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Jank - verbish kinda noun roughly xlated as bad, no account, suckish, worthless.
Not unlike being trapped with elderly ancients whining and pining about how the country is on a highway to hello.
Zooming in on Great Satan haters in the Internat'l Community of jerks, creeps and tyrants reads like a fun to be with event in your local newspaper:
From Caracas to Tehran, political leaders who have defined themselves through their caustic anti-American rhetoric, men who shook masses of followers into frenzies of anti-Washington fervor, are having some very, very bad days.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, who still refers to Great Satan as “The Empire,” the man who fanned himself on the UN stage to blow away the heckish devilish fumes smell of 43, and later said he could still smell sulfur after 44 stood at the podium, has become gravely ill. The populist Chávez manipulated his country’s laws hoping to stay in power until 2030, but now he has cancer. With few details revealed other than his admission that he had cancer surgery in Cuba, it’s hard to know what the prognosis is. But it seems unlikely Chávez’s disastrous one-man rule of Venezuela will last another two decades.
Chávez’s good pal Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is going through some difficulties of his own. The Iranian president, whose own hate-filled speeches have triggered walkouts at the UN — as when he said most people blame Washington for the 9/11 attacks — is gradually losing power. The ayatollahs who helped him retain the presidency after the protests that followed the disputed 2009 election, have had enough of Ahmadinejad. He got too big for his britches and now the turbaned ones want him out. He may or may not stay in office, but he has lost much of his power.
Neither Ahmadinejad nor Chávez would get much sympathy from another of their best friends, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Assad is fighting for his political life, and doing it by killing hundreds upon hundreds of pro-democracy demonstrators in his own country. The demonstrators continue the fight. Assad has lost all legitimacy. He had tried to wear the mask of a moderate reformer, but now all Syrians, all Arabs — the entire world, really — know the truth. He is a butcher who will stop at nothing to hold on to power.
It gets better!
The troubles for Dr General President For Life Bashar Bay Bee and Gay Free Persia's fiery little rocketeer Ahmadinejad could give ulcers to Hiz'B'Allah's overtly robust bespectacled rocket rich Body Part Collector General H'Ssan Nasrallah, who has his hands full with some serious jank of his own design.
A U.N. Special Tribunal has indicted four Hiz'B'Allah members in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Nasrallah had desperately tried to prevent this from happening. That’s because the indictment rips the veneer off Hiz'B'Allah's claim to work only for the protection of Lebanon. Most Lebanese know his militia was created by Iran, armed by Tehran and Damascus, and worked at the behest of the Iranian and Syrian regimes. Hariri’s killers sought to protect Syrian control of Lebanon by eliminating its most effective critic.
In Iraq, that other anti-American cleric, Moqtada al-Sadr, is fuming because the government may ask some American soldiers to stay in Iraq. All Great Satan's combat cats troops are scheduled to unAss the place at the end of this year. But many in the Iraqi government want to ask Great Satan hang out a while longer.
Oh Snap - a mini Nakbah fo sho ho! Iraqi gov asking the Americans to stay. It’s enough to make the overtly girthy fuzz faced Iranian minion Mookie totally freak the freak out and threaten a new civil war!
Of course, America’s best-known enemy, ObL, is out of the picture. He may or may not be enjoying the services of 99 virgins in paradise. But he has finally given his life for the cause, something he wanted only his followers to do.
Lest too much hap hap happiness is taken from mocking the afflicted or dead - there are some evil minder control freaks enjoying that four hour glow from gobbling multiple extenze
Ahmadinejad’s domestic foes may hate Great Satan's guts even more than he does. In Arab countries where America has lost important friends, their replacements could create new difficulties.
In Aegypt, the most powerful political party is the MoBroHood, hardly fans of America (or girls. Shudder). But even more troubling is what we’re learning about the “liberal” parties. The vice president of Wafd, the biggest secular party, recently declared that 9/11 was “Made in America,” the Holocaust is a “lie,” and Anne Frank a “fake.”
So even as enemies au courant are getting backed up, jacked up and slack jawed - new opportunities and maybe even new enemies are raising their pointy little heads. The latest issue of Jank Times.
Pic - "Wrong in all the right ways and read all over!"
Strategy!
"The comprehensive way to try to pursue political ends, including the threat or actual use of force"
Perhaps the only thing better than belly shots or strategy in general - is military strategy in particular.
The 2011 Nat'l Military Strategy has been unleashed (pdf) and it ain't all that.
Teufel Hunden's Warcraft Academy academic cadre - the same cats who gave us COINista gankstas like Dr Mark Moyer and the essential "Question of Command"- brings the bling with cirriculum cohort the super savvy Professor Lacey, former All American/Screaming Eagles, Institute for Defense Analyses cat and embed reporter for the Op that took out the largest Arab army in history in 20 days. Dr L zeroes in with some killer critique:
Purporting to explain how the military will support the National Defense Strategy, which in turn explains how the Department of Defense will support the objectives of the National Strategy. Taken together, the three documents are supposed to provide our military leaders with all the strategic-planning guidance they require for the next year. Given their stated importance, I probably should not have taken several months to get around to reading the NMS. On the other hand, very few persons in the military ever bother to read it at all. In fact, most of the few dozen or so who do read it, do so only because they want to have something to ridicule. Most recognize that the NMS is useless as far as providing strategic direction for the force, so why should officers busy fighting 2.5 wars waste any of their precious time on it?
I teach strategy to Marines and other military officers for a living. The classes hear ad nauseam that if your plan does not include any directions as to how to carry it out, and how to obtain resources for it, then you do not have a strategy. You have an aspiration. The NMS has a lot of aspirations. There are several dozen of them in the first few pages alone. One has to wade through eight pages of aspirations before coming to: “The core task of our Armed Forces remains to defend our Nation and win its wars.” Wow! I would have led with that one.
Military strategists might wonder why the authors of the NMS made them wade through a third of the document before getting to the crucial reason of why we maintain a military in the first place. One might even wonder if the NMS authors really mean that winning wars is job number one, since elsewhere in the document you find: “Lastly, we will be prepared to act as security guarantor — preferably with partners and allies, but alone if necessary — to deter and defeat acts of aggression.” Lastly? Really? Since page one says, “Our foremost priority is the security of the American people, our territory, and our way of life,” one wonders what activities are so important that the military has moved defeating aggression to last in its order of concerns.
If you do not tell commanders and planners the relative priority of each of the 250 (plus) things you want them to prepare for, then everything becomes a top priority — or a bottom priority. With the budget constraints the military will face in upcoming years, commanders need to know what the priorities are so they can properly allocate limited funds. The NMS pays lip service to this on its second page: “Defense budget projections indicate that leaders must continue to plan for and make difficult choices between current and future challenges.” I bet a lot of leaders hoped to find a clue somewhere in the next 19 pages as to how to do that. Instead they get this:
Both our Nation and military will face increased budget pressures and we cannot assume an increase in the defense budget. As we adjust to these pressures, we must not become a hollow force with a large force structure lacking the readiness, training, and modern equipment it needs. Instead, we will maintain a whole, Joint Force that retains quality people, sustains and develops the right capabilities, and maintains a sustainable tempo to effectively mitigate operational, institutional, force management, and future challenges risk. We must continue to . . .blah blah blah.
In other words, you leaders will not have anywhere near the money you need, but you are still expected to do everything you did before, plus some.
The NMS tells commanders that this strategy “acknowledges the need for leadership that is redefined for an increasingly complex strategic environment,” but it gives us no idea what “redefined” means or how commanders should go about redefining themselves. It tells leaders they must “leverage our capabilities,” without telling them what capabilities to leverage or how to do so. The NMS states: “As a convener, our relationships, values and military capabilities provide us, often uniquely, with the ability to bring others together . . .” What the heck is a convener?
It is also good to know that “the Joint Force will take a strong role in international efforts to safeguard access, sustain security, provide oversight and accountability, and promote responsible norms in the global commons.” What exactly does it mean to provide “oversight and accountability” for the global commons? I was unable to find “providing oversight and accountability” on any of the Services’ mission lists. And for that matter, does anyone have a list of these “norms” and possibly even some pointers on how a carrier task force goes about promoting them?
This is not real strategy. Rather it is strategy by platitude.
Platitudes, for the uninitiated, are a long-honored tradition in the military. When I was a young Army infantry officer, they used to bring a number of general officers in to speak to us during training. Over time, someone developed a list of platitudes generals loved to use (e.g., Train as you fight, or, What you do in training you will do in combat). Copies were handed out before every talk. As a result, no one paid much attention to the general’s message, as the soldiers were all checking off boxes so as to win Platitude Bingo. If such a list existed for scoring national-security documents, the NMS might not win, but it would be close.
A real strategy must address three items: ends (What do you want the military to do? — and saying “Everything” is not the best answer), ways (How do you want it done?), and means (What do I have to do it with?). If your strategy does not include all three of these essentials, then you have produced trash that no one will read. Well, maybe not no one. Whatever committee gets assigned the task of writing the NMS for 2012, its members will pull the 2011 version up on their computers and use it as the draft for their own version.
Dr Lacey also done did two of those stiff back things with paper in them called "First Clash: The Miraculous Greek Victory at Marathon and Its Impact on Western Civilization" and "Keep from All Thoughtful Men: How U.S. Economists Won World War II"
Dr Lacey's views are his own of course and are not to be considered as DoDish or Marine Corps University Official jawflapping.
Pic - "Dell'arte della guerra"
WoW - the Watchers Council - an eclective collective of cats both cruel and benign with their ability to put steel on target (figuratively - natch) on a wide variety of topictry across American, Allied, Frenemy and Enemy concerns, memes, delights and discourse.
Every week these cats hook up each other with hot hits and big phased cookies to peruse and then vote on their individual fancy catchers.
With out further adieu and adon't:
Council Winners
Non-Council Winners
See you next week!
GsGf's Persian Advisor, the right honourable (and right hot!) Dr Karim Sadjadpour reveals that despite "...Iranian President M'moud Ahmadinejad’s demagoguery and Holocaust revisionism on the world stage have earned him alarmist comparisons to der Fuhrer, his recent, ignoble fall from grace reveals the Iranian president for what he really is: the dispensable sword of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei."
Since the Revolution way back in the last millennium, 2 schools of cats have been running the place:
Reforming pragmatists really think 'Slamic Republic’s survival means to ease up - way up - on political and social restrictions and making economic expediency a top priority over ideology.
And
Hard-lining hard liners, led by Supreme Leader, believe caving in on revolutionary ideals could totally queer the mix - like that perestroika stuff did to the old Union of Soviet Collectivist Republics.
"...What Khamenei failed to realize was that Ahmadinejad and his cohorts had greater ambitions than simply being his minions.
"...They spoke of their direct connection to the hidden imam — Shiite you know what slam’s Messiah equivalent — in an attempt to render the clergy obsolete. In “private” meetings — which were bugged by intelligence forces loyal to Khamenei — Ahmadinejad’s closest adviser, Rahim Mashaei, spoke openly of designs to supplant the clergy. The last straw came earlier this year, when Ahmadinejad tried to take over the Ministry of Intelligence, whose vast files on the financial and moral corruption of Iran’s political elite are powerful tools of political persuasion and blackmail.
K. Sooo what all is gon happen, Cap'n?
"...Khamenei’s desire to project a unified front to the world is likely to keep Ahmadinejad in office until his term expires in 2013. Khamenei seeks to wield power without accountability; this requires a president who has accountability without power. A disgraced Ahmadinejad can conveniently absorb blame for the country’s endemic economic, political and social disaffection.
"...Great Satan can aid the cause of democracy and open society in Iran by focusing on tearing down the information and communication barriers the regime has erected. Technological aid and infrastructure for better Internet and satellite communications would allow Iran’s democracy activists to stay connected with one another and show the outside world what’s happening in their country.
"...By accentuating the country’s internal rifts and breaking previously sacred taboos — such as challenging the supreme leader — Ahmadinejad has become an unlikely, unwitting ally of Iran’s democracy movement. Once thought to be leading the "Slamic Republic’s rise, he is more likely to be remembered by historians as the man who hastened its decay.
Pic - "Supreme Leader's rhetoric depicts a resolute leader with a remarkably consistent and coherent—though highly cynical and conspiratorial—world view.”
Rodina Mat' Zovyot!
As a really girthy nation/state (ain't none bigger bay bee!) Commonwealth Russia spans like a bunch of the earth's surface.
And she hangs in a rough hood - hooked up border wise with semi rival new clear powers like Ppls Republic of China and crazy Dear Leader's NoKo
As hostess with the mostess of those hot! Siberian resourceful resources Commonwealth's Military is still suffering from that underwhelming blitz that finally licked Georgia's peach plumb clean plus she needs her military to get up as close as possible to outperform PLA one day...
Commonwealth's military production industrial complex is totally jank too:
"...Only 36% of strategic defense enterprises are solvent, while another 23% are tottering on the verge of bankruptcy.
"...Another problem has to do with human resources. Most skilled workers and scientists are nearing retirement age. At the same time, quite a few technical-college graduates are in no hurry to sign up with the defense industry because of low wages and insufficient career opportunities.
"...The lack of qualified personnel and up-to-date production equipment will inevitably impair product quality. In fact, India, Algeria and some other countries are beginning to file quality claims.
Oh Snap! Only now, the flight of smart cats is spreading to the generals tovarisch!
"...Reporting in the Russian media on July 5 on the resignations of another group of generals triggered unusual speculation about their motives. It centered on why a small number of comparatively young and talented generals had resigned, and if this might shed light on the dark recesses of a “reform” that has long-since faltered under the burden of self-contradiction (Komsomolskaya Pravda, July 5).
"...Resignations were submitted by Lieutenant-General Andrei Tretyak (52), the Deputy Chief of the General Staff and Chief of the Main Directorate of Operations, Lieutenant-General Sergei Skokov (51), the Chief of Staff in the Ground Forces and Major-General Oleg Ivanov (45), Chief of the Electronic Warfare Directorate and “others.”
"...During the reorganization of General Staff officers initiated under the management of Defense Minister Anatoliy Serdyukov in the fall of 2008, that literary concept transmogrified into a unique contemporary experience: the “superfluous general.”
"...The Russian defense ministry is currently pre-occupied with issues such as European missile defense, the future of Russia’s strategic deterrence, and a faltering military modernization agenda; for many “reform” has slipped off the radar.
"...But the underlying issue that transcends analysis of “reform” is that the latest “superfluous generals” were younger with more career potential than previous examples.
"...And the top brass can ill-afford to lose such senior officers.
Pic - "Can't really forecast Russia's actions. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma: but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interests.”
Janissaries!
Since the traditional despot remedial activity in Syria seems to be an endless sexercise in futility (aren't they all? Why even tolerate their existence?) and a destabilizing factor in regional stability - What if - the Ottomans decided to do Syria?
GsGf's Ottomanic expert Dr Soner Çağaptay (Oh! He got game bay bee!) shares re estabbing the ancient Imperium would be totally off the hook y'all!
"...Growing unrest in Syria is increasingly spilling over the border into Turkey. So far 12,000 Syrian refugees have crossed into Turkey, and with a crackdown on the way in Idlib near the border, thousands more could be heading that way.
"...Ankara has expressed outrage at the situation, calling the Syrian regime's oppression of civilians a "savagery." It has also said it might set up a buffer zone inside Syria to manage the flow of refugees on the Syrian side of the international line.
Uh - hold up! Could Ottoman Army really, really waltz into Suriya al- Kubra sans Bashar Bay Bee's Official Consent?
"...You bet, Courtney! To start with, the Turks are restless, for they are now stuck between a rock and a hard place. The first instinct of the Justice and Development Party, or AKP, government in Ankara in reacting to the unrest in Syria is to avoid conflict and try to maintain good relations with Damascus. Since coming to power in 2002, the AKP has put in place a "zero problems with neighbors" policy, which included promoting rapprochement with Syria, and subsequently becoming one of Damascus' best friends.
"...However, as the Syrian crisis threatens to spill over into Turkey, the "zero problems" policy may not be sustainable. If unrest moves into Aleppo, a Syrian city with 3 million inhabitants located only 26 miles from the Turkish border, there could be a massive wave of refugees into Turkey. And do not forget the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK. This group, which has launched destructive terrorist attacks in Turkey, is well organized in the ethnically Kurdish areas of northern Syria along the Turkish border, including Azez. The Syrian membership of the PKK also represents the group's hard-line, violence-is-the-best-policy branch. A flow of Syrian refugees into Turkey would mean at least a few undetected hard-line PKK members slipping across the border, which is something that Ankara does not want.
"...Ankara's first reaction to the spiraling violence in Syria will be to contain the crisis in Syria. This would also help Turkey maintain the growing soft power it has painstakingly built in the Arab world since the AKP rose to power in 2002. So, expect Turkey to avoid direct military intervention to the extent possible. Instead, expect Ankara be serious about its proposal to set up a buffer zone inside Syria, in which the Turkish government and military would provide the Syrian citizens with security and relief. This happened once before in 1991 when during the Gulf War, Saddam unleashed violence on Iraq's Kurdish population in the north. Around 1.5 million Iraqi Kurds fled towards Turkey. Ankara set up a buffer zone inside Iraq to contain the flow of refugees. In April 1991, following these efforts, the United States began Operation "Provide Comfort," which set up bases to deliver humanitarian aid to refugees from inside southern Turkey, and sent a U.S.-led coalition force into northern Iraq to establish a de-militarized zone and construct resettlement areas. In July, Operation Provide Comfort II began, which served mainly to protect the Kurds from Iraqi attacks. Ankara might pursue at least the first, Turkish-led part of this model again so that the refugee problem does not end up in its lap.
"...There is always a chance that Syria might turn out to be worse than Iraq. Should the Assad regime carry out massacres in large cities such as Aleppo -- certainly a possibility, given that Assad's father bombed downtown Hama in 1982, killing at least 10,000 to crush an uprising there -- the AKP might find Turkish public sympathies for the persecuted fellow Muslims next door too unbearable to ignore. Genocidal massacres in Syria, coupled with the breakdown of law and order, would make Turkish intervention almost unavoidable. So, a Turkish buffer zone inside Syria might well be Turkey's best option to avoid a direct military intervention for humanitarian reasons, but only so long as Assad does not turn genocidal on his own people.
Pic - "Persia has interests in Syria too" with Nilanti
