Steven LaTulippe tells us why we should not bug the Muzzies

Steven LaTulippe has an article posted at Takimag (November 7, 2007) that channels the thoughts of the neutralist. In Let’s Sit Out World War IV He gives reasons why the US should bug out of the Middle East. We agree and though it is not exhaustive in discussing all our geopolitical problems, it is dead on in the area it does cover:

America does not border the Islamic world. It has a statistically insignificant Muslim population that is better assimilated than that of any other Western nation. America is bounded on its east and west by vast oceans and to the north and south by two militarily weak and predominantly Christian nations.

The irony resides, of course, in the fact that despite these blessings, America is the nation doing most of the fighting against radical Islam.

When analyzing the likely course of these civilizational struggles – and plotting a strategy for America to deal with them – one must also recognize another important fact: The ultimate outcome of Islam’s civilizational wars has already been determined. Radical Islam is not a viable paradigm upon which a modern society can be built. It is destined, like communism before it, to collapse from within. The trajectory of political Islam can already be seen in Iran, where it first came to power. As a governing system, the Islamic Republic has been discredited in the eyes of the masses and survives mostly by repression and manipulation. Economically and culturally, it is an utter failure.

Furthermore, radical Islam is not now, nor will it ever be, a civilizational threat to America. Nor will it conquer the world or overturn modern civilization. These goals are simply beyond its capacity

When these two ideas are considered together (i.e. the lack of geopolitical conflict between America and Islam, and the inevitable collapse of Islam as a political ideology), America’s most prudent path becomes obvious: The United States should withdraw from the Middle East and declare itself a non-belligerent in Islam’s civilizational wars. In so doing, America can avoid the casualties and ruinous costs of wars which have nothing to do with our national survival.

Given the immediate proximity of numerous, ancient enemies (and the many bloody divisions that exist within the body of Dar-al Islam itself), the Muslim combatants will not long bother themselves with a non-threatening nation on the other side of the planet. America’s tragic involvement in these wars was wholly the product of our wrong-headed, interventionist foreign policy. When that provocation is removed, so will the cause for enmity.

While obviously beneficial to America, this strategy leaves open the issue of what will happen in the aftermath of our withdrawal.

In all probability, the civilizational struggles between Islam and its neighbors will progress along their natural trajectories.

And what would those trajectories be? Well, when the West had nothing to worry about as regards the non west, we managed to slaughter each other in the two big Twentieth Century conventional intramural contests. Maybe the Islamic world can return the compliment and show us how they can kill each other in fourth generation contests amongst themselves. Or, maybe, without us there, they will stabilize and built a great international civilization. Maybe not. We do not predict the outcome, but believe the world would be no worse and ourselves much better under Neutralism.

We might feel differently if the nations of the region possessed carrier fleets. As it is, all we need do is not let in lads who want to go to flight schools with a non landing curriculum and overstay visas along with a general tightening up of immigration policies and practices.

That Guy Murphy Must Have Worked At State

His law, "What can go wrong, will" should be memorized by all the geniuses there.

So we hardly get over containing the Turkish intervention brouhaha and now there is the Pakistan neo coup.

Of course, many of the brainiacs over at foggy bottom probably view this as an opportunity rather than a crisis. Breathes there a Georgetown or Kennedy School graduate with soul so dead that they can't whip up an op ed for Wapo or NYT in a trice?

Of course, surely there is someone ahead of the game who is already working on the book rights for Who Lost Pakistan.

Stratfor on Iran

George Friedman over at Stratfor has written an article titled War Plans: United States and Iran. In his first paragraph, the words I found most interesting are,

A possible U.S. attack against Iran has been a hot topic in the news for many months now. In some quarters it has become an article of faith that the Bush administration intends to order such an attack before it leaves office. It remains a mystery whether the administration plans an actual attack or whether it is using the threat of attack to try to intimidate Iran -- and thus shape its behavior in Iraq and elsewhere

So the well informed (after all it is his business to be in the know) Mr. Friedman is not certain that the attack is going to happen. This, pour moi, is cause for some optimism.

Most of his piece is a discussion of what the shape of an attack could take and the drawbacks. There is no dearth of negatives and Mr. Friedman takes the time to point them out. It is starting to get cold up here in Nova Anglia so he is at his most scary when he states,

consider the Iranian response. Iran does not expect to defeat the U.S. Air Force or Navy, although the use of mine warfare and anti-ship cruise missiles against tankers in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz should not be dismissed.

So heating the old homestead should increase in cost if the Persians get some mines out and a few lucky hits, eh. Actually, they don't even have to do that, according to George,

A campaign against economic infrastructure would take some 4 million barrels per day off of the global oil market at a time when oil prices already are closing in on $100 a barrel.

Which means that all those wishful thinkers who believe that the Iranian people are just waiting to see the regime end and will be grateful to the Great Satan should think about Mr. Friedman's follow up,

Such a campaign is more likely to drive a wedge between the American people and the American government than between the Iranians and their government.

Tellingly, he says,

The United States is stretched thin, and everyone knows it.

Especially the Iranians. They have not budged and they don't appear scared. My guess is (and George seems to agree) they've done their homework and when they hear us huff and puff and threaten to blow the house down, their reaction could be something like, "yeah, you and what army?"*

George ends with this,

The United States could have defeated North Vietnam with a greater mobilization of forces. However, Washington determined that the defeat of North Vietnam and the defense of Indochina were not worth the level of effort required. Instead, it tried to achieve its ends with the resources it was prepared to devote to the mission. As a result, resources were squandered and the North Vietnamese flag flies over what was Saigon.

The danger of war is that politicians and generals, desiring a particular end, fantasize that they can achieve that end with insufficient resources. This lesson is applicable to Iran.

What is unsaid is the level of commitment we would have to make. Massive increase in defense spending (really, offense spending) and a draft. That is not on. From a neutralist point of view, this is a stupid idea. Truly, to anybody with an intelligence above minimally conscious, it should be a bad idea.

Mr. Friedman's article is well worth your time.

*I know, I've used this before.

More Phony Soldiers

"According to a Houston Chronicle analysis of the third-quarter finance reports, Ron Paul once again leads in donations from those who list the military as their employer. He is followed by Barack Obama, and then by John McCain." Thus reports Eric Garris at the Antiwar.com blog.

What the heck is going on here? Have libertarians been sneaking past recruiters? Or do real soldiers support ending the war? Gee, maybe there are no phony soldiers, just phonies with microphones.

Message to Rush Limbaugh

Sir,

A warrior like yourself cannot let this pass. A fellow by the name of Ricardo Sanchez is going around claiming to be a lieutenant general. Not only that, he proclaims that The U.S. mission in Iraq is a "nightmare with no end in sight."

Rush, a true warrior like you cannot let this stand. Expose this fellow for the phony soldier he is.

Yeah, that's the ticket.

Hat tip to antiwar.com.

A Non Report Card On The War

Interesting article at Defense and the National interest discusses a presentation by LTC Kilcullen, the Ozzie wunderkind of counterinsurgency. The article author, Fabius Maximus (for any neocons reading, that's a pseudonym)thinks the light colonel is explaining to his audience why we are losing even though that is not his stated purpose.

Anyway, Fab gives us the goods:

A well-intended but colonial attitude might be unavoidable in these wars. In Vietnam we spoke highly of our loyal South Vietnamese allies, our “little brown brothers.” Forty years later we treat the Iraq government with a similar friendly contempt, which its own people see and imitate. Their rebellion to foreign occupiers (like us) is a natural, if counter-productive result.

He describes a “Kiss of Death” syndrome” on slide 22. This powerful label also applies to our relationship with local governments under current COIN doctrine when we get too helpful. We take control, which diminishes the government’s legitimacy, which strengthens the insurgency, which incites us to try harder, which starts another cycle.

The government becomes seen by many of its own people as lackeys or even quislings, only regaining legitimacy by opposing us – as they do today over symbolic issues like the role of Blackwater, or passive aggressive behavior (e.g., failure to pass the oil exploitation legislation we require).

I think that "Only gaining legitimacy by opposing us" says a mouthful.

Fab wonders if Kilcullen is having his audience on. I hope he is as the alternative is that a very smart man is intentionally stupid.

Message from Greg Cochran: Just Hop on the Bus Gus

At least that's the impression one gets from the September 24th, 2007 American Conservative Magazine's front cover. Mr. Cochran's article can be summed up in one word, Go!

The article is worth reading because of the way your man elaborates on the go statement. He writes well,

Politicians, for the most part, have accepted statements about withdrawal requiring anywhere from one to two years. They want to be “responsible”—that’ll be the day. Some may have calculated that slow withdrawal might better disguise defeat and thus be more politically palatable, but I don’t think many are that Machiavellian. I think instead that, with a few honorable exceptions, they’re profoundly ignorant of war and thus have to blindly accept anything the professional military says. That ignorance is, of course, one of the reasons we got into this mess in the first place. That goes double for columnists: in pundit-land, a military expert is someone who thinks that the phalanx is cutting-edge technology.

It seems to be raining Greg Cochran lately. The Neutralist is okay with that. If our budget were larger, ah, if there were a budget, we would commission him to write for us.

Watch for the glossy print version of The Neutralist, coming within a millennium.

We have been remiss in not including The American Conservative in our links and that shall be remedied immediately.

If Greg Cochran Is Not A Neutralist, We Will Pretend He Is Anyway

It all started over at the 2blowhards website. One Friedrich von Blowhard posted a piece wherein he quoted the frontrunning candidates' foreign policy views that had the effect of letting them make themselves look foolish. Whether or not that was his intention it worked so well he titled it:

Where's Snow White? We've got the Dwarves...

One Greg Cochran left a comment:

There is no threat out there that can be usefully addressed by a larger ground army. In fact, there's not much of a short-term threat out there at all. Except the threat from within: crazy people. That one is serious, as always.

You have to have physical power to be a substantial short-term threat, and jihadists don't have any: not one tank, not one jet, no money, no industrial base, no scientists. Oh, and I forgot, no _country_, no state. No nukes and no prospect of getting any. Shit, if they had the entire Arab world under their imaginary caliphate, they'd still be weak as a kitten: the contemporary version of the Ottoman Empire.

In the longer run, someone without physical power can sometimes make a difference (i.e. cause trouble) with ideas: but of course the Moslem world doesn't have any. "No major invention or discovery has emerged from the Moslem world for well over seven centuries now." They haven't even managed to come with up with fast-selling bullshit like Marxism or psychoanalysis. _I'm_ likely to cause more of that kind of trouble than all the Moslems on Earth without even trying.

This is essentially the Neutralist analysis and therefore we appropriate it, giving proper credit to its author.

As if that were not enough Mr. Cochran submitted to questioning from Michael Blowhard. Mr. Blowhard characterized Greg Cochran as:

It's eerie how right his predictions have been, and it's impressive that he arrived at them not from some uninformed political point of view but from a practical, fact-driven, and down-to-earth one. No one can accuse Gregory Cochran of being a sentimental, knee-jerk leftie, let alone a frisee-munching, Manhattan-dwellin' metrosexual, that's for sure. Cochran looked into the facts, he assessed the facts, and he reached conclusions that have so far proven to be 100% correct.

The interview, in two parts is worth reading. Our takeaway was provided by Steve Sailer quoting the Blowhard interview in his blog:

2B: As far as Mideast policy goes, how could we do better than we do?

Cochran: I think we have little chance of running a practical Middle East policy. The political class is ignorant and / or crazy (and also lazy) and seems to enjoy being manipulated by groups whose interests are not closely aligned with those of the United States. For example, Bush Senior had Prince Bandar try to prepare Junior for the world stage. Why the hell would anyone pick a fat Saudi thief as a political science instructor? Why not someone on our side? And when Rudy has Norman Podhoretz as a foreign policy adviser -- Norman who wants to invade Arab countries that haven't even been discovered yet -- well, I tremble for my country.

2B: So what's the right general course of action for the US as the world's premier power?

Cochran: Do little. Stay strong -- although this can't possibly require the current high level of military expenditures. If I were picking an actor to represent the right policy, it'd be Jimmy Stewart -- a nice guy that you never, ever want to threaten. A mix of "It's a Wonderful Life" and "Winchester '73."

2B: What are some basic things that you wish more Americans understood about the mid-east, and about their own government?

Cochran: 1. Iraq is a Seinfeld war -- a war about nothing. 2. The Mideast isn't that important. 3. The people running the country have no idea what they're doing.

Steve Sailer wrote in his own blog comments

Well, at least Prince Bandar isn't dumb. And that Ahmad Chalabi guy, with his Ph.D. in Math from the U. of Chicago, is downright smart.

Figuring out a foreign policy that's in the best interest of America ... a job Americans just won't do anymore!

I have been reading Mr. Cochran's astute comments for years now. I've always been impressed by his agreement with my viewpoint:) He expresses it with a better analysis than I could. He knows the science, and even some of the insiders.

I explained how I knew in a prior posting

I'm sorry, I was against this war from the beginning. I knew it was a fraud from well before day one. How you may ask could a nobody from a backwater know such a thing. I was born and raised in a state unexcelled for its culture of corruption. Politicians from Louisiana could learn a few tricks. A lot of it is done without any bribery. No, it is done much more smoothly. first, someone starts mentioning un met needs. Then, the newspapers have articles that morph the un met need into a crisis. State reps and senators start using phrases like " we need to do it for the children" and "the kids are our future." Soon enough there is a new state agency and cronies are being hired all over the place.

It was a little bit different with the war drumbeat. First, we have Iraq mentioned as part of the Axis of Evil. Then, do we remember the Anthrax scare? I do. I remember pundits hot for action, for others of course. As I live up on a hill, I can get Boston stations on the car radio. One talk show host, Jay Severin was shilling for the war big time. One afternoon he breathlessly intoned that it was reported that the anthrax involved in the letters had the footprint of an Iraqi lab and that if it did have that footprint, then, "We are at war with Iraq." Cut to a break.

The anthrax scare faded away but the drumbeat continued. I remember some peacenik type acquaintances talking about going down to New York for a march and hearing them hopeful about stopping the juggernaut. I remember telling them that the people who want the war, can have the war and that is that. Of course that was discounted, but that is life. If common sense had ever prevailed in this country, the slogan would have been, Forget the Maine. Contriving a war has a history here.

Some of the propaganda was so obviously stupid that it embarrasses me as an American to think it was said and quoted. Condoleeza Rice's remark about the smoking gun turning out to be a mushroom cloud was, maybe, the worst. A few unfortunates might have believed that Iraq was somewhat near the bomb, but no one suggested they had any inkling of a delivery system. So, Condi, how were they to get it to a target? "Quick Achmed, get it on to the donkey cart, we will get it on a cargo ship as part of a shipment of dates and when it gets to New York Harbor, it gets set off. I volunteer you, Achmed, for this important mission."

Anyway, it does not matter how you attain your "Neutralismo," only that you get there.

Guilt by Association

So the apples are being harvested here in Swamp Yankee Land and I'm headed over to a local orchard to buy some. Actually, I more interested in their unbelievably delicious cider donuts, but will eat apples as well to salve my conscience. Pressing the seek button on the radio, I came across a station with a women holding forth about the recent Bin Laden video. The hostess, one Monica Crowley, was making fun of the Democrats for having OBL's foreign policy as a campaign strategy, even though, as your man pointed out they have not kept the promises.

Okay, Monica, let's go over this slowly, OBL's minions, as far as we know, attacked us and baited us into a war that turned out to be a loser. Then we thought up a war against Iraq and that is going just as swimmingly. The people of the United States allowed control of the Congress to pass to a party that implied it would do something intelligent about the war. That party is doing its best now to make itself look as bad as their sworn enemy George W. Bush. I am not the greatest admirer of our electorate, and I have no truck with the Democrats as I regard them as no more than a cargo cult masquerading as a political party. No matter, voting Dem was less stupid than voting Republican this time.

Now work with me Monica. That OBL slickly endorsed the donkey's campaign policy and chides them for not making it work, does not mean he is wrong.

This is like the trick that was pulled on Walt and Mearshimer. Call David Duke and ask if he agrees and then tab W & M as Grand Kleagles.

Okay, Monica, I assume you believe that 1 + 1 = 2. You know what, David Duke does too. Maybe you want to call him and order a sheet. I bet the Dalai Lama counts the same as DD, though his holiness does not believe it is real. I suspect Alan Dershowitz counts that way as well. Alan, Dave you have so much in common with Monica.

OBL was being glich francach caca laca (Irish saying translated as cute as a shithouse rat). He would portray himself as Thomas Jefferson if he thought he could confuse us. That does not make Thomas Jefferson wrong. Wake up Monica. I'd love to catch him and see him tried and hung, but El Jefe Maximo Jorge W blew that. I don't see not finding him in another five years while losing American lives in the Afghanistan or Iraq as all that productive.

Monica, like Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh et al, pretends to be a conservative. I don't claim to be conservative, but I do follow a conservative line in foreign policy. Major General Smedley Butler said it all this in a speech in 1933,

There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. War for any other reason is simply a racket.

Monica, this is conservatism. Spreading democracy, which we are not doing, is not.

If you decide to set aside your statist baggage, and embrace this, you too can be a conservative in foreign policy. If David Duke wants to set aside his racial baggage, he is welcome also. Heck, if Al Sharpton wants to set aside his racist baggage, come on in. if Al the Dersh wants to drop neoconnery, he's our man. It's not a big tent yet, but it could be.

Steve Sailer, the last holdout

Steve Sailer just can't seem to leave Vietnam. He is going to end up like those two Japanese holdouts in the Philipines found decades after the war if he doesn't let it go. Give it up, Steve, we need you here.

Let's look at the last paragraph of his article, What's the opposite of the sunk cost fallacy?,

The NVA tried a tentative offensive in December 1974, following the Democrats midterm election triumphs, found that the US wouldn't provide air support, so launched a massive offensive in March 1975. The South Vietnamese collapsed about as quickly as France in 1940.

Now, if a tentative offensive is begun in December and the crusher launched in March, what was the ARVN doing in between? I don't think they were starved for equipment as I remember all the stuff the NVA captured after the fall of Saigon. If the South was going to survive, it would always be as some kind of welfare case. We are better off gone.

In a prior article, Vietnam, he makes this claim,

Today, with American air power so unchallenged, it seems strange that the Democrats didn't want to allow air support of the South Vietnamese. After all, a couple of decades later, a Democrat President got involved in an internal dispute of negligible significance to America, and bombed Yugoslavia into ceding control of its internationally-recognized Kosovo province, at minimal cost in lost aircraft.

Actually, the FRY had ceded this before the bombing. what caused the war to start was their rejection of this paragraph in the Rambouillet Agreement,

NATO personnel shall enjoy, together with their vehicles, vessels, aircraft, and equipment, free and unrestricted passage and unimpeded access throughout the FRY including associated airspace and territorial waters. This shall include, but not be limited to, the right of bivouac, maneuver, billet, and utilization of any areas or facilities as required for support, training, and operations

The war ended when NATO (i.e. us) surrendered on this point. If anyone thinks being able to stay in occupation in the Balkans, let alone the Middle East is a victory, well, good luck with that.

A One Paragraph Lesson in International Relations, or this guy will never be teaching at the Kennedy School

Over at The Black Sea Today's post is a quote of a great travel writer. The takeaway I got is that the Middle East, is and for us will always be toxic. Wasting lives and treasure there is goofy. But enough, I steal below.

The Levant
"These countries were so small! One of the more marvelous atrocities of our time was the way in which the self-created problems of these countries, and their arrogant way of dealing with them, made them seem larger, like an angry child standing on its tiptoes. They were expensive to operate, too; they had vast armies; they indulged in loud and ridiculously long-winded denunciations of their neighbors. All this contributed to the illusion that they were massive. But no, they were tiny, irritating, shameless, and vindictive; and they occupied the world's attention way out of proportion to their size or importance. They had been magnified by lobbyists and busybody groups. Inflation was the theme here, and it was just another tactic for quarrelsome people to avoid making peace."
--Paul Theroux, The Pillars of Hercules

Steve Sailer, Neutralist?

Steve Sailer has an article at his blog titled, Vietnam that discusses American military adventures from recent history. Now, I would guess Mr. Sailer does not consciously think of himself as a neutralist, but his screed makes the case The Neutralist made in America's greatest 20th century victory. I don't think that Mr. Sailer realizes he is making it, but we appropriate where we can and do not care how many innocent reputations are ruined by association. As we do not gather vast traffic, iSteve need not overly worry.

Mr. Sailer discusses Vietnam and Korea as well as Kosovo. He really does not come to the conclusion as to what we got out of those adventures, which is of course nothing. Well, it is of course The Neutralist's contention that we got something out of Vietnam. We got to leave.

His final paragraph makes another neutralist point,

In contrast, Islam has virtually no appeal to anyone above the lowest orders of society if they weren't born into a Muslim family. There is no single Islamic superpower to provide direction to the squabbling Muslim states, and most of these governments are more or less averse to the extremists. Even taken together, all the Muslim states in the world have only a small fraction of America's military might. For example, there is no Muslim aircraft carrier. Technologically, Pakistan is 50 years behind America in the development of nuclear weapons, and the rest lag even farther.

Any problems we have with militant Islam are immigration problems. It cannot be said too often, 911 was an immigration failure. We were not attacked by a carrier fleet. A jihad army did not land Normandy style. We are essentially fighting ourselves.

Bush to America, "I Broke It, You Bought it"

Well, he didn't exactly say that. These were his words, "One unmistakable legacy of Vietnam is that the price of America's withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens whose agonies would add to our vocabulary new terms like 'boat people', 're-education camps' and 'killing fields'."

Now unlike most Americans, I do not believe George is a dummy. As noted previously, I think he is smarter than he is given credit for. This attempt at manipulation is as cute as all the cool people who are trying to shift us into Darfur and as believable. When George Clooney raises a battalion and leads them into the Sudan, he will get some cred. There is nothing our current commander in chief can do to gain any.

Well, he could tell the truth.

"Ladies and Gentlemen of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, I come before you to take full responsibility for what can only be called a disaster. There were no weapons of mass destruction, the intelligence was flimsy and contrived. The regime was changed but the dynamics of Iraqi politics have not changed and therefore I cannot say we can hope to leave a stable democracy in place. The constant death and mayhem that takes place in Iraq today, could accelerate. This is my fault and I apologize to the you my fellow citizens and to the Iraqi people and our allies."

No, I know that's not going to happen. I just hope no one buys the real statement of President Chutzpah. I never go into Pottery Barn and I resent being blackmailed into paying for stuff I did not drop.

Oh, and if anyone in the FBI is reading this, there is a nutcase named Stu Bykofsky who is lamenting our lack of national unity and thinks he knows a way to get it back. You want to keep an eye on flight training schools and costume stores that might stock Arab headgear. The lad does not sound all that stable.

Our Bestest Buddies, The Turks, Or Is It The Kurds?

I guess it was about a week or two ago, I saw a small Yahoo News article headlined "Turkey massing‭ ‬140,000‭ ‬troops." It seems there are Kurds in Turkey who are not happy about being Kurds in Turkey and would have that area of Turkey not be Turkey. Needless to say, the Turks are not in agreement with this idea. They also do not care for the fact that the Kurds who have used certain violent tactics to express their feelings can cross the border into an area of Iraq referred to as Kurdistan and attain effective sanctuary. So, the Ankara government has sent troops ready to cross said border to catch and not release Kurdish proponents of the Not-Turkey Thesis.

This is a bit of a mess for the nation that claims leadership of what is sometimes called the Free World. We have had a longstanding alliance with the Turks going back to the early postwar era when an American fleet called in at Istanbul to signal the Soviets hands off. The Turks reciprocated by sending men to stand with us in Korea.

Our relationship with the Kurds has been a bit different. If I wanted to use a word to describe how we have treated the Kurds, I would not rule out betrayal. Henry Kissinger used them to pressure Iraq in the seventies and dropped them when he had struck the deal he wanted. Now we are friends again with the Kurds and they are building a modern state with a market economy. You only need read the gushing reports from neoconnish reporter Michael Totten, here, here and here. His Middle East Journal articles portray the Kurds admiringly and seem to suggest we plight our troth to them. Of course, Mr. Totten does not paint his picture, warts and all. The Kurds may be closer to modernity than Shia and Sunni, but they still have some bad habits.

The Christian Science Monitor reports on the quaint practice of Female Genital Mutilation. It persists in Michael Totten's ultra advanced Kurdistan. To be fair, many Kurds are facing the problem, but the government can be touchy on the subject, "The [Kurdish] Ministry of Human Rights hauled us in for questioning," says Assi Frooz Aziz, coordinator of WADI's Germian medical team. "They accused us of publicizing the country's secrets." Hey, even we can be rather shy about our blemishes, but the Kurds do need a tad of work on that open government thing."

So there we are, the benevolent hegemon, hunkered down in Iraq having to do what all imperiums have to do eventually, decide whom to betray. It's a no brainer. Stratfor has an article in their free service that tells us just how strong, both militarily and economically, th Turks are in the Middle East. Also, it is not in their character to wet their pants when someone, including us, barks at them.*

So according to Robert Novak, we've done a deal with the Turks. In order to forestall the invasion, we'll cooperate in setting up the Kurdish separatists. Well, I for one am not surprised. We have some good experience in Kurd betrayal. It's been done before and will be done now and will probably be done again. After all, the Turks have options. The Kurds have only us.

Just another mess to clean up.

Hat tip to Justin Raimondo at Takimag.

*I don't remember the book's title. It might have been "This Kind of War," Anyway, it describes an engagement in Korea where the Turks were about to be overrun. The officers threw down their caps and said they would not retreat behind them alive and led their men into the Chinese. They were of course destroyed. I think the book continued with a comment about how the PLA did their best to avoid the Turks after that.

Hot Off The Digital Press-Ron Paul Is The Only Candidate Who Can Win The Election

Don't take it from me. In the immortal words of the late Jean Shepherd, "I don't make the news, I just report it." Well, I'm reporting what someone else is reporting. Stratfor, the intelligence service that a lot of the heavy hitters pay big bucks for has a piece today, Gaming the U.S. Elections where they prove that no Democrat or Republican can win the election. Imagine, Ron Paul is not nominated and we have four years without a president. Ooh, that does send cold, sensual chills all up and down my spine and is probably the only thing that one can contemplate better than Ron Paul winning.

Enough digression. Let's look at the relevant passage.

no sitting senator has won the presidency since Kennedy. The reason is, again, simple. Senators make speeches and vote, all of which are carefully recorded in the Congressional record. Governors live in archival obscurity and don't have to address most issues of burning importance to the nation. Johnson came the closest to being a sitting senator but he too had a gap of four years and an assassination before he ran. After him, former Vice President Nixon, Gov. Carter, Gov. Reagan, Vice President Bush, Gov. Clinton and Gov. Bush all won the presidency. The path is strewn with fallen senators.

That being the case, the Democrats appear poised to commit electoral suicide again, with two northern senators (Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama) in the lead, and the one southern contender, John Edwards, well back in the race. The Republicans, however, are not able to play to their strength. There are no potential candidates in Texas or California to draw on. Texas right now just doesn't have players ready for the national scene. California does, but Arnold Schwarzenegger is constitutionally ineligible by birth. In a normal year, a charismatic Republican governor of California would run against a northern Democratic senator and mop the floor. It's not going to happen this time.
Instead, the Republicans appear to be choosing between a Massachusetts governor, Mitt Romney, and a former mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani. Unless Texan Ron Paul can pull off a miracle, the Republicans appear to be going with their suicide hand just like the Democrats. Even if Fred Thompson gets the nomination, he comes from Tennessee, and while he can hold the South, he will have to do some heavy lifting elsewhere.

The Edwards hypotheses fails as he is really no different from Thompson. They are essentially the same grade phony. If one has a problem, the other has the same.

Thus, unless the Republicans want to commit suicide and leave the nation executiveless for four years, their only choice is Ronnie.

How come only guys with the name Ron can save that hapless party.

Ron Paul is the only real neutralist and the only one who can win.

The mind of the War Blogger

I have before cited the blog Al Fin. His war blog is Abu Al Fin. It is an excursion into a realm of happy talk about our current unpleasantness, the so called war on terror. Mr. Fin had a post called “Iraq in Vivid Complexivision.” This is, I assume, a neologism of his own invention. Now, I tend to think that someone who needs to use an exotic way of expressing themselves is trying to obfuscate. So does the term have any meaning. I'm not sure. He did answer my comment where I did not ask for a definition with his own comment that might give some clue,

“I am sure you can see far enough beyond the one-dimensional media coverage of Iraq to understand that the terms "winning" and "losing" fail to describe the complexity of the engagement in Iraq.

There are an incredible number of interests being promoted and represented in the Iraqi theatre of operations. Yet the media fails utterly to portray the complexity of the conflict(s) there.

My point of view has little to do with "winning" or "losing" in Iraq. I suspect that arabs cannot be reformed from their bloody-mindedness. Even more ominous, is the demographic theory dealing with the "young male bulge" theory of national and international conflict. I suspect that there is an incredible amount of prognostic potency in that theory.

So, think in "complexivision." There is a lot to learn. I'll try to present sides of the issue that the media studiously ignores.”
So boil away all the verbiage above and you get 'it's complex so we have to stay.' Yuh. I thought this a bit meaningless. I just guess I'm an either you won or lost type of guy. Staying because it's complex is just LBJ's hunkering down. Hardly a strategic vision."

Still, I wanted to be fair so I asked him a question,

“I've got a "complexivision" question for you. Is it more important to keep diddlin' in Iraq or to secure our nation's borders?

Also, if the amnesty is passed, will there be any point to Iraq?”
His answer,"

“It would be better not to conflate Iraq with illegal immigration.”

Ah, yes. The event that started us off on all these adventures was perpetrated by pilots who took off from carriers off the coast of NY and DC. No, it was immigration failure that let the perps of 911 in. Now I am happy to blame Bill Clinton for his goofiness in giving away the store, but our current maximum war leader wants everyone in the world to come here, so no help there. You score the easy points first and securing the border and fixing immigration is the first step, not the last. Maybe, Simplivision (a neologism for Occam's Razor) would help our friend.

I also asked him,

“if you have the grand strategic vision that you can express in a word other than complexivision, please go for it.”

His answer,

“Iraq, it is proving very useful for training US marines, soldiers, sailors, and airmen for the expanding world jihad. What you see in Gaza and Lebanon (and Iraq) today, you are certain to see in European cities tomorrow.”

Ah, if you have the border secure, the Jihadis will fight each other because they can't get here. Anyway, if past is prologue, those trained military will have been wasted by the ongoing leadership incompetence, spending years in VA facilities or working for Blackwater. My hope is that they get to enjoy their pensions whole and live easy like the warbloggers. As time goes on, more and more of the new enlistees will be CatIVs and the less intelligent. Using them as cannon fodder will be counterproductive and, as they will be less competent, even closer to murder than the current misuse of our military is now.

And then of course he took refuge in an ad hominem,

“Of course, if you don't think the jihad is worth worrying about, then there is no need to prepare, and Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi may make sense to you. In that case, I cannot be of help to you.”

Actually, I don't think wasting well trained infantry against people whose death solves their salvation problem and lessens their countries unemployment burden is a good idea. Fighting a war that favors the strategy of the enemy is hardly grand strategy at its best. If he believes that, no one can be of help to him. Anyway, he should phrase it now to include Lugar and Warner with Nance and Harry.

He asked me about my military experience. I told him of my inglorious Vietnam Era service. I asked him his. He did not answer the question, but accused me of rambling and closed the comments.

So what do I make of such people. He may have shut off debate because he was bored with me. Fair enough. Still, he had no real answers. He is a smart lad, so to be so willfully wrongheaded takes effort. This so called War on Terror is so obviously a scam in the same manner as the War on Drugs with a lot of privatized profits and socialized costs that to believe in it, an intelligent person has to be getting some benefit or has to torture logic brutally in his own mind.

I have a problem with his skating on the question of his military service. Now is this important? I believe so and eventually, I shall devote a whole post on the chickenhawk thing. If you are going to cheerlead for the overseas adventures, and you have never put yourself at risk, there is a high degree of hypocrisy as was seen in the song and dance of the exposed Jonah Goldberg. If Al is a veteran of active service in the combat arms or blogging after going off duty in in the Sunni Triangle, he has my abject apology. If he is just a cheerleader, well, res ipsa loquitur says it all.

Anyway, my comment that got him started was,

"Yep, we're winning. Winning now. Winning next month, Next year, two years from now. Five years from now. Maybe longer.

Then we shall leave, having accomplished zip."

All the happy talk from the war bloggers won't change that.

Kosovo, Gee is that still around?

Well, yes. Stratfor.com on one of their free intelligence reports* discusses Kosovo and how it is rearing its head, ugly or otherwise. George Bush wants to wrap it up by giving the Former Yugoslav territrory independence. The Serbs are opposed, but who cares about them.

Well, someone does. That someone has nukes, hydrocarbons and a bone to pick. Russia has seen the US meddle in its "near abroad" for awhile now and, according to Stratfor, they have an opportunity to push back. Bismarck may not have thought the Balkans worth a Pomeranian Grenadier, but Merkel and her homies don't think it is worth one cold winter's day. Maybe George is out by himself on this one.

So George, after a few years of tapping the hornets nest, has to worry that maybe the swarm might decide it is time to do some stinging of its own.

Putin does not embody the spirit of Thomas Jefferson. I may not want him for president of my own country, though other than Ron Paul, the current crop of candidates is worthless. I can see how Russians might see him as their best bet.

I recommend Stratfor's article and I also recommend that Vladamir bring his own chef to Kennebunkport.

Kosovo, another interventionist non success.

*The Neutralist Institute has not seen any increase in its current endowment of $0. Therefore, Stratfor's free service is all that can be afforded at this time.

Words of Wisdom and Folly

I am now living in slow mo with almot no energy from a viral infection. Therefore thievery is all I am capable of. The Black Sea has kindly accomodated me. Please read below.

Words of War

"They made a desert and called it peace."
--Tacitus

"Peace is not the absence of war; it is a virtue; a state of mind; a disposition for benevolence; confidence; and justice."
-- Spinoza

"There was never a good war or a bad peace."
--Benjamin Franklin

"I do not mean to exclude altogether the idea of patriotism. I know it exists, and I know it has done much in the present contest. But I will venture to assert, that a great and lasting war can never be supported on this principle alone. It must be aided by a prospect of interest, or some reward."
--George Washington

"To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public."
--Theodore Roosevelt

"Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger. It works the same in any country."
-- Hermann Goering

"The victor will never be asked if he told the truth."
-- Adolf Hitler

"Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play."
-- Joseph Goebbels

"The Central Intelligence Agency owns everyone of any significance in the major media."
-- William Colby, former Director of the CIA

"War is a malignant disease, an idiocy, a prison, and the pain it
causes is beyond telling or meaning; but war was our condition
and our history, the place we had to live in."
--Martha Gelhorn

"War is a catalogue of blunders."
-- Sir Winston Churchill

"Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events."
--Sir Winston Churchill

"Regardless of whether we say so publicly, we will go to war, because Saddam sits at the center of a region with more than 60 percent of all the world's oil reserves."
--Anthony H. Cordesman, Senior Analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies

“I don’t think the neocons really give a shit what happened in Iraq and the aftermath. I don’t think they thought it would be this bad. But they said: Look if it works out, let’s say we get Chalabi in, he’s our boy, great. We don’t and maybe there is some half-ass government out there, maybe a strong man emerges, it fractures, and there’s basically a loose federation and there’s really a Kurdish state. Who cares? There’s some bloodshed and it’s messy. Who cares? I mean, we’ve taken out Saddam. We’ve asserted our strength in the Middle East. We’re changing the dynamic. We’re off the peace process as the centerpiece and we’re not putting pressure on Israel.”
--Retired General Anthony Zinni

"We've got the basic strategy right. . . . Our objective is victory, and that's the road we're walking down. . . . It may not be popular with the public. It doesn't matter, in the sense that we have to continue to do what we think is right, and that's exactly what we're doing. We're not running for office; we're doing what we think is right."
--Vice President Dick Cheney

War is not nice."
--Barbara Bush

"When I take action, I'm not going to fire a 2 million dollar missile at a 10 dollar empty tent and hit a camel in the butt. It's going to be decisive."
-- George W. Bush

Dennis Dale comes out for the Truth

Blogger Dennis Dale has a piece at his Untethered that I wish I had written as it expresses my thoughts better than I could have. Okay, maybe he is not channeling me, but there is nothing he has written in his article Support the Truth that I disagree with.

"Support the troops", with its seductive appeal to the romance of martial heroism, the obsequious and pointless genuflection it compels of all, constricting discourse, is a death spiral. It is the nuclear option of debate, the napalming of one's own position, the burning of the village in order to save it. It would not be deployed if not for the hopeless logical and factual position of those who use it.

People do not propose entering into a war in order to support the brave men and women who fight it (though the appeal to glory is always implied); but they can always be counted on to insist on continuing a war, no matter how pointless or unjust it is revealed to be, for this very reason.


I could quote and highlight all of the article, but it is his. Go and read it. Read it to the end.

It's time to become conscientious objectors refusing the call of "support the troops." No one is "against the troops"; this phrase is a content-less redundancy, obscuring more than revealing. It's time for a discharge. Call it a reduction in forces. These words have lost all meaning, one more casualty of our new culture of war. They have been left on the front lines of a meaningless war, sacrificed for the goals of the corrupt and cowardly, just like their real world counteparts.

Here's one more heresy for you: our greater obligation is to the truth, not the troops. They, and the rest of us, will be just fine if we can only honor this.

The Rhetorician

Okay, so y'all have written off the pres. His sellout of the border has caused Republican talk show creatures to start condemming him to beat the band. Well, I don't sell the man short at all. I admire him. Indeed, he has given me another reason to keep him in high regard.

I was driving home this morning from the not so big city. The radio was playing George Bush's answering of questions. I was vaguely listening when one fellow asked the president in effect, if Osama is so bad in Iraq now, isn't that because we invaded as he was not there before. I'm not too clear, but that is the sense I got.

Now the true answer to that question is, Hell, yeah. George did the only thing he could. He didn't answer the question. His reply, as best I remember it was, "So what you're saying is, the option would have been to let Saddam stay there." He then went on to cite the litany of all the works of evil of the late President.

It was a tour de force of what in another language they call being glich francach caca laca, or, cute as a shithouse rat.

Alright, I grant it is a low sort of cunning, but no matter. He was not talking to the people on the White House lawn or rose garden or wherever. He was talking to the people who hate the guy who asked the question. I am not sure even they are listening anymore, but it was the people he needed to talk to.

It's too bad he can't talk to them about immigration.

Darn that Fred Reed

Hey, I'm supposed to be the Neutralist and Fred Reed goes and writes one of the best neutralist articles ever. Heck, I don't even know if he is actually a neutralist.

Anyway, well worth reading.

Al Fin on war

I enjoy reading the blog Al Fin as I have an interest in science even though I have no real scientific knowledge or ability. Sometimes, though, he goes on to other subjects and there we disagree. Below are a couple of places.

AL FIN I

On May 11, 2007 he quoted approvingly from another blog,

The U.S. military currently possesses command of the global commons. Command of the commons is analogous to command of the sea, or in Paul Kennedy’s words, it is analogous to “naval mastery.” The “commons,” in the case of the sea and space, are areas that belong to no one state and that provide access to much of the globe. Airspace does technically belong to the countries below it, but there are few countries that can deny their airspace above 15,000 feet to U.S. warplanes. Command does not mean that other states cannot use the commons in peacetime. Nor does it mean that others cannot acquire military assets that can move through or even exploit them when unhindered by the United States. Command means that the United States gets vastly more military use out of the sea, space, and air than do others; that it can credibly threaten to deny their use to others; and that others would lose a military contest for the commons if they attempted to deny them to the United States. Having lost such a contest, they could not mount another effort for a very long time, and the United States would preserve, restore, and consolidate its hold after such a fight. ...

The United States enjoys the same command of the sea that Britain once did, and it can also move large and heavy forces around the globe. But command of space allows the United States to see across the surface of the world’s landmasses and to gather vast amounts of information. At least on the matter of medium-to-large-scale military developments, the United States can locate and identify military targets with considerable fidelity and communicate this information to offensive forces in a timely fashion. Air power, ashore and afloat, can reach targets deep inland; and with modern precision-guided weaponry, it can often hit and destroy those targets.

He then writes,

"Most people who comment on the state of the world lack even a basic understanding of the firmer layers of reality beneath the media facade."

Yeah, so what. The last part of the last paragraph tells us


“At least on the matter of medium-to-large-scale military developments, the United States can locate and identify military targets with considerable fidelity and communicate this information to offensive forces in a timely fashion. Air power, ashore and afloat, can reach targets deep inland; and with modern precision-guided weaponry, it can often hit and destroy those targets.”

Well, the rest of the world knows that and there are precious few who are interested in taking us on in that realm. That does not mean no one wishes to take us on. A heck of a lot do. They are just more subtle about it. Those planes and ships don't do us much good against the suicide bombers. Anyway, the great beneficiaries of our world service are the Chinese*, who get to safely send all the exports to us and the oil producers who can ship non Texas Texas Tea here without fear of any piratical mishaps. What are we sending out of the country. The jobs don't travel by tanker.

Some may argue that this trade is win win. I am a free trader, but I think there is an analogy with the US auto industry here. The car makers made deals with the workers that insured future costs would be a drag in competing with foreign competition. As we are the only nation seriously paying for the security of the commons, this is a competitive cost we impose on ourselves that leaves us at a disadvantage. Of course there are many other ways we shoot ourselves in the foot. Will our excessive spending across the board lead us to disaster. That is for another day and for the black magicians of the occult craft of economics to discuss.
*I believe Al is on firmer ground as regards China here.

AL FIN II

In the second Al Fin post he presents a youtube video of Uncle Jimbo. Uncle Jimbo is presenting a rant wherein he explains the difference between a peacetime army and the army in time of war. Now, I know I disagree with Uncle Jimbo on the war. I do feel some sympathy with the lad, though. He lives in Madison, Wisconsin and gets to hang out in a la la land. I know what that is like as I get to spend a good deal of time in the Five Colleges area in the Connecticut River Valley of Western Massachusetts. I believe our adventure in Iraq is stupid. Still, spend enough time in a university town and even though one can't justify the war, you would almost want to support it in the same way that the moralizing about smoking makes me want to take up cigarettes so I can blow smoke in someones face. Of course, he continues to live there, so he must in some way enjoy it.



UJ's little talk is not bad. It reminds me of de Tocqueville's commentary, Causes Which Render Democratic Armies Weaker than Other Armies at the Outset of a Campaign and More Formidable in Protracted Warfare. He is right, the less adept are replaced by those more competent. People move up to where they belong.

Where he is wrong is that de Tocqueville wrote about how, when the peacetime army goes to war, it is at a disadvantage with all the time servers. As the battle rages and the homeland is threatened and other avenues of advancement in the nation are cut off, the military becomes the only outlet for ambitious people to rise. This is not happening here. The bright lad will not forego the position at the hedge fund to serve in Iraq. Yes, we have good men fighting, but one must doubt that there are going to be a lot more gushing out of the pipeline. In fact, we have even increased the number of cat IVs* we are enlisting.

If anything, time in this respect is on the side of the enemy. Poor, uneducated and with few prospects, there is no dearth of lads who do not see a glorious death as that horrible compared to their current meager existence. Amongst that pool of recruits, there are probably many who are officer material and will rise in their society in the way de Tocqueville outlines for a democratic army facing a foe with the potential to dominate its homeland. These unlucky ones will miss out on Jihadi suicide and will have to make do with all the mundane aspects of gathering intelligence, planning strategy and keeping up the level of mayhem. With us there, they have no reason to ever give up.

All wars are different and doing too much Vietnam analogizing is probably unhelpful. Still, if these guys think that a twenty year field exercise in a desert country is going to be in any way a victory, then they have no right to call anyone else a moonbat. That is simply the truth.

*Low scorers on the qualification exam.

UPDATE-How the boys got to New Jersey

It appears the Jersey Jihadis, or, if you would, the Jerseyhadis did not all come through the airport. Three of them came across the Mexican border.

I know my president, hearing this has ordered the building of the fence post haste.

I thought this wasn't supposed to happen

By now, almost all the arguments for the Iraq adventure have turned to dust. WMD, never were. Democracy, yeah, that's going to happen. One that is still in play is the we are fighting them there so we don't have to fight them here schtick.

Except it is kind of gone now. The Jersey Boys destroyed that. Actually, they are not really from Jersey, but they reside there now. These fellows never understood that according to the rules of the game, they were required to attack us in Iraq. If they attended New Jersey schools, then the heavens cry out for reform. Or, maybe they are just kinda garden variety dumb. What is it that people feel the need to video themselves.

Except for that little Faux Pas, they did seem on their way to producing some mayhem. Now, for there to be any truth to the we must fight them there so we don't have to here, then Fort Dix has to be defined as part of Iraq. Here, I am on fairly solid ground in disagreeing. Fort Dix is my alma mater. I spent eight happy weeks there. Well, I spent eight weeks there preparing to fight all the battles of the Viet Nam war that took place in the continental US.* Not once did I see a sign, either in English or Arabic, stating that the facility was the property of the Iraqi govenment.

So I am guessing that a reasonably intelligent person would say, if you don't want Jihadis here, you don't let people from Jihadi breeding areas into the country. These lads did not come ashore as frogmen. They probably landed at an airport, went through immigration after some documents were presented and disappeared. Obviously, your government does not really care.

So there is no reason to think our troops are going to do any good over there. Come home boys.

*I was particularly stalwart in the campaign against boredom.

Guest Post, Another Reason Why Our Foreign Adventures Do Not Deliver What We Hope For

The Black Sea left a comment on my other blog that he was kind enough to give me permission to post here.

In large part, our military (and policy) failures stem from two sources.

Number one: The American people really don't possess the necessary zeal for full-scale imperialism. Yes, yes, we're willing to turn a blind eye to our leaders interventions abroad (so long as we or our children don't have to paqrticipate directly), but we're made a bit queasy by such activities, and we'd rather not know the details of what's actually involved. Ours isn't the sort of poulation that will, with enthusiasm, engage in sustained imperial adventures. We're perfectly comfortable with idea of Walmart spreading globally, but that's capitalsim, not military conquest. Resistance groups say that, with enough time and bloodshed, we'll leave; and they're right. We soon wonder what the point is, we don't have long attention spans anyway, and since we soon forget our own blunders, we assume everyone else will as well.

Number two: Our leaders insist on using military force for purposes which military force cannot achieve, i.e. altering the politcal and social structures of other peoples. Military forces can kill people; they can depose foreign governments, as was demonstrated with great speed in Iraq. They cannot persuade people to accept a political system which is inimical, or simply foreign, to their interests. This folly is compounded by the fact of America's alleged fondness for representative government. We then recoil, more in confusion than in horror, at what representation in other parts of the world produces.

We've no reason to believe that Muqtada Al Sadr (sp?) isn't a genuinely popular politcal figure with a widespread base of support. His miltias my be actively involved in kidnapping, torture, and extortion, but who is to say that this tarnishes his domestic image.

In short, we keep trying to use a chainsaw to conduct brain surgery. It's not going to work.

Another Country to Adopt

Michael J. Totten’s Middle East Journal is a very good read from a man who is on the ground, actually visiting the places he blogs on. He has an article on his blog about the Iraqi Kurds and the government and army they have set up.

It is an informative piece. The Kurds have set up an effective nation in all but name. They have suffered since forever and if ever a people deserve to have a secure and peaceful homeland, it is the Kurds.

Totten is informative and brave. What is never answered by him, is why is Kurdistan our problem? In his piece he is told by Kurds, they want to be our friends. That is all well and good. If any American is stuck in Iraq, he would be a fool to want to be anywhere else but Kurdistan.

As an article it is good propaganda, unless you ask the question why a US- Kurd alliance. We don’t need one more set of dependents.

The Kurds produced the most sagacious Muslim commander ever, Saladin. They are an intelligent people. Surely, there are enough of them who remember their last great alliance with the US in the Seventies. Henry Kissinger sold them down the river over the Shah and the Shatt al Arab. The Kurds suffered horribly. It was as shameful an episode in American history as any. If the Kurd’s trust us, they’re nuts.

I hope the Kurds remember Lord Palmerston's axiom: nations have no permanent allies, only permanent interests. Heck, I hope we learn it. Our country’s welfare, not the Kurd’s or any other country’s is our interest and it is best served by Neutralism.

The Kurd’s fighting force is impressive, but without an airforce or a very effective air defense system, they’ve got a big problem.

Jihad ain't what it used to be.

I am glad the Brits got home safely. It was all theater and the Iranians got the Tonys as far as I'm concerned. We don't have TV so other than a few breathless spots on radio, all I know is what I've gotten from the net. I promise that will never stop me from shooting from the hip.

One interesting article from Spiked Online. It seems media outlets in our mummy country were reporting wild Persian mobs calling for blood. The mob turned out to be eleven orderly lads outside the foreign ministry in Teheran.

I did see a picture of angry people calling for something on the Drudge site. What they were calling for, I can't say as it was a still photo. I guess they were Iranian because the caption said so. Just looking at that photo, I could tell that crowd was on something. My guess is Geritol. Maybe they have multiple dependencies and are popping Centrum Silver as well. Clearly the Iranian Revolution as a popular force is spent.

There may be only one thing and one man that can unite that country. A bombing campaign by George Bush. Maybe that is why the mullahs have not backed down. No matter what we threaten they seem to be defiantly yelling back at us, "Yeah, you and what army?" Maybe they think our land forces are so thin now that they can deal with an invasion. I don't think they are fearing a bombing campaign. Surely they have dispersed what needs to be dispersed by now. A lot of bombs constantly falling for a few weeks or months on what? Watever old armament they possess is probably more valuable to a scrap metal dealer than on a battlefield. No, the stuff they need to keep is the stuff that could turn Iran into one big Sunni triangle, except they are Shia.

Clark Stooksbury says it best, "Once you get past aircraft carriers, B-52 bombers and Cruise Missiles, our power is rather ordinary and we have racked up numerous failures to prove it."

Be All That You Can Be

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.

Kipling, The Young British Soldier


The Neutralist is going out on a limb and speculating that Faye Turney's recruiter never recited Kipling's verse as the proper attitude of the British serviceman or woman facing capture. We speculate the subject of capture never came up at all. Now as Yanks, it is possible that we have the Queen's forces all wrong and the selling point is the danger. Thirty years or so ago, it was different, but some got the wrong impression.


Colonel Come in, what do you want?

Private Watkins enters and salutes.

Watkins I'd like to leave the army please, sir.

Colonel Good heavens man, why?

Watkins It's dangerous.

Colonel What?

Watkins There are people with guns out there, sir.

Colonel What?

Watkins Real guns, sir. Not toy ones, sir. Proper ones, sir. They've all got 'em. All of 'em, sir. And some of 'em have got tanks.

Colonel Watkins, they are on our side.

Watkins And grenades, sir. And machine guns, sir. So I'd like to leave, sir, before I get killed, please.

Colonel Watkins, you've only been in the army a day.

Watkins I know sir but people get killed, properly dead, sir, no barley cross fingers, sir. A bloke was telling me, if you're in the army and there's a war you have to go and fight.

Colonel That's true.

Watkins Well I mean, blimey, I mean if it was a big war somebody could be hurt.

Colonel Watkins why did you join the army?

Watkins For the water-skiing and for the travel, sir. And not for the killing, sir. I asked them to put it on my form, sir - no killing.
From Monty Python


Watkins just did not get it. How kind of his colonel to set him straight that death might occur. Now, no war stories here, but thirty five years ago in the US Army, I would not have seen the colonel. I would have been lucky to see the first sergeant who would have been happy to explain that someone might be killed and by the way, that latrine might need some attention. I have left out some of the nouns and adjectives that he would have flavored the discourse with.

Of course that was all a long time ago and the marine recruiter,who spoke to my high school graduating class in assembly did apprise us of the opportunities, “We lost twenty five men on a hill last night and we need some recruits to replace 'em.”. It was a brave show and we all laughed. I doubt any recruiter is doing that these days, if they even get into a school.

It appears the Brit captives faced overwhelming force and resistance would have been suicidal. You might think that the captured British personnel would have defiantly given only name, rank, serial number and date of birth. I don't know if any did but Faye Turney spoke on TV

“Obviously we trespassed into their waters,” British sailor Faye Turney said on the video broadcast by Al-Alam, an Arabic-language, Iranian state-run television station that is carried across the Middle East.
“They were very friendly and very hospitable, very thoughtful, nice people. They explained to us why we’ve been arrested, there was no harm, no aggression,” she said.
Turney, 26, was shown eating with sailors and marines. At another point, she was seen sitting in a room with a floral curtains, smoking a cigarette.
“My name is leading sailman Faye Turney. I come from England. I have served in Foxtrot 99. I’ve been in the navy for nine years,”

Now, Sailman Turney I am sure faced duress and may have made statements to mitigate treatment of the other crew members captured with her. Had you or I been there and faced mistreatment I suspect sooner or later we would give in.

This is a problem for us and our Anglo allies (probably soon enough to be our non allies). It looks like it will be more so as time goes on if we wish to fight more of these little foreign adventures. Somehow, a “mum”* writing to her babies won't do much for a government's polling numbers.

The US.Army uses a computer game to recruit. All high tech and antiseptic. My son is a nerd and I went with him to Wired's Next Fest at the Javits Center in Manhattan. We were a bit disappointed as it was mostly just gadgets, but the display by the Army's Natick lab was instructive. They were demonstrating the completely connected soldier. I asked the guy in charge the purpose. His reply was that if someone needed to takeover command it could be approved at higher headquarters and they could keep tabs on the battlefield. Yup, those of you who were worried that there was an impending shortage of bureacracy in your nation's forces, be at ease. Centralize upward. Scene a few years from now: “President Pelosi, Spec 4 Lars Vijayswarti here. Colonel McSanchez was just killed along with everyone else in the Officers' Club Humvee and I am taking command. Over.” “Spec 4 whoever you are, President Pelosi here. Keep me informed and when you surrender, please observe protocol. You will be liable for any breach of courtesy to your captors. Over”

The Japanese were harsh on their own men in their fight to the death cause your dead if you are captured policy. I don't think it is preferable to honorable internment as a POW, but it beats being part of the Oprah show that went on in Iran.

Thanks to President Ahmadinejad the captives are going home. It was a bright move on his part, reminiscent of Paul Kruger's letting go of Jameson's buffoons. I suspect the Persians knew what they were doing. Brownie points on the world stage and they would not have to put up with whining self absorbed, entitled westerners.

* Text of purported letter from captured British Faye Turney to her family, including husband Adam and daughter Molly:
"We were out in the boats when we were arrested by Iranian forces as we had apparently gone into Iranian waters." "I wish we hadn't because then I would be home with you all right now." "I'm so sorry we did because I know we wouldn't be here now if we hadn't. I want you all to know that I am well and safe." "I am being well looked after, I am fed three meals a day and I'm in constant supply of fluids." "The people are friendly and hospitable, very compassionate and warm." "I have written a letter to the Iranian people to apologize for us entering into their waters." "Please don't worry about me. I'm staying strong. Hopefully it won't be long till I'm home to get ready for Molly's birthday party and with a present from the Iranian people." "Look after everyone for me, especially Adam and Molly, I love you all more than you will ever know."

Not wanting to be overly tough on Faye, but is that why you spend a lot of time on a ship on the other side of the world when you love them more than they will ever know. Not wanting to sound sexist, well not caring all that much if I do, but she does not look like the type one would say, “Yer mother wears combat boot,” about. There was a reason why armies had men with tough guy personnae. Oh well, at least she had her constant supply of fluids.

Another reason for neutralism

Contrary to increasingly popular opinion, our war in Iraq has been an unqualified success. If you have been an executive or investor in any of the corporations contracting with the American government, you have probably done well. whether you have done good or not is another story, but no matter. After all, if the bottom line is ok, so are you.

Things are only going to get better,

And something interesting: "On August 5, 2004, the White House created the Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization, headed by former US Ambassador to Ukraine Carlos Pascual. Its mandate is to draw up elaborate ‘post-conflict’ plans for up to twenty-five countries that are not, as of yet, in conflict. According to Pascual, it will also be able to coordinate three full-scale reconstruction operations in different countries ‘at the same time,’ each lasting ‘five to seven years.’" Here we get a glimpse of the real reasons or forces behind the Bush administration’s preemptive wars. "A government devoted to perpetual pre-emptive deconstruction now has a standing office of perpetual pre-emptive reconstruction. Contractors drew "reconstruction" plans in close collaboration with various government agencies and how, at times, contracts were actually pre-approved and paper work completed long before an actual military strike: "In close cooperation with the National Intelligence Council, Pascual's office keeps ‘high risk’ countries on a ‘watch list’ and assembles rapid-response teams ready to engage in prewar planning and to ‘mobilize and deploy quickly’ after a conflict has gone down. The teams are made up of private companies, nongovernmental organizations and members of think tanks—some, Pascual told an audience at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in October, will have ‘pre-completed’ contracts to rebuild countries that are not yet broken. Doing this paperwork in advance could ‘cut off three to six months in your response time

I found this article at The Secret Diary of an Israeli Water Engineer blog.

"Quintilius Varus, give me back my legions"

This was originally published September, 2002. There were rumblings of the we need a draft and I think my original idea was to set forth some reasons why that was not on. As I am probably in need of some medication, but would forget to take it even if prescribed, things started to ramble.

I was wrong on the course that the occupation has taken. I thought the resistance would not arise for long while. After all we are dealing with a people who have a proverb that goes, "You must kiss the hand you cannot bite." I thought they would suck us dry while taking our measure before they started shooting at our troops.}

"Quintilius Varus, give me back my legions"

I think I was about eight years old when I first read those lines. Not at all a precocious child, I'd heard some older family members talk about the Roman Empire and went to the local branch library to ask if there was something I could read. The two lovely women who ran the place always got excited if a kid showed some interest in books. Though they did not have a budding scholar on their hands, they did find me a book that began with Aeneas and ended with Odovacer.

The Roman defeat and loss of three legions at the Teutoburger Wald in A.D. 9 are the origin of the words of the title. Augustus screamed them as he would beat his head against the door posts. It was a disaster for Rome that could not have happened. Heretofore hapless German tribes caught the legions of Rome in a giant ambush on ground unfavorable and annihilated them.

A tribal leader, Arminius, had been watching the Romans for quite awhile. He studied their tactics, he studied their leaders and he was ready when his opportunity came.

So what? There were many military defeats in history. Why is this one so important? After all, Rome herself had suffered much worse and she would continue on for a few hundred years more as a going enterprise.

It was serious because Rome was never able to raise those legions again and this may have implications for us as well. Augustus had been trying to establish a stable frontier in the north. He had made great progress toward the goal under the able generals, his stepsons, Drusus and Tiberius. At Teutoberger Wald, the able generals were not there. Instead, as it was, or seemed, peaceful enough, the region was left in the care of Varus, a political appointee. Military historian J.F.C Fuller called him a "camp attorney." Of course no such animal could ever infest our military.

When Augustus learned of the debacle, he did beat his head against the wall, but he also set to work. To bring Roman forces back to strength, he set to calling up the available men of military age. According to the historian Dio, "when no men of military age showed a willingness to be enrolled, he made them draw lots, depriving of his property and disenfranchising every fifth man of those still under thirty-five and every tenth man amongst those who had passed that age. Finally, as a great many paid no heed to him even then, he put some to death." All this to little avail.

Thus ended the democratic and patriotic army of Rome. In the future, it would be an army of mercenaries. Oh, Roman citizens would still man the legions for a long time, but they would be of the under classes (as they had mostly been since Marius) and of naturalized peoples from many nations. Most who enlist for twenty plus years are thinking more of the reward for service and less duty, honor and country, even if they do have an affection for such sentiments. Or so it has been my observation.

So why implications for us? 911 has given us an outpouring of patriotic fervor not seen in my lifetime. Everyone seems to have a flag in front of their house and a window decal or a "These colors don't run" bumper sticker. However this has not translated in a rush to the colors, understandable in that Admiral Bin Laden did not launch his attack with a carrier fleet and an expeditionary force and did not seize Puerto Rico preparatory to an assault on Little Havana. Still, if President Bush had gone on television the night of the attack and had said, "I am therefore asking Americans of military age to join the armed forces of this country that we might defeat this most grave challenge," does anyone believe that the call would have been answered? Certainly, there would be some small increase in enlistments, but the US Army is sold as an opportunity for self fulfillment. The recruiting ad slogans were, "Be all that you can be," and are now, "An army of one." Of course, "Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" would not sell even if our young people knew what it meant. The smell of battle will not bring an avalanche of recruits.

From the Civil War to World War II, during wartime, we had a democratic army. By that, I mean there was general participation with a lot of enlistments and, other than a few Civil War draft riots, the rest made up with conscription that was not resisted. During a rare moment of lucidity while pretending to be a college student, I remember a professor talking about Helmuth von Moltke. This Prussian general had come to the United States to observe the American Civil War. The lecturer mentioned how von Moltke had observed the railroads in America and went home to invest and make a killing in German trains. Von Moltke also had another observation. He contradicted any idea that the spread of democracy would lead to a more peaceful world. Rather, democracy would lead to mass armies as the whole nation needed to be involved in the war effort and the people propagandized for the national crusade.

Time has dulled my memory, so I do not claim to have the general's thoughts right. I have searched half heartedly to find his writings on the subject and failed. Even so, I think World Wars I and II prove the point sufficiently.

We were able to keep our democratic military through Korea and part of the Vietnam war. As the Vietnam war progressed (or didn't), one portion of the age group subjected to conscription revolted. This seems a bit surprising in that if you were a college student at the time, you were exempt and I knew almost no one who had to serve even after graduation. If you could not find some excuse or physician to ease you out of harm's way, your parents had wasted the tuition. Notice how a lot of today's cheerleaders (Cheney, Bennett, Wolfowitz et al) never went. A mind is a terrible thing to waste.

Nevertheless, as more American youth are co-opted into the maw of the education industry, they seem to feel they are part of an elite even if they are majoring in bowling science at Pepperidge Farm Junior College. They may condescend to "volunteer" in the Freedom Corps* if the stipend is ample, the honor great and the burden light, but military service is something they will avoid like the plague and short of Augustus coming back to execute the recalcitrant, will fight any attempt at a draft.

Alas, it is doubtful that we shall suffer a defeat on the scale of the Teutoburger Wald. It may be possible that a small team of terrorists could place a mine that would be able to sink a navy vessel with significant loss of life, but such an event would take immense skill and even greater luck. What is more likely is that we'll be bled over time. No matter. Our Teutoberger Wald really was the Viet Nam war. Our Varus was the "Camp Attorney" Westmoreland.

Today, only the underclass serves as enlisted men in the combat arms. The implications of this are many. As the section of the population that has received the least of the benefits of our prosperity, they will have the greatest tendency to be mercenary about their service. Any loyalty will be first and foremost to their fellow soldiers who share the same burdens. As time goes on, these feelings can only intensify.

One would also suspect that we would see a deterioration in Reserve and the National Guard reenlistments. You saw all those lads and lassies at the airport or some other facility during what everyone understood was an emergency. Well if we are going to constantly call up units for overseas and other duty, something has to give. It is one thing to have a claim on you for the big event, quite another thing to be subjected to mobilization after mobilization in a force used for international adventure as opposed to national defense.

How all this is to develop over time can only be rank speculation. I assure everyone that had I any confidence in my own abilities as a seer, I would take them to the stock market or Foxwoods and with the results, hire a staff to help my screed appear more polished. Still, I aver my abilities are no worse than the average blogger. So let us go forth.

While the civilian defense establishment gets bolder, the actual military brass will get more timorous. We see this happening already. From Colin Powell being (rightly) appalled by Madeline Albright's remark on what good is it if you can't beat up someone to the generals' reaction to all the DoD staff yelling to get Saddam. One set gets to play chess and the other, twister. The boys with toys are saying they don't have enough and the warmongers are claiming Hussein has just about everything one could want in the way of WMDs and has cleverly hid them under every mattress in Mesopotamia.

I suspect that a squad of PX managers could probably defeat Iraq. According to David Hackworth, whom I heard commenting on a local talk show, we only needed a third of what we sent to Gulf Storm** and I doubt, considering all the problems he has had that Saddam has been able to rebuild his forces such that we need worry. Also, I doubt anyone really wants to stay long in the field in his service. Surely, a heck of a lot of Iraqis are looking forward to our reign. These are a people with a long history of cynicism of big government. Heck, they invented both big government and the cynicism thereof. No doubt they are audibly salivating on how they can manipulate our occupation forces who will be staying a long time if they get there. After all, the only successful "exit strategy" we have ever executed was at the end of the Viet Nam War. Maybe I'm wrong and Iraq will give us a black eye before succumbing and the warmongers will be chastened, though I doubt it.

The Iraq adventure should be popular and everyone should enjoy the spectacle. Adam Smith explained it thus:

"In great empires the people who live in the capital, and in the provinces remote from the scene of action, feel, many of them scarce any inconveniency from the war; but enjoy, at their ease, the amusement of reading in the newspapers the exploits of their own fleets and armies. To them this amusement compensates the small difference between the taxes which they pay on account of the war, and those which they have been accustomed to pay in time of peace. They are commonly dissatisfied with the return of peace, which puts an end to their amusement, and to a thousand visionary hopes of conquest and national glory, from a longer continuance of the war."

In the absence of a draft, it should all be great fun to watch.

Of course over time, it should get expensive, if only for Flyover Nation. Foreign adventure, whether one calls it imperialism, colonialism or benevolent hegemony, always has a constituency. Conquistadors or patroons, some crucial class wants something and has the influence to get it, while the rest of the country gets little but expense. In our case, being a nobody from nowhere, I can't say who exactly is pushing what in what proportion. Still, there are many well connected. There are a number of centers of power that would benefit from our world mission. From oil companies to military contractors to some deputy something who dreams of his own bureaucratic mini empire as well as allies who need a favor. Of course, when the contractors who build Camp Babylon are about to be paid, it is not likely they will request a reduction in their stipend as their part in the War on Terror. In the next several years we can expect to see a lot of profits privatized and costs socialized.

Is there anything that could stop the trend as it is now developing. It does not look so. President Bush said at West Point that we're the good guys and we have the right to get the bad guys anywhere anytime, and, by jingo, we can do it. True, the polls show that people don't think we are winning, but that probably does not translate into a lot of dissent. An occasional scare on US soil can allow the government to justify support for taking the war to the terrorists. No, things should continue on the same way until it collapses naturally.

It matters not what you call it, the old Marxist "correlation of forces" or the alignment of the planets, things should continue to go forward no matter the administration (I remember conservatives moaning that there had been more deployments in the Clinton administration than in......). Could anything stop it? Well yes, say we alienate enough Afghanis such that they go after us as they did the Russians. Say the rebels are successful in Columbia such that only US troops could prop up the regime and we took the bait. If both groups could bleed us enough such that we had to make ever larger commitments of troops, maybe a reassessment would be possible. My guess is that our "best and brightest" are smart enough to devise a strategy of an acceptable level of mayhem such that the bleeding won't be noticeable until the last drop has drained away. Our army will change, our nation will change until Odovacer drags Romulus Augustulus out of the Oval Office.


* Freedom Corps as I vaguely remember it was in the wake of 911 a briefly proposed new children's crusade outfit.

**Of course on the same talk show, Hack hailed the capture of Padilla as a great intel coup even though a former deputy director in State's office of counterterrorism said he "couldn't make a dirty burrito, never mind a dirty bomb."

Message to Republican Congress guys and gals-JUMP SHIP NOW

Okay some of you are not all that vulnerable as you were elected or returned to your senate seat last fall and have a period of time to distance yourself from any mistakes your party makes as the holder of executive office. The mistake that is contemplated could turn out to be the mother of all goofiness.

Reps and senators up at the next general election should be giving this some thought. Also, that not rare species, presidential hopefuls should be thinking about this too.

You do not want to be caught in anyway being associated with the president if there is going to be an Iran adventure. The Persians are not likely to look on this kindly and could possibly close the straits of Hormuz and that might send a barrel of petroleum to $250. Now that is roughly five times the current price. So if five times the barrel price is $250, the equivalent (caution, I am no econoist and am guesstimating) at the pump might be around a tenner.

Now, my Rpublican solon friends, if this comes to pass, let us guess how you will be perceived. I do not think the term "Skunk at a lawn party" is at all too harsh. So it wasn't your idea. Tell that to the voters!

Keep in mind, I do not consider you as any better or worse than the Dems, but they will not be tarred with the same brush. Information from Econbrowser. Hat tip Dennis Mangan.

The Neutralist and WWII

Of all the wars of the 20th Century, only the Second World War saw American territory attacked. If Robert B. Stinnett's Day of Deceit is correct it need not have happened. Stinnett is okay with deception and felt it necessary to foist a lie on the American people. My widowed aunt disagrees.

Anyway, it is the Neutralist policy to view a president who could avoid a war as superior to one who got us into one. Stinnett gains credibility because he is not a Roosevelt hater, but partisan. There may be no absolute proof, but this is certainly evidence that FDR sought war.

If the Third Reich was so evil that defeating it was a moral imperative, there would have been smarter policies from an American standpoint, such as continuing the support of Britain and adding support of the Soviet Union (a question of dubious morality) shy of goading Hitler into war with us. Same with Japan.

Was Hitler the evil that made everything else moral? He was certainly a dark force, but the analogy I would make would be that both Hitler and Stalin were cyanide and everyone else was arsenic.

Gary Brecher states the points better here. The neutralist appropriates this column as our official viewpoint.

So what is it I am not getting here?

Okay, we are going to send 21,500 men to Iraq to..... win the war? Stabilize the situation? That is not going to bring us up to any special number of troops. So what is the point?

Also, we are sending another carrier group and a patriot missle battery. These should not be all that much help in defeating/containing guerillas. Also the theater is to be commanded by an admiral.

I know there is something I am not getting here.

Senator McCain still does not get it

From Antiwar.Com blog:

This morning on CNN Late Edition Wolf Blitzer asked American Enterprise Institute spokeswoman Danielle Pletka about the comparison between Iraq and Vietnam.

Pletka said:

“Senator McCain speaking at the American Enterprise Institute on Friday said This isn’t Vietnam. In Vietnam, when we left, they didn’t follow us. These guys are gonna follow us. We remember what happened when we left Afghanistan. Let’s not forget what the consequences are of leaving Iraq prematurely.”

Could someone please tell the Senator, they can only follow us because our system of immigration and border control is broken. 911 was an immigration policy failure more than anything.

The member from Arizona has been stalwart in not wanting to fix the problem.

New Links

Antiwar. com and the Antiwar.com blog are being added to our links. Antiwar.com is the premier site for anti intervention news in the country.

A New Link

I have decided to link to Michael J Totten's Middle East Journal. I doubt Mr. Toten will be all that excited about this. He was, after all, interviewed by uber warblogger Hugh Hewitt in friendly style.

So why the link. I read Mr. Totten's posts about Beirut and Hezbollah and they buttress the Neutralist's position that our involvement in the labyrinthe that is the Middle East is a ridiculous waste of time.

He appears to be a brave and insane lad doing what he is doing. I wish him great luck and long life.

The Faux Conservative War Policy

Mr. Quin Hillyer over at The American Spectator has written:

"Support President Bush's expected call for a troop "surge" in Iraq. It is impossible to be a true conservative and, at the same time, to accept defeat in a military endeavor in a key strategic area of the world. Forget the arguments about whether we were wise to topple Saddam or not in the first place. (We were right, by the way.) The fact is that we are there now, and if we don't secure the peace, we will have lost, and the loss will have horrific repercussions for stability in the Middle East and for American standing in the world. Every other option on the table (other than a troop surge) is, in effect, a strategy for managing a defeat, rather than for securing a victorious peace. Those other strategies are therefore unacceptable. Utterly unacceptable. And cowardly to boot."

Mr. Hillyer is very good at forgetting and he wants you to be as well. He forgets that the war was not sold to topple Saddam (that is what he wants you to forget the arguments about), but on WMDs. He does want you to remember, we are there now and we have to win or you are no conservative and you are a coward.

So we have to have the surge. The surge, and if it does not work? Well, that he does not address.

The big problem with the article is that Mr. Hillyer has no idea of what a conservative is when it comes to war and foreign policy. The only true conservative policy is the defense of hearth and home. Saddam was Iraq's problem not ours and the WMD scare was a scam. Is Mr. Hillyer so ignorant that he has never heard of the real conservative policy. John Quincy Adams said: "America is the friend of liberty everywhere but the guarantor only of our own."

I am in most things libertarian and when not libertarian, reactionary. In foreign and military affairs, I am conservative. JQA is still my Secretary of State.

I searched for a bio of Quin and found some. It does not say if he has any military experience. I don't know if he is a reservist and will be called up to participate in the surge. If he is not, then he should weigh his words before he throws around "cowardly," as he is all for others putting themselves in danger.

Hat tip to Clark Stooksbury