George Friedman's Analysis

The Neutralist is a bit lazy today, but we think George Friedman of Stratfor has it right and we post his work below.

From http://www.stratfor.com/

Link to article.

The Russo-Georgian War and the Balance of Power
August 12, 2008 | 1508 GMT


By George Friedman
Related Special Topic Pages
• Crisis in South Ossetia
• U.S. Weakness and Russia’s Window of Opportunity
• The Russian Resurgence
• Kosovo, Russia and the West

The Russian invasion of Georgia has not changed the balance of power in Eurasia. It simply announced that the balance of power had already shifted. The United States has been absorbed in its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as potential conflict with Iran and a destabilizing situation in Pakistan. It has no strategic ground forces in reserve and is in no position to intervene on the Russian periphery. This, as we have argued, has opened a window of opportunity for the Russians to reassert their influence in the former Soviet sphere. Moscow did not have to concern itself with the potential response of the United States or Europe; hence, the invasion did not shift the balance of power. The balance of power had already shifted, and it was up to the Russians when to make this public. They did that Aug. 8.

Let’s begin simply by reviewing the last few days.

On the night of Thursday, Aug. 7, forces of the Republic of Georgia drove across the border of South Ossetia, a secessionist region of Georgia that has functioned as an independent entity since the fall of the Soviet Union. The forces drove on to the capital, Tskhinvali, which is close to the border. Georgian forces got bogged down while trying to take the city. In spite of heavy fighting, they never fully secured the city, nor the rest of South Ossetia.

On the morning of Aug. 8, Russian forces entered South Ossetia, using armored and motorized infantry forces along with air power. South Ossetia was informally aligned with Russia, and Russia acted to prevent the region’s absorption by Georgia. Given the speed with which the Russians responded — within hours of the Georgian attack — the Russians were expecting the Georgian attack and were themselves at their jumping-off points. The counterattack was carefully planned and competently executed, and over the next 48 hours, the Russians succeeded in defeating the main Georgian force and forcing a retreat. By Sunday, Aug. 10, the Russians had consolidated their position in South Ossetia.

On Monday, the Russians extended their offensive into Georgia proper, attacking on two axes. One was south from South Ossetia to the Georgian city of Gori. The other drive was from Abkhazia, another secessionist region of Georgia aligned with the Russians. This drive was designed to cut the road between the Georgian capital of Tbilisi and its ports. By this point, the Russians had bombed the military airfields at Marneuli and Vaziani and appeared to have disabled radars at the international airport in Tbilisi. These moves brought Russian forces to within 40 miles of the Georgian capital, while making outside reinforcement and resupply of Georgian forces extremely difficult should anyone wish to undertake it.
The Mystery Behind the Georgian Invasion

In this simple chronicle, there is something quite mysterious: Why did the Georgians choose to invade South Ossetia on Thursday night? There had been a great deal of shelling by the South Ossetians of Georgian villages for the previous three nights, but while possibly more intense than usual, artillery exchanges were routine. The Georgians might not have fought well, but they committed fairly substantial forces that must have taken at the very least several days to deploy and supply. Georgia’s move was deliberate.

The United States is Georgia’s closest ally. It maintained about 130 military advisers in Georgia, along with civilian advisers, contractors involved in all aspects of the Georgian government and people doing business in Georgia. It is inconceivable that the Americans were unaware of Georgia’s mobilization and intentions. It is also inconceivable that the Americans were unaware that the Russians had deployed substantial forces on the South Ossetian frontier. U.S. technical intelligence, from satellite imagery and signals intelligence to unmanned aerial vehicles, could not miss the fact that thousands of Russian troops were moving to forward positions. The Russians clearly knew the Georgians were ready to move. How could the United States not be aware of the Russians? Indeed, given the posture of Russian troops, how could intelligence analysts have missed the possibility that the Russians had laid a trap, hoping for a Georgian invasion to justify its own counterattack?

It is very difficult to imagine that the Georgians launched their attack against U.S. wishes. The Georgians rely on the United States, and they were in no position to defy it. This leaves two possibilities. The first is a massive breakdown in intelligence, in which the United States either was unaware of the existence of Russian forces, or knew of the Russian forces but — along with the Georgians — miscalculated Russia’s intentions. The second is that the United States, along with other countries, has viewed Russia through the prism of the 1990s, when the Russian military was in shambles and the Russian government was paralyzed. The United States has not seen Russia make a decisive military move beyond its borders since the Afghan war of the 1970s-1980s. The Russians had systematically avoided such moves for years. The United States had assumed that the Russians would not risk the consequences of an invasion.

If this was the case, then it points to the central reality of this situation: The Russians had changed dramatically, along with the balance of power in the region. They welcomed the opportunity to drive home the new reality, which was that they could invade Georgia and the United States and Europe could not respond. As for risk, they did not view the invasion as risky. Militarily, there was no counter. Economically, Russia is an energy exporter doing quite well — indeed, the Europeans need Russian energy even more than the Russians need to sell it to them. Politically, as we shall see, the Americans needed the Russians more than the Russians needed the Americans. Moscow’s calculus was that this was the moment to strike. The Russians had been building up to it for months, as we have discussed, and they struck.
The Western Encirclement of Russia

To understand Russian thinking, we need to look at two events. The first is the Orange Revolution in Ukraine. From the U.S. and European point of view, the Orange Revolution represented a triumph of democracy and Western influence. From the Russian point of view, as Moscow made clear, the Orange Revolution was a CIA-funded intrusion into the internal affairs of Ukraine, designed to draw Ukraine into NATO and add to the encirclement of Russia. U.S. Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton had promised the Russians that NATO would not expand into the former Soviet Union empire.

That promise had already been broken in 1998 by NATO’s expansion to Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic — and again in the 2004 expansion, which absorbed not only the rest of the former Soviet satellites in what is now Central Europe, but also the three Baltic states, which had been components of the Soviet Union.

The Russians had tolerated all that, but the discussion of including Ukraine in NATO represented a fundamental threat to Russia’s national security. It would have rendered Russia indefensible and threatened to destabilize the Russian Federation itself. When the United States went so far as to suggest that Georgia be included as well, bringing NATO deeper into the Caucasus, the Russian conclusion — publicly stated — was that the United States in particular intended to encircle and break Russia.

The second and lesser event was the decision by Europe and the United States to back Kosovo’s separation from Serbia. The Russians were friendly with Serbia, but the deeper issue for Russia was this: The principle of Europe since World War II was that, to prevent conflict, national borders would not be changed. If that principle were violated in Kosovo, other border shifts — including demands by various regions for independence from Russia — might follow. The Russians publicly and privately asked that Kosovo not be given formal independence, but instead continue its informal autonomy, which was the same thing in practical terms. Russia’s requests were ignored.

From the Ukrainian experience, the Russians became convinced that the United States was engaged in a plan of strategic encirclement and strangulation of Russia. From the Kosovo experience, they concluded that the United States and Europe were not prepared to consider Russian wishes even in fairly minor affairs. That was the breaking point. If Russian desires could not be accommodated even in a minor matter like this, then clearly Russia and the West were in conflict. For the Russians, as we said, the question was how to respond. Having declined to respond in Kosovo, the Russians decided to respond where they had all the cards: in South Ossetia.

Moscow had two motives, the lesser of which was as a tit-for-tat over Kosovo. If Kosovo could be declared independent under Western sponsorship, then South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the two breakaway regions of Georgia, could be declared independent under Russian sponsorship. Any objections from the United States and Europe would simply confirm their hypocrisy. This was important for internal Russian political reasons, but the second motive was far more important.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin once said that the fall of the Soviet Union was a geopolitical disaster. This didn’t mean that he wanted to retain the Soviet state; rather, it meant that the disintegration of the Soviet Union had created a situation in which Russian national security was threatened by Western interests. As an example, consider that during the Cold War, St. Petersburg was about 1,200 miles away from a NATO country. Today it is about 60 miles away from Estonia, a NATO member. The disintegration of the Soviet Union had left Russia surrounded by a group of countries hostile to Russian interests in various degrees and heavily influenced by the United States, Europe and, in some cases, China.
Resurrecting the Russian Sphere

Putin did not want to re-establish the Soviet Union, but he did want to re-establish the Russian sphere of influence in the former Soviet Union region. To accomplish that, he had to do two things. First, he had to re-establish the credibility of the Russian army as a fighting force, at least in the context of its region. Second, he had to establish that Western guarantees, including NATO membership, meant nothing in the face of Russian power. He did not want to confront NATO directly, but he did want to confront and defeat a power that was closely aligned with the United States, had U.S. support, aid and advisers and was widely seen as being under American protection. Georgia was the perfect choice.

By invading Georgia as Russia did (competently if not brilliantly), Putin re-established the credibility of the Russian army. But far more importantly, by doing this Putin revealed an open secret: While the United States is tied down in the Middle East, American guarantees have no value. This lesson is not for American consumption. It is something that, from the Russian point of view, the Ukrainians, the Balts and the Central Asians need to digest. Indeed, it is a lesson Putin wants to transmit to Poland and the Czech Republic as well. The United States wants to place ballistic missile defense installations in those countries, and the Russians want them to understand that allowing this to happen increases their risk, not their security.

The Russians knew the United States would denounce their attack. This actually plays into Russian hands. The more vocal senior leaders are, the greater the contrast with their inaction, and the Russians wanted to drive home the idea that American guarantees are empty talk.

The Russians also know something else that is of vital importance: For the United States, the Middle East is far more important than the Caucasus, and Iran is particularly important. The United States wants the Russians to participate in sanctions against Iran. Even more importantly, they do not want the Russians to sell weapons to Iran, particularly the highly effective S-300 air defense system. Georgia is a marginal issue to the United States; Iran is a central issue. The Russians are in a position to pose serious problems for the United States not only in Iran, but also with weapons sales to other countries, like Syria.

Therefore, the United States has a problem — it either must reorient its strategy away from the Middle East and toward the Caucasus, or it has to seriously limit its response to Georgia to avoid a Russian counter in Iran. Even if the United States had an appetite for another war in Georgia at this time, it would have to calculate the Russian response in Iran — and possibly in Afghanistan (even though Moscow’s interests there are currently aligned with those of Washington).

In other words, the Russians have backed the Americans into a corner. The Europeans, who for the most part lack expeditionary militaries and are dependent upon Russian energy exports, have even fewer options. If nothing else happens, the Russians will have demonstrated that they have resumed their role as a regional power. Russia is not a global power by any means, but a significant regional power with lots of nuclear weapons and an economy that isn’t all too shabby at the moment. It has also compelled every state on the Russian periphery to re-evaluate its position relative to Moscow. As for Georgia, the Russians appear ready to demand the resignation of President Mikhail Saakashvili. Militarily, that is their option. That is all they wanted to demonstrate, and they have demonstrated it.

The war in Georgia, therefore, is Russia’s public return to great power status. This is not something that just happened — it has been unfolding ever since Putin took power, and with growing intensity in the past five years. Part of it has to do with the increase of Russian power, but a great deal of it has to do with the fact that the Middle Eastern wars have left the United States off-balance and short on resources. As we have written, this conflict created a window of opportunity. The Russian goal is to use that window to assert a new reality throughout the region while the Americans are tied down elsewhere and dependent on the Russians. The war was far from a surprise; it has been building for months. But the geopolitical foundations of the war have been building since 1992. Russia has been an empire for centuries. The last 15 years or so were not the new reality, but simply an aberration that would be rectified. And now it is being rectified.

Georgia on my mind, and Afghanistan

Via Jim Lobe, I came across the blog of ex intel guy, Pat Lang. In it he has a post about Outpost Margha. A Telegraph article about this lonely spot provides the background for what is endured in a lonely spot.

Thinking about the soldiers' plight is not pleasant. According to the Telegraph,

The soldiers will stay at Margha for about a month, when the next Chinook will arrive to take them back to a forward operating base for two days' break - just enough time to rest, take a shower and do their laundry, before they are sent out to one of the other remote combat outposts for another month of relentless guard duty. The men do 15-month tours in Afghanistan.

I am writing an article I hope to sell about a civil war officer. In researching his war, the hell that was a soldier's life came through. Marching to Shiloh, getting up in the middle of the night to be ready to advance at dawn, marching against massed artillery and rifle fire. Retreating via forced march in any kind of weather. Day's without sleep or rest. At least in that war, once disengaged, there was usually some rest. The outpost life seems a worse fate. I thought as I was reading it the sentence would say "the next Chinook will arrive to take them back to a forward operating base for two weeks' break" instead of "two day's." How do they stand it? I am guessing, better than anyone can expect, but not all that well at the end of the day.

Dr Ira Katz, the head of mental health services for Veterans Affairs - a government department that looks after the welfare of US war veterans - estimated recently that there were about 1,000 suicide attempts a month among war veterans, the highest number since records began.

The situation has got so bad that about 20,000 troops serving in Afghanistan and Iraq have been prescribed antidepressants - 17 per cent of those currently serving in Afghanistan, and 12 per cent of those in Iraq. The drugs help the soldiers cope with the unimaginable stress - for an overstretched military, it helps keep them in the field.

Living with death at your door is bad enough, but it is all a constant irritation. Who knows what drives you over the edge. Per Colonel Lang, "Men living on combat rations for months at a time? Constipation must be a problem."

The Colonel also points out,

Air power is lovely as a source of logistical and fire support, but "Margha" is resupplied by civilian contractors and has one mortar as its available indirect fire support? There is obviously not enough US air power available for either job.

His tactical suggestions make sense, but point up the futility of it all.

Both the foreground ridge in the picture and the one behind it should be covered with pre-registered artillery and mortar fires so that every attack by fire will be answered so rapidly that it will be extremely dangerous to fire from those positions. Dare I think of an aggressive program of ambush patrols on the part of these paratroops? There would have to be a lot more of them. They are now now more or less pent up in their little fort. The Taliban must think they have already died and gone to paradise. This is eerily reminiscent of old British experience in this same area.

A counter-battery mortar radar would be a good idea at "Margha" if they do not already have one. There should be US artillery positioned to support places like this, but in today's army that kind of thinking seems to have gone away.

If we haven't done this by now, it's probably because we can't. The resources are not there.

So what has this to do with Georgia, much the same as Iran. Every time we make the Iran adventure noises, the mullahs say, in effect, "Yeah, you and what army?" Now, Putin is as well. Heck, he may even have said it in the Great Hall to the "leader of the Free World." He could say anything he wanted and Bush would not be wearing his famous you know what eating grin.

The Colonel has another post, Let's make a deal - NATO and Russia in which he suggests,

The Deal: No expansion of NATO on the borders of Russia in return for a commitment on the part of Russia that there will be no further introduction of Russian Republic forces or "volunteers" into former parts of the USSR that are now independent.

That deal was, in essence, made with Gorbachev and we broke it. This is another reason why a neutralist foreign policy is the path. The United States, like any other country cannot be trusted. We have to enshrine a Neutralist Ethos as our way or we shall ruin ourselves.

I recommend the blog, Sic Semper Tyrannis 2008.

He actually said it

Now, I've always thought John McCain a poseur and fraud in his political life. As bad as a charlatan is, at least one does not think such a person necessarily intellectually deficient.

Still, to say something as insane as "Today, We Are All Georgians" gives one pause. No, John, we are not all. I shall never admit to being Stalin's countryman.

From a calculating point of view, this statement makes sense only if all or almost all Americans have become psychotic.

I hope he doesn't believe that stuff. That he would say it is scary enough.

Another Result

The Georgian Foreign Minister, Condoleezza Rice is expected to be replaced by Sergey Lavrov.

I think the Brits call this being knocked for six.

The best laid plans of mice and men, aft gang agley

The Georgian attack on its erring minorities went awry fast. Speed of light fast. The point has been made that the Caucasians would not have considered the gambit without at least a wink, if not a nod from Los Yanquis. One expects that to be true, especially as we consider timing.

So what conclusions can we gather from the events.

1. Russia was ready. They probably had more than an inkling of what was to happen.

2. We look stupid.

Gee that intel reform of a few years ago worked miracles.

Maybe, when the USSR broke up, along with some nukes, we should have bought the men who became the FSB.

This contretemps should give us pause. Unfortunately, if past is prologue, we shall be Bourbon about it, at least in the learning nothing department.

One can only picture the meeting of Putin and W in the great hall.

Spiked's Brendan O'Neill has a good article on the subject. Their are a lot of them, but this one stands out due to its intro,

It is remarkable how quickly other people’s bloody tragedies can be transformed into simple morality tales by Western observers sitting in cushioned, air-conditioned offices.

NATO Responds to Crisis

Dateline March, 2010,

NATO announced that Georgia's application for membership has been approved as the last of that country's troops fled the national territory during the Russian Federation's last offensive.

President McCain*, in typical aggressive poseur mode, vowed to escalate the rhetoric. He has asked Glenn Reynolds to rally like minded bloggers to aim barbs at the Former Soviet Union. He did not rule out the use of terms such as Stalinist.

In other news, Chickenhawk Hall of Famer, Max Boot called for allowing grammar school dropouts to enlist directly as NCOs to make up for the shortfall in petty officers serving in Afghanistan.

*If necessary, substitute Obama here

TheMasterTimekeeper

TheMasterTimekeeper left a comment on a prior post that was long enough to need a post of its own. His comment is first and my reply, after.

For the sake of discussion I'll grant you the term "Neutralist" even if it sounds like R. Douglas Stuart with a new coat of paint.
It seems, in the Finnish example, to require subcontracting one's foreign policy to a behemoth neighbor. In the Swiss example it means becoming, in essence, a free rider. What do you think would have become of the Swiss had Hitler taken Western Europe? If Stalin or any one of the fellows between him and Gorby had sent the motor-rifle divisions West? It's quite clear- the Swiss would, like the Finns, exist at the pleasure of whoever was running Europe. If things came down to a fight, the Swiss would have been reduced to banditry by any patient foe who could gain air superiority and interdict supply lines. Twice Western Europe faced such a foe, and twice the Swiss were spared this fate by American intervention.

The Japanese example you cite is similar in many respects. The Tokugawa regime, having "insulated" Japan from most outsiders, had little industrial or military capability. Thus Japan existed at the sufferance of her contemporaries for many decades.

Finally we come to my point- if the United States adopted similar policies and withdrew our influence from the outside world, we would eventually be in a similar situation; existing at the whim of whatever foreign powers stepped up to take our place.

If avoiding this fate means NATO membership and a military presence abroad, so be it. It's a price I'm already paying and I prefer it to the alternative.
Having said this, I eagerly await a response. I believe you've posted elsewhere that our military capabilities shouldn't extend much further than what is required to protect our borders, but I fail to see how this is compatible with a "Neutralist" foreign policy.

Neutralism has many problems, but I believe they are less than Imperialism. The Marxist term, correlation of forces, means that the moon has to be in the seventh house and Jupiter must align with Mars for the age of Aqarius to occur. Similarly, for the Switzers to fall, someone has to win the whole ball of wax.

I haven't read Buchannan's new book, but long ago, I heard that Churchill's big strategy was too get the US into the war. If the Brits had absolutely no hope of US involvement, they may have done a deal with Dolph. We cannot speculate what that would have led to in history for good or ill, but it would have left Helvetia standing. If the correlation of forces had been that the war had continued, and the Brits had been knocked out and Germany had conquered Russia, maybe Switzerland would have been Finlandized. It could have been that Germany would have been so drained that it could not have said boo.

All in all, Neutralism has served the Cantons well enough. In fact, though I think it is fighting a rear guard action with its own PC, it is not in the maw of the European Union that appears to be instituting a Reich on its own. The Dutch Prime Minister opined that Wilders could publish, but he hoped to find grounds to prosecute. Come back Seyss-Inquart, all is forgiven.

As to Japan, they were not neutralist, the isolationism stemmed from the upper classes not wishing the people being armed. The early Brit imperialism meant having an army in France that was invincible, but Wat Tyler's archers almost overturning everything. The Japanese were defenceless against the outside world, but impervious to revolution. Engaged with the world, they did the Imperialism thing. China was too big a meal and still they took the bait FDR put out and went too far. Imperialism ruined them.

The point is, that even if Neutralism runs chance, Imperialism is a sure loser. Whether it is Athens and the Delian League, or the Soviet Union. Caesar conquering Gaul, led inevitably to Odovacer. Maybe it wasn't a week and a half later, but it was certain.

Our Imperialism is coming a cropper. As Neutralists, we would have more going for us than Switzerland, with our two oceans. If you think bugging the Russkies and Chinese is a brilliant strategy, fine. I would rather let them bug each other, which they might do if we were not in their faces. Maybe there is a way to be engaged in the world and not be imperialists. Unfortunately, sooner or later, you will get neocons.

I think about systems of government. Being a New Englander and former town officer, our direct democracy style of government is enthusiastically supported by, almost no one. It is difficult to get people to come out for the town meeting unless it is about the school budget and then they will mindlessly vote for anything. If you told them they were required to come to the town meeting, they would demand a dictator so they would not have to be bothered. Still I prefer the system we have now.

The point is, there is no philosopher's stone for a system of government, but some work better than others. The founder of a dynasty may bring heaven on earth while his idiot heir can make it hell. I am not a democrat, I prefer to think of myself as republican (small d and r). That is cute, because republicanism gives me enough leeway to say I'm for what works tolerably well constitutionally. So it is with neutralism. There is no magic FP. It has its problems, it is just not the sure loser interventionism is.

I wish I had more the time to give this. Certainly, several paragraphs are in my head. Finland should be addressed. Also, I did a google search for R. Douglas Stuart and found nothing much to look at. When The Neutralist Association attains a lush endowment, I shall assign such tasks to staff more talented than I.

I have treated a neutralist defense policy here. Henri Guisan's biography is an interesting treatment of the Confederation's fancy footwork during the war, but is like Samuel Johnson's comment on the Giant's Causeway, "worth seeing, but not worth going to see."

MasterTimekeeper,

My son is of military age. He could save the fam a lot of money if he went ROTC. I have not supported that for reasons a reader might get from following this blog. It has bothered me a lot. From the link, you can see I believe everyone should be part of national defense, including my family.

What would I say if he wanted to do the Pat Tillman thing. If he said, I want to enlist for duty in Afghanistan, my answer would be, We have no chance of winning, we have no chance of changing that nation for good and our purported reason for going there no longer exists. There is no way our being there helps anything FP wise. Enlisting under those conditions is wrong.

Say it's your son. What do you answer?

Your Tax Dollars At Work

for anyone that still has any vestige of belief that there was any justice in our attack on Iraq and is not wearing a strait jacket or on extreme psychotropic drugs, I ask you to remember the anthrax scare.

My government, like most, purveys a lot of propaganda to convince it's citizenry that whatever policy it wishes to follow is right and good. Some of the propaganda is actually based in reality.

In my life, the anthrax scare is up there for the most transparent foolishness. I remember a local talk show host, Jay Severin 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.

You probably heard something similar.

Anthrax kinda sorta disappeared. It's come back, One guy got a settlement from the Leviathan rather than have the good name of Holy Mother State sullied. Another guy apparently offed himself, but it's a bit murky yet.

Does the anthrax episode make the case for neutralism. I think it helps. It certainly does not help the cause of the activist foreign policy.

Pat Buchanan has a Neutralist Column-Is he channeling?

Honorable Exit From Empire, a July 25, 2008 column from Pat Buchanan is pitch perfect as a neutralist manifesto. It is as if it were the culmination of a public life that started in cold warriorhood and through constant reflection due to his circuitous time in different political wildernesses, came to a clear world view.

The world owes Nixon a debt of gratitude. If Pat had actually been able to salvage that presidency, he might have gone on to all the honors that life as a courtier brings. Instead, he has attained Neutralism.

Why do we think he might have come to enlightenment through channeling us?

Pat finishes with,

Because, if all U.S. troops were brought home from Europe and Korea, 10,000 rice bowls would be broken. They are the rice bowls of politicians, diplomats, generals, journalists and think tanks who would all have to find another line of work.

And that is why the Empire will endure until disaster befalls it, as it did all the others.

Well' isn't that just a more stylistic and succint way of putting what appeared in the neutralist on February 7, 2007,

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.

The Neutralist is glad to accept Pat into our ranks, whether he wants it or not. We award him The Order of Neutralismo, First Class.

Sheldon Richman asks the question not enough of us ask

.....And that is What is Victory.

Regarding whether McCain is a big meanie for saying Obama wants to lose while The Strait Jacket Talker wants to win,

you’ll see barely any examination of the words “win” and “lose.” But that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? Should we win or lose in Iraq? Depends on what we mean.

There is something more important "we" need to think about here, and Sheldon focuses laserlike on "us,"

There’s another word that needs scrutiny: we.

When a country goes to war (more precisely, invades and occupies another country), it sounds as though only one entity is acting. But there are really at least two groups involved: the government and the population it dominates. (Of course, the government and population can each be made up of many people with different and conflicting interests.)

So “we” don’t go to war. A small group of policymakers takes the rest of us to war.

You've seen the blogposts like this one,

We are not "losing" a "war" in Iraq

The guy who wrote this is a biglaw wannabe who won't get near the military to save his life. Still, the tone makes it sound like he just got off patrol and it's all good.

Ah Well.

I've been reading Sheldon occasionally, though he is worth much more than that. So many great columns, so little time. I recommend him highly. His blog is here. We are also linking to The Future of Freedom Foundation, his other home.

New Link and an Award

A website that comments on a local talk show guy rightly took him to task for the stupidity of calling the founding fathers isolationists. Over to the right in the Manifesto you can see we eschew the "I" word.

The abovementioned website links to AZ Place which had a fine post on the subject last January.

Below are a few extrapolations,

According to the neoconservative Republican frontrunners, if you’re not in favor of preemptive military strikes of nations that pose no threat to the United States, you’re an isolationist!

You might disagree with the principle of noninterventionism. But please don’t erroneously call it “isolationism”, else you are engaging in name calling and resorting to twisted pretzel logic tactics.

But that may be the neoconservative bias — they rally for wars they themselves (or their children) do not wish to fight. They weep not at the annihilation of the innocent, and accept the tag of “collateral damage” with a shrug. They care not over constitutional erosion and cheer for unitary executive doctrine that essential crowns the president as king. They excite over banning the IRS and willingly burdening future generations for the war machine machinations indebtedness.


And of course he quotes TJ,

…it is proper you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our Government, and consequently those which ought to shape its Administration. I will compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none…


So today we invest Naum of AZ Place with the Neutralist Article of the Week Award* whether he wants it or not. Good on ye, lad. I assume it's lad. You can refer to your operation as the Award Winning AZ Place.

*even though it appeared months ago.

Everybody Off the Plane, Now!

Over at Defense and the National Interest they note that the no fly list is at a million no flyers. It appears Bill Lind and his crew are not amused. To quote those skeptics,

Your first reaction might be that if the number of terrorists is into seven figures we are truly doomed — it only took 19 plus a support organization of perhaps a few dozen to carry out 9/11.

We say why fight the progression. It is foolish to do things piecemeal. Let's go for it and put everyone in the country on the no fly list. Look at the problems we take care of.

1. The oil crisis is solved.

2. We can finally stop shaking in our boots. A nation on lockdown is a safe nation.

3. It'll probably happen anyway. Better we do it at one fell swoop then taking years.

4. There will be no more problems with the frisky friskers at airports having their passionate desire to do a good job being mistaken for passionate desire.

This list of benefits is surely not exhaustive, but we at The Neutralist have only so much time to spend saving the nation.

Still, if the Department of Fatherland Security, wishes to call on us, we are here for them.

Who needs the Russkies? We can do it to ourselves.

My prior post about not bugging the Russians has caused me to ask a question. Towards the end of the cold war it is said that we increased our defense budget and instituted Star Wars in order to bankrupt the Soviet Union.

So now (referring again to previously cited Fabius Maximus post) we are bugging Les Russes. I hope it is not with the intention of causing them to file the international equivalent of Chapter 11.

If that is the thought, or even if it is not the thought, considering their natural resource situation and our inept treasury and fed, we might ask who is going to bankrupt whom.

Another Take on Why They All Want Nukes

The Skeptical CPA believes the Saudis want Nukes because they live in fear of Iran. In a comment on this blog he said if we don't take the Persians out "We'll see a nuclear armed: Saudi Arabia (SA), Egypt, Jordan and Libya."

The Fabius Maximus post cited previously had an alternative reason why states might think they needed the big one,

In a post-Westphallian world where the prohibitions against preemptive attacks have faded, where Israel and the US both declare preemptive attacks as a routine part of their military strategy, nukes have become the only guarantee of sovereignty.

Years ago I read Thomas Szasz's thoughts on delusion. To you and I, someone claiming to be Napoleon is a nut. To the delusional, the delusion is a solution. A crummy life is overcome by the imperial pretension. A better solution than the delusion of Obama as messiah.

We should see the confrontation from the Mullah's point of view. They are hated by possibly a vast majority. A few bombs on stuff that would take years to turn into a serviceable nuke without the help of someone we are also bugging (e.g. Russia) et voilà, they have unified the nation and solidified their rule and when production is back up $40 gas. Oh, they have also shown the Israelis an unstable rogue state. Not a bad bargain from the keep power at all cost standpoint.

Maybe, Saudi Arabia (SA), Egypt, Jordan and Libya (not to mention San Marino, Monaco and the Vatican among others) want 'em because they don't trust us.

What do we get from bugging the Russkies?

Trouble, that's about it.

Fabius Maximus points up the situation,

A classic formula for escalating tensions is to provoke rival states, then declare their response to be aggressive.

It was fun playing with Russia during the Yeltsin clown era. Now that Putin has closed the looting and stealing playground, we have discovered they can push back and that of course makes them the bogeyman.

Sorry, they said enough and we are not smart enough to deal with them on the basis of speaking

to the Russian governing elite in the only language to which it has ever responded positively: principled cooperation backed by strength.

Of course, with a neutralist foreign policy, there would be a lot less need to talk in the first place.

Change You Can Believe In

I believe. Yes, I believe that when Barack Obama says he is for change you can believe in, because when he was told to jump your man said how high,

And,

changed his mind on foreign policy.

How can anyone not believe that change.

Anyway, as regarding his followers, anyone who would chant "Yes we can" would just as readily chant "Sieg heil."

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold

So Yeats says in his poem the second coming. The Neutralist has not the power of a critic to analyze the poetry, the line we quote in the title may have some validity in the event of an Iranian crisis. It is a useful turn of a phrase.

Today on the news, I heard that the Persians have stated they will not change their nuclear program. Now here we are shouting and shouting to them to stop or , or well we're gonna do something.

And we do have the capacity to do something. We can do a lot. Yet they still do not alter their path.

Israel screams it may do something. They too can do something and the Iranian government does the equivalent of a yawn.

Maybe the people who are cheerleading should give it thought.

The above is a digression from the purpose of referencing the poem. If we or the Israelis engage Iran and it does not go well, the ramifications will be vast. The news reports we are all altering our behavior due to high oil prices. It is tight, but most of us can do some workarounds whether it''s carpooling or trading in a Hummer for a Yaris.

Well, what would be the result if the Mullahs get attacked and have a plan and it impedes if not actually interdicts the Straits of Hormuz? At least temporarily the price per barrel will hit astronomical levels. That may be enough to make the words of Yeats' poem real.

In a Parapundit post Randall Parker quotes a Marketwatch article about a happy little prediction

IN 2004, ARJUN N. MURTI, A TOP ENERGY ANALYST AT GOLDMAN SACHS , published a report predicting "a potentially large upward spike in crude oil, natural gas and refining margins at some point this decade." It was a controversial call, with crude around $40 a barrel at the time. But it was right on the money. Four years later, crude is trading around 139. Murti sees energy in the later stages of a "super spike," in which prices rise to a point where demand drops off. In a note last month, he wrote that "the possibility of $150-to-$200-per-barrel oil seems increasingly likely over the next six to 24 months."

Now, few would doubt the possibility. I would not argue the probability as I am not equipped. In a country that has an inflation problem and yet sends out checks to every working taxpayer, I admit to shock if it did not happen sooner or later.

In my previous post, Maybe He Needs To Be A Tad More Skeptical I react to the Skeptical CPA's idea that Israel should take on Shia Iran as defender of Sunnis. He sees good, The Neutralist sees disaster.

If the mullahs have a plan it would probably have something to do with oil. They have no force that can take us on conventionally and if we do not send in land forces that is there only possible option other than mayhem in Iraq. They don't even have to actually set mines, they just have to say they did to devastate futures markets and getting insurance could become interesting.

I waited in line in 1973 for gas. We had money for it, the supply was the problem. If nobody is at the gas station because $10 is too much per gallon, I would be worried about the center holding.

We can probably get by this to another era of seeming abundance. A gradual runup of oil so that we transfer to electric cars over time would have some pain, but is endurable. If Mr. Murti's prediction is exceeded over the weekend due to a tanker blowing up near the straits, even by accident, all bets are off.

An adventure against Iran will not end well.

WWSNS? (What Would Sam Neil Say?)

I'm not a Tom Clancy fan. As a Mick, I think he goes overboard in making his hero Hibernian, but he also did too much in making the man a tool of the Brits in his anti IRA screed. Still in the movie, The Hunt for Red October, there is a small scene where Sam Neill's character is talking with Sean Connery's. Neill talks about how he is going to travel from state to state in his recreational vehicle. At one point he says, "No papers?" and Connery affirms, "No Papers." I loved that.

That was of course in the old Evil Empire days. Nowadays, we are scared of everything. I saw a post at Squirmelicious detailing the decline in our privacy and the increase in our surveillance.

Kids, we're all going to die. Hate to break it to you. Get out from under the bed and face the day. After all, when you sneak out of the house, you have a greater chance of dying for your country going to the 7-eleven and getting in a car crash than being attacked by Achmed. Got a swimming pool? An undertaker wife told mine that her husband had a lot of business from his affluent clientele's drowning children. Never said international terrorism got one.

Oh, speaking about "The Troubles," they said instituting surveillance cameras in the Six Counties was just to watch "terrorists." Gee, guess what's all over Britland now. I guess your Lumpen Limeys are all terrorists, or so HMG thinks.

I don't think as Squirmelicious does that Obama is the answer as he's flipped the flop on the Mid East. I think the people are the problem. If we did not see a bogeyman at every turn, the powers that be would not run with it.

Maybe He Needs To Be A Tad More Skeptical

I hope the Skeptical CPA is having us on. I read your man everyday and respect his opinion on financial markets, legal and regulatory matters as far as I understand the issues. In a recent blog post, he wrote the following,

Bush should stop fiddling around and give Israel the green light to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities with whatever help it needs. Then Israel can portray itself as the defender of Sunni Islam.


Okay, part of the post are sarcastic. For example, "Aren't you comforted by Bush's "confidence in the King"? Isn't Bush the guy who looked into Putin's soul and liked what he saw?"

Certainly, giving nuclear anything to anyone is not what our foreign policy should be about. The idea that encouraging the Israelis to bomb the Persians is going to solve anything for us is not one of SCPA's best.

If after the bombing the King can keep his bestiary together, he should do well enough. Only on the face of it will Israel get something and we shall have even more dependence on KSA.

Most ideas for war in the new millennium have not panned out. SCPA is a pretty sharp lad, His tongue has to be so far back in his cheek he's choking/joking.

Times Change

When I was a kid, we moved from the working class inner city to the working class burbs. About a mile and a half down the hill was a village center with a movie theater. this was just before the building of big shopping plazas and about ten years before movie multiplexes. It was one screen and when our moms got tired of us in summer, we would be given the small change of admission and allowed a matinee.

That was the fifties and much of it I don’t remember. As there was a feature and a B movie on most bills and there were so many, I am vague. Amongst the boys, there was a lot of horsing around during the lesser films.

I have a distant memory of one B flick that recurs more now. It is of some uniformed men taking another man and placing him on a board and submerging him in water to get him to talk. I remember the victim as looking stolid and laconic and with chiseled features.

Not much else is recalled except that his persecutors were the bad guys and he was a good guy and he was on our side. The implication was that we were fighting against the evil in the world that would do this.

Of course, life is more complex than that. It would be ridiculous to claim our side never did anything untoward. I had an uncle whom my mom implied was a little off after the war. There were two events he might never have gotten over. One was being the only survivor on a transport ship that was sunk. The other was being on patrol and his group came across a Japanese soldier washing his clothes. The men watched him until he was finished. It would have been nothing to capture him alive. One of my uncle’s comrades aimed his gun and shot the man in cold blood. Certainly, there were more instances of such behavior. Still, they were not policy sanctioned by the Roosevelt adminstration. The Neutralist contends if FDR were the great genius he is portrayed, he would have achieved our necessary foreign policy goals while avoiding war. Still, let it be said, our record in the matter of treatment of prisoners was much better than our opponents.

I wish that could be said now. Unfortunately, we have General Taguba's report to deal with.

After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes. The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account.”

Amongst the practices cited,

U.S. personnel tortured and abused detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, using beatings, electrical shocks, sexual humiliation and other cruel practices.

Is it absolutely necessary to torture prisoners to get necessary. If we won WWII without it, I doubt we need it during our faux war on terror. The sexual humilition thingee, well, the deathless prose of Justin Raimondo says it all,

Okay, you’re trying to get a terrorist to talk, to spill the beans about whatever vile terroristic plots he knows about, and it’s easy to imagine beatings and even electrical shocks being utilized to this end—but the key that the torturers were just having a little sick fun with their charges is signaled with all this “sexual humiliation” stuff. I mean, let’s get real—is that hardboiled Al Qaeda type over there really going to break once you break out the dildo, or will waterboarding work just as well?



An American Mom

Stratfor is Channeling The Neutralist

In our last post, On to Persia we noted that the Israelis were telegraphing their possibly intended punch. Now, telegraphing a punch is a theatric practice to let the audience know that you intend to hit the other actor. In real life this is not done. You smack the other guy quickly before he smacks you, or in the case of fans of the movie, Million Dollar Baby, she smacks you.

Well, Mr. George Friedman, impresario of Stratfor has written an article, Mediterranean Flyover: Telegraphing an Israeli Punch? He also noticed the Israeli's are yelling, "This time, I'm gonna do it. No, this time, I really mean it." He comes up with a few alternative scenarios but in the end thinks it's a bluff.

We tend toward this latter theory. Frankly, the Bush administration has been talking about an attack on Iran for years. It is hard for us to see that the situation has changed materially over the past months. But if it has, then either Israel or the United States would have attacked — and not with front-page spreads in The New York Times before the attack was launched. In the end, we tend toward the view that this is psychological warfare for the simple reason that you don’t launch a surprise attack of the kind necessary to take out Iran’s nuclear program with a media blitz beforehand. It just doesn’t work that way.

We hope George and Stratfor are right.

If anyone who reads The Neutralist knows Mr. Friedman, if you run into him, please let him know, we have approved him for official Neutralist Groupie Status (NGS). We don't so honor just anyone. In fact, as evidence of our esteem, we are making it Platinum Neutralist Groupie Status (PNGS)

On to Persia

So oil is up about $11 on Israeli war rumors. What would happen if there were an actual attack? I am no economist. I like to think of myself as curious about my world. Still, I am not interested in finding out if the worst case is true.

Something that causes the strait of Hormuz to possibly close cannot be good for us. Sooner or later, it can't be good for Israel.

The Israeli's should be consulting their historian, Martin Van Creveld. His article, The World Can Live With a Nuclear Iran, in the Forward is worth a read before sending the jets to Persia. Mr. Van Creveld is right. The Islamic Republic is not much militarily and won't be anytime soon. So they make a primitive nuke. How do they deliver it.

So why worry if these guys are not much in our way. Just another, oh what is the word I'm looking for......cakewalk. True no planes will rise to meet us. Any tanks are probably rusty. My guess, and it's only a guess, is that we've talked and talked about this that the Persians are listening and thinking and may have a surprise. If it's mining the straits, well, that's not high tech and is doable.

During the Yom Kippur war, Israel ripped up the middle and across the canal. If you've read Liddell-Hart you know a frontal attack is the most difficult operation and most wasteful of soldiers. The way the Israelis were able to do this was through meticulous intelligence. It may have been one of the greatest military operations in history to overcome the problems of the direct approach and change it to Liddell-Hart's beloved indirect approach. Of course it was completely secret.

Osirak was brilliant and secret as well.

Lebanon, twice were there too many telegraphed punches. As to the looming Iranian adventure, not too much of that loose lips sink ships out there. If the Iranians are not watching and planning, they are the dumbest people ever.

Steve Sailer endorses Neutralism

Steve Sailer has come out for Neutralism at his blog and in an article at Vdare.

He makes the argument for neutralism as well as any neutralist.

Strange as it may seem to readers of the Washington Post, there are countries that essentially have no foreign policy—such as Switzerland, which has espoused strict neutrality for the last two centuries, and Finland, which was forced to delegate its foreign policy to the Soviet Union from 1945-1989—and yet are famously pleasant places to live.

The basics of a sustainable, sensible foreign policy are simple—1) Don't invade anybody; and 2) don't let anybody invade you.

Then, he identifies the groups who are most for entangling us where we don't belong,

The various foreign policy hobbyist factions can be loosely categorized as:
A What Dwight Eisenhower called the military-industrial complex.

B Lobbyists, flacks, and intellectuals on the payroll, directly or indirectly, of foreign interests.

C Ethnic lobbies, such as Cubans, Armenians, and Jews.

D War Enthusiasts. These are guys who should be spending their energies on what successful hypercompetitive men normally do across this great land of ours: bribe star high school football players to sign with Old State U. Yet, because the most influential Enthusiasts typically went to colleges with weak sports programs, such as the Ivy League or the military academies, they instead funnel their enormous competitive urges into playing the Game of Nations as if the United States of America was their alma mater’s team, even when there is very little national interest at stake. Historians may someday attribute much of America's hyperactive 21st Century foreign policy to the lack of first-rate college football teams in New York City and Washington D.C. to soak up the aggressive urges of the rich and influential.

E The Stuff White People Like set, who demonstrate their moral superiority by demanding that something be done about Tibet, Burma, and a handful of other fashionable topics. They somehow know with complete certainty who are the good guys and who are the bad guys in obscure territories on the other side of the globe. Of course, after they succeed in driving out the bad guys and the good guys inevitably begin to act like the bad guys they replaced, the Stuff White People Like people lose interest and move on to the next fad.

The one group he does not identify is 'er Majesty's Government which gamed us into WWI. Of course, over the Twentieth Century and into the New Millenium, it is murky as to who was the gamer and gamee. In this century it appears we are using them a tad more than the other way. What sane government would have followed us into the land of the Kut disaster unless there were a "Special Relationship."

Also, Steve at one point seemed to have a crush on Auntie Maggie. You can still find them together at his old website.

He will never mention us, maybe because he does not know we exist, but still, we can recognize his having attained a certain maturity now that he may have lacked before.

Come Out of That Closet, Fab

In reading Fabius Maximus' post The Myth of Grand Strategy, it is obvious there is nothing grand about our national strategy in the world.

He quotes the late Colonel Boyd (a man who oft appears to be the patron saint of his blog) as defining grand strategy as focusing,

our nation’s actions — political, economic, and military — so as to:
• Increase our solidarity, our internal cohesion.
• Weaken our opponents’ resolve and internal cohesion.
• Strengthen our allies’ relationships to us.
• Attract uncommitted states to our cause.
• End conflicts on favorable terms, without sowing the seeds for future conflicts.

One would not be remiss in thinking that we are not doing all that well on any of the above. Indeed, our great cold war victory might be explained as merely outlasting the dumbest economy that ever existed.

He then goes on to devastate the idea of an ambitious grand strategy. Thomas Barnett's esquire article The Pentagon's New Map gave a view of the hubristic FP,

LET ME TELL YOU why military engagement with Saddam Hussein’s regime in Baghdad is not only necessary and inevitable, but good. When the United States finally goes to war again in the Persian Gulf, it will not constitute a settling of old scores, or just an enforced disarmament of illegal weapons, or a distraction in the war on terror. Our next war in the Gulf will mark a historical tipping point — the moment when Washington takes real ownership of strategic security in the age of globalization.

The only thing that will change that nasty environment {the Middle East} and open the floodgates for change is if some external power steps in and plays Leviathan full-time. … Freedom cannot blossom in the Middle East without security, and security is this country’s most influential public-sector export. By that I do not mean arms exports, but basically the attention paid by our military forces to any region’s potential for mass violence. We are the only nation on earth capable of exporting security in a sustained fashion … Until we begin the systematic, long-term export of security to the Gap, it will increasingly export its pain to the Core in the form of terrorism and other instabilities.

Fab's critique,

The Iraq War demonstrates the folly of Barnett’s ambitious grand strategy. We quickly floundered due to lack of accurate information. Our preconceptions, based on reports from exiles such as Ahmad Chalabi, proved erroneous. Our plans repeatedly proved specious, either unworkable or counterproductive. Our major tools, the State Department and Department of Defense, demonstrated an impressive degree of institutional incompetence.

Res ipsa loquitur.

Even more to the point,

At the end of his Esquire article Barnett lists those nations in the Gap, the “non-integrating” part of the world:

Haiti, Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, former Yugoslavia, Congo, Rwanda/Burundi, Angola, South Africa, Israel-Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Somalia, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, North Korea, Indonesia.

Two Gap nations invaded (but not but not yet “integrated”), and only 16 more to go! Looking forward, he lists candidates for possible future action, the “new/integrating members of Core I worry may be lost in coming years”:

China, Russia, India.

As Carl Sagan would say, there are bil-li-ons and bil-li-ons of people waiting for us to liberate them from their culture.

Mr. Barnett is still in business as a consultant and is paid to make speeches. With Mr. Barnum's estimate of the population of his potential customers, he should be in business awhile. Oh, I know the Neutralist harps on the chickenhawk thingee, but we do not approve of someone who is okay with people dying for their vision and yet have never put themselves in that position. Suffice it to say, from his bio, it seems he has never gotten close to having to learn the joys of low crawling.
Fab then discusses,

Why do Grand Strategies Fail?

General Semantics also sees the world in terms of maps. It is a science of applied epistemology invented in 1933 by Alfred Korzybski. The “ABCs” of General Semantics explain why grand strategies tend to fail, and greater ambition increases the odds of failure.

A. The map is not the territory.

A map is an abstraction drawn from our experience and knowledge. The wider the scope of a grand strategy, the more abstract — the less granular– its map. Which makes it less reliable. Maps like Barnett’s include the world’s religions, political structures, and economies. No single person or small group has the necessary knowledge necessary to do more than a cartoon sketch of our complex and changing world; and even that will be riddled with errors.

B. The map doesn’t cover all the territory.

As Secretary Rumsfeld said so aptly, we face unknown unknowns –significant factors of whose very existence we’re ignorant. These can be like demographics, factors so large and slowly developing that they remain invisible to most of us. Or they might be of a dimension completely unknown to us, like the lead in Rome’s water and wine that robbed them of the IQ margin needed for survival.

C. The map reflects the map maker.

We all have biases, prejudices, and parochial views. These limit our ability to see and think broadly enough to shape a global grand strategy.

Nothing a neutralist would disagree with.

He then gives us a strategy that we shall annotate,

America’s Need for a Humble Grand Strategy

The point of this essay is not to compare our performance with an impossible perfect ideal, but to suggest that humility is appropriate when conceiving a grand strategy. Because, of course, we always have a grand strategy — our collective policy with respect to the external world — either by design or default. Perhaps we should consider building our grand strategy on lower, more solid ground. Consider these four principles as the foundation for our grand strategy.

1. Respect for other peoples, their values and beliefs. We speak of multiculturalism, but often act to impose our “universal values” (aka human rights). First show respect by not being near them.

2. Reluctance to use our power and awareness of our limited wisdom. Amen

3. Defense in preference to offense. Yup

4. Defense is inherently the stronger posture, and more appropriate for a hegemonic state like America. A kinetic and unpredictable hegemon disturbs other States — both friends and foes — exacerbating the natural tendency for other States to ally together against a it. It will get better if we drop the hegemon pose

5. Firmness in response to clear threats. A Neutralist Foreign Policy will cut down on those threats. We are okay with hitting back hard.

Game theory shows “tit for tat” to be the most effective strategy in many games. Our system of international law, going back to the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648, justifies military action only in response to an attack by another state — not preemptively. The Iraq War is another lesson in the wisdom of that policy.

He quotes William S. Lind to finish,

So long as we are on the grand strategic offensive, threatening to impose our ways on every one else through military force, we will be defeated regardless of how many battles we win. Like Germany in both World Wars, we will generate new enemies faster than we can defeat old ones.

I liked his article. I just wish he would follow it to its logical conclusion and use the N (Neutralism) word.

This Guy is Fein By Me

Alan Bock's April 19, 2008 article, Prosecuting No-Threat Stumblebums is worth reading for its examination of the government's policy of encouraging losers to conspire against the US and then arresting them and trumpeting how Holy Mother State then saved the day.

The Neutralist is especially grateful to Mr. Bock for pointing us to Mr. Bruce Fein.

Mr. Bock quotes from Mr. Fein's advice to the next president as published in Slate,

End the ‘war on terror' as a legal paradigm. International terrorists are criminals, not warriors. The next president should see to it that terrorists will be captured, interrogated, prosecuted, and punished according to civilian law. The United States is not at war with international terrorism. The next president should ensure that we do not brandish the weapons of war in lieu of traditional law enforcement against international terrorists.


Mr. Bock complements those "Fein" words with a few of his own,

Haven't we lived in fear of phantom threats long enough?

Of course I could not resist clicking on the link to Mr. Fein's article. His beautiful words sent cold chills up and down the Neutralist's spine.

Withdraw all U.S. troops from foreign countries. The Declaration of Independence explains that the purpose of government is to secure unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The United States was not created to build an empire, to aggrandize government, or to purge the planet of nondemocratic regimes. Accordingly, the next president should announce that we are withdrawing all U.S. troops from foreign countries and that, hereinafter, all the nation's military resources will be devoted to building missile, electronic, and other defenses against potential foreign attacks. The United States lacks the wisdom necessary to spin modern democratic gold from centuries of despotic flax by military force or otherwise. Iraq and Afghanistan are clear proof. Further, the United States has no moral responsibility for the destiny of persons outside its jurisdiction who pay no taxes to support the government and pledge no allegiance to the republic.

He got even better,

Torture should be categorically renounced. President Bush has hedged on whether he would torture suspected al-Qaida detainees in hopes of extracting intelligence. There is no evidence that torture works. The Defense Department and the FBI renounce water-boarding, and intelligence veterans concur that information derived from torture is worthless. Moreover, if the United States tortures, the risk of torture to our own captured soldiers climbs exponentially. The new president should categorically renounce torture. It cannot be justified pragmatically. And no civilized nation stoops to imitate the savagery of its enemies.

Indeed, the whole article is now on our index of required reading.

Mr. Fein is one of the principals of the American Freedom Agenda. He was also with the Justice Department during the Reagan Administration.

Mr. Fein, this is not your lucky day. We have decided to inflict on you the prestigious article of the month award.

Unprecedented Award of Article of the Week for two pieces. To the same writer!

Burkeman1 has scored twice. We therefore have no choice but to award the Article of the Week twice whether he wants it or not.

In Enemies Everywhere, he tells the American right to get over their paranoia. The world is not about to overrun us. In his writing, we don't know if he intended to make the case for neutralism, but he did. After all, if they are not coming to get us, there is no reason for us to be going overseas to get them.

In A Debate Parameter of Lies: Hillary and McCain on Iran. Burkeman writes about a show I've never seen to make a point very well,

In the cartoon show "The Boondocks" there was once an episode in which two "wigger" characters (one a distant parody of George Bush) rob a conveinance store at gun point staffed with an Arab clerk. A security guard stumbles upon the robbery and pulls his gun on the two bandits in the middle of the robbery. The Arab clerk has his hands in the air and is unarmed. The security guard orders the robbers to lay down their guns at which point the two wiggers insist they were being robbed by the Arab and that he has a gun.

The security guard, perplexed looks at the Arab holding up his hands and responds that he doesn't have gun and repeats his demand that they lay down their weapons and surrender. At which point the robbers insist again even more stridently that this "Terrorist looking mutherbleeper" has a gun! The guard- nervous- looks again at the Arab clearly holding up his empty hands and repeats that he sees no gun. The robbers again say the Arab clerk has a gun and tell him to look more closely. The guard, scared, and out gunned and intimidated by the two robbers, hesitates and says "I don't see a gun though!" To which they reply simply, slowly and even more loudly- look again, He has a gun! At which point the guard says "well maybe . . ." The scene goes on like this for a good 5 minutes until finally the worn out nervous guard agrees against his own plain sight that indeed the unarmed hands in the air Arab clerk has a gun and they proceed to all fire upon him.

Perhaps the most devastating allegory I have seen of the runnup to the Iraq war ever put in simple stark terms. A true delight (even if most of the rest of that cartoon series is unwatchable black nationalist twaddle) and a rare example of unambiguous moral clarity on the Iraq war.

I was reminded of that episode upon reading of recent statements of John McCain and Hillary Clinton concerning Iraq. The same pattern is being repeated. A wholly false parameter of "debate" about Iran has been setup that the two fraud sides pretend to debate over when there is actually no factual basis, at all, for their positions. And our "free press" simply allows them to prattle on with zero challenge.

Burkeman1 explains it more, but this is enough for us.

We must warn Burkeman1 that he is on thin ice here. Two articles gets two awards. If he ever does the trifecta we shall be forced to make him a Fellow of the Neutralist Institute.

Actually, The Surge is Working, in a subtle sort of way.

Retired Colonel Douglas MacGregor makes the point that the reason for the Surge was to get Americans to the November elections without talking about Iraq. I agree with most of what the Colonel says. I am not sure about his thesis above, but I don't say he is wrong.

Can't say the dots completely connect, but Gavin at Gavinthink says,

I'm tired of hearing about the war. It has been discussed to death over the last five years, with the Left saying that we shouldn't have done it in the first place, and the Right saying that we HAD to do it (and that either Unforseen Circumstances have made it go poorly, or that the Administration made some "unfortunate" decisions along the way).

Now, I can't say if the surge is causing that attitude, but if Gavin who lives in Amherst, MA (but is not a typical Amherst cool aid drinking type), a town where you can always find a peace vigil whether you want to or not, has a hard time discussing the war, one must suspect the effect would be greater elsewhere.

To his credit, Gavin does still talk about the war.

An interesting interview with the Colonel is here.

We give Col. MacGregor our interview of the week award, even though we are not sure of the date and don't absoulutely agree with everything. Colonel, you will just have to live with the shame of being one of our awardees. Congrats.

Boston Radio Chickenhawk Reports the Surge is Working, again

Michael Graham, Boston Radio Chickenhawk (WTKK 96.9 FM, 9AM to Noon) while listening to General Petraeus tells us that the surge is working. I wasn't listening too closely as the war is always going swimmingly according to him. Maybe it is, but how we can tell from the Petraeus snapshot when he was saying it was going well before the surge which if it was, why the heck was el surgeo needed?

Maybe Mr. Graham might want to read someone else's testimony like the left wing anti military General Odom's testimony.

He could read the words of Anthony Cordesman who formerly served as National Security Assistant to dovish Senator John McCain. (hat tip Parapundit)

Nah, your man has been shilling for the war for a long time and will not stop. Hey, a few more deployments for the stopped loss cannon fodder and enlist the cat IVs and it will work.

Support those troops, Mike, especially the ones who gave money to Ron Paul. Think they might have been making a statement.

As I wrote before,

"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 mongers won't change that.

I Don't Know About Waterboarding, but The Torture of Logic is Happening Apace.

The Israeli Water Guy is an interesting fellow. He has lived in a few places and speaks a number of languages. He has many posts about interesting social and historical subjects. He also should be sent to the Hague for criminal torture of logic.

You see, he thinks the Iraqi war an improvement over sliced bread. Mr. Greg Cochran is more impressed with sliced bread. The IWG responded to Cochran's indictment of the profitability of colonial involment with the words, "From where gcochran got the bizarre idea that wars should be profitable? What is it, a business operation? I am starting to agree with mencius that Prof. Cochran's neurone count has been declining lately."

Ah, well, what would be the point of colonialism but for the gain of the colonialist power? It never happens as Greg made the point, but no intelligent person really believes that spreading civilization silliness. Anyway, a nation that watches reality shows is not in a position to spread civilization.

The whole thing started on the 2blowhards website with a back and forth between Cochran and Mencius Moldbug. Now it is my opinion that Greg did better, not because Mencius is unable to present his position, it is just when you come down to it there is nothing there to defend and he has to do the song and dance like bringing up Egypt. To believe in the war and the lies that led to it leaves you in a, well, I can't think of a charitable way to put it.

Of course, I'm not all that interested in being charitable to your man. After coming out the worst in the fray, he deigns to comment,

Finally, Greg Cochran and I had another altercation about Iraq at 2Blowhards. I really take no pleasure in this sort of thing. Cochran has obviously lost a step or two - it's like beating up an old man.

Nerve he has, class he lacks, unless of course his tongue was in his cheek.

He does mention being 34 yo. Believeing in, letting alone defending fairy tales at that age is sad.

Gen. Odom wins The Neutralist Testimony of the Week Award

Below is the testimony of retired general William E. Odom on Wednesday before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. We bestow on him the uncoveted Testimony of the Week Award for the common sense and clarity of his words.

We have a quibble. Below Gen. Odom states,

The only sensible strategy is to withdraw rapidly but in good order. Only that step can break the paralysis now gripping US strategy in the region.

We fully agree, but then he goes on,

The next step is to choose a new aim, regional stability, not a meaningless victory in Iraq.
Regional stability is devoutly to be wished, but, if he means it as anything less than the prelude to our instituting a complete neutralist foreign policy, then we disagree. Any FP that ties us to the labyrinthe of the mid east, let alone all other areas for other than the period necessary to completely disengage will just lead us back into a never ending one more intervention situation. The temptations are too great.

In high lighting the absurdity of current American foreign policy, the money quote is,

one need only take note of the al Qaeda public diplomacy campaign over the past year or so on internet blogs. They implore the United States to bomb and invade Iran and destroy this apostate Shiite regime.

As an aside, it gives me pause to learn that our vice president and some members of the Senate are aligned with al Qaeda on spreading the war to Iran.

It is surprising this is not in The Onion.

We do wonder if the General is not channeling The Neutralist,

Also disturbing is Turkey’s military incursion to destroy Kurdish PKK groups in the border region. That confronted the US government with a choice: either to support its NATO ally, or to make good on its commitment to Kurdish leaders to insure their security. It chose the former, and that makes it clear to the Kurds that the United States will sacrifice their security to its larger interests in Turkey.

We made the same point in the post, Our Bestest Buddies, The Turks, Or Is It The Kurds? back on Ausgust 2, 2007. Of course, we know the General had the score all along, but we are needy.

Please read his worthwhile words spoken to people who will probably not listen.

TESTIMONY BEFORE THE SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE ON IRAQ

By William E. Odom, LT General, USA, Ret.

2 April 2008

Good morning Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. It is an honor to appear before you again. The last occasion was in January 2007, when the topic was the troop surge. Today you are asking if it has worked. Last year I rejected the claim that it
was a new strategy. Rather, I said, it is a new tactic used to achieve the same old strategic aim, political stability. And I foresaw no serious prospects for success.

I see no reason to change my judgment now. The surge is prolonging instability, not creating the conditions for unity as the president claims.

Last year, General Petraeus wisely declined to promise a military solution to this political problem, saying that he could lower the level of violence, allowing a limited time for the Iraqi leaders to strike a political deal. Violence has been temporarily reduced but today there is credible evidence that the political situation is far more fragmented. And currently we see violence surge in Baghdad and Basra. In fact, it has also remained sporadic and significant in several other parts of Iraq over the past year, notwithstanding the notable drop in Baghdad and Anbar Province.

More disturbing, Prime Minister Maliki has initiated military action and then dragged in US forces to help his own troops destroy his Shiite competitors. This is a political setback, not a political solution. Such is the result of the surge tactic.

No less disturbing has been the steady violence in the Mosul area, and the tensions in Kirkuk between Kurds, Arabs, and Turkomen. A showdown over control of the oil fields there surely awaits us. And the idea that some kind of a federal solution can cut this Gordian knot strikes me as a wild fantasy, wholly out of touch with Kurdish realities.

Also disturbing is Turkey’s military incursion to destroy Kurdish PKK groups in the border region. That confronted the US government with a choice: either to support its NATO ally, or to make good on its commitment to Kurdish leaders to insure their security. It chose the former, and that makes it clear to the Kurds that the United States will sacrifice their security to its larger interests in Turkey.

Turning to the apparent success in Anbar province and a few other Sunni areas, this is not the positive situation it is purported to be. Certainly violence has declined as local Sunni shieks have begun to cooperate with US forces. But the surge tactic cannot be given full credit. The decline started earlier on Sunni initiative. What are their motives? First, anger at al Qaeda operatives and second, their financial plight.

Their break with al Qaeda should give us little comfort. The Sunnis welcomed anyone who would help them kill Americans, including al Qaeda. The concern we hear the president and his aides express about a residual base left for al Qaeda if we withdraw is utter nonsense.

The Sunnis will soon destroy al Qaeda if we leave Iraq. The Kurds do not allow them in their region, and the Shiites, like the Iranians, detest al Qaeda. To understand why, one need only take note of the al Qaeda public diplomacy campaign over the past year or so on internet blogs. They implore the United States to bomb and invade Iran and destroy this apostate Shiite regime.

As an aside, it gives me pause to learn that our vice president and some members of the Senate are aligned with al Qaeda on spreading the war to Iran.

Let me emphasize that our new Sunni friends insist on being paid for their loyalty. I have heard, for example, a rough estimate that the cost in one area of about 100 square kilometers is $250,000 per day. And periodically they threaten to defect unless their fees are increased. You might want to find out the total costs for these deals forecasted for the next several years, because they are not small and they do not promise to end. Remember, we do not own these people. We merely rent them. And they can break the lease at any moment. At the same time, this deal protects them to some degree from the government’s troops and police, hardly a sign of political reconciliation.

Now let us consider the implications of the proliferating deals with the Sunni strongmen. They are far from unified among themselves. Some remain with al Qaeda. Many who break and join our forces are beholden to no one. Thus the decline in violence reflects a dispersion of power to dozens of local strong men who distrust the government and occasionally fight among themselves. Thus the basic military situation is far worse because of the proliferation of armed groups under local military chiefs who follow a proliferating number of political bosses.

This can hardly be called greater military stability, much less progress toward political consolidation, and to call it fragility that needs more time to become success is to ignore its implications. At the same time, Prime Minister Maliki’s military actions in Basra and Baghdad, indicate even wider political and military fragmentation. We are witnessing is more accurately described as the road to the Balkanization of Iraq, that is, political fragmentation. We are being asked by the president to believe that this shift of so much power and finance to so many local chieftains is the road to political centralization. He describes the process as building the state from the bottom up.

I challenge you to press the administration’s witnesses this week to explain this absurdity. Ask them to name a single historical case where power has been aggregated successfully from local strong men to a central government except through bloody violence leading to a single winner, most often a dictator. That is the history of feudal Europe’s transformation to the age of absolute monarchy. It is the story of the American colonization of the west and our Civil War. It took England 800 years to subdue clan rule on what is now the English-Scottish border. And it is the source of violence in Bosnia and Kosovo.

How can our leaders celebrate this diffusion of power as effective state building? More accurately described, it has placed the United States astride several civil wars. And it allows all sides to consolidate, rearm, and refill their financial coffers at the US expense.

To sum up, we face a deteriorating political situation with an over extended army. When the administration’s witnesses appear before you, you should make them clarify how long the army and marines can sustain this band-aid strategy.

The only sensible strategy is to withdraw rapidly but in good order. Only that step can break the paralysis now gripping US strategy in the region. The next step is to choose a new aim, regional stability, not a meaningless victory in Iraq. And progress toward that goal requires revising our policy toward Iran. If the president merely renounced his threat of regime change by force, that could prompt Iran to lessen its support to Taliban groups in Afghanistan. Iran detests the Taliban and supports them only because they will kill more Americans in Afghanistan as retaliation in event of a US attack on Iran. Iran’s policy toward Iraq would also have to change radically as we withdraw. It cannot want instability there. Iraqi Shiites are Arabs, and they know that Persians look down on them. Cooperation between them has its limits.

No quick reconciliation between the US and Iran is likely, but US steps to make Iran feel more secure make it far more conceivable than a policy calculated to increase its insecurity. The president’s policy has reinforced Iran’s determination to acquire nuclear weapons, the very thing he purports to be trying to prevent.

Withdrawal from Iraq does not mean withdrawal from the region. It must include a realignment and reassertion of US forces and diplomacy that give us a better chance to achieve our aim.

A number of reasons are given for not withdrawing soon and completely. I have refuted them repeatedly before but they have more lives than a cat. Let try again me explain why they don’t make sense.

First, it is insisted that we must leave behind military training element with no combat forces to secure them. This makes no sense at all. The idea that US military trainers left alone in Iraq can be safe and effective is flatly rejected by several NCOs and junior officers I have heard describe their personal experiences. Moreover, training foreign forces before they have a consolidated political authority to command their loyalty is a windmill tilt. Finally, Iraq is not short on military skills.

Second, it is insisted that chaos will follow our withdrawal. We heard that argument as the “domino theory” in Vietnam. Even so, the path to political stability will be bloody regardless of whether we withdraw or not. The idea that the United States has a moral responsibility to prevent this ignores that reality. We are certainly to blame for it, but we do not have the physical means to prevent it. American leaders who insist that it is in our power to do so are misleading both the public and themselves if they believe it.

The real moral question is whether to risk the lives of more Americans. Unlike preventing chaos, we have the physical means to stop sending more troops where many will be killed or wounded. That is the moral responsibility to our country which no American leaders seems willing to assume.

Third, nay sayers insist that our withdrawal will create regional instability. This confuses cause with effect. Our forces in Iraq and our threat to change Iran’s regime are making the region unstable. Those who link instability with a US withdrawal have it exactly backwards. Our ostrich strategy of keeping our heads buried in the sands of Iraq has done nothing but advance our enemies’ interest.

I implore you to reject these fallacious excuses for prolonging the commitment of US forces to war in Iraq.

Thanks for this opportunity to testify today.

The Neutralist Policy on Tibet and Eric Margolis Is Awarded "Best Article of the Week" Whether He Wants It Or Not

As Chairman and only member of the Neutralist Association of The US, I deem it policy that I avoid expressing my personal feelings. Still, I do have them. One of them is that personally, at heart, I am a secessionist or at least a decentralist. The more power that accretes to an imperial center, the less well off a nation.

So, I am for Israel out of Palestine and Palestine out of Israel. England out of Ireland and Ireland out of England. France out of Brittany. Russia out of Chechnya and Independence for Lower Slobbovia.

As to our own unpleasantness 1860-1865, I am glad the South is still part of the US, but I can't think of a constitutional reason that secession was illegal. Of course if it can be proven that the men who approved the constitution burned holy cards in their hands as they approved it, then I would concede the point. We Nortenos forget the Hartford Convention or that the Empire State specifically reserved the right of leaving in their ratification.

Having said that, here is the official statement of The Neutralist, It should be the policy of the American Republic never to involve itself in disputes of other political entities as to what constitutes the official territory under government.

Notice the period at the end of that statement. That's it period. We again reiterate Adams that America "goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy" as well as the Irish proverb that only a fool gets involved in the religious wars of churches to which he does not belong.

Having reiterated the policy, we recommend the article by Eric Margolis, HOW TO RESOLVE THE TIBET CRISIS It is quick lesson on how we got to where we are and where are we going. We tend to forget that India is just south of Tibet and may have interests that do not coordinate with China's. The Tibetans are oppressed by China. It could not be otherwise no matter how well intentioned the uninvited guest may be.

His suggestions are wise, but will probably not be heeded. This is sad, but "face" is big in Asia. Heck, it's big here to, we just pretend it isn't.

Our First Ever Presidential Rankings

I am moved to set up our Presidential Rankings after watching Jim Rogers on Youtube suggest closing down the Fed and firing Bernanke.



Mr. Rogers is entertaining, but that is not the real reason for including the video. Dear CNBC, I am available as a commentator. I can put on a fake downmarket Brit accent and sound as stupid as the commentators (their accents aren't fake, but they do sound stupid). Granted, I don't look as good as Maria, but she doesn't look as good as she used to.

But I digress. Rogers is decrying the socialization of the losses. I was wondering if we really do need a fed. I did some imperfect research. According to a goldbug, Howard Katz, the Fed is our third national bank. We have done without a Fed before. Mr. Katz opines that the Fed serves not our interests, but those of a few.

I am not an expert in economics. As a Polish American major at a reserve intelligence school I attended (don't laugh) used to say, "I have all my money in cash." In the next few years, I expect to be getting a W-2 from the blood bank as I shall have to find tuition resources for my kids.

Still, I have some opinions about the Fed. One rationale for its existence was to make sure we did not have those old panics and crashes. How did that work out from 1929 to WWII?

Thus to our ranking. Two prezzies who go up in value are Andrew Jackson and US Grant. Jackson for vetoing the National Bank Charter extension and Grant because he vetoed the Inflation Bill which would have been the 19th Century equivalent of Helicopter Ben throwing money out the window. Grant had the excesses to deal with of a war he did not start but did more than anyone other than Sherman to end.

I specifically put these men above Madison, Polk, Lincoln, McKinley, Wilson, Roosevelt, Truman, Johnson, Bush and Bush. Why? If these lads were so great, they would have been smart enough to figure out how to avoid a war. J&G were at least not warmongers.

In our rankings, avoiding war gets you extra points.

Admiral Fallon Resigns

The adult has left the building.

Is Karl Rove Challenging Douglas Feith for the Title?

In one of his presidential campaigns, Harry Browne said the US had a great offense but no defense. 911 proved that to anyone who had the ability to reason.

Unfortunately, there is no dearth of people who find that a difficult undertaking. Shortly after the Twin Towers went down some pundits opined how now people saw they needed big government. Okay, the leviathan that took oodles of tax money to build up a military and intelligence apparatus that allowed 911 was now to be looked for to save us. So we sent them into Afghanistan to not capture our grand antagonist. Oh, don't worry, Hilary will be there to answer the phone.

Now Karl Rove, mastermind of two not so overwhelming Bush victories and the loss of the House and Senate goes on national television to say

Well, we were not involved in the world before 9/11, and look what happened.

Now, if Mr. Rove believes that we had just a few national guard units hanging out weekends at the armory, he needs Britney Spears dad to be appointed his guardian. I'm guessing he is just being as the Irish phrase has it, glich francach caca laca (I'll clean it up, cute as a outhouse rat).

Then he went on to say,

If we were to give up Iraq with the third largest oil reserves in the world to the control of an Al Qaida regime or to the control of Iran, don't you think $200 a barrel oil would have a cost to the American economy?

Maybe a recession will intervene to moderate prices, but does anyone remember the price of gasoline before we went into Iraq. I don't think our being there has caused it to stabilize.

The producers of Fox News Sunday should make Rove standup when he is on as that is the usual position of a comedy routine.

Hat tips to antiwar blog and Daniel Larison

Let Him Who is Without Sin Cast the First Stink Bomb

After the English Revolution had spent itself and Cromwell had died in his bed, England decided it wanted to be Merrie Old instead of a nation of saints. Charles II was invited home. Chuck 2 wasn't all that jolly about his dad's execution so he went about getting even with the regicides. One guy he could not kill, he dug up and hanged anyway. I doubt Ollie felt too much as he hung on the gibbet, but if it made Chucky Junior feel better then that was okay.

William F. Buckley, Jr. has passed on. There are mostly encomiums even from conservatives who had disagreed with him. They are of the, "I disagreed with him, but he wasn't all that bad," stripe. That is how ladies and gents observe the passing of anyone who at least did not kill Dumbledore. I never knew the man and have nothing to say other than we were not on the same wavelength but good luck in whatever dimension awaits you.

There is a website that I am ambivalent about. I favor immigration control for a number of reasons, partly because 911 was an immigration system failure more than anything else. I am more nuanced in my views on restriction. Still, I have found it interesting to read. The editor, Peter Brimelow, published his eulogy on the passing of Buckley and gave it the title of William F. Buckley, Jr., RIP—Sort Of. That "sort of" business says it all. Reading the article, one almost feels Mr. Brimelow feels bad he can't put the man on the gibbet before the body get too cold.

Undoubtedly, there will be many books out that will praise or pillory WFB. That would be the time to honorably stick the knife in with a review. Heck, I'm sure Mr. Brimelow could write one of those books.

Mr. Brimelow has put his character on display and it is not pretty. As the voice of humility, I've done the same. Mostly in my youth, I never passed up the chance to be less than gentlemanly and I regret it. I hope Mr. Brimelow figures it out.


The man more than anyone else who might have reason to write a mean spirited bit on Buckley's passing didn't to my knowledge. He did write a piece about the man over a year ago that viciously got back at his former boss. Actually, no. He wrote kindly about the man as Buckley started his battle with emphysema. Peter, Joe Sobran has a lesson for you on how to be a gentleman.

William S. Lind and Fools Rush In

William S. Lind's article title Fools Rush In says it alll. Mr. Lind, at the Defense and the National Interest blog, characterizes removing Kosovo from Serbia as a "crime and a blunder." Though the Neutralist yields to no one in disgust at our support of criminal acts we are more upset at blunders.

There is something about Europe and the US that WWI just has to be kept going. When George M. Cohan wrote were Over There and the lines, We won't be back till it's over over there, no one realized that it would never be over there. There must be magnets in the ground of the Balkans that keep attracting us. It's one of histories dumber attractions.

Mr. Lind says the Russkies are not amused and I don't blame them. He says they have the capacity to help the Serbs that they did not during the prior Clinton era unpleasantness. Memories are short in this life. Russia does not have to start a war to have a little fun with us. The two most complete defeats suffered by the superpowers postwar, Viet Nam and Afghanistan, saw neither patron commit ground units. It would not be without irony if we left Afghanistan because Russia started supplying, oh, I don't know, maybe something analogous to a stinger.

I don't think they really love the Taliban, but the Taliban did not invade Russia and never would.

Our forces are overextended. The opportunities for mischief are many.

Of course, there are no dearth of neocons touting the New Cold War. Of course, none of them are rushing to the colors.

Mr. Lind's proposal makes sense if there really were those magnets, but we don't have a real interest in Southeast Europe. We did not have one in 1916 either. It's too hard to say au revoir, let's just bug out. The Balkans were never worth Bismarck's Pomeranian Grenadier, they are not worth a National Guardsman.