Must Reads...

The most interesting reads of the day...

1. Wretchard at the Belmont Club discusses the concept of NetWar... This is a bit of sarcasm:

If technology has undermined the bureaucratic state, then the intellectual heirs of Westphalia, with their visions of supranational institutions will have truly confused the problem for the solution. In the face of increasing attacks by networks of criminals and terrorists, their answer will be bigger, more international bureaucracies. The United Nations will become the smallest unit capable of fighting modern terrorism. And some would call that good.

The Left, fighting swarms of plankton with leviathans...


2. And, to make optimal use of your soft power folks have to show up and be persuaded...

For years the United Nations presented itself as a saintly organization bent on saving the whales when it wasn't preserving world peace. Reality fell somewhat short of this ideal, and the process of disillusionment is always painful to watch. In a way, even those who didn't believe in the fake labels can feel a sense of loss at watching the hope, and then the belief fade from the faces of those who have been suckered. The truth will set you free; but first it will make you miserable.

Where is John Clese when you need him...

Oh, that's right, I saw him writing the lyrics of 'Brave Sir Murtha' on a napkin - while Cindy Sheehan clopped coconuts together to a lively toon...

Winning the War on Terror...

Re(1): 'The Three Conjectures', BelmontClub, Wretchard TC
Re(2): 'Strategic Overview', USS Clueless, Steven den Beste
Re(3): 'Strategic overview: Annotating and updating Den Beste ', TigerHawk, TigerHawk
Re(4): 'Who's on First', BelmontClub, Wretchard TC

I have asked the question regarding Iraq…

What will winning look like?

So, here is the beginning of an answer:

1. First of all we must accept that Iraq is a focal point in the region. The eyes of modern Islam turn to Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Iran for guidance. Prior to 2003 there was an axis of Sunni militancy consisting of Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Syria that fermented terror to expand their variant of Islam on the edge of the proverbial sword. Iran competed aggressively to promote their own variant. Please review a map to see the geographical significance of Iraq. Please note the annual pilgrimages to Najaf as a demonstration of the religious significance of Iraq. Please study your texts on Babylon, Asyria, and the Abbasid Caliphate centered in Baghdad as examples of historical significance.

2. Therefore, to compete in this war of ideas we have to either destroy the culture of militant Islam or promote an alternative idea. In this there is no grey area. The opposition fired the starting gun decades ago, gave us a punch we could not ignore, and goaded us into the field in a manner they thought they could control. A sad mistake on their part.

3. Now a guess… Is there anyone out there that doesn’t think the American government didn’t develop a plan to deal with Islamic Terrorism when/if it hit us hard? These plans were probably initiated under Nixon, goobered up under the Carter foolishness, reinitiated in the Reagan era, structured under Bush I, conflated and conflicted during the brilliant Clinton foreign affairs administration, and were in the process of being regenerated under W.

Therefore:

Maybe, just maybe, these administrations wanted to avoid a massively destructive and culturally caustic Total War. They, and all of us, wanted to resolve this conflict in a way that does not kill hundreds of millions (mostly Arab civilians) and destroy our open society. Thus Iraq…

• We needed to break the Crescent of Terror
• We want to give Iraq the chance to Reform Islam
• And provide a Shining City on the Hill for the rest of the Region

We will know when we are winning, or have won, when Iraq starts pulling other regional entities out of the 7th Century and into the 20th Century. When those entities can no longer bitch and whine about Israel and the Great Satan. When those ‘citizens’ form consensual governments and end their subjugation under regional ‘strong men’. When the regions economies are expanding rather than contracting. When those basic constructs are visible we will know we have moved forward in this conflict.

My contention is that this reformation is occurring now. My contention is that W struck as Churchill would have struck – before the cancer spread to the point where the patient had to be killed and the doctor wounded. To the Left, are you proud of Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Dresden, Stalin’s gulags, and the Iron Curtain? Dithering in the 1930s resulted in invasive surgery in the 1940s. Back then it was the Paleolithic Right, now it is the Conflicted Left. Do you want your generation to be remembered as we remember Charles Lindberg, and Henry Ford, and even grand pappa Bush. I hope not...

Note: Iraq is merely a theater in the Global War on Militant Islam. Winning in Iraq or Afghanistan or Indonesia does not imply total and complete victory. Our goal is, and should remain, Total Victory.

Mawkish Murtha Quits Again...

Did the 'defense hawk' Congressman Murtha promote the inglorious, and with 20/20 hindsight, exceedingly dangerous retreat from Somalia in 1993...

I can hear the 'Brave Sir Robin' songs being scratched onto napkins - preening about the exploits of Mawkish Sir Murtha.

The Left in this country is in trouble when a Monty Python skit comes to mind when they trot out their war heroes and 'defense hawks' in a time of conflict...

Update (2005/11/24 0746):
Another thought. 'Mawkish Sir Murtha' can be sung to the Democrats favorite marshall music - 'Brave Sir Robin' by Monty Python. The video could portray one of our ignorant, uneducated, low skilled, poverty stricken louts that are coerced into our ‘volunteer’ military as the war horse (the chap with the coconut shells).

Visiting and Re-Visiting the Wayback Machine...

Re(1): 'Strategic Overview', USS Clueless, Steven den Beste
Re(2): 'Strategic overview: Annotating and updating Den Beste ', TigerHawk, TigerHawk

The above resources are critical to understanding our times...

There is NO War in France…

Re(1): 'Once in France', The Belmont Club, Wretchard TC
Re(1): 'Do You Hear the People Sing?', The Belmont Club, Wretchard TC

Right Now!!!???

Smart people are using hyperbole to describe the conflict in France.

To the annoyance of both Francophiles and Leftist acolytes of the Fifth Republic, the actions in France at most still seem to be a battle of opportunity for the local disaffected. We do not know if it has been initiated, or is in the process of being assumed, by Islamist forces. It is a misuse of the word ‘war’ to ascribe it as such. Since the Global War on Terror has been ongoing for 20 - 40 years, and since the conflict is truly global, and since Europe has previously been a front in the conflict, we must watch for an opportunistic attempt to make France a Front or a Theater of the War. France is the Sickest Man in Europe - but she is by far not the only ill patient in the region. The problem for France is that the assumption by Islamists can occur quickly - and that the French have dithered in normal Leftist indecisiveness. Islamist forces can now capitalize on the power vacuum opening up in large swaths of France and Europe.

European appeasement in the GWOT may, in fact, lead to the war being fought here (as in Europe) rather than there (as in the Middle East). Europe may come to regret their inability to project force, but she may be saved by a stronger internal police than exists in America. The frightening thing about this rioting is that France's 'Fifth Republic' may fall in something as small as a regional battle. It may not take a theater campaign to collapse the surrender monkeys. That fact is as sad as it is frightening - and it harkens to a point behind Wretchard's point, that France fell to Nazism as well as to the German army.

If France falls, the pecking order will be Spain, then Italy, then Germany. To date, however, we have no proof that militant Islam has the ability to use this uprising. The Anglosphere may have destroyed this capability. Thus, America may once again save French bacon in a war between good and evil.

We shall soon see how organized militant Islam is...

We may soon see how militaristic the West is...

This is what President Bush strove to avoid...