Secretary Gates gulping Kool-Aid…
Robert Gates, considered by some to be the Secretary of Defense, has apparently joined his bosses in the emotional hatefest against Iran. Apparently all evidence that Iran is not the purely evil country that George Bush wants it to be is to be denied or discounted.
But never mind that. Here’s what he said in the last paragraph of a story in today’s Globe:
Gates ended his speech with a grim warning against underestimating the United States. Nazi Germany, imperial Japan, Fascist Italy, and the former Soviet Union all made that miscalculation, Gates said. “All paid the price. All are on the ash heap of history.”
Gates is apparently under the impression that the United States won World War II and the so-called Cold War all by itself. That would, of course, fit right in with the delusional thinking of the Bush Administration in a Bubble.
Gates also had a cute little remark in answer to a question about whether Israel’s nuclear arsenal posed a threat to the Middle East. He said no, because Israel had never threatened to destroy a neighbor. Really? They just dropped bombs on Syria, they’ve been hell bent on destroying Palestinians for several decades, and last summer they bombed the crap out of Lebanon and killed a thousand civilians doing it. Gates has now officially received his George Bush Inner Circle of Idiots secret decoder ring.
It’s unfortunate that if Bush and his hench-psychos continue to have their way, it’s the United States that will end up on the ash heap. And sooner rather than later.
[BTW, Jim Jones and his crew apparently drank something called Flavor-Aid, not Kool-Aid. But it just doesn’t have the same cool ring to it, does it?]
U.S. Army to be faster, smaller, meaner, and more high-techie…
Future wars by the United States Army will be fought with mice, according to this article by Alec Klein of the Washington Post.
In the Army’s vision, the war of the future is increasingly combat by mouse clicks. It’s as networked as the Internet, as mobile as a cellphone, as intuitive as a video game. The Army has a name for this vision: Future Combat Systems, or FCS. The project involves creating a family of 14 weapons, drones, robots, sensors, and hybrid-electric combat vehicles connected by a wireless network. It has turned into the most ambitious modernization of the Army since World War II and the most expensive Army weapons program ever, military officials say.
The Lion sees a couple of problems with this, besides the ones outlined by critics in the article.
It’s not mentioned, but does the Army assume that nobody they fight will have the smarts to disrupt all that fine electronic networkery?
The Lion would also meanly point out that almost five years ago a high-tech, lean, mean American Army invaded Iraq and handily defeated a fourth-rate Iraqi army that for the most part didn’t even bother to show up to fight, opting instead to melt away and fight several more years, holding at bay the finest Army America could field with RPGs, AK-47s, and by continually adapting clever explosive devices created from whatever they could get their hands on.
So while the new high-tech American Army of the Future can likely invade and occupy any third world country, what they can’t do with all their gadgetry and clever killing machines is win a war of aggression, not in the long term, and not based on lies, illegalities, and immorality. Iraq proves that and will continue to prove it as long as the psychos keep the Army there.
CIA and DOJ demonstrate continued corruption…
From the Associated Press in today’s Globe:
The Justice Department and CIA yesterday announced a joint inquiry into the spy agency’s destruction of videotapes of interrogations of two suspected terrorists.
‘I welcome an opportunity to address questions over the destruction of videotapes,’ CIA Director Michael Hayden said.
The review will determine whether a full investigation is warranted.
Does anyone in his right mind think that including the CIA in an investigation of itself, with the Department of Justice, still a corrupt and politicized arm of the Bush Administration, is going to result in anything other than a whitewash?
Just when you think this government can’t get any more pathetic, any more disgusting, any more dangerous, it produces a coverup of a coverup by two of the least trustworthy agencies in the Federal Government, one that engages in acts of torture illegal under American and international law, and another so crippled and corrupted by Bush and AG Alberto Gonzales that it will be a generation before Americans can even begin to trust the system of justice in the United States. And imagine, an investigation of torture by a man, Attorney General Michael Mukasey, who claims that a technique recognized by the world as torture for five hundred years may not really be torture, depending on what a psychotic President says.
The United States is way way way down in the rabbit hole.
Grumpy Lion 
On your disparaging comments about the US’ military capability – If we do decide to attack Iran it won’t be like Iraq; it’ll be a straight-up occupation! We’ll roll in in the wake of massive missile and air strikes and secure the key infrastructure. A few guerrillas won’t make that much difference since we won’t be hamstrung by the fiction of “liberation.”
I figure 12 months to stabilized oil output and an Iranian casualty count at approximately 40% of total population – not counting secondary and tertiary deaths due to public infrastructure failures.
So…Not a particular practical problem for the US – but one Hell of a political and “ethical” one. Personally I lean towards not going there, even though we can.
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It’s interesting to note that 28,000,000 Iranian casualties doesn’t seem to bother you. And that you believe that there will be only a ‘few’ guerillas.
I don’t doubt that the U.S. military could defeat Iran’s military, but at a heavy cost that would make any occupation considerably more problematical than the current Iraq occupation. It seems arrogant and shortsighted to think that the Iranian population would roll over en masse and let the U.S. occupy Iran against a ‘few’ guerillas.
Frankly, I think the U.S. would, within not too long a time, get its head handed to it, and deservedly so. And that’s aside from the political fallout. And also ignoring whether the military is anywhere near capable of invading and occupying Iran. Bombs and missiles, conceded. Beyond that, what? Occupy Iraq and Iran, when we cannot even successfully occupy Iraq? Or perhaps you’re thinking of a draftee army to raise the manpower? Aside from the domestic political problem with that, it would take more time than Bush and the Psychocons have left in office to train them sufficiently to function as a modern, high tech army.
You’re talking cakewalk, again, while Iran and Iraq are offering a swamp full of quicksand, venomous snakes, and lots of really nasty bugs, not to mention a few crocodiles and other toothy nasties.
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You’re still making the mistake of thinking that Iran would be handled s Iraq has been. I doubt we’d hamstring ourselves by trying to back a civilian government. If we – and as I said I hope we don’t – invade Iran, it we be an actual invasion.
If you take out the major urban centers and break the Republican Guard’s mainline units, it wouldn’t be that hard to secure the primary resources and related infrastructure. We could place a satrap in power later.
As for the Iranian losses, I’m not unconcerned about them. They’re the “ethical” question involved.
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I still think you’re underestimating what the Iranians would do in terms of guerrilla warfare, and the scale of it. You can’t invade and leave. The military would be just as tied down in Iran as in Iraq, probably in a much worse position given the size and topography of the country.
I’m not sure that we wouldn’t also be facing Russia in some capacity if we invaded Iran. They might be more than happy to repay us for Afghanistan, as well as protect their own interests in Iran.
In any event, I think we may both agree to some degree that no matter how it would be done, it would ultimately be a bad idea with a bad outcome.
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In reference to the Kool-Aid vs. Flavor-Aid comment, remember that even before the Jonestown lunacy the phrase had a meaning almost as apposite: it referred to drinking the LSD-laced ‘electric’ Kool-Aid at the happenings sponsored by Ken Kesey’s Merry Pranksters.
Two popular idioms for the price of one, both entirely appropriate descriptors for neocon behavior!
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Tom Wolfe, of course! Another of The Lion’s synapses disconnected.
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Lion, what should be of most concern about the CIA story is that things like this no longer elicit much outrage. It already seems like yesterdays news. “Oh, the CIA destroyed evidence that it knew for a fact that Congress (the American people) were demanding? Huh. Hey, what’s happening on the Michael Vick sentencing?”
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My understanding is that Vick got the extra five months tacked on because two of the dogs he killed were CIA agents in dog drag.
I got a good laugh out of the CIA agent who came forward and said he finally decided what he did was torture. And then bragged that the guy they tortured helped them stop a dozen or so terrorist plots.
Yeah, right. Zubaydah, or whatever his name was, more likely gave up some names of people he didn’t like. “Ali ben Ali, he’s going to bomb a Starbucks in Riyadh Tuesday.” And then the CIA picks up someone named Ali ben Ali, who probably flirted with Z’s sister, incurring Z’s wrath, and AbA is now locked up in Guantanamo for five years not knowing what the fuck is going on.
The CIA, just like everyone else in the Bush government, is concerned with one thing: covering its ass, and they don’t give anymore of a damn about democracy and liberty than the terrorist jihadists.
And where are the goddam Democrats? There should be two dozen open investigations going on with no quarter given. Instead they hand out bullshit as smelly as the fascists on the Republican side. Say ‘filibuster’ to a Democrat and he craps his pants and folds up like a wet napkin. Let the assholes filibuster. Let them talk and talk and talk. Call their frigging bluff. Let them look and talk and act like the sick bastards they are.
Instead of drawing clear lines of demarcation, the Democrats are just crapping in the water.
Fuck all of them.
Where’s my goddam Nyquil?
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[…] hench-psycho “It’s unfortunate that if Bush and his hench-psychos continue to have their way, it’s the United States that will end up on the ash heap. And sooner rather than later.” (Dec. 9, 2007, Grumpy Lion) […]
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