Words we've been waiting to hear.

An Arab apologizes for 9/11. Not for himself, of course, but for the culture that spawned it, with a short summary of why.

I trust that they will not be propogated. After all, they're not PC. But they're true.

Concerning conspiracy theories

Back in, I think, Winter of 2004-5 Popular Mechanics published an edition specifically to debunk 9/11 myths. They were pretty thorough, and nailed a few that I hadn't even heard of. Naturally, the conspiratorial idiots who think these things up have accused the editor in question of being a pawn of the conspiracy.

A fellow soldier in MI pointed me towards Loose Change once a few months ago. I pointed him to a collection of the points made in that article.

I won.

It makes me sad that these people have as much say-so in the constitution of our government as I do.

Mandatory 9/11 post

From Cox and Forkum.

There was a memorial today on post that I didn't attend because I was passed out at home, sick and medicated. But that's ok with me... I don't need a memorial. As I told the wife the other day when she was talking about attending, every time we slaughter another one of those terrorist bastards is little memorial to me.

It's about time

"Armed with nuclear weapons," Bush said, Islamic extremists "would blackmail the free world, and spread their ideologies of hate, and raise a mortal threat to the American people. If we allow them to do this, if we retreat from Iraq, if we don't uphold our duty to support those who are desirous to live in liberty, 50 years from now history will look back on our time with unforgiving clarity, and demand to know why we did not act. I'm not going to allow this to happen - and no future American president can allow it either."

Finally, some clear words with backbone in them. (unfortunately, though unsurprisingly, not from Europe) But is this a warning or a starting shot? I think the former.

Linked from Daily Briefing on Iran.

The United Nations and the Iraq War

Some time ago I promised to delve into and illuminate some of the reasons that it was a good idea for the US to invade Iraq. Since I'm still on vacation for a couple of days, I figured I'd start that up though it won't be finished. I still have other things I have to do also. As I was making a list of things to talk about, I suddenly became inspired to expound on the topic of the United Nations. So I've posted this piece first. It's not quite up to professional standards, as I've written it all at one sitting from what is in my head right now, but it's reasonably clear and I've sprinkled it with references when I could find relevant ones.


The Iraqi adventure has proven the abject uselessness of the United Nations as an international security agent.

After fourteen UN resolutions against Saddam’s defiant Iraq the UN did something bold and innovative to compel obedience… absolutely nothing. In addition to doing nothing, the international sanctions (and attached Oil for Food program) that were supposed to compel Iraq into doing something were subverted into private financial projects (i.e. bribery and embezzlement) by a variety of people ranging from the UN leadership to private business interests to members of governments, all the while secretly enriching Saddam Hussein and thereby defeating the entire purpose of the sanctions. On top of this, when the US and Britain proposed in 2002 to doing something to actually enforce the UN resolutions (read: threaten and perhaps use force), many of the other members did their utmost to block the proposed actions, including even the threat of force. (without the threat of force, why would Iraq agree to anything?)

While people (usually on the left) talk about the Iraq war as being the private project of President Bush and his minion, Tony Blair, in violation of international laws left and right, not to mention human decency, it has probably been the greatest single blow for a peaceful international order since the end of the Cold War. Or at least, it would have been were so many people not so doggedly, irrationally set against it. Think about it; for the first time since Korea (I specifically leave out Gulf War I, because if its intimate connection to Gulf War II; they may as well be two phases of the same conflict and perhaps even share a name) rogue international behavior in violation of UN resolutions (some of which explicitly threaten the use of force, although in diplo-speak, so typical laymen miss the point) would be met with real consequences. One of the reasons that the UN is weak is because the nations that it was designed to control, the Irans and North Koreas and Iraqs of the world, don’t listen to it. Again, why should they? No one will make them. The UN might, maybe, if the French and Russians and Chinese are in the mood to lose potential sales, pass economic sanctions which will be ignored or subverted after a few years, if not revoked outright because of ‘humanitarian reasons.’ (That was a constant debate in the UN throughout the 90s) But the use of force? That’s so… uncivilized. The same scenario can be extended to Iran and its nuclear ambitions, to genocide in Darfur and Rwanda and Serbia, et cetera. All pressing problems that the UN should, theoretically, counter. All terrible tragedies that instead require(d) private intervention because the Security Council couldn't/can't bring themselves to act. Finally, even private intervention on behalf of the UN as in 2003 (as I mentioned, previous resolutions that Iraq had violated promised the use of force) was condemned because (hah) it went around specific UN authority. So weakness (ahem, sophistication) breeds impotence, (endless ineffectual diplomacy) as you might expect

What the diplomatic bruhah before the Iraq invasion showed about the UN was that the UN as an institution absolutely lacked the means and collective will to enforce itself on the international community and, because of that, there's really nothing anyone can do about it when third party powers like the US and UK decide to act instead. France's vaunted and much abused (and apparently paid for, if you followed the above links) veto power in the UNSC proved utterly worthless in the end, because it exists and they threatened it on the premise that no one would dare to operate outside the explicit (rather than implied, as the US/UK did) blessings of the UN. But someone dared, and suddenly the big stick was broken. What Protestants care about being ex-communicated, after all?

What does this demonstration of impotence mean for the US? Well first of all no one, even foreign powers, can expect the UN to be a constraint against an unwilling United States in the future for the same reason that it hasn't been a constraint against any other power disinclined to listen to it; no one will make us. If the rules don't work for us, we will change (or ignore) the rules. Future international political battles will take place where they belong; behind closed doors.

I can already hear people whining about how that makes the US a 'unilateral' rogue nation. Well, they're right, sort of. If it is in our national interest to ignore 'the rules' then we will do so, as we have in the past. The thing is, so will everyone else. France can land troops in a west African nation or ruthlessly slaughter people in Algeria without asking permission, the Russians can storm and burn Chechnyan cities and extort Ukraine with its energy resources without going through international processes, the Chinese can threaten to (or actually) invade its neighbors like Tibet and Vietnam and Taiwan without the blessings of the UN... why can't the US topple an enemy power who violated a cease-fire by firing on our forces and broke the WMD clauses, attempted to assassinate a US President, and was a chief supporter of international terrorism? (any one of which is a cassus belli) Why aren't these other (sitting UN Security Council member) powers condemned? Why are THEY condemning us, the damned hypocrites? *shrugs* Because we're the US. Most everyone hates us. Those who don't hate us envy us. We're the biggest, brightest target on the international battlefield, which is why peace activists can, with a straight face and clear conscience, call us a terrorist nation and march in protests alongside Stalinist communists (yes, that happened in 2003. Several times) instead of against people like the Iranians, the Sudanese, Hamas, and so forth.

The launching of the invasion also demonstrated that UN resolutions might actually be carried out by a member nation independent of a specific UNSC "go" date. In its most basic terms, the UN authorized the use of force against Iraq in 1991, the use of force was suspended upon the signing of a cease-fire, the cease-fire was violated, and hostilities resumed, ending in the destruction of the Iraqi government. Therefore, the US and UK carried out the final execution of motions begun twelve years earlier. Hmm; UN Resolutions can be dangerous after all. Sure they may sit there for a decade or so, but sooner or later a member state can suddenly decide to enforce it and lo and behold they have (theoretically) executed the will of the UN body. The idea that a UN resolution would actually be enforced and driven to its conclusion is kind of a shocker; I suspect that there will therefore be fewer of them in the future, and more carefully worded. Given the lowest common denominator requirements in effect already, I expect a decrease in the number and even theoretical potency of UNSC Resolutions. The UN will slowly remove itself from any interference in international power politics beyond the symbolic level because its members fear that Resolutions might be used against them in the future by crazy unilateralists. Like America, for instance.

So it seems that the Iraq war has put a final nail into the relevancy of the United Nations to international politics. Not only is it too weak institutionally to compel behavior of any kind, but because nations can use its declarations as a sort of diplomatic legitimacy shield outside the explicit will of the decision-making body it will stop even trying to influence international politics in meaningful (at least in remotely controversial) ways.

As an American nationalist, I fervently hope this is true. I see the UN as a corrupt, ineffectual, anti-American country club which, at odds with all logic and morality, grants legitimacy and power to the most odious regimes on earth, within our borders and largely at our expense. And I would much rather see it weakened or disappeared than strengthened and intrusive.

Returned

I had no idea that a National Park site billed as a natural wonder full of wild animals could be so... commercialized. I went in with camp foods, trash bags, a firearm and two knives, a Leatherman, cold and wet weather gear, and so forth, since I figured we would be way out from civilization. Nah. Within 200 yards of our tent were three restaurants, a coffee/ice cream shop, a relaxation lounge for those who, you know, didn't want to get dirty, and a grocery/supply store. A little disappointing after I hauled all that shit up there.

Another surprise were the people. At least half of all the people I encountered there were foreigners of all sorts... Russian, German, British, Australian, Japanese... The rest of the (American/Canadian) folks looked like either the rugged outdoorsy types who do this kind of thing for kicks, (whom I expected to see) hippies, (seriously, who else brings a guitar and bongo drums along with their scruffy beards to a national park?) or upper class WASP types on vacation. A large percentage of the middle aged+ men (and there were quite a few) came along with a young, pretty girl. My wife ventured that they were of the mail order variety.

Got some nice pics of the park I figured I would share.

The whole park is in an extended valley so pretty much wherever you look is an image like this. The shade provided is nice when the weather is hot like it was on our trip.











Here we have a scenic river. It's quite low here, as you can judge by the prevalence of non-submerged river stones, but I understand that it's practically raging during spring and early summer from snowmelt.

This is a nice shot of Vernal Falls, which we climbed. And that climb was a bitch, especially since the wife and I decided to be all hard core and military and carry full ruck-loads on our backs that included meals, water, and emergency supplies. Something like an 833m climb, very steep. I'm happy that we made it, but it sure did hurt afterwards.






This is a shot of part of the granite stairwell we climbed to get to the top of the falls. It resembles something you'd find in Incan ruins in Peru, though mercifully at a lower altitude. It continues around the back side of that mountain on the right for quite a ways down, and on the left proceeds up to a near sheer cliff face and climbs up to the falls themselves.






A shot of the valley from the top of the falls. i.e. proof of victory over the damned stairway. That little band of winding water is the same one pictured above with all the river rocks showing, but much higher in elevation.















Atop the falls was a little pool between the runoffs and the falls proper labeled Emerald Pool where a number of people (including some attractive foreigners of some type or another... didn't recognize the language) brought swim suits along for a dip, which they very soon regretted. The water was quite cold.







A nice trip, though the drive was long and the experience vaguely disappointing because of 1) all the hype about Yosemite being marvelous, though I imagine it's better in the spring with more and larger waterfalls, and 2) the commercialization. $50 souvenir clothing and a beer store within spitting distance of your 'camp ground' does not a mystic natural experience make.

Vacation

I'm on leave for a week so the wife and I are taking off to Yosemite, since it's within driving distance of where I'm stationed right now. We'll be gone for a few days and hopefully I'll have some interesting pictures afterwards. Also hopefully, I won't have to kill any bears. I understand they're a problem in Yosemite. So I'm bringing a friend.




I like my SIG.

By the time I get back I might also have a book review. I'm currently reading : To Dare and To Conquer: Special Operations and the Destiny of Nations, from Achilles to Al Qaeda. So far, (I'm 3 chapters in) it's fascinating. The guy knows his stuff and is kind of funny. But I've noticed a trend. The most successful operations, the ones that did indeed alter history, save kingdoms, or break armies, were conducted with the utmost ruthlessness. I fear that such qualities are no longer allowed to US forces.

Worth visiting

Even if only for the humor. MEMRI TV collects clips of Middle Eastern TV (of various kinds) and translates them for English language public consumption. Sometimes you find some highly revealing things there. Sometimes, you just get a chuckle.

Warning: repeated visitation over a long period of time may cause depression, or Dawnfire-like thought processes.

Because I think they deserve to be repeated.

I've had these for a while, sitting in a file, forgotten. I can't recall exactly when they were taken, but I'm almost certain it was this past summer.

They were strangely absent from MSM coverage. Hmm.

Saddam Tortured

Now I think that all but the most milk-blooded pansies can agree that this was well deserved.

A report on 'Qana-gate'

I discovered via LGF's media scandal quicklinks a consolidated report on one of the Hezb'Allah conflict's media circuses, the 'Qana Massacre', detailing the shoddy work and outright deception involved. It's over at EU Referendum.

The Ambulance fiasco

At first, I was thrilled at the recent exposures of media lies (which we in the military have known about for literally decades), but this is starting to reach a penultimate, pathetic low.

You only have to LOOK at that vehicle to know that it wasn't hit by a missile. Are 'professional' journalists really so stupid, so lazy, and/or so dishonest as to pass that garbage off as truth?

The answer, as is being consistenly demonstrated and reinforced, is yes.

Eteraz , in response to a commenter

Assistant Village Idiot asked me earlier to give an opinion on this blog. So I looked it over.

I didn't spend a whole lot of time there, maybe 30 minutes scanning this post and that. I was impressed at this one (coincidentally the 1st post when I went there) because of the research and effort to find the facts, and this one for its honesty, some things somewhat lacking in much of the blogosphere. So it seems that Eteraz is capable of and willing to present rational thought backed up by hard information. However, his whole blog seems to be infused with a kind of victim complex and sort-of-subtle self righteousness, or sense of moral superiority. Like here. It starts out like a reasonable post, but then kind of rambles into a "I'm such an outsider, pity me" story, and ends up implying the need for the acceptance and embrace of exactly the kinds of fanatics he began the post denouncing as insatiable and aggressive for whom a welcoming embrace is only another step on the path to instituting theocracy. A weird twist on the self-pity thing here.

Worthwhile, esp. if you care about Pakistan and/or modern Islamic issues.

Odd; the word 'scais' in his title blurb doesn't seem to exist in French... I've gotten 0 hits on 4 translators.

To know the taste of freedom, one must taste oppression

Otherwise, how will you ever know the difference?

I think that's the problem with today's liberal retards (as opposed to non-retarded liberals, which seem to be in short supply nowadays... I think they've been re-labeled as moderates). They bitch and whine and decry the 'authoritarian' and 'fascist' Bushitler police state because they honestly don't know any better.

They have no fucking idea what it's like to live under a REAL police state; where your online habits, your mail, your phone calls, even your daily movements are scanned, screened, or controlled; where the police and dreaded 'security services' have almost unlimited power not to reference your international phone calls against a list of known terrorist figures, but to extort you, steal your Rolex, or rape your sister; where participation in an anti-government (or even just a controversial social issue) demonstration can land you in jail where you are beaten, tortured, and denied access to information, friends, family, or counsel; where owning a weapon marks you as a revolutionary to be executed; where foreigners are treated better than domestic citizens by the government because their countries actually care about them and may intervene if they are mistreated; I could go on.

I have a new definition for modern American liberalism. I like it.

On keeping military secrets

And by logical extension, civilian intelligence agency, R&D, and other state secrets.

From Shelby Foote's (who I think is long dead) The Civil War: A Narrative; Volume 1, Fort Sumter to Perryville:

"It was at this point, aggravated further by a shortage of arms and powder, that the general [Johnston] was summoned to ride down to Richmond, two days before the inauguration, for a conference on the military situation... Unequivocally, he stated that his army must fall to a position further south before the roads were dry.

[skip paragraph about President Davis's internal thoughts]

Back at his hotel, it was Johnston's turn to be alarmed. He found the lobby buzzing with rumors that the Manassas intrenchments [sic] were about to be abandoned. The news had moved swiftly before him, though he had come directly from the conference: with the result that his reluctance to discuss military secrets with civilians, no matter how highly placed, was confirmed. No tactical maneuver was more difficult than a withdrawal from the presence of a superior enemy. Everything depended on secrecy; for to be caught in motion, strung out along the roads, was to invite destruction. Yet here in the lobby of a Richmond hotel, where every pillar might hide a spy, was a flurry of gossip predicting the very movement he was about to undertake. Next day, riding back to Manassas on the cars, his reluctance was reconfirmed and his anger heightened when a friend approached and asked if it was true that the Bull Run line was about to be abandoned. There could be no chance that the man had overheard the news by accident, for he was deaf. Nor did it improve the general's humor when he arrived hat afternon to find his headquarters already abuzz with talk of the impending evacuation.

Two things he determined to do in reaction: 1) to get his army out of there as quickly as he could - if possible, before McClellan had time to act on the leaked information- and 2) to confide no more in civilians, which as far as he was concerned included the Chief Executive...

Here is an example from the 19th century of defense secrets being leaked by civilians with such speed (thanks, I'm sure, to telegraphs) that they beat the author of said secret back to his own quarters. Although history shows that the Confederate army in question survived this little crisis, to do so it had to rush from its positions short much equipment and preparation to escape the most notoriously slow US General in history. i.e. careless comments by (ir)responsible officials almost caused the destruction of an entire army.

In the modern era, leaked secrets can be literally broadcast across the entire world in a matter of hours. Depending on the leak, information could be transferred to a beligerrant within minutes.

Yet still, many (if not most) Americans don't think leaks to the press are a big deal and routine offenders go unpunished. One day, this leniency is really going to hurt us. Or rather, it's going to get some poor troops or agents somewhere killed and make the leaker feel guilty. (maybe)

Does this really surprise anyone?

Israeli troops have raided a Hezb'Allah 'stronghold' in Lebanon, an act which has already been labeled as a 'flagrant violation' of the cease-fire.

Israel says that the raid was aimed at Syrian and Iranian arms shipments to Hezb'Allah, which are also forbidden by the cease-fire. If true, the cease-fire had already been broken (after what, a whole 5 days?) by, of course, Hezb'Allah. In the strictest reading of the laws of war, Israel (assuming they can prove that Hezb'Allah was indeed shipping arms) is now free to re-enter Lebanon and resume the fighting. That's the whole point of having cease-fire conditions, right?

Unfortunately, that won't happen because the rules that apply to the civilized powers of the earth are not expected to apply to barbarians like Hezb'Allah. They can re-arm, absorb foreign 'volunteers,' mobilize, and prepare for a new round of fighting, but Israel can't do anything about it without being damned in the eyes of the world.

Doom and gloom, as per usual

In response to a post by Tigerhawk.

First things first, this is the NYT, and that article was written with a slant, though they seemed to hide it better than usual.

For instance, it begins; "the anti-American insurgency has continued to strengthen despite the killing of the terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi."

That's way too simple, and not technically correct anyway. Please follow me through our collective memories...

At one time, the 'insurgency' was Baathist. It has since been crushed. Everyone knows and acknowledges this.

Then it was Salafist, fueled by MB/Hamas-types from Palestine and the Gulf. They didn't do so hot either, their chieftain got blown up a couple of months ago and their network broken from the top down. That means that the ones who were left were local, small scale groups with limited resources. All they can do are plant IEDs. When was the last time they launched a coordinated attack en masse on a prison or Marine base? Before Zarqawi was toasted, right. Simplest explanation for a rise in the number of IEDs is two-fold:

1) all those jihadists who were in Zarqawi's since disassembled organization have taken their mortar rounds and started making bombs out of them, since they aren't using them in coordinated assaults anymore. Why let them go to waste, after all? (educated guess here, I don't have hard information)

2) Iran is supplying them, to some groups. That's a fact, and has been for some time. One of theirs killed a friend of mine.

A simple rise in IED's might indicate an increase in strength, but not here because it has been accompanied by a simultaneous FALL in other activites, like the prison breaks and guerrilla assaults I mentioned. The Salafists are building road bombs because it is effective and cheap. They're not raiding installations because they can no longer afford to. That indicates a WEAKENING of the Salafist insurgency; they can no longer carry out operations that at one time they did regularly.

Given these points how can one explain the (anonymous, naturally, which I inherently distrust) statement, "“The insurgency has gotten worse by almost all measures, with insurgent attacks at historically high levels,” said a senior Defense Department official who agreed to discuss the issue only on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak for attribution. “The insurgency has more public support and is demonstrably more capable in numbers of people active and in its ability to direct violence than at any point in time.”"

Assuming that that statement wasn't taken out of time or context, that doesn't make any sense does it? After all, Zarqawi and almost all of his cell chiefs (remember all those raids that immediately followed his death?) have been neutralized. And how would Zarqawi's insurgency, which killed more Shi'i than Americans anyway, ever have such public support in a majority Shi'i country? Seems contradictory, doesn't it?

That's because the statement is referring to the Shi'a militias, not 'the insurgency' that everyone thinks of. The Shi'a militias are, again, funded, armed, and possibly trained by the Iranians. Their political leaders regularly travel to Iran for 'consultations.' (i.e. instructions) And they have begun to seriously misbehave by killing political, religious, and occassionally business rivals and picking fights with the British. Though they were laying off the US; after Sadr's two previous beat-downs and the nasty bloody destruction of a few of their Baghdad 'death squad' by US/Iraqi Special Forces, [which was accompanied by a 'hands off' warning to Iran; you might remember that little gem in the 'oh wow, a US diplomat is going to talk to Iranians' episode a few months ago] they didn't seem eager to play with us anymore, it looks like they've gotten their fight back.

The power and assertiveness of Shi'a militias is an Iraqi political problem and they're trying to find a way to deal with them *without* a rebellion. There have been direct assaults against some of the more obnoxious of these groups, but they were not overt or politically challenging. I don't think a peaceful effort'll work myself; they're not the type to compromise.

But anyway, tying Iranian-backed Shi'a militias in with Baathist and Salaafist fighters (who spent a significant amount of time and effort killing Shi'a) is wrong at best, dishonest at worse.

What this uptick in violence represents is not an angry country trying to rid itself of an occupying power... that's silly. If that's what the goverment wanted, all they have to do is say "leave," rather than "please don't go away yet." What this is is the increased aggression of foreign-backed militias. They've gotten themselves into a zealous, earth-cleansing crusading frenzy, helped by the Hezb'Allah drama and Ahmadouchebag's apocalyptic rhetoric, and by god they're going to purify their land with fire and blood. (they really do talk like that you know)

There may be a civil war in Iraq if no suitable peaceful way is found to reduce these militias; but it won't be sectarian. It'll be US- backed/nationalist/loyalist and Iran-backed/religious/rebel. If we depart without leaving a secure, unchallanged government (in whatever form) then we've handed the country to Iran and invited intervention by the other Arab powers. They've been working against us almost from the beginning, first with money, then with bombs and bullets.

The Baathists are beaten, and Al Qaeda is beaten. Now it's a war by proxy with Iran. Inshal'lah, after them there won't be another enemy and we can go home. Or invade Iran. Whatever.

What would it take...

to mobilize the West?

So, if an existential war against Islamo-fascism is as inevitable as World War II became after the appeasement of the 1930s, what event would be necessary to motivate the United States to militarize its society and economy to fight that war? What event, if any, would militarize Western Europe?

A conventional opposition force. Anything less does not require mobilization to counter. *shrugs*

A-ha!

I told you it was illegal! Two former AIPAC lobbyists are being prosecuted for disclosing classified information to 'reporters and foreign diplomats.' They tried to argue that the Espionage Act was uncontitutionally vague, and a federal judge smacked them down.

We need more of this.

Also, and thanks to Tigerhawk for the initial tip, here is a convenient, simple list of modern leftist hypocracies of modern times.

The antiwar Left wants to wield American power. The jihadists want to destroy it … and us. All of us.

The antiwar Left has a conveniently flexible moral compass. Consequently, the Clinton era Echelon program was fine, but Bush’s NSA Terrorist Surveillance Program is an impeachable offense.

Mishandling classified information by a Clinton CIA director was worthy of a pardon, and destroying classified information (and lying to investigators about it) by a former Clinton national-security adviser was worthy of a pass, but leaking the unremarkable fact that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA is the crime of the century.

Bombing Kosovo without U.N. approval was a moral imperative; invading Iraq after over a dozen U.N. resolutions is a violation of international law.

Renditions conducted between 1994 and 2000 were just good national-security sense; renditions conducted between 2001 and 2006 are war crimes.

Indicting Osama bin Laden in 1998 and then doing nothing to capture him while he bombed two American embassies and an American naval destroyer, killing hundreds, was aggressive yet intelligently modulated counterterrorism; allowing Osama bin Laden to evade capture in Tora Bora while killing and capturing hundreds of his operatives and decimating his hierarchy is irresponsibly incompetent.

Wet fingers firmly in the wind, the Left looks you in the eye and tells you that what is depends on what the definition of “is” is, then votes for it before voting against it. The object of the game is power, and they are willing to gamble, even with our lives, to get it or keep it.

There are some other things that could be in there, like canceling a CIA operation designed to capture OBL at the last minute because someone might get killed, but overall a decent rundown. And some Democrats honestly wonder why no one but they themselves will trust them with defense and security issues.

What have we gained from Iraq?

Over on Tigerhawk's comments, after I put much effort into research and analysis, I unleashed my formidable rhetorical arsenal (actually I just punched up a quick 10 minute point by point reply) against some two of my favorite local leftists who had some misguided ideas about the world. Screwie Hoolie surrendered with a stock remark about spit, but Lanky Bastard, in a fairly civil way, admitted to overstating some stuff (which he did, and even bothered to double check) but also included this:

Obviously I think this war is foolish and has damaged US interests, and obviously you don't. And even if I've started off snarky, this part is dead serious: if you want to convince me otherwise, what you should do is explain to me the cost/benefit. What have we gained or won (or are likely to gain or win) that is worth what we've paid and continue to pay? That's the key to changing my mind. Give me the bottom line, answer-to-the-stockholders response. Why is this worth it? And while we're being frank, let me ask: what set of circumstances would cause you to believe that this war isn't in America's best interest? I'm curious. ff to mail me if you'd rather not post in comments.

The fact that a left-winger has actually expressed interest in hearing what will essentially be a rational analysis for invading Iraq (even if I suspect that he asked because he doesn't think I'll be able to do it well... perhaps hence the caveat at the end for email so I can avoid any personal embarrasment) just made me so giddy that I figured that I had to give it a shot. I'm actually going to put a little effort into this, so it won't be posted now. When I finish I'll make a new post here and send him the word to peruse (or ignore) at leisure.

You're all Nazis!

A nice, relatively even-handed rant by the Sandmonkey. Too bad the people to whom it applies will never listen.

Religion of Peace? Not really...

Some enterprising Canadian has explored that question that most of us ask facetiously; "is Islam really the Religion of Peace? Do these terrorist assholes pervert its teachings or are they really only following them to the letter?"

The conclusions, following serious and impressive study, might surprise you. Even I learned a couple of things. It is long, though.

Mandatory Lebanon Opinion

I actually got a comment talking about how someone quoted me on a respectable blog (The Belmont Club) so I have some motivation to write something today. I reckon I'll say something about the Israeli/Hezb Allah thing since I think that it's mandated by law that I have to. It's in the Geneva Conventions. (saw the Ballad of Ricky Bobby the other night... entertaining and not as silly as I thought it would be)

I really don't think the current situation (as far as Israelis and Americans are concerned) is all that different from the one in 1982. Terrorist organization launches attack, after attack, after attack across the border and finally, in a moment of utmost stupidity, kidnaps Israeli troops what, two weeks after Israel invaded Gaza because Hamas kidnapped some Israeli troops? So the IDF moves to stomp Hezb Allah into the dirt. Completely predictable, and completely justifiable. The whinings and bitchings of pacifists, Islamists, and leftists aside, Hezb Allah has had this coming. It's unfortunate that other Lebanese will suffer too, but that's what happens when you let a terrorist faction establish a mini-state within your borders and then launch raids into hostile powers; they're eventually going to retaliate.

An aside on all the people condemning Israel for causing civilian deaths... Never mind. It isn't worth my time. Instead, go here to see how Hezb Allah runs things in Lebanon, here for proof that they fight from civilian areas, and here to see how they are purposefully using other ethinic and religious groups as human shields against their will, with some more details here, including their willingness to kill fellow Lebanese who don't allow them to use their homes and churches. Here are accounts of Hezb Allah fighters using UN posts as shields also. It might also benefit some of you people to go here and actually READ documents that many people like to talk about, but almost no one has so much as looked at.

'Journalists are nothing more than freebooting spies'

Paraphrasing from a Tom Clancy novel, though I forget which one. I found a post by Sandmonkey, an Egyptian blogger whom I enjoy reading, which approaches my position on the 'journalists publishing defense information' topic. Just glad to find someone else (in Egypt, no less) who thinks like me.

A letter I sent to both of my senators...

Hello Senator's aide who might read this.

First thing, this is not a form letter. I wrote every word of this.

Second thing, I'd like to assure you that I'm not part of your ideological base, nor of your opposition's. This is the first time I've ever written a letter to a public official of any kind, and I beg you not to consider my opinion representative of only a fringe element of the public; I am very much a moderate. By implication, that means that the issue I'm writing about is very important to me and to people like me. (most everyone I know)

What I want to rant about is the recent publication by the New York Times (specifically editor Bill Keller, and reporters Eric Lichtblau and James Risen) of a classified financial 'tracking' program used by elements of the US government to trace and thereby help eliminate terrorists and their funds. Following this 'outing' of a perfectly legal and apparently highly useful program, Secretary of the Treasury John Snow released a letter highly critical of the Times crew that lists with some specificity the lengths that Congressmen and Executive officials took to try to convince the Times to not publish this story because it would harm the national interest, efforts that the Times ignored.

To me and many other Americans (and not just your typical Right-wing Defense nuts) this action by the Times staff borders on treason and is certainly illegal. Why does this nation have Classifications for sensitive information if such restrictions are meaningless? Why is it a crime to seek out and publish national defense information (Title 18 > Part I > Chapter 37 > § 793) if such laws will not be enforced? Will the Times (or any other organization or individual who does the same thing) be held accountable when terrorists, foreign agents, or other enemies who could have been stopped by such a program strike and slay American civilians or service-members like myself? Will these reckless and unpatriotic fools be allowed to comfort themselves with the mantra "Freedom of the Press!" then? How about those who leaked the information in the first place? Small comfort for the dead or their families.

Free speech has limits. If it is illegal to dishonestly defame another in print (libel) or scream 'Fire!' in a crowded theater, how can it be tolerated when a major American news organization publishes information obviously and unarguably detrimental to the safety of Americans by informing our terrorist enemies how we fight them?

Please, as a constituent, military intelligence soldier, and citizen, I ask that Senator Cornyn do everything in his power as Senator from the great state of Texas to act against this kind of irresponsible, illegal behavior by urging whatever legal options are available including prosecution of the offending parties, additional legislation to tighten the national security of this nation with regard to an out of control press, and whatever personal lobbying, persuasion, or other insider trick he can manage to try to stop these kinds of dangerous things from happening.

MY NAME HERE, US Army

P.S. If for some reason you or anyone affiliated with your office would like to publish or otherwise recreate this letter, in part or its entirety, feel free. You have my express permission, and tentative encouragement.

Songs

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Returned from Exile

I've begun to awaken from my Arabic-induced coma. As I may or may not have mentioned, I'm in California to learn Arabic and those first 8 weeks or so are killer. Doing fine now however, more like 13 weeks in; did well enough on my last test that they actually send me home a little early. Or at least, they did today. So I've got more leisure time now to do things like rant and bitch to an imaginary audience on the Internet.

A few days ago, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's death was broadcast, confirmed, and reconfirmed, and the expected villains (Hamas, other Islamist assholes) shed their tears and promised their vengeance, while others (like most of Iraq, the US, Jordan, and civilized people in general) gave a little cheer and whistled away the day in a happy mood.

Immediately following the Blue Dude's highly satisfying expiration, the Iraqi government finally pieced together its final components and began to act like a governing body. A number of places on the Internet have hosted speculation that the immaculate timing of Zarqawi's death with the final establishment of a permanent Iraqi government was no coincidence; I agree with this assessment. Without just making stuff up, the idea that he was traded by the Sunni political faction to the Shi'a in exchange for the Defense Ministry is not that far-fetched, though simplistic. But hey, that's how conspiracy theories work best.

Speaking of conspiracies, the moonbat battalion has been churning over how Zarqawi was really an American plant, or a bogey man who never really existed in the first place. They must have truly astounding mental abilities to reconcile those ideas with the government of Jordan banning the introduction of his corpse into their country because he would 'stain their soil,' or his family saying how his death removed a 'stain on their honor,' or the pictures, eyewitness testimony, autopsy, et cetera. Hearing him repeatedly referred to as a stain makes me smile. Another imaginative Internet comment called him a 'Human Nightmare.' Hehe.

This post has a complete lack of links because it's not really current; these things have been in the news and overly commented on already. This is more like a measuring point for my own continued blogging, like a starting line.

This shouldn't really surprise anyone

Poll results shown over at the Strategy Page.

"American Poll Shows Troops Respected Far More Than Critics

March 20, 2006: A recent Harris Poll, asking Americans which "institution" they admired the most, the military came out on top, with 47 percent saying they had a great deal of confidence in the military (38 percent had "some," while 14 percent had "hardly any.") In second place was Small Business (a new category, introduced last year) with 45 percent, then universities (38 percent), Supreme Court (33 percent), medical community (31 percent), and so on to the bottom, where we find the media (14 percent), large companies (13 percent), organized labor (12 percent) and, in a tie at the bottom, the legal profession and Congress, each with ten percent.

The introduction of small business as a separate category resulted in predictable numbers. Small businesses are much more flexible and responsive to their customers and employees. A similar break down of media would be interesting, as small operators (especially those on the Internet) appear to have more respect than the more traditional outlets.

What the troops will find particularly gratifying is that Americans think the least about the people who criticize the military the most."

Osama dead?

From The Big Pharaoh.

Curt Weldon: Bin Laden Is Dead

Rep. Curt Weldon, who broke the Able Danger story last year revealing that military intelligence had identified lead hijacker Mohamed Atta as a terrorist threat before the 9/11 attacks, now says that Osama bin Laden has died.

Weldon made the stunning claim during an interview Wednesday with the Philadelphia Inquirer, which reported: "Weldon is making explosive new allegations. He says a high-level source has told him that terrorist leader Osama bin Laden has died in Iran, where he has been in hiding."

Weldon cited as his source an Iranian exile code-named Ali, telling the paper: "Ali's told me that Osama bin Laden is dead. He died in Iran."



This is interesting news and I'm a bit surprised it hasn't been repeated elsewhere. Wouldn't the MSM love to report something like this to highlight Bush's 'failure to capture' Osama?

Uh oh...

Someone wasn't very careful with their words.

Similar to the last post

is one focusing on the non or under-reported facts and happenings of Iraq. You can bet that if it's non or under-reported, it's gotta be mostly good news!

On the question of Iraqi Civil War

With busier days and less sleep lately I've been disinclined to come update this place. Especially since no one reads it. *cry*

A piece from Arab News (Saudi in origin, I'm pretty sure) on why Iraq is not in a civil war, like so many hopeful liberals have claimed.

The entire explanation for World War 2 in Europe

summed up in a little video clip.

This deserves to be reposted

From the blog A Daily Briefing on Iran:

Ex-Official: Russia Moved Saddam's WMDs

Kenneth R. Timmerman, News Max:

A top Pentagon official who was responsible for tracking Saddam Hussein's weapons programs before and after the 2003 liberation of Iraq, has provided the first-ever account of how Saddam Hussein "cleaned up" his weapons of mass destruction stockpiles to prevent the United States from discovering them.

"The short answer to the question of where the WMDs Saddam bought from the Russians went was that they went to Syria and Lebanon," former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense John. A. Shaw told an audience Saturday at a privately sponsored "Intelligence Summit" in Alexandria, Va. (www.intelligencesummit.org)

"They were moved by Russian Spetsnaz (special forces) units out of uniform, that were specifically sent to Iraq to move the weaponry and eradicate any evidence of its existence," he said.

Shaw has dealt with weapons-related issues and export controls as a U.S. government official for 30 years, and was serving as deputy undersecretary of defense for international technology security when the events he described today occurred.

He called the evacuation of Saddam's WMD stockpiles "a well-orchestrated campaign using two neighboring client states with which the Russian leadership had a long time security relationship." READ MORE

Shaw was initially tapped to make an inventory of Saddam's conventional weapons stockpiles, based on intelligence estimates of arms deals he had concluded with the former Soviet Union, China and France.

He estimated that Saddam had amassed 100 million tons of munitions –- roughly 60 percent of the entire U.S. arsenal. "The origins of these weapons were Rusisan, Chinese and French in declining order of magnitude, with the Russians holding the lion's share and the Chinese just edging out the French for second place."

But as Shaw's office increasingly got involved in ongoing intelligence to identify Iraqi weapons programs before the war, he also got "a flow of information from British contacts on the ground at the Syrian border and from London" via non-U.S. government contacts.

"The intelligence included multiple sitings of truck convoys, convoys going north to the Syrian border and returning empty," he said.

Shaw worked closely with Julian Walker, a former British ambassador who had decades of experience in Iraq, and an unnamed Ukranian-American who was directly plugged in to the head of Ukraine's intelligence service.

The Ukrainians were eager to provide the United States with documents from their own archives on Soviet arms transfers to Iraq and on ongoing Russian assistance to Saddam, to thank America for its help in securing Ukraine's independence from the Soviet Union, Shaw said.

In addition to the convoys heading to Syria, Shaw said his contacts "provided information about steel drums with painted warnings that had been moved to a cellar of a hospital in Beirut."

But when Shaw passed on his information to the Defense Intelligence Agency and others within the U.S. intelligence community, he was stunned by their response.

"My report on the convoys was brushed off as ‘Israeli disinformation,'" he said.

One month later, Shaw learned that the DIA general counsel complained to his own superiors that Shaw had eaten from the DIA "rice bowl." It was a Washington euphemism that meant he had commited the unpardonable sin of violating another agency's turf.

The CIA responded in even more diabolical fashion. "They trashed one of my Brits and tried to declare him persona non grata to the intelligence community," Shaw said. "We got constant indicators that Langley was aggressively trying to discredit both my Ukranian American and me in Kiev," in addition to his other sources.

But Shaw's information had not originated from a casual contact. His Ukranian-American aid was a personal friend of David Nicholas, a Western ambassador in Kiev, and of Igor Smesko, head of Ukrainian intelligence.

Smesko had been a military attaché in Washington in the early 1990s when Ukraine first became independent and Dick Cheney was secretary of defense. "Smesko had told Cheney that when Ukraine became free of Russia he wanted to show his friendship for the United States."

Helping out on Iraq provided him with that occasion.

"Smesko had gotten to know Gen. James Clapper, now director of the Geospacial Intelligence Agency, but then head of DIA," Shaw said.

But it was Shaw's own friendship to the head of Britain's MI6 that brought it all together during a two-day meeting in London that included Smeshko's people, the MI6 contingent, and Clapper, who had been deputized by George Tenet to help work the issue of what happened to Iraq's WMD stockpiles.

In the end, here is what Shaw learned:

In December 2002, former Russian intelligence chief Yevgeni Primakov, a KGB general with long-standing ties to Saddam, came to Iraq and stayed until just before the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003;

Primakov supervised the execution of long-standing secret agreements, signed between Iraqi intelligence and the Russian GRU (military intelligence), that provided for clean-up operations to be conducted by Russian and Iraqi military personnel to remove WMDs, production materials and technical documentation from Iraq, so the regime could announce that Iraq was "WMD free."

Shaw said that this type GRU operation, known as "Sarandar," or "emergency exit," has long been familiar to U.S. intelligence officials from Soviet-bloc defectors as standard GRU practice;

In addition to the truck convoys, which carried Iraqi WMD to Syria and Lebanon in February and March 2003 "two Russian ships set sail from the (Iraqi) port of Umm Qasr headed for the Indian Ocean," where Shaw believes they "deep-sixed" additional stockpiles of Iraqi WMD from flooded bunkers in southern Iraq that were later discovered by U.S. military intelligence personnel;

The Russian "clean-up" operation was entrusted to a combination of GRU and Spetsnaz troops and Russian military and civilian personnel in Iraq "under the command of two experienced ex-Soviet generals, Colonel-General Vladislav Achatov and Colonel-General Igor Maltsev, both retired and psing as civilian commercial consultants."

Washington Times reporter Bill Gertz reported on Oct. 30, 2004, that Achatov and Maltsev had been photographed receiving medals from Iraqi Defense Minister Sultan Hashim Ahmed in a Baghdad building bombed by U.S. cruise missiles during the first U.S. air raids in early March 2003.

Shaw says he leaked the information about the two Russian generals and the clean-up operation to Gertz in October 2004 in an effort to "push back" against claims by Democrats that were orchestrated with CBS News to embarrass President Bush just one week before the November 2004 presidential election. The press sprang bogus claims that 377 tons of high explosives of use to Iraq's nuclear weapons program had "gone missing" after the U.S.-led liberation of Iraq, while ignoring intelligence of the Russian-orchestrated evacuation of Iraqi WMDs;

The two Russian generals "had visited Baghdad no fewer than 20 times in the preceding five to six years," Shaw revealed. U.S. intelligence knew "the identity and strength of the various Spetsnaz units, their dates of entry and exit in Iraq, and the fact that the effort (to clean up Iraq's WMD stockpiles) with a planning conference in Baku from which they flew to Baghdad."

The Baku conference, chaired by Russian Minister of Emergency Situations Sergei Shoigu, "laid out the plans for the Sarandar clean-up effort so that Shoigu could leave after the keynote speech for Baghdad to orchestrate the planning for the disposal of the WMD."

Subsequent intelligence reports showed that Russian Spetsnaz operatives "were now changing to civilian clothes from military/GRU garb," Shaw said. "The Russian denial of my revelations in late October 2004 included the statement that "only Russian civilians remained in Baghdad." That was the "only true statement" the Russians made, Shaw ironized.

The evacuation of Saddam's WMD to Syria and Lebanon "was an entirely controlled Russian GRU operation," Shaw said. "It was the brainchild of General Yevgenuy Primakov."

The goal of the clean-up was "to erase all trace of Russian involvement" in Saddam's WMD programs, and "was a masterpiece of military camouflage and deception."

Just as astonishing as the Russian clean-up operation were efforts by Bush administration appointees, including Defense Department spokesman Laurence DiRita, to smear Shaw and to cover up the intelligence information he brought to light.

"Larry DiRita made sure that this story would never grow legs," Shaw said. "He whispered sotto voce to journalists that there was no substance to my information and that it was the product of an unbalanced mind."

Shaw suggested that the answer of why the Bush administration had systematically "ignored Russia's involvement" in evacuating Saddam's WMD stockpiles "could be much bigger than anyone has thought," but declined to speculate what exactly was involved.

Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney was less reticent. He thought the reason was Iran.

"With Iran moving faster than anyone thought in its nuclear programs," he told NewsMax, "the administration needed the Russians, the Chinese and the French, and was not interested in information that would make them look bad."

McInerney agreed that there was "clear evidence" that Saddam had WMD. "Jack Shaw showed when it left Iraq, and how."

Former Undersecretary of Defense Richard Perle, a strong supporter of the war against Saddam, blasted the CIA for orchestrating a smear campaign against the Bush White House and the war in Iraq.

"The CIA has been at war with the Bush administration almost from the beginning," he said in a keynote speech at the Intelligence Summit on Saturday.

He singled out recent comments by Paul Pillar, a former top CIA Middle East analyst, alleging that the Bush White House "cherry-picked" intelligence to make the case for war in Iraq.

"Mr. Pillar was in a very senior position and was able to make his views known, if that is indeed what he believed," Perle said.

"He (Pillar) briefed senior policy officials before the start of the Iraq war in 2003. If he had had reservations about the war, he could have voiced them at that time." But according to officials briefed by Pillar, Perle said, he never did.

Even more inexplicable, Perle said, were the millions of documents "that remain untranslated" among those seized from Saddam Hussein's intelligence services.

"I think the intelligence community does not want them to be exploited," he said.

Among those documents, presented Saturday at the conference by former FBI translator Bill Tierney, were transcripts of Saddam's palace conversations with top aides in which he discussed ongoing nuclear weapons plans in 2000, well after the U.N. arms inspectors believed he had ceased all nuclear weapons work.

"What was most disturbing in those tapes," Tierney said, "was the fact that the individuals briefing Saddam were totally unknown to the U.N. Special Commission."

In addition, Tierney said, the plasma uranium programs Saddam discussed with his aids as ongoing operations in 2000 had been dismissed as "old programs" disbanded years earlier, according to the final CIA report on Iraq's weapons programs, presented in 2004 by the Iraq Survey Group.

"When I first heard those tapes" about the uranium plasma program, "it completely floored me," Tierney said.

No proof is given here, aside from a man's claims of seniority and "I'm not crazy, I'm a victim of a cover-up." Nutcase right? So why'd I post it again here? Because I've heard these points and theories before, and not in the media. (though I remember hearing about reports of "Russian convoys to Syria" in the days before the war, back before I was in intelligence)

Fuck California

From now until my death, any time I hear someone talk about how great California is I am going to laugh.

Beside the over-abundance of liberal whackoes, the socialist state, the unlit and poorly marked and railed highways, the stupid laws, and the superiority complex, I've found something else that I really, *really* despise...

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

That is literally more than *twice* the price of what such an item (a 12 pack of coke!) costs at home in Texas. In a major city, with a somewhat higher cost of living. I'll stick to the Commissary, thanks. Or import my food from Switzerland via the Internet. It'd be cheaper.

Fuck California.

Oh great.

Things just keep getting better.

If there is even a whiff of atomic weapons technology changing hands or being developed in Venezuela the US will reach down and crush them. South America is our backyard, and there is no way in hell the US would tolerate atomic weapons on the same landmass, esp. in the hands of a bizzarre, somewhat irrational enemy like Chavez.

The CIA and Army had better be all over this.

Fan the fires of jihad...

...by reading these humorous cartoons.

I haven't posted much about this whole cartoon thing because 1) I think the whole idea is fundamentally stupid and 2) the online community and press, including much more important people than I, has made this a prime cause. My contribution won't be missed.

I'd just like to say that this is the kind of thing that President Bush was talking about when he said that they "hate our freedoms." I've been trying to explain to people ever since that he wasn't just being rhetorical or repeating a ridiculous claim for political reasons, like everyone assumed. They really, really do.

There's even a genre of books that have been published on the idea, begun with something called 'Signposts Along the Way' or 'Milestones' (when translated to English) written by a guy named Sayyid Qutb. Sayyid was executed in the 60's by Abd al-Nasser in Egypt for anti-government Islamist ideas and actions with the Muslim Brotherhood, but his brother carried on his ideas and was one of Ayman al-Zawahiri's college teachers. The Wikipedia article I linked above is kind of sanitized and neutral (as I guess I reference has a right to be) but it doesn't say that he claimed that we Americans deserved death for how we lived. This one demonstrates some of his nuttiness. And here is a glowing biography of Qutb as a 'Great Muslim,' demonstrating that his life and ideas are still looked upon favorable in the Middle East and not just by terrorists but by Young Muslims and the Islamic Circle of North America, which describes itself as a "non-ethnic, non-sectarian, open to all, independent, North America Wide grassroot organization."

From 'Milestones:'

From Sword of Islam, a hardback that I own: "...jihad is solely geared to protect the religion of God and his Holy Law (Shar'ia) and to save the Abode of Islam (Dar al-Islam) and no other territory... Any land that combats the Faith, hampers Muslims from practicing their religion, or does not apply the Holy Law, becomes ipso facto part of the Abode of War. (Dar al-Harb)"

Following this classification and borrowing some ideas from Sayyid Mawdoudi, he describes how those lands that apply Shar'ia are legitimate and those that do not are illegitimate and deserving of destruction and replacement by something new and righteous. He also originated the use of the term Crusader (Salibi) and Land of the Crusaders (al-Salibiyah) to describe Westerners and the West. You might have heard those terms used by Al Qaeda. You should've. They say it all the time.

Allow me to point out that these writings predate American support for Israel. Qutb was executed in '66. American support for Israel didn't really manifest in any meaningful way until after the Six Day War which was, of course, in '67. Also, Israel's most virulent enemy, Abd al-Nasser, was bogeyman #2 (behind the West) on Qutb and co.'s hit list. A blow against apologists and revisionists that think the world revolves around Jerusalem.

In conclusion, the reactions to this cartoon thing (manufactured as it may be) shouldn't really surprise anyone who has studied Islamism and the Modern Middle East. Liberties, individualism, and tolerance are literally not respected there. Orthopraxy, community, and piety are. It doesn't take a genius...

Holy crap

I can almost see the outline of a spine forming somewhere between the Seine and the Danube! Who'd have thought?

A startling admission!

Not startling in the sense that I'm surprised it happened, but startling in the sense that I'm surprised anyone admitted to it.

I almost wish that the Iranians would just bite the bullet and start a war. All this preliminary stuff (nuclear negotiations standoff, interfering internally with their neighbors, inflaming international incidents because of cartoons, et cetera) is tiresome.

On interrogation and torture...

I've stumbled across an excellent (and rather long, for the Internet) piece on US military interrogation methods and how woefully... weak, they are. That is, our interrogators have to be nicer to the terrorists that they interrogate than NCO's (non-commissioned officers; i.e. sergeants) have to be to their own soldiers. Which is, of course, completely and utterly assinine.

Ahmed the Afghani Goatherd who fought for the Taliban because they had been winning for the last 5 years might break if you stare at him sternly and tell him he was a bad boy, but a hard core Al Qaeda "professional" will not. They are trained and conditioned to resist interrogation, even torture, by oppressive Arab security and intelligence services at those nifty little camps they go to. A direct testimony of this truth is related in the book "The Interrogators," which the article's author quotes a few times. The squeaky clean by the book methods used by the initial groups of interrogators in Afghanistan in 2001-02 accomplished exactly nothing. No information of any value. Some detainees, including Arabs (who were obviously Al Qaeda transplants, and a few of whom were later revealed as key ["high value" in MI jargon] targets) were set free with a wave. It was only after the interrogators got more aggressive and creative that prisoners started to break. And then, only the flunkies (more or less) would break. The leaders would just clam up, confident that they could outlast their questioners. So off to Cuba they would go, for a tropical vacation and more of the same.

'Well,' you might ask, 'if these guys are supposed to be tough, what makes you think harsher treatment would break them?'

You should see what they do when we threaten to give them to the Israelis. Or the Saudis, Kuwaitis, Egyptians, Bahraini, or whatever other local power they've pissed off. (but especially the Israelis) A bunch of these guys have committed crimes from money laundering to drug trafficking to sedition to rape in some of these countries where rough treatment is more... routine. They would be treated worse in Yemen for peddling dope or raping a little boy (to use a case I'm familiar with) than they would in the United States for massacring dozens of Iraqis or beheading prisoners on television. And they know it. And many of them will do anything to avoid such a fate, including ratting out their friends. Some hold out though, thinking that they are tough enough to handle it or not really believing that we weak and puny Americans would do such a thing. Sometimes, after these criminals get sent to their respective offended countries (like some of them do), they suddenly start to sing to their new captors and lo! new information is gained. This is the root of the "Outsourcing of Torture" accusations in the press. This stupid flap over Secret International CIA Prisons is undoubtedly linked to this and similar tactics. That's the trouble with secrecy. Because it's secret, you can't just hold up pictures and placards disproving every stupid little accusation and theory that gets thrown at you. Hence why the CIA and Freemasons (both organizations are by and large made up of fine people) have sinister reputations.

Contrary to the not-necessarily-widely-held opinion that our interrogation techniques are somehow inhumane or cruel, they are in fact not tough enough. And after the Abu Ghraib incident (which is kind of stupid anyway... similar antics can probably be found on any large campus in the US... in a frat house during Rush Week. Naked pyramids, hooah!) Army interrogators there are saddled with so much red tape and bureaucratic mother-may-I? horse shit that they are completely ineffective. The military has had to train Air Force interrogators(?!) to go in there instead because of all the BS following the Army around. Shouldn't that ring some bells? The freaking AIR FORCE now has to interrogate terrorist prisoners captured by the Army because the Army is too scared to touch them because of possible political backlash. It's like the entire Johnson Administration's Vietnam strategy writ small. Fucking politicians. And that includes some military officers.

It's pushing 3am and I'm tired and kind of rambling. Summary:

"Is that all you've got? You Americans are pussies." - "Oh yeah? We'll send you to the Mossad!" - "Oh have mercy!" This does not mean that we are not, in fact, pussies.

Alright...

More or less settled in. Wife's arrived, household crap has been delivered (though not all of it has been unpacked and distributed yet) and Internet access has been set up. Huzzah.

Class date is set for 26 March. I tell myself, at least it's not in April. Oh, and remember that other company that Arabists were being transfered to? I've been transfered there. *sigh* Though I hear they've actually started investing in Arabic study materials. That's a plus. And apparently the 1st sergeant is a former SF operator, good guy, and does not ascribe to the style over substance philosophy that pervades the military. Heard nothing but good things about him so far.

Ok, done with personal update,

God this is taking forever.

Finally made it out to DLI after three long, agonizing weeks in that gods-forsaken hell-pit we know as Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. May it burn to the ground.

So I get here the week before I'm supposed to start class, and barely have time to finish inprocessing (cuz I got here in time for a 4 day weekend) before class starts. Cool, short wait. So I got to class (even though I feel like shit that day) and guess what? "You're not in this class, you're on a wait list. You'll probably start in March or April."

...

Then why the fuck was my ship date in DECEMBER? Stupid fucking broken TRADOC. I'm quite obviously bitter. And I'm not a lone case. Some people have been here since November or longer waiting for a class. So if anyone asks why, in 2006, there still aren't enough Arab linguists in the Army, you can tell them that there are lots of us... we're just all mowing lawns and pushing papers because TRADOC, in it's infinite wisdom, obviously greatly expanded the slots for Arabists but didn't bother arranging for new classrooms and/or new instructors to handle them all. My company has actually had to start vacating it's day room and CQ area to turn it into a classroom.

A classroom... in barracks. You know someone has fucked up when you have to convert the troops' living area into a classroom.

Oh, and there are soo many Arabists now (har har) that 1/3 now have to be shipped over to the company that handles European languages. Whose policies are geared towards students who are here for 6 months, not 16. Where language support materials like software, audio tapes, books, and cadre who can speak the language in question, are not available.

Every time I'm in TRADOC (that's Training and Doctrine, the purgatorial fairy land you exist within while you're in training and that doesn't actually teach you your job... rather, they teach you their own mythical version of your job which you are expected to forget and begin re-learning when you get to your actual duty station afterwards) I am further appalled at the disjointed operations and... retardation that seems to rule. Eventually, I should stop being surprised, but it just seems to keep getting worse...

Oh, and I'm sick too. Viral bronchitis. Hurray.