Asymmetrical warfare, 1906
They had never been Filipinos: their identity pre-existed King Philip of Spain; their national consciousness had always been as Muslims. After the first Mohammedan missionary arrived in Sulu in 1380 parts of the island of Mindanao had constituted themselves into the Sultanate of Sulu. A succession of Europeans: the Portuguese, French, British, and Spaniards had attempted to incorporate it into their respective colonial schemes but the Muslim Malays, led by Imams who controlled ruthless kris killers, resisted implacably. When beaten on the battlefield they simply surrendered out of convenience, signed a peace treaty and disregarded it once the enemy force had left.
When the US acquired Mindanao after the beating Spain in the Spanish-American war, Americans came face to face with what came to be known as asymmetrical warfare. Here were attacks on civilians, beheadings, raids on schools. All the stuff of modern headlines. And in the pre-explosive era the ultimate weapon of Imams was the suicide bomber of the day: the juramentado. The difficulty of the campaign against the Moros is suggested by number of Medals of Honor awarded to the regular US Army (not the Constabulary): five MOHs were awarded in 1911 alone for actions on or near the island of Basilan. But reading Victor Hurley's the Jungle Patrol is the best way to get a sense of that long-ago campaign. It largely describes the experience of the Philippine Constabulary, a unit of Filipino enlisted men with American embeds, a creature that would be instantly familiar to men in Iraq. Reading the Jungle Patrol is an exercise in deja vu. If you can imagine a Chinese trader on a boat in place of an expatriate Sri Lankan truck driver in Iraq this scene of murder will be instantly familiar.
The night of November 1, 1907, a Chinese trader named Tao Tila had the dubious distinction of being the first recorded victim of Jikiri. The Chinese was sailing a vinta along the coast of the island of Jolo, engaged in trade with the Moros. Off the coast of Lumapid, in the blackness of night, a swift sailing boat sped out of the dark, and a voice aboard the Malay privateer called in the Sulu tongue, "Kill them." A moment later the pirate ship was alongside, and the crew of the Chinese boat were stricken with krises before they could rise from their benches.
Or if you've been in an expatriate worker's compound relaxing after a hard week of work you can imagine the scene of what would today be called a terrorist attack.
They entered the camp and approached Case, offering to purchase a vinta (sailboat). Case replied that they had no boats to sell, and the Moros withdrew. At five o'clock the raid began. The seven Moros deployed about the camp. On signal, one of the bandits entered the store where Mrs. Case was arranging the stock and asked for cigarettes. As the woman turned to the shelves she heard Verment scream outside and, looking through the window, saw the logger go down before the blades of two Moros. ... As Verment lay dying outside the store, Case was set upon by two other Moros, who severed his head with a stroke. The wife of the dead Verment received a ghastly kris wound that laid open her back from shoulder to hip.
The suicide bomber had his direct precusor in the Juramentado. Here's a turn of the century convoy going down an apparently secure street.
Lieutenant Rodney, an officer of the 2nd Cavalry, had gone for a Sunday afternoon walk with his small daughter. Walking unarmed on the Jolo-Asturias road, Rodney had been preceding a seaman named Steel and two other sailors from the Quiros by a few steps. Before the sailors could draw their weapons, a Moro burst suddenly into view, hacking with a barong and killing Rodney instantly. A guard leaped from a sentry post as the sailors began to fire their revolvers, and blew the Moro's brains out with a shotgun.
The Mohammedans of the Philippines had originated a unique and deadly method of individual fighting that was a degenerate offshoot of the principle of the jihad, or Holy War, that is specified by the Koran ... According to the Moro belief, it was within the power of one man, and his kris, to break in a stride from the miserable nipa shacks of the Sulu shores to the scented gardens of Paradise where the houris waited. For the Koran offers great reward for the slain in battle.
One example of the tremendous power of fanatical motivation is provided by this account. It calls to mind the numerous descriptions of VBIEDs shrugging off bullets as it barrels towards its target.
Lieutenant Ellsey of the Constabulary was sent into the hills to serve warrant on a Moro named Usap for stealing carabao. He had anticipated no particular trouble, and carried with him a small patrol of six men. He found his man standing in the door of the usual Moro shack, with a ladder leading up to the door. The Moro glowered down at the small patrol as Ellsey served his warrant. His expression did not change as he turned to get his turban for the trip. But Ellsey felt that all was not well. He circled the shack and saw Usap reach under a mat and draw forth a barong. The Constabulary Lieutenant raised his rifle and drilled the Moro through his head. As Usap dropped, two other Moros leaped from the room. The waiting patrol dropped them in mid-air. They were dead when they hit the ground. The patrol then mounted the ladder and captured three additional Moros who had not yet worked themselves into the amuck stage.
While they were tying these prisoners beneath the house, a Moro in a near-by field was plowing rice with a carabao. They heard him shout as he leaped to attack with a barong. "Timbuck aco," he was shouting; "shoot me." He came with long bounding strides, headed straight for the waiting patrol. Four of the soldiers opened fire on the advancing Moro in support of Lieutenant Ellsey. A stream of hot lead poured into his body, but the Moro never faltered. He came nearer, slower now, but still on his feet. The barong was upraised as he headed for Lieutenant Ellsey. Ellsey fired his last shot, and the Moro still came. Ten feet from the officer a Krag bullet thudded into the amuck's spine. His legs gave away. As he fell, he hurled his barong before he died. The patrol stripped the dead man and turned him over. Twelve bullet holes were in his body. Ellsey had escaped decapitation by only ten feet.
Juramentados could operate in tactical teams. This account of US Cavalry unit at Camp Severs in Jolo describes what it was like to be under a sustained juramentado attack.
The camp itself was a large rectangle, completely enclosed with wire. The line of company tents were about ten feet inside the wire on each side. Inside the line of tents were the saddle racks and the picket lines of horses. The fence was seven feet high, with ten wires, making the strands about eight inches apart. Every twenty feet along the top of the fence, was a Dietz lantern with reflector to light up the high grass outside for several yards. The firing trench just inside was. banked up and ready for business. In a few seconds after an alarm by the sentries, the men could be out of their tents and ready to meet an attack. We felt secure. ...
It was in the night that I came out of a deep sleep feeling that a shot had awakened me. Then there were two shots and a cry: 'MOROS . . . MOROS.' Then a whole barrage of shots. I reached for my riot gun. It was gone! So was Lieutenant Crites. Snatching my .45 from beneath my pillow, I tore aside the mosquito-net canopy and ran out of the tent. Dark figures were coming up to the fence on the run. The firing was general. ...
A big cavalryman charged out of a tent just ahead of me with a riot gun. He poked the gun within a foot of the running figure ahead of me and blasted. The man swerved and stumbled on. 'My God,' I wanted to shout, 'stop shooting at our own men.' Then I brought up suddenly. Powder smoke filled my nostrils and I was looking down the barrel of that same riot gun. The big soldier was about to let go again. Some kind of a squealing voice came out of me: 'Hey . . . it's me . . . it's me'... I would never have recognized it as my voice. ...Then all firing ceased as the men went at it in a furious bayonet to barong duel that was a fight to the finish. At the nearest cavalry tent a white soldier rolled out under the wall, rifle in hand. Before he could stand up a Moro was upon him. Another soldier crawled out and the Moro leaped to him. My Corporal Batiokan ran up to crush the Moro's skull with a rifle butt. Blood was squirting from two great gashes in the cavalrymen's back. Soldiers came running to carry away the wounded man. Their uniforms were red with blood. ... One of the men was past medical aid. He had been chopped to ribbons, with arms and legs severed and lying apart from his body. ...
Seven of the eight juramentados who had made the attack had succeeded in getting through the wire in the face of the fire. One lay dead outside the wire and seven were stretched out in the enclosure when morning came and we made inspection. The hospital was lined with terribly wounded men, slashed with barongs, and we were forced to kill many of the slashed horses who had been in the path of the charging Moros. The juramentados who had plunged through the wire in a desperate dive had left skin and clothes on the wire. They were horribly torn from head to foot by the long barbs. They were riddled with bullets, and many had heads bashed in and bayonet stabs. They lay there, with glittering eyeballs and bared black teeth. Their heads were shaven and their eyebrows were a thin line of hair.
Then the US Army did something the Spaniards had not been able to accomplish in three hundred years. It seized tactical control over the entire area of Mindanao, including the hinterlands, using combined American-Filipino teams whose exploits were almost unbelievable. Here's one example:
[Captain Elarth] was ... investigating a report of Moro organization, and he came into contact with a thousand tribesmen, armed and ready for action. ... He called for a parley with the headmen; and the Constabulary--ten men and the Captain--sat down on the summit of a hill, surrounded by the hillmen. Three Moros on the edge of the crowd began to mutter and the headmen rose from the ground and began to draw away. Then the trio of frenzied fanatics drew their weapons and rushed the Constabulary Captain. The Constabulary took refuge in a rally formation, with fixed bayonets. The leading Moro was almost upon them before Elarth could draw his pistol. "Pot-i-na" (Die now): the voice of the Moro was a scream as he hurled himself upon the Captain. At the same instant the hillmen released a shower of spears.
Elarth dropped the first two Moros with skull shots from his pistol, but there was no time to stop the third, who was armed with a spear. There was a movement behind the doomed Captain, and Sergeant Alvarez leaped forward to take the spear in his chest. Too late to save his Sergeant, Elarth blew the Moro's head away with a .45 calibre bullet. Had the long-haired hillmen supported the three Moro leaders as they charged, the entire detachment would have been wiped out with the loss of eleven rifles. But the hillmen contented themselves with showers of spears before they melted into the jungle. Left on the field were eight dead Constabulary bodies bristling with spears. Elarth, with his two surviving men, jerked the bolts from the dead men's rifles and plunged into the deep bush. All day and all night they marched, to return safely to the Constabulary post. Elarth had ably upheld that old fighting tradition of the Corps: "To be outnumbered always; to be outfought, never."
The sort of men capable of defeating the Moros were pretty rough. Take Oscar Preuss.
At 4:30 in the afternoon he began on a quart of Gordon's Gin--at midnight it was finished and Preuss was deadly sober. He was ... almost too rough for Mindanao. His career had included a term as a Sergeant in the German Lancers during the Boxer Rebellion in China. He had then crossed to East Africa as a Lieutenant of Infantry. Various South and Central American revolutions saw him in action, and he had ridden for Uncle Sam as a cavalryman.
He made few military mistakes. One of them had been the time he disarmed a Moro and neglected to search the natives' hair for a dagger. He bashed out the Mohammedan's brains when the knife flashed into view, but not before the Moro had slashed the cheek of Preuss and pierced the roof of his mouth.
They say he was called to Manila to justify his ruthless slaughter in Mindanao. A Colonel of the Board of Inquiry questioned him, "Captain Preuss, it is said that you, personally, have killed 250 Moros. What is your statement, sir, to that report?" Preuss drew himself up, and officers say his tone was placid and yet discontented: "The report is in error, Colonel; my count places the total at 265." In 1911 Preuss won a Medal of Valor at Mailog Cotta in Lanao. He was then a First Lieutenant of Constabulary, with four years' service. It was his sixth or seventh war, though Preuss was then but thirty-three.
Another officer of almost demented courage was Leonard Furlong, who the Moros feared as an almost unearthly being. Furlong actually led a unit of Christian/Moro constabulary men that would go anywhere, any time to take on anybody. One example of his exploits is given below.
Furlong arrived at Bugasan at daylight on the morning of July 9. He had but six rifles in his party. He called to the inhabitants of the house to surrender, and found, not a few Moros, but a gang of 100 armed bandits who surrounded his small force. In one of the most dramatic hand-to-hand combats of the period, Furlong personally killed six of the Moros, and extricated his men without injury to his force. He personally broke a passage through a wall of krismen as point of that compact group of soldiers who battled hand to hand with the odds ten to one against them. ... One of the most striking examples of Furlong's policing activities was his extermination of Kali Pandopatan, the Sultan of Buldung. The Kali had been playing double with the American government, and Furlong, with a dozen Constabulary, had gone to the cotta of the Kali for a conference. Once inside the cotta, he was set upon by more than 400 Moros, armed with barongs. Furlong backed his party into an angle of the walls and was in possession of the field after a terrible hour of slaughter. ...
Perhaps one of Furlong's most characteristic gestures was throwing his hat into the Moro forts he was preparing to assault and wagering that he could get to it before any of his men. It is said Furlong never lost a single one of those bets. In 1911 he was sent to Manila because his superiors feared that he was losing his mind. Furlong shot himself in his quarters.
Commentary
Twenty years after the campaigns Victor Hurley sat among a group of Moros while gathering material for his book and tells this anecdote.
Twenty years after Furlong had fired his last shot, this writer stood with wrinkled and ancient Moros on the sites of some of the Cotabato battles of this Captain of Constabulary. We talked, the Moros and I, of those old days of murder and piracy and ambush, when the kris had been the law and the measure of a man. The Moros are always ready to talk of battle.
These scarred old reprobates with blackened teeth and betel-stained lips, were no exception. Our conversation that day was filled with grand names: Allan Fletcher of the Scouts, called "Papa" by Moro and Filipino and American--a grand campaigner; Lieutenant Whitney of the prodigious strength gained a shuffle of bare feet and the twitch of a turban; then we talked of a Lieutenant named Cochrun--"a brave man, si," was his accolade; a youngster's name came into the conversation--Jesse Tiffany. The Moros fought him on their cotta walls. He, too, was valiant--a nod of the turbans confirmed him with the greatest praise a Moro can bestow on a man.
But when I mentioned Furlong, a glisten came into the eyes of ancient Moros who talk of redder and grander days. They sent up the most impressive salute to Valhalla that I can ever hope to witness. I see them now as I write--a circle of genial old ruffians, almost ready themselves to mount a white horse to Paradise. Their turbans are off now and their chins at rest on their scarred and brawny chests. After twenty years, they bend a neck to the memory of Leonard Furlong--"most desperate fighting man of all."
Sixty years later, in the 1990s, an incident occurred which reminded me vividly of Hurley's story. I was sitting with a well known Muslim warlord on the island of Basilan whose improbable first name was "Pershing". I asked the warlord why his father should name him after General Blackjack Pershing, of all people, when Pershing was known to have crushed the Moros in the campaigns that Hurley described. The warlord turned to me and said, "my father wanted to name me after the greatest warrior he could think of. And that was Pershing." Some things will never change; and one of those is that even in the sight of Allah there is no respect for the craven.
Note
From a purely historical point of view, I think some of Hurley's translations of native speech leave something to be desired. For example, I think 'Pot-I-Na' means rather something else than what he thinks, though doubtless equally pejorative. My guess is that it may be some form of "patyun" which in this context means "die". It also sounds like "you S.O.B.", in dialect, yelled from a distance. Maybe some scholar will clear it up.
310 Comments:
You will hear of the child first only in legend...
George W. BinLaden
Moral of the story: Bring a rifle to spear fight.
Weather it is Victor Hurley’s recount or Winston Churchill they all describe the same thing. It is not a Religion of Peace; it is a Religion of murder! It is true in the history that Victor tells of the Muslims being there long before any Euro-Americans and they have every right to defend them self’s (as inhabitants) and their land but the mercilessness of the Religion of Peace is the same, They would steal, lie, torture and murder any and all from children, women and helpless individuals to those that wanted to make peace with them.
Islam is far more the crusader then any other religion has ever been, Islam brutality has only been matched by Mongols, Genghis Khan.
Islam can never be Peaceful to anybody, for a Muslim to make it to “paradise” it is impossible, it is impossible to follow ever edict and rule lay down by the Koran and Hadeeth (sorry spelling maybe wrong) there for a follower must sacrifice himself by killing infidels and they are always at war with infidels.
The reason Islam is so popular with the lower class, uneducated, criminal is because it allows them to take what is not theirs.
There is only one answer to Islam, it is the same they give to everybody else!
Those old-timey Constabulary officers may have been able to relate to the Moros on a much more basic level than the Arabic-speaking academics of today. They understood each other as men, which is a concept which now has to be painstakingly explained to the moderns.
On that basic human level it was possible to accept certain contradictory things. A man could be your friend and yet you would not trust to turn your back on him. You understood each other's virtues and -- this is important -- each other's limitations. The Moro can be your friend but not in the way the politically correct expect.
Wretchard,
Very good history. It is useful to note the parallels.
I'm interested in hearing more. What did Pershing believe represented victory? Was it realistic?
I cant but wonder what if they dipped their 45 ammo in pig's fat if it would not of had an even greater impact..
Stirring and striking words, Wretchard, even more so than we have come to expect
Brown Line: Yes, I thought of the .45 ACP also. It was developed in order to provide a weapon with "stopping power" - a large but fairly slow round that would, it is claimed, not only mortally wound a Moro but shove him back into the brush from sheer kinetic energy. I doubt that - do the math - but it did give our troops confidence.
The .45 ACP became the standard U.S. sidearm - and in the 1960's the USAF abanonded it for the .38.
The reason was explained as a desire to arm aircrew with a LESS Effective handgun - one that inspired less confidence.
The Air Force decided that they did not want its downed pilots shooting it out with enemy soliders - they wanted them to hide and wait for rescue - and even being captured but to eventually return home was better than a duel to the death they could not win.
Now, we face the same kind of enemy - indeed, the SAME enemy - that inspired the .45 ACP - but we still have the .38 mentality. It is an example of how we have yet to wrap our minds around the problem.
And as for names : Ever notice what certain Army bases are named? Jackson. Stuart. Today there are those that want to rename public schools bearing the name of slave-owners such as Washington and Jefferson. But less than 100 years after the worst War in U.S. history, the US Army had no problem with naming its forts after "the enemy."
Wretchard, extremely interesting. According to Wikipedia, the US Army lost 4,324 men in the Philippine campaigns--this at a time when the total American population was about a quarter of it's current number. That would be like losing over 16,000 men today. Yet that era is all but forgotten. As dramatic as the Moro stories are though, I gather most of those losses were at the hands of non-Muslim Filipinos. Another forgotten aspect to the era: the United States government was regulating human slavery on (nominal) American territory into the 20th century, out of respect for Muslim custom and law ( http://www.msc.edu.ph/centennial/ba990820.html )
http://www.bakbakan.com/junglep/jp-17.html
It was Colonel Alexander Rodgers of the 6th Cavalry who accomplished by taking advantage of religious prejudice what the bayonets and Krags had been unable to accomplish. Rodgers inaugurated a system of burying all dead juramentados in a common grave with the carcasses of slaughtered pigs. The Mohammedan religion forbids contact with pork; and this relatively simple device resulted in the withdrawal of juramentados to sections not containing a Rodgers. Other officers took up the principle, adding new refinements to make it additionally unattractive to the Moros. In some sections the Moro juramentado was beheaded after death and the head sewn inside the carcass of a pig. And so the rite of running juramentado, at least semi-religious in character, ceased to be in Sulu. The last cases of this religious mania occurred in the early decades of the century. The juramentados were replaced by the amucks. .. who were simply homicidal maniacs with no religious significance attaching to their acts.
http://www.parapundit.com/archives/000507.html
Lost Verses of the Koran
Surah 115: The Pig
read it and wear a depends....
havent laughed so hard in months
The Officers and men you write of, W, were made of stern stuff.
For them, is certainly was,
"Do or Die"
Seems that both occurred.
And all for what, now.
How was the island of Mindanao and the lot of it's people improved by the governence of outsiders.
What is the situation there, today?
I read that it is still an unsafe destination for tourists. Could lose a head or just be blown to bits.
But that could just be Propaganda.
China, Iran may arrange oil deal
By ELAINE KURTENBACH
The Associated Press
SHANGHAI, China - China and Iran are close to setting plans to develop Iran's Yadavaran oil field, according to published reports, in a multibillion-dollar deal that comes as Tehran faces the prospect of U.N. sanctions over its nuclear program.
The deal is thought to potentially be worth about $100 billion.
The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that the two sides are trying to conclude the deal in coming weeks before potential sanctions are imposed on Iran for its nuclear ambitions. ... "
Who'd have thought that ChiComs and Shia could coordinate their Actions to counter US & EU measures?
It seems that in Mindanao, back in the day, it was a localized Enemy, not part of a World wide movement. Not so true today.
Where is tha Heart of the radical Mohammedan Movement, if not in the mountains of Warizistan, where it is left to fester and grow, unmolested by .45ACP's or stern men.
http://kentsimperative.blogspot.com/2006/02/small-wars.html
The nature of unconventional warfare is surprisingly enduring, as is the direct experience of war itself over the centuries. For all of the innovation in technologies, armaments, and the very record of war itself, some lessons remain starkly engraved. These become our narratives, repeated and relayed from generation to generation so that knowledge may at least have its shadow handed down - for no one can truly yet adequately convey the visceral experience of combat to another. It is a life experience that has no equal - it must be gone through first hand.
Worse yet is the complete lack of narrative structure regarding the small wars in countries of Latin America, Asia, Africa, and elsewhere that have predominately characterized the military instrument in American foreign policy for decades. It is rare to see these brushfire conflicts and forgotten campaigns highlighted in contemporary discourse.
We have the same kind of men, and now women, in our military as we did back in those days. Unfortunately our civilian leadership has grown soft. Instead of beating back the Muslims for a few generations as they did back in the turn of the last century we shall either lose this war or slaughter a hundred million or so in a nuclear fire.
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The men of the US Armed Forces will go out, beyond the wire, and do what must be done, as did the Forefathers. The truth is that their Generals are afraid, of bad press, loss of life and more than anything, damage to their post Military employment opportunities.
The Generals are running this "War", or so says the President, I see no reason to disbelieve, him.
" ... THE PHOENIX is Boston's leading ''alternative" newspaper, the kind of brash, pull-no-punches weekly that might have been expected to print without hesitation the Mohammed cartoons that Islamists have been using to incite rage and riots across the Muslim world. Its willingness to push the envelope was memorably demonstrated in 2002, when it broke with most media to publish a grisly photograph of Daniel Pearl's severed head, and supplied a link on its website to the sickening video of the Wall Street Journal reporter's beheading, ..."
" ... But the Phoenix isn't publishing the Mohammed drawings, and in a brutally candid editorial it explained why.
''Our primary reason," the editors confessed, is ''fear of retaliation from . . . bloodthirsty Islamists who seek to impose their will on those who do not believe as they do . . . Simply stated, we are being terrorized, and . . . could not in good conscience place the men and women who work at the Phoenix and its related companies in physical jeopardy. As we feel forced, literally, to bend to maniacal pressure, this may be the darkest moment in our 40-year-publishing history." ... "
When fear cows the media, stern men are needed in other locales as well as the battlefronts over the far Horizon.
Wretchard you never cease to impress. Thank you for these wonderful uplifting stories of derring do by extraordinary Western warriors.
The Muslim will not, in fact cannot change. As these stories and countless others just like these demonstrate the Muslims have been bent on conquest and hegemony since their inception. These bloodthirsty mongrels will stop at nothing short of total conquest. All apprearances to the contrary are cleverly designed versimilitude. They must be first driven from our shores. NO responsible government could countenance a nuclear armed Islamic government. Clinton betrayed his oath of office when he allowed the swine in Pakistan to acquire nuclear capability.
I understand your reticense in advocating war, but equivocation is a luxury we can ill afford. You too will soon be on board as we all must if we are to survive.
The comparison with Iraq is valid. The ‘small war’ fought in the Philippines was not a large set piece conflict. It was, obviously, fought by small units. It was fought with both the iron fist and the velvet glove. It was fought with a political structure very similar to our own right now. It was administered by leaders with a long term outlook. With Theodore Roosevelt as President and William Taft as the regional civilian lead…
The current playbook is a modification of the previous playbook…
The goal is to split the current version of the Moros from the populace…
That is working…
Our long strategic goal is for a peaceful, democratic, shining city on a hill. We may have to be satisfied with a tactical, and statistical, victory. One that places our military in the decisive position in the Middle East. One that precludes state sponsored development of mass amounts of WMD and nuclear weapons. One that acts as a force multiplier for our regional military structure. However, the Iraqis may surprise us and prove capable of attaining the primary victory. The primary victory is a lasting victory. The tactical victory effectively walls this part of the gap from doing too much damage to our heartland.
Only time will tell!!
But as our Host so vividly points out, it is the Christians that had invaded Mindanao:
" ... They had never been Filipinos: their identity pre-existed King Philip of Spain; their national consciousness had always been as Muslims. After the first Mohammedan missionary arrived in Sulu in 1380 parts of the island of Mindanao had constituted themselves into the Sultanate of Sulu. ... "
So the technologically repressed natives of Mindanao fought back with spears, against the foreigners that invaded their land.
" ... A succession of Europeans: the Portuguese, French, British, and Spaniards had attempted to incorporate it into their respective colonial schemes ... "
By what, the Divine Right of Empire, did these interlopers from afar claim Dominion over the people of Mindinao?
These people were not fighting to expand their territory or force others to their Religion. They were defending their homeland and way of life. Such as it was.
It is not at all a part or parcel of the current situation, except in the context of once a battle is joined, it must be fought.
The issues and ideology of the fight were not nearly the same then, as they are now. At least it seems, on Mindanao.
Pasha Gordon might have had a different take on the matter though, in the Sudan, right before he was beheaded and put on a pike.
But then again Pasha Gordon was in Sudan, not London, when he fell to the Mohammedan's blade.
A bit different from today, aye.
At least from Mr Van Gogh's point of view.
In 1911 it was the US taking the offensive in the March of Civilization. It was our boys off to far away lands, finding locals to assist US in our cause.
In 1995 it was Mohammedans from Mindanao that met with Mr Terry Nichols and taught him how to get his bombs to explode, so then, 84 years later, the Mohammedans were finding locals to assist in their cause, here.
Not in the intellectual realm, or with misguided words or bad cartoons, but here, on the ground, causing casualties in real time.
Progress is being made though, a couple more decades, that's all, just wait while we stay the course.
Don't worry about that reef up ahead, it's not on the charts, nor in the Plan.
The lookout, he must have had a beer with lunch.
desert rat said...
But as our Host so vividly points out, it is the Christians that had invaded Mindanao:
ah yes, in this specific circumstance...
tell me how about the Islamic INVASION of Jerusalem?
According to the recent Teddy Roosevelt bio series, the Commanding General was cashiered after his victorious campaign in the Phillipines for tolerating excessive brutality by those under his command. Interesting that in any victories over irregular forces, our delicate sensibilities have had to be violated. This applies from WT Sherman to the present day.
Different place, different time, porker, different cause & different effect.
Desert Rat,
I really don't understand your recent posts. Based on earlier posts, it is apparent that every conflict should be World War II. Total, and Final, Destruction of the enemy with a hundred million dead. That may come to pass. That option is always there!!!
Had Hitler been stopped when he was weak would we have had to carpet bomb Germany to win a total victory.
Did winning a low intensity conflict in the Philippines provide a beachhead into the region – militarily, economically, and culturally? That beachhead might have been wasted by stupid political and military decisions made in the 1930s, but it was there. It was decisive ground that could have been used to contain or crush imperial Japan.
It may well be that our next President will be the fool that gives up the advantage. Your vote counts – vote Howard Dean, John Kerry, or Hillary Clinton!!!
Only time will tell!!!
Just look at what they tried to do with Col North.
This came after Victory, as well.
Granted he turned the tables on the Inquisitioners, but none the less, the attempt was made to destroy him, in spite or because of the success he made of President Reagan & Mr Casey's Policies.
That is why, for one reason, no successful propaganda campaign could be launched from Washington, today.
I, for one, have never advocated for massed killings or destruction.
I have advocated for War.
The Congress has authorized two. One, in Iraq, is complete, the stated US objectives have been met.
The second War, against aQ is, as of today, a dismal failure. The Enemy has found Sanctuary in Pakistan. We sanction the situation with payments to the Pakistani Government.
How does this relate to the European or for that matter the Japanese invasion of Mindanao?
That is exampled by the causes for which the Muslims fight, as opposed to the Mohammeans.
Why do Muslims take up arms in support of the Iraqi Government, against the Mohammedans?
Why do Muslims take up arms against the Mohammedan Taliban, in Afghanistan?
Why do Muslims in Jordon renounce the Mohammedan terrorists from their own Families?
The Muslims in Mindanao were fighting for their homeland.
The US, in attempting to suppress them, was operating contrary to US Peinciples, as described most aptly in the Declaration.
When we stray from those Principles, good lifes are lost for what, in the end, is for naught.
The Muslims of Mindanao have evolved, from locals fighting for their freedom from foreign intervention to Mohammedans waging Global Jihad.
The Battle of Mindanao, in nine decades has morphed into a Global Monster, the Mohammedans killing US Citizens in their offices and day care centers, by proxy.
Where is the Strategy to change the course of the past 90 years.
That is the real lesson of Mindanao, or so it seems to me.
Yeh, I concur w/ Boghie, Rat--half the time I don't get what you're driving at. But that last post was pretty sobering alright.
desert rat said...
Different place, different time, porker, different cause & different effect.
yes, it was an invasion, EARLIER, with MUCH larger Effect by the Islamic hoardes...
All right, buddy, now look to Iran.
A country filled with Muslims, according to some, pro US Muslims.
Attacking a nuclear capacity that does not yet exist, bombing some empty buildings or destroying either a single centrifuge or dozens, makes little difference in the "Long War", 90 years and counting for US in Mindanao.
But what will become of the Muslims of Iran? As I watched FOX News, today, the Iranian youth were signing up to counter attack US Installations in the ME.
The operative word being, counter.
Most Muslims or Americans for that matter will stand and fight, when invaded or attacked.
For the Mullahs of Iran, what is a building or two hundred, in exchange for a country with a renewed Mohammedan Soul.
That would be, for them, in a word, priceless.
porker,
Just where did those other tribes of Israel get off to?
I've never quite understood.
Maybe the Arabs are just decendent of one of those lost tribes, trying to find their way home. maybe not, aye. Maybe a tribe moved on, to Mindanao. Maybe not.
Some think a Tribe came to the Americas. Some think not.
I wouldn't fight a War over the Book of Mormon, but some did.
As you say, let's sit back and watch, pass me a rind, will ya?
Rat, I just haven't followed the distinction between go soft on official enemy Iran yet go hard on official friend Pakistan, because we shouldn't inflame the Iranian street, but should inflame the Pakistani street.
d'Rat: Just where did those other tribes of Israel get off to?
I hear some 2 million from amongst the lost are to be found in India. Some more million are thought to be The Kurds. The Kurds actually reconverted back to Judaism but later were overran by Islam.
Anyhoo, as one wise Rabbi once said,
we shall recognize them by their fruit..
Wiki: Kurds and Jews
In 2001, a team of Israeli, German, and Indian scientists discovered that the majority of Jews around the world are closely related to the Kurdish people, more closely than they are to the Semitic-speaking Arabs or any other population that was tested. Most of the 95 Kurdish Muslim test subjects came from northern Iraq. Moreover according to another study, the CMH (Cohen modal haplotype) is a genetic marker from the northern Middle East which is not unique to Jews. However, its existence among many Kurds and Armenians, as well as some Italians and Hungarians, would seem to support the overall contention that Kurds and Armenians are the close relatives of modern Jews and that the majority of today's Jews have paternal ancestry from the northeastern Mediterranean region.
Then, buddy, take the next step.
Who attacked US on 9-11.
Wahabist Mohammedans.
Whom have we counter attacked?
Wahabbist Taliban in Afghanistan, a CIA Operation using indig mercenary forces to topple a Terrorist Government. Forces that were already opposed to the Taliban, but needed Cash and Air support. Four years later, only half of the 70,000 man Afghan Army has been trained. How long before the other 35,000 troops will be ready, I do not know, I wonder if anyone does.
Secular Iraq. A major US military operation, costing hundreds of billions of dollars.
This Operation was required for a number of reasons, but none due to aQ, or another Congressional Authorization would not have been required.
Now we threaten Shia Iran.
In each of the major cases, Iraq and now Iran, we move further from fighting the 9-11 attackers, Wahabbist Mohammedans, and closer to engaging the Enemies of the Wahabbist financiers, the Sauds.
These being Saddam and now Iran.
The Saud's favorite client state, Pakistan, is giving Sanctuary to aQ training bases, safe houses and according to most, Dr Z and Osama, himself.
Why is this situation allowed?
Why is the US making tribute payments to Pakistan?
What happened to the Bush Doctrine?
Why has the War on Wahabbist Terror sputtered to a halt?
Expalin how when the Pakistanis already have WMD, is the Homeland of aQ, founder of the Taliban and is the major Nuclear proliferator of all time,
why have the Shia of Iran, trying to build a clone of a Pakistani Nuke, from Pakistani plans, with Pakistani centrifuges, now the center of all that is bad in the World?
What happens when Russia or China signs a Defense Pact with Tehran? It'll happen, I venture to say, before November.
How about, instead of the Warsaw Pact of the 20th Century there is a Havana Axis, after the September Summit meeting, there.
Russia, China, Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia and a 'Stan or two all agree with Iran and Syria to mutually defend each others "Rights".
Both of the two Challenges, aQ and Iran are real. Only one is an Authorized War, the one we ignore.
The other percieved threat, Iran which exists today only in the realm of Rhetoric, soars high in sight.
The Wahabbists, those that took down the Towers, they win if we attack Iran, lose if we take on the Taliban and aQ, where ever they have found Sanctuary.
I'd love to see aQ lose.
I've only got 25-30 years left, max. I like to see the US do, before I die, how about you?
"I've only got 25-30 years left, max"
---
Give me a break, Max!
My Heart Bleeds!
Attitudes like that is what's gonna bring this country down.
Buck Up!
(Maybe time to stop knocking big Pharma and the NRA, too.)
I support the NRA, doug.
They oppose mixing beer, perscription drugs and firearms.
While they support the right to bear arms, they also acknowledge the responsibilities that come with those Rights.
Not all of US act in a responsible manner with our firearm Rights.
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Why do you think they call it the
BATF?
Alcohol, Bare Arms, Tobbaco, Firearms,
(and a hot chick when Mrs. Cheney is not around)
Also Plavix, Norvasc, Atenolol, and etc.
Who ever thought the hottest drug and sex NewsItem would be a 65 year old heart patient?
Glad they got nothin better to report on.
(Like a success the Worldwide War on Terror, can't have that)
When did sex hit that story, doug.
Something I missed?
On a serious note:
What do you think would be needed to accomplish the training in Afghanistan as you would have it?
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The entire shift to Iran as the "Center" of the War on Terror has been a masterful use of Propaganda.
Most of the target audience does not even realize they've been targeted. Masterful work.
Well beyond what could come out of the best efforts of the Federals on staff.
That $75 Million USD that Ms Rice requested, not nearly enough for this kind of work.
"As I watched FOX News, today, the Iranian youth were signing up to counter attack US Installations in the ME."
---
Anybody got a link to any article like that?
That's a bit troubling if not a propaganda setup.
No, I'm not for the USA losing this thing, Rat. A Caspian Pact is the biggest worry we've got, I agree with you. It's already in formation, taking a step and cocking an ear, then another and another.
Maybe both sides want it that way?
France and Hillary pretend to be hawks on Iran, so it is a more "bipartisan cause?"
Keeps both the Iranian and American "streets" pre-occupied.
(not arguing this is a good thing for us, still think Syria should be next)
Buddy 12:47 PM,
Yeah, your little Oil Update in the last thread is vital and happening as we speak.
I'm not sure, doug.
First thing would be to ascertain why only half the Army has been stood up. There are, most likely, a variety of reasons. Political, financial and others.
Ms trish may be able to tell us.
The men could have been trained and processed, I think.
If it's been three years since the founding, starting from scratch, which they did.
We've averaged training 1,000 men a month. That is a pretty good clip, really. That is assuming no drop outs, just graduates and 100% retention, to date. No idea how long a Afghan signs up for, 4 years or more?
So basicly a Battalion a month is coming on line. It would take about 5 more years, at this current pace, depending on reenlistment retention to get to 70,000.
Shows just how much effort went into standing up the Iraqis, in about a year or so.
Considering a reported 50% first payday dropout rate, we have processed quite a few, perhaps 500,000 Iraqis through some military training.
I am interested in what you think would have to be done in order to train the Afghani's in a timely manner, 'Rat.
...I keep thinking of that short post by Trish about how this has metabolized into it's present steady state, though, and it isn't going to change.
Unfortunately, I think she's right.
mine written after yours, obviously
before, that is
Had not seen that 50% dropout rate.
What's in it for a guy to put in the time and then immediately drop out?
No, Doug, not a false report, the video is all over Fox, including young Persians with perfect English saying that if attacked, they will counter against coalition forces in Iraq. Well-produced film of highly-organized PR event, yes. Also likely true.
Meanwhile, today Israel cut-off the cash to the Hamas gov't, Pakistan tested a new Ballistic nuke-capable missile, and announced a defense ministry-level visit to PRC next month. The Russian/Iran uranium-enrichment program is getting down to details, so bye-bye the brief moment of USA/UN effective alliance thru the IAEA.
Yeah, but the Ruskies will insure it's only used for peaceful purposes, right?
---
Man, things have sure accelerated lately, haven't they?
What will WE live to see, much less kids, and hopefully, surviving grandkids.
Venezuela has a presidential election in December. Maybe Jimmy Carter will go back down there and help his beloved Christian faith this time around. Maybe stop in Panama and get that Canal back for us, too.
"To subdue the enemy, blood must be shed and we can't pretend that the loss of any and every American soldier is some unbelievable cosmic tragedy that the nation can not endure..."
---
C-4,
The left has played that one out so long they aren't pretending anymore:
They believe it, and they've got a goodly portion of the country believing it also.
The Alphabet War will require that we secure against Chavez.
My impression is that Iranian-Americans as a group are more patriotic than most other folks from the ME.
True?
Oh, there is a case for being at War with Iran, even without the Nuclear mirage, no doubt about it.
No one has begun to make it publicly, though.
The WMD case about Iran, the CIA says is not even close to a "Slam Dunk", yet.
When the Russians sign the Iranians up, which they will, there goes the Military Option, hello containment, then the Iraqis will ask US to leave, come Jan '07.
No matter the beating of the EU War drums, the Bear still is unafraid, and after a twenty year nap, crafty, hungry and cranky.
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IMO C-4 summarizes how far we have to go to get there from here.
...wonder what it will take?
"No matter the beating of the EU War drums, the Bear still is unafraid"
Odd they aren't terrified.
How could that be?
Not only the EU but C-4's description of where we are wrt addressing the real costs of war.
...and the Media make sure the world knows every up to the minute detail.
Then there's the Oil Thing.
Anyone care to compare handwriting analysis between Cedarfard and Opotho?
Remember the EU offered the Iranians a Security Arrangement, the Iranians demurred. The Precedent for such an Agreement is set and accepted by all Parties, though.
They will accept a Security Agreement from the Russians and Chinese and pursue their "peaceful nuclear power generation" as is their "Right" under the NPT.
Yes, doug, Russia will guarentee only "Peaceful" use. But what that guarentee is worth...enough for the UN and EU.
Then look to Venezuela to start it's nuclear program, with first Iranian & then Russian assistance. That Iranian part of that Deal has already been inked, as to the Russians, only makes sense for the KGB to operate in Latin America, again.
1:30 PM LOL,
Two different modes:
The direct approach,
and the fair balanced highly nuanced, educated, and EXTREMELY Intelligent* crap dance.
*Just Ask.
You have any Jooish Lawyer friends, Mika?
until, tckurd,
he meets his bitter end, at the hands of...
Osama bin Bush
"Then look to Venezuela to start it's nuclear program,"
---
THAT won't wake up the American Street?
Somehow it might play out that way, I guess.
Have a few Senators make a few more State on State Deals.
Maybe Mutual Defense Alliances against Cowboys?
c4:
Right now the US soldier has a divided government, few useful allies in large part because of neocon arrogance, a media out to screw them, and a Jewish-dominated legal establishment obsessed with enemy rights and liberties over war-winning considerations.
on the left side of c4's mouth he complains: Jewish-dominated legal establishment obsessed with enemy rights and liberties over war-winning considerations.
on the right side of c4's mouth he complains of neocon arrogance.. which he has explained as JEW puppet masters looked for a fight against islam..
I guess the jews do control everything, the left and the right....
and I guess, thanks c4 i forgot, i am 9 foot tall with a 12 inch putz.... c4 reminds me that the jews are super human, able to be in 2 different geo-political places at once....
it's great to be the king....
Doug, 1:43
Are there any other kind?
Why? Do we need another Devil Advocate?
(PS. Someone is really having fun with these word verification codes! kkkpig. LOL)
It's that Cohen Haploid Thing.
Kurdish Style.
Hybrid Vigor: Man and Superrace.
Well, at least the outlines of the enemy are clarifying. Cartoon wars are today getting Christians killed in Nigeria, as well as putting literally millions in the streets in Jakarta (trying to storm the US Embassy) and across Pakistan. Pretty well-coordinated global intimidation offensive. Look for something bigger tomorrow, the last of our three-day President's Day weekend, to shake our financial markets for Tuesday morning's re-open.
Meanwhile, the Scooter Libby Trial will be our focus--we will get to the bottom of why "Scooter Libby" couldn't recall which of several people he first conversed with about the wife of some yellowcake-paper forger being an employee or something of the CIA or something.
Doug: It's that Cohen Haploid Thing. Kurdish Style.
I know what you mean.
From the Ad Link often on BC's front page:
"Everything that he has done
was against this country."
Joe Frazier on Muhammad Ali
Part man, part myth, and all American, Muhammad Ali is history's most beloved, most revered athlete. But though he was "The Greatest" inside the ring, outside he was a hulking mass of contradictions.
Cashill reveals how Elijah Muhammad seduced Ali--and how that seduction spelled the betrayal of Dr. King's dream, the death of Malcolm X, the humiliation of Joe Frazier, the rise of Don King, and the tragic undoing of Mike Tyson--and proves that:
Ali was an unapologetic sexist and unabashed racist, calling for the lynching of interracial couples and an American apartheid as late as 1975.
Ali routinely denigrated black heroes who did not share his point of view, including Joe Louis, Jackie Robinson, Thurgood Marshall, and especially Joe Frazier.
Ali shamelessly courted some of the most brutal dictators on the planet: Qadaffi, Idi Amin, Papa Doc Duvalier, Nkrumah, Mobutu, and Ferdinand Marcos.
Fianally, somebody wrote it.
Never could stand the Idol Worship of this Jerk.
Now they'll Probably Issue a Fatwah.
I do not recall any riots, bombings, fires, etc over the Cartoons occuring in Iran.
Speachs and Rhetoric, yes.
Masses rioting, no.
That is left for the frontline countries.
There have been riots throughout Pakistan, with numerous deaths reported.
So which, buddy, of these ideas
" ... I just haven't followed the distinction between go soft on official enemy Iran yet go hard on official friend Pakistan, because we shouldn't inflame the Iranian street, but should inflame the Pakistani street. ... "
The Iranian street is not inflamed, it is quite reserved.
The Pakistani street, on the other hand, riots over cartoons and had thousands of armed men parading in it, after the Predator attack a few weeks ago.
Where do the "people" hate US?
More so Pakistan than Iran.
Governments are another thing, entirely, but how secure are either of the Governments, really.
The Hatloids and McJoos.
"Governments are another thing, entirely, but how secure are either of the Governments, really."
---
Think Pakistan is more subject to an overnight change.
but doug, it's a "long war".
The Iranians are not invulnerable.
Now this is an interesting story, little reported in thhe US.
"The usual explanation for Pakistan's failure to go all-out against al Qaeda and Taliban forces along the Afghan frontier is that Gen. Pervez Musharraf's armed forces and intelligence services are riddled with Islamic extremists. But there is also another, equally disturbing, reason. Musharraf has increasingly been forced to divert ground forces and U.S.-supplied air power from the Afghan front and from Kashmir earthquake relief efforts to combat a bitter, little-noticed insurgency in his strategic southern coastal province of Baluchistan. ... "
now we've both read this WaPo story before, doug, but the importance begins to hit home.
If we follow the Principles laid down in the Declaration, we should be supporting the Baluchistanis.
They are a direct destabilzing force in Iran " ... The Baluch ancestral homeland stretches west beyond Gwadar into adjacent Baluch-majority areas of eastern Iran, where there is a nascent Baluch rebellion against President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. ... "
and amongst the greatest enemies of:
" ... Musharraf's armed forces and intelligence services (that) are riddled with Islamic extremists. ... "
The Baluchistanis, a War on Terror two fer, but we are helping to kill them, to bad for that, aye.
From the Beeb:
Iran announced it was halting trade with Denmark, as protesters pelted the Danish embassy with petrol bombs.
Police fired tear gas in a bid to keep back hundreds of angry demonstrators, some of whom attempted to scale the wall into the embassy compound. Earlier, the Austrian embassy in Tehran came under attack.
Well, Paki gov't stability may be a black hole for us news-biz consumers, but it's not for that arguably hardest-nose, unblinkered, reality-moored power-brokering group of insiders on the planet, the big international hedge-fund managers, who according to Bill Richards, UBS hedge-fund mgr, are betting big on infrastructure and natural-resource development in "Australia, Japan, Eastern Europe, Turkey, and Pakistan". This from my notes from a CNBC interview a couple days ago.
2:36 Good to hear, Bud.
Alternative Input from Traditional Sources. We need that.
Have you read any of Starling's stuff on the UAE?
2:30 PM Maybe the Investors are betting on the Taliban?
2:32 PM I'm starting to think our best hope is this gets pushed to a crisis point that wakes people up sooner rather than later.
(actually I always believed it, to be perfectly honest!)
aristide, I love this quote
" ... "They want to test our feelings," protester Mawli Abdul Qahar Abu Israra told the BBC.
"They want to know whether Muslims are extremists or not. Death to them and to their newspapers," he said ... "
This particular fellow is from Afghanistan
They all are big on the "Death" thing, aren't they?
Tell me again guys, why are we being so nice with these fellows?
Aristides: Iran announced it was halting trade with Denmark
Wouldn't that force the EU to take punitive steps?
doug,
Big fund managers have erred in the past.
Anyway, past performance is no guarentee of future results.
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d'Rat: Tell me again guys, why are we being so nice with these fellows?
Someone needs to buy them F16s.
http://www.indiadaily.com/editorial/12-04-04.asp
Istanbul is having it's million man 'toon march today, too. I dunno about the big capital flows, they do get caught out--but it's the execption that proves the rule. Evidently their exhaustive studies--which are long-term big-buck lobbies inside the governments of these countries--are proving to the most professional skeptics, people who do not have to sing and dance for any press, that these political systems are deep and durable.
Doug, as far as investing in the taliban, I think the big capitalists have long since learned that certain attitudes are not investment-grade. Communists, for example, notoriously beg investment, then steal the dough.
I didn't realize it until now, but Wiki has a running timeline of Cartoon War information.
To answer Mika's question, on January 30 the "European Union backs Denmark, saying that any retaliatory boycott of Danish goods would violate world trade rules."
On Feb. 6, "Iran stops all trade with Denmark, thereby violating their agreements with the EU."
On Feb. 13, "Organization of the Islamic Conference's (IOC)Secretary General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu to defuse the crisis. Ihsanoglu called upon the EU Parliament to pass legislation to combat Islamophobia: 'People in the Muslim world are starting to feel this is a new 9/11 against them.'" [Uh...????...Whaa...?????]
And a final portent of things to come: "The Russian newspaper Gorodskiye Vesti is shut down by the authorities after publishing a cartoon of Mohammed of their own."
When the Cold War began Soviet Russia tried to establish itself as the "global protector of Islam." It started supplying trips to Mecca for Muslims, opened Mosques in Moscow, and generally tried to manipulate Islamic Manicheanism to triangulate against the West.
I think this is what Russia is doing now, as it feels more and more encumbered by the Western dominated global system. If you want to know 'bad', imagine a global insurgency of Islam rhetorically and materially supported by Russia. I think Putin believes he has discovered our kryptonite.
So they can bomb their own people into submission, mika.
All those poor Baluchistanis, death from above, by US proxy. When all they want is to live under the Rule of Law established by Pakistan's pre Military Dictatorship Constitution.
But no, Democracy as US Policy does not apply to the Wahabbists in Pakistan.
The US must supply the General President with the means to kill those who could be amongst our best real allies, much like the Kurds.
Whenever the US backs a Military Dictator, in Iran, Iraq, Central America, Vietnam or Africa bad things usually come of it, eventually.
The only exception that comes to mind, Chile, but it just proves the Rule, I guess.
I've been saying that for a while now, aristide, in my own uncosmopolitan way.
All the signs are there, to be read.
d'Rat,
It's for "Baluchistanis" to prove their usefulness to us, not the other way round. This is their chance. Let's see what they make of it.
I think you are right, 'Rat, and I remember you bringing that up after Putin solicitude of both Hamas and Iran.
The signs are certainly not encouraging out of Russia.
"uncosmopolitan"
???
All this time I thought he was Metro.
Potempkin-Beslan/Moscow theater/airliners a few months ago/etcetera ?
But the Kremlin can be many things all at once.
And who knows where the Chechens stand with the Mullahs?
Maybe dey don't trust each other--Kremlin always fits into those situations, as the always reliably ice-cold.
The big money backed Batista to the end, didn't it buddy?
Even the Soviets Union. None of the Experts believed it could collapse, even after it did.
Sometimes when you live closest to the problem, the more difficult it is to see it, for what it is.
The US Southern Frontier as an example.
" ... Drug-related violence in Nuevo Laredo is out of control and threatening our side of the border ..."
from the Houston Chronicle.
This uptick in violence is a result, partly, to a breakdown in Law Enforcement on our side of the Border. The high volume of illegal migrants has decreased everyone's Security. Flouting the Law does that. Rudy's zero tolerence for petty crimes, in NYC, is proof enough. Major crime dropped, as the minor infractions were pursued.
And then this, right off the wire
" ... JAKARTA, Indonesia Feb 19, 2006 (AP)— Hundreds of Muslims protesting caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad tried to storm the U.S. Embassy on Sunday, smashing the windows of a guard post but failing to push through the gates. Several people were injured.
Pakistani security forces, meanwhile, sealed off the capital of Islamabad to block a planned mass demonstration and fired tear gas and gunshots to chase off protesters. In Turkey, tens of thousands gathered in Istanbul chanting slogans against Denmark, Israel and the United States. ... "
ABC News Pass those rinds!
I'm really disappointed in Russia, and reflexively note that the door to a peaceful world was open for awhile in the 90s, but the leader of the free world was currently setting new standards of the one thing the old commies probably feared most--utter fecklessness. For example, the commission set-up to help Russia privatize--the Chernomyrdan commission--well, our commissioner was choirboy/goon VP Al Gore.
I sure hope Secretary General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu is not the top news item for long.
Opotho will know how to pronounce it, tho.
no mika,
you've never worked an Insurgency.
Perhaps counter somewhere, but few of US have ever mounted an Insurgency Campaign. Those that have, I've spoken to at length.
We go to them, train and equip. That is our function, to give the Montagard or Iraqi or Kurd or Northern Alliance trooper an opportunity that they cannot give themselves.
The Baluchistanis hold strategic ground, within Pakistan and Iran.
Much like the Kurds in Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria. It is up to US to exploit that, not wait for the Baluchistanis to meet your mythical standard of worthiness.
If we would fight less than a Total War
Which is the whole point, isn't it?
3:38 PM Somebody mentioned Algore got $200 k+ to betray America.
Not a bad deal when you got lots o Petrodollars to spend.
Yeah, whit, (3:42 PM) but if you explain the history of the RoP in just the correct way, add in some Nuclear Physics, and they'll change their ways in a jiffy.
Course it won't work if you remain the bigot that you have always been.
Everyone holds strategic ground. The "Baluchistanis" are nothing special. Not unless they care to make themselves into something special. If the Baluchistanis really don't care for the way they're being treated by the Iranians and Pakistani entities, then we should be willing to listen should they wish to talk. But it should be their move to come and talk to us. That is if they see us as someone worthy of talking to.
"Britain was surely the most USA friendly country in the EU prior to becoming an Islamic Entity."
3:53 PM
EVERYBODY's Special, Everybody's Fine,
they'll get your head,
and I'll still have mine.
So, according to the Teheran U. ethics code a Muslim "defends" Islam by random killing.
Apparently the imans do not comprehend the nuances of medieval Islamic jurisprudence. George W. Bush should tell them about it and fix it all up.
"I think we have already seen how they respond."
Through the Prism of your Bigotry, Only.
If mika, we were at War and were taking the Offense, we'd be making those types of moves.
In Baluchistan, in Kurdistan. We should be sponsoring, training and eqipping an active Iranian Insurgency.
On the Air Waves and in the Movies.
Product placement in Movies is a common occurance. What products, in which films would mind f**k the Mohammedans. I'm not sure, but I know they exist.
There is a wide range of Offensive Actions we could be taking, instead we've "Stayed the Course" and are extended in Iraq, where we police Internal Iraqi politics.
Meanwhile the cancer grows and morphs, across borders and oceans.
All the way to Boston, where Editors admit, they are fearful to print the news.
Thomas Paine would puke if he heard
Captain Preuss or Leonard Furlong those men, I think, would Publish, regardless.
d'Rat: We should be sponsoring, training and eqipping an active Iranian Insurgency.
My god!! What's wrong with letting the Iranians and the Pakis do that work for us?! Seemed to have worked fine with Saddam in Iraq.
3:21 PM and RWE said in Bush 1, it was going to be US/Russia against the world.
But then came Bill.
They'd arm up the boys in Baluchistan and in Kurdistan.
They'd take the fight to 'em, same way it's been taken to US.
That is how to fight an Asymmetrical Battle, whether in 1906 or 2006. It's '06 regardless and truth will out.
And no, there are many people in the World that do not hold Stategic Ground.
Nor are there that many Ethnic minorities in Iran to expliot, You fight with the Ethnic Indigs you've got, mika, not the ones you wished you had.
Mr Rummy said something similar, once.
It's more true in starting an Insurgency than anything else.
It may not be the Baluchistanis War, yet. We cannot blame them for that, they may just need some leadership, or cash. Perhaps both and a little positive Propaganda.
It is, after all, supposed to be important, to US.
Because, mika, the Pakistanis sold the Iranians the nuclear tech to begin with. Why would you expect the Pakis to destabilize Iran? The idea is way counter intuitive.
Many of the Baluchistanis ARE Iranians.
As are the Kurds.
That is who the Insurgency starts with, mika, diseffected minorities.
Then the Sunni Arab minority, fnally moving into the Persian youth movement, if one really exists.
But the ethnic minorities within Iran are there to be exploited.
That's what the Baluchistanis would be.
It is our job to do that, if we are at any kind of War with either Iran or Wahabbist Mohammedans, or both.
d'Rat:
They need motivation to fight. I see no reason not to allow the Iranians and the Pakis supply them that motivation.
desert..
porker, -Just where did those other tribes of Israel get off to?
intermarried and choose to abandon the group, (small exception tribe of dan found in ethiopia, and two other groups, one in India and one found in south africa), a good example is pour one glass of water in a pool, not lost, just not unique anymore.
....Maybe the Arabs are just decendent of one of those lost tribes, trying to find their way home. maybe not, aye.
arabs come directly from the bastard child of Abraham with his concubine Hagar.
...Some think a Tribe came to the Americas. Some think not.
Funny, i have heard of this cat in the west, that thinks the indians are a lost tribe of israel, this was NEVER asked of us, and if asked we'd say, nope.. (so what would we know?) However recent dna tests have proved that mr Smith's drug fantasy is nothing but crap...
...I wouldn't fight a War over the Book of Mormon, but some did.
Yes, but not the Childred of Israel, we didnt fight over this, those other's that did want to "fight" ( that also want to self adopt themselves into my family) did...
As you say, let's sit back and watch, pass me a rind, will ya?
Yep pretty amazing watching people murder in the name of the G-d Of Abraham, Isaac & Jacob, and still trying to prove to the children of Abraham, Isaac & Jacob that they are in fact correct, and the children of Abraham, Isaac & Jacob are wrong...
Pass the rinds.... it's going to get bloody
Buddy,
Could you explain, or elaborate on, the first paragraph of your 3:08 PM post?
Jamie Irons
Son of monkey, you know that the jews are the bastards.
we'll actually i don't think islam calls jews "bastards", whichever our mother, the term bastard doesn't apply to the litters of pigs and children of monkeys...
Man, right now we're the token Gentiles here, Whit.
In the words of Warron Zevon, mika,
"Ot's Lawyers, Guns & Mmoney"
That'll get 'en out oof this.
They have the motivation, it's just that US Logistics support to the General President is killing them.
So the US is attacking them, by proxy. I would almost bet, but do not know, that these Baluchistanis are not Wahhabists.
Could be wrong, but doubt it.
lol
I have a saying...
i respect all ethical people inspite of their stupid childish beliefs, including my own...
i teach this idea to all people I meet...
you'd be amazed how many people never thought of it that way before...
Jamie,
It's a continuation of his 2:36 PM comment, but it will be good to hear him elaborate further.
I'm just always wondering who will take the place of the General when something happens to him, one way or another.
" ... In 1973 a war of independence broke out in Baluchistan.
For five long years there was total war. At its peak the Baluchis raised a force of 55,000 combatants. Nearly six Pakistan Army divisions were deployed to fight them. The Pakistan Air Force was also deployed and its Mirage and Sabre fighter jets carried out strikes all over rural Baluchistan. Widespread use of napalm has been documented by scholars like Robert Wirsing of the University of Texas and Selig Harrison. Iran too joined in the military action and Huey Cobra helicopter gunships of its Army Aviation were widely used. By the time the last pitched battle was fought in 1978 5,000 Baluchi fighters and 3,000 Pakistani soldiers had died. Civilian casualties were many times that. The Baluchi war for independence was crushed, but the aspirations still flicker. ... "
So it seems, in the recent past both the Iranians and the Pakistanis have done battle with the Baluchi.
" ... Speaking at the 57th session of the Commission of Human Rights at Geneva between March 9 and April 27, 2001, Mehran Baluch, a prominent Baluch leader said: 'Our tragedy began in 1947, immediately after the creation of Pakistan. The colonialist army of Pakistani Punjab forcibly occupied Kalat at gunpoint.' Even now a struggle continues in Baluchistan. Leading Baluchi leaders like Sardar Attaullah Mengal, Sardar Mahmood Khan Achakzai and Nawab Khair Baksh Marri, heads of the three great Baluch clans, have been leading protests over the economic exploitation of the region's great natural resources to the exclusion of the local people. Marri and hundreds of his supporters are under arrest. ... "
What about Baluchistan?
What about Baluchistan? Indeed!
Al-Qaeda Planned Missile Attack on Incirlik Air Base:
Ankara, alarmed by the crypto, informed MIT Undersecretary, Gendarmerie Headquarters, and Security General Directorate. The gendarmes, who guard the region, have taken emergency measures around the American base against missile attacks.
MIT and police units began multifaceted operations in Adana. The intelligence units had uncovered another action plan of al-Qaeda against Incirlik Air Base. Police intelligence had found out the organization was preparing to attack the base with a hijacked plane.
Al-Qaeda Plan
If we were true to our Principles we would support these people, not help suppress them
" ... If there is an example of the grossest violation of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights committed by a state, it will be found in Balochistan ... "
" ... The sin of the people of Baluchistan is that their leadership never accepted the merger of Baluchistan with Pakistan, and they never reconciled to the present status of Balochistan as an occupied province of Pakistan. Therefore Islamabad based administration always looked upon them with suspicion. This has drawn a wedge between the people of Balochistan and Islamabad and the rulers seek revenge through discrimination. Consequently the Baloch have minimal representation in the federal administration and its higher ranks.
Madam. Chairperson,
Balochistan continues to remain a neglected region. Literacy rate is bare 3 per cent and income per capita is the lowest in Pakistan. It was not without a design that Islamabad rulers exploded the nuclear device in the Chagi hills in Balochistan in 1998. The radioactive fallout of this experiment on the people of the area is simply disastrous.
Madam Chairperson,
Absence of viable educational and medical structures have spelt a disaster for the entire Baloch population. Punjabi oligarchy is afraid of Baloch becoming knowledgeable about their civil, political, economic and cultural rights. They would like the budding Baloch youth to remain illiterate and backward so that they are labelled as criminals and are hunted down in police encounters. This is how the oligarchy has been trying to strike at the roots of Baloch society. Growing unemployment among the Baluch youth forces them to head towards the metropolitan city of Karachi to find a livelihood. This results in tremendous ecological and demographic imbalance and encourages slum growth. increased crime is its by-product.
Madam Chairperson,
It should be mentioned that the 1973 Constitution of Pakistan provides for royalty to Balochistan for exploitation of natural gas reservoirs at Sui. But Pakistani rulers never implemented the terms of the agreement. Indeed, the exploitation of natural resource of Balochistan for the benefit of the Punjab is continuing unabated ... "
UN Commission on Human Rights
Democracy and literacy for the chosen few Iraqi Muslims.
It is still Despots for the rest.
Desert Rat,
David Warren, a clear-eyed Canadian commentator whom I generally admire, has another take on the Baluchis in his post on Musharaf, "Mush":
http://www.davidwarrenonline.com/index.php?artID=572
See what you think.
Jamie Irons
Some one said, when I continued in a similar way, to stop the Japanese.
Well, not exactly.
boghie said
" ... Did winning a low intensity conflict in the Philippines provide a beachhead into the region – militarily, economically, and culturally? That beachhead might have been wasted by stupid political and military decisions made in the 1930s, but it was there. It was decisive ground that could have been used to contain or crush imperial Japan. ... "
Jamie, I was trying to point out that in some cases--Turkey and Pakistan--private investors seem to be putting less stock in the visuals and more stock into hard data they've researched on the governments themselves.
The message I take is that at least some component of the apparent instability of the 'Islamic street' is a show. A taunt, a game of jeer.
You or I, in contrast, would be dead serious about whatever drove us to burn embassies--we wouldn't do it on the word of our Rabbi or Pastor. Not much of a point, really.
Benador Associates--think tank--has written on the Baluch connection. Here's one I've saved, very eye-opening.
Jamie
Very informative, I've learned more about these folk, in a few hours, than I'd have ever guessed possible.
Mr Warren seems to have accumulated the basic info I had in regards the background, causes and possibilities of Pakistan in general and Baluchistan in particular.
We come to different conclusions, though. His hope is for the General President to muddle on, I'm quite certain that Pakistan will erupt, regardless.
Mr Warren writes
" ... quite apart from the Danish cartoons, were recent successes in ambushing leading Al Qaeda figures -- who, it must be understood, are folk heroes to several million graduates of Pakistan’s Saudi-financed madrassahs. Gen. Musharraf himself would love to drain the odd swamp; but they are filling faster than anyone can drain them. Moreover, he must be sceptical of the allegiance of many of his senior officers, who have publicly stated “Islamist” views. ... "
" ... If Pakistan falls, it will be into the hands of Punjabi and Pushtoon religious fanatics. If that happens, Baluchistan and the Sindh will break free. India will be drawn into the heart of the chaos. A war will follow, in which nuclear weapons might well be used. That’s why, for all his occasionally murderous duplicity, we should all be cheering for General “Mush". ... "
And when the General dies, the Cheering stops, and aQ will have those nukes.
We'll be outside, looking in, without a friend in the room.
Amir Taheri is a Benador associate. Here's yer "Neo-Islam", from Feb 17.
Well, buddy, we've had those Iraqi files for three years now, still not translated.
The more I read of these people, the better for US they seem. The Baluchi seem to hate the Iranians more than they hate US, and for now, that could be enough.
Or perhaps not. But if the option is not pursued, than the Iranian Crisis as well as the War on Wahabbist Terror really is a Sham.
If the Army wanted to issue the .45, they could ask Kimber to make them 500,000 today and be done with it.
Seriously, anyone needing material for the psy-war has gotta read Amir Taheri--starting with "Neo-Islam". Lotta good ammo in there. Things the press should've made common knowledge years ago.
Buddy,
"Neo-Islam" is a wonderful piece.
I have not been disappointed by Amir Taheri...
And thanks for clarifying your post about which I had a question.
Jamie Irons
Trish,
The American involvement in the Philippines was probably a mistake. But it's a 107 year old mistake. I don't think anyone in the War Department even knew there were Muslims, amoks and Juramentados in Mindanao.
There was really no strategic rationale to take the Philippines. The Navy knews this immediately and when after the Great War the Philippines was left behind the Japanese fortified island barrier it was only the insistence of Leonard Wood and his cronies who kept it garrisoned in force. The US divisions that surrendered on Bataan were doomed from the 1920s onwards. Macarthur retook the Philippines largely for political reasons. It's still debateable whether it was a necessary step on the road back to Japan. The Central Pacific theater was probably the more important route.
But it's even more true that Spain had no business colonizing it in the first place, as far as historical justifications go. Magellan simply ran into it by accident.
And yet ... if Magellan followed by the Spanish warrior-priests had not met the rising tide of Muslim proseletyzation in 1571 the Islands would have become an Islamic colony. By the time Legazpi came the indigenous tribes had become beseiged in the uplands as Islam spread in the lowlands. Had the Philippines not been claimed for the Cross it would have been claimed for the Crescent. One of the fundamental misconceptions of history is that the only empire-builders were the White Men.
How does one judge that? I don't. History happened as it did.
trish,
I'd just like to add that there was active pre-European empire building in SE Asia. The Sri Vijaya and Madjapahit empires come to mind. How extensive was pre-Islamic civilization? Consider Borobudur. When Stamford Raffles was in Java in the early 1800s he heard rumors of a great temple in the interior that had lain forgotten for centuries. He began to unearth a magnificent temple complex which you can visit today, incidentally the largest Buddhist monument on earth. And it's pre-Islamic.
mika. said...
Wiki: Kurds and Jews
In 2001, a team of Israeli, German, and Indian scientists discovered that the majority of Jews around the world are closely related to the Kurdish people, more closely than they are to the Semitic-speaking Arabs or any other population that was tested. Most of the 95 Kurdish Muslim test subjects came from northern Iraq.
///////////////
While some Jews returned from Babylon--ie Iraq-- to build the second temple--many more did not.
Little known fact, Saladin, the Greatest Muslim Warrior and Islam's go-to example of tolerance, was a self-made, bootstrapped-up-thru-the-ranks Kurd.
Fred, I see your point, but there's also the point that the effect should be devastating on today's zealots, to learn that Salafism was from the get-go a cynical fraud only pretending to piety in order to enrich its leaders. It's quite a message, if it could be got out.
'One of the fundamental misconceptions of history is that the only empire-builders were the White Men.'
I have never heard/read that thought. The Aztecs, Mayans, Incas, Chinese, etc. There were more non-white empires than white empires.
Or MoveOn.org, no doubt.
Trish,
Can you tell me in a nutshell what was wrong with Just Cause?
ex-helo,
You probably missed a couple of comments by Opotho:
He thinks we're mostly Closet KKK types that think all the others are Monkeys.
The info or psy-war is nothing more than the lower-cost step that our own history requires be tried first--while we prepare for its failure. The cartoon war has been utterly disasterous for the 50 or so mob-killed people--but it appears to've done wonders to clarify the battlefield for a great number of westerners.
Well, since the notes that comprised Mo's collection of writings passed by the Angel were almost all eaten by a family pet and then others gathered from "memorizers" around the land and then ran into other problems later where there were "different versions" so all but one were burned....
It's doubtful that anyone knows exactly what, when and how the Qur'an came to its final form.
But now, it can not be modified, revised or doubted as the word of G-D just like the Bible is believed to be by radical Christians.
Both are to die over.
Papa Ray
"--but it appears to've done wonders to clarify the battlefield for a great number of westerners."
---
Even more than a forty hour Muslim history course ala Opotho would, I'd wager.
Trish,
I thought maybe it was that we did not want to turn over the control of the Canal to his guys.
Ah, Opotho is just trying to figure out what the hell's happening--just like you is, Doug. Y'all just had a misunderstanding--it was clear to a come-lately thread-scanner.
Supposedly, thanks once again to
Jimmy Carter PBUH, they were soon sposed to take over administrative control of the Canal.
After he refused to step down when he lost the election, maybe we figured that meant trouble?
I thought it was because he was a head-of-state cocaine smuggler whose incarnating narco-government promised to be bad for civilization.
'Rat will know:
He was out by then, right?
Does anyone see any parallels between Islam and a Fire Ant nest?
Even if you so much as breath on the nest, they swarm out and get all over you and sting you.
"I get the feeling, that before this is settled, we'll be backing off and letting the Shias and Sunnis duke it out. The problem with that is: Nuclear...."
We're seeing that battle for influence inside Iraq.
Anyone know what the border is like between Pakistan and Iran? You hear of a lot of hot borders in the world, that isn't one I've heard much of. Course, the Pakistanis and Iranians already have enough on their hands as is...
"i respect all ethical people inspite of their stupid childish beliefs, including my own..."
The way I always put it was: "I don't care if you think I'm going to hell, so long as you don't try to send me there prematurely." [Took on a meaning of its own after 9-11, obviously.]
Ah, I hadn't made the connection between Baluchistan and the Iranian-Pakistani border - stupid me.
Desert Rat, if we were true to our principles we'd also probably support the Chechens, Uighurs, and Ruthenians.
Against the Russians, Chinese, and Slovakians, respectively. So things obviously get in the way of our principles.
In recognition, maybe it'd be better to support nobody, at least until they give a reason to. Maybe there's something wrong with our relations with other powers when we're begging them to help us, rather than the other way around. Or maybe we've just got the wrong friends.
you certainly got into the guts of that story
Anybody see the Larry King Flight 93 Survivor Show?
...listening to part of it, must have been hard to watch.
Two mothers so far that thought they might be getting a call:
Both figured it was there responsibility to compose themselves in preparation.
Pretty Cool.
Bingham's mom even went so far as to advise them to try to do something as chances were good they'd die otherwise.
A bomb-builder emerges from the shadows:
Right up to the hot August night his apartment exploded, Louai Sakka's neighbors took him for a newlywed. The lanky Syrian was not seen much in the corridors of the high-rise residential complex where he lived in this sunny resort city, but he spent time nuzzling an attractive young brunette and sipping beer beside the pool.
"He's been involved in this for 15 years," said the attorney, Osman Karahan.
The lawyer said he handles almost 80 percent of the criminal cases brought against Islamic militants in Turkey, a practice that increased sharply after Sept. 11, 2001, when Turkey began detaining large numbers of suspects at its borders. In 2000, he secured the release of Sakka's wife and three children, who were taken in an operation that narrowly missed Sakka.
In the aftermath of the fall of Fallujah, foreign fighters in Iraq convened a shura, or council, Karahan said. The meeting authorized 10 separate attacks on Israeli targets.
Inside his apartment, the living room became a workshop crowded with plastic vats, gas masks, fire extinguishers and PVC pipes to circulate the water needed to keep stable more than 1,000 pounds of hydrogen. The room held 200 pounds of aluminum powder and 13 pounds of C-4 plastic explosives.
How the fire began is unclear. The metalworker suspects it was sparked by his creation, wired for industrial use at 7,500 watts, enough to melt the wiring in a residential building.
A Bomb-builder
Sam's Link:
"The attorney's office candidly declares his beliefs.
The waiting room features copies of Kaide magazine, the Turkish spelling of Qaeda, with ads announcing the martyrdom of Turkish volunteers in Iraq.
Copies of a paperback titled "Virgins of Paradise: Eyes Like Fawns and Shining Skin" are on sale for $4.
Every image of a human face, including the portrait on Karahan's diploma, is covered by a tab of paper.
"Angels don't come where faces are pictured," Karahan explained."
---
What a bunch of Morons.
Unfortunately they are also Committed Madmen.
I think, doug, that Just Cause was caused by some deep dirt that Mr Noriega had on Bush 41, back from the CIA days. But that is just a thought.
The ChoComs have administrative control of the Canal, best as I can tell. Which is fine by me, someone has to dredge the thing and keep it operating. May as well be the Chinese.
Burned down the family home in Panama, they tell me, have not been back to see it. But in exchange they got a Canal Zone home, which had to have been a trade up.
Most of the old town, which was pretty ghetto, was burned, by US, they say. Replaced by condos & hotels & what not.
One note when it comes to Just Cause and Panama, we left as soon as it was over.
That was, I guess, a Lesson Forgotten by the son.
" ... Able Danger linked Mohamed Atta and three other 9/11 hijackers to the Brooklyn cell, said Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, who was the liaison between the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Able Danger team.
"It shocked us how entrenched a presence al-Qaida had in the United States," Mr. Kleinsmith said.
Lt. Col. Shaffer testified he tried three times to have Able Danger data on the Brooklyn cell presented to the FBI, but that on each occasion Pentagon lawyers forbade the meeting. ... "
And oh so much more
Jack Kelly
Sad, oh so sad,
then came the Cover Up
" ... Bin Laden’s intention in 2001 was to portray the West as scared, emotionally vulnerable, over-reactive, decadent and careless of liberal values. The West has done its damnedest to prove him right. ... "
When a War drags on and on and on, without an end it sight, even it's proponents begin to lose resolve.
" ... Were I Bin Laden I could not have dreamt that the spirit of 9/11 would be so vigorous five years on. I have western leaders still parroting my motto that “9/11 alters everything” and “the rules of the game are changed”. I have the Taliban resurgent, financed by Europe’s voracious demand for oil and opium. I have the Pentagon and Scotland Yard paying me the compliment of a “long war” of indefinite duration. My potency is said to require more defence spending than was needed to contain the might of the Soviet Union. ... "
" ... There never was a “terrorist threat” to western civilisation or democracy, only to western lives and property. The threat becomes systemic only when democracy loses its confidence and when its leaders are weak, as now. Terror attacks are for the police. For George Bush and Blair to demand a “long war” against Bin Laden and, by implication, a long suppression of civil liberty is ludicrous. Western civilisation is not some simpering weakling that cowers before a fanatic ’s might, pleading for leaders to protect it by all means, however illegal. It has been proof against Islamic expansionism since the 17th century. It is not at risk.
The American president and the British prime minister have spent half a decade exploiting Bin Laden for political ends, in thrall to their security/industrial complex. They have relied on terrifying their electorates with new and bloodcurdling threats, with what Runciman calls “spook politics”. ... "
In all reality this fellow from The Times, in London, is more right then wrong.
Bin Laden is not going to win and never was. But Bush and Blair are giving him an astonishing run for his money.
Titled: Bush and Blair have brilliantly done Bin Laden's work for him
"Stephen Cambone, undersecretary of defense for intelligence, told the committee his office was unable to find a copy of the chart or any other evidence supporting the claims of Lt. Col. Shaffer and Mr. Smith.
The thoroughness of his "investigation" was called into question when neither Mr. Cambone nor the three underlings he had with him could name the man who ran Able Danger during its Garland phase.
That embarrassing admission was elicited by U.S. Rep. Curt Weldon, a Philadelphia-area Republican.
"
But for Attila, papa, it was the Romans that were always causing trouble, for Carthage.
He made it to the Gates of Rome, but the walls, they were to high.
Here in the US there are no gates, the wall was never built and the Horde continues to invade.
13 million at last count, thousands more arriving with each neww dawn.
The analogy, may not be completely apt, but it is scary enough.
'Rat,
Mayor on long Island did his own Census, since US Census does not reflect number of illegals.
Can't recall excactly, he has AT LEAST 25% there!
He said it has MUSHROOMED IN THE LAST FIVE YEARS!
...reason for census is so he can deliver services.
He says if Feds won't do their jobs his job, (as a liberal) is do planning on WHAT IS, not what
WE PRETEND TO BE HAPPENING.
---
Meltdown at the Border,
Ouiz:
What the Hell kind of President allows that after 9-11?
A Squishy, Compassionate Jerk?
...or Just a Corrupt Politician?
You Decide.
But whit, Islam is a Religion of Feace, according to Mr Bush, and in any case, we are not at War with it.
We are at WAR with Osama, by Congressional Authorization, but we are LOSING that WAR.
That is the Truth.
How to change course and achieve Victory is the rea; Challenge.
It will not be remedied by "Staying the Course".
We have not even identified the true Enemy.
So how will the continued parroting of "Islam, Religion of Peace" by the CiC and his Administration, "Staying the Course" as it were, bring US closer to Victory?
By the Administration's own admission, it will not.
That is why, now, we are in for the "Long War", against, by Congressional Act, only aQ, not Islam, Muslims or Mohammedans.
No winks or nods authorize war.
Them's the facts, in the Law and on the Ground.
This country will be voting Democrat from whenever those demographics take over, until it is no longer recognizable as the USA.
I vote for corrupt, but it could be competentcy, Mr Cheney proved his was lacking, but I just live here.
Mayor says with 25% plus Economy is DEPENDENT on them now.
(Just like that Rufus Dufus poster said a few days back)
...we're doomed, because we DECIDE TO BE DOOMED.
When is Belmont Club going to address this Disaster?
doug. the Country voted Democratic in 2000. Only the Electoral College vote put Mr Bush in office, not the Popular vote.
The direct "Will of the People" subverted.
Granted the founders ere smart fellows, but it ain't the Mexicans that create the Demographic threat to the Republic, it is the Actions, or lack there of, by the Republican Party that will swing the next Election.
It will be a National referendum on Bush Policies, the '08 Vote, if we have not Won by then, or at least have Victory within our sights, the War on Wahhabist Terror will be over.
(But then, I could ask that at 95% of the "Conservative" sites)
See no Evil.
Illegals vote Democrat.
Bet their kids will too.
The figures show Hispanics DO vote Democrat, 'Rat.
(I'm sure it's reversed for all the older generations that came for legitimate purposes, before Socialism took over.)
We keep voting after '08, and the demographics keep getting worse.
Maybe bin Laden will run as a third party candidate. He'd make a great president insofar as solving all these immigration and al Quada problems. The Telegraph would be tickled, too. As well as lots of Americans who are just tired of the conflict and wish we had a leader who knew how to keep the politics on point.
Make Iran the 51st state, then we don't have to worry about 'em anymore, they're just "us". Hell, let's make the planet the 51st state.
Will Britain have won if we kill bin Laden and growing areas in the UK institute Sharia?
Doug,
Maybe we should set the Joo Flu on them Turkeys?
I'm tired of the one that LIES about the Illegal Problem, Buddy.
...and oversees it getting worse than it ever did under Clinton.
There may be a case there, doug, but it is a secondary one.
The migrants I know, personally are as "Socially Conservative" with the most severe "Family Values" as any US citiizen I have EVER met.
I do not know all that many migrants, but there are many in the agricultural industries of AZ.
Someone has to clean up after those horses, endlessly.
Even if all of the 13 Million voted as a Bloc, most never even try to vote, avoiding as much contact with "The Man" as possible, that would be a small percentage, about 8, of the total vote.
So yea, generationally it could impact National US elections.
Mikah: Moral of the story: Bring a rifle to spear fight.
No stupid, you bring a freak'n Tank!
The "Hispanic" vote overall votes Democrat by a significant margin.
The children of illegals are legal.
They go to schools that teach them to hate Amerika, at least in Calif. that is.
What could we expect?
Some Bible tooting feet stomping Hillbilly
Who is Mikah? ;-)
You were saying Alex..?
annex northern Mexico, buddy.
Then the problems in Nuevo Laredo and the rest of Mexico could still be ignored. But then those guys down there could vote and would not have to travel without their families to get work.
When a Government refuses to either enforce or change a Law, then begins to enforce it selectively, it is a corrupt Government.
The corruption may not be financial, but it certainly is moral.
"When a Government refuses to either enforce or change a Law, then begins to enforce it selectively, it is a corrupt Government."
---
...just look at all the "Citizens" that now rationalize and justify the corruption, since we are part of it, and some folks would rather not admit who they are.
(Easier to talk about the corrupt Euros)
I know. It's a legit beef. We're skating over thin ice. Listen to The Hon Ron Paul. The whole American Experiment counts on people uinderstanding self-government. but if we have to become Authoritarian in order to survive, we may as well get on with it.
What is Selective Enforcement?
Canadian Doctor: Sorry End of the line.
Mexican Peasant: Step right up.
---
Only lifetime govt employee could eat after THAT day's work.
Doug, stop playing Jeopardy.
Haven't read Paul yet, he scares me.
"I am not affiliated with Ron Paul in any way, and I paid for this comment!"
The thing about Ron Paul is, he's pretty much factually correct of everything he says. But...but...something stinks somewhere, i just don't what it is--do you, mr. jones?
What's the point of the Paul Link, Buddy?
...I don't think I'll force myself to read it.
No real point, Doug. Just to mention that there is a leader available who can explicate quite well the downside of foreign entanglements and big government.
CBS Evening News?
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