“Fixed fortifications are monuments to man’s stupidity” - Patton
Personally I think that Patton made an overstatement; especially if they are used as part of a coherent strategy and not as the only strategy.
They should be considered a force multiplier...
-- plus heavy penalties for employers hiring illegals--for instance, the owner of a company hiring illegals should go to prison about the same time the company goes bankrupt from assessed fines----
Patton’s Army was an army of offense..rolling destruction and victory...and not defense.
Definitely an overstatement. He is speaking from historical experience of WWI and WWII (Maginot Line).
Were he commanding armies in the Middle Ages I don’t think he’d make the same claim. :)
There is a difference between a barrier and a fortification though.
One of the false protests that many raise against walls is that they aren’t 100% effective. Implicit is the idea that something that is not always adequate is not worth doing, as if even “often ineffective”, which would also be “occasionally effective” ... or mixed bag results at best, is the same as being “worthless”.
Fortifications are failure intolerant by comparisons.
The real reason the left doesn’t like walls is the symbolism that is all too clear to those on either side of them: someone takes this border seriously. For many on the left people’s mere circumstances justifies everything they do or want.
Personally, I’ve been joking/suggesting for more than a decade that we should rely on hedgerows where possible: really nasty long thorn hedges. We can fill them with all sorts of nasty critters, or at least post warning signs of all the sorts of nasty critters that might be there, declare the whole thing a bird sanctuary and get free enforcement from animal activist making sure no illegal alien overturns some bird nest (the last is part of the joke aspect).
Naturally I have always realized that REAL hedgerows take a long time to become really nasty, even if thorns several inches long can be found on relatively young plants, but like a wall the symbolism itself can be important.
Siegfried Line
When asked about the Siegfried Line, General George S. Patton reportedly said "Fixed fortifications are monuments to man's stupidity."
Of course Patton was speaking of fixed military fortifications such as the Maginot Line, not border walls for controlling immigration.
“Personally I think that Patton made an overstatement; especially if they are used as part of a coherent strategy and not as the only strategy.”
A wall isn’t the solution. It’s a tool used a s part of the solution.