Symbolic Targets

Life is a meaningless nightmare of suffering,
and it's all over too soon
--Woody Allen
_____________________

[Note:  Ranger will be returning to his military roots this week. While Lisa had a lot of presence in posts over the past several years, she will now pull back to the role of copy editor. Readers may note the lack of gussying up. (But if you liked Rangerette's frilly-Kevlar style, you will still see it in her posts.) The writer will always be identified in the vanishingly-light tagline at the article's end. -- the editrix.]

The key point of terrorist activity is that their targets are soft and symbolic. That is why the craven activity of running down pedestrians with a van should not be surprising.

This clearly indicates that terrorism is NOT warfare because softness and symbolism does not designate legitimate military targets. When applying a military yardstick to terrorism we lull ourselves into a false sense of security, i.e., we will be protected by a powerful military that knows how to fight it.

Simple logic dispels that notion. Ask yourself: "How many al Qaeda No. 2's has the United States killed since starting its Non-War of Terror? Did any of those drone kills produce security here in the States?

If we think symbolic targets are not cricket for the use of terrorists, then why does the U.S. use them? Assassinating Osama bin Laden in his bedroom is a good example.

If OBL had been killed at the Battle of Tora Bora, that would have been legitimate as he would not have been a symbolic target, just another hostile on the battlefield. However, escaping death he moved on to sanctuary in Pakistan. (Good jihadists don't really get 72 virgins, but rather safe haven in Pakistan, the original "Sanctuary City" state.)

In his safe house, the aging OBL was no longer a military threat (if he ever was), but just a man in his jammies. He was a non-combatant symbolic target.

In fact, OBL was largely beyond symbolism at the point of his murder, and the action looked like a paltry act of vengeance. (However, the much-lauded operation sure provided Academy grist for a military film-makin' woman in EOE Hollywood.)

We seem to not know that vengeance is not military. It is Old Testament dogma which does not have any place in liberal humanistic thought.

This is why we will not defeat terrorism. First, it cannot be approached by classic military action. Every time a terrorist is killed, his replacement is close behind. In celebrating that which has failed, we have become emotional and betray the essential logic of war-fighting.

We choose for military myths over our legal codes and traditions.

A War on Terror will not be won by killing people in their bedrooms. If symbolic targets are not legitimate for terrorists, then how can they be legitimate for the U.S.?

Is this what warriors and war-fighting have become?


ed. coda:

Terrorists strike soft targets, unsuspecting and in an inferior posture. When the U.S. military "takes out" soft targets like OBL -- a man well-past his "use-by" date -- it has joined in their project.

The huzzahs which followed his 2011 death were anticlimactic, the cheers sounding like a 45 record being played on 33 1/3. The "hunt" for OBL kept a war project going for a decade, but the resulting mayhem has so far surpassed the man that the outlay of accomplishing his demise has little justification.

Most cultures create a military mythos in the form of an iconography to buoy cultural spirits over an essentially death-dealing project. The new Instamatic or Super 8 is a Smartphone aided and abetted by Facebook or YouTube. It is easy, like taking holiday beach pictures -- anyone can do it.

For Hitler, Leni Reifenstahl filmed it. For Islamic State, the graphic du jour is 9th century beheadings in the desert on Instagram, victims in orange, executioner in black (orange is the new black?)

An eager, desperate, salacious and obedient press gloms on and feeds it back to us in a bright-shiny package. Just like Capt. Renault, we are all shocked.

For the U.S., it is plucky West Virginian Jessica Lynch who went down shooting (not), being sent back from the checkpoint to the hospital to allow for the filming of her heroic four-service rescue. Football hero Pat Tillman was to be interred as the casualty of enemy fire, until his family questioned the plot line.

In a time when we have lost our way, we must make meaning and justification by any means necessary.

Where are we now vis-à-vis Islamic terror?

A Pocketful of Mumbles

 I have squandered my resistance
For a pocketful of mumbles,
Such are promises
All lies and jest
Still, a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest 
--The Boxer, 
Simon and Garfunkel

 See, in my line of work you
got to keep repeating things over and over
and over again for the truth to sink in,
to kind of catapult the propaganda
--President George W. Bush

Why do we never get an answer
When we're knocking at the door
With a thousand million questions
About hate and death and war 
--Question, 
The Moody Blues   
_________________________

The OCT 2015 -  JAN 2016 Army Echoes, the quarterly newsletter sent to over a million retired soldiers and families, has set for itself the modest proposal of keeping its readers in thrall to Them Terrorists, 24/7 ("Sustaining Antiterrorism awareness -- always ready, always alert," p.5.) Just in case you fail to subject yourself to the ample media sources which should have already brought you to this paralyzed state.

Ranger will deconstruct the money graph, to wit:

"Terrorists can attack anywhere, anytime – the threat is real. Over the recent months the continued threats on social media from the Islamic State of Iraq and The Levant (ISIL; also commonly referred to as ISIS) and their influence on domestic extremists demonstrates the lengths that terrorist groups take to threaten our nation and our military communities. ISIL has also expanded their tactics to include cyber-attacks and attempts to exploit private and sensitive information of our military personnel and their families. These risks pertain directly to Retired Soldiers, just as they do the entire Army community."

A sophomore creative writing undergrad would recognize the weakness presented here as fact, courtesy the United States Army. The breakdown begins with opening statement: "Terrorists can attack anywhere, anytime."

Is that true? Can you think of somewhere they could not? How about a nuclear (surety) weapons storage area, the protection of which is the job of the Army, after all. So, no -- not anywhere; check one.

Next: "(T)he continued threats on social media from the Islamic State of Iraq and The Levant (ISIL; also commonly referred to as ISIS) . . . demonstrates the lengths that terrorist groups take to threaten our nation and our military communities." OK -- "social media threats" -- certainly is not a nice thing to do. We call such people "trolls", and what they do is BULLYING. When they act on their threats, they become criminals. 

Bullying certainly has its own corrosive quality, but do WE need to be "always ready, always alert"? Maybe we could just farm out that set of feelings over to the people paid to monitor such transmissions on a daily basis. That IS what they are paid for, after all, and it would cut down on our psychotherapy bills and Unisom consumption, something that would be good for an overworked, over-stressed population, no? 

Aren't Terrorists a Level One threat? If they are out "to exploit private and sensitive information of our military personnel and their families," and "(T)hese risks pertain directly to Retired Soldiers, just as they do the entire Army community," tell us what these tactics entail so that we might be proactive about it. Instead we are fed a vague miasma of fear, riding on the tails of the aura created around terror groups.

Further: the piece is predicated on a falsehood: ISIL is not a terror organization. IS has a military chain of command, their members wear uniforms, carry weapons and attack military targets. They do not conform to the international laws of war.

The last fact does not render them terrorists, but rather War Criminals. Possibly they could be convicted under "crimes against humanity", but the evidence favors war criminal prosecution. A paragraph full of lies and half-truths, courtesy your U.S. Army.

You can sleep well, tonight, despite the fact that rough men stand ready to scare you witless.

[Cross-posted @ milpub.]

Then There's Maude

I am very glad to have in my cabinet
such able statesmen as you have proved yourself to be.
And I shall be pleased to avail myself
of your counsel and advice.  
But I can never consent to being dictated to. 
I am the President 
and I shall be responsible for my administration
--U.S. President John Tyler
__________________

Re. the words of President Tyler and the desk plaque of Harry Truman: if only President Obama were a "buck-stops-here" kinda guy. Alas.

Let us begin with an oft-forgotten precept in 2014: America is a nation governed by laws, and we oppose the concept of cruel and unusual punishment. This is foundational. But then there's Gitmo (Hearing Offers Rare Peek at Guantanamo.)

Why can't President Obama, as Commander in Chief, order the military to shut down the Guantanamo Bay detention center -- the shining promise of his early administration?

Can the President not use one of his exalted Executive Orders to do it? If Obama can EO the minimum wage, then surely he can EO the closure of Gitmo. He could grant Presidential pardons, and send the prisoners home. Mea culpa.

What have 60 prisoners done that the rebels in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Syria have not done? Why are the prisoners at Gitmo evil, wicked, mean and nasty, but the jihadists supporting revolt in the region treated to the munificence of U.S. tax dollars? In Syria there are jihadists from about 55 nations whom it is U.S. policy to support.

We the people deserved to witness fair and open trails for the terrorist events of 9-11-01, but have not. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), the one inmate who very publicly fits the bill for being tried, has inexplicably never been before a court. 

If a prisoner has been charged with a war crime, then he should be tried in court. If found guilty, then execute him. What does it mean that some inmates are being considered for a war crimes trial before a military commission? After 12 years the U.S. has not moved to try these inmates; it's time to piss, or get off the pot. Gitmo is a stain which has done nothing to make the U.S. safer, or to counter the al Qaeda threat.

America should admit that it has poisoned the well, and even if these inmates were complicit, it is too late for a fair trial. We committed torture and did not obey our legal protocols.

Just as a review for the Rangers in the class:

If a man is al Qaeda and captured on the battlefield then he is a prisoner of war -- UNLESS he can be proven to have committed war crimes or crimes against humanity. Generally, terrorists do not fight on the battlefield and even if they did, they are not a threat to the U.S., which is the tag affixed to the Gitmo detainees. (If an al Qaeda is captured on the battlefield this generally means that the person is a military member of the organization and not a classic terrorist threat.)

Military threats are far threats and hence, of minimal concern to our citizens at home.

Here is an idea: send the Gitmo detainees to the Syrian rebels and call it a day.

What We Say When We Won't Call it "War"

 I'm a walking nightmare, an arsenal of doom
I kill conversation as I walk into the room
I'm a three line whip, I'm the sort of thing they ban
I'm a walking disaster, I'm a demolition man 
--Demolition Man, The Police 

Since time is short and you may lie,
I'm going to have to torture you.
But I want you to know, it isn't personal 
--Repo Man (1984)

Lies, lies in my papa's looks
Lies, lies in my history books
Lies, lies like they teach in class
Lies, lies, lies I catch on way too fast
--Lies, The Rolling Stones
________________________

What moral or legal imperative compels the United States to interfere in the Syrian Civil War?

Let's parse a typical argument for U.S. intervention from The Week magazine, with RAW's explication in RED:

"Still, the U.S. can't afford to passively await the outcome, said Dennis Ross in NewRepublic.com. It will be time-consuming and difficult to direct training, money, and weapons to the right opposition groups [how do we ascertain "RIGHT"?], so that Assad can be forced to accept a negotiated transition from power [=we can kick out another sitting ruler and replace him with someone we foolishly believe to be OUR GUY.] But consider the alternative: Eventually Syria will fall apart and become "failed state" [Syria IS a FAILED STATE.] Assad's chemical weapons would then fall into the hands of al Qaida-affiliated rebels [all rebels are "al Qaida affiliated; alternatively, how can we divine that "al Qauda affiliated rebels" would be the recipients of the munitions windfall, if there in fact are other sorts of rebels?] This brutal tragedy is already "one of the greatest tragedies of the 21st century," but it could get much, much worse (8.2.13)."

Hyperbole leads us to believe action is the only option. However, our own Civil War was fought without foreign intervention, and roughly 750,000 U.S. soldiers died in that conflict, out of a population of 30 million. No Arab or Middle East state has seen loss on that level. Why not offer other nations fighting civil wars the same neutrality with which our nation fought?

Let us be clear: There are no "good guys", so who will benefit? Forget the Syrians -- how will intervention benefit the security of America? Have U.S. actions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Egypt or any other Arab or Middle East state produced any tangible benefit to the funders -- the U.S. taxpayer?

When did the U.S. get into the foreign Civil War Resolution business? The U.S. is not the U.N., and the President is not elected to fight other people's wars. The U.S. Department of Defense is not charged with protecting the rebelling malcontents in other nations.

The U.S. has just fought two of the longest conflicts in U.S. history, and done so supporting corrupt, inept and non-democratic governments from rebels and insurgents. We call these COIN wars (counterinsurgencies), and they are based in fighting those who would advocate overthrowing their government, even when said government is questionable at best, and corrupt and non-democratic, at worst. Syria would be something different, and by entering it the U.S. would be fighting on both sides of the COIN divide. White man speaks with forked tongue.

We are inconsistent: We oppose National Security interventions into our personal lives, but accept U.S. intervention into other people's civil wars. The policy wonks who state that al Qaida affiliates will benefit from a Syrian Civil War have not explained how introducing U.S. violence into the picture will lessen the likelihood of increased al Qaida activity. Are we getting up in everyone's business to distract us from our own dismal circumstances stateside?

We are blinded by our military might: Intervening in Syria assumes that a military reaction will solve a political problem. The media has led us to believe that the misnamed "Arab Spring" is our offspring, and that we must be a presence in any violence in the Islamic world. However, the only reason the U.S. has forces in the area is to ostensibly protect us from terrorist activity -- which is not the case in Syria.

When we launch cruise missiles it will be an act of violence with no morally justified logic.

Commando Cops

--Anaheim (CA) SWAT team member 

It's a hard world to get a break in
All the good things have been taken 
--It's My Life, The Animals

Did you ever think about life
as a metaphor for television 
--Chuck Paluhniak

 ___________________ 

"Training for Terrorism: Do You have the Mindset to Deal With the One-Percent" is an an article in Combat Arms (2013) suggesting training United State Law Enforcement to confront terrorism in a military manner; this so wrong in so many ways.

U.S. police are not soldiers, and combat training and  methodology is not a police function.  The streets of America can be mean, but they are not a battlefield. The last armed terrorist attack in the Continental U.S. was an attempted assassination of President Harry S. Truman in Washington D. C. by Puerto Rican separatists in 1950.

The author ("SGM Kyle Lamb, Ret.") incorrectly states that attacks like those in Mumbai (2008) are "coming to a street near you". Lamb states, "These terrorists decided that the United States was not prime for this particular attack, so they chose Mumbai."  WRONG.

The group that carried out that attack exploited a porous border and Pakistan ISI support (reportedly).  The group, Lashkar -e-Taiba, does not target U.S. interests nor are they capable of attacking the U.S. homeland as they lack the training, personnel and assets to do so.  Mumbai was only "chosen" because it was soft and easily exploited; suggesting that such a group could attack the U.S. is a paranoid fantasy.

Who are these murderous 1%, anyway? When was the last time a terrorist team killed a target here in the U.S.?  They are non-extant, but they are useful for raking the bucks for the paranoid fanatics selling a combat version of LE. However, combat and LE are two different concepts. U.S. LE must treat all threats the same. A properly-trained policeman or SWAT should react the same in a terrorist or law scenario; if loss of life is imminent, then the team may use deadly force.

The author suggests a "head shot" if a "vest-wearing terrorist [is] detected with thermal devices". We presume this would involve some profiling to determine if the threat is not "an average citizen" but instead, "terrorists we must kill to protect our citizens." 

"Cops are forced to treat everyone they come into contact with the same as a law-abiding citizen being pulled over for speeding [ugh, then he's not "law-abiding", right? -ed.] Unfortunately, terrorists are prepared to die for a cause and take you with them. You cannot treat these individuals as you would the 99 percent of the population who make contact with you daily."

If this article were based in reality, it would acknowledge that it would be more beneficial to capture terrorists than it would be to kill them in the execution phase; a live prisoner is worth 1,000 dead terrorists.

In fact, cops are the last line of defense that would confront a terrorist threat here. Terrorists will never use AK's and military tactics to attack targets in America. As this would be an imported threat, there would be layers of detection and prevention before any such act could even hope to reach the execution phase. Sigint and Humint filter out most attacks, both foreign and domestic, before they exit the planning stage.

Since the advent of the Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©), the military and the police have cross-trained in federally-sponsored exercises such as "Emerald Coast" (in N. Florida). The result is a weak-minded and wrong-headed blending of military and police philosophies -- police are not combat-assets and vice versa.

We should be especially mindful of the lines as many police are recruited following military service. In order to avoid the militarization of LE, the "serve and protect" posture should be reinforced to replace the "search and destroy" mentality.

The author further conflates the concept of Rule of Engagement (military) with Use of Force (civilian), suggesting that policymakers should adopt a no-holds-barred policy for the police.  His frustration arises from the military's ROE constrictions, but were this a real war, there would be no such constrictions.  His frustrations do not apply to the civilian world of LE which abides by federal guidelines and Constitutional restrictions, none of which have changed or lost their viability since the events of 9-11-01 mesmerized our reptilian brains.

Terrorists are still just bog-simple criminals, and our laws still apply handily.  As well, the basis of all federal guidelines is the sanctity and preservation of life, even that of the shooter if at all possible, a concept which is antithetical to military thinking. (Lacking in this piece is the role of the Hostage Negotiator (HN) to resolve a situation before or even after the shooting starts -- what happened to the HN's?)

The U.S. is a nation guarded by the rule of law.  If the police become mobile death squads, then we have become worse than terrorists.

Borderlines

Everything, everything, everything
In its right place
--Everything in Its Right Place,
Radiohead

An asylum for the sane
would be empty in America
--George Bernard Shaw

--Bloody paperwork. Huh!
--I suppose one has to expect a certain amount.
--Why? I came into this game for the action,
the excitement. Go anywhere, travel light,
get in, get out, wherever there's trouble,
a man alone.
Now they got the whole country sectioned off,
you can't make a move without a form
--Brazil (1985)
____________________

If the U.S. were serious about the immigration problem and terrorism counteraction, here a few suggestions to help kill two birds with one stone. The suggestions would require beefing up Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS) and eliminating the useless bureaucratic behemoth, Homeland Security Administration (HSA). Ranger is not advocating these measures, but merely suggesting them to serious-minded people.

Using some old-fashioned horse sense, something in short supply today, both efforts should be decentralized since our system was designed to work from the bottom up, an idea we seem to have lost along the way.

There's no hiding the situation: Each of us sits on the Mexican border when we sit in a McDonald's or Burger king anywhere in America. This is the natural line of drift for illegals, and if one were setting an ambush, these would be the places.

On the State Level:

• Require documentation to buy a vehicle. This includes any motorized transport, including lawn mowers, since many illegals enter the lawn care business.

• Require documentation to buy car insurance.

• Check bus stops: No i.d., no tickets.

• Require documents to see a doctor, especially gynecologists. Deport pregnant illegals before they give drop their gift on the U.S. system.

• Require documents to purchase fast food, especially on a Sunday morning before Catholic Mass. Localize efforts to regions of Catholic churches.

• Require documents at emergency rooms, liqour stores and Walmart.

• Require documents to register for school

• Require documents to obtain a U.S.-issued credit card.

Homeland Security may be relieved of their burden by requiring documents to buy airline tickets -- if one is not legal, one does not fly (unless a Mexican, South- or Central American desires to leave the country.) This is aimed at neutralizing the terror threat.

Do not allow more than one individual from a foreign threat area per flight. Ditto persons with legal Visas from threat areas. Disallow them to congregate to complete a hijacking. If terrorism originating in the Middle East is the threat, then focus on that reality -- don't single out one-legged nuns. Don't check shoes (a "safety measure" Great Britain has recently decided to ditch.)

Reinstate profiling (which was briefly enacted.) El Al has great success with this approach. These countermeasures clearly come under the rubric "racially profiling", but that seems fair and just since it is Mexicans and Middle Eastern radical Islamists that are the threat and/or problem. Intelligence agencies can continue to focus on the new insider convert threat that would bypass the above system.

If one is searching for elephants (the real sort) in Cleveland, it is wise to restrict your searches to zoos or circuses; if you're looking to kill deer, stay in the woods. Present immigration policy is looking for elephants in the woods and trying to kill deer in the zoos.

Simply put, place your ambushes on the traveled trails, for that is where you'll make the kills. Illegal immigrants do not usually visit zoos, the Kennedy Center, the opera or Broadway, so don't look there (unless you're checking the hired hands.) If illegal Mexican and Guatemalans are the target, then legal, patriotic Mexicans and Guatemalans should gladly support our "Be alert -Not afraid" program.

Former President Bush hired Boeing et. al. to build a virtual fence at a cost of $5+ Billion. But four years on and $1 billion in, barely 50 miles of the border has been covered.The New York Times recently suggested Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano call a halt to the effort, the SBInet:

The “virtual fence” was a misbegotten idea from the start, based on the faulty premise that controlling immigration is as simple as closing the border — and that closing the border is a simple matter of more sensors, more fencing and more boots on the ground. So long as there is a demand for cheap labor, a hunger for better jobs here, and almost no legal way to get in, people will keep finding ways around any fence, virtual or not.

Border security cannot work unless it is accompanied by a real effort at comprehensive immigration reform. There is no getting back the $1 billion already wasted. We can avoid squandering billions more (Virtual Failure on the Border).

For some reason we are not technologically-advanced enough to create this system. If not a virtual fence, how about a real one, with razor wire and lights, and then activate the entire National Guard for their patrol?

Ranger's ideas could be simply employed, but there would be no wiggle-room. If the U.S. is seriously concerned about illegal immigration and just as seriously wishes to call a halt to it, the procedure for netting them and returning them is pretty straight-forward. But you can say hasta la vista to your cheap drywalling and lawn work. Are we committed in more than word to ending this State burden? The lure of cheap strawberries and household help is seductive.

If these efforts did not work, then arm the drones and shoot a few 15-year-olds on the border. While that won't stop the problem, but it will sure relieve some of our roiling angst. Ranger is bunkering up in anticipation of reactionary attacks, so hit me with your best shot.

The New Untermenschen

Army of None, Gavin Hadallar

In giving rights to others which belong to them,
we give rights to ourselves.

--John F. Kennedy

An injustice committed against anyone is a threat to everyone.
-- Montesquieu

The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor
is the mind of the oppressed.
--Stephen Biko

Terrorism doesn't just blow up buildings; it blasts every
other issue off the political map. The spectre of terrorism--
real and exaggerated--has become a shield of impunity,
protecting governments around the world from scrutiny
for their human rights abuse
--Naomi Klein
_________

Terrorism is a phenomenon that is distinct from warmaking. Because it is by nature adversarial and attack-driven, it has been recently conflated with war. But terrorism per se is a discrete activity, and criminal in nature. Therefore it is to be dealt with in the Federal Court system.

It is essential to bring the federal response to terrorism back into the picture, to reinstate some measure of reality and sanity to this government.

GWB and minions want to create a class of prisoner that falls outside the rule of law and the protections of the U.S. Constitution. This extra-legal categorization would "permit the long-term detention of foreigners on American soil without charges or appeal, just on Mr. Bush’s say-so."

"Defense Secretary Robert Gates said 'the biggest challenge is finding a statutory basis for holding prisoners who should never be released and who may or may not be able to be put on trial' (Terrorism and the Law: In Washington, a Need to Right Wrongs.)"

Yes--doing dirty deeds and making them look kosher is quite a challenge. It requires the exquisite legal prestidigitation of a Gonzales. It demands Rovian resources.

The policy is analogous to the Nazi untermenschen categorization of groups of their citizens they deemed worthy of ostracism and ultimately, extermination. The untermensch was banished to a liminal area beyond civilized behavior and legality. The new untermenschen are called detainees.

Since Ranger has a healthy dose of paranoia in his weltanschauung, there is always the possibility that old Ranger bloggers would be the next gruppen to go. If anybody is marginalized, then anybody can be. It's a slippery slope.

The founding fathers divided the powers to conduct and declare war between two co-equal branches, giving Congress the power in a time of war to “make rules concerning captures on land and water"(Constitution, Article 1, Section 8, Paragraph 11.)

Congress took this right and responsibility to heart when the Geneva Conventions (GC) were ratified, thereby becoming the law of the land. Unfortunately, this Constitution template has been co-opted by the slimy mental midgets within the U.S. government.

The GC covers the militarily captured personnel that become POWs. But terrorists are not captured.

Off the field of battle, suspected terrorists by legal definition must be arrested by police exercising jurisdiction over the suspected individual.

The Constitution discusses capture since arrest powers were otherwise held to be the the purview of the individual states. War was a federal function and law enforcement was seen as a local concern.

The founders did not envision an expansion of federal law enforcement beyond the powers enumerated in the Constitution. Police powers resided with the states, while the Federal authority retained warmaking and diplomatic functions. Obviously this is no longer the case.

One thing remains clear though: whether speaking of war or terrorism, there is nothing stated within the U.S. Constitution that encourages or authorizes torture, kidnapping, renditions or secret prisons. If these are war powers of a president, then this country has become a rogue nation.

None of these legal violations are warfighting measures, and are subversive of U.S. values.

This is the result of taking the U.S. military to war against a criminal faction.