Category Archives: Military

Sarah Palin talks policy

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Two good interviews for Gov. Palin today, with Matt Lauer this morning and Wolf Blitzer this evening; they did want to talk about David Letterman’s vile behavior as well (Blitzer only briefly, Lauer at greater length), but beyond that she got substantial time to talk about the progress on the Alaskan natural-gas pipeline, the state of American politics, and the political future. Both Lauer and Blitzer did their jobs very well, I think, conducting interviews that were respectful without merely being puffballs, and Gov. Palin did well in answering their questions and making her points.

 

In remembrance

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Today is the 65th anniversary of D-Day; yesterday was the fifth anniversary of the death of Ronald Reagan. Joseph Russo put up a wonderful post on President Reagan, which I encourage you to read; as for remembering D-Day, I don’t think anyone’s ever done a better job of that than the Gipper himself.

Here, in this place where the West held together, let us make a vow to our dead. Let us show them by our actions that we understand what they died for. Let our actions say to them the words for which Matthew Ridgway listened: “I will not fail thee nor forsake thee.”Strengthened by their courage and heartened by their valor and borne by their memory, let us continue to stand for the ideals for which they lived and died.

May it ever be so.

Barack Obama’s priorities

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The Commander-in-Chief of the United States Armed Forces finally saw fit yesterday, two days after the murder of Pvt. William Long and the attempted murder of Pvt. Quinton Ezeagwula, to issue a statement on this attack on two young men who had pledged him their service (HT:  Michelle Malkin):

I am deeply saddened by this senseless act of violence against two brave young soldiers who were doing their part to strengthen our armed forces and keep our country safe. I would like to wish Quinton Ezeagwula a speedy recovery, and to offer my condolences and prayers to William Long’s family as they mourn the loss of their son.

Compare this to Sarah Palin’s statement, issued Tuesday (yes, a sitting governor took this seriously enough to respond more promptly than the President of the United States):

The stories of two very different lives with similar fates crossed through the media’s hands yesterday—both equally important but one lacked the proper attention. The death of 67-year old George Tiller was unacceptable, but equally disgusting was another death that police believe was politically and religiously motivated as well.

William Long died yesterday. The 23-year old Army Recruiter was gunned down by a fanatic; another fellow soldier was wounded in the ambush. The soldiers had just completed their basic training and were talking to potential recruits, just as my son, Track, once did.

Whatever titles we give these murderers, both deserve our attention. Violence like that is no way to solve a political dispute nor a religious one. And the fanatics on all sides do great disservice when they confuse dissention with rage and death.

And then, further, compare this to the statement of our Commander-in-Chief on the murder of George Tiller:

I am shocked and outraged by the murder of Dr. George Tiller as he attended church services this morning. However profound our differences as Americans over difficult issues such as abortion, they cannot be resolved by heinous acts of violence.

What conclusions can be drawn from these comparisons?  I can think of four.

  1. Barack Obama cares more about the murder of abortionists than about the murder of American soldiers.  The former “outrages” him, the latter merely “saddens” him.
  2. Barack Obama is more willing to condemn those who act in the name of Christianity than those who act in the name of Islam.  Murder by the former is “heinous,” while murder by the latter is merely “senseless” (never mind that it made perfect sense to Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, formerly Carlos Leon Bledsoe).  This makes sense, given that he appears to be committed to a policy of naïve appeasement of global Islam, while his attitude toward evangelicals who don’t like his actions is, “I won.”
  3. Governor Palin takes the murder of American soldiers more seriously than President Obama.
  4. The likes of al’Qaeda are going to be a lot more worried if Sarah Palin is elected president down the road than they will ever be about Barack Obama.

Sarah Palin on the murder of Pvt. William Long

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Here’s Gov. Palin’s statement (HT:  Mel):

The stories of two very different lives with similar fates crossed through the media’s hands yesterday—both equally important but one lacked the proper attention. The death of 67-year old George Tiller was unacceptable, but equally disgusting was another death that police believe was politically and religiously motivated as well.

William Long died yesterday. The 23-year old Army Recruiter was gunned down by a fanatic; another fellow soldier was wounded in the ambush. The soldiers had just completed their basic training and were talking to potential recruits, just as my son, Track, once did.

Whatever titles we give these murderers, both deserve our attention. Violence like that is no way to solve a political dispute nor a religious one. And the fanatics on all sides do great disservice when they confuse dissention with rage and death.

She’s right on all counts.  Contrary to my initial expectation, the killer here wasn’t a fringe anti-war activist, but rather an American Muslim convert and Yemen-trained Islamic terrorist.  My point still holds, though:  will the media and leftist pundits (but I repeat myself) treat Long’s murder as a terrorist act and go after those whose hateful rhetoric encourages such acts?  So far, nope.  (Go on, tell me you’re surprised.)

Update:  The Atlantic‘s Jeffrey Goldberg has noticed, as has Toby Harnden of the Telegraph.

Jihadis in US prisons = big “Hit it Here” sign

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I hadn’t gotten around to reading Beldar of late, so I missed his post on why moving the Gitmo detainees to the US would be a really bad idea—a post which raises a far scarier scenario than the one I considered:

The most serious risk is that the same type of terrorist organization that mounted a simultaneous four-plane multi-state flying bomb assault on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon on 9/11/01 would welcome the opportunity to assault any holding facility on American soil, or whatever community was closest thereto, in an attempt to force the captured terrorists’ release. Simply put, friends and neighbors: Any holding facility for radical Islamic terrorists on American soil would be a target and a potential “rescue mission” for which al Qaeda or its like would delightedly create dozens or hundreds of new “martyrs” from among their own ranks.

Right now—as has been continuously true since the first prisoners were shipped there after we began operating against the Taliban in Afghanistan—these terrorists’ would-be “rescuers” can’t assault Gitmo without first getting to Cuba and then defeating the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps at sea, on land, and in the air. That’s not the kind of fight they want; those aren’t the kind of logistical hurdles they can ever overcome. Keeping all the captured terrorists at Gitmo, in other words, has played directly to our strongest suit as a nation—our superb, unparalleled, and highly professional military strength as continuously projected in a place of our choosing without risk of collateral casualties among American civilians.

But once the scene shifts to American soil, we lose virtually all of that combination of power and flexibility, and surrender back to the terrorists all the advantages upon which they regularly depend. Getting into the U.S., or using “sleepers” already here? In a fight against some local sheriffs or prison guards armed mostly with revolvers and tasers (perhaps supplemented with shotguns or even a few assault rifles, but no heavy weaponry at all)? With the fighting to take place in or even near any American population center? Can the Obama Administration possibly be so stupid as to forfeit all of our own advantages, and give all of the terrorists’ advantages back to them?

(Emphasis in the original.)  Read the whole thing, and you’ll understand why such a move would amount to designating Target #1 for al’Qaeda’s next attack.

Memorial Day

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Pete Hegseth, the head of Vets for Freedom, posted this on NRO’s The Corner yesterday; it’s an excellent evocation of what this observance means:

Memorial Day is about one thing: remembering the fallen on the battlefield and passing their collective story to the next generation. These stories, and the men who bear them, are the backbone of this American experiment and must never be forgotten. As John Stuart Mill once said, “War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war, is worse.” The minute—excuse me, the second—we believe our freedoms inevitable and/or immutable, we cease to live in history, and have soured the soldier’s sacrifice. He died in the field, so we can enjoy this beautiful day (and weekend). Our freedoms—purchased on the battlefield—are indeed “worthy of war.”

And this day, with America still at war, it is also fitting that we remember the soldiers currently serving in harm’s way. Because, as any veteran can attest, just one moment, one explosion, or one bullet separates Veterans Day from Memorial Day. Soldiers currently in Iraq and Afghanistan are fighting for our freedoms today, knowing it’s possible they may never see tomorrow. These troops—and their mission—deserve our support each day, and our prayers every night. May God watch over them—and their families; May He give them courage in the face of fear, and righteous-might in the face of evil.

Barack Obama tries to duck accountability . . . again

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This from Andy McCarthy on the current state of the argument over releasing more photos from Abu Ghraib.  The Obama administration is claiming to have come up with a new argument against the release, when in fact (as they surely know full well) they’re advancing the same argument made by the Bush administration:

As the Second Circuit Court of Appeals’ decision last September in ACLU v. Dep’t of Defense relates, back in 2005, the Bush Justice Department first argued, in the district court, that the release of the photos “could reasonably be expected to endanger the physical safety of United States troops, other Coalition forces, and civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan.” The judge rejected this argument—incorrectly in my view, for what that may be worth—despite acknowledging the “risk that the enemy will seize upon the publicity of the photographs and seek to use such publicity as a pretext for enlistments and violent acts.” (Opinion at pp. 4-5). Then, as the three-judge Second Circuit panel noted, this national security argument became the Bush Justice Department’s “lead argument on this appeal.” (Id., pp. 8 & ff.) It’s simply false for Gibbs to contend otherwise.

Why all the legerdemain? Because, as I said in the lead argument made in Tuesday’s column (and on which I will elaborate in a new article later today): Obama is using this litigation as a smokescreen. He’s now getting plaudits for reversing himself and his Justice Department (which, in contrast to the Bush Justice Department, didn’t want to fight this case at all—just wanted to release the photos). But he is still trying to get away with voting present—which is to say, he is hiding behind the judges.

McCarthy explains,

It is in Obama’s power, right this minute, to end this debacle by issuing an executive order suppressing disclosure of the photos due to national security and foreign policy concerns. As I’ve noted, there’s no need to get into a Bush-era debate over the limits of executive power here. In the Freedom of Information Act, indeed, in FOIA’s very first exemption, Congress expressly vests him with that authority. See Title 5, U.S. Code, Section 552(b)(1)(A) (FOIA disclosure mandate “does not apply to matters that are …specifically authorized under criteria established by an Executive order to be kept secret in the interest of national defense or foreign policy and . . . are in fact properly classified pursuant to such Executive order”).

Besides being simple, issuing such an order would be a strong position and the screamingly obvious right thing to do. But it would also be a fully accountable thing to do, and that’s why President Obama is avoiding it. He realizes—especially after he surrendered details of our interrogation methods to the enemy—that he can’t afford to undermine the war effort again so quickly and so blatantly; but his heart is with the Left on this—that’s why he agreed to the release of the photos in the first place and why he is trying to prevent mutiny within his base. So here’s the game: Obama tells those of us who care about national security that he is taking measures to protect the troops and the American people, but he also tells the Left that he hasn’t made any final decisions about the photos and that the question is really for the courts to decide. That’s why he carefully couched yesterday’s reversal as a “delay” in the release of the photos.

Alternatively, of course, if the president really believes that releasing the photos is the “screamingly obvious right thing to do,” he could just go ahead and order it done; but that would also be a fully accountable thing to do, and so would not answer his core objective. McCarthy goes on to note that the administration has not elected to invoke the executive-order provision in its FOIA defense, but rather “a section relating to the withholding of records ‘compiled for law enforcement purposes,'” presumably leading with a weaker argument to increase the odds that the court will order the release of the photos.  That way President Obama can get what he wants without actually having to do it himself and thus take responsibility for it.

Of course, all this involves trying to manipulate the court, and as McCarthy notes, that may not go over well:

I can assure you that federal judges don’t like to be toyed with. Supreme Court justices may not mind if the administration treats the media like a lap-dog and the public like we’re a bunch of rubes; but, regardless of their political leanings, the justices have goo-gobs of self-esteem, and they will not take kindly to being treated like pawns in the Obamaestro’s game. The Solicitor General should expect some very tough questions about why the busy justices should waste their valuable time grappling with a tough, life-and-death legal issue when Obama could simply issue an order—regardless of how the Court rules—suppressing the photos. This, of course, is the question the media should be asking. Unlike the White House press corps, the justices will take the time to understand what’s happening and they will not roll over.

 

One thumb up, one thumb down

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I’ve been meaning to post on the recent pirate attack on the Maersk Alabama and its aftermath, for a couple reasons.  First, President Obama deserves credit for giving the go-ahead for military action; I believe the appropriate response to pirates, terrorists, and anyone else who would hold innocent lives in pawn for their own benefit is best illustrated by the Israeli raid on Entebbe:  no mercy, no quarter, no hesitation.

But second, that requires one other thing:  no negotiation.  Here, in my opinion, is a major black mark on this administration; to first offer to negotiate and then strike was a deeply problematic move, for reasons that Cornell’s William Jacobson lays out:

There are two choices when negotiating with hostage takers/pirates. One is the Israeli model of no negotiation. The only thing to be negotiated is the life of the hostage taker. Money, free passage, and other benefits are not on the table. The purpose of this approach is to deter further hostage takers, even if it means the death of the hostage.

The other model is the model of negotiating over almost any benefit, as long as the hostage is freed safely. This is the model Obama initially appeared to follow with the pirates. But if one believes the spin coming out of the White House, then negotiation was a ruse to buy time.

The problem is not in this case, which ended successfully, but in the next hostage taking situation. If one is going to follow a negotiation approach, the trust of the hostage takers in the negotiation process is key. If hostage takers believe negotiation is a ruse, then the hostage is in more danger. Words cannot be just words in a negotiation.

So negotiating as a ruse is the worst of all alternatives. It does not have the deterrent effect of the Israeli approach, or the hostage-safety effect of the negotiation approach.

This point was actually illustrated quite nicely on last Friday’s episode of NUMB3RS, for those who follow that show.  The likely result of this approach by the administration will be what the pirates are already threatening:  escalation.  This tactic worked, this time, but it won’t work again—and as a consequence of its use, the pirates are much more likely to preemptively kill any Americans they take.

The ironic thing about this is that, all in all, the pirates are probably the best allies we have in the Horn of Africa.

Piracy is not a strategic threat to the US, it is a big problem for Europe and Asia but not for us. It wasn’t until Asia and Europe realized we weren’t going to solve this problem for them that they stepped up themselves.

Terrorism in Somalia has long driven Navy operations off that coast. On one side, we have a high visibility piracy problem that does not threaten the interests of the United States directly, at all, and our only current national interest regarding the piracy issue is one man with 4 guys in an orange boat 200 yards off the bow of the USS Bainbridge (DDG 96). There is a national economic interest, but the impact to date has not risen to a level that has created a serious concern among global leaders to the point they are willing to commit serious resources toward solving the problem.

On the other side of the Somalia problem, we have the terror problem no one else in the world is interested in doing anything about. And in the middle is the reality that while both the pirates and terrorists are operating in the same black market space, the pirates and terror groups don’t like each other.

Then there is another problem. What if we support a government strong enough to remove piracy, but too weak to do anything about the terrorism cells? Piracy is what has the international community involved in the problems of Somalia right now, if that goes away, we are left with the bigger threat to our national interests and no one internationally to help.

In other words, the pirates aren’t hurting us that much, but they are hurting the Somali terrorists that are a much bigger threat to us.  I don’t like the idea that we might be better off working with them than fighting them—allying ourselves with thugs has never worked out all that well in the past—but from a Realpolitik point of view, it actually makes a lot of sense.  Really, who else is there?  That being the case, even if we leave that aside (as, morally, I believe we should), it does still suggest that our focus in Somalia should continue to be where it has been:  not on fighting pirates, but on stopping terrorists.

HT (for the last article quoted):  Smitty

Credit to Patty Murray

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Back when I was still officially a Washington resident, I had and took a couple opportunities to vote against Patty Murray for Senate, and if I had another chance I still wouldn’t vote for her; but I have to give her credit for this one.  As you may have seen (since it’s all over the Web; emphasis mine),

Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki confirmed Tuesday that the Obama administration is considering a controversial plan to make veterans pay for treatment of service-related injuries with private insurance.But the proposal would be “dead on arrival” if it’s sent to Congress, Sen. Patty Murray, D-Washington, said.Murray used that blunt terminology when she told Shinseki that the idea would not be acceptable and would be rejected if formally proposed. Her remarks came during a hearing before the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs about the 2010 budget. . . .Currently, veterans’ private insurance is charged only when they receive health care from the VA for medical issues that are not related to service injuries, like getting the flu.Charging for service-related injuries would violate “a sacred trust,” Veterans of Foreign Wars spokesman Joe Davis said. Davis said the move would risk private health care for veterans and their families by potentially maxing out benefits paying for costly war injury treatments.

That’s just disreputable—especially coming from the Secretary for Veterans’ Affairs, the guy who’s supposed to be the advocate for veterans in the administration.  Kudos to Sen. Murray and her colleagues for telling the administration to forget about it.Update:  Jon Stewart absolutely trashed the administration over this (transcript here):
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