Victor Davis Hanson Ping!
Posted on 06/02/2004 8:09:54 AM PDT by quidnunc
Most of the time in war, diplomatic machinations don't create enduring realities — events on the battlefield do. After World War I, the defeated, but not humiliated, German army that surrendered in France and Belgium provided the origins for the "stab in the back" mythology that fueled Hitler's rise to power. After World War II, by contrast, the shattered and shamed Wehrmacht in Berlin was unable to energize a Fourth Reich. George S. Patton, snarling to head for Berlin and beyond in 1945, grasped the importance of "the unforgiving minute," when military audacity can establish a fait accompli on the ground that diplomats quibble over for decades. His unfulfilled wish to take Prague meant a blank check for a late-arriving Red Army that would help ensure a half-century of totalitarianism in Eastern Europe.
The labyrinth of failed plans and bad-faith deals in the Balkans led nowhere until the U.S. Air Force secured in 79 days in 1999 the capitulation of Slobodan Milosevic — the chief foreign policy achievement of the Clinton administration. Suicide bombing failed to bring Yasir Arafat what he could not obtain at Camp David only because of the skill and ingenuity of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), which — through a multifaceted strategy of border fortification, proactive attacks, targeted air assassinations, and increased intelligence and vigilance — drastically curtailed the efficacy of the tactic. Arafat today is a marginalized figure not because of a belated European perception that he is corrupt and murderous, but because he was first reduced to a humiliated lord of a rubble pile — thanks to the IDF.
In our current postmodern world, we tend to deprecate the efficacy of arms, trusting instead that wise and reasonable people can adjudicate the situation on the ground according to Enlightenment principles of diplomacy and reason. But thugs like Moqtada Al Sadr's Mahdi Army and Saddam Hussein's remnant killers beg to differ. They may eventually submit to a fair and honest brokered peace — but only when the alternative is an Abrams tank or Cobra gunship, rather than a stern rebuke from L. Paul Bremer. More important, neutrals and well-meaning moderates in Iraq often put their ideological preferences on hold as they wait to see who will, in fact, win. The promise of consensual government, gender equality, and the rule of law may indeed save the Iraqi people and improve our own security — but only when those who wish none of it learn that trying to stop it will get them killed.
-snip-
(Excerpt) Read more at victorhanson.com ...
FYI
Kill them! Kill those who send them! Kill those who celebrate what they commit!!!
"Oh it's too late baby, yes it's too late ..."
Carol King
Victor is right-on again!
Well, let's just drop VDH into the middle of Fallujah or Ramadi so he can show the Marines how its done.
"Kill them! Kill those who send them! Kill those who celebrate what they commit!!!"
Yes!
I would have liked to see us lead the Fallujah governing council/top mullahs or whoever, to a block that had been completly destroyed.
Then we would tell them, "We will make all of Fallijah look like this, block by block, until you get the terrorists out of your city."
Then for emphasis, before their eyes, completely flatten the next block over.
IMHO what must be killed is the soulless ideology that spawns these brain dead zombies. Until then, the west is in deep doodoo.
We should be helping the goons die for their cause.
Victor Davis Hanson Ping!
If the humiliating withdrawal from Vietnam in 1975 helped create the landscape for the boat-people, reeducation camps, the Cambodian holocaust, the takeover of the Tehran Embassy, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Russian-sponsored insurrection in Central America, and a decade-long demoralization at home, so, in the same way, our momentum thus far has curtailed the Libyan weapons program, brought revelations of nuclear mischief from Dr. A.Q. Khan, and put Iran and Syria under scrutiny--a volcanic, not a static, situation that can as easily deteriorate as improve.
Both our enemies and friends are watching. And both our will and our abilities are being measured. Future actions to oppose us or support us will depend to a large degree on our perseverance and effectiveness in the current fight.
Did you catch VDH on Hugh Hewitt's Memorial Day show? Three hours of VDH covering (briefly) the history of warfare. Wow.
A perfect description of the root of most of our problems in Iraq -- the media fifth column.
Excellent article. Once the President wins reelection (Please, God!), I believe we will see a much tougher stance, more along the lines that VDH recounts.
VDH Bump!
Audacity is a force multiplier. Bears repeating.
1. Annapolis dropped him in a classroom last year to show midshipmen how it's done. Somehow that indicates that the military doesn't think he's a second-guesser.
2. Did you read the article? Do you really think that less killing of insurgents in Iraq is a choice made by the USMC? His basic point is, "Let the Marines be Marines, they're doing a great job."
3. You wrote that because you're over serving in Iraq right now, right?
Exactly.
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