The Noble Pundit

A Bold & Brilliant Leadership Move

It is now being reported that Saddam has fired his air defense commander as the coalition forces have gained 95% control of the air over Iraq.

Of course this leads to two questions: why did it take so long for Saddam to realize that his air defenses weren't very effective and why don't we have total control of the air over Iraq? I mean who do we have to fire since we only control 95% of the skies? It's not like Saddam is sending up the entire Iraqi Air Force or even a single plane! There is no reason we can't have 100% control here.

Actually, I'm betting that the 95% figure is something that was made up. We, in all reality, do dominate 100% of the skies over Iraq. The only things keeping us from complete air domination are the occasional surface-to-air missile, not that they're very effective against us either. I've got a feeling that this reporter just felt a need to downplay just how successful we have been in the air.

So will this air defense general be considered successful if he gets us from 95% control to 94%? If not, maybe he can get air defense techiniques from the French. After all, they were pretty successful in protecting Paris from German bombs during their rolling surrender to kick off the main event in WWII. I think the French plan was to put both arms straight up to deflect and eventually stop the bombs. It worked for them, and I'm guessing it would work for Saddam too. He should try it.

A Brilliant Military Strategy

Well, it looks like they see suicide as the path to victory. Iraq blew up its first soldier (intentionally, at least) yesterday, taking four of ours with him. One of the many VPs of the country vowed that more would follow.

Good for them. Seriously, I'm happy for them if they believe so much in their cause that they're willing to die for it. And if they self-detonate it means that our men don't have to worry about a guilty conscience from killing them. It's the best of both worlds - they die for their cause and we don't have to kill them. All we have to do is to make sure that we protect our men and we'll have hit the trifecta.

Donald Sensing wrote a great essay about why an Iraqi Islamist would want to turn themselves into a bloodstain on the road. His comparisons between the Japanese of WWII and the Islamofacists of today are excellent. And as he states, hopefully the fedayeen will never catch on to their lunacy. They would be much more dangerous in a post-war Iraq than they are now.

Reading his essay also gives me some additional hope for the Iraqi people. Why? I've been concerned that they would never be able to move beyond the cult glorifying suicide. It seemed to almost be the basis on which their entire religious existence was founded. American and western Muslims have, for the most part, moved beyond the cult, but the people in the Middle East seemed to be in this never-ending cycle of stupidity. But the Japanese managed to overcome this same cult and they have actually grown to prosper since the end of WWII. If the Japanese could overcome the power of the cult, so can the Iraqis.

Hopefully, we won't have to suffer through four years of exploding cultists before they start to grow up.

It all goes back to their experiencing a Renaissance and beginning to value a human life.

I'll put $100 on the US Army

I knew that people would gamble on almost anything -halftime scores, pass caught in a quarter, over/under, stolen bases, whatever. But I was only really aware of sports betting. Not so. According to CNN.com you can now gamble on Saddam's future.

I would think that you would have to have a pretty serious gambling problem or a pretty good sense of humor to bet on his future. This isn't quite the same as a fun wager on football or baseball scores. There is something much more disturbing, almost sinister, about betting on someone's future. Once again, we prove that man will do almost anything to push the bounds of good taste.

The American Investigative Army

Is it just me or does it seem like we're doing an awful lot of investigating with this war. We're investigating God only knows how many friendly fire incidents, missiles in Turkey, Iran and Syria, missiles in Baghdad markets, missiles that miss missiles, missiles that make it through our missiles to complete missile attacks, missiles that miss, missiles that hit, mines, chemicals, antidotes, suits, schools, hospitals, factories, atrocities, POWs, accidents and much, much more. It seems like we're going to be spending more time investigating the fighting than actually fighting.

Now don't get me wrong, an investigation to see what went wrong is never a bad thing. One of strengths is being able to look at what didn't work and figuring out how to make it work. We're successful because we learn from our mistakes.

But come on. At the rate we're starting investigations, being an investigator for the military is going to be the most secure job in history! We're going to have more lawyers in theater than soldiers (that'll make Saddam give up for sure. Imagine 250,000 lawyers coming 'round your block to investigate. You'd commit suicide too). We have got to get a grip here, folks.

Friendly fire needs to be our top investigative priority. We need to make sure that we do everything we can to minimize the casualties to our troops. The rest of the stuff, it's just not as important. We have got to figure out how to protect our troops from ourselves. We've done more damage to the coalition military than Iraq has. That has got to stop.

Bad Reason To Pass A Law

"I'm bored...It's been a long winter." This is the primary reason an Iowa town may make lying a crime.

You know that government has way too much power and not enough reason for existence when stuff like this happens. Someone needs to take this guy out for a lesson on the concept of limited government.

We're getting ahead of ourselves

OK, back to warblogging!

I don't like this new round of potential escalation by the Pentagon. Rumsfeld is now basically putting the Syrians on notice that they need to clean up their act before we clean it for them.

We can't really fault them for selling arms to Iraq. They have never made any bones about whom they support in this battle. They don't complain about terrorism while supporting the king terrorist (like the Russians have). The Syrians supporting Iraq in this fight isn't much different than the US acting as the arsenal for democracy in WWII - except that the Syrians are supporting the soon-to-be losers. Can't fault them for acting on principle, even if it's wrong.

So long as they only act as the arsenal of thugocracy, we need to simply keep a close eye on them. At this point, we have no justification for going to war with Syria. Should a Syrian soldier fire a rifle within sight of an American, then it might be another story.

I sure hope Rummy is simply sending a message. Being on the wrong side of history is not necessarily justification for war. The administration is going to have to make a better case than this.

Or we have to invade Russia first. In the dead of winter. With the French leading the way.

#9: Commitments, Decency, and Lies

Sorry the posting has been so light the last few days, I’ve just had a few things come up that were a little more important than blogging. Work has been rough and hasn’t allowed any time for me to even keep up with the news, much less to comment it. Besides the war has now entered a consolidation phase before the next big push. There’s no sense in rehashing the same “there was a firefight today” or “the Iraqi Army committed atrocities” stories. I’ll almost always be a day late and a dollar short for those.

But really, I’ve been much more concerned with something else these last couple of days.

One of my pet peeves is people deliberately breaking commitments without the decency to explain themselves. That, in my opinion, is one of the most foul and evil things a person can do to another human being. And when it is a commitment that was made at a funeral service - well then you deserve the worst someone can bring down on you.

A few years ago, a good friend of mine – and my sister’s best friend – made a horrible decision and paid for it with her life. She was 18, with her whole life in front of her, and after a night of drinking, she decided to drive to the beach. She didn’t make it.

This girl was like my “other” sister. Our families had been friends for nearly 15 years. I had coached her sister in softball and watched the two of them grow up along with my sister.

But that one morning in July, she was gone. I saw from the outside a small glimpse of the pain it caused her family; I felt up close the pain it caused my family. The devastation all around was incredible.

The young lady had been a star softball player at my high school alma mater. She had graduated two months before her death and was looking forward to going to a local community college. The night of the viewing, I was there as the high school softball coach brought in her jersey and proclaimed that no one would ever wear that number again for the high school softball team.

It was a very generous offering and the girl’s family accepted it. It seemed as though the coach truly felt compassion for the family. Everyone in attendance - myself included – took her commitment at face value.

The following softball season my sister and her sister discovered that there was a player wearing the “retired” number. Meetings and consultations ensued, with the coach saying basically that it was a mistake. And her commitment was taken at face value.

The next year, it was again discovered that the number was back on the field. Again, more discussions and explanations and apologies. And again, her commitment was taken at face value.

A few weeks ago the girl’s sister, who works with me, came in almost in tears because the number was on the field again – for the third year running. Her sister and my sister worked extremely hard to resolve this without involving her parents (she was afraid of the pain it would cause them). They offered to buy a new uniform to replace the one with the “retired” number. They were willing to accept a zero being appended to the number – anything but that single number.

It eventually filtered back that the coach was not going to honor her commitment, due to beliefs based on hearsay. The comments that she was making to everyone except the people involved were baseless and probably slanderous. If she had tried, she could not have come up with another lie that would cause as much pain as what she spoke. She attacked the memory of a dead girl with the most vile and repulsive BS I have ever heard. The girl’s sister is a very stoic person and what was being said reduced her to tears. And the coach was afraid to say it to anyone who really mattered – the family to whom she had made the casket-side commitment.

Yesterday was her mother’s birthday. They’re having the birthday party tonight. Today, we got a phone call from the school principal who promised to honor the commitment. The agreement was informally put in writing and the girls are going to getting together the money to make it happen. But most importantly they get to give her mother one of the most beautiful birthday presents, a defense of her daughters honor.

I’m very proud of what the two girls did (with some help from my mother). They faced down a despicable liar and they did with class and brutal effectiveness. They learned how to handle to absolute worst possible situation and to come away with what they wanted and their pride still intact.

I just wish they could have learned the value of principle and the importance of commitments an easier way.

I know they’ll both read this over the weekend. I was as offended as everyone else. I don't think I could have handled it as well as you two did. You know I could never say it in person, but I’m proud of both of you. And so is she.

More on the Decline of Civilizations

I was thinking about the post I wrote last night about the decline of civilizations through he expansion of leisure. I was feeling pretty good about it and then I had an interesting thought that kind of threw a different light on the issue.

As I was pondering everything, I noticed that the three main civilizations I talked about all shared a key common factor – they were long-lived. The life cycle of each civilization was measured in centuries, not decades. And that lended more strength to my belief that American civilization still has its best years to come. And as I was feeling all nice and proud and thinking how the American rise coincided so nicely with the British fall, I suddenly realized – the British haven’t really fell. They’re not as dominant as they once were, but they haven’t completely collapsed. So what happened to make the British so resilient and defiant of the trends of history?

It took me a while to identify what I see as the true root cause of the downfall of civilizations. Leisure is still a root cause, but what is the true underlying reason that causes the expansion of leisure?

Now I’m not a sociologist and don’t even play one on TV, but I think that experience has shown the way to at least some of the answers. Expanded leisure is a function of getting older. In our early years, we work to learn and to earn so that as we age we can do more that we want and less of what we have to. In other words, younger people work harder and older folks take more time to appreciate life. There are of course exceptions on both ends of the spectrum, but I think that it’s a pretty fair and accurate generalization.

In all three civilizations, an aging population left the productive workforce and as the younger generations had to devote more and more resources to supporting the elderly there became a disincentive to work. As fewer people worked to their potential, it increased the efforts required of the others, which was another disincentive to work. And so began a vicious cycle that could be broken only by altering the demographics of the nation. The population had to begin getting progressively younger in order to present an incentive to work. In Greece and Rome, this was achieved by a collapse of the civilization and a corresponding reduction in lifespan, which helped to lower the average age of the population. France is looking more and more like it will require a revolution to change the welfare state, but it will not achieve any greatness again until it experiences another baby boom that will help to lower the average age of the population.

This makes me worry some about the state that America is really in. We have an aging population also. They main difference, and what I see as being our saving grace, is that our elderly population is much more willing to put in a full day’s work. That desire to continue to contribute should be enough to put us over the hump. Unfortunately for me, I think that the “Generations X & Y” are going to have a little trouble achieving a higher standard of living as the demographics won’t be favorable until late in our working lives. But I also think that this period will end up being a one-generation aberration in the growth of American power.

So how did the British avoid these aging population issues? People get old and want to relax in the later years even in England. The British have an element of their population that does it’s best to avoid work – just like every nation. So how were the Brits able to pull it off?

The British, I believe, pulled it off through emigration. Just as immigration has helped us in the States to avoid the issue up until now, the British were able to send away enough of the right elements of their population to pull this off. Some people, like the convicts were forced to leave, while others left of their own free will. They went to America, Canada, Australia, Ireland and many other nations. But the ones who left tended to be older (they had to acquire the resources to leave) or the derelicts that didn’t add much to the state of civilization anyway. The removal of these elements of society allowed England to maintain a fairly low average age.

The maintenance of a low average age and its corresponding high productivity led to the survival and strength of British civilization.

It’s interesting to look at the fates of the Americans, Germans, French, and British since WWI in respect to this theory. Germany, France and England all had entire generations wiped out in the trenches of WWI. The resulting age gap allowed the average age of the population to drop in those three nations as they headed into WWII (the US was still expansionist within its own borders and was able to decrease its average age just through natural population expansion). During WWII, the Americans, Germans and British all lost sizable chunks of their populations, while the French basically sat the war out and didn’t see too much of an effect of their population. After WWII, the three affected nations underwent population booms which led to a strengthening of influence in the 1960s and 1970s as those baby boomers started to come of age. French influence and power declined at the same time, as their population just simply got older and more leisurely.

Is this a well-researched study? No, everything here is based on personal (and possibly flawed) observations and readings. Am I saying that this is the end all answer for why civilizations fail? No, it’s just my theory. If you have a different idea or a reason why I’m wrong, post a comment and let me know.

France and Imperial Rome

Brian Chapin over at American RealPolitik has made an interesting and accurate observation of the on-going decline in nations like France, Germany, and Belgium. He has essentially made the connection between an expansion of leisure and a decline in the host civilization.

As we look back through history, in the Western civilizations we really have two clear examples of leisure undermining the nation-state: Greece and Rome.

The great cities of ancient Greece established themselves first of great military powers. Their militaries were built up by a cooperative effort on the part of the population. During the Golden Age of Greek power, everyone was contributing to the success of the nation-state.

But after each city established its dominance over an area, certain elements of the population turned to leisure activities. The writing of plays and philosophizing went from being simply an important contribution in the quest for civilization to being the primary purpose of people's lives. To expand their leisure time the citizens would turn over the responsibilities of basic life to others - people who did not have the same stake in the city as the citizens. As a result the quality of the economy went down as the quality of life for the citizens rose. As time went on, the economy could no longer support the leisure and the city-states of Greece fell into a decline from which they never fully recovered.

Rome, the great adapting nation, conquered the Greeks and discovered many excellent ideas in the process. They learned of philosophy and education. They also learned of architecture and art. But with the multitudes of wonderful and good ideas, the Romans also learned the seeds of their decline (in the Western portion of the Empire, at least).

The leisure problems the Greeks had perfected on a city scale, the Romans took to an imperial scale. The cause of Rome's greatness was the integration of the aristocracy into the government of the nation during the first and second centuries. But as Rome's influence expanded and more non-Latins began to hold positions of power, the landed aristocracy of Italy began to seek out leisure at the expense of work. As the years went on, Rome found itself facing many of the same problems in the Western Empire as the Greeks had faced. And eventually the Western Empire fell to the barbarians because the people didn't care to fight - after all it wasn't their land.

Interestingly enough, the city of Rome also became the first proof that communism could lead to decline by encouraging sloth among the people. Remember, in the city of Rome the residents were provided with "bread and circus" to keep them happy - regardless of the work they did. By providing them with free food and entertainment many of the city's residents never worked. As a result the city never really developed a commercial class and therefore was not able to cope very well with any economic blips.

So how does this affect modern day France and Co.? Well, remember these are the homes of the ultra-militant labor unions and the 35-hour work week (maybe going to be less soon). Labor and command economies (to an extent, but not completely) have lead to a stagnation of ambition of the last 50 years. As a result, the people are turning more to a life of leisure instead of putting in a solid week's worth of work. Couple that with an aging population and it's hard to fathom how these nations are still economically afloat.

It's also interesting to note that in these countries, the commercial class is frowned upon. I wish I could find the study to link to, but I remember seeing a German study in which a very high percentage (maybe 70%+) of German high school kids thought that being a businessperson was a terrible idea. In these nations there is absolutely no respect for the shopkeepers and as a result, you see the nations starting to head down the same road as Imperial Rome.

It's a shame to see former great powers reduced to hollow shells of their once vibrant selves. Mr. Chapin is correct in his assertion that these nations in decline will slowly, but surely move further and further away from us as our economies become more and more divergent. How long will the decline take? I have no idea, but hopefully their fall from grace won't turn violent.

One week

So we’re just over a week into this adventure we call the war in Iraq. The media is talking doom and gloom and the coming of Armageddon. Iraq is, of course, putting out propaganda the likes of which haven’t been seen in a long, long time. But most importantly, what do I think? Here are my quick thoughts before bed:

1.) To be within 100 klicks of Baghdad within 5 days of having started the ground drive – that’s nothing short of incredible.
2.) We have dropped an incredible amount of ordinance on Iraq with almost no civilian casualties – even as Saddam tries to get us to kill his people.
3.) I don’t think we’ve seen shock and awe yet. Soon we will unleash a combined arms attack on a major Iraqi military formation. The combined power of all four branches of the military unleashed at once – that will be shock and awe.
4.) I think that only shock so far has been the Iraqis trying to figure out how we’re already on the outskirts of Baghdad.
5.) The ground war has already gone longer the Gulf War I, and we have less than half the casualties.
6.) The media is by and large bound and determined to downplay our successes as they might vindicate our decision to go to war. The mainstream media will report this as another Vietnam unless we are so decisive in our achievement that they would have to out and out lie (and then they still might).

The US military (and the coalition forces also) have really proven just how professional and skilled they are. We’re annihilating the military, yet taking the time to carry a wounded boy to medical attention. We’re bringing in food and water along with more tanks and personnel carriers. We’re fighting fair, even as our enemy does not. We have comported ourselves in a most excellent manner. Our men and women in uniform have done much to make us proud of them. And we are proud of them.

To paraphrase David Glasgow Farragut: Damn the media, full speed ahead!

Friends, Allies, & The UN

They must be piping drinking water into the UN building straight out of the East River or maybe the Mexicans brought their own water, but something is making our friends and allies go weird on us at the UN; first it was the Axis of Weasels, then Russia and now the Mexicans.

The Mexicans take over the Presidency of the Security Council next week. Now you would think that it would be good for us to have an ally in the Presidency rather than a nation that relies on a witchdoctor for foreign policy. But our friends to the south have decided that they have three goals: "to return multilateralism to the UN," to "find a way to reinsert the UN into Iraq," and to "revise and limit the power of veto."

Now the first two goals are wonderful politically correct throwaway statements. They make the socialist, one-world-government wackos happy. There is nothing wrong about spouting off that kind of useless rhetoric.

But that third goal, to "revise and limit the power of veto," that is a very dangerous undertaking - most of all for the UN. We provide a disproportionate share of the UN's resource, financial and otherwise. If we pull our funding out of the UN, it fails. Nobody else really cares enough about it to fund it like we do.

But other nations, and the UN itself, need to realize that with our excessive contribution comes certain rights. We have a defacto veto over anything stupid that the UN may come up with - we can just pull our funding. It would kill the organization if we did that, but if the action is egregious enough and we have no other procedural power - well it is valuable real estate that the headquarters building sits on.

We hold the "golden share" because we provide the gold. If the UN takes away our absolute veto and essentially tries to subjugate over national interests to that of a Libya, a North Korea, or a Guinea then the diplomats won't be watching too many more Broadway plays.

If the UN is serious about reform, they need to provide humanitarian aid to Iraq and forget about multilateral diplomacy and providing security. They need to work on the touchy feely stuff and leave the protection to the big boys who have the means to enforce their edicts.

Instead of worrying about France getting "their fair share" in the new Iraq, the UN needs to worry about Iraqis getting "their fair share" of food and water.

Instead of trying to force the coalition to bail out of governing Iraq in the immediate aftermath, they should be glad that for once they can distribute aid to the people of a nation rather than the kleptomaniacs that usually rule third world nations.

Or maybe instead of being arrogant, whiny, condescending and ungrateful, they should just step back and say "Thank you."

They should thank us for supporting this organization even when it worked against interest. They should thank us for having given the organization credibility. They should thank us for being willing to get dirt under our nails to make the organization work.

Reforming rules and trying to stick themselves into Iraq for anything other than humanitarian aid is not needed. A simple "Thank you" would suffice, thank you very much.

More Offensive Pictures

It's not quite the POW video, but this is pretty offensive nonetheless. Are they just trying to see how ticked off they can get us? Are we going to find the Hussein-Bin Laden vacation videos next?

I wonder what other "works of art" the regime of Saddam has produced.

Iraq and the UN

I was watching TV earlier and saw the Iraqi ambassador to the UN sitting before the Security Council babbling on about illegality of the war and begging the Council to take action against us (maybe they could pass a resolution or seventeen).

Why is this nattering nabob still there? Even the Security Council has basically admitted that the Iraqi regime is going to change. We know this because they have started talking about how to administer humanitarian aid after the war is over. Why are we still allowing the spokesman of a failed government to continue to spread useless propaganda?

It’s not like he’ll ever be able to get a condemnation of the war passed. And in short order, the government he purports to represent will be no more. There are no more negotiations to come for this Iraq; there is no more purpose to his being able to waste the “valuable” time of the Council.

Saddam’s regime should be no more important than that of a consultative member of the UN. These are the nations that are not formally recognized, but that can be consulted for information. Saddam should not be allowed to call meetings, propose resolutions, or to vote in any decisions to be made. The Iraq of Saddam has no stake in the future of the world. Their future is up.

They're Making My Brain Hurt

This is getting tough to comprehend. Maybe I'm a little too simplisme to understand the nuances here, but the French seem to be acting even more irrational as time goes on. They demand we hand Iraq over to them, but that we pay for the rebuilding. Now they worry that there might be repercussions for their insolence. And they whine about consequences of their disrespect. They want all the benefits of a successful prosecution of war, but absolutely none of the responsibility.

The French want a big role in the reconstruction of Iraq. Since we won't be plundering the nation after we defeat Saddam, the commercial contracts will be the most valuable immediate economic gain from the liberation of Iraq. We, meaning the coalition of the willing, have taken on the responsibility of removing Saddam Hussein from power. We will have paid the price of progress with the blood of our men and women.

What makes the French think that their "experience" in dealing with a now defunct regime is so important? We will be changing the regime. We will be providing the humanitarian aid that the UN (selfishly manipulated by the French, Germans and Russians) will not; they can provide it - and we've asked them to- but they refuse to help the people in need of aid. We will be rebuilding the basic infrastructure that Saddam is destroying. We will pay in blood to set up the foundation of the new Iraq that the French wish to exploit for commercial gain.

The coalition must discriminate against companies from nations that opposed us. It must be perfectly clear that if you oppose us you cannot expect to ride our coattails to profit. When we declare our intention to solve a problem, each nation has a choice to make. They can either join us in solving the problem, they can remain neutral and quiet, or they can oppose us. Those, to one degree or another, are the only three choices. If you loudly and proudly and vehemently oppose us no matter what, you cannot expect us to just roll over and give you what you want when we're done. We are one of the most benevolent conquerors in history, but our benevolence should only extend to those that we actually defeat in battle and to the people we liberate.

The French do not deserve our benevolence. They have only earned our contempt.

A moment of truth

The moment of truth has arrived. If these first reports of an uprising in Basra are true, then we have now arrived at the point where we can correct the mistakes of a decade ago when we abandoned the Shi'ites to Saddam's slaughtering henchmen.

From the stories I've been hearing it sounds like the Brits are handling this exactly right. They have apparently started shelling the Iraqi mortars that were being turned on the citizens of Basra. The Brits are even considering plans to enter the city in support of the Shi'ites. Good.

We owe it particularly to the Shi'ites of Basra and to the Kurds in the north to do whatever we need to to protect them - even if it requires some coalition deaths. We hung them out once, we cannot do it again.

Rage and Doing Right

I just came across this article from the New York Post which is describing the anger felt by some of our soldiers as they discuss the execution of the American POWs.

The other night, I said that our collective blood pressure would be rising - and justifiably so. Especially after the fake surrender ruses we need to have surrendering Iraqis on a short rope. I have no problem with any of that.

I do have a problem with the medic who claims that it is going to be harder for him to treat a wounded Iraqi he might come across. He's a medic. It's his job to help people, regardless of who they are - American, British, Iraqi or terrorist. If the person is hurt and in need of medical attention, so long as the medic can safely provide help, he should be required to. It is not his job to judge who is worthy of life and who is not. It is his judge to save lives - not coalition lives, any life.

This is where we run the risk of acting improperly. We need to channel our rage and direct it with unending fury on those who wish us harm. But for those who are weak and in need, we need to be absolutely sure that we are there for them. Our strength comes from our doing the right thing. I hope this guys superiors had a conversation with him about that.

Al Jazeera and Decency

Our friends at Al Jazeera just don’t get it. They are questioning why we think that the POW tape they aired was a violation of the Geneva Convention. They also rail against our showing video of Iraqi POWs and decry our “double standard” on the matter. I want to know what is so difficult for them to understand.

The Geneva Convention protects POWs from becoming public curiosities and from media interrogation. It also protects POWs from atrocities like summary executions. It does not ban the showing photographs or videos of POWs. A photograph or video does not make a POW a public curiousity - dragging them through the streets in a triumph procession does. But even that isn’t the real problem here.

Al Jazeera showed video of Americans who had been executed. It showed a video of Americans being interrogated by the Iraqi news media. It showed pictures of American soldiers having pain inflicted on them by an interrogator from the media. It showed clear violations of the Geneva Convention.

But what about the American videos of Iraqi POWs they scream. Well what about them? They show Iraqi soldiers surrendering, being frisked, and then restrained. I have yet to see a video showing executed Iraqi POWs. I’ve yet to see a video showing reporters interrogating POWs for public consumption. I’ve yet to see a video that shows a POWs being put in extreme discomfort intentionally (restraining them is not the same as aggravating an injury).

They also claim that the Geneva Convention should not apply because the UN didn’t sanction this attack. The UN did sanction this attack, just not with an 18th resolution. And the Geneva Convention is not a UN rule, it is a treaty that we signed. The original Conventions actually predate the UN by nearly 100 years. Just because the UN didn’t pass resolution number 18 doesn’t mean that the Geneva Conventions don’t apply. They are two separate subjects.

Do we have a double standard? I don’t think so. We expect a certain level of respect to be accorded to our POWs. Is a picture of a POW bad? No, it may actually be helpful in showing the families that their son or daughter is still alive. Is a picture of a beaten or executed POW bad? Absolutely. Is that a double standard? No, it’s a matter of degree and of good taste.

I realize that Al Jazeera is “an Arab TV station” and that the Arabs have different standards than we do. That is no excuse. I have never met a Arab that condones murder. Claiming a double standard is wrong. The only thing that this video proved is that Al Jazeera has no standard of decency.

A reason I like the Orlando Sentinal

Is the Arab News not enough?

Now you can try out the new english site for Al Jazeera. It's got a heavy pro-Arab spin, which is expected and has some rather inflammitory stories - also expected. But it is another source of information and in my opinion you can't have too many of those.

Kids and Heroes

I was just reading an excellent article over at the National Review by Peter Gibbon in which he ponders the decline of the American soldier as a hero. He correctly observes that kids today look at athletes, movie stars and rap stars as heroes and asks the question of why is the soldier in decline as a role model in American society.

Mr. Gibbon then goes into a discussion of the various educational tools that essentially portrayed the American soldier as anything but a hero. But in his concentration on books prevents him from discussing why American kids have so little respect for the military.

I think that the establishment of heroes begins at home, with the family. I have a six year old and an eight year old that I’ve been teaching a lot about the world lately. Since 9/11 they have had many questions like “why do people do that?” as they saw the towers fall. They asked “why did they do that?” when the stories came out about the firefighters going into the towers. They ask “why are we at war?” and “are we bombing them? Are they bombing us?” None of these questions are easy to answer for another adult, much less a child.

But I try.

When they ask why the towers had to fall, we talk about how some people in the world are evil. We don’t talk about how groups of people are evil, we talk about how individual people can be evil. The kids are very religious (don't know how that happened), so we can discuss things in terms of angels and the devil. Is it perfect? No. But it gets the point across. They understand that most people are good, but that there are a few evil ones who can really make the world miserable.

They ask why we are at war. It’s a little more difficult question to answer, but we discuss it anyways. The discussion almost always revolves around the idea that some people are so evil that they can’t be allowed to stay in power and threaten people. Is it overly simplistic? Yes. But for the kids, it gets across the main point that there is such a thing as a justified war; there are people evil enough to need to be punished. And when that evil person is the leader of a nation, military force is the way to punish them.

These two questions help to teach the kids about principles and the concept of right and wrong. They start to understand that there are some things worth fighting for. They also start to learn that there are people in the world that would do them harm. These are tough lessons even for adults.

The big questions I’ve been getting lately are “Are we bombing them?” and “Are they bombing us?” On the most basic level these are yes or no questions, we are bombing them and they are not bombing us (at least over here). And I think most people would change the discussion at that point. But we sit there and talk about what they see on the TV. We talk about why we use precision guided weapons and why we try to avoid killing innocents. My six-year old watches the bombs hitting around Baghdad and sees the burning buildings and says “we’re bombing the bad guys.” Pointing to an untouched apartment building in the same picture he says ”these are good guys.” And then he tells me “we made sure we didn’t bomb these guys while we bombed these ones.” He understands the importance of avoiding civilian deaths. He points to US soldiers and talks about how they’re getting the bad guys.

By reinforcing the lengths we have gone to to protect innocents, both kids have started talking about the soldiers in hero terms. They talk about how good they are and how they value life. The youngest talks about how he doesn’t want to be a soldier (because he wold have to go to far away from his Mom), but that he’s happy that they try to protect people. But he’s happy that soldiers are out there protecting him, just like the NY firefighters went to protect the people of New York. He talks about being a firefighter and has obviously thought about becoming a soldier. They are heroes to him. And his sister feels the same.

Why do these two look at firefighters and soldiers (and paramedics and nurses and policemen and many others) as heroes? Why don’t they look to athletes or musicians or actors for their role models. They watch enough TV that their familiar with actors and athletes. But they still look to the working Americans for their role models.

I think that it mostly has to do with our talking to them. Too many parents allow their kids to be taught by the likes of a Michael Moore by not talking to them. Sure, I can’t use the broad theoretical arguments that I do here, but I can still just talk with them. And I have always looked on working Americans as real heroes. Just like their mother has. The key is that we spend time talking to them and letting them ask the questions they want answered.

I’m not the perfect parent – far from it. But if we want our fighting men to be heroes, it really starts at home. Heroes are found in your values, not in a textbook. If you want your kids to have a better set of heroes, talk to them and help them to find a better set of values. This is why I don’t want a village raising my kids.

I wish I could do this

Wow. That's all I can say. Wow.

Go read it. Now.

Stocks, War & Plans

I’m glad I’m not a stockbroker anymore.

I used to absolutely hate the days like today where the market irrationally reacts to news. There is no real reason why the market dropped as bad as it did today; it just decided that resistance was bad, so down it went. Of course, there was also no real reason for the market going up over the last week to ten days, either.

People just never seem to understand that the market has its own psychology. Forget all the reading you’ve done in the self help investing books – the stock market is anything but rational. It reacts to news with gut reactions, just like a person would. The market runs on emotion, not logic. It tends to react almost like it’s bipolar: when it’s up – it’s up. Conversely when it’s down – it’s down.

I get frustrated listening to commentators on the market talking about why the market is reacting to something like it is. They all try to apply logic to an illogical being. They try to apply rational thoughts to an irrational market. They try to apply reason to an emotional organism. They just never admit that sometimes the market is, for lack of a better word, stupid.

I spent time working with investors that made millions and investors that lost millions – both ways literally. $250,000/day swings either way were not terribly uncommon. But you could always tell who was making money and who was losing just by listening to the questions and the reactions.

When things went like the last week has, the ones that made money would be asking for information about what had fundamentally changed. Had a company’s financial situation changed? Was there an overly bearish economic report? They always looked for a justification for a move. They gathered information and then made a strategic investing decision and they stuck to it.

The ones that lost money, they’d be asking what a company was selling for. They’d be asking how much a position was worth if they sold or how many shares they could buy. Why a move was happening wasn’t anywhere near as important as the fact that it was happening. Rather than establishing a strategy, they looked for “opportunity,” never realizing that by the time they found it, it had already passed them by.

Trying to divine the stock market is more impossible than trying to figure out Saddam. People who are successful establish a plan and then take advantage of opportunities that the plan creates. People who are unsuccessful are reactionary and try to take opportunities as they see them.

So why would I bring this all up in the middle of the war? Several reasons, actually. First off, I hated the “why is the market doing this” questions. Hearing a variation of it on the radio is what brought on this rant. Second, I think that people should know more about how the market works if they’re investing. Successful investors know this stuff – even if it is only instinctively. Third, it is part of a larger life lesson and also one of the main reasons why we will be successful in our fight against Iraq.

Part of life is developing plans to achieve certain goals, and then taking advantage of opportunities that advance that progress of the plan. With the war in Iraq, DoD and the Pentagon established a plan to achieve success in Iraq. When an opportunity that advanced the plan presented itself last Wednesday, we took advantage of it. But only because it advanced the plan that was set up to achieve a larger goal.

Saddam on the other hand, has no plan. He is counting on taking advantage of fleeting opportunities to advance his cause. He is planning on reacting to our advances. His goal is avoid defeat, but he does not know what he has to do to achieve that goal. He fails to realize that his reactions will always be a step behind. He fails to recognize to the opportunities he sees will already be closed by the times he recognizes that they were there.

We are working from a plan, Saddam is hoping for a miracle. We have figured out how to achieve our goal; he has not. But most importantly, we can look at the long term goal and find strength during setbacks. Saddam has no long term goal; he can only see reason for panic in a setback. Our plan is why we will win.

It will also help you to tame the insanity of the stock market.

Read and feel better

Peggy Noonan over at OpinionJournal has great column today about the war in the bigger scheme of things. Take a few minutes to read it- it is well worth the time.

I've had enough!

OK, I've had enough of today. I don't think I've ever had such a bad day in analyzing news. It seems like every thought I've had today (but not the gut reactions) has been wrong. I blew it on the GPS jammers and now FOX is reporting on TV that the chemical weapons plant we found may not have any chemical weapons.

Very, very frustrating day of blown analysis. I'll try to do better - I promise. Got to get back in everyone's good graces.

Tomorrow, as usual for a weekday, I'll probably be quiet during the day, but I'll be watching for the following things:

1.) I expect that we're finally going to make contact with the forward elements of the Republican Guard. I'll be interested to see how that goes.

2.) I also expect that we're going to start finding more banned weapons.

3.) I'm expecting that the "shock & awe" campaign will start to really ramp up as the full visceral effect of the POW tape starts to set in.

I'm going to bed now before I stick my foot in my mouth again tonight.

OK, a correction is in order

Earlier tonight I posted a rant about the Russians providing GPS jammers to the Iraqis. Donald Sensing has provided me links to an essay he wrote and one that CPO Sparkey over a Sgt. Stryker wrote debunking the GPS jammer theory.

I went back and reread the original Fox News article that my essay was based on. This time I read it not for the content but for the little details that can change the story.

I found two of those little details that I had overlooked. First the formal complaining is being done by the STATE DEPARTMENT, not DoD. The guys over at State are not exactly paragons of defense knowledge (Powell a notable exception). The second little detail is that an unnamed DoD official merely said there was "concern at the highest levels" about this. To me, that's codespeak that says "shut up and ask a real question."

So, State is whining and DoD has already moved on beyond the issue. So the Russians were apparently only out to make a buck. But I'm still going to stand behind my indignation and I am still ashamed of having defended them in the past.

With these sales, they were, in my opinion, encouraging the Iraqi regime to believe that killing their own citizens was a legitimate tactic. Anything which even remotely encourages that belief is wrong. Whether the jammers work or not was not the basis for my being upset. It was the de facto encouragement of killing Iraqi citizens.

I was wrong about the details, but not about the principle. I stand corrected.

UPDATE: While doing some other research on the web, I came across this article which backs up what Mr. Sensing had to say. It also talks about some of the potential countermeasures that could possibly be used to defeat the "jammers" besides just INS. I'm going to go sit in the corner for forgetting that the military likes multiple levels of redundancy.

A Note To Dr.Blix

Dear Dr. Blix,

I wanted to take a moment to apologize for doubting the value of inspections in finding banned weapons in Iraq. Obviously, you were right. The inspections needed more time.

After all, look what has come to light just in the last week. We have discovered at least two Scuds, a few Ababil-100s which we have now proven that they fly too far, and now we have found a chemical weapons plant! All this and the party's just getting started.

I apologize for having doubted you Dr. Blix. I am sorry I have ever made fun of your apparent incompetence. Had I know that we were this close to identifying banned weapons and that the Iraqis were this keen to disarm themselves, I would not have supported this war. It's hard for me to say this, but you were right.

Congratulations on our success Dr. Blix. I'm sure that our military feels much safer due to your outstanding disarmament efforts.

Sincerely,
Chris

PS: I sincerely hope that you don't understand satire any better than you do deception.

Highly Refined Evil

I’ve been somewhat disturbed by the Russian problems that have come to light today. By the “Russian problems” I mean the sale of GPS jammers to Iraq, the sale of night vision goggles and now the discovery Russian missiles that were produced within the last year. These are all significant problems, but I’ve been unsure how to approach a discussion of the issues.

I’ve been pondering on this for several hours, but during dinner my father called and asked how I thought this affected the humane concerns of this war. In regards to the GPS jammers, he brought up some very interesting points.

He pointed out that most of the bombs we are dropping in Baghdad are JDAM or other GPS guided weapons. We are using these weapons so as to minimize the civilian casualties in the city. With a jammer, the Iraqis would essentially turn our smart bombs into unguided dumb bombs with a corresponding increase in civilian casualties. Since the Iraqi regime doesn’t care about the lives of its citizens, the propaganda value of such misses would be immense.

The misses would also serve to make us doubt the effectiveness of our weapons. There are already reports that just the threat of GPS jammers caused us to slowdown the bombing of Baghdad while we evaluated the effectiveness of the jammers on our weapons.

We have flown thousands of bombing missions over Iraq now; with at last report, 3 civilian deaths. That is absolutely incredible. Never before in history has so much explosive power been used with such a small amount of collateral damage.

The lack of civilian deaths is directly attributable to our use of precision-guided weapons. We have still yet to drop a single dumb bomb. Not one. There is no carpet-bombing this time.

Our foe doesn’t like that. The Iraqis want us to kill civilians. They want to give ammunition to the anti-warriors of the world. Their use of GPS jammers with the intention of deflecting a bomb onto a civilian is proof that we have more concern for their citizens than they do. It is also a crime against humanity (GPS jammers are legit to deflect bombs into unpopulated areas, but not into the heart of a city’s population).

The Russians knew what the intention of the Iraqis was. They knew that the Iraqis would attempt to use these jammers in the commission of crimes against humanity. That tells me that all of the Russian posturing in the UN was a bunch of bunk. They had no concern for the Iraqi citizens – they only had concern for their commercial ties. Putin and Ivanov lied to us. Out and out lied to our faces.

Given their duplicity with the jammers, the NVGs and anti-tank rockets are not a surprise. I also believe that they were at least a legitimate sale in that those tools could really only be used against the US and coalition militaries. I still have a problem with the Russians selling Iraq weapons to use against us while claiming to be our friend, but that is not the same as selling a tool that they knew the Iraqis would use to kill civilians.

In this war, the US has made a concerted effort to bring humanity to the battle. We have gone to extraordinary lengths to protect Iraqi citizens. It is truly a shame to see that our “friends” who had such “concern for human rights” have been selling out the Iraqis human rights. It is a shame that our “friends” have no concern beyond the almighty dollar (or euro or ruble or whatever).

I’m ashamed that I have defended the Russians in the past on this blog. This makes me sick.

Pure Evil, Pt. 2

I just popped over to the Drudge Report and found more pictures (not for the queasy) from the Al Jazeera exclusive about the American POWs.

Before, I was pissed. Now, I'm seething. Someone needs to take the grinning idiot in the pictures out for a lesson on etiquette.

The Al Jazeera comments that they didn't know this violated the Geneva Conventions - they have to be a crock. No one, I mean no one, with even the slightest bit of conscience could even begin to think that airing this tape would not violate even standard of humanity.

The leader of the Iraqi formation that did this - he is now on the same level as Saddam and Chemical Ali. Haven't we started the Basra War Crimes Tribunal yet?

Pure Evil On Display

I am absolutely ticked about the war crimes committed and videoed by the Iraqis. Brian over at American RealPolitik has outtakes from the Al Jazeera video which appears to show dead American soldiers. Do the Iraqi government not realize that this will only serve to strengthen the resolve of the Americans? Do they not realize that we did not back away after the horror of 9/11? Have they not noticed that we have set a course and we will NOT be deterred from it?

I said earlier, that I expect that we will unleash Hell on the Iraqi Army. After seeing this picture, I have no doubt that we will exact a measure of revenge for this.

And the guys at Al Jazeera had better read the Geneva Conventions - this should be their only warning. Someone also needs to talk to them about good taste, also. I hope that we're "putting them on notice."

This is the consequence of allowing pure evil to exist. These men paid for it with their lives. It's too bad that this still won't convince the anti-warriors that Saddam is evil incarnate.

The Iraqi's Make A Stupid Mistake

Al-Jazeera has just recently shown a tape, which supposedly shows several POWs and dead servicemen. Showing a media interview of POWs would be in violation of the Geneva Convention (as if Saddam really cares about that).

But as I'm sitting here listening to the reporters talking about the reactions of Defense Department officials, it is starting to sound like the collective blood pressure of the Pentagon is rising.

Up until now, the war has been fought pretty much by the rulebook. No one has done anything in contravention of the rules of war. This, however, would be a clear violation of the rules of civilized warfare. UPDATE BEFORE I FINISH: It is also being reported that the four KIAs look like they were executed - not killed in combat.

And it's sounding like we're getting pissed. They took the first dirty shot and now they will suffer the consequences.

I don't think that we've really seen "shock and awe." If we conclude that there were executions, I think that we will be unleashing hell on the Iraqi Army. Our reaction may make the Highway of Death in Gulf War I look like a picnic party.

They had better start praying to Tommy Franks and President Bush because Allah will not be able to help them now. Let's just hope they remember the proper prayer method - hold a white towel over your head and walk south with your hands over your head. This prayer of contrition will be their only hope.

Is the Vatican pro-oppression?

After seeing reports like thisI've got to start to wonder if the Vatican is supporting oppression, so long as it is the status quo.

The Vatican has a long history of supporting murderous dictators and violent violators of human rights. The most egregious example was the Vatican's silence during the Nazi/fascist regimes of WWII. Throughout the horrors inflicted on humanity by Hitler, the Pope said nothing.

Today, he is denouncing the US invasion of Iraq and terming it "a threat to the fate of humanity." He is also claiming that there is no legal or moral basis for our military action.

Earlier, when the Pope said that those making the war decisions would be responsible before God, I had no problem with it. The Pope is supposed to make statements about religious issues. His responsibility statement was a statement of a religious based position.

But his statements now are indicating a disconnect from reality. The Pope cannot believe that a regime which feeds citizens into shedders (as opposed to the ovens) is one that is worthy of protection. He has to understand that there is a moral justification for regime change. It is impossible to religiously justify the actions of the Iraqi regime in such a way that would be worthy of stopping an invasion on moral grounds. The only way I can the Pope making statements like this is if he were to completely and totally ignore the facts on the ground.

I can understand the Pope being generally opposed to war on principle. But he has to realize that there are times and situations in which military force is the best option (sort of the lesser of all evils). There are times when the status quo is not an acceptable outcome. The Vatican needs to true to its spirit, not to the dogmatic doctrine written by men years and years ago as they tried to avoid taking a real stand.

If the Catholic Church wants to stay relevant in the world they need to get in touch with the real world.