In This Dimension

The Taliban, Pakistan, SWAT and America

A columnist in today’s WSJ writes of the problems and way forward for Pakistan, the SWAT area of which is arguably the penultimate theater in any war on terror that is serious, Saudi Arabia being the logical ultimate theater.

Any war on terror that is serious in the way WW2 was serious - a fight to the death against tyrannical threats to liberty and freedom, which very much is what Islamism vs The West really is - that does not BEGIN with the immediate destruction of Saudi Arabia and its funding of global Islamist terror is not serious.

And, of course, having[…]

Silly Afghanistan Constitutional Discussion

Recently the WSJ published an OpEd about Afghan governance entitled, “The Surge Afghanistan Needs.” The columnist, Ann Marlowe, yammers on and on about strengthening governance and problems with their “disastrous 2004″  Constitution.

This entire constitutional argument is silly, ignorant and naive. 

Our soldiers died - and are dying - to free these people. Our money paid for it. Our constitution is the best in the history of the known universe, our people the most free and equal. There is zero reason these people ought to have been allowed to create their own constitution and governance policies just as they emerged - are[…]

The Religion of Peace in Mumbai

From the WSJ

India Security Faulted as Survivors Tell of Terror
By YAROSLAV TROFIMOV, GEETA ANAND, PETER WONACOTT and MATTHEW ROSENBERG

MUMBAI — As waiters started setting dinner buffets in Mumbai’s luxurious hotels, the killings that would ravage this Indian metropolis began out of sight, in the muddy waters of the Arabian Sea.

In the dusk hours of Wednesday, fisherman Chandrakant Tare was sailing his boat about 100 yards from a fishing trawler when he spotted young men killing a sailor on board. He says he saw them toss the body into the engine room. Assuming he had stumbled upon pirates, Mr. Tare says,[…]

Bush, Saddam, Yellow-cake and the Media

If somehow you actually believed the mulitalteral decision (all G8 countries) that Saddam was, indeed, buying yellowcake uranium to build nukes, you are hereby redeemed as a multilateralist intelligent person un-swayed by a leftist media and illiberal Democrat party.

If, on the other hand, you insisted that the Joe-Wilson-driven, media-demanded unilateral choice (that’d be only America felt that way) not to believe Saddam had yellow-cake - - wrong again!

Not only did Saddam have it, he had tons and tons of it. 550 metric tons, to be exact.

And Bush has known about it for years – since the US Army found it[…]

Voting

Does anyone really want Obama in the White House when this happens again?

Really?

This is what we are voting on. Everything else will take care of itself within our normal system. This is outside of it.

Unintended Consequences

Unintended consequences have interesting historical ramifications.

Had Hitler known America would come in with Britain, would he have set in-motion Operation Sealion, which precipitated the Battle of Britain, which led to the (possibly accidental) bombing of London and the retaliatory bombings of German cities and an entirely new chapter in warfare?

Had Wilson known that sending the AEF to France would result in the flawed Treaty of Versailles, the destruction of the Ottoman Empire (which gave rise to Islamic fundamentalism – ask bin Laden), to hyperinflation in a defeated Germany, German re-armament, World War 2, 50MM deaths, and Soviet expansion into Eastern Europe and[…]

What “international crisis” was Biden referring to?

The Wall Street Journal’s James Taranto today asked readers if they could come up with plausible areas of the “international crisis” to which Sen. Biden referred in his remarks over the weekend. Below is one thought:

 
Based on timing, etc., I’d have to think that the context is Venezuela and a Venezuelan Missile Crisis.

Obviously the Pentagon has been briefing the Senate committees on the Russian activities there. Biden would have that fresh in his mind.

For Putin not to test Obama (certainly not a JFK, who actually distinguished himself in war), would be uncharacteristic. Putin needs to investigate what, if anything, Obama[…]

Fighting the Iranian Navy?

This article in the Atlantic today posits issues in a naval war with Iran. While an interesting article in which Kaplan discusses asymmetrical naval warfare in a rather mundane way (certainly no new insights are provided), the premise is absurd.

The absurdity, however, is not that of the columnist alone. It seems to be of the strategic “thinkers” in our government and military as well.

The absurdity is the idea of sacrificing American soldiers in combat when the goal of the military action – changing the behavior of the enemy (which is the purpose of war) can be achieved without sacrificing a single[…]

Guantanamo Multiculturalism

Here is a very interesting article (”Court Orders Release of Chinese Muslims from Guantanamo”) from today’s Wall Street Journal, interesting for two reasons – at least.

The first reason is the separation-of-powers. The Court has no more right to tell the Executive what to do than the Executive can tell the Court how to decide a particular case.

If The Bush Administration doesn’t like the Court’s argument in releasing Guantanamo prisoners, there is no Constitutional requirement to release them; the Executive and Judicial are co-equal branches of government. (Had Republicans, when in control of Congress, understood the Constitution they always brandish, they would have removed[…]

Listen to a Democratic Iraq

The article linked here notes that Iraq is demanding a date-certain for a pullout of all foreign forces.

The absurdity of the refusal of the Bush administration to accede to this is phenomenal.

America went into Iraq to overthrow a Stalinist dictator and give the country of Iraq back to the people of Iraq.

The participation in several elections, the Anbar Awakening, the reduction in violence, the willingness of Shia and Sunni to get along all in the government, all argue that the goals of the invasion have been reached.

Time to go home.

Set the date.

What’s the problem?

If “conditions on the ground” at the[…]