Posted on 04/13/2004 9:02:27 AM PDT by So Cal Rocket
And if anyone expects that his enemies are going to cease their incessant screaming and foaming at the mouth over it, they are quite naive.
What GWB is doing now is demonstrating that militant Islam can be defeated and rolled back. There is a lot at stake in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the mullahs in Iran know it. Their very existence and control of Iran is at risk. It is no wonder that they are aiding the terrorists in Iraq against the US. The mullahs in Iran are next.
ABC's Nightline, which is usually a liberal lint-picking exercise, did a much better job of putting the new hostage-taking campaign into perspective, explaining carefully how local expressions of concern, sympathy, and support become toys in the hands of the hostage-holders as they attempt to manipulate governments and outcomes.
Meanwhile, the local ABC affiliate rushed to the airport for an ambush interview of returning Kellogg, Brown and Root employees. (The old M.W. Kellogg engineering company got bought several years ago during the continuing collapse and "consolidation" of the oil service industry.) One employee was quoted during the interview as saying that KBR employees were told that they couldn't so much as pick up a weapon in self-defense while they were in Iraq; it was a firing offense. I'm not surprised the Texans came home; they recognize an unreasonable proposition when they see one. The New Yorkers are presumably still there, glowing with inward Hillaryness and Chuckiness as they resolutely refuse to defend themselves.
The author of the thread article appears not to be aware of the depth and power of the plan President Carter put in motion during the Desert One fiasco. That was a totally weather-imposed operational failure, aggravated by Washington's (Carter's) insistence on micromanagement: people couldn't do anything until the satellite was up, e.g., so that Carter could remain in close contact with the field commanders. Charlie Beckwith was made to drag a 100-yard-long chain of impediments into the field, and that and the bad weather killed his op.
The operation was written up from knowledgable sources about 10 years ago in Soldier of Fortune. It involved a sneaky-pete infiltration of the embassy, quick knockdown of the "student" thugs, and then massive air cover for the extraction: Spooky, F-111's, carrier air, everybody was to get involved. The embassy was to be destroyed after removal of the hostages, and Spectre gunships and "Daisy Cutters" were to be used to suppress the "students" and Pasdaran responding to the area when the alarm went up. The operation, if carried through with, would have caused absolutely massive casualties among the Iranian partisans.
SOF's principal source was a junior Air Force intelligence officer who was familiar with the op-order. He said he was glad the plan failed in the desert, because in his opinion it would likely have failed in the city with significant American casualties and a casus belli.
Which wouldn't faze me now, but this was barely five years after the fall of Saigon, when the Senate was still stiff with people like Birch Bayh, Gaylord Nelson, and Frank Church. The country and the Congress were at their flaccid, bellyfeeling worst, and only doubtfully capable of standing up for a strong and very bloody operation like Beckwith's was supposed to be.
Not if the liberal New Class has anything to say about it. They're in full ululation mode, trying to shove the country's nose into the carpet and "cure" us of our support for President Bush.
Bad dog! Bad dog! NEVER vote Republican again!
One problem is that there is a grain of truth behind the "you want to live, we want to die" taunt popularized by radical Islamists. Coffee-house radicalism is always a luxury of wealth, and requires the creature comforts of a bourgeoise society to nurture its ability to criticize the very same. If the same individual who called for "death to the oppressors" (i.e. the Western capitalists, Americans, or whatever the leftist boogeyman du jour turns out to be) is dismayed when he's taken seriously and immediately devolves to a pious preference for peace, it isn't simply hypocrisy, it's a sign that the romance of his fantasy world has come up against the gritty realities of body parts on the street and doesn't like what it sees.
More to the point, the sandmaggots must be made to see with crystal clarity that in the past we chose not to act.
We could have, perhaps should have, responded more assertively decisively and directly. We are doing so now. Deal with it, back off, or die!
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