Stop the Violence

I was reading the comments at Trump’s chilling ultimatum to Putin as he demands Russia ends Ukraine war, and came across this one from @оалатвлвд .

If someone committed a heinous crime against your child and when you went to retaliate, some said "stop the violence" mhow would you feel?

Good question. I had an answer.

I am the child violated. I say don't fight evil. Heal it. Fighting often causes civilian casualties. Fighting adds evil to the world. The question is "Can you give up the anger?" And then - can you help the perpetrator do the same. The anger is the disease.

The anger is the disease.









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The Good Stuff Is At 3:30

What Republicans believe starts at 3:30 (the stuff before it is pretty good too).

H/T Instapundit

Wars And Rumors Of War

Will there be a reopening of the war between North and South Korea soon? Some people think so.

In Moscow's bleakest assessment of the situation on the Korean peninsula yet, Russian deputy foreign minister Alexei Borodavkin said tensions between the two countries were running at their highest and most dangerous level in a decade.

"Tensions on the Korean Peninsula could not be any higher. The only next step is a conflict," he told foreign policy experts at a round table on the subject in Moscow.

His prediction came two months after North Korea vowed to wage "a sacred war" against South Korea and its biggest backer, the United States.

And that is not the only hot spot that could erupt. Japan and China are not exactly on the friendliest of terms these days.

The USS Hawaii, a nuclear-powered attack submarine, arrived earlier this month at Yokosuka, home port of the U.S. Seventh Fleet, one more asset in America’s naval buildup in Northeast Asia, which can be viewed as a direct result of Chinese assertions of hegemony over the East China and South China Seas.

In July three Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines surfaced more or less simultaneously at Pusan, South Korea, Subic Bay in the Philippines and Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. The three are converted Trident missile submarines, having been stripped of their intercontinental ballistic missiles and stuffed with Tomahawk cruise missiles - 140 per sub – armed with conventional warheads.

The Hawaii is part of new class of attack submarines that are configured to operate in shallow, near-shore waters. As the submarine’s captain was happy to tell the Pacific Stars and Stripes newspaper on arrival, the sub has the ability to maintain a “persistent presence off shallow waters.”

It is nice to have a strong American President in office during these troubled times. Ah. Oh? Well never mind. Which reminds me: Miss Me Yet?

Don't forget to put up your down payment for the next gang of rascals come this November. And do not forget. If you choose unwisely in November you will have another chance to correct your error in 2012. Because, we are Americans and we can vote them out.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

Diplomacy By Other Means

I was visiting Althouse and came across this comment by a guy bashing Republicans:

They prefer war to diplomacy

Just anther instance of the left not getting it.

War is diplomacy by other means - Clauzwitz.

See, it works like this - if you have a carrot and a stick you can accomplish more than if you have a carrot alone.

And if all you have is a carrot and the other guy has a stick you are at a serious disadvantage. Such a situation is referred to as appeasement.

H/T Instapundit

Cross Posted at Classical Values

Peace Through War

Jefferson to Adams in a July 11, 1786, letter: "I acknolege I very early thought it would be best to effect a peace thro' the medium of war."

Jefferson was speaking about the jihadis of his day.

There Will Be War

A sad thought on this Memorial Day:

It makes no difference whether we have a peace candidate or a war candidate. As long as the jihadis want war there will be war.

War Magic

The Secret Strobe Lights of WW2 describes an interesting weapon of war. Strobe lights.

It might have been the greatest lost weapon of World War II. Major-General JFC Fuller, the man credited with developing modern armored warfare in the 1920s, called failure to use it "the greatest blunder of the whole war." He even suggested that British and American tank divisions could have overrun Germany before the Russians -- if it had been deployed, that is.

I've been looking at a new range of strobing weapons, which use flickering lights to subdue criminals and insurgents. But it turns out that the disorienting power of such lights was discovered decades before.

The secret weapon Fuller was referring to was the Canal Defence Light -- a powerful searchlight mounted on a tank, with a shutter allowing it to flicker six times a second. The 13-million candlepower searchlight -- intended to illuminate the battlefield and dazzle the enemy -- was described in a fascinating article on the CDL Tanks of Lowther castle...

I first read about it in a book about Jasper Maskelyne, The War Magician.

Another use of flickering lights in World War II was the proposal by Jasper Maskelyne, a stage magician employed by the British military. (A very colorful account of Maskelyne's role is given in the book The War Magician - reading it you might think he won the war single-handed.) The magician was given the task of making the Suez Canal invisible to enemy bombers. When the idea of constructing an illusion using mirrors was rejected as impractical, another plan was formulated, as this site on Maskelyne describes:

Maskelyne came up with the unorthodox idea of constructing 21 'dazzle lights' along the length of the Canal. These powerful searchlights, containing 24 different spinning beams, projected a swirling, cartwheeling confusion of light up to nine miles into the sky. A barrage of light to confuse and blind the enemy bombers, which Maskelyne dubbed Whirling Spray.

Fisher claims that this radical defensive shield of light was highly effective and was a major reason why the Suez Canal remained open for the duration of the war.

However, in spite of the book's claims, the dazzle light were never actually built (although a prototype was once tested). Is the power of strobe lights just an illusion based on hype, like Maskelyne's whirling spray? Or a significant new weapon that will be ignored or shelved because people are either ignorant of it or don't believe...?

I had read the story of the Canal Defense lights in the "The War Magician" about Maskelyne's exploits against the Axis Powers in North Africa and had always wondered what they were about. Now I know.

I came across this article through the following links: starting with Classical Values to Chicago Boyz to Zen Pundit to Wired

Bring Back The Draft

So we can invade Iran! Well not exactly. It seems that the anti-war folks want this so they can recruit more people to their ant-war movement.

The argument can be summed up simply. Only a small percentage of Americans are carrying the burden of the war. This is unfair. More to the point, it has been impossible to get parents and college kids to give more than a passing damn about the war.

The calls for a military draft are in fact calls for forcible enlistment in the anti-war movement, which has suffered greatly from its failure to recruit in the current voluntary political involvement model. The calls for a draft are nothing more than frustrated efforts to bolster the effectively non-existent anti-war movement to Vietnam levels by swelling its ranks with suddenly concerned suburban Americans.

I like this quote attributed to Talleyrand, "You can do anything with bayonets, except sit on them." These guys should be careful what they ask for.

H/T Instapundit

Bill's Revisionism

Even The New Republic notices.

Campaigning for his wife this afternoon in Iowa, Bill Clinton threw an asterisk over his position on the Iraq war:

"Even though I approved of Afghanistan and opposed Iraq from the beginning," said Clinton, "I still resent that I was not asked or given the opportunity to support those soldiers."

Bill still has it going on. Support the wife? Check. Support the troops? Check. Throw an arm’s length up between your team and the war administration? Check. This ‘two-for one’ bit sure has legs. But as much as Clinton may wish it otherwise, these days Bill's extra-credit work cannot go unchecked. Reporters soon rustled up a speech at the war's outset in which Clinton said:

"I supported the President when he asked the Congress for authority to stand up against weapons of mass destruction in Iraq."

It looks like Bill is spinning faster than an Iranian uranium enrichment centrifuge.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

Why Are We Over There?

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
- John F. Kennedy

Any other questions?

I’m still a liberal. My (former) party these days? Not so much.

Prompted by a commenter at Breitbart - Hollywood is casualty of war. Hollywood is a strange battlefield. It is where losses are taken from no INCOMING. From what I can ascertain, losses in that division may actually improve combat efficiency. In fact it seems that a lot of other divisions whose strength reduction would improve our combat capabilities are in fact losing strength.

What happens in such cases is that small losses do not impair combat capability much. However, if the losses continue eventually the division is no longer self sustaining and it breaks. The thing is you can tell that a break is coming but exactly when is hard to predict. A lot depends on morale. If that is high the losses must be severe. If it is low insignificant losses can trigger collapse.

The recent turn around in the fortunes of war will only add to the strain. Will it be a breaking strain? Too early to tell.

Citizen Soldier

I. NAMING OF PARTS

To-day we have naming of parts. Yesterday,
We had daily cleaning. And to-morrow morning,
We shall have what to do after firing. But to-day,
To-day we have naming of parts. Japonica
Glistens like coral in all of the neighboring gardens,
            And to-day we have naming of parts.

This is the lower sling swivel. And this
Is the upper sling swivel, whose use you will see,
When you are given your slings. And this is the piling swivel,
Which in your case you have not got. The branches
Hold in the gardens their silent, eloquent gestures,
            Which in our case we have not got.

This is the safety-catch, which is always released
With an easy flick of the thumb. And please do not let me
See anyone using his finger. You can do it quite easy
If you have any strength in your thumb. The blossoms
Are fragile and motionless, never letting anyone see
            Any of them using their finger.

And this you can see is the bolt. The purpose of this
Is to open the breech, as you see. We can slide it
Rapidly backwards and forwards: we call this
Easing the spring. And rapidly backwards and forwards
The early bees are assaulting and fumbling the flowers:
            They call it easing the Spring.

They call it easing the Spring: it is perfectly easy
If you have any strength in your thumb: like the bolt,
And the breech, and the cocking-piece, and the point of balance,
Which in our case we have not got; and the almond-blossom
Silent in all of the gardens and the bees going backwards and forwards,
            For to-day we have naming of parts.

You can hear the author, Henry Reed, and Frank Duncan reading "The Naming of Parts". I first read this in high school 40+ years ago. There are more sections and stanzas at the link.

Expose Yourself

Code Pink's Medea Benjamin has sent out a phony email claiming to be from Blackwater contractors. The guys who protect our dips in rough places.

She signed herself in the phony letter Kitty Laver. Let me quote:

Directing the new Department of Public Integrity is Kitty Laver, who has 20 years’ experience in public relations and corporate responsibility. “My job is to put the mercy back in mercenary,” says Laver.

Nothing like exposing yourself.

Too bad she is not more to the right. I'd love to give her a hand. Or a tongue.

I fear our differential politics and mutual proclivities would not mix.

A sad day for bi-partisan politics in America.

A Sound Proposition

You start knocking over nations that support or harbor terrorists and sooner or later nations get the idea that it is not wise to support or harbor terrorists.

Seems like a sound proposition to me.

I can understand why so many Euros don't like the idea. The Euros couldn't even handle such a proposition in their own back yard.

Not to worry. Americans have a lot of experience with this sort of thing, and we are getting better at it all the time. Practice makes perfect.

Inspired by the comments to a post about Islamic Fascism Awareness Week at The Reference Frame.

More Chaos

My friend linearthinker liked my post on Practicing Chaos so much he decided to add some thoughts of his own.

"The difficulty in planning against American doctrine is that Americans neither see fit to follow their doctrine nor even read their manuals." KGB Document

The KGB demonstrated incredible perception. The day-to-day activities recollected from roughly 30 years in the Federal bureaucracy bear out the truth in their statement. Must have been hell for the Soviets, until they realized what they were up against, and by then it was probably too late. One could paraphrase Churchill endlessly on the frustrations one encountered almost daily while coping with the bureaucracy, citing for instance, the unwilling led by the uninformed in pursuit of the worthless.

I have my own scars to bear witness to the feckless leadership of our Federal bureaucracy, and yet their situation was one to evoke sympathy from even the most callous observer when it was realized they were forced into institutional schizophrenia by the conflicting demands of their purse masters in Congress. I offer into evidence only the environmental vs timber production direction given to the US Forest Service from the 70s through the turn of the century. But even that conflicting direction cannot begin to explain why the bureaucratic machine insisted on reinventing the wheel at every shift in program direction or new daily work challenges.

Go read the whole thing.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

Practicing Chaos

"The reason Americans do so well in war, is war is chaos, and Americans practice chaos on a daily basis." Rommel 1942

From The Corner which has more pithy quotes in the same vein.

From The Wiki Damn It

Stephen Green, Vodka Pundit, was discussing/live blogging Tuesday's Republican debate and it came out that Stephen (or Vodka as he is fondly known) was once a card carrying Libertarian. So I left a few words:

Another ex-card-carrying-Libertarian. Woo hoo.

I remember a Lib fundraiser calling me about a month after 9/11 and I made smoke come out of his ears.

They haven't called back since. The party must have shrunk 40% in that month.

I've got a few of them on a Ron Paul thread at Classical Values and one guy thought we beat the Barbary Jihadis in 1801-03 (Jefferson) with Letters of Marque and privateers.

Then I pulled up some quotes from the wiki (from the wiki damn it!!!!) and he went quiet.

So then he goes all "no declaration of war" on me and I pulled up another wiki (from the wiki damn it!!!!) about the War on the Barbary Jihadis. More silence. Then I pulled up the actual AUMF and compared it with Jefferson's Congress AUMF from the wiki (from the wiki damn it!!!!) and he hasn't been back since.

Libs live in Libertopia. The land that never was or will be. Like the Socialists looking for the New Socialist Man the Libs are looking for New Libertarian Man. I hope they find him and marry him.

H/T Instapundit

Cross Posted at Classical Values

Peaceful Settlement

From Retief's War by Keith Laumer:

"I is a great believer in peaceful settlements," Jik-Jik assured him. "Ain't nobody as peaceful as a dead troublemaker."

via Instapundit. Insty has links to more free Laumer. The link above is to some free Laumer.

We Will Get All Industrial On Them

Wonderful discussion going on at Dr. Sanity's about shame cultures, why they tend to despotism, and why their war on the West could lead to unfortunate consequences. Especially for them.

The Dr. not being an avid historian gives Dresden as an example of what Americans are capable of. Commenter Simon-Peter sets her straight and proves it was mainly a British show. So I decided to help the Doctor out:

Simon-Peter,

I think the point is not to make exact American points, but to show what Western Man is capable of.

The fire bombing of Japanese cities is probably the best American example - with Hiroshima and Nagasaki the exclamation points.

The generals bombing Japan were worried. They were running out of cities to destroy. As I recall they figured that by Nov. or Dec. of '45 there would be no major targets worth bombing.

Heck, the atom bomb guys were worried. The production rate was only about 3 a month. Not enough to sustain a bombing campaign.

Consider the state of mind required to think like that.

These islamo nut jobs do not want to continue tickling the dragon's tail. We will get all industrial on them.

Cross Posted at Classical Values and at The Astute Bloggers

Which Wolf

A kind reader in the "peace at any price" camp sent me this story: Which Wolf.

A Cherokee elder sitting with his grandchildren told them, “In every life there is a terrible fight—a fight between two wolves. One is evil: he is fear, anger, envy, greed, arrogance, self-pity, resentment, and deceit. The other is good: joy, serenity, humility, confidence, generosity, truth, gentleness, and compassion.” A child asked, “Grandfather, which wolf will win?” The elder looked him in the eye. “The one you feed.”

To which I responded:

I note that feeding the right wolf does not always work out as planned.

In 1936 the world began feeding an Austrian wolf. His hunger was not fully sated until 1945.

So yes. It does depend on the wolf you feed.

Wanting Peace Bad Enough

So I'm visiting Netscape blog and the question of Iraq comes up. And a liberal mockingly implies that the surge is not working.

You tell me the surge is not working.

I believe you.

I'm glad you want to hand over Iraqi Democrats to the death squads. The beauty of your position is inescapable. The morality beyond reproach.

We CAN have peace in Iraq by handing over Iraqi democrats to the death squads. It is just that some people do not want peace bad enough.

===========

Me?

I Support Democracy In Iraq