Archive for March, 2007
The Dignified Rant: Sacrificing the Truth
31 March 2007One thing that never fails to anger me about some on the anti-war side is their allegation that Iraqis aren’t sacrificing to win this war and that we should pull out and let those lazy cowards fight their own war.
Of course, this forces the anti-war politicians to ignore the sacrifice that Iraqi civilians endure as [...]
The Dignified Rant: Responsibility
31 March 2007The risk we are taking by seeming to take over security duties in Shia neighborhoods from militias was on display with heavy Shia losses to Sunni car bombs:
The radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr issued a scathing attack on the United States on Friday, following one of the country’s bloodiest days, blaming Washington for Iraq’s troubles and [...]
The Dignified Rant: Hostages
31 March 2007The Iranians continue to hold fifteen British military personnel and feel no shame, as Ahmadinejad shows:
“The British occupier forces did trespass our waters. Our border guards detained them with skill and bravery. But arrogant powers, because of their arrogant and selfish spirit, are claiming otherwise,” IRNA quoted Ahmadinejad as saying during a speech in the [...]
The Dignified Rant: Dull Tip of the Spear?
30 March 2007Our European Command commander thinks we have too few Army troops stationed in Europe to accomplish its missions:
The U.S. military’s top general in Europe said the continuing rotation of Europe-based troops to higher-priority missions in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as the relocation of troops from Europe to the U.S., has left his cupboard a [...]
The Dignified Rant: Dropping a Rock on Their Own Foot
30 March 2007An interesting report on the growing theoretical ability of China to pressure Taiwan using growing economic links.
Yet in practice it hasn’t worked out for China. Indeed, the report says the Chinese tend to target the Taiwanese business people in any crisis, harming those that in theory should be most favorable to the mainland because of [...]
The Dignified Rant: Step One
30 March 2007If critics of Guantanamo Bay prison facilities ever succeed in getting us to close it over the faux human rights concerns, remember that closing this facility will just be step one in an effort to keep us from holding any terrorists anytime anywhere.
We aren’t doing anything wrong there. Tell the critics to bugger off.
Originally posted [...]
The Dignified Rant: Insurgent Numbers
29 March 2007This article (tip to Stand-To!, I think) says that one U.S. military analyst claims that the Sunni insurgency has grown to 70,000:
The analyst said he and other intelligence watchers know the Sunni enemy grew to about 70,000 based on battlefield evidence since 2004. …
The military does not believe all 70,000 insurgents are day-to-day participants. Many [...]
The Dignified Rant: Stab in the Back
29 March 2007First the House and now the Senate have voted to impede our ability to win the war in Iraq:
In a mostly party line 51-47 vote, the Senate signed off on a bill providing $122 billion to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It also orders Bush to begin withdrawing troops within 120 days [...]
The Dignified Rant: Phase V
29 March 2007Last year was a year of setbacks after initial hopes of winning that year were dashed. This occurred not because the enemy was winning but because new enemies emerged.
During 2006, we tried to get the Sunni Arabs to finally lay down their arms and end their fight (I’m suspending my Times DeSelect policy for this [...]
The Dignified Rant: Neither Guns Nor Butter
28 March 2007The North Koreans squeezed their people to scrape up the resources to build nuclear weapons.
By “squeezed” I mean starved and abused them, of course.
Yet after all of that effort, the North Koreans failed to light up a nuke last summer and failed to demonstrate basic competence in long-range ballistic missiles as well. Which explains why [...]
The Dignified Rant: Away … From the Sea
28 March 2007The Chinese are looking to increase oil imports from Russia and are visiting Russia’s central Asian region:
Chinese President Hu Jintao met industry chiefs in Russia’s oil-rich Tatarstan region on Wednesday during a visit aimed at securing energy supplies and smoothing relations between the neighbouring countries.
Hu attended a trade exhibition in Kazan, capital of the mainly [...]
The Dignified Rant: Go Tell the Britons
28 March 2007The Iranian hostage crisis continues. This cannot be about the fifteen hostages alone. It is about the Iranian regime that would tear down our world of laws and rules even is it uses those laws and rules to shield themselves from our power. Free the hostages at the price of some small surrender, and there [...]
The Dignified Rant: Between Iraq and a Couple Hard Places
28 March 2007For a people who spent four centuries lording it over their more numerous social inferiors, Iraq’s Sunnis have brought on lots of problems for themselves.
They could have portrayed themselves as liberated victims of Saddam and bought themselves a place in a new Iraq, but instead they tried to reclaim the glory days of neck stomping [...]
The Dignified Rant: Send Money, Guns, and Imams
28 March 2007Ledeen at Pajamas Media notes (without supplying a link to the article, so I looked) that the Iranian government is paying to convert Sunnis to Shias, including many in Syria:
Another country, which is also clearly a target of Iranian proselytizing, is Syria. According to some recent reports, Iran gives $10,000 to each Syrian family that [...]
The Dignified Rant: Attrition
27 March 2007Every once in a while the press reports a big insurgent attack and I comment that it is unusual since my impression is that the enemy rarely attacks in even platoon strength (30-50 men). I wondered if I was getting the right impression from press reports.
Apparently so:
A U.S. combat post was attacked by two suicide [...]
The Dignified Rant: Well, This Explains a Lot
27 March 2007North Korea agreed to shut down their nuclear programs (well, we say that. God knows what the North Koreans think they agreed to do). This might explain a lot:
“The United States does not recognize North Korea as a nuclear weapons state,” [CIA Director Michael] Hayden was quoted as saying by a South Korean defense official [...]
The Dignified Rant: I Display My Amazing Powers of Deduction
27 March 2007There were riots in a French subway station:
Officials said about 100 people were involved in the melee at Gare du Nord, one of Paris’ most important transport hubs. Officers and police dogs fired tear gas and charged at groups of marauding youths, some of them wearing hoods and swinging metal bars.
Yes, those darned “youths” again. [...]
The Dignified Rant: I Display May Amazing Powers of Deduction
27 March 2007There were riots in a French subway station:
Officials said about 100 people were involved in the melee at Gare du Nord, one of Paris’ most important transport hubs. Officers and police dogs fired tear gas and charged at groups of marauding youths, some of them wearing hoods and swinging metal bars.
Yes, those darned “youths” again. [...]
The Dignified Rant: It’s the Regime, Stupid
27 March 2007The latest Iranian hostage crisis featuring 15 British sailors and marines has the usual crowds out arguing for inaction. For some, it is America’s fault (it always is, it seems) and for others it is counter-productive to strike militarily because that “plays into their hands.”
These are sad days for Britain’s history of greatness when the [...]
The Dignified Rant: Making Friends and Influencing People
26 March 2007In our four years in Iraq, we started with the support of most Kurds, gained the support of most Shias, and are starting to gain the support of Sunni Arabs.
Our press and the sainted international community may treat the jihadis inside Iraq as glorious freedom fighters, but Iraqis are not so confused. Sunni Arabs continue [...]
The Dignified Rant: Hell Hath No Fury
26 March 2007Europe has a bloody history and talk of how Europeans have lost the ability to fight is short-sighted.
Ours is only the latest generation to imagine that brutal warfare is a relic of the past. In 1851, Edward Creasy wrote, “It is an honorable characteristic of the spirit of this age, that projects of violence and [...]
The Dignified Rant: Is It That Hard to Write Headlines?
25 March 2007Iran doesn’t like the sanctions the UN Security Council imposed.
This is what the AP headline states:
“Iran partially suspends U.N. cooperation”
The first line of the story reports:
Iran announced Sunday that it was partially suspending cooperation with the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency, citing the “illegal and bullying” U.N. Security Council sanctions imposed on the country for its [...]
The Dignified Rant: China as a Geographic Entity
25 March 2007Will the Center Hold in China?
China’s people speak quite different languages, as I noted here in the update.
And Strategypage writes that corruption in China–which prompts riots and demonstrations out in the provinces–is difficult for Peking to control because China is not a unitary state where orders from the center are followed by the peripheral regions:
Senior [...]
The Dignified Rant: The Straw?
25 March 2007The international sanctions that the UN is slowly applying to Iran over their nuclear program seem fairly insignificant. But given the sad state of Iran’s mullah-run economy, I’ve concluded/hoped that they may be more significant than I first thought.
The Iranians reject the latest sanctions:
“The world must know — and it does — that even the [...]
The Dignified Rant: What I Wrote Four Years Ago
24 March 2007On Instapundit not too long ago, Glenn Reynolds noted a challenge from the left side of the blogosphere to recall what bloggers wrote four years ago in March 2003 and admit error where wrong.
This is my entire March 2003 posting history from my old TDR site with summaries of the major points. Since each and [...]