Does Obama get out of bed each morning wondering how he can screw things up today?  Does the Obama Administration have a secret department within the bowels of the White House whose job assignment is to come up with ways to screw things up for the United States?  I mean – it just seems impossible for anyone to accidentally screw up so many things so often, and in some case, on a continuous basis.

President Obama is a prime example why I believe the United States needs a military man as President.

Look at Afghanistan.  Under the leadership of the current Commander-in-Chief, American causalities have skyrocketed.  And they will get worse as the Taliban rebounds.  All because an inexperienced American leader openly tells the enemy that he will be withdrawing Americans troops on a date certain.  Oh, you can rest assured that Americans deaths will continue to rise in Afghanistan until we rebuild our forces on the ground there, allow them to go after the insurgents, and untie their hands and allow them to decimate the Taliban in Afghanistan – and in Pakistan — or, get American troops out of Afghanistan – completely.

So what has the Commandeer-in-Chief screwed-up lately?  Well, according to news reports he is about to order a shocking draw down of American troops in Iraq.  Instead of decimating the enemy in Iraq, Obama is decimating American troop numbers to such a low level that US troops will be hard pressed to defend themselves — let alone train Iraqis to take care of themselves.  Look for American causalities to rise in Iraq very soon.

It is reported that American commanders in that theatre are “livid” at the Commander-in-Chief for this amateurish handling of the US military.  What this is, in my opinion, is total disrespect for the US military by Obama.   Our military deserves more, a hell of a lot more, from their Commander-in-Chief, especially after all their sacrifice.

A small contingent of troops will create another “Fort Apache” situation where US troops could potentially over-run and wiped-out.

On the other hand the mad mullahs of Iran are beside themselves with joy!  They cannot believe their good luck.  They find it almost impossible to believe the American people would allow their President to show such disrespect for their nation’s warriors.  But — they are jubilant with the knowledge that this huge blunder by Obama will allow Iran’s influence to grow by leaps and bonds within Iraq and it will allow Iran to train and rearm a huge army of Iraqi insurgents along with a massive inflow of Iranian troops to retake Iraq and fulfill the Iranian goal of hegemony in the region.  In other words – Iran will own Iraq after all the American blood spilled on Iraqi soil – thanks to Obama.

You know, we Americans are one screwed-up people.  We have elected a leader who has managed to trash the nation, here at home, and internationally, and still nearly 40% of the electorate supports the “Trasher-in-Chief.”  How do you explain something like this?  How is it possible that descendents of pilgrims and pioneers have not stormed the White House demanding that Obama resign and leave the Oval Office? (One reason, of course, is that we are painfully aware that Joe Biden is waiting in the wings to step into Obama’s shoes.  That scenario is so scary that I don’t even want to go there!)

Here’s what I see in my somewhat dusty crystal ball for US/Iraqi relations:  The US will have to invade Iraq for a third time — to drive out the Iranians.  The problem with that scenario is that should we have to do that, we most certainly will have to drive into Iran itself to destroy the current Iranian regime and cripple the Iranian military and their nuclear bomb aspirations.

That will be no easy task.  It will be a very long and nasty war with more casualties that the Afghanistan and Iraq wars combined and, most likely, become a regional war involving most of the nations of the Middle East including Israel.

Its called “Thinking Ahead.”  Most successful leaders do it as a matter of course.  Unfortunately for America, our illustrious leader seems devoid of the ability to think ahead about anything but his reelection.

Presidents who win wars listen to their military commanders.  They draw from that well of training and experience dug by the men who actually have to fight the wars by committing American sons and daughters to “Harm’s Way,” and then have to write the letters to their families when those same men and women lose their lives as a result of the commands THEY give.  THEY KNOW about fighting and defeating America’s enemies.  Civilian Presidents, as a rule, DO NOT!

Only 3,000 American troops on the ground in Iraq means they will have to assume a defensive mode and maintain it 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.  The stress alone will be awful on those men and women.

So why is Obama doing it?  Politics — plain and simple. It’s called “pandering” to the political left. And it will get worse until Mr. Obama is relieved of his duties in the Oval Office in November of 2012.

This is just another reason to vote for anyone with an “R” beside his or her name when you enter the voting booth in November of 2012.  Times are just that desperate in America today.

J. D. Longstreet

 

WesternFront America

I’m Shocked, Shocked, I tell you!

Like the famous scene from the classic movie “Casablanca” the whole thing concerning Iran trafficking in weapons in Iraq is a sham. I mean, of course, our government’s expression of surprise and pretended annoyance. It has been common knowledge for YEARS. Why, now, is it suddenly being spotlighted?

Anyone with the slightest interest in America’s war efforts in the Middle East has known this was a common occurrence all along. Why, all of a sudden, is the Obama Administration making a big deal over it?

Maybe we should investigate WHY we feel it necessary to dissect any and every action of our vaunted leader in the White House.

We have become so accustomed to the double dealing, the constant stream of lies and near lies, coming from this administration, that we have come to view everything out of the Obama White House (and its Czars and flunkies in charge of the various government “agencies”) through the lens of truth endeavoring to filter out the untruths and as much deception as we possibly can. It ain’t easy!

Look, America has been fighting a proxy war with Iran for, well, nigh on to ten years, at least, just in Iraq and Afghanistan. That doesn’t even take into account all the other trouble spots around the globe where the US is in some degree of conflict with forces sponsored by the “mad mullahs” of Iran.

And it didn’t begin with Iraq or Afghanistan. It began with the Carter administration and the dethroned Shah of Iran. Iran and America have been at direct and indirect odds ever since.

It is a pretty sure bet that Iran will simply take over Iraq when the last American troops leave. The stage is being set for that eventuality even now.

In Afghanistan, the shadow war is a little less clear but the assassination of Ahmed Wali Karzai, the half brother of Hamid Karzai the President of Afghanistan, would lead one to believe that efforts to gain a vantage point from which to take control of Afghanistan, when the Americans leave, is on-going.

If makes no sense to me that the American military is involved in Libya, in a limp-wristed attempt to unseat Gaddafi, and not involved in operations to destroy Iran’s fast moving efforts to acquire nuclear bomb making skills and materials. Has the Obama administration decided the US CAN live with a nuclear-armed Iran? It certainly seems that way. If so, then THAT is another reason to show Mr. Obama the door in November of 2012.

Make no mistake about it. The US IS going to face off with Iran in a shooting war — sooner rather than later. It seems to me that fighting an enemy that does not have nuclear capabilities is better than going head to head with another atomic power.

Procrastination is NOT our friend, especially when the enemy is working around the clock to develop weapons to potentially wipe a small nation of the map, and smash even moderately sized nations (such as those in eastern Europe) back to the Stone Age.

The world has been warned, many times over, that Iran is seeking hegemony in the Middle East. Once they acquire nuclear weapons they will have it.

Waiting for Israel to take out Iran’s nuclear capabilities is not going to work. Not so long as Obama is in the White House.

Israel does not trust Obama and his minions. They believe he has shown entirely too much favor toward Islamic nations and too much DISFAVOR towards Israel, to be trusted as an ally in any kind of military action against an Islamic country. They reason, rightly, that one cannot continuously look over one’s shoulder while in mortal conflict. With Obama as an ally, Israel reasons that deciding who is the greater threat to them (in the midst of battle) would be a deterrent to Israel in winning a military confrontation with Iran. Therefore, whatever Israel does against Iran — expect it to be totally covert with no notice to the US until their actions are a fait accompli.

In the meantime, removing American troops from the Middle East only allows Iran to slip its leash.

America needs a huge military base, of its own, in the Middle East for ongoing and future operations in that theatre. I suspect such a base now exists … in Iraq. However, that doesn’t mean the Obama administration will not abandon it to the Iraqis/Iranians. Such is the naiveté of Obama and his cohort in both the White House and the Congress.

Most everyone, with common sense, knows America is leaving Iraq … temporarily. We will be forced to return to Iraq, and probably Afghanistan, in the not too distant future. Whether fighting Iraqis, Afghanis, or Iranians, America’s job is NOT DONE in the Middle East!

So long as America depends on the nations of the Middle East for the fuel to run our republic, we have no choice but to remain engaged with them — even if that means going to war against them, or defending them.

Until America comes to it’s senses and decides to use its own petroleum resources and stop relying on tribal countries and socialist countries for the life blood of our economy we will be harnessed to them much the same as a man having a wolf by the throat. He (we) can’t turn loose. To be free of the wolf, the wolf must be “put down.”

America is in desperate need of leadership with common sense. We need a leader who will confront Iran and plant the flag declaring we will not tolerate Iran’s efforts toward hegemony in the Middle Eastern powder keg. The world is tired of the constant bickering, squabbling, fighting, killing, and general “hell raising” from a group of countries that refuse to grow up and join the 21^st century world.

Obama is NOT that leader!

J. D. Longstreet

 

WesternFront America

A problem with which American administrations have grappled since the days of Thomas Jefferson’s presidency has been Arabs and the Middle East. The Marine anthem mentions “the shores of Tripoli” because, in 1801, Jefferson sent them to there to put down the Barbary pirates.

One of the best books on this subject is “Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present” by Michael B. Oren who, with exquisite irony, is currently serving as the Israeli ambassador to the United States, the nation of his birth.

Regarding the Middle East, if you have had the feeling that the Obama administration has been spectacularly inept as it takes its turn at bat, you’re right. Barely six months into his first year, on June 4, 2009, the newly-minted President gave a speech in Cairo.

“I’ve come to Cairo to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect, and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive and need not be in competition. Instead, they overlap, and share common principles—principles of justice and progress, tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.”

Obama’s impressions, aspirations, or re-write of history, past and present, clashes with the reality of current and past events. He has, in fact, adopted virtually all of his much maligned predecessor’s policies in the Middle East and took a bow for authorizing the long awaited assassination of Osama bin Laden.

As this is being written, the White House is debating the levels of military withdrawal from Afghanistan and Iraq. In both cases the public is alternatively told that the leaders of those two nations either want the U.S. to leave or to stay. Where the truth falls no one seems to know.

It is very instructive to read what is being published in the newspapers that serve readers in the Middle East. Suffice to say that neither the President, nor his policies, is well regarded. One can read daily translations of articles from their press, as well as Asia and Europe at an interesting site, .http://watchingamerica.com/News.

I would argue that no amount of “hands on” involvement with the events unfolding from the Maghreb nations of northern Africa to those that form the heart of the Middle East will significantly alter the outcome of events occurring there.

In addition to the uprisings to throw off the shackles of despotism from Tunisia to Libya to Egypt to Syria, Bahrain to Yemen, the common denominator for these and other Arab nations is their well-deserved sense of having been the victims of various regimes. They are all likely to be united in their fear of the rise of Iran, a Persian nation, and one that will soon achieve nuclear parity with Pakistan, India and, yes, Israel.

The world has lived with “the bomb” since the end of World War Two in August 1945. Nuclear weapons have not been used since, but Iran is the wild card. It will not yield to international sanctions. Its cabal of ayatollahs will not be overthrown from within. It must either suffer a massive attack on its nuclear and military facilities or it will fill the skies over Israel and other nations with mushroom clouds.

The leaders of Western nations seem unaware that, immediately upon the death of Mohammed in 632 A.D., Islam split into two factions, Sunnis and Shiites, who have been in conflict with one another ever since.

The history of Islam consists of waging war on everyone else as well either for the purpose of conversion, looting, or the collection of taxes laid on non-Muslims. This history has been broken by rare, short periods of tolerance, but Muslims, convinced that their Koran is the absolute word of Allah, have been indifferent to the values of the West and the advances of modernization that have usually been imposed on them through colonialism.

Islam has been around nearly 1,400 years and gives no evidence of reforming itself away from the Arab culture in which it took seed and away from the brutal punishments that pass for justice. It was and is a savage “religion” bent on global domination.

Even when Muslims find hospitality in non-Muslim nations like those of Europe they immediately set upon an effort to impose Sharia law, usually through intimidation, on the indigenous population. In the Middle East, hands and heads are still cut off, rape victims are stoned, and a charge of blasphemy or apostasy can get you killed.

As this is being written, Christians and the few Jews still residing in the Middle East and the Maghreb are fleeing for their lives as their churches are being burnt to the ground and their lives are at risk.

One would think that, after U.S. involvement—invasions—of Afghanistan and Iraq, we would have figured out that Islamic nations are impervious to any concept of Western style democracy. Islam’s claims to be a religion are framed within a political system run by theocrats.

Elections have managed to put Hamas in charge in Gaza and Hezbollah in charge of Lebanon. The ayatollahs grabbed power in Iran and turned that nation into a prison. The mobs in the streets of Syria are trying to overthrow the Assad dynasty, warring against an Alawaite minority tribe ruling as Baathists. Yemen is a basketcase and Somalia is even worse.

The ignorance of these facts has cost Americans billions, if not trillions, with our adventures in Afghanistan and Iraq. It has led President Obama to intercede in Libya for no good reason. It is a desert under which oil exists. Beyond that, it hardly matters which dictator is in charge. Gadhafi’s dabbling in terrorism cost him more than it was worth.

So long as Obama is President, the U.S. will pursue unrealistic and often stunningly stupid policies and actions as regards Islam and Muslim nations.

By way of one small example, in April Janet Napolitano, the Secretary of Homeland Security, appointed Arif Alikhan, a devout Muslim, as Assistant Secretary for Policy Development. Alikhan was born in Damascus, Syria. I am sure you feel safer now knowing that.

Are there nice Muslims? Sure. Are there “moderate” Muslims? Possibly, but they are outnumbered by the millions who are not. Oil money and various illegal enterprises support terrorism. Even Americans contribute because the Obama administration will not permit exploration or drilling for an estimated 150 billion barrels of our own domestic oil.

And you still wonder why President Obama actually bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia? Or that George W. Bush ignored the fact that all but one of the nineteen 9/11 terrorists were Saudis? No President wants a repeat of the 1973 Saudi oil boycott.

Nothing good can come out of the current turmoil affecting most Arab Muslim nations. The U.S. would be wise to maintain its military power, but the fact is our Navy is being reduced, our Air Force is flying aging aircraft, and the combat divisions of our Army and Marines are worn out from repeated tours in the Middle East.

Obama is as clueless as Woodrow Wilson who thought he could bring “peace in our time” and only managed to help set in motion the run-up to World War Two. He has put America at risk in so many ways I am losing count.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

 

WesternFront America

Does anyone really believe the government of Egypt will ultimately become a democracy like unto that of the US?? I mean — anyone other that a few eggheads in Washington and in the cloistered halls of academia, of course.

Naw! Ain’t gonna happen!

When all the smoke finally clears in Egypt the chances are extremely good that another strongman-type government will reign supreme in Egypt. And, honestly, I don’t think that is all bad.

A very astute friend came to visit me today, and as we sat in my office discussing the situation in Egypt and the Middle East, we agreed that the Arab countries and the Persian country of Iran are not what one could describe as “fertile soil” for democracy. Not by a long shot.

Look. For a democratic government to survive it takes commitment by the people of that country to work, every day, at maintaining control of their government… as we Americans are learning today – much to the chagrin of many US citizens!

A people of a democracy must think of themselves as a single entity and not as a member of multiple tribes, or clans, or religions, etc. And that is where democracy crashes and burns in the countries of the Middle East. Democracy hasn’t a chance, in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in Iran, in Egypt, in Jordan, in Syria, in Lebanon, in Pakistan, in Yemen, in Tunisia, in Saudi Arabia, etc.

Sadly, all the American blood shed in Iraq and in Afghanistan will have been wasted in the attempt to bring democracy to both those countries.

I am convinced that once US troops leave Iraq and Afghanistan, they will revert to their former ways and their former strongman-type governments — or anarchy and chaos – or all three. In a startlingly short time, I am convinced the attempt to introduce democracy to those countries will be nothing more than a memory and a memory that will fuel only more resentment towards the US.

In the beginning of the wars in Afghanistan, and in Iraq, we advocated a scorched-earth policy on both battlefronts. Utterly destroy the countries, especially their infrastructure, and leave them both as piles of smoking rubble — and bring the troops home.

As I see it, there was no reason to make efforts to win hearts and minds in that region. It led only to a bog-down and an extended stay, which is costing us great gobs of our treasure for which I see no return on the investment of our blood and money.

I do not support the US government’s policy of promoting democracy and so-called “human rights” by favoring certain Middle Eastern countries with loads of foreign aid, military aid, etc. I also do not support any attempt to spread democracy at the point of the gun or the bayonet.

I live in a part of the United States — that IS a part of the United States — as the result of my ancestors having been forced back into the US at the point of that bayonet. I am 150 years removed from that incident — and it STILL smarts!

A century or so from today, if, and when, the Middle Eastern countries decide they want to experiment with democracy and request our assistance, then, by all means extend a helping hand. Until then, the US, in my estimation, has no business creating a government the people don’t understand, do not respect, and one that appears weak and unstable to them.

Until they are ready and willing to forsake their “tribal mindset” democracy has no chance of a long life in the aforementioned countries.

The US Government could save itself some sleepless nights worrying about protecting the continuous flow of oil from the Middle East if our inept government would allow the oil companies the right to explore for and drill for our own oil beneath our own soil and our own ocean bottom.

It has been established that America has enough oil of its own to service our needs for hundreds of years into the future even at today’s daily consumption of petroleum products including gasoline, and natural gas — not to mention one of the worlds largest deposits of coal.

We know from experience that the moment our own oil fields are opened and the threat of a decrease in the demand for middle eastern oil drops, even by a tiny bit, the middle eastern oil countries will drop their prices for crude as if it were a white hot stone.

One way to get the ball rolling on our own shores would be for the US Congress to abolish the Environmental Protection Agency, or at least, cut its funding to the point that it becomes totally impotent.

If I had any advice to give the US government on the Egyptian crisis, it would be short and simple, and, I believe, would save us some trouble down the road a few years. That advice would be: Stay the hell out of the Egyptian “revolt” and allow it to play out without interference from the US. We can only make more enemies by injecting ourselves into an Egyptian domestic problem.

Another bit of unsolicited advice to the current regime in power in the US would be this: If the Obama regime really wants to do something that would actually be constructive in the Middle East, I would advise bolstering Israel with whatever Israel needs to insure that she is not overrun by the Islamist nations surrounding her.

Unfortunately, we currently have a presidential administration that is hostile to Israel and openly friendly to the Islamist states. That attitude by Obama was seen as an open invitation to mischief by those Islamist states that have sworn to utterly destroy the state of Israel and wipe her from the map.

Mr. President: Fortify Israel – forget Egypt. Egypt will work out its own problems with, or without, input and interference from a US President they have concluded is a weak, naïve, chief of state who will be out of office in a couple of years, in any event.

J. D. Longstreet blogs daily at INSIGHT on Freedom at: http://www.csadispatch.blogspot.com/

E-Mail: longstreet1862@gmail.com

 

WesternFront America

It took several weeks for word of the British defeat at Yorktown to reach the king and parliament. Not long after the end of the American Revolution, the government led by George Washington dispatched diplomats to London to negotiate a trade treaty.

Today we watch events unfold in far off places often in real time. What we lack, however, is context. Most Americans and, I suspect, others in Western nations are frequently at a loss when it comes to knowing anything about the culture and history, past and recent, of nations in the Middle East, Africa, or Asia.

What we do know about the Middle East is that, since the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran along with the rise of al Qaeda and other jihadist organizations, things have not gone well for American and Western interests.

How different everything might have been if U.S. troops had occupied Tehran in 1979 and demanded the return of our diplomats after they had been taken hostage.

After World War One, what was once the Ottoman Empire that ruled the Middle East and areas of the Maghreb in northern Africa, the French and the British got out their maps at the Versailles conference to literally draw new lines on it and create new nations that were, in fact, colonies. They included Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan, and a strip of territory called the Palestinian mandate. The chief prize at stake was oil.

After World War Two was concluded many of the former British and French colonies, including India, and much of Africa declared their independence. The Saudi Royal family had already thrown in its lot with America. In Egypt, the Suez Canal, opened in 1869, was jointly owned by the British and French. The British called the shots there through its royal family.

The Egyptian defeat in the 1948 war in response to the establishment of Israel stirred discontent among its military leadership. Gamal Abed Al Nasser ultimately emerged as Egypt’s leader after a July 1952 bloodless coup against King Farouk and the royal family. In 1956 Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal.
Here’s what it gets very instructive. In 1956 the British and French, with Israeli involvement, sent troops to seize the Suez Canal. That operation was quashed by President Dwight Eisenhower who made it known that the United States would not support it. The era of colonization was over.

What had been occurring, however, was an era of pent-up anger throughout the Middle East focused on the establishment of Israel and resentment of the former colonial powers. The British had earlier installed a royal family in Iraq. A new component was opposition to the dictators like Hussein who emerged to run Iraq. Another example is the fact that first the British and then the Americans had controlled Iran’s oil through its royal family. Other royal families continue to control mideast oil.

Ironically, it took George W. Bush to rid Iraq of three decades of despotic rule by Saddam Hussein. However, this has to be balanced against the fact that the U.S. has also supported the authoritarian regime of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt. It was, however, Egypt, as well as Jordan, who made peace with Israel.
Arab military defeats gave way to support for the so-called Palestinians as pawns in the war against Israel. The main support of the Palestinian “refugees” is the United Nations, sixty-three years after 1948 and subsequent wars to destroy Israel. Iran has funded two Palestinian terrorist organizations, Hezbollah and Hamas.

At the heart of the turmoil in the Middle East is a movement to restore Islam to its former glory when it literally knocked on the doors of Europe. The jihadists such as Osama bin Laden dream of a worldwide Islamic caliphate. As in the early spread of Islam, it would be achieved through war, but the tactic employed would be terrorism and the fact of Islam’s expanding population worldwide.

An irony of the Islamist movement is its opposition to the monarchies ruling Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, all of whom have proven to be good allies to the United States at the same time they have funded the spread of Islam. In Egypt, under Mubarak, the jihadists known as the Muslim Brotherhood were ruthlessly suppressed. The Saudis actually exiled bin Laden.

What the world has witnessed has proven to be very bad news for the West. The 1979 Iranian revolution has given us Mamoud Ahmadinejad and a regime plotting through proxies to control Lebanon via Hezbollah and Gaza via Hamas, while it plots to control Iraq and eyes the Gulf States as well. Its closest ally these days is Syria. It has long sought to become a nuclear power. Its proclaimed goal is to destroy Israel.

Democracy has not turned out to be much help in the Middle East. Rigged elections in Egypt kept Mubarak in power for three decades. Saddam Hussein used terror and the Baath Party to achieve and hold on to power. Elections were rigged in Afghanistan. Pakistan has been mainly ruled by its military.

Lebanon was a democracy and now its prime minister comes from the ranks of Hezbollah. Turkey has had a long run of real democracy, but only because its military ensured that Islamists did not take over.

Americans have a lot at stake and, of growing concern to many, a President, Barack Hussein Obama, whose first television interview was with Al Jazeera, who bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia, and whose first global outing was a tour of the Middle East to demonstrate how friendly he was to their cause.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

 

WesternFront America

America did not win the war in Iraq. That’s a fact. America did not win the first Iraq war. That, too, is a fact. Iraq is set up, as we write these few comments, for its next dictator — with at least a couple of Iraqis preening themselves in the shadows just waiting for the moment, which will not be long in coming.

Look, the plain truth is – you cannot win a war while attempting to win the hearts and minds of those you are warring against! Until America understands this we will NEVER win another war!

To be successful in war you have to beat the snot out of your opponent through attrition and any other means at your disposal until he either has no troops left to put into the field against your forces, or he is so beaten that he loses the will to fight. The victor must make the price of going to war against him so costly any would-be enemy will think long and hard before firing that first shot. America doesn’t do that anymore. It is common knowledge that if you desire the rebuilding of your country — simply attack America!

Another important aspect of wining a war is to never take the civilian population off the list of targets. That may shock you. It should. But war is hell. People die – innocent people die, too. I repeat: war is hell!

It is nice to make an effort to avoid civilian causalities, but one must understand that it will prolong the war and make it imminently more costly in lives and treasure to win a conflict. A civilian population that is being decimated will put pressure on its government to end the war, even if that means surrender on any terms.

We did nearly everything wrong in Iraq. Rest assured, we will be forced to return combat troops to Iraq in the future. No matter what our national leaders try to tell us – the war in Iraq is not over, not nearly over. If this withdrawal is anything it is a time-out, a breather for our troops, nothing more. I hope the military brass has the good sense to leave a goodly portion of those troops in Kuwait, because they will be needed again — and soon.

We are making even worse mistakes in Afghanistan. We cannot win a war in Afghanistan without the use of nuclear weapons. I mean, of course, a decisive victory. The best we can hope for is some sort of agreement with the Afghans/Taliban. I expect that very thing is being worked on at this writing.

Just LOOK at Afghanistan. To begin with, the Afghans have very little to lose, period. The terrain in Afghanistan is unsuitable for a conventional war. We have had very limited success smashing those solid rock caves with even those powerful bunker buster bombs and missiles. Those Afghan mountain redoubts can be taken out using tactical nukes. If the US were set on victory in Afghanistan, we’d use those nukes. We would also wipe out their poppy fields and decimate the Taliban population, both the civilian and warrior class Taliban. We would take their lives, wholesale.

Unfortunately, our President sees himself as a citizen of the world FIRST and a citizen of the United States second. It is the first time in history that the President of the United States views himself as being a citizen of the country with which the military he commands is at war!

That can’t be good for any kind of REAL victory in Afghanistan. All this President wants out of Afghanistan — is the troops he commands. And – as soon as he can come to some sort of arrangement with the Taliban, He will pull the US Military out of Afghanistan, too.

You know, I doubt President Obama ever played organized football or baseball. He probably played that game the liberals love so much – soccer. I still contend that soccer is no game for Americans. American games don’t end in “ties.” That’s because Americans play to win.

Just like American football players and baseball players and basketball players are trained to win, the American military is trained to win… not tie with the enemy.

I don’t think Obama has any clue how humiliating it is to our troops to have them fight a war with one hand tied behind their backs and then, after spilling their blood at his command, order them to withdraw short off a victory. Oh, they will salute and comply with his commands, but he will have lost their respect and their trust for the remainder of his term as their Commander-in-Chief. (No wonder the democrats fear the military vote this November!)

America’s days in Afghanistan are numbered. Everybody knows it: Obama, the Taliban, the US troops in Afghanistan, and the American people. We all know it because we know this President has no taste for real conflict of any kind — political or military. Just look at all the “czars” he appointed so as to avoid conflict with the Senate. Look at his recess appointments made, we believe, for the same reason. If he can give a command and have his wishes fulfilled — fine. But – if he has to fight for it – forget about it. That is what we see in Iraq and what we will see soon in Afghanistan.

It is disgusting to see the one government organization, which really understands what honor is, the US Military, have their own honor tarnished by a Commander-in-Chief not worthy of the troops he commands.

J. D. Longstreet blogs daily at INSIGHT on Freedom at: http://www.csadispatch.blogspot.com/

E-Mail: longstreet1862@gmail.com

 

WesternFront America

In remarks at West Point, President Barack Hussein Obama laid out his plan for the surge in Afghanistan.  As is my usual practice, I will present excerpts in block quote format interspersed with my comments.

To address these important issues, it’s important to recall why America and our allies were compelled to fight a war in Afghanistan in the first place.  We did not ask for this fight. On September 11, 2001, 19 men hijacked four airplanes and used them to murder nearly 3,000 people.  They struck at our military and economic nerve centers.  They took the lives of innocent men, women, and children without regard to their faith or race or station.  Were it not for the heroic actions of passengers onboard one of those flights, they could have also struck at one of the great symbols of our democracy in Washington, and killed many more.

In this paragraph, President Obama  begins to set up his pretext, one shared by his predecessor.  Any sentient American  more than  17 years old must be very sheltered  to be unaware of the fact that the abomination was planned  by Muslims in Afghanistan.  Sure, we needed to retaliate. But the next paragraph contains egregious deceptions which must be refuted in detail.

As we know, these men belonged to al Qaeda — a group of extremists who have distorted and defiled Islam, one of the world’s great religions, to justify the slaughter of innocents. Al Qaeda’s base of operations was in Afghanistan, where they were harbored by the Taliban — a ruthless, repressive and radical movement that seized control of that country after it was ravaged by years of Soviet occupation and civil war, and after the attention of America and our friends had turned elsewhere.

Al-Qaeda means “the base”, it is equivalent to Ummah al Islamiyya: the set whose members are Muslims.  Taliban means “students of the Qur’an”. Those are Muslims. There is nothing special about them except the fact that they are believers who obey Allah and emulate Moe. They are normal, not exceptional.  They have not “distorted and defiled Islam”.  Islam remains what it was when Moe died in 632, a damnable war cult, not a religion of peace.  There is nothing great about Islam. It conquered half the known world. Is that greatness?  In the process, it murdered 270 million, what is great about that? Great slaughter, is desired by Allah, Islam’s demon, who established it as a prerequisite for releasing hostages for ransom. That is genocide; if genocide defines greatness, then  morality has been inverted.

Islam does not recognize “innocents” outside Ummah al;-Islamiyya. Only Muslims can be innocent, all others are rebels against Allah, who must be defeated and gathered together into Hell.     Jihad against disbelievers is not an optional extra added by extremists; it is not bida, it is standard Islamic doctrine laid down in Surah Al-Anfal & Surah At-Taubah.  8:39 contains Allah’s command to fight pagans until all resistance ceases and only Allah is worshiped on a global scale. 9:29 contains Allah’s command to fight Jews, Christians & Zoroastrians until they are subjugated and extorted.  Moe confirmed the command to Jihad, which continues until the last day. Islamic law requires a minimum of one military expedition against kufar in every year, failing only when there is insufficient strength. Doubters & dissenters should open Reliance of the Traveller to O9.0 and continue reading through O9.9.  O9.1 is explicit about the communal obligation to attack disbelievers in their own countries in every year. O9.8 & 9.9 reveal what the caliph does as a regular practice, aggressively, not defensively: he makes war upon Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians until they become Muslims or pay extortion, he fights all other people until they become Muslim or dead.  How is it possible that a religion has such a law in its canon?

America, our allies and the world were acting as one to destroy al Qaeda’s terrorist network and to protect our common security.

The terrorist network is Islam. It consists of every Mosque, Madrassa & Muslim wheresoever dispersed over the face of the earth. Destroying al-Qaeda is not possible without destroying Islam!  No effort is being made to accomplish that necessary objective. Both President G.W. Bush and President Obama deny the fact that Islam is at war against us. Our elected leaders will not acknowledge the fact that Islam is intrinsically inimical to life, liberty & representative government.

Under the banner of this domestic unity and international legitimacy — and only after the Taliban refused to turn over Osama bin Laden — we sent our troops into Afghanistan.  Within a matter of months, al Qaeda was scattered and many of its operatives were killed.  The Taliban was driven from power and pushed back on its heels.  A place that had known decades of fear now had reason to hope.  At a conference convened by the U.N., a provisional government was established under President Hamid Karzai.  And an International Security Assistance Force was established to help bring a lasting peace to a war-torn country.

You can not scatter what is dispersed globally: Islam. President Bush lacked the courage to attack Tora Bora with sufficient force to eliminate bin Laden. Even eliminating him would not end the Jihad.

Neither were Taliban driven from power. Taliban are only Muslims who study the Qur’an. Afghanistan’s new constitution makes the Qur’an the source of its law. Umdat as-Salik O9.8, which requires warfare against us, is part of Afghanistan’s law. This nation and the world are being misled by morons and traitors.  It is not possible to bring peace to a nation whose culture is war.  The only peace Afghanistan can have is the peace of the grave, when the graveyard is full and the surface is empty.

Today, after extraordinary costs, we are bringing the Iraq war to a responsible end.  We will remove our combat brigades from Iraq by the end of next summer, and all of our troops by the end of 2011.  That we are doing so is a testament to the character of the men and women in uniform.

There is no responsible end to the war in Iraq while it remains populated by Muslims, our sworn enemies. When our troops leave, Iraq will revert to war between Shiia & Sunni, when that warfare ends, it will resume status quo ante as a sponsor of terrorism. No other outcome is possible while its population remains Islamic.  The pull out on a set timetable is a testimony to the stupidity and treachery of our elected leaders.

But while we’ve achieved hard-earned milestones in Iraq, the situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated.  After escaping across the border into Pakistan in 2001 and 2002, al Qaeda’s leadership established a safe haven there.  Although a legitimate government was elected by the Afghan people, it’s been hampered by corruption, the drug trade, an under-developed economy, and insufficient security forces.

No legitimate government can be composed of Muslims!  Islam requires theocracy, one man rule by the Qur’an, not man made legislation. While Afghanistan remains Islamic and tribal, it will be corrupt and violent, neither well governed, peaceful nor stable. The problems listed by President Obama are not members of the set of soluble problems. Even if they could be solved, Afghanistan would revert to status quo ante: a state sponsor of terrorism.

I set a goal that was narrowly defined as disrupting, dismantling, and defeating al Qaeda and its extremist allies, and pledged to better coordinate our military and civilian efforts.

The “extremist allies” are every Muslim on the face of the earth. Will you kill them all?  Will you convert them to a peaceful religion? No, you will do neither, and the terrorism will continue because you are a cowardly fool.

And our forces lack the full support they need to effectively train and partner with Afghan security forces and better secure the population.

“Afghan security forces” is an oxymoron. Those forces are composed of Muslims. Muslims are warriors, not security forces. To Muslims, peace is the condition of the world after they have completed their conquest of it.  No matter how much you train them, they will shoot you in the back when given the opportunity, and they will betray your plans to the mujihideen.

I owe you a mission that is clearly defined, and worthy of your service.  And that’s why, after the Afghan voting was completed, I insisted on a thorough review of our strategy.

Any strategy that leaves live Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq is a total waste of blood and treasure, a fool’s errand of the worst sort. No good outcome is possible.

After 18 months, our troops will begin to come home.  These are the resources that we need to seize the initiative, while building the Afghan capacity that can allow for a responsible transition of our forces out of Afghanistan.

When will our forces leave Bosnia? When will our forces leave Germany?  When will our forces leave Japan?  You have presented our enemy with a time line telling them how long they must wait before they can seize power and restore the status quo ante. I call it treason.

I do not make this decision lightly.  I opposed the war in Iraq precisely because I believe that we must exercise restraint in the use of military force, and always consider the long-term consequences of our actions.

How do you win a war with restraint?  How do you win a war without identifying and killing the enemy? What are the long term consequences of allowing Islam to continue to exist on the face of the earth, accruing nuclear, chemical and biological weapons which it will not long hesitate to use? What were the consequences of ignoring Hitler’s military buildup, substituting appeasement for preemption?

Most of all, I know that this decision asks even more of you — a military that, along with your families, has already borne the heaviest of all burdens.

You are asking them to die for a lie. You are sending them to defeat, wasting their blood and the taxpayer’s treasure.

If I did not think that the security of the United States and the safety of the American people were at stake in Afghanistan, I would gladly order every single one of our troops home tomorrow.

Our security is at stake wherever Islam exists; wherever Zakat is collected and sent to Hamas, Hizbollah & al-Qaeda; wherever Muslim satrapies are stockpiling missiles and rushing to construct nuclear warheads.

So, no, I do not make this decision lightly.  I make this decision because I am convinced that our security is at stake in Afghanistan and Pakistan.  This is the epicenter of violent extremism practiced by al Qaeda.  It is from here that we were attacked on 9/11, and it is from here that new attacks are being plotted as I speak.  This is no idle danger; no hypothetical threat.  In the last few months alone, we have apprehended extremists within our borders who were sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan to commit new acts of terror. And this danger will only grow if the region slides backwards, and al Qaeda can operate with impunity.  We must keep the pressure on al Qaeda, and to do that, we must increase the stability and capacity of our partners in the region.

Strike al-Qaeda, insert Islam. The danger will grow no matter what, unless you eliminate Islam from the region. Then, the danger will come from another region where Allah’s writ runs and his slaves reside.

No Muslim is our partner!  Muslims who claim to be our partners are  practicing al-taqeyya and kitman; they are deceiving you. Allah explicitly forbids Muslims to be friends or partners of kuffar. Muslims must be in a dominant, not equal or subordinate relationship with  kuffar.

To meet that goal, we will pursue the following objectives within Afghanistan.  We must deny al Qaeda a safe haven.  We must reverse the Taliban’s momentum and deny it the ability to overthrow the government.  And we must strengthen the capacity of Afghanistan’s security forces and government so that they can take lead responsibility for Afghanistan’s future.

Islam has bases in Iran, Syria & Lebanon. There are Islamic bases and training camps right here in America. What will you do about them?  You say “al-Qaeda” when the correct word is Islam. Why can’t you name the enemy? How do you hope to defeat an enemy you can not identify?   Weak or strong, Afghanistan’s government, like that of Pakistan, is in the hands of Muslims, our enemies. In the end, they will attack us and our allies. There is no benefit in strengthening them.

We will meet these objectives in three ways.  First, we will pursue a military strategy that will break the Taliban’s momentum and increase Afghanistan’s capacity over the next 18 months.

To win, you must seize and hold territory 24/7/365.  You must kill enemy combatants. No more catch and release. You must deny sanctuary, both in Pakistan and Afghanistan. You must deny human shields. Your rules of engagement are costing our soldiers their lives. The word is treason. Like Lindon Johnson, you are murdering our service members for political gain.  More troops is not a strategy, it is feeding the meat grinder, filling coffins.

They’ll increase our ability to train competent Afghan security forces, and to partner with them so that more Afghans can get into the fight.  And they will help create the conditions for the United States to transfer responsibility to the Afghans.

Afghans are the enemy, idiot. They are not our allies nor partners, they are Muslims. You are training them to fight against us, just like Arafat’s “security forces”.

We will support efforts by the Afghan government to open the door to those Taliban who abandon violence and respect the human rights of their fellow citizens.

.Stupid statements like that make my blood boil! Muslims do not abandon violence without abandoning Islam! Muslims do not respect human rights!  They never did and never will!! Allah does not, Moe did not and they will not. Being a Muslim, President Obama knows that. There is only one possibility: treason.

We’re in Afghanistan to prevent a cancer from once again spreading through that country.  But this same cancer has also taken root in the border region of Pakistan.  That’s why we need a strategy that works on both sides of the border.

Strike cancer, insert Islam. Otherwise the statement must remain false. No strategy can work unless it causes Islam to be eliminated from Afghanistan and Pakistan. Any outcome that leaves them Islamic is a defeat.

And there is no doubt that the United States and Pakistan share a common enemy.

Islam is the enemy of all mankind. Pakistan is our enemy.  Is Obama too stupid to comprehend objective factual reality or a traitor. I don’t believe its stupidity.

Moving forward, we are committed to a partnership with Pakistan that is built on a foundation of mutual interest, mutual respect, and mutual trust. We will strengthen Pakistan’s capacity to target those groups that threaten our countries, and have made it clear that we cannot tolerate a safe haven for terrorists whose location is known and whose intentions are clear.

Imbecility, maundery & treachery; what a combination!  We have no mutual interest with Muslims. They do not respect us. We can not trust them. They support those groups, they do not combat them. Pakistan was, is now and will continue to be a safe haven for terrorists. Muslim and terrorist are synonymous terms.

To abandon this area now — and to rely only on efforts against al Qaeda from a distance — would significantly hamper our ability to keep the pressure on al Qaeda, and create an unacceptable risk of additional attacks on our homeland and our allies.

A single drop of truth in a river of lies. It stands out like a  carp swimming upstream  in a sewer.

Second, there are those who acknowledge that we can’t leave Afghanistan in its current state, but suggest that we go forward with the troops that we already have.  But this would simply maintain a status quo in which we muddle through, and permit a slow deterioration of conditions there.  It would ultimately prove more costly and prolong our stay in Afghanistan, because we would never be able to generate the conditions needed to train Afghan security forces and give them the space to take over.

The same is true of Obama’s strategy.

Now, let me be clear:  None of this will be easy.  The struggle against violent extremism will not be finished quickly, and it extends well beyond Afghanistan and Pakistan.  It will be an enduring test of our free society, and our leadership in the world.  And unlike the great power conflicts and clear lines of division that defined the 20th century, our effort will involve disorderly regions, failed states, diffuse enemies.

Shrub failed the test. Obamination is failing the test. We need leaders who can measure up, men like Churchill, McArthur &  Truman.

We will have to take away the tools of mass destruction.  And that’s why I’ve made it a central pillar of my foreign policy to secure loose nuclear materials from terrorists, to stop the spread of nuclear weapons, and to pursue the goal of a world without them — because every nation must understand that true security will never come from an endless race for ever more destructive weapons; true security will come for those who reject them.

Nukes are in the world. There is no possibility of ensuring that our enemies have eliminated their inventories and won’t make more. The dream of a nuke free world is impossible. Continuing to harbor it is evidence of insanity, or is it treason?
Like Shrub, Obamination refuses to identify and accurately describe the enemy. He falsely ascribes to the enemy objectives that it does not have. He falsely characterizes our relationship with certain enemy powers as an alliance or partnership. He postulates a non-existent  dichotomy between the enemy, which he calls a partner, and a subset of the enemy, which he mislabels as the enemy.   Obamination’s strategy is a house of cards founded on a lie. It can not stand in the storm of reality.

Originally posted at Ben’s Blog © Dajjal

 

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