A Nation At War

Sometime back - one of Great Satan's super intelligentsia whispered that

"...A society as blessed as ours - its people safe even while at war, prosperous even amidst economic crisis - needs to be reminded that such blessings come at a cost. Memorial Day is a time to remember, but it is more than that

"Good men and women go off to war on our behalf, and some do not return.

"On Memorial Day, we observe more than the fact that people died, but also how their deaths came to pass, and in what cause. We commemorate not just their sacrifice, but the context that gives meaning to both the fate they suffered and the lives they led.

"We recognize the commitment to selfless service that brought them to a fateful day in an out-of-the-way place they had never heard of before they died there

"Memorial Day is not simply about remembering our fallen; it is a day when we should fully and properly express our gratitude.

"America owes them everything.

America has been at war across eight Last Days of May - and longer - and those kids who were 4th or 5th graders at the time are now at the front in a frontless war and may very well pay the ultimate price

Pic "Holy Ground"

Word Games

Checkmate!

In the unreal world of the diplopolititary, language -- words-- are brazenly subtle at times and often convey a smokescreen of sorts for the actual actions and activities acted out - the very mirror opposite of walking the walk and talking the talk.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?

Essentially - consider:

44's admin and their new unimproved Nat'l Sec Strat makes use of not using certain terms while actually plotting preps to enrage enemies without ever breathing any enemy related nomenclature.

Jesus weaponry at squad level (as far as we know!) has been banned, Xian ministers uninvited and that which must not be named stricken from official vocab.

Yet at the same incredible instant, scantily clad hotties are escorted into combat zones to get the troops all het up, intolerant enemies may soon face the fruits of the biz end of Don't ask - Don't tell while Great Satan racks up record numbers of enemies vaporized without trial, appeal or even a whisper of a warning.

As best understood - certain elements regard the loaded jurisprudence of a tactic AKA "...taqiyyah..." as

"Concealing or disguising one's beliefs, convictions, ideas, feelings, opinions, and/or strategies at a time of eminent danger, whether now or later in time, to save oneself from physical and/or mental injury." A one-word translation would be "Dissimulation."

Got it.

Great Satan has a similar def, bay bee.

"Word Games"

Pic "Whisko Tangy Foxtrot"

DPRK

Axis of Evil! When it comes to punching way above her weight class - the world's largest underground rocket factory with a nation state attached - got game!

DPRK projects malign influ, fear of military puppet gangsters and a world of hurt - NoKo is the "Hybrid Threat Phantastique!

"...Capabilities range from nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles to thousands of tanks and artillery pieces, millions of infantrymen, hundreds of aircraft (virtually all obsolete but most in working order) and a special operations command of over 100,000. In the last Korean War, northern forces engaged in guerrilla activities throughout the peninsula.

"... Pyongyang might even resort to terrorist attacks in the United States or along the supply lines from the U.S. homeland to the war zone.

Juche'!

A challange for Great Satan's 30 year in the future military's ability to do a hybrid threat while COINing multiple hot spots, firing up a Major Offensive and spying out CENTCOM for covert or overt combat events to engage if the need or even opportunity arise!

Collectivist China's one and only client state just split town after a quick gig to chat and get seductively chatted up

Beijing disses any jank about any hook up betwixt the super stressed peninsula and Dear Leader's Daytripping

"Two separate events"

"...There is a small — and rare — kernel of truth in the official Chinese line. It is not just the sinking of the Cheonan that has Beijing worried about what is happening inside the “Hermit Kingdom.”

"...There are a number of signs that China’s rulers are worried about the Kim regime’s stability in general and the North Korean ruler’s physical condition and mental state in particular. Informed speculation holds that the Chinese leadership wanted to see firsthand to what degree Kim is now mentally and/or physically impaired.

Sweet! China needs to be worried - after all Noko would have collapsed and reunified eons ago except for Chinese aid.

"...As long as China remains ambivalent in its reaction to North Korea's aggressive behaviour, it is demonstrating a continued interest in maintaining a divided peninsula that produces regional tension and instability. Without a clear strategy towards North Korea, we can expect more of North Korea's hostile actions.

Consider:

Accepted mythology preaches China is afraid of millions of sick and starving refugees swarming en masse into the Motherland.

Dear Leader has practically guaranteed it!

Recent events have annihilated the "Sun Shine Policy" - where SoKo gave up righteous booty like foodstuffs and medical supplies, Dear Leader risks the dishonor of headlining Great Satan's Official Enemies List and 44's newly-formulated New Clear Posture would receive its first exam.

"It is not clear what kind of punishment the United States could or should inflict on the North if that regime chooses to employ nuclear weapons against us or our allies. We may well wish that the Obama Administration had not truncated deployment of the National Missile Defense system.


"Wonder what restraint the Chinese would be urging if one of their ships was sunk by a foreign rival?"

Unbound!

Great Satan Unbound!

Hot gossip about leaking P4's plot for Great Satan's expansion of para military spy ops is off the hook!

"...The top American commander in the Middle East has ordered a broad expansion of clandestine military activity in an effort to disrupt militant groups or counter threats in Iran, Somalia, Saudi Arabia and other countries..."

Turning asymmetrical warfare into an artform, Great Satan is taking the PD3 formula - penetrate, disrupt, defeat, or destroy - into overdrive and into enemy, friendly and frenemy turf.

Plus - it grants easy access and authority for launching clandestine military chicanery to area commanders - unlike covert ops that require the CiC to high five or thumbs down.

Gussied up as a spy/intell gathering force - Special Forces Command would "prepare the environment" for any future attacks Great Satan may deign to do.

Pic "There's plenty of work to do"

Grand J!had

Oh it's true bay bee! The charming thing about conspiracies is that when a machination is real - no one ever suspects - - when it's not - - everyone does.

Kinda like Ikhwan's magical master plan to create a network of unfun, unfree Imperial m'hammedist enclaves using some kind of 7th century Preacher Command and Control socioreligious edictive laws.

The real deal is to get Great Satan the heck out of the way. Mainly because her sexyful appeals of freedom of choice, championship of individual rights and laid back laissez-faire are like kryptonite in Smallville to any collectivist control freaks.

Enter "Grand Jihad" -- unleashed for sale today.

The real threat to Great Satan "...is not terrorism. The real threat is Islamism, whose sophisticated forces have collaborated with the American Left not only to undermine U.S. national security but also to shred the fabric of American constitutional democracy—freedom and individual liberty..."

Attorney/author and NRO cat Andrew C. McCarthy "...provides a harrowing account of how the global Islamist movement’s jihad involves far more than terrorist attacks, and how it has found the ideal partner in President Barack Obama, whose Islamist sympathies run deep.

"...McCarthy is the former federal prosecutor who convicted the notorious “Blind Sheikh” and other jihadists for waging a terrorist war that included the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. In his national bestseller, Willful Blindness: A Memoir of the Jihad (Encounter 2008), he explored government’s conscious avoidance of the terrorist threat, which made the nation vulnerable to mass-murder attacks.

"...In The Grand Jihad he exposes a more insidious peril: government’s active suppression of the Islamist ideology that unabashedly vows to “conquer America.”

"...With the help of witting and unwitting accomplices in and out of government, Islamism doesn’t merely fuel terrorism but spawns America-hating Islamic enclaves in our midst and gradually foists Islam’s repressive law, sharia, on American life.

"...The revolutionary doctrine has made common cause with an ascendant Left that also seeks radical transformation of our constitutional order. The prognosis for liberty could not be more dire.

Pic "The Grand J!had" with Sarah Maple

Backhand Or Forehand?

Deja vu! Checking out all the gossip from the current fighting in Afghanistan and Marineistan, it may be the Taliban is sharing thoughts like

"...We were like a man who had seized a wolf by both ears and dared not it let go..."

The reflective reflections of von Mellenthin in the essential "Panzer Battles" describes the precarious sitch that once proud panzertruppen of the nigh invincible Wehrmacht found themselves.

Facing an undying Bolshevik juggernaut way back in the last millennium when Europa still enjoyed combatting betwixt themselves, Deutschland's "...best operational mind..." von Manstein laid it out to play it out as in having two choices:

'The Backhand': Let the enemy strike - fall back with the flow, regroup and just as the Soviets were reaching the limits of their zenith - launch an amazing counterattack that nets more turf than before. Kharkov III is a good example of the 'Backhand'

'The Forehand': When it looks like the enemy is prepping for an offensive - strike first. Often called a spoiling attack - upsetting enemy timetables, plots and preps. The ill fated 'Ardennes Offensive" AKA "Battle of the Bulge" is a good example of the forehand strike.

The Battle of Khandahar is underway -- and our enemies are perhaps trying a spoiler-- yet so what?

"...For those of you who have labored in the profession of arms you can recognize just how much ammunition was expended by the Taliban. Forty five minutes of constant RPK fire from multiple machineguns takes thousands of rounds. Firing multiple rockets from up to six RPG launchers is also an extravagant use of ammo given the current rates of consumption by the Taliban."

Sweet! So Taliban and their assorted assortment of allies are wasting their substance on peripheral attacks that do not blunt Great Satan's edge or significantly divert her plans for the lo down ho down about to get down in the Af part of AfPAK .

Pic "We must take the battle to the enemy, disrupt his plans, and confront the worst threats before they emerge." with Sienna

The Democrazy Myth

Yeah Yeah -- We know.

Of all the people to ever walk the face of the earth -- only one particular group (all conveniently located in Arab League) -- are immune to the civilizing enhancing magical life more bettering delish delight of democracy.

"...The rise of radical Islamism has been no less obstructive when it comes to Arab democracy. Decades of unholy alliance between Arab autocrats and the West have seen radical Islam emerge as a "salvation" force. If free and fair elections were to be held in any Arab country, Islamists would come to power.

"...That was the case in Algeria in 1991-92, in Iraq in 2005, and in the West Bank and Gaza in 2006. Other countries, such as Jordan, Morocco, Kuwait, Yemen and Bahrain, have created more limited space for democracy. There, too, Islamists have immediately filled it.

Well, maybe. So far -- there is no proof whatsoever that rowdy m'hammedists want to govern if and when they bust out the ballot box boogie.

Maintaining roads, schools, infrastructure, dispensing justice and the rule of law or even making sure the trash is picked up, may be far beyond skill sets like persecuting people enroute to creating a Preachers Paradise. Let alone alleviating all the corruption that the Arab autocrats have engineered for eons.

Instead, perhaps we should carefully reconsider...

"...Everywhere in the Middle E and North Africa the Islamists are the alluring, mythical alternative to the wretched reality under which people live.

"...In Iran, fundamentalism is the wretched reality under which people live.

Millions of people suffering under corrupt royalty in Ray Bans and Presidents for Life may very well look to the idea of voting in a m'hammedist gov as 'saw that on Al Jazeera in the Strip' and/or consider the wretched reality of life under the Supreme Leader.

"...There is a myth that though we love freedom, others don't; that our attachment to freedom is a product of our culture; that freedom, democracy, human rights, the rule of law are American values or Western values.

"...Ours are not Western values. They are the universal values of the human spirit, and anywhere--anywhere, anytime ordinary people are given the chance to choose, the choice is the same: freedom, not tyranny; democracy, not dictatorship; the rule of law, not the rule of the secret police.

Pic "Exporting Democracy"

"Hiz'B'Allah Moderates"

Recent events in Great Satan's Nat'l Sec cats world are amazing and a bit alarming.

Aside from corrupt moral revisionists comparing Great Satan's rowdy borderlanders like AZ to murderously intolerant totalitarian collectivist killers like Red China, an incredibly uninformed statement stands out like a thong at Church:

"Hiz'B'Allah moderates"

As best understood, these inappropriate mental meanderings trek along the line of an attempted xformation of HBA from within - to something unlike a terrorist organization and conferring a real legitness - to the mod elements.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? While it's true there is no state on state declaration of war betwixt Hiz'B'Allah and Great Satan - alas - no risible one liners about sucking up to 'moderate' Ss Totenkopf 3rd Reichers during WWII time are apropos - a bit of reflection should leap to mind.

Hiz'B'Allah's entire raison d'etre' is - it was created to run Little Satan out of Lebanon eons ago. An Iranian fed and funded 'Resistance Auxiliary' that could project force and pressure in Persia's Near Abroad.

Thing is - since Little Satan unassed Lebanon's 'Blue Line' way back at the dawn of the New Millennium - Hiz'B'Allah has been way more adept at 'resisting' the legit gov of Lebanon than rocking up 'Divine Victories.'

And it's no clerical error that puts rocket rich rejectionists (led by the overtly robust Body Part Collector General) on Great Satan's Official Enemies list.

Hiz'B'Allah were the most proficient killers and serial tormentors of Americans throughout Cold War history til 911 time. Hiz'B'Allah owes Great Satan a blood debt that has no statute of limitations.

And it's not all ancient "Flock of Seagulls Era" concern either.

Hiz'B'Allah trained choice Mookie's Mahdi minions in Lebanon beginning in 2005. "Brother Commander" Mugahniyah himself hung in Iraq overseeing deployment, tactical considerations and advanced training.

Any American casualty in Iraq since then could very well be courtesy of Hiz'B'Allah.

So in sense - yes - Great Satan should be clamouring to see these 'Hiz'B'Allah moderates"

With flies walking on their eyeballs.

Pic "Great Satan loves Hiz'B'Allah! They taste like chicken" with Megan

Resignation

It is with deep regret that I informed the President today that I will step down as Director of National Intelligence effective Friday, May 28th.

I have had no greater honor or pleasure than to lead the remarkably talented and patriotic men and women of the Intelligence Community.

Every day, you have worked tirelessly to provide intelligence support for two wars and to prevent an attack on our homeland.

You are true heroes, just like the members of the Armed Forces, firefighters, and police whose job it is to keep our nation safe.

Your work over the past 16 months has made the Intelligence Community more integrated, agile, and representative of American values. Keep it up – I will be cheering for you.

Dennis C. Blair

Clown Wars

Whoa! Only in the magical, mythical ME.

“Armed struggle was the worst tactic that Palestinians could have used against a whole society marked by trauma and paranoia,” the Pulitzer Prizer Kai Bird writes in Crossing Mandelbaum Gate.

True!

"...Mustering populist rhetoric and citing ideals that ceased being fresh a half-century ago, these proponents of an endless armed struggle against Israel often quote the late Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser: “What was taken by force, can be only restored by force.”

Things may be changing as Palestine recently unleashed a 'clown offensive' against Little Satan - risible, harmless - goofy goobers to crack wise and draw attention to the abandoned Egyptian Colony on the Strip and the abandoned Jordanian colony in West Bank.

Alas -- for Palestine -- Little Satan was ever watchful and preempted the 'Clown Offensive" not once but twice:

Prado the Clown -- a Spanish mirth merc -- was ejected along with his girlfriend after just 6 hours visiting with Little Satan's anti terror cats enroute to the Strip. He promptly went home and compared the Strip to living in Sept 1939 Poland right around blitzkrieg time.

The 2nd clown -- world famous Great Satan hating Gnome Chomsky -- was ceremoniously ejected from Little Satan enroute to West Bank and promptly condemned Little Satan as being equal to Stalin's collectivist Russia.


Pic "The affirmation of non-violence is potentially its own form of disarmament."

Secret Agent Strippers

"Arab-Americans rejoiced Monday over the crowning of raven-haired beauty Rima Fakih, a 24-year-old Lebanese immigrant from Michigan, calling it a victory for diversity in the United States, especially at a time when Arabs suffer from negative stereotypes in this country — and anti-immigrant sentiment is in the news."

How Sweet!

Rima's dossier looks great -- super hottie princess fleeing the heck out of Hiz'B'Alland as a babe (literally, ya'll), growing up in Great Satan, growing fully crunk and disorderly and hooking up a less rowdy, laid back PBUH in coexistence with Xianity.

Bend Sinister?

"...Just like the 9/11 hijackers drank alcohol at the Pink Pony and gambled in Vegas–both no-nos..." in m'hammedism -- secret agents are allowed "...to engage in taqiyyah [deception of the infidels to further the cause of Islam/jihad]..."

Are terrorist rocket rich rejectionists, led by their overtly girthy Body Part Collector General are doing their best Byzantium inveigling?

Deploying deceit with the ancient concept of laffy taffy (the old tricks are the best tricks, nicht war? ) in the new millennial era of xforming the world into multiple nation states of hoochies, players. pimps and hoes.

Pic "This victory is a reaffirmation that America is America, the land of the brave and the land of opportunity. Rima now can be a role model for all our young people."

Mob Rules

Since 44's admin hit town - the quiz is:

"Why the reluctance to state the obvious truth?"

After all, Captain Obvious and the Limits of Cool should have alerted the 'Nation of Cowards cat' (with the worst m'stache ever) that things were off the hook with 'that which must not be named.'

"...Holder is not the only one who wants to shield us from this obvious truth. New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, questioned about the bomber’s motives before Shahzad was identified and caught, said the terrorist might have been acting out of opposition to the health-care bill. Washington Post blogger Ezra Klein said he might have become unhinged by the foreclosure of his Connecticut home.

"...Similar dignitaries have advanced similar theories. The Christmas underwear bomber, Barack Obama initially said, was an otherwise unspecified “isolated extremist.” Fort Hood killer Nidal Hasan, we were told by journalists, may have been a victim of post-traumatic-stress disorder — although he never saw combat. Back in the George W. Bush years, we were told that the gunman who started shooting at the El Al counter at LAX had just chosen his target at random, and the New York Times found nothing significant when the Mumbai killers targeted a Jewish community center.

"...Why the reluctance to state the obvious truth, that we are under attack from terrorists motivated by a radical form of Islam?

Wait for it!

It's the Howling Mob theory. Yep. Rowdy hillbilly, ghetto savvy intolerant 'Mericans attacking things what ain't right, amen.

"...Janet Napolitano’s Homeland Security Department, tasked with finding possible terrorists, set about tracking disgruntled military veterans and gun owners. Just the kind of people who turn into a Howling Mob!

"When you see a smart man like Eric Holder saying stupid things, you know something else is going on. You’re seeing a high official who regards most of us as cowards, who believes the truth could make us a Howling Mob.


Pic "The Mob Rules"

Greater Iran

Whoa!

From the same kinda cats that were psychic about scantily clad hoochies, hotties and hoes and their earthshaking powers, comes an interesting geo - diplopolititary sexercise:

Greater Persia.

Stretching from Pakistan, Afghanistan all the way to Palestine - Greater Persia - Iran - would easily wipe clean and draw again boundaries betwixt nation states as easily as the naughty British Imperialists created such fakebelieve borders and nation states eons ago.

There is a real point here - Iran - nearly alone of the ME nations, has defining borders that have existed for millennia.

Imperialist Crusaders determined the map for Iraq, Wahabbi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Little Satan, Gulf States, Palestine, and Pakistan.

Greater Iran would determine the map for hooking up Iraq, Wahabbi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Little Satan, Gulf States, Palestine, and Pakistan. would redraw those borders in a regional war.

Say it out loud?

The Shia Crescent - a magical Imperial shi ite m'hammedist ummah would be best ruled by Iran's Chief Ayatollah - they don't call him the Supreme Leader for nothing - and has plenty of "regional adversaries" including not only Little Satan, but all the world's sunni regimes.

Pic "By God's grace, Iran has entered the world countries' nuclear club" with Britney pretending to be Paris

Happy BDay Little Satan!

It's Nakbah Day! Shout out to Little Satan celebrating her 62nd this year! Incredible - and soooo true. Despite the unhinged fact that nearly 300 million members of Arab League have tried and failed to put paid to a tiny tiny piece of real estate (with no oil) sweetly attended to by less than 7 million people.

Certain rowdy members have learned the hard way not to send panzers, combat jets and conscripted infantry against Little Satan, yet there are several threats to her existence.

Some things just get better as time goes by. And just like Great Satan, Little Satan continues to cruise. Totally off the hook in any endeavour - arts, academics, the Beatles, biz, communication, education, medicine, science, space exploration, tech - Little Satan is one sexy magical pixie.

Hotter than a firecracker and twice as loud Little Satan is also nigh indestructable.

Hanging in appearantly the only spot ever in the ME with like zero oil (compy speaking), no friendly homies on her borders, a tiny pop, little real estate (after the show ho's like Gaza, WB and Har Dov Farms included - Little Satan "occupies" less than 1% of the Arab world and less than 1/10th of a % of mohammedist turf), no Suez Canal, no militias or resistance movements, Little Satan's very existence gives the eternal finger to all her failed, backwards, repressive hoodmates.

She is far superior, far more humane than Hosni's Egypt, Abdullah's (v2.0) Jordan, Bashar's Syria and ex colonies like Abbas' West Bank , HAMAS' Gaza Strip, Royal Saudiland and embattled Lebanon.

Unlike her neighbors - Little Satan has real military prowess - yet she's unmilitaristc. She accommodated all faiths - yet remains secular. She absorbs refugees from the entire world - creating loyal, productive citizens throughout an Alamo - Masada environment that created sustained and maintained a tolerant, egalitarian democracy.

Beaches and biotches - Little Satan puts the 'HO' in "Holy Land."

It is only cool and natch for Great Satan to hook up with Little Satan - just like best girlfriends forever - nigh indistinguishable.

"That is why they call Israel the Little Satan, to distinguish it clearly from the country that has always been and will always be the Great Satan – The United States of America."

Oh Snap!

Happy BDay Little Satan!

Pic "Saluting an island of Western democratic values in a sea of despotism"

Game Changer?

For eons, the Red China Navy has been not unlike a glorified Coast Guard of sorts.

And that is sooo last millennium!

Check out the world's oldest and most biggest Collectivist regime's desires for more

"In order to defend China's territory and sovereignty, and secure its maritime rights and interests, the navy decided to set its defense range as the Yellow Sea, the East China Sea and the South China Sea.

"This range covered the maritime territory that should be governed by China, according to the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, as well as the islands in the South China Sea, which have been its territory since ancient times."

Whoa!

"To discourage the U.S. or any other foreign navy from intervening in Beijing's declared sphere of influence around Taiwan and in the South and East China Seas in a crisis, Chinese military strategists have developed a set of weapons and tactics to deny hostile forces access. Among the weapons are submarines that are increasingly difficult to detect and an array of long-range anti-ship missiles that are increasingly difficult to defend against.

"The latter include what would be the world's first operational ballistic missile and maneuverable warhead guided by satellite and land-based over-the-horizon radar to strike aircraft carriers at up to 12 times the speed of sound far out at sea. U.S. military officials and analysts regard it as a serious threat to American naval operations in the Western Pacific.

"U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates on May 3 warned that "the virtual monopoly the U.S. has enjoyed with precision guided weapons is eroding — especially with long-range, accurate anti-ship cruise and ballistic missiles that can potentially strike from over the horizon."

"China's anti-ship ballistic missile, with a range of 1,500 km, would be fired from mobile launchers on land. Adm. Robert Willard, the commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, told Congress in March that China was "developing and testing" the missile.

"He added that it was "designed specifically to target aircraft carriers." Gates said that such a weapon could potentially put at risk a modern nuclear-powered U.S. carrier with a full complement of the latest aircraft — an asset worth as much as $20 billion.

"He added that a combination of lethal missiles and stealthy submarines "could end the operational sanctuary our navy has enjoyed in the Western Pacific for the better part of six decades."

"It is not the first time that Gates has spoken about this threat. Last September, he said that China's "investments in anti-ship weaponry and ballistic missiles could threaten America's primary way to project power and help allies in the Pacific — particularly our forward bases and carrier strike groups."

"The U.S. Naval Institute cautioned a year ago that "the mere perception that China might have an anti-ship ballistic missile capability could be game-changer, with profound consequences for deterrence, military operations and the balance of power in the Western Pacific."

Pic "Future Game Changer"

Treason

"The notion that the government can, in effect, execute one of its own citizens far from a combat zone, with no judicial process and based on secret intelligence, makes some legal authorities deeply uneasy."

Oh snap! Talking about Awlaki - the New Mexican born American citizen responsible for attacking Great Satan in recent months like Ft Hood and the Xmas Day bumbling bomber.

Deeply uneasy attorneys need to man up, overcome their risible inner ethical wrestling match and get on a war footing like State Dept legal eagle and newest Drone Gone Wild! fan Harold Koh.

"The making of U.S. foreign policy is infinitely harder than it looks from the ivory tower. Why?

"Because, as lawyers, we are accustomed to the relatively orderly world of law and litigation, which is based on a knowable and identifiable structure and sequence of events. The workload comes with courtroom deadlines, page limits and scheduled arguments."

True! The real world is unlike academia.

"American citizenship doesn’t give you carte blanche to wage war against your own country. If you cast your lot with its enemies, you may well share their fate.”

This is exactly correct with the happy benefit of being true.

Ideally, the ideal deal would be a swift capture followed by an agonizing period of uncomfortable uncomfortableness, a fast trial and a '1st class hangin'. "

Yet what if the traitor in question is hidden far far away in combat free, sunny climes?

Drones Gone Wild? A magical hit team from any one of Great Satan's upgunned all weather hunter killer teams?

Either way is fine.

It. Doesn't. Matter.

Traitors are currently defined as Americans who enlist, aid, fight for or benefit old school nation states and old school militaries. Like Tokyo Rose or Benedict Arnold.

Authorities deeply uneasy about annihilating Americans who flee to foreign lands for the magical haj to embolden, encourage and exhort enemies to kill fellow Americans should consider Alwaki as a modern day Lord Haw Haw or Axis Sally.

Pic “If we need to stop dangerous terrorists who hide in remote parts of the world, inaccessible to U.S. troops, law enforcement, or any central government what do you do — cover your ears and wait for a truly devastating explosion in Times Square?”

Pakistan Expedition

Whoa! It's true bay bee -- all the cool kids knew way back before 44's AfPAK Surge that Afghanistan was about as good as it's going to get -- unless -- Great Satan stormed the sanctuaries of JaM, LeT and al Qaeda in wild wild west Pakistan.

Recent events hooked up with the Attorney General's 'Double Epiphany" could be interpreted as setting the stage for Great Satan's Land of the Pure Expeditionary Force.

"Several factors point to the fact that such an option is indeed being considered by the Obama administration and Pentagon officials. First, conservative lawmakers on Capitol Hill have long been sounding alarm bells asking for a wider presence in Pakistan to accomplish the goals of the war on terror. Recent hearings held on Capitol Hill have focused on groups such as Jaish-i-Muhammad and Lashkar-i-Taiba that do not operate in the areas currently being targeted by aerial drone attacks.

"In a hearing held in March, several US congressmen noted that the Lashkar “had put the world on notice that they intend to escalate the carnage and take it worldwide”.

"Other analysts have repeatedly pointed to the necessity of expanding drone strikes into Quetta to target the Quetta shura which supposedly runs the Taliban operations. While Shahzad’s connections are not currently traced to groups other than the Taliban, the fact that he spent time in Pakistan bolsters the position of those who insist that a wider military presence in Pakistan is crucial to eliminating the threat to the American homeland.

"Second, the problems faced by the highly publicised US/Nato initiatives in Marja and Kandahar in Afghanistan have created a political demand for a more decisive endgame in the region. In the footsteps of the Marja offensive in early April, The New York Times reported that many of the gains made in the area by the US Marines’ costly offensive had largely been reversed and many Taliban had moved back into the area.

"The Kandahar offensive due to start soon has also been the subject of lowered expectations, with experts saying that the easy absorption of Taliban fighters into the local population and the lack of visible centres of Taliban control make it difficult to win a decisive victory in the area.

"The reason why the failure of both offensives — one yet to begin — is relevant to the Pakistan equation is simple: with the beginning of a US withdrawal already announced for 2011, there is immense political pressure on the Obama administration to produce some semblance of victory.

"The expansion of the Afghanistan war into Pakistani territory would not only be a culmination of the Obama campaign’s slogans of Pakistan being the real problem, it would also provide a visible endgame to the vexing and increasingly intractable issue of whether the war in Afghanistan has really eliminated global terrorism.

"The ongoing saga of drone attacks and Pakistan’s tacit approval of them has provided further fodder to the argument that expansion of incursions into Pakistani territory would be met with vocal opposition but would more or less be tolerated by the current Pakistani establishment. Supporters of this argument point to the fact that Pakistan’s sovereignty, once foregone, is relinquished for ever and airstrikes by US forces are not too different from aerial drone attacks.

"Recent reports indicate an expansion of the use of the aerial drone programme to include not just high-value Al Qaeda and Taliban targets as previously planned but also “general patterns of life”. This new approach could include targeting large gatherings of people with weapons or vehicle processions even where the identities of the persons in them remains unknown. The lack of an outcry by Pakistan’s military and civilian establishment following the reports suggests that a limited military incursion by US forces could be given tacit approval.

"Those who doubt that the Times Square saga will be a game changer point to the following: first, even with the escalation of terse rhetoric against Pakistan, Obama administration officials have continued to point to the fact that Pakistani authorities are cooperating in every way possible.

"Second, the capacities of US ground troops are undoubtedly already stretched to the limit in Afghanistan and an expansion of the military campaign, even if politically valuable to the Democrats facing elections in November, may not militarily be feasible. Little evidence exists that the obstacles faced by US troops in Afghanistan such as failure to discern the enemy, the changing loyalties of tribal leaders and an unforgiving and alien terrain, would not follow them across the border into Pakistan and thus make such expansion minimally valuable.

"Finally, the fact that Pakistan chose to test-fire two short-range ballistic missiles in the footsteps of escalating rhetoric can be seen as a direct message to the United States: while ground invasions into Iraq and Afghanistan were met with little resistance, such incursions would be considerably more complicated in the Pakistani case. This last point would suggest that reminding the US of this fact at a crucial moment was designed to make the overt point that tolerating the drones does not mean automatic approval of airstrikes and ground troops.

"As in the wake of the Mumbai bombings, Pakistan finds itself in a difficult position where the failure of the state to crack down on militant groups within its borders may well be used as an excuse for invasion of its territory. While Pakistan’s nuclear capability can ultimately function as an effective deterrent against invading Pakistan, it can also become the source of an obstinacy that continues to ignore the cancer of militancy in the country.

Pic "Pakistan is ruled by the trinity: Allah, the Army and America"

Indirect Approach

"In strategy, the longest way round is often the shortest way there; a direct approach to the object exhausts the attacker and hardens the resistance by compression, whereas an indirect approach loosens the defender's hold by upsetting his balance."

Consider Captain Liddelhart's maxim maximus in recent diplopolititary events betwixt Syria, Hiz'B'Allah, Little Satan and SCUD missiles:

"Given the negligible strategic benefit the Scud constitutes for Hizballah – as well as the logistical headaches involved with establishing an infrastructure for the nearly 12-meter-tall weapon and its challenging liquid fuel rocket – and the minimal additional detrimental impact for Israel, the real question is: Why have the reports emerged now?

"Some analysts (including senior officials in Hiz'b'allah), suggest that the government of Israel invented the issue to distract from its current bilateral problems with the Obama administration.

"Based on Washington’s sympathetic response to Israeli claims, however, this explanation isn’t particularly convincing.

"More likely, Damascus and Tehran engineered the Scud crisis to divert US-led efforts to build an international coalition to sanction Iran for its nuclear endeavors. Indeed, the timing of the reports is eerily reminiscent of Hizballah’s cross-border operation on July 12, 2006, which occurred the same day the meeting in Paris of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany was slated to refer the Iranian nuclear issue to the UN Security Council.

"The abduction and killing of Israeli soldiers sparked a war that effectively won Tehran nearly another year of unfettered enrichment activity. (While it’s impossible to know with any certainty, the new diversion initiative might have been what was discussed at the February 2010 meeting in Damascus between Assad, Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad).

"Today, though tensions remain high, both Israel and Hizballah do not appear interested in an escalation. And until the next war, it will likely not be known whether Hizballah in fact obtained Scuds from Syria.

"Nevertheless, for Washington the crisis is a useful reminder that Damascus, whether innocent or guilty of this transfer, continues to provide the Shiite militia with increasingly advanced capabilities that will make the next war even costlier for Lebanon and Israel.

"For Washington, the Scud issue should prompt more than just a temporary refocusing on the well-intentioned but poorly implemented UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which calls for Syria to end weapons transfers to its Iranian-backed Lebanese allies.

"That the Assad regime is upping the ante with Israel via Hizballah at the very moment Washington is working to deepen its diplomatic engagement with Damascus should give the Obama administration pause.

"If this Syrian behavior continues, the Obama administration will likely arrive at the same conclusion the Bush administration reached in 2004: that Damascus actually is – as it so vociferously claims to be – a regime dedicated to supporting “the resistance.”

It doesn't appear too early in 44's tenure to openly diss the sad, ancient boring asseted "Syria Track" as a big fat failure and laugh off overt overtures that overly suck.

Indeed.

"... the administration’s decision earlier this month to renew sanctions against Damascus just might suggest a growing appreciation in the White House as to the nature of the Syrian regime and perhaps for the limits of diplomatic engagement with a self-defined resistance state.


Pic - "If all our problems were as easy as Syria, the War On Terror would have been won long ago."

COIN World

By the year 2013 the world will be a very crunk and disorderly place:

CENTCOM will be the pièce de résistance - a counter insurgency war fought in Iraq betwixt Whabbi Arabia, Theocratic New Clear Iran and Great Satan

Counter insurgency ops will be off the hook in AFPAK, particularly the Land of the Pure - as the Pakistani Taliban's New Guard launches a nationwide insurrection to take control and forcibly force time travelling on the fastest growing new clear arsenal on the planet -- a nuked up semi nation state into the medieval age:

"...a failed state, ripe with civil war, bloodshed, inter-provincial rivalries and a struggle for control of its nuclear weapons and its complete Talibanization..."

Funded by the dreaded pop pop poppy fields in Afghanistan (that funnily enough do not seem to merit attention as a premier enemy enabler), balkanized resistance movements fracture along tribal lines in Baluchistan.

Palestine's near birth/death/life experience will absorb energies, resources and troops to keep a lid on events spilling into Egypt, even as up armored Hiz'B'Allah and Revo Guard proxies approximate siezing total control in Lebanon -- aided and abetted by the tiny tiny Allawite regime in Basharopolis -- against Great Satan's Lebanese contingent of Teufel Hunden.

Yemen will become the 2010 version of North Waziristan -- victimized by al Qaeda like terror groups and unhealthy doses of Iranian and Saudi minion wars.

Somalia and Sudan fight civil wars, hooked up with atrocities on a nigh Hitlerian scale.

Instability will spread far beyond Great Satan's CENTCOM.

Failed states - like Mexico and Arizona will be chock full of drug regimes, gangster statelets and traditional non state actor outers.

Welcome to COIN World.

Pic - "Successful Insurgencies and Counterinsurgencies"

Drone Wars

As best understood -- 'blowback' is not shorthand for sneezing up little white lines of you know what. Instead, 'blowback' is the equal/opposite reaction from Great Satan's enemies.

Have 'Drones Gone Wild!' made Great Satan less safe on the home front?

"Have they had the perverse consequence of driving lesser insurgencies to think of targeting Times Square and American airliners, not just Kabul and Islamabad? In short, are they inspiring more attacks on America than they prevent?"

"It is a hard question."

Not really.

Since 2006, there have been 1,159 leaders and operatives from Taleban, al Qaeda, and assorted intolerant jerks, creeps and losers killed.

And 95 civilians killed.

Long War Journal has an amazing, constantly updated study (sweetly snuggled all together on 1 page) Charting the data for Great Satan's Drone strikes in Pakistan, 2004 - 2010.

By happy happenstance it also disses the "Great Satan dines on the blood of innocents" meme that loser lobbies like "Weenie Hut Juniors" or the ex F.B. I told you so guy constantly whine about.

Essentially -- Great Satan is grinding them up and spitting them out -- their only hope for survival is a spectacular strike at the homeland. Or any strike.

Anything to grant a respite to allow in depth, intensive training to prep for Talibaning Pakistan or ISI's ancient dream of 'Strategic Depth' for that magical Götterdämmerung showdown with Hindu India

North Waziristan is impact area number one bay bee for drone strikes. Of 133 strikes since 2004, 63.0% have hit targets in North Waziristan, and 32.8% have hit targets in South Waziristan.

Which certainly adds a bit of 'get your shiz together -- lest your semi nation state's largest benefactor does it for ya" to AFPAK Mac's recent "Land of the Pure Tour"

Pic -"Drones are a cause of pleasure for the tormented people of Waziristan!" with "Ninja Babes from Space"

Mom

"Considerable Temptations"

A few hot! things to consider, reconsider and think about

"When Iran gets the bomb, the nuclear club will have a crucial new feature. Without an Iranian bomb and barring regime change in Pakistan, we know that no nuclear power will transfer a device to a private army of the religious elect like Hiz'B'Allah in Lebanon.

"With an Iranian bomb, such assurance instantly ends.

Hiz'B'Allah is integral to the ruling clerical and military establishment in Iran. It has pledged itself to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and from the perspective of Iran's leaders it is a wing of their apparatus. The party's formidable armory, fortified territory, and intelligence capability give it credibility as a base for Iranian strategic weaponry bordering Israel, in the heart of the Arab world, and half way to Europe.

"It would be entirely within character for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard to establish a clandestine strategic unit in Lebanon, with nuclear devices.

"There are considerable temptations: targeting Israel without needing to use ballistic missiles; deniability (at least in the mind of Tehran); and a secret reserve outside Iran.

Pic "My! What a big bed you have"

VE Day!

Nazi time Deutschland literally fought to annihilation -- until there was literally no country left to defend.

The Third Reich - she died kicking and screaming, finally crashing down in an orgy of pulverized, burning cities and a river of blood — civilian and military, German and non-German. Military history knows no year quite like 1944 -45 and if lucky, will never see another.

On May 7th the surviving ruling remnants of the once powerful Dritten Reich finally screamed "GOD! PLEASE! STOP!"

May 8th is Victory In Europe Day.

The legacy of VE Day is with us still. There never could have been a European Union - let alone a re unified Germany without Great Satan's will power, staying power and fire power.

And VE Day would not have been possible without Great Satan, Great Britain, Canada, Australia and the Russian Red Army's incredible ability to absorb horrific losses, to bounce back and win.

Happy VE Day!

Future Palestine

Wheee! After suffering more pressure than Waffen SS Panzer Division 'Das Reich' in Falaise Gap, the other half of the deadly serious yet amazingly risible intolerant Little Satan Hating Posse - Dr Mearsheimer finally succumbs to repeated pleading by all the cool kids to fantasize about 'Future Palestine"

So, does the Strip become the Riviera of the Med's SE 40? Fully crunk with bookstores, girl schools, churches, gay bars, Xian Youth Groups, Yacht Clubs, Hotels, Casinos, strip clubs and abortion clinics?

Does West Bank become a Mecca for cutting edge biz, manufacturing, shopping malls, education, high finance and fashion?

Nope.

"Future Palestine, and by that I mean the future of the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, or what was long ago called Mandatory Palestine. As you all know, that land is now broken into two parts: Israel proper or what is sometime called “Green Line” Israel and the Occupied Territories, which include the West Bank and Gaza.

"In essence, about the future relationship between Israel and the Occupied Territories.

Given present circumstances there are four possible futures for Palestine, including Ye Olde "2 State Illusion."

"To be viable, that Palestine state would have to control 95 percent or more of the West Bank and all of Gaza. There would also have to be territorial swaps to compensate the Palestinians for those small pieces of West Bank territory that Israel got to keep in the final agreement. East Jerusalem would be the capital of the new Palestinian state.

"In the 2nd scenario, Greater Israel would become a democratic bi-national state in which Palestinians and Jews enjoy equal political rights. This solution has been suggested by a handful of Jews and a growing number of Palestinians. However, it would mean abandoning the original Zionist vision of a Jewish state, since the Palestinians would eventually outnumber the Jews in Greater Israel.

Third up?

"Israel could expel most of the Palestinians from Greater Israel, thereby preserving its Jewish character through an overt act of ethnic cleansing. This is what happened in 1948 when the Zionists drove roughly 700,000 Palestinians out of the territory that became the new state of Israel, and then prevented them from returning to their homes.

Following the Six Day War in 1967, Little Satan "...expelled between 100,000 and 260,000 Palestinians from the newly conquered West Bank and drove 80,000 Syrians from the Golan Heights.

"The scale of the expulsion, however, would have to be even greater this time, because there are about 5.5 million Palestinians living between the Jordan and the Mediterranean.

"The final alternative to a two-state solution is some form of apartheid, whereby Israel increases its control over the Occupied Territories, but allows the Palestinians to exercise limited autonomy in a set of disconnected and economically crippled enclaves.

Expulsions are terrible -- no doubt -- all those poor poor people having to flee their homes, refugee camps (estabbed eons ago, aided and abetted by kindred Arab nation states that for some unknown reason could not bear to assimilate their own cuzs -- who share the same dialect, customs, penchant for honor killings and tribalistic kleptocrazy) and leave the past behind.

So what?

Can't be any worse than the millions of refugees who fled before the old school Soviet juggernaut that redrew the face of Ost Europa hard on the heels of Deutschland's 'Drang Nach Osten"

Even better -- sweetly parceling out Palestinians to any of Arab League's kindred despotries (horrid and benign) would be a strategic re alignment of immense proportions!

5 and a half million of the most literate Arabs ever on the face of the earth, with a track record of voting in real, open transparent elections may very be the harbingers of democracy promotion for the Middle East in the New Millennium.

Pic - "Neither track of Palestinian politics — resistance or negotiation — offers hope of achieving independence."

Why Pakistan?

Land of the Pure is a magical place where anything can happen! Girls can learn to fly jets only 69 miles a way from where Pakistani Talibani brutally beat girls for promotional vids.

Pakistan's motto could very well be something like "Hey ya'll! Watch this!"

Why do Pakistan and the Pakistani diaspora crank out such a high proportion of the world's terrorists?

Just lucky!

"Indonesia has more Muslims than Pakistan. Turkey is geographically closer to the troubles of the Middle East. The governments of Iran and Syria are immeasurably more hostile to America and the West.

"Yet it is Pakistan, or its diaspora, that produced the CIA shooter Mir Aimal Kasi; the 1993 World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef (born in Kuwait to Pakistani parents); 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed; Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl's kidnapper, Omar Saeed Sheikh; and three of the four men behind the July 2005 train and bus bombings in London.

"The list of jihadists not from Pakistan themselves—but whose passage to jihadism passes through that country—is even longer. Among them are Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, Mohamed Atta, shoe bomber Richard Reid, and John Walker Lindh, the so-called American Taliban.

"Over the past decade, Pakistani fingerprints have shown up on terrorist plots in, among other places, Germany, Denmark, Spain and the Netherlands. And this partial catalogue doesn't include India, which tends to bear the brunt of its western neighbor's love affair with violence.

And it very may well get way worse way too soon...

Pic "Frantic in Talibanistan"

Cost Of Containment

At the same incredible instant that Persia's little rocketeer whines to the Un that Great Satan should be punished for shameful nukey naughtiness, news broke hot! intell that Great Satan has 5,113 new clear war heads with several K in reserve.

Madame Sec HRC smacked boo tay that Mullahopolis' hand picked pres "...offered the same tired, false, and sometimes wild accusations against the United States and other parties at this conference.

"But that’s not surprising. As you all heard this morning, Iran will do whatever it can to divert attention away from its own record and to attempt to evade accountability."

Whoa!

Definitive analysis of the costs of containing Iran.

There is, of course, much debate concerning what to do about Iran and the regime's pursuit of nuclear weapons. The policy proposals most frequently debated by wonks are: (1) sanctions, (2) military strikes, (3) working with, or at least supporting, the Iranian people in their efforts to overthrow the regime, (4) containment, and (5) do nothing. These are not mutually exclusive options, of course, but each comes with its own primary tactic and should come with a rigorous cost-benefit analysis.

Thinking through the costs of a "containment" strategy, similar to that used to contain the Soviet empire. This piece points out that the situation is very different from the Cold War, during which America was up against a legitimate super power as opposed to a "Third World upstart."

In recent months, however, the "contain Iran" strategy has garnered new prominence with very little thought (until Anton's piece) given to the costs of containment.

"The unstated (and probably unrealized) assumption underlying the contain-Iran argument is that, once Tehran is nuclear, America will have to get tougher.

"But how likely is that? If we won’t confront Iran over the killing of American soldiers now, why would our national spine get any stiffer in the face of a threat of nuclear retaliation?

"If we won’t do anything to stop Iran from getting the bomb, why should anyone believe that we will suddenly grow bolder once Iran actually has the bomb?

Pic "The Cost of Containment"