less tolerable than war is an essential component of moral reasoning about war.

That's what Hari is saying, too. It's a really good piece. Read it all.

by Donald Sensing, 1/18/2003 10:48:00 PM. Permalink |

An outstanding essay on the use of force against Iraq is found in the UK Guardian newspaper.

by Donald Sensing, 1/18/2003 10:26:00 PM. Permalink |

What does A.N.S.W.E.R. stand for?
It's the sponsor of all the "peace" rallies being held this weekend. What does it stand for? Russell Wardlow has the answer.

by Donald Sensing, 1/18/2003 10:06:00 PM. Permalink |

"What would Dietrich do?"
German Lutheran pastor and pacifist Dietrich Bonhoeffer was executed by the Nazis in 1945 for participating in a plot to kill Hitler, a true charge. So Photon Courier asks what would Dietrich do now about Iraq?

"I suspect that if Honhoeffer were an Iraqi he would be part of a dissident movement opposing the Hussein regime," says scholar Victoria Barnett. "At the same time, because he was a pacifist, he would seek a peaceful solution to the conflict."

The historical Bonhoeffer, however, reached the conclusion that Hitler should be killed, as the same article notes. "A Christian should not kill..." says Bonhoeffer's friend Eberhard Bethge, "But there are times you are responsible for human beings around you, and you have to think aout all means to stop that man who is killing."

by Donald Sensing, 1/18/2003 04:47:00 PM. Permalink |

I hate to say I told you so, but . . .
I told you so. Tacitus observes the "peace" protests today and says very much what I said earlier.

by Donald Sensing, 1/18/2003 04:42:00 PM. Permalink |

Some Blogger Pro problems
I use Blogger Pro to write this site. There are two versions of Pro, and the later version is experiencing some publishing problems, namely, it won't FTP to my off-blogger host.

So I am publishing using the older version, but it does not support all the format features of version 2. That's why the headlines for posts of yesterday and before have disappeared - version 2 supports headline code but version 1 doesn't.

Someday . . .

by Donald Sensing, 1/18/2003 04:13:00 PM. Permalink |

Some short subjects

"Islam is what Muslims do" . . .
. . . was the name of an August posting of mine. Now that theme is echoed by Professor Bala Ambati, writing in Duke University's "Chronicle" newspaper.

Religions are defined not only by ideals but by realities, not just by their deepest and most beautiful insights, but by their adherents' behavior. . . . When moderate Muslims state terrorist attacks are disconnected from Islam, they ignore the reality that Islamic fundamentalist imperialists act in the name of Islam and Muslims, claiming "true Islam's" mantle from conspicuously absent moderates. . . . Until the realization that theocracies cannot be democracies dawns throughout the Islamic world, saying terrorism is disconnected from Islam is a smokescreen employed to abdicate responsibility to face reality.

I quote myself: "If what we are experiencing is not the real Islam, then the rest of the Muslims need to get the Islamic house in order. They need to understand that the present crisis is not just that of Islamists against the West, it is the Islamists against everybody who does not tow their line.

Hey you -- you "moderate" or "non-radical" Muslims! You're next. Better choose sides, because either side that wins will remember.

Concludes Dr. Ambati,

Moderate Muslims must choose whether to let megalomaniacs, liars, misogynists and murderers hijack societies and religion and pilot them into destruction's abyss. Sidelines are not moral high ground. Unequivocally repudiating and forswearing terrorist methods and imperialist aims of Islamic fundamentalism by moderate Muslims is overdue. This requires calling the present jihad by mujahadeen and martyrs awaiting paradise its name, hirabah (unholy war) by mufsidoon (evildoers) bound for jahannam (hell).

(via TR Fogey)

Nashville is first for US Marine recruiting
Best of the Web Today quotes the San Francsico Chronicle that much to the surprise of military recruiters, northern Califonia has proved fertile ground for new recruits. "In fact, Northern California ranked second to Nashville in the Marine Corps' national recruiting last year, according to Maj. Mark Johnson, commanding officer of Marine Recruiting Station San Francisco."

Just in case you missed it, that means that the single city of Nashville, population 1,187,521 in 2000, sends more men and women to the Marine Corps than half the entire state of California, population 34,501,130 (for the whole state; how many live in the northern half I don't know). And the Chronicle is apparently worried that the place is becoming too pro-military. Yeah, right.

Environmentalism is "the American Left at worship."
Thus sprach Christopher C. Horner in NRO Online, cited by Craig Alan Myers, who adds, "and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles" (Romans 3:23).

by Donald Sensing, 1/18/2003 10:09:00 AM. Permalink |

More about Iraq and US oil consumption
Iraq exports oil under controls established by the United Nations after the Gulf War in the "Oil for Food" program. The oil Iraq exports under this program is sold on the international open market. Currently, the United States buys more than two-thirds of Iraq's oil, but this accounts for less than four percent of the oil America imports. So the US is certainly not starved for Iraqi oil, nor is Iraqi oil particuarly significant in America's total oil production and importation. (We buy more oil from either Norway or Nigeria than Iraq.)

According to the American Petroleum Institute:

About half of the oil we consume is produced here in the United States. The rest is imported. Of the oil we import, 51 percent comes from other nations in the Western Hemisphere [mainly Mexico and Canada -- DS], 21 percent from the Middle East, 18 percent from Africa and 11 percent from other countries. API provides a variety of studies on this topic in the Industry Statistics section of this website.

Note well: three-fourths of the oil we consume is from stable sources, either domestic production or sources within our own hemisphere. In fact, the US imports almost as much oil from Canada alone as from all the Persian Gulf countries combined. Furthermore, the API states that at the current rate of consumption, current proven reserves will last at least 63 years and perhaps as many as 95 years. The US Geological Survey estimates that the earth still holds as much as 2.1 trillion barrels of oil.

There is no shortage of oil.

by Donald Sensing, 1/17/2003 04:37:00 PM. Permalink |

Where is Steven Den Beste and what have you done with him?

An alien masquerading as the justifiably renowned Steven Den Beste has taken over his site, USS Clueless. The War and Peace-length posts there are gone! All his posts on the current page can be read not only in one sitting, but even between sips of coffee! For example:

(On Screen): With North Korea ratcheting up the pressure, evidently because it is facing imminent internal meltdown, the US is playing the situation exactly as it should. Time is on our side, so we're moving "deliberately", which is to say that we're moving slowly. And US envoy Kelly is now saying that the process of resolving the crisis is going to be a very slow one.

This is exactly the right approach, because North Korea is trying to panic us into working for a quick solution which would permit them to wring huge concessions out of us. But they are the ones who are truly in a hurry, and if we refuse to be rushed, and as they face disaster, and as their increasing attempts to cause hysteria obviously fail, they'll pull back and then they will be the ones who make major concessions.

Folks, that the entire post- all of it!

Steven, come back! Come back!

by Donald Sensing, 1/17/2003 04:32:00 PM. Permalink |

Why the Iraq War won't be about oil
More accurately, here is the reason President Bush isn't going to make war against Iraq for the benefit of his friends in the US oil industry, or the US oil industry at large. An article in the Philadelphia Inquirer points out:

There will be no fantastic oil bonanza at hand if Saddam Hussein is ousted. After 20 years of war and sanctions, Iraq's oil infrastructure is in disarray. It will take three or more years and $7 billion to $8 billion just to get back to 1980 production levels of 3.5 million barrels per day, according to experts.

Boosting production to 6 million bpd would take $30 billion to $40 billion more in investment -- and many more years.

Let's think this through like the Capitalist Pigs we really are rather than the looney conspiracy theorists who yell, "No blood for oil!"

The more oil flows from Iraq, the more oil there is on the world market.

Demand is rising, but it can't rise by even 3.5 millions barrels per day, every day, in only three years.

Hence, world oil prices will drop once Iraq's fields come fully on line as production capacity outruns demand.

We Capitalist Pigs are greedy, not stupid. We're not about to invest $7 billion to lower prices.

And forget some sweetheart deal with the post-Saddam Iraqi government by which Iraq direct sells oil to America. Cutting the world spot market out of Iraq's oil production would drive America's allies purple with fury, because we buy oil from and sell oil to many of them, Norway and Russia being major overseas suppliers to America, for example. Such a deal would also prove that the post-Saddam government was only a US puppet; it would be held illegitimate by other regional governments and Europe and Asia. Politically, there is no upside to that for us, not even cheap oil.

There's a longer excerpt and additional discussion at Geitner Simmon's site, where I found the link to the Inquirer story to begin with.

Update: CPO Sparkey has a word about this topic. So does Jonah Goldberg.

by Donald Sensing, 1/17/2003 04:22:00 PM. Permalink |

The real reason we station our forces on other countries
Larry at Before Breakfast writes of what a South Korean lieutenant colonel told him 15 years ago the real reason the USA keeps boots on the ground in South Korea:

to keep the South from going north. As soon as you leave, we will conquer the north and then attack Japan." LTC X's mentors are now out of power but he was deadly serious at the time.

Funny he should say that. I was told the same thing when I reported for duty in Korea in 1977. The year before, two US Army officers were axed and bludgeoned to death inside the DMZ's Joint Security Area. That was all the reason the South needed to head to Pyongyang; it took a major diplomatic effort by the US to prevent it.

In 1992 I attended a defense conference in California with some pretty high-powered people holding a discussion about Europe. I went there as one of the traveling staff of then Secretary of the Army Michael P. W. Stone. The conference was hosted by a member of the British House of Lords, whose name escapes me. The German delegate was a Bundeswehr lieutenant general assigned to the West German ministry of defense.

There were no reporters present, so people spoke pretty freely. During the course of the discussion, Herr Leutnant General said that the only reason Europe had enjoyed its longest period ever of uninterrupted peace was that there were two US Army corps in western Germany, and significant US forces elsewhere in Europe. He didn't quite say that without American boots on the ground there, Europe would have gone to war with itself again, but we clearly understood that's what he meant. The British and Italian representatives nodded.

That's why folks who think that the US military will be out of Iraq only 18 months or so after the Saddam is toppled are dreaming in lala land. (Care to recall how long we've been "temporarily" in Kosovo?) I wrote in October 2001 that we would be there for a generation: "It will take decades and there are no guarantees. But the alternative is to fight culture and religious wars generation after generation." I still stand by that.

by Donald Sensing, 1/17/2003 12:27:00 PM. Permalink |

Quote of the day
"We're going to ensure these Huns don't come in here and pillage and ravage this place." Philadelphia Deputy Police Commissioner Robert Mitchell, referring to security plans to keep fans from tearing Veterans Stadium apart for souvenirs after the last-ever NFL game there is finished this Sunday.

by Donald Sensing, 1/17/2003 08:41:00 AM. Permalink |

Christians and war -
Australian pastor Martin Roth has a page of thoughtful essays on Christians and War, including one that asks, "Where Is the Justice in Not Attacking?" He also asks why, if Australia was right to intervene militarily in East Timor in the 1970s, it is wrong to stop the atrocities in Iraq now.

by Donald Sensing, 1/17/2003 08:41:00 AM. Permalink |

The tattered remains of United Nations credibility
Shreds of legitimacy is all the UN has remaining, says Austin Bay, because it has appointed Libyan dictator Muhammar Gadafi to chair the UN Human Rights Commission (UNHRC).

Libya's links to torture and terror are proven. The Gadafi regime's domestic opponents are either dead or live in exile under constant threat of assassination. Libya's secret police and system of "revolutionary committees" throttle the populace. Libya has no independent human rights groups, and the Libyan government controls the press completely and absolutely.

The 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, (which killed 270 people) came at Gadafi's order. It was no mistake; it was no misunderstanding. Pan AM 103 was calculated, callous murder. . . .

by Donald Sensing, 1/17/2003 08:39:00 AM. Permalink |

She loved him more than life.
A true and moving story about a woman who loved her baby more than her own life.

by Donald Sensing, 1/17/2003 08:37:00 AM. Permalink |

Marines are moving out
The mother of a US Marine infantryman emailed to say her son reports that Camp Lejeune, NC, is "clearing out." He is between assignments; the unit he was scheduled to join has already deployed, so he doesn't know whether he'll be reassigned or will catch up to it. In the nonce, he was assigned temporary duty at a recruiting station, where his daily uniform is dress blues. The mom says, "I like that: that's on the mom-approved military job list." I'll bet!

But her son got his anthrax shot last Sunday, and will complete smallpox and other immunizations this week.

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 10:17:00 PM. Permalink |

The new head of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy . . .
. . . has $30 million he wants to share with you. No, really! I'm serious. Yes, very. (via Daily Pundit)

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 03:36:00 PM. Permalink |

The text problem is fixed
NZ Bear kindly emailed me that in Mozilla browsers (i.e., Netscape) the text of my posts were invisible, probably due, he said, to a tagging problem in my template coding. I revised the template yesterday, moving the byline and permalink to the end of the post instead of the front. Mr. Bear also examined the source page and suggested what the problem was - and voila! he is right. So now it should work - at least it does on my version of Netscape.

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 01:58:00 PM. Permalink |

What the president said about Iraq
It seems an appropriate time to review quotes by the president and the secretary of state about the crisis in Iraq, and why confrontation seems unavoidable. So look these bona-fide quotes over, and see what you think.

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 01:04:00 PM. Permalink |

Does the peace movement really have good intentions? No.
Former Marine officer Adam G. Mersereau fingers the foolish utopianism of the so-called peace movement, which is that the USA is the wellspring of all misery in the world.

The peace activist then reaches the conclusion that the United States can make a unilateral decision for peace, simply by choosing to lay down its arms. If the United States would ignore open and notorious breaches of U.N. directives and treaties, and simply refuse to disturb the current state of peace, then peace would prevail by default.

However, Mersereau credits the peaceniks with good intentions while exposing their foolish world view. He seems to think that the real desire of the peace movement is peace. But it isn't.

The "peace movement" isn't about peace

The people of Iraq and North Korea, to pick two random examples, have not been at peace inside their own countries in decades. They share among them hundreds of millions of man-years - and woman- and child-years - of misery, oppression, murder, tyranny, torture, starvation, internal and external terrorism and even slavery, in thrall to the cruel men who ruthlessly rule them.

The wars that these illegitimate governments have waged against their own people and other nations draw not the slightest whimper of protest by "peace" activists, who travel to Baghdad to denounce America and give comfort to the brutal tyrant, Saddam Hussein.

It's past time we understood that western "peace" activists are not interested in peace. They are not for peace.

The two main camps of the peace industry

The Down With America camp - This is the smaller camp active in America. It denounces any and all things American for no other reason than that's what they do. To them America is bad, every place else is good, especially non-European places. (Europe is suspect, but is tolerated because it is no longer religious. One of America's chief faults is that Americans are still religious.) The oppressions and slaughters that people of color regularly wage upon one another is of no interest to this camp except as another thing to blame upon America. This is the sort that Mersereau describes, although, as I said, he erroneously credits them with actually wanting peace.

This was the kind of pacifists George Orwell described in his essay, Notes on Nationalism, May 1945:

The majority of pacifists either belong to obscure religious sects or are simply humanitarians who object to taking life and prefer not to follow their thoughts beyond that point. But there is a minority of intellectual pacifists, whose real though unacknowledged motive appears to be hatred of western democracy and admiration for totalitarianism. Pacifist propaganda usually boils down to saying that one side is as bad as the other, but if one looks closely at the writing of the younger intellectual pacifists, one finds that they do not by any means express impartial disapproval but are directed almost entirely against Britain and the United States …

The Political Identity camp - The larger camp is equally uninterested in peace. Its motivation is pure, partisan politics. It is universally liberal to outright leftist, but not pacifist. Its members do not object to war per se, they mainly object to war being waged by the wrong people. This is the camp referred to by TR Fogey, who links to an article by Michael Totten with this nugget:

While it is unlikely that leftists [the DWA camp - DS] would have supported the war against the Taliban if Hillary Clinton waged it, it is almost certainly true that most mainstream liberals would support the war in Iraq if she were leading the charge against Saddam now. With only one exception, every anti-war liberal I have talked to admits this is true.

That defines the PI camp quite well: their support of or opposition to military force depends almost exclusively on whether their party is the one wielding it. Totten writes,

After weeks of arguing with one of my colleagues, I finally got him to concede that an American military intervention to depose Saddam Hussein is justified and appropriate. I convinced him by sending him reams of information about the brutal nature of Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship. He really didn’t know, and now he does, and he changed his mind. But with a catch. "This isn't the right American administration to carry out the invasion," he said.

Robert Kagan recently wrote "Yesterday's liberal interventionists, in Bosnia, Kosovo and Haiti, are today's liberal abstentionists. What changed? Just the man in the White House."

Together, these two camps comprise the "peace movement" in America today. It is not possible to grant to either camp the courtesy of good intentions. The DWA camp is virulently anti-American, and therefore pro-fascist, pro-tyranny and pro-oppression, all of which are states of war, not peace.The political identity camp sees peace and war through the lens of whether their own political faction holds power. If so, war may be good. If not, war is always bad.

There are no good intentions to be found anywhere among them.

There are a small number of true pacifists who do not fit into either camp, but their visibility and influence is near negligible. Quakers and Mennonites, for example, generally do not work to undermine America but neither do they support America's wars. However, my personal experience shows that almost all American religious protests against the Bush administration fall into the political identity camp. They almost without exception supported Clinton's war against the Bosnian Serbs and accepted his violent attacks upon Iraq, his cruise-missile campaigns against Afghanistan and Sudan (which killed innocent people) and his invasion of Haiti. But I have already written about the neo-Marxist politicization of the Church.

Update: TR Fogey excerpts "Confessions of an Ex-Pacifist" by Dr. David Lazerson, who "tells us how our current situation in our struggle against terrorism differs from the anti-war glory days of the 1960's":

You see, this notion of pacifism gets a bit sticky when one side believes in dialogue, reaching out a hand in friendship, and even compromising, while the other side hates your guts, wants your head displayed on a stick, and would like nothing better than to level your towns and plant their flags all over the joint. Peace only works when it´s a two-way street. If not, pacifism becomes suicide.

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 12:25:00 PM. Permalink |

Formationless warfare
Large formations of ground units are the wave of the past, according to a retired lieutenant colonel. In decades past the only way to mass decisive combat power on the ground was to mass troops. But to mass troops, whether under armor or not, against American forces is merely to invite destruction. Sensor and strike technology has rendered the large formation permanently obsolete. (via Before Breakfast)

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 10:49:00 AM. Permalink |

Piling on Le Carre
James Lileks puts his phasers on stun to rebut left-wing John Le Carre's very foolish article in the UK Telegraph. Now The Brothers Judd rebut it as well, doing a very good job. You'll notice I refrain from joining in, even though it would be as easy as stealing candy from a baby. The reason is that I don't understand why we take him, or others of his ilk, seriously. The man's a joke!

There might be an intellectually consistent, thoughful opposition to confronting Iraq, but I have yet to see it. So I think the best thing to do with fantasy ideologists like Le Carre is simply to ignore them. They are not serious people.

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 10:02:00 AM. Permalink |

USA becoming Big Brother society, says ACLU

The United States is at risk of turning into a full-fledged surveillance society where "Big Brother is watching you," says a report released yesterday by the American Civil Liberties Union.

Sophisticated technology makes advanced surveillance simple, but the erosion of constitutional protections in the wake of September 11 threatens the legal safeguards protecting Americans from excessive government snooping, the report concludes.

(Link)

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 08:33:00 AM. Permalink |

Possible major shakeup in theory of evolution
A new study shows that physical features lost through evolution can be re-evolved later.

Brigham Young University researchers have uncovered genetic evidence in stick insects -- a group of bugs that resemble tree twigs with legs -- that could force scientists to rethink long-held beliefs involving a part of the theory of evolution.

According to the study, many species of stick insects re-evolved wings, traits preserved in dormant DNA, over the course of 50 million years -- an idea that flies in the face of what insect evolutionary biologists believe. . . .

The findings could eventually prompt scientists to look for re-evolved traits in other creatures, even humans.

(Link)

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 08:27:00 AM. Permalink |

US says Korean nuke crisis has no quick fix

Eliminating nuclear weapons from the Korean peninsula would be a "slow process," U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly said on Thursday.

"The Korean peninsula needs to be free of nuclear weapons," he said. "That's something that China, the U.S.A., South Korea, Japan, Russia, really the whole international community agrees on.

"And it's going to be a slow process."

(Link)

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 08:23:00 AM. Permalink |

Blix fingers Iraq for illegally importing weapons material

Iraq has illegally imported arms-related material but it is not yet clear whether the material is related to weapons of mass destruction, the chief U.N. weapons inspector said Thursday.

Hans Blix, who spoke to reporters after meeting with European Union officials, said Iraq has to be more active in addressing the concerns of the United Nations and the inspectors.

"It's clear they have violated the bans of the United Nations in terms of imports," said Blix.

(Link)

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 07:57:00 AM. Permalink |

This stone ancient tablet could mean trouble.
A 2,800-year-old stone tablet has come to light in Jerusalem that verifies Jewish claims of primacy there over the relatively late-coming Islamic religion. It confirms the existence of the Temple of Solomon on the Temple Mount, Judaism's holiest site. Muslims deny that Jews ever had a temple or holy site there.

The sandstone tablet has a 15-line inscription in ancient Hebrew that resembles descriptions in Kings II, 12:1-6, 11-17, said Israel’s Geological Survey, which examined the artifact. The words refer to King Joash, who ruled the area 2,800 years ago.

In it, the king tells priests to take “holy money ... to buy quarry stones and timber and copper and labor to carry out the duty with faith.” If the work is completed well, “the Lord will protect his people with blessing,” reads the last sentence of the inscription.

However, forgery has not been ruled out, although it appears very unlikely. (Story at MSNBC, I neglected to record the link and now I can't find it. Trust me, it's there somewhere.)

Update: Front Page documents the deliberate destruction of the Temple Mount still being carried out by the Palestinian Authority, which insists that the site has neither a Jewish nor Christian heritage. The PA is eradicating evidence of Jewish and Christian activity there.

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 07:54:00 AM. Permalink |

Can't compete with this depravity
Here is an expose of North Korean gulags.

At one camp, Camp 22 in Haengyong, some 50,000 prisoners toil each day in conditions that U.S. officials and former inmates say results in the death of 20 percent to 25 percent of the prison population every year.
Products made by prison laborers may wind up on U.S. store shelves, having been “washed” first through Chinese companies that serve as intermediaries.
Entire families, including grandchildren, are incarcerated for even the most bland political statements.
Forced abortions are carried out on pregnant women so that another generation of political dissidents will be “eradicated.”
Inmates are used as human guinea pigs for testing biological and chemical agents, according to both former inmates and U.S. officials. . . .

“All of North Korea is a gulag,” said one senior U.S. official, noting that as many as 2 million people have died of starvation while Kim has amassed the world’s largest collection of Daffy Duck cartoons. “It’s just that these people [in the camps] are treated the worst. No one knows for sure how many people are in the camps, but 200,000 is consistent with our best guess.

“We don’t have a breakdown, but there are large numbers of both women and children.”

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 06:08:00 AM. Permalink |

Beretta to make a revolver
Well, knock me over with a feather - Beretta has announced that it will release a clone of the Colt Single Action Army .45-caliber pistol. The original Colt SAA was adopted by the US Army in 1873. Also known as the Peacemaker, it is the "six gun" that everyone sees in movie westerns. Single action means that pulling the trigger does not cock the firing hammer (that would be "double action"); you have to manually cock the firing hammer before you pull the trigger.

The Beretta gun is called the Stampede. Its parts will be mostly made by Beretta subsidiary Uberti, then assembled by Beretta. It will have a case, nickel or high-polish blue inish. No price has been announced, but new Colt-brand models' list price is an astonishing $1,530.

SAA clones have become very popular in recent years. "Cowboy action shooting" competitions are growing in number and popularity. Other manufacturers also offer SAA clones in different calibers such as .22, .357 magnum and .44.

by Donald Sensing, 1/16/2003 06:06:00 AM. Permalink |

Flexibility is the key to success in today's modern, volunteer, all-action Army!
An essay on why improvisation is central to how the US military fights

During the Vietnam War there was a sign outside the US Army Infantry School:

Here lie the bones of Trooper Jones,
late of this institution.
He died last night in his first firefight.
He used the “school solution.”

After the German army was ejected from North Africa in World War II, German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel remarked that no army knew less than the American army, but no army learned faster, either.

In modern times, a West German general said, “The reasons Americans do so well in war is that war is chaos, and the American army practices chaos on a daily basis.”

In the 1980s, a Soviet general-staff publication cautioned its readers, “The reason that planning operations against the American Army is so difficult is that American officers do not know their own doctrine and do not read their own manuals.” Thus, they thought that using US Army operations manuals as planning guides for their offense or defense was likely to be fruitless.

In fact, US military schools do an excellent job of teaching our doctrine, and students must demonstrate mastery thereof to graduate. But something happens between getting the diploma and employing real units either in exercises or battle. It is the realization that every situation is different and that improvisation is always called for.

Why we improvise

When the Cold War was in full swing, US forces conducted annual exercises in West Germany called REFORGER, an enormous, free-maneuver exercise that ranged across whole sections of the country, one year in Bavaria in the south and the next in central Germany. These exercises employed entire US Army corps and German formations on both sides.

In Reforger 1984 I was an artillery captain, the fire direction officer for 1st Brigade, 3d Armored Division, part of the Blue army that year. I had graduated from the Field Artillery Advanced Course in 1983, where we were drilled thoroughly in tactics at division level and below. One of the best instructors was a US Marine major, whom I’ll call Major Smith because I can’t remember his real name. (Marine artillery officers receive all their artillery training at the US Army Field Artillery School, and teach there as well.)

In 1984 the Blue army took the offensive the second week, fiercely resisted by the Red army. Modern combat is fast and mobile. There is no front line. By the second day the map overlay of unit positions resembled a kaleidoscope - units here and there, with Red forces similarly arrayed. The third day the overlays of friendly and enemy positions showed a swirling, tangled mess. A major Red armor formation was being encircled by my division. The two arcs of blue units swooping from the west, on the north and south of the Red units, were in turn pressed from the north and south by other Red formations.

I was in the 1st Brigade tactical operations center racking my brain trying to figure out what kind of fire-control measures to implement for this mess - the manuals didn’t cover such a situation. Then in walked tactics instructor Major Smith. He was visiting artillery units and operations center as an observer to determine how the school could do a better job.

I reintroduced myself and showed him the overlay and map. His jaw fell when he saw it. “Any recommendations?” I asked. He examined the map for a long moment. He turned to me and said, “Good luck.” Then he left. I don’t recall what tactics we used, but they were heavily improvised.

Improvisation is the key to the American way of war

For decades, Europeans have accused the US Army of being amateurs. The Brits especially thought so in World War II, but they were wrong. Our soldiers were amateurs, with millions of them having been recently inducted and not well trained at first. But the Army itself was thoroughly professional. Leaders like Marshall, Eisenhower, Patton, Bradley, MacArthur and many more of lesser rank and fame and endured the bitter inter-war years in semi-isolation, starved for funding, but fine honing their craft. The US Army’s Command and General Staff College and Army War College were dynamic and practical think tanks. The branch schools were inventive; during the 1930s the US Army Field Artillery School invented the modern fire direction center, which was vastly superior to any artillery fire control system used anywhere in Europe.

This undergirding of professionalism is the foundation of successful improvisation. Even as skilled a tactician and professional officer as Gen. George S. Patton knew that. He drilled his men mercilessly on the fundamentals of warfare, but emphasized to them, “There is only one principle of war that is true in all times and situations: use all the means at hand to inflict all the damage you can upon the enemy.” That, to Patton, was a rule, all else was mere guideline.

Only well-drilled armies can successfully improvise over and over again. Patton proved his and his officers’ improvisational skills during the Battle of the Bulge. His Third US Army disengaged contact with the Germans, swung itself 90 degrees, and attacked the German forces near Bastogne - all in three days. Any “true professional” soldier would have known such a maneuver was impossible, but Patton’s men, expert in command, control and improvisation, did it.

Even Douglas MacArthur, son of a lieutenant general, with more than 20 years as a general himself when the Korean War broke out, proved a master of improvisation in that war by landing Marines at Inchon harbor in Sept. 1950. Inchon’s daily tides swung more than 30 feet. A small island, occupied by N. Korean forces, commanded approaches to the harbor. It had to be secured before the landings could take place. A Marine battalion was landed on it and then the fleet withdrew because of ebbing tide. It returned almost 12 hours later to land the main force, but tides permitted landing only 90 minutes before dark. There was a high sea wall that had to be breached before the Marines could move inland - the first time the Marines used ladders since the Mexican War.

Any “professional” soldier would have rejected such a foolish plan outright, and in fact the entire Joint Chiefs of Staff did so. MacArthur insisted, Truman approved, and history was made. The Marines secured Inchon before dawn the day after the landing. Then the Eighth US Army attacked from Korea’s south and the North Korean People’s Army was soon destroyed.

Last year in Afghanistan, US Special Forces joined the Northern Alliance. The Green Berets and the Alliance were heretofore unknown to one another. The SFs mounted horses (not a skill taught in the Special Warfare School), coordinated Air Force and Navy bombers, and led the alliance to victory. All of which was improvised at the time.

The coming Iraq campaign will be heavily improvised

It is not the US military that is guilty of planning to fight the last war. The military’s imagination is much richer than the rest of the country’s, when it comes to military affairs. When the US moved against Afghanistan in 2001, the chorus of critics who cried we were heading into a quagmire all evoked the Soviet army’s misadventure there that had ended only 11 years before. Of course, the Americans’ victory there bore no conceptual resemblance to the Soviets’ defeat.

If we war against Iraq, there will be no repeat of the Gulf War, fought as it was for limited objectives over limited terrain. I am hesitant to predict the course of the campaign because I have been “out of the system” for seven-plus years. But I’ll predict this:

The 2003 campaign against Iraq will be unlike any military operation we have ever seen in many ways. Significantly, I think that many of the heavy units that have deployed so far are really intended for deception and reserve initially, and then for occupation.

A map overlay of points of military action will be a “measle sheet,” meaning that many actions of varying intensity will take place simultaneously, or nearly so, all over the country. Army and Marine units will be deployed inside Iraq at dozens of different objectives.

We will use technologies in battle we have not used before, and which are presently unknown to the public. Robotic technologies will be used in new ways, with new capabilities.

Maybe more about this later. But I don’t think that any of us writing about the coming campaign have really imagined very well what it will be like. So stay tuned.

Another prediction: When the North Koreans see how Iraq is finished, it will come to its senses very rapidly.

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 12:35:00 PM. Permalink |

John LeCarre froths at the mouth
What an idiot.

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 08:34:00 AM. Permalink |

Congrats to blogger Bill Hobbs . . .
for getting a new job at Belmont University in Nashville.

I started a full-time job at Belmont University on Monday, where I'll be developing a fairly complex and involved online publication that will incorporate weblogs and other forms of online journalism. And apparently I have already impressed my bosses greatly, because they're giving me Monday off. Oh. Wait. What's that, you say? Everyone gets Monday off at Belmont 'cuz its Martin Luther King Day? Oh. nevermind.

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 08:26:00 AM. Permalink |

The end of the U.S. Air Force
Trent Telenko explains how aging aircraft and budget crunches could mean the end of the Air Force as we know it, and why the fighter plane is perhaps an endangered species.

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 08:22:00 AM. Permalink |

Women in combat . . .
The real issue is "gender equity" and promotions, not success in battle, which seems to be of no concern on either side of the issue. (ABC News)

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 08:08:00 AM. Permalink |

Cruel joke about Bee Gee Maurice Gibb draws ire.
Brit TV personality says on TV of dead singer, "I bet the heart monitor was singing the tune of 'Staying Alive.'" (BBC)

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 07:58:00 AM. Permalink |

US/UK bombing of Iraq intensifies . . .
The target list expands; yesterday was severest bombing raid in a year. But the total number of targets hit over the last five months is only 80. (Washington Post)

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 07:55:00 AM. Permalink |

Germany bans militant Islamic group.
Deutsche Welle newspaper reports,

German interior minister Otto Schily has banned a militant Islamic organization in his country, calling the group anti-Semitic. Schily said the group Hizb ut-Tahir opposed good relations and understanding between people. He also said its representatives had used "very anti-Semitic language" against Israel at a recent university conference in Berlin. Hizb ut-Tahir's main objective is to unite Islamic nations into a single state.

I wonder whether that last sentence holds the real key to Germany's actions; it sounds an awful lot like a Islamist version of Heute Europa, morgen Welt!

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 07:51:00 AM. Permalink |

Russia sending envoy to Baghdad
Al Bawaba reports,

Russia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Saltanov, Russia's leading Iraq expert, would lead "consultations with the Iraqi side."

"He will present our views and consider possible steps to ensure a political and diplomatic solution to the Iraqi problem," ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko said in a statement.

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 07:48:00 AM. Permalink |

China and USA confer on North Korea.
Russia offers to mediate. N. Korea says it may take more severe steps than withdrawal from non-proliferation treaty. (Link)

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 07:45:00 AM. Permalink |

Al Qaeda has adapted to US tactics.
Terrorists now avoiding death or capture more easily.

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 07:42:00 AM. Permalink |

This seems entirely unsurprising.

by Donald Sensing, 1/15/2003 07:40:00 AM. Permalink |

"Before Breakfast"
Before Breakfast is a brand new blog "devoted to discussion of the US military," authored by a retired Army officer with 32 years' service. Not much posting yet, let's hope more is to come.

by Donald Sensing, 1/14/2003 08:08:00 PM. Permalink |

"Hey, Mr. President!"
It's me, the vision thing.

by Donald Sensing, 1/14/2003 06:36:00 PM. Permalink |

Firebase Four-Papa-One, Korean DMZ, 1978
I talked about the Korean DMZ and the Joint Security Area in my last post. Just outside the DMZ during my tour in Korea (77-78) was an artillery firebase called 4P1, pronounced Four-Papa-One. Because the DMZ runs north-south in that part of the country, 4P1 was actually east of the DMZ.

I spent my Korea tour as a lieutenant assigned C Battery, 1st Battalion, 38th Field Artillery, whose motto was "Steel Behind the Rock." "Steel" referred to artillery fire, "the Rock" was the 38th Infantry Regiment, which earned the nickname Rock of the Marne for its heroic defense near the Marne River in France in 1918. My battery's standing mission in Korea was to provide artillery fire for the 1st Battalion, 38th Infantry. We were all part of the 2d US Infantry Division, which is still stationed in South Korea.

In 1978, 4P1 was the only combat firebase in the Army. The division's artillery units took turns rotating through duty at 4P1. My battalion's turn came up in the summer of 1978. There were five batteries in the battalion, three of which were firing batteries with howitzers. Each of those three spent 35 days there. We went up with our six 105mm howitzers in late May, commanded by Capt. Bill Brophy, an outstanding officer. (Bill retired in 1999 as a colonel and is now a vice president of Usibelli Coal Mines, Inc., in Alaska.)

I was the battery fire direction officer (FDO), in charge of the fire direction center, FDC. (Yes, I know, you didn't sign up for an acronym lesson, but that's what the military uses.) We also had three lieutenants as forward observers (you guessed it, "FOs"). Our FOs went to duty inside the DMZ.

There were two guard posts inside the DMZ. One was called GP Ouelette, so close to the boundary line with North Korea you could have spit on communist soil. The other GP was maybe 400 meters further away; I don't recall its name. Under the terms of the armistice, only military police are allowed inside the DMZ. So we had two ~~infantry~~ military police detachments inside the DMZ, one detachment at each of two guard posts. Each was at least of platoon strength and very heavily armed. Every time I went to Ouelette I became a military policeman, too, complete with arm brassard, rifle locked and loaded the whole time.

Our guns fired shells weighing 35 pounds with a maximum range of 11 kilometers. A 105mm high-explosive projectile had a casualty radius of 30 meters. Our six guns could fire a total of 180 rounds the first three minutes of a fire mission, then for weapon-safety reasons, had to drop to three rounds per gun per minute for sustained firing. The guns were arranged in the open in a pattern we called a "lazy W,"with 25 meters spacing between guns laterally, and alternating front to rear about 15 meters.

My FDC was inside an underground bunker at one end of the gun line, about 30 meters up a rise. The FDC served as the operations center for the battery, with out bunks at the far end. We had radios to talk to the division command post-forward, which had a secure line to the main division command post in the south. We also had radio to the infantry operations center at Camp Liberty Bell, just outside the DMZ, where an infantry battalion was stationed at high alert. We had a radio to each guard post to talk to our observers and we had field phones to Capt. Brophy's ready room, each of the guns and the executive officer's battle station. We were up and running 24/7. Our main job was calculating ballistic firing solutions for the guns.

There were 125 prearranged targets inside North Korea and the DMZ for which we had to recalculate firing data four times per day. Weather has great effect on artillery ballistics, and four times per day a "metro" section, not part of our unit, flew weather balloons that collected weather data and radioed it back to the ground. These data were converted into a very lengthy numeric voice message which was radioed to us. Receiving metro messages was very exacting and time consuming. Fortunately, 4P1's bunker had an electronic artillery computer called the Field Artillery Digital Automatic Computer (FADAC, of course, pronounced fay-dack), but only my FDC sergeant, Sgt. Gosinski, and I had been trained on it. Without it we could not possibly have manually recalculated data for 125 targets four times per day. Sometimes, we got the weather data on punch-hole tape, which FADAC could read.

The permissible response time for fire missions was very short. The guns were laid on a target inside the DMZ, which we could have shot within seconds of receiving the radio call for fire. To keep us on our toes, the division had a practice mission called, "speedball do not load." At any time of day or night, no matter the weather, a division-staff officer could direct an FO to radio a call for fire to us - but obviously not to be shot. The stopwatch was ticking, and excuses were not accepted!

A breath away from war

To distinguish these missions from real missions, the call for fire was slightly changed. The FO would call us and say, "adjust fire, speedball do not load, over." That way we knew it was a practice mission. As I recall, though, we only had three minutes to report ready to fire, except that we did not actually load a round into the howitzer.

We'd flip a light switch by the radio that started a siren above the bunker. Across the fire base, every cannon crewman and battery NCOs sprinted to their guns if they weren't already there. Meantime, the FO completed the target information, we computed the firing data and read it on the field phone to the guns.

After just a few days we in the FDC could tell right away when the FO had a SDNL mission because of the stress in his voice.

So one afternoon the radio comes to life and I could tell it was a SDNL mission. But instead of saying, "Adjust fire, speedball do not load, over," he said, "Fire for effect, at my command, over." That was a real call for fire. I hit the siren.

There had been a breach of the MDL by a platoon of 40-50 North Korean troops. They had crossed to our side of the DMZ. On the division radio network I heard the ~~infantry~~ military police on patrol inside the DMZ being ordered to set up an ambush and kill them. Capt. Brophy was off site in his jeep. I called him on the radio and gave him a code phrase to return immediately.

We quickly computed firing data. I directed the mission be fired with three rounds of high-explosive per gun, using impact-detonating fuzes instead of air burst fuzes. Sgt. Gosinski sent the firing data to the guns. Some gun chiefs were a little confused about whether this mission was practice or real - the ones who were Vietnam vets weren't confused! I briefed the XO by field phone and he got the gun chiefs straightened out. Each crew loaded a high-explosive round and placed two more, ready to fire, in the ready rack. Things were very tense. The battery commander came in and I briefed him, then he went to the gun line.

I don't know how long we stayed ready to fire, probably 20 minutes. Then the FO called. My FDC soldiers were wide eyed when they heard him. I probably was, too! We knew that 4P1 could get hit by more than 600 North Korean artillery rounds within 10 minutes. We would have been atomized in such a barrage.

"End of mission," said the FO.

The enemy had crossed back over the line before they reached the ambush. So they lived to see another day, and so did we.

by Donald Sensing, 1/14/2003 04:10:00 PM. Permalink |

Where did my comments go?
I have no idea what happened to my site's commenting feature. It was here this morning.

by Donald Sensing, 1/14/2003 02:23:00 PM. Permalink |

When I visited North Korea
I previously wrote about the imbalance of combat power on the Korea peninsula and why the malnourished, poorly trained conscripted North Korean military is hopelessly outmatched by the combined military might of the US and the Republic of Korea (ROK). As I mentioned, I served in the 2d US Infantry Division (2ID) from 1977 - 1978 as a field artillery lieutenant.

The boundary line between the North and South is the Military Demarcation Line, MDL. It bisects the peninsula east to west, except in the western portion, where it actually runs mostly north to south. Seoul is only 30 miles south of that portion of the MDL. The terrain on 2.5 kilometers on either side of the MDL constitutes the Demilitarized Zone.

Panmunjom village was located near what became the MDL during the Korean War. It was there that final negotiations between the US and its allies and the Chinese and North Koreans were held. Prisoners were also exchanged there upon the cease-fire agreement. That village had actually been destroyed in the war before the negotiations started. The place called Panmunjom now is a wholly artificial construct designed for ongoing military-to-military contacts between the United Nations Command (meaning US/ROK) and N. Korea, officially known as the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea.

Panmunjom actually straddles the MDL; it is free on one side and communist on the other. There are several buildings there, one of which is used for the meetings, which have continued fairly regularly for several decades. The negotiation table inside this building (more like a shed) sits exactly centered on the MDL. When I visited there were no N. Koreans in the building, so we were allowed to walk around the table, this technically entering North Korea, though obviously only by a few feet. A friend took a picture of me standing on the other side of the table.

Panmunjom sits inside a four-kilometer-wide strip of the DMZ called the Joint Security Area. The JSA, including Panmunjom, is staffed on our side by a combined ROK/US detachment. The DPRK side is staffed by North Koreans, obviously. There is a low hill on the DPRK side of Panmunjon. Atop the hill the DPRK built a high and wide building, meant to overawe us with its foreboding. It’s a joke because the whole building is really just a facade six feet deep. It’s the main building in this South Korean photo:

Just a facade!

The 1953 Armistice established a Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission (NNSC) as an independent, fact-finding body for maintaining the armistice. Originally it was composed of senior officers from four noncombatant nations. We selected Sweden and Switzerland, the DPRK and China selected Czechoslovakia and Poland.

The Czech component was forced out by the DPRK early in 1993. The Polish component was forced out by the DPRK early in 1995. Note that these are the years when those two nations shrugged off the last of their communist chains. The Swedish and Swiss delegations are still encamped in the southern half of the DMZ adjacent to the JSA. The former Polish and Czech camps are now used by the North Koreans for their own purposes.

by Donald Sensing, 1/14/2003 11:14:00 AM. Permalink |

"The psychological roots of anti-Americanism"
Read this essay by Victor Davis Hanson. Really.

by Donald Sensing, 1/13/2003 09:50:00 PM. Permalink |

"The feminization of society"
Fred Reed analyzes that topic, linked at the very blunt-spoken Kim DuToit, who provides this thought-provoking nugget:

The feminization of society plays its part. On average, men prefer freedom to security; women, security to freedom. Women, having climbed into a male world in which they don't seem comfortable, seek laws, laws, laws to control every cause of angst. Men, hemmed in, feel trapped. Much of the tightening control seeks security-helmet laws for kids on bicycles, fear of smoke, seat-belt laws, ever-falling definitions of drunk driving, warning labels stating the universally known, the neurotic fear of laser pointers, the hostility of a female-run school system to competition and rough games beloved of boys.

Your thoughts? Leave a comment!

by Donald Sensing, 1/13/2003 09:21:00 PM. Permalink |

"We hate America."
That's what Norwegian Blogger V. Valberg wrote, but you know he doesn't mean it or he would have written, "We hate AmeriKKKa." Some Norwegian attitudes come in for a blasting in his post.

Incidentally when Petter Nome was asked that given Saddam Husseins history of gassing his own people, mass murders, invasions, rapes and tortures, didn't he think that maybe this guy was a monster that should be removed. To which he answered "Well I am sorry to upset you, men that stuff is peanuts compared to what the Americans have done with their foreign policy over the years, Vietnam, Cambodia,..." he went on in that vein.

That was really quite shocking, someone outright confronted by the interviewer and several of the other guests, in as direct a fashion as possible, I mean they SPECIFIED the atrocities and still he said peanuts.

I guess he must be a Norwegian relative of Jimminy Peanut Carter, no dictator is so vile that the Americans aren't worse, and remember Americas sins can never be washed away!

Then he is off to Hate America Drill where . . .

we will all march lock-step over an American flag for a couple of hours, and then there is lunch and the five minute hate when we boo George W. Bush.

Just a day in the life in 21st century Europe.

by Donald Sensing, 1/13/2003 09:12:00 PM. Permalink |

Rangel's bill for a draft is not the only one alive in Congress.
A Republican-sponsored military draft proposal, House Resolution 3598, "Universal Military Training and Service Act of 2001," is still an active bill in the US House. This bill,

Makes it the obligation of male citizens and residents between 18 and 22 to receive basic military training and education as a member of the armed forces unless otherwise exempt under this Act.

The bill has languished in the Subcommittee on Military Personnel of the House Committee on Armed Services for the past year. It has three sponsors, all Republicans, and was originally introduced by Rep. Nick Smith (R-MI 7th) in Dec. 2001. For all intents and purposes, it's dead.

I still cannot find the resolution number for the bill Charles Rangel introduced. The commenter who said in an earlier post it is HR 163 is incorrect. I googled it without success and a visit to Rangel's home page turned up a lot about his proposal, but not the resolution number. So does anyone know?

by Donald Sensing, 1/13/2003 08:55:00 PM. Permalink |

Women in combat
One fine day at Fort Bragg, NC, I was present when a female reporter from Newsweek was talking to an infantry platoon sergeant, a Sgt. 1st Class, of the 82d Airborne Division. They had a polite and free-ranging discussion about a number of topics; then she pooped the question:

Reporter: So, do you think women should be permitted to serve in the infantry?

Infantry sergeant: Oh, yes, ma'am.

Reporter: You do?!?!

Sergeant: Yeah, I have three sons and I figure that if some female wants to come home in a body bag instead of my sons, I'm all for it.

The reporter wordlessly slapped her notebook shut and walked away.

by Donald Sensing, 1/13/2003 04:27:00 PM. Permalink |

Blogger blinking again
For some reason links to a Blogger permalink of another post don't always take you directly to the post concerned, but to the top of that post's page. I dunno why. Blogger, again.

by Donald Sensing, 1/13/2003 03:59:00 PM. Permalink |

War and moral clarity
Joe Katzman discusses and links to George Weigels amazingly good essay, "Moral Clarity in a Time of War." I also discussed at some length Weigel's points last month; see also "The Fallacies of Pacifism."

by Donald Sensing, 1/13/2003 03:55:00 PM. Permalink |

Don't tax 'em - elect 'em!
David Brooks explains why economic class warfare doesn't work.

I'm writing this from Nashville [my hometown - DS], where one of the richest families, the Frists, is hugely admired for its entrepreneurial skill and community service. People don't want to tax the Frists — they want to elect them to the Senate. And they did.

Senator Frist's father was a highly regarded and greatly loved physician. Some of the older folks in my church knew him. When they have spoken of him they have always mentioned his compassion and dedication to the healing arts, not his accumulation of wealth.

The Frist home, now owned by the senator, is less than a half-mile from where I grew up and my parents still live. Year before last, Vince Gill and his new bride Amy Grant rented it for a few months. At the end of my boyhood street was a home, surrounded by several acres, then owned by the Jarman family, who had founded and owned the first apparel company to be worth a billion dollars.

But my childhood neighborhood was middle class, not wealthy. My parents' house was built in 1925; it was 37 years old when they bought it for $18,500. It has eight rooms and six tiny closets. The lot is about 1.5 acres, but back then all lots had to be big enough to handle septic tanks, there being no sewer system. My best friend lived one street over. Both his parents worked, still not the norm in those days. His dad was a self-employed shopkeeper, his mother drew ads for a local department store. The lady across the street from me was an elderly widow, living on a small pension. A teacher lived next door. The father of another friend up the street was a wage worker.

This kind of neighborhood is something that Brooks overlooked in his article. Flyoverland America is not as socially segregated as the class warriors, still sucking Marxist milk, imagine it is. It never occurred to me or my friends that we should be jealous of the Jarmans; instead we wondered how we could arrange to cut their grass and make some real money. Brooks says,

Americans do not see society as a layer cake, with the rich on top, the middle class beneath them and the working class and underclass at the bottom. They see society as a high school cafeteria, with their community at one table and other communities at other tables. They are pretty sure that their community is the nicest, and filled with the best people, and they have a vague pity for all those poor souls who live in New York City or California and have a lot of money but no true neighbors and no free time.

Yep. Brooks' article is very good, read the whole thing.

by Donald Sensing, 1/12/2003 06:25:00 PM. Permalink |

Oh, boo-hoo!
Bill Cowher is livid with rage - no, wait, that's not news since he's always livid about something. What has him spittlizing this morning is that his team choked at the end of the overtime period yesterday against the Tennessee Titans, letting Tennessee move easily down the field and then committing a foul that gave Titan Jicker Joe Nedney another kick for a
game-winning field goal.

I know I need not repeat the story, but here is the Pittsburgh paper's account of it and here is the Nashville paper's. (The penalty call was "running into the kicker," not roughing the kicker, as mis-reported by both papers.) Cowher said that Nedney took "two extra steps" to get in the path of the rusher, but replay clearly showed he stopped dead still after he kicked the ball. The Steeler player's contact was not "incidental" - he hit Nedney from feet to buttocks:

Not incidental!

Dem's da breaks, Pittsburgh.

by Donald Sensing, 1/12/2003 07:44:00 AM. Permalink |

Casus belli, explained by the Times Online.
Then I invite you read my related essay, "Why deterrence worked against the Soviets - But would be losing bet against Saddam Hussein."

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 05:14:00 PM. Permalink |

Bill Murray, George W. Bush, and Congress
The demonic monster from the Great Beyond is perched atop a New York skyscraper. Only Dr. Peter Venkman (Bill Murray) and his team of Ghostbusters can defeat the evil gods. In the mayor's office a debate is raging: shall he approve the Ghostbusters taking over the crisis? Accused of being a fraud, Venkman plays his trump card:

"Mayor, if we fail, we fail, and we go to jail. But if we succeed . . . you will have saved the lives . . . of millions of registered voters!"

That's exactly why the Bush plan will pass. Pete du Pont writes that it will benefit 100 million people,

. . . including 35 million investor households, tens of millions of older Americans, and people with children and married couples. That is an enormous constituency to oppose, which is why in the end, after some months of liberal howling, most of the president's plan will be enacted into law.

Yep.

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 05:08:00 PM. Permalink |

Radical egalitarianist tax policy
Hugo Gurdon (sic) says,

Until society adopt s the radically egalitarian position that everyone should earn the same amount, and legislates accordingly, tax cuts will always offer left-liberal demagogues a stick with which to beat conservatives.

And he does the math to show why if Bush's tax proposal had been exactly reversed from what they are, the Left would still be beating him up for "tax breaks for the wealthy."

But there's a way out of this Catch-22 dilemma that both parties are subject to: a flat-rate income tax with a floor of income excluded from taxation, say OTTOMH (off the top of my head), $20,000. The 20,001st dollar would be the first dollar taxed, of which the earner would pay, say, 15 cents to Uncle. The 75,000th dollar earned would lose 15 cents to Uncle, too.

The taxation floor could be raised in set increments based on dependents, but that's it - no other deductions, not for home mortgage, not for capital losses (as a separate category), not for moving expenses, not for nothin'. Insgtantly, the tax code would become completely comprehensible to everyone and the playing field would be level for everyone, rich and poor alike.

(Steve Forbes, founder of Citizens for a Sound Economy, uses a different floor and exemptions, as shown by this proposed, new version of the Form 1040. My numbers are merely illustrative. CSE is now co-chaired by Dick Armey.)

This tax is progressive because the more money you make, not only do you pay more taxes in absolute dollars, but you pay taxes on a greater percentage of your income. Someone earning $25,000 pays tax on only the $5,000 above the $20K floor, that is, s/he pays taxes on 20 percent of earned income. But someone earning $80,000 pays taxes on 75 percent of that, or $60,000. The reason that's fair is that the marginal rate never goes up (the rate at which the next dollar earned will be taxed).

Some advantages:

It vastly simplifies business and personal accounting.

Tax shelters become unnecessary and indeed, undefinable.

The tax code no longer skews the market by favoring one sector over another. The public aggregately will spend, invest or save (or not) on the basis of inherent value and true risk v. payoff, not influenced as now by how it will affect their tax returns.

Mortgage costs won't be covertly skewed down by built-in deductibility. This will make homes more affordable for everyone, including the working poor,

A wealth-creation boom like this country has never seen and a huge increase in paid tax revenues to the government (wait, that's not necessarily a good thing . . . .)

If this happens, it will be many years. But it should happen.

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 04:47:00 PM. Permalink |

A true story of a genuine Muslim hero . . .
who stopped a synagogue from being arsonized, on LGF.

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 10:48:00 AM. Permalink |

Congrats to mega-Blogman Glenn Reynolds . . .
for being named the "Brogan Distinguished Professor of Law" at the Univ. of Tennessee Law School.

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 10:03:00 AM. Permalink |

Draft system already under court challenge
Some Massachusetts teens and a 20-year-old have filed suit in US District Court, seeking to overturn the sex-selectivity of the Selective Service Administration, which requires only men to register for the draft, and does not accept registration by women.

''If people want women's rights, they should want it wholeheartedly, including for women to have to fight in wars,'' said plaintiff Nicole Foley, 17, of Ipswich. ''We should take the good with the bad.''

Selective Service spokeswoman Alyce T. Burton said that the SSA will register women if Congress changes the law to require it. (via campc.com)

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 09:56:00 AM. Permalink |

My own tale of marksmanship training
I forgot to mention that the essayist I refer to in the post below calls for a return to a robust shooting competition program, involving all soldiers in the Army and Marines. That's an excellent idea because nothing inculcates accuracy better than competition training.

I was fortunate in two ways, learning to shoot. First, my dad was an excellent shot and taught me well as I grew up. Bird hunting also helps develop instinctive pointing skills.

Second, I shot for four years of varsity rifle team in college under the personal tutelage of two Special Forces master sergeants, first Chuck Norton and then "Pat" Patterson. My senor year I hit a bad slump and my scores really suffered. Pat tried to tell me what I was doing wrong, but I was so frustrated and unwilling to listen that I refused to take his advice to heart.

After a few fruitless practices when I had insisted on self analyzing (wrongly), Pat quietly said to me, "If you try it my way now, and score a bullseye on your next shot, the beer and pizza tonight are on me." Well, what college student is going to turn that down? I assumed a prone firing position and Pat made some position corrections.

Then he picked up an unused target and walked downrange - unnecessary because we had mechanical target mounts. He got to the backstop, turned around and held the target at arm's length from his body. "Okay, shoot a bullseye," he said. I knew Pat well and knew he wasn't bluffing. Talk about pressure!

I loaded my Anschutz rifle and swung it into position slowly from my left so the muzzle would not cross his body. The target was not even slightly quivering as Pat held it. "Breathe, relax, aim, squeeze." Bang! Pat looked at the target and snorted. He walked back to me and showed it to me. "Ten ring," he said. The bullet hole was slightly off center but did indeed take out the tiny dot in dead center that earned 10 competition points.

Since that day I never refused to listen to a coach. My memory of Pat holding that target is as clear today as if it had happened yesterday, but it was 26 years ago.

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 08:22:00 AM. Permalink |

"Only hits count" - the challenge of military marksmanship
Sgt Stryker's site links to an editorial, which is on target about military marksmanship in some things, but misses in others.

On target: If the effect on training ranges by environmental statutes is as widespread as he says it is - and I think he almost certainly right - then we're in serious national security trouble.

Miss: The M-16 rifle and the 5.56mm cartridge was adopted because of its "reduced recoil (a consideration for our kinder, gentler co-ed recruits)," which is just idiotic nonsense. The M-16 was adopted in the mid-1960s, when the Army was far from coed. The other reasons he gives are closer to the truth.

Serious Miss: The writer has bought the myth that American troops were outstanding shots until recently, he says until the Vietnam War. In fact, American soldiers after the War of 1812 were piddling marksmen, including WW 1, when somehow Sgt. York's astonishing rifle skill was became popularly thought typical. It certainly was not. Civil War commanders on both sides complained loud and often at how poorly their men shot. After WW2, the Army calculated that it had taken 30,000 fired shots to kill each single enemy soldier (including MG fire, of course, which did skew the figure some).

The fact is that today, most basic trainees have never fired a rifle, which is not a bad thing altogether. They bring no bad habits that have to be trained out before good habits can be trained in. Sometimes the prior-shooters really are already good shots, but most often they are mediocre and just think they are good.

Trainees are often scared of the rifle, too, a culturally-conditioned attitude that takes time to work out. The marksmanship training basic trainees get is excellent. The great majority of basic-training graduates are very good shots - when they graduate. Unfortunately, that's the last actual marskmanship training or real practice they ever see.

Unfortunately, the Army is parsimonious with ammo in peacetime and almost no commander teaches marksmanship as part of unit training - they get it in basic, and that's that. Apart from the rare live fire exercises, where marksmanship is not evaluated, troops fire only 40 rounds per year, plus another set in chemical suit. Heck, we didn't even train enough to maintain rifle skills, much less improve them.

Good rifle shooting comes from correct instruction followed by practice, practice practice. Shooters must learn to shoot without flinching; this is the number one reason they miss (but no one admits to doing it, of course). Proper sight picture is everything for accuracy, then smooth trigger pull, with every body part relaxed except the trigger finger.

This isn't easy even on the range for many/most troops without a lot of practice. Now compound it by having the soldier lie in a rocky hole, with mortar fire dropping all around, and the enemy shooting back.

Truly aimed rifle fire in battle is very difficult. The commanders who trained their troops to do it in wars past had to sacrifice substantial training in other skills to improve their troops' accuracy. But that's a tough call to have to make.

"Only hits count."

One WW 2 division commander did insist his troops become skilled shooters, and had them on the range many times more frequently than the norm. I can't recall his name or the division, but I do recall this anecdote: During a battle in Europe, his troops captured a German doctor whom the CG spoke to. The German doctor wanted to know why the American soldiers were so accurate - they had an uncanny ability to shoot German soldiers in the arms or shoulders.

The US commander responded, "That's not accuracy. They pulling their shots and scoring sevens when they shoot be shooting tens." When the division was pulled off the line, he sent his troops back to the range (homemade ranges, of course).

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 06:49:00 AM. Permalink |

Anti-Judaism = anti-democracy
So say two respected historians.

Writing in the October 2002 issue of Commentary magazine, [Harvard literature professor Ruth R.] Wisse sets out to compare the poisonous font of anti-Semitism today, the Arab-Muslim world, with the Nazi source of yore, and ends up offering a novel explanation of the hateful creed's potency: "Modern anti-Semitism," she writes, "achieved its power as a political instrument through its opposition to liberal democracy itself — as personified by the Jews."

There's an intriguing notion. If state-sanctioned anti-Semitism indicates a society's animus not only toward Jews, but also toward liberal democracy (not to mention tolerance and the Rights of Man), then the fallacy of decoupling the plight of Europe's Jews from the threat to the democracies becomes pretty clear: Attacks on the one may prefigure attacks on the other.

Leading me to wonder: does the rise in anti-Jewish sentiment in Europe presage a potential return to European authoritarianist government, perhaps even a return to tyranny in a country or two?

by Donald Sensing, 1/10/2003 06:48:00 AM. Permalink |

Three analyses of what's next with Iraq
Or more specifically, what the consequences are of the US being the roped dope: three excellent writers linked and excerpted by Bill Quick. They are Mark Steyn, David Warren and Michael Ledeen. Read his post and read the original essays, too.

by Donald Sensing, 1/09/2003 10:29:00 PM. Permalink |

Hey, how's your morale?
A regular-Army friend of mine sends me a copy of this missive that he sent primarily to folks in Year Group 81 (which basically means the cohort of officers commissioned in 1981). It seems there are problems in the Army's promotion system.

An Open Letter/Gripe/Whine to my fellow Year Group 1981 stuckees. . .

I'm convinced YG81 is absolutely cursed with DA Promotion Boards. For your consideration:

Back in 1990, the Major's selection board was canceled for two years as the Army had a backlog of people already selected for Major but couldn't get promoted due to DOPMA Field Grade limits. [DOPMA is the federal law that governs officer strength limits - DS] The board was held and pin-on point was not affected . Don't forget that little "downsizing" experiment they tried with our Year Group
In 1997, LTC Board was held and results released. Whoops, seems the US Senate must actually record the roll-call vote, not just a voice vote. Couldn't re-schedule until after the Summer Holidays. Vote finally came on 26 Sep , again, pin-on date was not affected;
and now Colonels Promotion board has, if you can believe this after all the mess PERSCOM went through with detailed and finite board instructions just two years ago, an "administrative error" in providing Joint Duty consideration requirements to the board members.

I have a real tough time swallowing this one. PERSCOM states pin-on point won't be affected. Think that might be optimistic in this case as the current board will be exhausted around Jun/Jul 03. If it takes the normal five months just to release and then the Senate must vote, we're back into Summer recess again. You just gotta love the Army!!!!

Sometimes I just think we are blessed to be in the Army cuz you've absolutely got to be brain damaged and dead to hang on with this type of excitement that never ends. Have a great Winter/Spring while you chew on what is left of your nails. . .

by Donald Sensing, 1/09/2003 04:39:00 PM. Permalink |

Is this for real? I report, you decide.
.
USN Catch and Release

Thanks to Jon Cherry for emailing me the shot!

Update: You have to read the first comment!

by Donald Sensing, 1/09/2003 04:19:00 PM. Permalink |

A disaster in the making: Lord of the Rings Part 3
The movie version of the famous trilogy has taken a horrible turn for the worse. This is really bad, mee-sa thinks (from Geitner Simmons via email.)

by Donald Sensing, 1/09/2003 04:05:00 PM. Permalink |

Been gone since early morning . . .
and will have to leave again a little later on, so free ice cream will be intermittent today and this evening.

by Donald Sensing, 1/09/2003 04:03:00 PM. Permalink |

Joe Katzman is back!
His first post in a long, long time is about The Two Towers. His site is now a team effort and is hosted at Winds of Change. Update your bookmarks accordingly!

by Donald Sensing, 1/08/2003 05:16:00 PM. Permalink |

Young US troops today have no sense of discipline, says active-duty NCO
I got an email today from a US Navy NCO who has been in the service for more than 12 years. It's just below, slightly edited for length. He included his name but I am not including it here.

If I remember correctly, you retired in the late 80's, which is when I joined. Since then, the number of kids joining that seem to have no sense of discipline, that they are somehow owed something, has dramatically increased. The "kinder, gentler" phase the Navy went through in the early 90's shortly after the Gulf War only exacerbated the problem. I'm seeing senior E4's and junior E5's, nearing the end of their first enlistment, being separated for problems ranging from PT failures to drugs to failure to adapt [to the rigors and standards of naval duty].

In addition, due to the force reduction of the early 90's, the Navy could not support a sudden rapid expansion. We have been reduced from three recruit training facilities to one. At Naval Air Station Sigonella (Sicily), all petty officers, regardless of seniority MUST live on the economy, there is no barracks space available. The rate at which we are currently decommissioning ships would not support a sudden influx of bodies, no where for them to serve. We are to the point now, they are considering leaving the ships deployed and rotating the crews every 6 months, like they do ballistic missile subs.

I retired in 1995, not the late 80s, but had been in the Pentagon and an Army Major Command since 1990. My last experience with troops ended in January 1990 when I departed from Fort Bragg - but those troops were paratroopers and highly motivated. I went to Bragg from artillery assignments in Germany, and enjoyed having very good troops under my command there, products of recruitment of solid citizens in the early 1980s.

So I am distressed to read this petty officer's account of young troops today. Any other active-duty or recent-service folks out there who care to comment?

by Donald Sensing, 1/08/2003 02:03:00 PM. Permalink |

Egypt makes Christmas a national holiday
Last month the Mubarak government made Christmas a national holiday, which means it ranks on the same level as all Muslim holidays. The Coptic Church in Egypt dates to apostolic days. The Copts recognize Jan. 7 as the day of Jesus' birth, so that's the holiday's date. Copts have been targets (literally) of violent Islamists in Egypt for several years and have been campaigning for greater political voice for many years.

Compared to almost all the rest of the Arab nations, Egyptian Christians are well off. Here's an account written by a US Air Force NCO of his encounter with a Saudi Arabian Christian.

by Donald Sensing, 1/08/2003 01:30:00 PM. Permalink |

More voices to expand the military
This one from USA Today, its author knows well whereof he writes.

by Donald Sensing, 1/08/2003 01:16:00 PM. Permalink |

"The opium of radical intellectuals and the crack in Osama bin Laden's pipe"
That's what the UK Times Online says anti-Americanism is. It is refreshing to read this:

Yankee-phobia is, at heart, a dark thing, a prejudice with ugly antecedents which creates unholy alliances. And, like all prejudices, it thrives on myths which will end up only serving evil ends.

It is a myth that America is a trigger-happy cowboy state over-eager to throw its weight around, a myth that America seeks to use its undoubted military power to establish an exploitative empire, and a myth that America thrives by impoverishing and oppressing other nations.

A trigger-happy starter of wars and provoker of enemies? The truth is that the US has been painstakingly slow to involve itself in foreign conflicts.

The article then dismantles the Lefts' myths about American, one by one. It's good.

by Donald Sensing, 1/08/2003 01:09:00 PM. Permalink |

Rangel has introduced his military conscription bill
CNN's story is here. Congress.org does not yet have the HR number or the text; I'll keep checking.

by Donald Sensing, 1/08/2003 09:03:00 AM. Permalink |

"The year of the scam:" Enron, WorldCom - and PowerBall
Forbes tells the real story about the PowerBall scam.

What a fitting way to end a year devoted to Enron (otc: ENRNQ - news - people ), WorldCom (otc: WCOME - news - people ), ImClone (nasdaq: IMCL - news - people ), Tyco (nyse: TYC - news - people ) and the research analysts. Call it the year of the scam. . . .

State lotteries are a sucker bet. They typically return about 55% of the money wagered. That's much less than a casino or a racetrack. The various lotteries admit it, but it's reported much less often than stories about winners, a staple on the local news. No one ever publicizes the millions of losers, but they're out there. You have to be in it to lose it.

Most of the arguments against lotteries are well known: The payouts are cheap relative to the pay-ins; players are disproportionately poor, which makes the lottery function like a regressive tax. But the mere fact that these complaints are true does not mean they should not be repeated. . . .

On the other side of the equation is the argument that playing the lottery is no more wasteful than playing videogames or listening to music or smoking or taking recreational drugs. Yet people can do those things if they want (except the drugs, of course). But of all those vices, the lottery is the only one wrapped in virtue. It's the only one where the profits supposedly go to education. It's also the only one where the states maintain a monopoly, assuring that the payouts stay cheap.

The main defense of the lottery is that it allows people to dream. That being the case, some have suggested to the Powerball promoters that they limit the top prize to $10 million or $20 million. That way the lottery could make 31 dreams (or 17 dreams if they dreamers take the lump sum) come true, rather than just one.

Lottery promoters are forthright in why they've rejected this advice: "For a $10 million jackpot draw we sell about $11 million. For a $20 million jackpot we sell about $13 million. With a $100 million jackpot we sell $50 to $70 million for the draw. [They sell more than one "draw."]...Many people write to suggest that we limit the size of the jackpot or that we split up the jackpot and give it away to a number of people. The truth is that there are many people who do not even think about playing Powerball until the jackpot rises to $40 million or $80 million or more. Even at $100 million we get calls from first-time players asking how to play the game."

As with any pyramid scheme, if the numbers don't keep getting bigger, people stop paying attention, and the scheme dies. Hence Jack Whittaker and his "$314.9 million."

by Donald Sensing, 1/08/2003 07:47:00 AM. Permalink |

Diplomatic "economy of force" in Korea
Syndicated columnist Austin Bay says the administration is "holding" in Korea in order to deal with Iraq. The reason is that the post-Cold War military is not large or deep enough to handle both at the same time.

The deep manpower and force structure cuts of the mid-1990s, the cuts that took the Army from 16 divisions in 1991 to 10, means U.S. forces are now spread thin. The cost savings from "reinventing government" touted by the Clinton administration came, in large measure, from defense. Those cuts now exact a strategic price and, in an odd way, increase the possibility of a nuclear war.

Here's why. When the Cold War ended, the new age of little wars struck with a vengeance.

An NYT headline this morning is, "Bush Welcomes Slower Approach to North Korea," so it does indeed seem we are "holding" there.

Remember the "peace dividend" that was all the buzz after the Sovier Union disbanded? How naive we all look now!

Maybe we need to add ground divisions. The War on Terror demonstrates the need for American "staying power" in a region, and staying power -- when it comes to making the long term changes really winning the terror war entails -- usually translates into well-trained troops on the ground.

I agree. We should ramp up our force structure and numbers now.

by Donald Sensing, 1/08/2003 06:42:00 AM. Permalink |

A sensible Church article about the Korean crisis
Long-time readers of mine know that I have often strongly criticized various declarations of North American and European churches concerning America 's challenges in international relations, usually meaning the war against terrorism and the potential war against Iraq. (Just see my essays for self-evident titles.)

Comes now the General Board of Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church, publishing an article online that I find positive. One reason it is more sensisble than many other similar missives may be that the author, Youngsook Charlene Kang, is of Korean lineage.

I have only minor nits to pick, such as pointing out that North Korea does not have a "new" nuclear program, it has simply re-energized its old nuclear program, and in fact the regime there has admitted it never stopped it. But that is a minor point.

Kang's article, unlike so many other church proclamations, does not simply excoriate the US and praise America's opponents. In fact, Kang pretty much admits that for now, the Bush administration is doing what it should be doing, which is rare praise coming from one of America's oldline denominations. She understands that all the players in the region have their own interests at stake, and those interests don't necessarily coincide.

Kang does not attempt to prescribe a course of action for the US, a rare display of restraint by religious writers addressing foreign policy. Instead, she calls for additional "programs of intercession, education, and public advocacy in order to further justice, peace, and reconciliation on the Peninsula" through continued contacts with the North Korea church. Of course, the North Korean church is state controlled, but the contacts should continue anyway. (Kang does not say so, but I am sure these programs include participation by the Korean Methodist Church as well. The KMC is Wesleyan in heritage, but is not part of the worldwide United Methodist Church.)

There are no diktats to the Bush administration, no simple-minded declarations that Jesus doesn't want war. Just acknowledgement that Christian people need to work together even (especially) in severely difficult circumstances. A few months ago I called for much the same actions with Iraqi Christians.

No, I don't expect that the actions Kang calls for will make Kim Jong Il behave and the nuclear problem disappear. But they cannot hurt, and may do some good toward the long-term health of the Korean peninsula.

by Donald Sensing, 1/07/2003 10:44:00 AM. Permalink |

US military too black, needs more white people
Liberal columnist Mark Shields thinks that the military has too many blacks and not enough whites. Shields beats the drum for a military draft (perishable link). He grabs the coattails of Rep. Charles Rangel, who is introducing legislation soon (he says) to bring the draft back. Shields notes that the military today is smaller than at any time of the Cold War (actually smaller than ever since the Korean War), just when military commitments are going to rise dramatically. Shields says that for the US military to meet just its current missions, "not even considering the "non-crisis" with North Korea, the United States military almost surely needs at least a half million more men under arms.

I am pretty surprised to see a member of the entrenched American liberal block calling for a much larger military. I have been mulling over posting about the need to raise the military's non-reserve, non-Guard, active-duty strength. I can't vouch for whether it should be raised by 500K, but I don't think that figure is far off for now.

Despite an unsubstantiated press hype, there never was any post-attack surge in enlistments. Desperate to meet its quota, the Army has been forced to accept hundreds of members with felony arrests. More than one out of three new volunteers fails to complete his enlistment. During the draft, between 1940 and 1973, just one out of 10 failed to do so.

It would be nice if Shields had cited sources for these claims. I was a training company commander at Ft. Jackson, SC, in the early 1980s, when the overall quality of the Army's recruits was really low. Not even the most ruthless of us sent home one-third of the basic trainees. I am very skeptical of this claim. Then Shields quotes Michael Barone (approvingly probably for the first time ever):

"War demands equality of sacrifice."

There has never been equality of sacrifice in our wars; in World War II, the infantry suffered three-fourths of all combat wounds and deaths. What draftee or volunteer was made an infantryman was not random, the Army and Marines assigned them on the basis of various tests. I think what Barone must have been getting at is that he thinks that the duty to risk sacrifice of life or limb or time in service should fall on all classes of society as equally as possible. I agree that would be good, but I am not ready to agree that this reason is a good one for restarting the draft.

The military today defending our nation is increasingly integrated by race and increasingly segregated by class.

It is true that minorities, especially blacks and Hispanics, are proportionally over-represented in the armed forces. The armed forces are indeed the most integrated entities in America and are the closest thing to a pure meritocracy in American as well. That is one big reason minorities join (and a big reason I stayed in for a career). As for increasing segregation by class - I assume he means economic class - again, I'd like to see sources cited. Intuitively, I think he's probably right, but not to the degree he probably means. But I don't think that social engineering is a good reason for restarting the draft.

It makes good sense that the nation's leaders have some personal understanding of the strengths, the weaknesses and the distinctive culture of the military.

And what has stopped them from getting that? They could have volunteered! The solution to this problem is for the voters not to elect non-veterans and for more veterans to seek office.

Charlie Rangel knows that the draft, in addition to restoring a sense of collective duty and common sacrifice, would guarantee that the nation's national interests will be more openly seriously, and vigorously, debated.

Is this really a problem? Those of you who took my online survey on that issue say not, so far: Only eight percent agree with that proposition, 73 percent flatly disagree, and 17 percent agree a draft might make Congress more deliberative, but its decisions would be the same anyway.

Shields concludes:

. . . war is not and cannot be a spectator sport, where the nation's advantaged elites and their children, at a safe remove, look on, while fellow citizens they do not know -- and will never meet -- do the fighting and the dying.

This is liberal code language for "rich, white people who vote Republican." Don't think so? When do you expect to see Shields write a column urging, say, Hollywood or media elites to enlist or send their sons and daughters off to "sacrifice"? There's no reason for Shields to wait for a draft to get more "advantaged elites and their children" to "do the fighting and the dying." He can call for volunteers now. But you'll never see such a column.

The point of the Rangel's and Shield's call for a draft is not victory in war, but undermining a Republican president. Does anyone seriously believe that if Al Gore had taken office, that Rangel et. al. would be calling for conscription?

Update: Richard Heddleson does believe that Democrats in Congress would have called for a draft if Gore had been elected.

by Donald Sensing, 1/07/2003 07:14:00 AM. Permalink |

Bush to blame for starving North Korean children, says US columnist
Three million North Koreans died in the last decade from starvation. Another seven million are now at risk of the same fate. Yesterday I read an online article that quoted some European aid workers, such as Doctors Without Borders (not a right-wing outfit, you know) as laying the blame squarely on the shoulders of none other than Kim Jong Il himself, whose personal agricultural diktats have been catastrophic and who let his people starve in order to feed and fuel his war machine.

Asia Times quotes the September 1999 issue of the South Korean magazine, Wolgan Chosun, "whose editor is a noted North Korea specialist."

As many as 3 million Koreans in the North have died of starvation because their leader, Kim Jong-il, is more concerned with his own survival and comfort than with the lives of his subjects, says the monthly, which is a sister publication of South Korea's largest and oldest daily, Chosun Ilbo. ''History will record the massacre of a minimum six million people (three million dead in the Korean War and another three million dead during the great famine) committed by father and son Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il as a devilish act in the same chapter with the holocaust of Jews by Hitler, the mass purge of Russians by Stalin and the killing fields of Pol Pot.''

But according to Martha Ezzard, a columnist for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Bush refers regularly to North Korea as an "axis of evil" country. He does not mean that North Korean children are evil, but how many of them will starve or freeze to death under the U.S. policy of isolation?

Let's see, if future starved children are Bush's fault, then the millions who starved during the 1990s were Clinton's fault. Right, Martha?

According to a Fox News report broadcast Monday, the US has given North Korea two million metric tons of food, worth $620 million, since 1995. Preasident Bush said this week that the US shipments would continue; the US is one of the top-tier food donors to the Stalinist state (maybe the top donor).

But Kim does not permit the UN World Food Program, a chief aid agency, to do its job in full.

The communist government restricted the program, which distributes the food aid, to serving 162 of the country's 206 counties. That leaves 13 percent of the 22.6 million North Koreans without aid.

The limitation has frustrated program officials.

"We have a serious issue with access because we would wish to see food assistance provided to all the people in the country who need it," said John Powell, director of the World Food Program's Asia bureau.

Powell said the North Korean government has blocked UN food aid workers from randomly checking distribution sites to ensure the food is going to hungry people.

Marcus Noland, an economist at the Institute for International Economics, said the real situation is even worse than we think: "My gut feeling is when we finally pull the rock up, we're going to find something that's pretty ugly." Indeed we will.

by Donald Sensing, 1/07/2003 06:46:00 AM. Permalink |

The present war is really a crusade.
But the crusade is being fought by Islam against the West - and non-Western non-Muslims.

Lest there be any doubt that what is going on now is a real crusade, and not just a protest against American hegemony, it is important to note that al Qaeda and other Muslim forces are now or have been engaged in conflicts not just against the West proper, but against Hindus in Kashmir and increasingly in other parts of India, as well as against Orthodox Russians in Chechnya. Moreover, the Muslim Uighurs are fighting the mostly Buddhist Chinese; and Muslims are doing battle in Indonesia and the Philippines. Hundreds were recently killed in Muslim-Christian violence in Nigeria over a beauty pageant (ironically won by a Turk, after it was moved to London). Muslim extremist cells are operating in scores of countries, and their cross-border cooperation in training and financing gives credence to the assumption that the driving force is not strictly localized grievances (witness Kenya, Bali) as much as a clarion call to a worldwide transnational Islamic revival.

All of this brings us to a number of hard political realities.

First, the discontent in the Islamic world is largely the result of inept and corrupt leaderships that have squandered vast fortunes in oil revenues. Despite its petro-windfall, the Arab world largely ignored and almost completely missed out on the economic boom and technological advances of the last 20 years. That isn't universally true of the Islamic world (witness Malaysia) but it does raise a serious question. Can Islam and democracy coexist at all? (Witness Iran and watch Turkey's efforts in that regard closely.) The alternative has been the emergence of demigods with 99.9 percent of the vote in rigged elections, such as Saddam Hussein, who heads a nominally secular Baath Party but seeks legitimacy in a dictatorship wrapped in Islamic trappings, or Moammar Gaddafi, who coined the phrase "Islamic Bomb" in urging development of an atomic one.

Absent a true reformation within Islam itself (which seems increasingly unlikely), the frustration over the present and the dreams of past glory of the 7th century are manifested by a destructive effort to bring the rest of the world down to Islam's current level.

by Donald Sensing, 1/07/2003 06:39:00 AM. Permalink |

Good-doing Jews must die.
OpinionJournal seems mystified that Yasir Arafat's al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades "murdered Massoud Mahlouf Allon, a 70-year-old Israeli man," who "used to collect used clothing and blankets and give them to Bedouin and Palestinians" in the Jordan Valley. Why did they very brutally murder Allon, who was showing charity and mercy to the Palestinians?

Charles Johnson on Little Green Footballs (linked at left) has over the months documented several instances of murders of Palestinian Arabs by Palestinian terrorists who accused them of collaboration or even simple friendliness with the Jews. The Palestinian terrorists are united in their desire to destroy Israel as a Jewish state. They are united in their desire to kill Jews. What the terrorists cannot tolerate is any common ground or humane contact between Jews and Palestinians. Such relationships might cause more and more Palestinians to reject the destruction of the Jewish state and Jewish people.

Likewise, al Aqsa killed Allon precisely because he was charitable and merciful to the Palestinians. What the terrorists cannot afford to let their own people see is a Jew doing good to them. Allon had to die because evil cannot endure the good.

by Donald Sensing, 1/06/2003 07:53:00 PM. Permalink |

China and Russia reject N. Korean attempts to paint US as agressor
Russian and Chinese representatives to the UN Security Council, along with the entire rest of the UNSC, rejected North Korea's claim that the US is an aggressor to blame for the communist state's rejection of nuclear-program restrictions. White House spokeman Ari Fleischer commented, "It takes a lot of work to get condemned by Iran and Cuba. And North Korea has done it."

by Donald Sensing, 1/06/2003 05:40:00 PM. Permalink |

Oil and the Iraq conflict
Thomas Friedman of The New York Times says the probably-coming war with Iraq is "partly about oil." He's right, but not for the reasons he states, of which more momentarily. The probably near-future war with Iraq is partly about oil because oil wealth has fueled Saddam's WMD program. If Honduras, for example, fell under the rule of an equally vicious despot, it could cause a lot of trouble but it could not develop nukes because Honduras just doesn't have the money and has no means to earn it. So in one sense, oil - more accurately, the income that comes from Iraq's oil - is certainly part of the reason the US and Iraq are headed for war.

More at stake than oil in Iraq
But oil is not the only reason. If all the US wanted to do was seize a lot of oil, we could just take over, say, Brunei, which is also stinking rich with oil money, although its oil reserves are nowhere near as great as Iraq's.

Actually, if Bush et. al. simply wanted to gain access to Iraq's oil, there is a simpler, easier and faster way to do so that does not put US troops at risk or cause rifts with nations allied or friendly to America: strike a business deal with Saddam that in exchange for us declaring that the UN sanctions against Iraq are no longer necessary and are now ended (no one will object to us ignoring them until the UNSC lifts them), US oil companies get near-monopolistic trade rights to Iraq's oil, maybe even at a discount from spot-market prices.

After all, if Saddam really isn't a threat to America, it would matter not that his oil income suddenly triples. He might even help Osama bin laden build more day care centers. Back to Friedman:

I say this possible Iraq war is partly about oil because it is impossible to explain the Bush team's behavior otherwise. Why are they going after Saddam Hussein with the 82nd Airborne and North Korea with diplomatic kid gloves — when North Korea already has nuclear weapons, the missiles to deliver them, a record of selling dangerous weapons to anyone with cash, 100,000 U.S. troops in its missile range and a leader who is even more cruel to his own people than Saddam?

Actually, Friedman winds up in the right place in this article, he just gets there the wrong way. Should we presume from his logic here that if North Korea also had oil, we'd be going after it also? No, of course not, because there are good reasons to confront Saddam coercively but not Kim Jong Il.

A difference of intent
Saddam is developing WMDs (chemical and bio now, intensive pursuit of nukes) for a different reason that North Korea. Now, I can't read minds any better than the next guy, and the North Korean regime is one of the toughest on earth to analyze. But I am led to conclude that the North has developed nuclear arms to deter attack on it rather than to use in conquest. The regime there is constantly exhorting its people to be ready to resist US aggression and attack. What the North wants to do is use nukes to ensure the continuation of the status quo of the Korean peninsula, meaning its existence. If at some time the peninsula is reunified under Northern rule, so much the better.

But what Saddam wants to do is drastically change the status quo of the entire Middle East. I have already written how, and this post is long enough now, so just click here and here and here.

Friedman concludes quite correctly.

If, on the other hand, the Bush team, and the American people, prove willing to stay in Iraq and pay the full price, in money and manpower, needed to help Iraqis build a more progressive, democratizing Arab state — one that would use its oil income for the benefit of all its people and serve as a model for its neighbors — then a war partly over oil would be quite legitimate. It would be a critical step toward building a better Middle East.

As I recall, the blogosphere has been saying that for months.

by Donald Sensing, 1/06/2003 07:00:00 AM. Permalink |

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