Airpower is all well and good. So are nukes, for that matter.
Back in the 1950s many pundits, especially in the USAF, argued that nuclear weapons made ground forces obsolete. An American general replied “You will always need some poor bastard, with a bayonet on the end of his rifle, to winkle the other poor bastard out of his foxhole and make him sign the peace treaty”.
I doubt that that will ever change, even if the bayonet is a monoblade on the business end of a bead rifle.
How else to crack through Americans’ everlasting sentiments against war even when it is clearly needed. This reaction by US citizens mimics what my mother taught me about my father’s (naturalized US citizen of Canadian parents) relationship with his family back in the Toronto Canada area. They were pushing the British side of the war, of course. The US was all WC Fields, “Go away, boy, you bother me.”
Americans always seem to think the enemy has no say in the matter when war is involved. Sorry, guys, the enemy gets a vote. And I am crazy enough to take a nation’s government at it’s word when it says it plans to destroy the US utterly AND is working towards nuclear weapons.
One thing I notice his how close Trump came to earning that TACO nickname. He REALLY does not want war. He just got stretched too far, Israel created the occasion, then Israel created the vacuum only the US could fill, and finally Trump rose to the need of the times.
Considering the amount of trouble our isolationism has gotten us into over two and a half centuries and more MAYBE this time we can stop with merely a 6 pack of bunker-busters. God, I hope so. The other three in the axis of evil are in more need of heavy attention now than Iran, Leave Iran to Israel while we keep the lid on Putin, Pooh Jinping, and wozname from the Dork Empire (North of South Korea). What they do at home is not our concern unless it affects world stability. When they mess with world stability they need chastisement, perhaps at a regime destabilization level. Then let the natives seize or not their chance.
The natives have that chance in Iran now; there is already enough of them to pull off regime change if of course it were not for the regime having the guns and not being afraid to use them on their own. But now, there is an opening.
Not so easy in ChiCom land, Russkieville, or even NoKo…the people are under the thumb, physically and largely even mentally. I don’t think they could or would pull off a coup or even a proper rebellion (ChiComs blew their chance after Tianemen, the Russkies after the fall, but of course those poor NoKo folks have never known or been allowed to know anything about anything but their Rocket Boy.
So, while Iran spits and sputters and probably goes down in a heap, we had better plan ahead as someone said, for what comes next with this evil trilogy of death dealers with nothing to lose and everything to gain…that always makes for a very dangerous enemy. And while we had the luxury of choice and timing as to our defense of the Jews, it won’t be at our option when the rockets start flying our way.
Will there be boots on the ground then? I don’t see how we can avoid it.
Mark the stock prices of the military-industrial complex companies now and in two months. Standby for Anduril to drop its IPO. Business will be booming. And please, pray for our men and women in combat arms. Let 45-47 be wise enough to tell the Neocons to piss off. Let Israel decaptitate the bastards.
Iraq/Afghanistan: Bush (Biden)
Libya: Obama
Vietnam: Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon
What I don’t see in the list is the name Trump. Maybe DJT end up acting like his predecessors (he didn’t as 45), maybe not. Unlike comic strip characters, however, I am neither a military genius nor a clairvoyant.
Still, this is exactly what I voted for: Peace through strength.
The Iranians essentially declared war when they seized our diplomats back in 1979. This was a violation of the ancient custom that diplomats are inviolable. They may be declared Persona Non Grata, deported, and told not to return, but their persons were never to be threatened or abused. If this were ancient Greece, the gods would be planning exquisite punishments for the Mullahs and their supporters. As it stands, the U.S. has been justified in striking Iran since 4 November 1979.
Islam has conquered 57 nations, with England and Germany next. Western civilization, what was once called Christendom, is in Islam’s crosshairs, championed by Iran. Iran’s proxies wreak havoc world wide. But their keys, the Big Goals, are ICBMs delivering nukes. You have no problem with your main character, a sniper, “retiring” his targets. You have no problem “disappearing” invading illegal aliens from the ranch. But your indestructible libido-driven fantasy shapeshifting terminators are just that, a fantasy. They don’t exist and cannot protect us. Blorp. You’re okay with Iran building their nuclear bombs and ICBMs? Then what?
16 Comments
Then is not now.
Learn from history so as not to repeat it.
But do not let history cripple you or kill you.
The German philosopher Georg Hegel is credited with saying, “The only thing we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history.”
Airpower is all well and good. So are nukes, for that matter.
Back in the 1950s many pundits, especially in the USAF, argued that nuclear weapons made ground forces obsolete. An American general replied “You will always need some poor bastard, with a bayonet on the end of his rifle, to winkle the other poor bastard out of his foxhole and make him sign the peace treaty”.
I doubt that that will ever change, even if the bayonet is a monoblade on the business end of a bead rifle.
clear ether
eon
How else to crack through Americans’ everlasting sentiments against war even when it is clearly needed. This reaction by US citizens mimics what my mother taught me about my father’s (naturalized US citizen of Canadian parents) relationship with his family back in the Toronto Canada area. They were pushing the British side of the war, of course. The US was all WC Fields, “Go away, boy, you bother me.”
Americans always seem to think the enemy has no say in the matter when war is involved. Sorry, guys, the enemy gets a vote. And I am crazy enough to take a nation’s government at it’s word when it says it plans to destroy the US utterly AND is working towards nuclear weapons.
One thing I notice his how close Trump came to earning that TACO nickname. He REALLY does not want war. He just got stretched too far, Israel created the occasion, then Israel created the vacuum only the US could fill, and finally Trump rose to the need of the times.
Considering the amount of trouble our isolationism has gotten us into over two and a half centuries and more MAYBE this time we can stop with merely a 6 pack of bunker-busters. God, I hope so. The other three in the axis of evil are in more need of heavy attention now than Iran, Leave Iran to Israel while we keep the lid on Putin, Pooh Jinping, and wozname from the Dork Empire (North of South Korea). What they do at home is not our concern unless it affects world stability. When they mess with world stability they need chastisement, perhaps at a regime destabilization level. Then let the natives seize or not their chance.
{^_^}
The natives have that chance in Iran now; there is already enough of them to pull off regime change if of course it were not for the regime having the guns and not being afraid to use them on their own. But now, there is an opening.
Not so easy in ChiCom land, Russkieville, or even NoKo…the people are under the thumb, physically and largely even mentally. I don’t think they could or would pull off a coup or even a proper rebellion (ChiComs blew their chance after Tianemen, the Russkies after the fall, but of course those poor NoKo folks have never known or been allowed to know anything about anything but their Rocket Boy.
So, while Iran spits and sputters and probably goes down in a heap, we had better plan ahead as someone said, for what comes next with this evil trilogy of death dealers with nothing to lose and everything to gain…that always makes for a very dangerous enemy. And while we had the luxury of choice and timing as to our defense of the Jews, it won’t be at our option when the rockets start flying our way.
Will there be boots on the ground then? I don’t see how we can avoid it.
Great ro hear these comments, illuminating.
Some tend to forget the ‘other poor bastard’ will fight for his country just as hard as we’d fight for ours upon seeing foreign boots on our ground.
Dejah Thoris, America’s future girlfriend
Deety and her “twin” Libby?
Don’t forget the “Smart Girl”, Gay Deceiver!
Zar Belk!
Mark the stock prices of the military-industrial complex companies now and in two months. Standby for Anduril to drop its IPO. Business will be booming. And please, pray for our men and women in combat arms. Let 45-47 be wise enough to tell the Neocons to piss off. Let Israel decaptitate the bastards.
CHRIS,
SUPPORT LEVEL PORTION OF THE PAGE IS NOT SHOWING
The difference being …
Iraq/Afghanistan: Bush (Biden)
Libya: Obama
Vietnam: Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon
What I don’t see in the list is the name Trump. Maybe DJT end up acting like his predecessors (he didn’t as 45), maybe not. Unlike comic strip characters, however, I am neither a military genius nor a clairvoyant.
Still, this is exactly what I voted for: Peace through strength.
The Iranians essentially declared war when they seized our diplomats back in 1979. This was a violation of the ancient custom that diplomats are inviolable. They may be declared Persona Non Grata, deported, and told not to return, but their persons were never to be threatened or abused. If this were ancient Greece, the gods would be planning exquisite punishments for the Mullahs and their supporters. As it stands, the U.S. has been justified in striking Iran since 4 November 1979.
Zar Belk!
Even Ghengis Khan valued diplomacy!
Islam has conquered 57 nations, with England and Germany next. Western civilization, what was once called Christendom, is in Islam’s crosshairs, championed by Iran. Iran’s proxies wreak havoc world wide. But their keys, the Big Goals, are ICBMs delivering nukes. You have no problem with your main character, a sniper, “retiring” his targets. You have no problem “disappearing” invading illegal aliens from the ranch. But your indestructible libido-driven fantasy shapeshifting terminators are just that, a fantasy. They don’t exist and cannot protect us. Blorp. You’re okay with Iran building their nuclear bombs and ICBMs? Then what?