Woodrow Wilson’s War Speech to Congress, 2 April 1917
(Time to pull this off the shelf and update it) :
(snip)
I am not now thinking of the loss of property involved, immense and serious as that is, but only of the wanton and wholesale destruction of the lives of non-combatants, men, women, and children, engaged in pursuits which have always, even in the darkest periods of modern history, been deemed innocent and legitimate. Property can be paid for; the lives of peaceful and innocent people cannot be. . .
It is a war against all nations. American ships have been sunk, American lives taken, in ways which it has stirred us very deeply to learn of, but the ships and people of other neutral and friendly nations have been sunk and overwhelmed in the waters in the same way. There has been no discrimination.
The challenge is to all mankind. Each nation must decide for itself how it will meet it. The choice we make for ourselves must be made with a moderation of counsel and a temperateness for judgment befitting our character and our motives as a nation. We must put excited feeling away. Our motive will not be revenge or the victorious assertion of the physical might of the nation, but only the vindication of right, of human right, of which we are only a single champion.
(snip)
There is one choice we cannot make, we are incapable of making: we will not choose the path of submission and suffer the most sacred rights of our Nation and our people to be ignored or violated. The wrongs against which we now array ourselves are no common wrongs; they cut to the very roots of human life.
(snip)
It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be in the balance.
But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts - for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own Governments, for the rights and liberties of small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.
To such a task we can dedicate our lives and our fortunes, everything that we are and everything that we have, with the pride of those who know that the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured. God helping her, she can do no other.
Hey all, was at my parent’s place (with no internet for the most part) with the wife for the annual turkey cull.
Braak’s take..from watching CNN and FOX:
1. The bad guys were very well trained for this...I was shocked frankly any were taken alive. Somebody on the thread said one or two of the bad guys were high on something. One of the mistakes they did make was the amount of intell they left behind. From what I am seeing and hearing thus far, this has the makings of a rogue ISI op in conjunction with LeT or Indian Mujaheddin...probably with some “staff work” done by Al-Q.
2. This was a big terrorist force...to take and hold ten separate targets in a city as large as Mumbai, and still have enough people to have roving bands of gunmen shoot the neighborhood up...I am thinking a short battalion sized force. I will even say some of the bad guys have probably already gotten away...probably stashed the weapons and gear and faded away in the confusion.
3. This was probably the largest terrorist operation ever. Nobody’s done something like this..and to be honest, it’s blurring the line here between a takedown of a terrorist held building or two...and a conventional infantry operation. We’re the only people who have come close to dealing with something like this in Iraq and Afghanistan, and nobody’s done it in a city of 30 million. Frankly...the Indians are doing solid work...we’d have more firepower and gadgets...the Indians tend more towards manpower intensive solutions. Word is casualties among the assaulter units were “very heavy”. Big kudos to that Hip pilot during the fastrope on the Chabad house...that was sierra hotel work staying that still...methinks the NSG needs to look at UH-60s or something with more than one troop door though. As for the cops...well, IFK put it best...no private gun ownership in India right now..so the Indian police don’t often deal with this kind of thing (who does?) and frankly..even having a SWAT capability might not have been enough. (Would NYPD or LAPD have done better in a similar scenario?)
In short...the bad guys pulled off a spectacularly successful operation from their POV. And if I am right about the links...Pakistan just started another Indo-Pakistani war. I am betting the civilian government knew nothing about this...but it doesn’t matter, as in Pakistan, it’s often the ISI and the Army calling the shots.
Braak is predicting war by Christmas.