Confabulatory Amnesia in America

In particular, it should be possible
to have a highly meaningful life
that is not necessarily a happy one
(e.g., as religious missionary,
political activist, or terrorist.) 
--Some Key Differences Between
a Happy Life and a Meaingful Life,
Roy F. Baumeister, et, al.  

 The less justified a man is in claiming excellence
for his own self,
the more ready is he to claim excellence
for his nation, his religion, his race or his holy cause  
--The True Believer, Eric Hoffer 

A land which … had given itself up to dreaming,
to fabulating, to tale-telling
--Lawrence Durrell 
____________________

Review: Morris Berman’s New Book on Japan, “Neurotic Beauty”

June 13, 2015 // 2 Comments

Tags: Japan, morris berman, Review
Posted in: #99Percent, Economy, Hooper's War, Post-Constitution America

Neurotic Beauty: An Outsider Looks At Japan is a fine addition to a long list of books that attempt to explain Japan, what one observer has called the “most foreign of foreign countries.” Berman succeeds in his explanation mostly by avoiding the polarized industry of such explainers. To put Neurotic Beauty in context, let me explain.


The Explainer Industry
Almost all books “about Japan” (I’m leaving out the 600 page volumes on the geisha or the photo essays on whatever new trend is coming out of Harajuku) fall into one of two categories.
The predominant narrative declares Japan a near-perfect place, an epicenter of pure Zen that has whatever the author thinks his home country lacks. The minority opinion is that Japan has come over the hill and because of its poor treatment of women workers, warlike past or economic hollowness or whatever, is doomed to be a footnote when the history of modern civilization is written. Perhaps some sort of Switzerland with much better food.
Berman asks: Why can’t both be true? Why can’t Japan be a place with a once beautiful, encompassing culture of craftsmanship, that lost its way in the modern world and, if it can find again what it really is about at its core, become the first post-capitalist country?


A Cultural History of Japan, with an Angle
The book’s argument begins with a look at what Berman sees as Japan’s cultural soul, craftsmanship. He details the relationship early potters, sword makers and others had with their work, a desire to do more than simply make something — a desire to create themselves as human beings through a quest for perfection in their work.
Inklings of this tradition still exist in modern Japan, as anyone who has seen the documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi can attest to. The sushi master requires his apprentices to practice for years before they can prepare food for customers, and the very few who stay on through the process get great joy from the process, more so than the results.


Japan Went Insane
As the Tokugawa (for simplicity’s sake, the samurai) era was coming to a close, Japan went insane, and abandoned all that, according to Berman. Fearful of being turned into a colony of the west, as was happening in China, the Japanese embarked on the Meiji Restoration. Science and engineering became the sole point of education, aimed in large part at building up a powerful military. Those forces, in imitation of the colonial west, would be turned on Japan’s Asian neighbors. Japan made itself almost literally overnight into as rapacious an imperialist nation as it possibly could.
And at that point, Berman draws a straight line through Nanjing, Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, leading right to the surrender that ended WWII. But instead of finding its way back to something of itself, Japan simply dropped capitalism in its imperial guise and picked it up in its hyper-consumerism guise. The so-called economic miracle of the 1960’s put appliances into homes and money into the hands of a booming middle class, but did nothing to fill the soul. The lost decades, and the current spiritual malaise in Japan as exemplified by the hikikomori and otaku cultures, were as inevitable as the spring rains which tear the cherry blossoms from the trees.


A Post-Capitalist Society
If you are at this point seeing some parallels to modern America, that is clearly intentional on Berman’s part (one of his earlier works is titled Dark Ages America: The Final Phase of Empire). Japan has been trying to “fill the hole” in its spiritual center for nearly a thousand years, first with Chinese learning (including Chinese Buddhism), then with a martial culture, then with imperialism, and, most lately, with consumerism. None stick; they are all too unfulfilling and incomplete.
The key difference between Japan and the U.S., however, is that because it has a legitimate soul to potentially return to (from the day the first Native American was murdered, America has been all about appetite), Japan holds on to a chance that it may become the first post-capitalist society, one where living becomes more important than owning. This is a theme which will be not unfamiliar to readers of Berman’s last book, Spinning Straw Into Gold: Straight Talk for Troubled Times. In Japan, there is something to fall back on.
It is a tall order, and Berman remains unsure what path Japan will take. Should it make the correct choice, however, the trope “only in Japan” could come to represent something more than Hello Kitty junk, bullet trains and cosplay.
Agree or disagree, Neurotic Beauty is a compelling, scholarly, narrative well-worth the time of readers seeking a better understanding of Japan.

I make no secret of my respect for Morris Berman’s body of work; read more here.
- See more at: http://wemeantwell.com/#sthash.Se3YOzNe.dpuf

Review: Morris Berman’s New Book on Japan, “Neurotic Beauty”

June 13, 2015 // 2 Comments

Tags: Japan, morris berman, Review
Posted in: #99Percent, Economy, Hooper's War, Post-Constitution America

Neurotic Beauty: An Outsider Looks At Japan is a fine addition to a long list of books that attempt to explain Japan, what one observer has called the “most foreign of foreign countries.” Berman succeeds in his explanation mostly by avoiding the polarized industry of such explainers. To put Neurotic Beauty in context, let me explain.


The Explainer Industry
Almost all books “about Japan” (I’m leaving out the 600 page volumes on the geisha or the photo essays on whatever new trend is coming out of Harajuku) fall into one of two categories.
The predominant narrative declares Japan a near-perfect place, an epicenter of pure Zen that has whatever the author thinks his home country lacks. The minority opinion is that Japan has come over the hill and because of its poor treatment of women workers, warlike past or economic hollowness or whatever, is doomed to be a footnote when the history of modern civilization is written. Perhaps some sort of Switzerland with much better food.
Berman asks: Why can’t both be true? Why can’t Japan be a place with a once beautiful, encompassing culture of craftsmanship, that lost its way in the modern world and, if it can find again what it really is about at its core, become the first post-capitalist country?


A Cultural History of Japan, with an Angle
The book’s argument begins with a look at what Berman sees as Japan’s cultural soul, craftsmanship. He details the relationship early potters, sword makers and others had with their work, a desire to do more than simply make something — a desire to create themselves as human beings through a quest for perfection in their work.
Inklings of this tradition still exist in modern Japan, as anyone who has seen the documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi can attest to. The sushi master requires his apprentices to practice for years before they can prepare food for customers, and the very few who stay on through the process get great joy from the process, more so than the results.


Japan Went Insane
As the Tokugawa (for simplicity’s sake, the samurai) era was coming to a close, Japan went insane, and abandoned all that, according to Berman. Fearful of being turned into a colony of the west, as was happening in China, the Japanese embarked on the Meiji Restoration. Science and engineering became the sole point of education, aimed in large part at building up a powerful military. Those forces, in imitation of the colonial west, would be turned on Japan’s Asian neighbors. Japan made itself almost literally overnight into as rapacious an imperialist nation as it possibly could.
And at that point, Berman draws a straight line through Nanjing, Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, leading right to the surrender that ended WWII. But instead of finding its way back to something of itself, Japan simply dropped capitalism in its imperial guise and picked it up in its hyper-consumerism guise. The so-called economic miracle of the 1960’s put appliances into homes and money into the hands of a booming middle class, but did nothing to fill the soul. The lost decades, and the current spiritual malaise in Japan as exemplified by the hikikomori and otaku cultures, were as inevitable as the spring rains which tear the cherry blossoms from the trees.


A Post-Capitalist Society
If you are at this point seeing some parallels to modern America, that is clearly intentional on Berman’s part (one of his earlier works is titled Dark Ages America: The Final Phase of Empire). Japan has been trying to “fill the hole” in its spiritual center for nearly a thousand years, first with Chinese learning (including Chinese Buddhism), then with a martial culture, then with imperialism, and, most lately, with consumerism. None stick; they are all too unfulfilling and incomplete.
The key difference between Japan and the U.S., however, is that because it has a legitimate soul to potentially return to (from the day the first Native American was murdered, America has been all about appetite), Japan holds on to a chance that it may become the first post-capitalist society, one where living becomes more important than owning. This is a theme which will be not unfamiliar to readers of Berman’s last book, Spinning Straw Into Gold: Straight Talk for Troubled Times. In Japan, there is something to fall back on.
It is a tall order, and Berman remains unsure what path Japan will take. Should it make the correct choice, however, the trope “only in Japan” could come to represent something more than Hello Kitty junk, bullet trains and cosplay.
Agree or disagree, Neurotic Beauty is a compelling, scholarly, narrative well-worth the time of readers seeking a better understanding of Japan.

I make no secret of my respect for Morris Berman’s body of work; read more here.
- See more at: http://wemeantwell.com/#sthash.Se3YOzNe.dpuf
_______________________

Further thoughts on the government's mythologizing of the Osama bin Laden raid.

It has been Ranger's consistent position that the age of terror was a sham which served no useful purpose to the citizens of the United States. The profiteers of the fabulation are many, however -- everyone from the contractors feeding off the military feeding off the government, to Hollywood.  A somewhat moribund film industry has found a new way with the pyrotechnics of the much-too-many films exploiting the easy meme of all against Terrorists.

Media has taken the Western out of the mothballs, and Destry Rides Again. The template is an easy one, and computers create vivid canvasses across which our eyes move and our brains are re-wired.

RangerAgainstWar has analyzed many of the Medal of Honor actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and concluded that, while based upon actual battles, the facts have been massaged, misrepresented and sometimes created and/or omitted as serves the meta-story (= This is a great battle against misshapen, craven malcontents, and the U.S. is there to save them -- an undefined quantity -- and us.)

However, since the Dakota Myers MOH it was clear the USMC and Navy were willing to stretch the truth. The same is true with Lieutenant Murphy's MOH, sanctified by Marcus Luttrell's hagiographic and ass-covering tale, The Lone Survivor. May as well kill two birds with one stone.

Ditto the book and subsequent movie, "American Sniper", based upon the life of the truest, bluest fightinist man since John Wayne. If you can get the people stomping mad and teary at once over one of the best if not brightest of theirs, you have won them. There are no more questions. Dismissed. Go to Chilis and watch a game (any will do) on t.v. and feel good (if not great) about being American.

Ranger's questioning is called unpatriotic blasphemy by some. But questioning the stories upon which a grave and lengthy military operation is based is the highest expression of freedom and love of country, and kicking ass in foreign lands is not the only way to be a hero.

So what does a people do when they learn the coveted truth upon which their democracy is based has been conflated with a fiction? When, contrary to the story of the brave troop of national leaders who sat riveted, watching the live feed of the OBL operation, they were in fact they were just watching another home invasion murder, as tawdry and meaningless as as a cop shooting down a man in Ferguson, Mo.?

The Middle East continues to flounder after untold loss of life and money. The (hoped for) redemptive OBL action was in fact a simple assassination, costly, but of no worth to anyone. Now we know the fix was in and it was scripted, a wrap before the helicopter lowered the troops into OBL's courtyard.

The is No Easy Day to be an American.

An Eastern Western

 
--Propaganda questions 

 But behind all this, the circus is
a massive machine whose very life
depends on discipline and motion and speed.
A mechanized army on wheels,
that rolls over any obstacle in its path,
that meets calamity again and again,
but always comes up smiling
--The Greatest Show on Earth (1952)

Look at that! That is a complete fucking fraud,
and it looks a hundred percent real.
It's the best work I've ever done in my life,
because it's so honest
--Wag the Dog (1997)

Come to your house,
no he doesn't stay long
Look around the room,
you see your father will be gone
--Death Don't Have No Mercy,
Rev. Gary Davis
________________________ 

 From a Special Operations perspective, the Osama bin Laden raid as presented by the Obama administration has some gaping holes. As Seymour Hersh said in a recent interview:

They're going in [ST6] just repelling down was the plan. You know, a perfect target for anybody with a BB gun. And they're going to go in like that without any air cover. (OBL) is going to hide out in a compound at Abbottabad, sort of a resort town, and a resort town 48 miles or so outside of Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan, within a mile or two of Pakistan's West Point where they train young officers, the army does, and a couple of miles from a regimental headquarters full of army troops. He's going to hide out there? I mean, As I wrote in the article, it's a Lewis Carroll story. It just doesn't sustain any credibility if you look at it objectively.

All Special Operations leave a paper trail, even though an event may be highly classified. Special Ops does not have any secret methods of mission preparation; they are all based upon logic and similar to those used in any combat unit. Troop-leading procedures and staff planning remain the same.

Pre-mission planning: 

-- Was Tac Air protection planned for all phases of the operation?

-- Was aerial rocket artillery pre-planned to seal off all avenues of approach and the objective?

-- Were medical assets on standby to receive the mission wounded?

-- Were intelligence assets designated to receive the Enemy Prisoners of War (EPW)?

-- Were the local U.S. Embassies alerted to the action?

-- Were "spares" designated for any helo losses at the objective?

--Was there a command and control element designated in the pre-mission planning which would be airborne during the operation?

--Were Air Forces assets on standby to deliver OBL to United States jurisdiction, should he be captured?

Actions at the Objective: 

-- Were avenues of approach blocked? 

-- Was there any near or far security element?

-- Were demo teams designated to destroy U.S. property left behind? Did the    Operations Order designate this?

-- What was the medevac standard operating procedure for friendly casualties? Were hospitals  on alert in Afghanistan?

-- What actions were anticipated Should Pakistani forces compromise the mission?

-- Were air cover assets on station?

-- Were Army Special Operations aviation assets covering the actions at the objective?

-- If the objective was too strong to be breached what actions were expected from the assault  team?

Actions upon leaving the objective: 

 

-- Were any assets designated to destroy any enemy forces reinforcing the objective?

-- Was there a designated temporary assembly area protected by friendly fires should the assault be repulsed?

These are all elements that a leader should address before, during and after the operational phases are actually conducted. An investigator should ask if these were present in the mission preparation and examination of the OPORD is vital in determining these points.

As example, the downed helo would not be destroyed until after the team was airborne and exfiltrating. No Special Operator would blow anything up until the assigned mission was completed. The mission is the highest priority.

The helo would be rigged and set to blow upon team exfiltration. Anything else would be calling additional local attention to the operation (though the sounds of gunfire and helo rotors bellowing into the night were all indications that the mission was operational, anyway.)

The team's actions indicate that this was a pre-determined cake-walk, and a real investigation would reveal this fact. Seymour Hersh's investigative piece begins the questioning, but it seems the media outlets are more interested in toeing the Obama administration's party line of denial, rather than doing their job as our watchdogs.

Murder, Inc.

Well I'm hot blooded, check it and see
I got a fever of a hundred and three
Come on baby, do you do more than dance?
I'm hot blooded, I'm hot blooded
--Hot Blooded, Foreigner

--Why'd you do it? Why did you kill him?
--He had bad breath
--Murder, Inc. (1960)

When Smith attacked Mr. Clutter
he was under a mental eclipse,
deep inside a schizophrenic darkness
--In Cold Blood, Truman Capote
________________

["Murder, Inc." is a re-post of a 9 April 2011 entry.]

February 1, 1968, B. G. Loan, Chief of the Vietnamese National Police, executed what was a guerrilla, Vietcong soldier or terrorist (take your pick, as this designation is irrelevant to this discussion.) Whichever, the recipient of General Loan's attention was shot dead on a Saigon street corner.

This was called field adjudication at the time, and in a perverse way this shooting was understandable and strangely appropriate. The killing was done in hot blood during a period of extensive combat.

However, this photo was a galvanizing moment which enabled the U.S. to pivot against the war. From 1 Feb 68, there was not a chance for the U.S. to win the war in Vietnam. Even though the execution was explained as a consequence of guerrilla activity and war crimes and due to a pervading wartime mentality -- despite any possibly legitimization of the act -- the pure violence was a turn-off to the American public.

The stark reality of the brutality was the final straw which broke the American voter's backs. That one death symbolized the futility of the shooting match in a black-and-white manner, in a way that no amount of debate could achieve. Gen. Loan's photographed action was the beginning of the end.

That was 43 years ago, and now we allow a U.S. president to issue a death warrant without anyone blinking an eye. In 1968 the U.S. public recoiled from the sight of a naked street-corner execution; in 2011, we exult at a presidentially-ordered murder of a thug in cold blood, no better or worse than a VC member on some Saigon street corner.

Why the recoil then, the approval now? The only difference is that Loan had the stones to pull the trigger himself in broad daylight. Why do we glorify a once and future president when both are akin to cold-blooded killers, something we once found so repugnant in the not-so-distant past?

Are we so disconnected from our national policies that we accept this violence in passing as business-as-usual? What does it mean to be an American today vis-a-vis war and assassination?

The lesson from Loan's/Obama's assassination is that any government with a tenuous hold on a situation will resort to desperate acts. Though the South Vietnamese restored short-term order via brutal tactics, NOTE: Saigon no longer exists.

When regimes execute people on street corners the end in nigh. Gang-style executions are symptomatic of bankrupt policies. If the U.S. was being successful, it would not have to resort to such activities.

Worst Case Planning

"Relax," said the night man,
"We are programmed to receive,
You can check out anytime you like... 
but you can never leave" 
--Hotel California, The Eagles 

Think where man’s glory most begins and ends,
And say my glory was I had such friends 
--The Municipal Gallery Revisited, 
W. B. Yeats 

______________________

The recent murder of U.S. Libyan Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other diplomats along with the release of Mark Bissonnette's book No Easy Day prompt further thoughts:

The Special Forces Son Tay raid was an Act of War into a hostile nation to retrieve United States Prisoners of War.   It was a high-risk operation, just as was the SEAL team assassination party's incursion in Abbottabad, Pakistan to kill Osama bin Laden.  The difference is, Pakistan is an ostensible ally, and allies do not invade other allies; the idea is, a nation runs hostile operations in hostile countries.

If Son Tay had failed, the U.S. could accept that fact and the resultant loss of friendly lives, but what would a botched job have done to America in the case of the OBL raid? Could we have accepted a Black Hawk Down scenario, in which U.S. dead would be dragged through the streets of a friendly nation in hideous glee?

Would the U.S. have fought any Pakistani troops sent to establish Pakistan's control of their sovereign territory?  Did anyone wargame these questions?  Were the risks worth the payoff?  Was the killing of OBL worth taking these risks?

Since the inception of the Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) the military logic of operations has consistently been composed of pie-in-the-sky planning and ignoring worst-case scenarios.  

What strategic value attended this operation?  If the intel was as good as Bissonnette's book suggests, why not just JDAM the target area?  If indeed killing was the object, why not simply put a precision target on the compound?

Maybe the fix was in, and the Pakistanis had been read into the scenario and had agreed to avoid and contact with U.S. troops, but this seems unlikely. If this were true, then they are a duplicitous bunch of opportunists sans straight-talk or straight-dealing. Whatever the situation, the operation lacked any semblance of military logic.

These thoughts pose further questions, "What is 'hostile'?"  Are Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Iraq and Afghanistan allies or even friendly, or are the hostile to the U.S.?  How does the U.S. treat enemies, and how, friends?  Can we even distinguish the difference these days?

It is hardly credible that Iraq and Afghanistan are friendly to the U.S.  It is readily believable that they will suck every dollar that we will throw their way, but they will never love or befriend us, and to believe so is delusional.

[cross-posted @ milpub]

The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, Pt. II

 Two shots in the heart, one in the mind
--T-shirt sold at a gun show

 Johnny's in America
Johnny wants a brain
Johnny wants to suck on a Coke
Johnny wants a woman 
--I'm Afraid of Americans, 
David Bowie
 __________________________

Former SEAL Mark Bissonnette's "No Good Day" recounted the assassination of Osama bin Laden, and though trying to serve as patriotic doggerel instead reveals the sham that is the Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©).

Instead of having America's finest assassinate an ailing terrorist has-been by breaching his compound, why not find out where he was having his weekly dialysis performed -- would not that be a better place to conduct an operation?  What other possible scenarios could have occurred?  Bissonnette writes of the ever-re-converted modular structure in which they trained, but there is no talk of training OUTSIDE of the box.

Of course, that would not be Bissonnette's call, but his higher ups, and one must wonder why such an anti-climactic denouement with such apparent contradiction was executed.  However, this quality should come as no surprise when one of the founding theatrics of the PWOT © -- the all-services "rescue" of Jessica Lynch -- was revealed for the sham it was.

Further, was it necessary to kill bin Laden?  Was he still an operational threat, or just a symbolic target of revenge?  If the latter, then the United States is using terror to combat terror, a never-ending Mobius strip of murder.

If the PWOT is about winning hearts and minds, how do we justify assassination? If the operation was so vital to our national security, then why is the helmet cam footage not being released?  Surely we the citizens have the right to see our tax dollars at work killing folks and alienating Islamic hearts and minds.

It has not been explained how the U.S. has the right to violate the sovereignty of the borders of the  nation of Pakistan.  Would we Americans welcome United Nations black helicopters invading our borders?

The U.S. romps and stomps like a bull in a China shop, acting as though the entire world -- or even just U.S. taxpayers -- buys into the Special Operations view of the world, which is that they may kill at will.

Entropy in FLA

Dracula: Blade, ready to die?
Blade: I was born ready motherfucker!
--Blade (1998)

The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle
--The Second Coming, William Butler Yeats

I can feel it coming in the air tonight, Oh Lord
I've been waiting for this moment, all my life, Oh Lord
--In the Air Tonight, Phil Collins
________________

RAW's on the road this week, and wished to share this celebratory marquis discovered in the Jacksonville Beach area. (Note the un-posed slabside behind the sign, sans rear hubcap, and the general crummy condition of the parking lot tarmac.)

But . . . Osama bin Laden is dead, dontcha know? And even though our infrastructure is crumbling nicely about our ears without any help from Mr. bin Laden (From God you come and to God you return), we still find cause to celebrate, like the musicians on the deck of the Titanic. We in Florida have always been privy to a certain genteel poverty, but is becoming more ubiquitous daily. But as long as they have a fight song, a team or a tribe, Floridians and much of the nation have a reason to believe.

Damn the flooding Mississippi dams, forget the BP oil fiasco, come hell or high water, there will always be a heathen hadji to fight. Hence the reason for some glee at the Pawn shop selling weapons, some to would-be Green Mountain Boys planning on going varmint hunting.

The sale wouldn't be because people lack the money to buy even those things pawned, would it?

Going Down

I'm just trying to make it real, baby, like it is.
I mean, maybe this is what you're supposed to do,
maybe this is what you're growing to
--Superfly (1972)

I told you to put one in his brain,
not in his stinkin' face!
--Miller's Crossing (1990)

Define your meanin' of war
To me it's what we do
when we're bored
--You're Going Down, Sick Puppies
___________________

Diane Sawyer, reporting on the killing of Osama bin Laden, said, "Now that we've taken him down . . ." Excuuuse me, Diane Sawyer, but are you a news person or a Mafia gun moll?

"Take him down" -- the vernacular of our new post-racial America? Now the U.S. has an African-American acting like John Gotti and newsfolk like Sawyer cheerleading us on to the lower levels of societal conduct as we lurch towards becoming a Marvel comic version of ourselves, at least in our minds. The vernacular of artistes like 50 Cent will lead the way; we will simply be following our president who enjoys that thug -- along with Old School, mind, on his iPod; or at least that's what he said when he was politicking.

Come to think of it, following the Mafia's lead might be an improvement as they at least try to limit collateral damage, and seldom target women or children.

Maybe Mrs. Sawyer's husband -- comic/director Mike Nichols -- is helping script a bit of dynamism in to what has been admittedly a somber business. Diane et. al. are helping us get our war on in the coolest way possible.

Real fly, Diane.

Murder, Inc.

Well I'm hot blooded, check it and see
I got a fever of a hundred and three
Come on baby, do you do more than dance?
I'm hot blooded, I'm hot blooded
--Hot Blooded, Foreigner

--Why'd you do it? Why did you kill him?
--He had bad breath
--Murder, Inc. (1960)

When Smith attacked Mr. Clutter
he was under a mental eclipse,
deep inside a schizophrenic darkness
--In Cold Blood, Truman Capote
________________

February 1, 1968, B. G. Loan, Chief of the Vietnamese National Police, executed what was a guerrilla, Vietcong soldier or terrorist (take your pick, as this designation is irrelevant to this discussion.) Whichever, the recipient of General Loan's attention was shot dead on a Saigon street corner.

This was called field adjudication at the time, and in a perverse way this shooting was understandable and strangely appropriate. The killing was done in hot blood during a period of extensive combat.

However, this photo was a galvanizing moment which enabled the U.S. to pivot against the war. From 1 Feb 68, there was not a fart's chance in a windstorm for the U.S. to win the war in Vietnam. Even though the execution was explained as a consequence of guerrilla activity and war crimes and due to a pervading wartime mentality -- despite any possibly legitimization of the act -- the pure violence was a turn-off to the American public.

The stark reality of the brutality was the final straw which broke the American voter's backs. That one death symbolized the futility of the shooting match in a black-and-white manner, in a way that no amount of debate could achieve. Gen. Loan's photographed action was the beginning of the end.

That was 43 years ago, and now we allow a U.S. president to issue a death warrant without anyone blinking an eye. In 1968 the U.S. public recoiled from the sight of a naked street-corner execution; in 2011, we exult at a presidentially-ordered murder of a thug in cold blood, no better or worse than a VC member on some Saigon street corner.

Why the recoil then, the approval now? The only difference is that Loan had the stones to pull the trigger himself in broad daylight. Why do we glorify a once and future president when both are akin to cold-blooded killers, something we once found so repugnant in the not-so-distant past?

Are we so disconnected from our national policies that we accept this violence in passing as business-as-usual? What does it mean to be an American today vis-a-vis war and assassination?

The lesson from Loan's/Obama's assassination is that any government with a tenuous hold on a situation will resort to desperate acts. Though the South Vietnamese restored short-term order via brutal tactics, NOTE: Saigon no longer exists.

When regimes execute people on street corners the end in nigh. Gang-style executions are symptomatic of bankrupt policies. If the U.S. was being successful, it would not have to resort to such activities.

[cross-posted @ milpub]

OBL's Mancave

All murderers are punished unless they kill
in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets
--Voltaire

Let us tend to our gardens
--Candide, Voltaire
_______________________

It's late, and I'm a bit punchy. But my reaction to this story is rather telling about the whole shebang (for me, anyway). First, the clip:

• Info from Osama raid shows interest in US trains (AP)

  AP - Some of the first information gleaned from Osama bin Laden's compound indicates al-Qaida considered attacking U.S. trains on the upcoming anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. But counterterrorism officials say they believe the planning never got beyond the initial phase and have no recent intelligence pointing to an active plot for such an attack.

My first reaction upon reading the head was,

"By Gawd, the poor man had a Lionel train set up in his mancave -- Lionel!!! -- and we killed him, when he really -- secretly -- loved us and our toys!"

That simple reaction tells a few things: [1] What a hopeless, pathetic romantic I am; [2] How severely I distrust the news given me by most major news outlets and, [3] What a failure the entire hunt for OBL has been that his assassination leaves me with the least bit of sympathy for my sworn enemy.

Then I read the story and thought, "This is probably hogwash to quell any suspicion that Bin Laden had in reality been largely superannuated." The whole cascade of events, from the blatant reality that our actual enemy is Pakistan and we daren't do a thing (unless we pull a Qaddafi on Zardari) to the anticlimactic assassination of OBL and Obama's fallow statement that "justice has been done" and wreath laying in NYC today -- it all strikes me as so robotic and forced, and not authentic.

When will the U.S. leave the sandbox and tend to our own gardens, which are becoming monstrously overgrown with weeds?

Abraham

Ranger Comment of the Day:

Since the WOT started, we've had
130,000 homicides in the U.S.
We have killed 130,000 of our own selves.
Meanwhile: How many have been killed
by domestic terrorists?

Don't give me that liberal yuppie bullshit
about a good fight, this isn't fucking Yale!
A good fight is one you WIN!
--True Believer (1989)
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When it was recently reported that Osama bin Laden's son, Saad bin Laden, was probably killed by a US missile strike in Pakistan earlier this year, this is one indication why the U.S. will not be successful in their Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) in AFPAK or Iraq.

The people fighting us are in it for the long haul, and they believe in what they are doing. OBL puts his sons on board. How many U.S. leaders put their families in harm's way? Generally speaking, the rich and powerful do not sacrifice their offspring on the altar of democracy.

OBL means to win; our leaders are cheerleaders. We may kill OBL's son, and we may even kill OBL, but that won't solve the problem. Did the deaths of the Saddam Hussein family make the Middle East or America any safer?

Another generation of dictatorial rule is germinating in Iraq as we swipe our credit cards through the machine.

Running Out the Clock

If you want to study the social and political
history of modern nations, study hell
--Thomas Merton

The United States today finds itself with
too much war and too few warriors
--Andrew J. Bacevich,
"The Next President Will Disappoint You"

I went down to the bank this mornin', 'bout half past nine.
Well, I was lookin' for a little somethin' in the credit line.
But the man said: "Look, what we got here, sonny:
"There's too much month at the end of the money"
--Too Much Month, Marty Stuart
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Ranger Question of the Day:
Why does everyone assume Osama bin Laden is in Pakistan?
Why not Saudi Arabia?
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In previous post Daddy Dearest, Ranger posited that the easiest way to disrupt terrorist networks is to foment discord within the ranks, thereby fragmenting their cohesion.

But what if al-Qaeda is the one exception to the rule, and classic attacks like disrupting money conduits and encouraging internal dissent will not work. What then?

Has anyone ever asked them what they want? Did anyone ask Khalid Sheik Mohammed in questioning what was his mission statement? "What were you trying to achieve?"

Did anyone offer them a forum, like a one-page New York Times ad? A professional You Tube? A microblog? Surely al-Qaeda is not so stupid as to espouse a "long war" strategy, are they?

What is their idea of success?