[ninenot]

So PJBuchanan and the Hack seem to be aligned against the sandbox-toy warrior, Billy Kristol and Wolfowitz.

[vbmoneyspender]

Smart leaders know that "supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting" - as Sun Tzu wrote years ago - and exhaust all other options before they unleash the dogs of war.

I'm sorry, I am not really up on my Chinese history but did Sun Tzu have any experience with weapons of mass destruction when he wrote his how-to several thousand years ago?

[polemikos]

I dunno, Hack. Seems Saddam won't budge unless you have a sword over his head (and even then). And expecting the UN's globalcrats to be firm is akin to wishing jello was cement. Ain't gonna happen.

Saddam may very well be the most ruthless leader on the planet today. Dealing with him puts me in mind of Sean Connery's quote from the Untouchables:

"If he pulls a knife, you pull a gun. If he sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue. That's the Chicago way."

[polemikos]

I dunno, Hack. Seems Saddam won't budge unless you have a sword over his head (and even then). And expecting the UN's globalcrats to be firm is akin to wishing jello was cement. Ain't gonna happen.

Saddam may very well be the most ruthless leader on the planet today. Dealing with him puts me in mind of Sean Connery's quote from the Untouchables:

"If he pulls a knife, you pull a gun. If he sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue. That's the Chicago way."

[rockinonritalin]

For months, the Bush war team has been talking up taking out Saddam and sneaking so many war toys into places like Qatar and Kuwait that it's a wonder our desert launching pads haven't already sunk from the weight of our pre-positioned gear and ammo.

We will avoid fighting with Iraq by convincing them that we are damn well ready to do just that.

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

I respect Hackworth, but he has gotten a few things wrong. Firstly, LBJ probably lied about the Gulf of Tonkin incident (although I only have heard Vietnam say so), secondly, Bush seems to be preparing for total war rather than the 'limited', costly action in Vietnam. Thirdly, Hackworth has Vietnam myopia. He apparently believes that we haven't learned anything from the past. That remains to be seen.

[uncbob]

What is going on here ?

I swear I saw Hackworth on some show about 3 months ago saying "It's going to be slam bam goodbye Saddam "

[fogarty]

Add Hackworth to the Bushbots list of "terrorist sympathizers and cowards" - a list which now includes:

General Zinni
General Schwartzkopf
Brent Scowcroft
Joint Chiefs of Staff
General Van Riper

Along with anyone who dares question the manner and tactics of an assault on Iraq, or anyone who dares raise concern about the logistics and manpower readiness.

[CatoRenasci]

The quote from Sun-Tzu represents great wisdom. However, saying supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting is not at all the same thing as taking a pacifist approach or being weak in the face of a ruthless and determined opponent. If an enemy in unwilling to yield and unbending in his opposition, the only ways to avoid fighting are capitulation (or appeasement, which is the same thing) or convincing the enemy that he is about to become engaged in a fight that he cannot win, while offering him a way out that preserves his person, but not his power. That involves what we we have come since the Eisenhower administration to call brinkmanship. And, in such situations, it is quite possible to miscalculate and end up in a real war. If one is not truly committed, as we were not in Vietnam, one then risks defeat. This is perhaps what Hackworth is concerned about.

I can hardly imagine that Hackworth truly believes in either appeasing Saddam or that the status quo can be maintained indefinitely. I would be very curious to hear if he has any serious policy proposals (which I doubt) to address the removal of Saddam and the successful prosecution of the war against Islamic terrorists. Hackworth is a brave man, and dedicated to our soldiers, but he showed strong leftist/isolationist tendencies after Vietnam. There is no necessary connection between his revulsion with Clinton and otherwise sensible views on foreign policy.

[Psalm 73]

"...I spoke with were for U.N. inspectors returning..."

Hey Hack, d'ya think FDR was a war-monger?
After all, going by his logic, Japan attacked us, so it was Japan that we should have whooped first. Why did we send troops into North Africa, why did we invade Italy? After all, they didn't attack us. (A rhetorical tack).
So, I see Hack has been drinking the UN kool-aid, maybe having tea with the French, too...

[Fearless Flyers]

Tough talk is meaningless without tough action to back it up. If Bush went on with his tirade against Sadam without positioning troops to back up his words, there would be no reason for the world to take the U.S. seriously and there would be no chance for inspectors to go back to Iraq.

[SevenDaysInMay]

We face a global Non-Governmental Organization warfare which seeks the offensive weapons destructive enough to devestate our economy while killing interesting numbers of us infedels. Whether by swarms of smaller scale attacks, such as practiced at WTC '93, OKC?, '98, East Africa, USS Cole, 9/11 or unleashed bio/chemical or even nukes, dirty or detonation, our mortal enemies M.O. is to wither our ability to function under Pax Americana.

Because this form of warfare offers the Axis governments plausible deniability, at least at the UN and on CNN, our national leadership must lead. The Battle of Iraq is no more offensive than our attack on the Japanese Fleets sailing east in mid 1942.

The failed societies jacking Pan-Islam's heinous envy are out to kill us, then dance in the streets over their triumph, dragging bodies of our dead if the can. The frustrated communists will continue to provide our enemies technologies to keep this war very dangerous.

IMO, we are mobilizing, with great shock over the depth and breadth of the Clintons'/Gore damage to our national defense. For too many American and international politicians, our 3,000 dead on 9/11 were not enough to prepare to win this decades long war of annihilation.

LBJ was a thoroughly corrupt bastard. He needed the Gulf of Tonkin event to play generalisimo. Our veterans need to lead in hanging the next McNamera who wastes our soldiers lives as a matter of party policy. Our current crop of politicans won't abide their Constitional duty of a Declaration of War because then we'd have to actually win the war. LBJ and Clinton are roll models to too many of our "leaders".

[dyed_in_the_wool]

It may be worth pointing out that Hack left the military because he became a pacifist.
While once a great leader of men on the field, International Relations, tact and civil leadership have never been his strong suits.
Love 'About Face', though. Great book.

[Hugin]

So PJBuchanan and the Hack seem to be aligned against the sandbox-toy warrior, Billy Kristol and Wolfowitz.

And Patty Patty Buch Buch's vast military experience consists of what? He was wrong about Gulf War I and he's wrong now.

As for Hack, I don't know what's gotten into his drinking water, but I can just as easily point to Ollie North, John McCain and even Bob Kerry who support getting Saddam. Combat veterans all.

[donozark]

My understanding is the North Viets have the patrol boat(s) involved in the Tonkin Gulf incident in a Hanoi museum. Bullet holes and all. This would of course lend credence to the incident actually occuring.

Anyone know if this is so? Any visitors to Hanoi?

[SBprone]

Hack would have us think he knows what's about to happen. He doesn't.

If Sun-Tzu were running this show he would be preparing overwhelming force just like the Bush team is doing.

Hack seems to think that Bush will let this whole thing get away from him.

Thanks for the vote of confidence Hack.

Now shut up!

[AdA$tra]

Bump for later reading.

[Cyber Liberty]

"Now it looks as though Congress is about to give Bush the green light for his shootout with Saddam rather than standing tall and insisting that U.N. weapons inspectors get another go at defanging the monster."

I got that far before I decided the rest of the article wasn't worth reading, that Hack's still gone pussy on us.

[CPL BAUM]

"Supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting" - Sun Tzu

Perhaps Sun Tzu had something in mind more akin to the following strategy:

Psychological Operation within the US military should be busy piecing together an audio and/or visual broadcast to blanket the airwaves of Iraq (to be unleashed just after the carpet-bombing ... but before the ground force invasion commences) in which their fearless leader commands that all members of his military lay down their arms and allow the "UN Weapons Inspectors" (a.k.a., 2nd Marine Division) to complete their job of "inspecting for Weapons of Mass Destruction" so that the nation of Iraq can prove once and for all to the Infidel Satanic Americans that Iraq is a peace loving nation.

We've gotta have reels and reels of audio on the guy. How tough could it be? If you thought the mass surrenders to jounalists were amusing in 1991, just envision what this disinformation could yield.

[Congressman Billybob]

Normally I respect the work of Hackworth. But here, he buys the lies of the Iraq regime about inspections as fully as Neville Chamberlain bought the lies of Hitler about German aggression. The Viet Nam analogy is false, and Hackworth should know it. Perhaps the Tonkin Gulf attack was faked or deliberately provoked, as he suggests.

But 9/11 was not provoked. And it DID happen. We all got to watch it live on TV. The proper analogy -- and as a literate military man Hackworth should know this -- is the War against the Barbary Pirates. That really happened, and in 1802 Congress gave President Jefferson the approval to go wherever and do whatever with the American military to shut down the pirates who were operating across several international borders.

The Muslim pirates then were actually not as bad as the Muslim terrorists today. Those Muslims seized our ships, crews and passangers while trying NOT to kill anyone -- because their goal was economic. The Barbary Pirates were at one point extracting one-fifth of the US federal budget in ransom payments to get our own ships and crews back.

Today's Muslims, on the other hand, are perfectly willing to kill as many Americans as they can. And they will keep at it until they are dead and their sources of money, support and weapons -- including but not limited to Iraq -- have been dispensed with.

It is a shame that Hackworth wrote, and World Net Daily published, such an historically dishonest piece.

Congressman Billybob

Click for "Til Death Do Us Part."

Click for "to Restore Trust in America"

Click for "I am almost out of ideas"

[PsyOp]

More like Hack has been sharing meds with Buchannan.