Big Al supports the Big O

OK, now for more reasons than this one, I now support Obama for President.  Heres why…

 Simply stated, he understands that only good can come from talking.  Given that last night he stated that he would readily meet with leaders of countries that are not ‘aligned’ with the United States.  OK, so Hillary doesn’t agree, yeah, well, she is wrong.  Again, simple, there are three results that can come from talking:

1.  A solution results, in which the US benefits and there is no war.

2.  A solution does not result, in which other actions must be taken, the worst being war.

3.  We arrive at a solution in which the other country, or the US, does not honor.  After which, we still have the option of war.

Without talking, meeting with, and negotiation, then we have removed one of our primary options for resolving conflict without military conflict.  Which leaves:

1.  War.

 By talking, we have not removed the option of later going to war if negotiations fail, or if the other country does not honor those negotiations, we have merely opened our options and allowed for another method for dealing with conflict.

Go Obama, and best of luck.

Just what I wanted for my Birthday

Well, I finally got what I wanted for my Birthday, Saddam’s head on a plate.  Sure, it may be a little simple, but I like simple, and I figure that a world leader is only entitled to kill 100,000 people before he deserves the death penalty.  I’m glad they gave him a traitors death instead of a heros’ death.  Hanging him for the killing of his own countrymen is retribution.

 Now the interesting part, this means that people should be held accountable for the deaths which they cause.  So what about other world leaders who cause the deaths of their own countrymen?  Sure, maybe not directly, but what if they act in a negligent or reckless manner and cause people to die? (yeah, i’m talking about the pre-war planning for Iraq).

But here are my predictions, the North and South of Iraq will experience a small peace dividend as a result.  There will be some small amount of peace in these regions.  The middle of Iraq, the Sunni part, will experience an increase in violence for a short period following the holiday of Eid Al-Adha, presumably because of Saddam, but in reality because there is no other good reason to fight.

Of course, this doesn’t change what we need to do in Iraq, get out of the cities, do what armies are designed to do, fight in the open, leave the urban fighting to the police.  Set up border security and kill anything except bedouins trying to cross the border and therefore provide a secure environment for the Iraqis to form an Iraqi government.

North Korean Nukes

The North Korean Nuclear test, although bad for the environment, is a great thing for national security of both the US and the Korean peninsula.

The sad news is that North Korea gaining nuclear weapons merely means that we can’t invade, and are forced to use non-military actions such as diplomatic, economic and information to coerce the regime.

No other country has used weapons of mass destruction as effectively as the United States, our use of biological weapons literally wiped a race of peoples off the face of the planet (Native Americans and smallpox blankets).  We only used nuclear weapons as a means to more quickly end World War II.

North Korea acquiring nuclear weapons presents a few options which The Prince would be proud.  One, in order to aid in the defense of other surrounding nations, we can offer greater military assistance to South Korea, Japan, Russia, and the Phillipines.  Second, we give North Korea a simple message: “use nuclear weapons against anyone, and we’ll bomb you into the stone age.”  North Korea will be unable to use their weapons without ensuring their assured destruction.

The doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction ensures that all countries who use Weapons of Mass Destruction will be completely destroyed, committing effective suicide.

The true threat does not come with nuclear weapons that can be attributed to a particular country, where the doctrine of MAD can apply, but with non-national groups where we cannot determine who detonated a nuclear device.  Without determining who produced a nuclear weapon, we cannot use MAD to ensure proper deterrence and retaliation.

A conversation between two vets.

 This is an ongoing conversation between myself and another veteran.  He was first, and my comments are in between the dashes. -A As far as this “war”, I think it’s severely misguided.

The premise of it is good (however fighting a ‘war’ on terrorism is like fighting a war on racism or sexism) Somewhere along the way the cause was misdirected.

Sure Saddam was an evil person, but he wasn’t really doing anything to us. We had him pretty well contained. I feel like out of the “Axis of Terror” we decided to pick on the weaker one of the three. Now we’ve just stirred up the hornet’s nest. We’re fighting this ‘war’ halfassed. We can’t go after these people/groups only part of the time. We need to commit to it or just stop all together. Too many politians are playing the political game and are riding the fence. But I can’t blame them. This is a nasty fight that will last a long time.

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I think that we got rid of the enemy we knew and could anticipate, and traded it for the enemy we don’t know and can’t predict. Honestly, I think that our best course of action would (and I’m not just using hindsight, I’ve been saying this for years) be to have asked Saddam for the head of bin Laden on a plate in exchange for reduced or removed sanctions. Let the two of them fight it out, and then deal with the results. Better to have them fight each other anyway. Hes been our proxy before, why not again?

As to what to do now, GET OUT OF THE CITIES! We have no business being there other than to get shot at. They can’t beat us in the open desert, and the only thing we need to do to create a stable Iraq is train the Iraqi forces and then set up security to prevent forigners from entering and causing a mess. The Iraqi’s will create a democracy, we don’t need to do it at the point of a gun. Plus we can’t.

How to win, or lose a war

This isn’t anything new, but somehow people seem to always forget it.

A war is not just raw untamed violence, it is the enforcement of a political decision by force.  And like any political decision, it is a multifaceted engagement between no less than two powers.

And when you’re considering a political decision such as invading another country, you must consider the goals involved.  The stated goals of the current war in Iraq are to remove Saddam Hussein and the Baath regime, and establish a free and democratic Iraq.

The ability to actually complete this goal in concept (ie establishing democracy at the end of a gun) can be debated elsewhere.  What I take issue with is the single faceted approach to warfare that the current administration has taken.

In any war, and in fact any interaction between at least two powers, there are four methods that one power can exert influence upon another power.  They’re very simple, and there is even an acronym for it: DIME.

1.  Diplomatic – This is basic dialogue and give and take.

2.  Information – The use of information to influence another power, for example, the democratizing power of the Internet gives everyone a voice in the world (me included).  Or propaganda, like what Osama Bin Laden does so well.

3.  Military – Fairly self explanatory, do what I say, or I’ll kill you and bomb your country into a parking lot and send in Marines to paint the lines.

4. Economic – Because sanctions work so well, and they actually do.

All four of these methods can be used in any interaction with other powers.  And they are used all the time even when there is no declared ‘war’.

The issue currently revolves around the inability of the United States to utilize all four aspects of influence to win the war in Iraq.  Its plain enough to see that in a stand up military fight, the US can destroy any other military power in the world, maybe even two of them.  The anti-US forces, in their many forms, have wisely chosen to forgo direct military action and utilize both asymmetric warfare in the form of roadside bombings, and more importantly to use information warfare against us.

If the US is intent on winning the war in Iraq, (which is debatable) then we need to establish programs and actions that ‘wage war’ on all fronts, including economic assistance, information warfare (which in our case, should be nothing more than telling the truth), and diplomatic measures designed to garner support both within Iraq and outside Iraq.

C. Rice (no I can’t spell her first name) wasted a perfectly good chance to establish some inkling of a relationship with Syria.  Although tragic, the bombings at the US Embassy provided an opportunity to praise the actions of the Syrian security who prevented a tragic loss of American life and establish a relationship with Syria which could lead to more stability in both Iraq and Lebanon.  There would have been no harm in acknowledging the assistance that Syria offered.

A

Being a Cheapskate

I realize that this doesn’t really belong here, or anywhere on this blog, but I thought I should put it out there if it can save people money.

Too cheap to buy a legal version of Microsoft Office?

Try OpenOffice, from http://www.openoffice.org

Works just as well as the Microsuck version, without the price.

A

The War in Lebanon – It’s not between nations

The current conflict in Lebanon has been touted by the news media as a conflict between Israel and Lebanon, or Hezbollah, or sometimes even between Islam and Judaism and Christianity. Although on the surface, these seem like viable arguments to some degree or another, I think the answer lies deeper.

First, a quick look at the history of the conflict in the Mideast as it pertains to Israel. The key players are Yasser Arafat (since deceased, but nonetheless important) leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, Ariel Sharon, the Prime Minister of Israel, and Sheikh Ahmed Ismail Yassin, the spiritual leader of Hamas, an organization dedicated to the destruction of Israel.

Ask yourself, what was the occupation of each of these people prior to their rise in their respective political parties and movements? Some might guess that Ariel Sharon was a military officer, few would know that Yasser Arafat was an Engineer. Sheikh Ahmed Yassin has been a religious leader and involved in Hamas most of his life, since his options were severely limited due to an injury at age 12. What is important, is that all of these people were relative nobody’s in the world. Their sense of importance and self-worth was tied to conflict between Israel and the Arab world.

So what do these three people have in common? They come from different backgrounds, with seemingly opposing goals; however, their goal is unified and simple. They want war.

Without a war to fight, their purpose in life would be void, and they would be relegated to the relative anonymity of a retired wartime leader, or even worse, a return to their pre-war obscure occupations. Of course, the victorious would be revered and respected, but they would have only a small fraction of their previous power. Because these three are wartime leaders, or ‘Hawks’, they have the ability to consolidate their power as a result of war.

Now that the war has turned into a ceasefire, leaders in the US have attempted to analyze who was the winner and who was the loser. The simple answer is that Israel is the loser, but so is Lebanon.

Terrorism is not a rich mans conflict. Aside from a notable Saudi, a vast majority of ‘terrorists’ are poor, with nothing to lose. With Israel’s destruction of Lebanon’s safety, security, and infrastructure, they have ensured that the next 40 years will bring a new generation of attacks from more 20 year old kids with nothing to lose.

Israel also lost the peace. On the nightly news, many of the Arabs interviewed clearly state that Hezbollah, or Hamas, or any of the other radical organizations are providing money and support in the form of food and shelter. To the Arab involved in the conflict, it shows who the ‘good guys’ are. The ‘good guys’ are the ones who will look out for their families and their welfare, which currently these organizations are doing, and Israel is not.

The simple fact, is that Israelis were kidnapped, and the Israeli hawk leadership decided that a special operations mission to retrieve them would not achieve the political goal of keeping the hawk leaders in power. The radical leaders in Lebanon, Syria, and Iran, obviously understood that a war with Israel would allow them to consolidate power in the region and ensure that it would stay that way for many years to come. They understood that it would only take a token offense to spark a war, and that would benefit them, providing they survive the conflict.

To make things abundantly clear, the enemy is not Lebanon, nor is it Israel, nor even Hezbollah or Iran, but the leadership of all parties who would ensure their stay in power by walking over the dead bodies of their countrymen.

 

A quick note about the title of the blog and philosophy

One thing that you hopefully will notice about this blog is that the entries are short. I figure if they are more than a few paragraphs long, no one will read them.

The title comes from Dr. Strangelove, I hate to say that I just see too much of that movie in todays government, albeit in color.

The commentary will range from military matters to politics, which are basically the same thing, to the occasional post regarding society and how it (is/is not) going straight to hell as a result of the (Democrats/Republicans).

If you can come up with a better name for the blog, or would like to offer ideas, criticisms, etc, don’t be shy, or hold back.

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