Thursday, September 11, 2003
For those of you who have not seen my nephews recently here they are. They are in second grad which means that we all must be getting old!!!!
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Wednesday, September 10, 2003
It is September 11, 2003 
the second anniversary of the most tragic day in many Americans lives. We have witnessed the world undergo drastic changes in the last 2 years and we hope that they are for the better. I think it is certainly for the better. I am proud to be an American and I know without a shadow of a doubt that I do not wish to live else where in the world. For all of the problems America has it is better than anyone else. We are Americans and need to remember the struggle of our forefathers and the difficulties they had creating and mainting this great nation in its early years so we could have and enjoy what is here today. Great Americans like these exist today as well. we see them everyday but do not pay any attention because we are all too busy engrossed in our own lives. It is the great ones who have that bit of selflessness that is remissed in most. We saw many examples on Sept. 11 from fire fighters to "joe" citizen who decided to give their lives to help others. So please take some time today to say a prayer for all those who were lost and the families they left behind.
We have also seen the American military engage in battles and show its incredible power in both Afganistan and Iraq. There have been mixed feelings by the public about this action but we must remember that we are not seeing the progress that has occurred. In Iraq there are 100 free press newspapers publishing what ever they wish. There is theatre in Bagdad which has not reared its head since 1977. Self expression is allowed in Iraq and in Afganistan and while it seems difficult at the moment it is always darkest before the dawn and we must stay the course because the alternative is unforgivable.
I am sure that I will have more to say after witnessing the events of 9-11-2003 so stay tuned. Remember that the Constitution
does not gaurantee us education, it does not gaurantee us social security, it does not gaurantee us medical benefits, the only gaurantee is that the Government will do all in its power to keep our borders secure form both internal and external threats. This is the precursor to all of our freedoms, because without security we will have no freedom and no discussion about any of these other issues.
the second anniversary of the most tragic day in many Americans lives. We have witnessed the world undergo drastic changes in the last 2 years and we hope that they are for the better. I think it is certainly for the better. I am proud to be an American and I know without a shadow of a doubt that I do not wish to live else where in the world. For all of the problems America has it is better than anyone else. We are Americans and need to remember the struggle of our forefathers and the difficulties they had creating and mainting this great nation in its early years so we could have and enjoy what is here today. Great Americans like these exist today as well. we see them everyday but do not pay any attention because we are all too busy engrossed in our own lives. It is the great ones who have that bit of selflessness that is remissed in most. We saw many examples on Sept. 11 from fire fighters to "joe" citizen who decided to give their lives to help others. So please take some time today to say a prayer for all those who were lost and the families they left behind.
We have also seen the American military engage in battles and show its incredible power in both Afganistan and Iraq. There have been mixed feelings by the public about this action but we must remember that we are not seeing the progress that has occurred. In Iraq there are 100 free press newspapers publishing what ever they wish. There is theatre in Bagdad which has not reared its head since 1977. Self expression is allowed in Iraq and in Afganistan and while it seems difficult at the moment it is always darkest before the dawn and we must stay the course because the alternative is unforgivable.
I am sure that I will have more to say after witnessing the events of 9-11-2003 so stay tuned. Remember that the Constitution
does not gaurantee us education, it does not gaurantee us social security, it does not gaurantee us medical benefits, the only gaurantee is that the Government will do all in its power to keep our borders secure form both internal and external threats. This is the precursor to all of our freedoms, because without security we will have no freedom and no discussion about any of these other issues.
This cartoon is a Bob Lang original that I stumbled across today. Since most know of my dislike for the UN this struck me as quite amusing.
Mazza
Mazza
Sunday, September 07, 2003
The last Lion is going to make a valiant return. I am now prepared to update my blog at least once a week and hopefully more often than that. It has taken much abuse and some prodding to finally lay out some time to write. This week is quite easy. My Brother in-law Captain Gary Burnette (U.S. Navy) has sent me an article that I believe deserves posting. So here it is.
Pre-emptive wars
Deterrence is no longer a solution
By Frederick Forsyth
Forsyth's new novel "Avenger" a best seller in Italy goes on sale in English in September. This essay is reprinted from Foreign Affairs Magazine.
September 7, 2003
Until the mid-1990s, terrorists always wanted something. The IRA wanted a united Ireland, the ETA wanted a separate Basque state, the PFLP wanted a Palestinian state and the extirpation of Israel, the Tamil Tigers wanted a Tamil state in part of Sri Lanka...and so on.
Some wanted separation, some unification, some (like the Kurds) a state of their own, others (like the Red Brigades) a fully communist state. Precisely because of that, they wanted to stay alive and see their vision come true, and therefore the Establishment could, if it wished, negotiate.
Then a small group arose who said this: "We do not want anything of you but your deaths. In thousands, in hundreds of thousands and eventually in millions.
"We say this because we hate you. We hate you with an all-consuming passion, not just for what you have done (though that is bad enough) but for what you are.
"There is no point in negotiating, for there is nothing to negotiate. We are going to kill you whenever, wherever and in as great a number as we can.
"We do this because the Almighty has commanded it. We have His texts to prove it. We do not fear death, we welcome it, for we are guaranteed eternal bliss if we die while killing you."
It was a weird message. It did not come in the mail, nor was it enunciated on Al-Jazeera television. It came from a thousand imams in a thousand mosques. It was directed at the United States in particular and the West in general. Its source can best be described as Islamist fundamentalism, a tiny but virulent incubus within the body of that great, billion-devotee religion, Islam. Not unnaturally, no one took it particularly seriously – at first.
In 1993 a group of Islamists in New York tried to demolish the World Trade Center by driving two vans packed with explosives into the underground parking garages. The towers were too strong. A few were killed, many more injured. The United States began, slowly, to wake up to a new and bizarre peril.
For eight years, under Bill Clinton, a fairly lethargic hunt was mounted for a shadowy body of religious "ultras" behind the new message. Two embassies in Africa were blown up, then a destroyer in Aden Harbor. Then came Sept. 11, 2001.
The rest of the world has, despite the ritual condolences at that time, not even begun to understand the transformational trauma that has gripped the United States since 9/11. That is why so much of what has been written is exasperated anti-Americanism.
Sept. 11 happened to coincide with a new, tough, no-nonsense and hugely underestimated (by Europe's intellectual snobs) president. Under Bush the United States thought things over and came back with a reply.
Broadly, it is this: "What the devil are we supposed to do? We have no choice. You leave us no choice. For 50 years of Cold War we practiced deterrence and kept the Soviet threat at bay. Even in their most paranoid moments, the Politburo did not want to die. But you do not fear death; you welcome it. So be it.
"We Americans can either sit and wait for the next bomb, the next carnage, the next wipeout of our citizens and then try to track down the perpetrators. Or we can identify you and use our considerable resources to hunt you down and take you 'out of the frame' before you strike, not after.
"That is called pre-emption, and that is what we choose to do."
Ever since 9/11 that is what has been happening. But the so-called war on terror goes further than the occasional eruption of secret agents into an apartment in Pakistan to arrest or kill another fanatic. The American message is more ample than that.
It continues: "Terrorists cannot eat and drink fresh air. They need a place to live, camps in which to train, money to spend, equipment to turn into bombs, officers to recruit. These have to be situated on someone's land, in someone's country.
"So to all those who think it might be fun to arm, train, shelter, feed, finance, hide, furnish diplomatic facilities or false papers prepared in government laboratories – or even to touch with a 10-foot pole – those sworn to kill our fellow Americans, we say this: The party is over. Desist now, or be lumped with the terrorists and die with them. That includes the tyrant states and the failed states. Expel them or be classed with them."
Far enough? The American message to the tyrant states includes one extra proviso. It is: "There are some weapons so foul yet so simple that they may be developed in basic government programs and yet can wipe out cities. There are agents based on the filthiest and fastest-moving diseases known to man. Medieval plagues, incurable scourges. There are gases and nerve agents so strong that a vacuum flask released in a crowded place can destroy thousands.
"None of you need research, develop, produce and store these weapons for self-defense. They simply cannot be used for self-defense. But they can, if suicidal fanatics are used as the delivery system, be brought to our cities and detonated. This we will not permit. Therefore, stop manufacturing these hideous weapons, destroy what you have, and do it now."
Saddam Hussein fit both categories. He manufactured some of the grisliest killer toxins known to man: He sponsored, paid for and sheltered terror. He was warned repeatedly. From 1991 he ducked and weaved, defying a flaccid, timid U.N. Security Council through 16 resolutions. But after 9/11 he was just a fool. He should have known. The United States was not joking. Not anymore.
The real outrage of the European left and the Third World is that they are horrified; apparently when the White House says "Enough is enough," it means it. Clinton was never like that.
So the horrified may shout, like the Scottish congregation, "We didna ken" ("We didn't understand").
But the message from Washington is "Well, ye ken the noo" ("Well, you understand now").
Pre-emptive wars
Deterrence is no longer a solution
By Frederick Forsyth
Forsyth's new novel "Avenger" a best seller in Italy goes on sale in English in September. This essay is reprinted from Foreign Affairs Magazine.
September 7, 2003
Until the mid-1990s, terrorists always wanted something. The IRA wanted a united Ireland, the ETA wanted a separate Basque state, the PFLP wanted a Palestinian state and the extirpation of Israel, the Tamil Tigers wanted a Tamil state in part of Sri Lanka...and so on.
Some wanted separation, some unification, some (like the Kurds) a state of their own, others (like the Red Brigades) a fully communist state. Precisely because of that, they wanted to stay alive and see their vision come true, and therefore the Establishment could, if it wished, negotiate.
Then a small group arose who said this: "We do not want anything of you but your deaths. In thousands, in hundreds of thousands and eventually in millions.
"We say this because we hate you. We hate you with an all-consuming passion, not just for what you have done (though that is bad enough) but for what you are.
"There is no point in negotiating, for there is nothing to negotiate. We are going to kill you whenever, wherever and in as great a number as we can.
"We do this because the Almighty has commanded it. We have His texts to prove it. We do not fear death, we welcome it, for we are guaranteed eternal bliss if we die while killing you."
It was a weird message. It did not come in the mail, nor was it enunciated on Al-Jazeera television. It came from a thousand imams in a thousand mosques. It was directed at the United States in particular and the West in general. Its source can best be described as Islamist fundamentalism, a tiny but virulent incubus within the body of that great, billion-devotee religion, Islam. Not unnaturally, no one took it particularly seriously – at first.
In 1993 a group of Islamists in New York tried to demolish the World Trade Center by driving two vans packed with explosives into the underground parking garages. The towers were too strong. A few were killed, many more injured. The United States began, slowly, to wake up to a new and bizarre peril.
For eight years, under Bill Clinton, a fairly lethargic hunt was mounted for a shadowy body of religious "ultras" behind the new message. Two embassies in Africa were blown up, then a destroyer in Aden Harbor. Then came Sept. 11, 2001.
The rest of the world has, despite the ritual condolences at that time, not even begun to understand the transformational trauma that has gripped the United States since 9/11. That is why so much of what has been written is exasperated anti-Americanism.
Sept. 11 happened to coincide with a new, tough, no-nonsense and hugely underestimated (by Europe's intellectual snobs) president. Under Bush the United States thought things over and came back with a reply.
Broadly, it is this: "What the devil are we supposed to do? We have no choice. You leave us no choice. For 50 years of Cold War we practiced deterrence and kept the Soviet threat at bay. Even in their most paranoid moments, the Politburo did not want to die. But you do not fear death; you welcome it. So be it.
"We Americans can either sit and wait for the next bomb, the next carnage, the next wipeout of our citizens and then try to track down the perpetrators. Or we can identify you and use our considerable resources to hunt you down and take you 'out of the frame' before you strike, not after.
"That is called pre-emption, and that is what we choose to do."
Ever since 9/11 that is what has been happening. But the so-called war on terror goes further than the occasional eruption of secret agents into an apartment in Pakistan to arrest or kill another fanatic. The American message is more ample than that.
It continues: "Terrorists cannot eat and drink fresh air. They need a place to live, camps in which to train, money to spend, equipment to turn into bombs, officers to recruit. These have to be situated on someone's land, in someone's country.
"So to all those who think it might be fun to arm, train, shelter, feed, finance, hide, furnish diplomatic facilities or false papers prepared in government laboratories – or even to touch with a 10-foot pole – those sworn to kill our fellow Americans, we say this: The party is over. Desist now, or be lumped with the terrorists and die with them. That includes the tyrant states and the failed states. Expel them or be classed with them."
Far enough? The American message to the tyrant states includes one extra proviso. It is: "There are some weapons so foul yet so simple that they may be developed in basic government programs and yet can wipe out cities. There are agents based on the filthiest and fastest-moving diseases known to man. Medieval plagues, incurable scourges. There are gases and nerve agents so strong that a vacuum flask released in a crowded place can destroy thousands.
"None of you need research, develop, produce and store these weapons for self-defense. They simply cannot be used for self-defense. But they can, if suicidal fanatics are used as the delivery system, be brought to our cities and detonated. This we will not permit. Therefore, stop manufacturing these hideous weapons, destroy what you have, and do it now."
Saddam Hussein fit both categories. He manufactured some of the grisliest killer toxins known to man: He sponsored, paid for and sheltered terror. He was warned repeatedly. From 1991 he ducked and weaved, defying a flaccid, timid U.N. Security Council through 16 resolutions. But after 9/11 he was just a fool. He should have known. The United States was not joking. Not anymore.
The real outrage of the European left and the Third World is that they are horrified; apparently when the White House says "Enough is enough," it means it. Clinton was never like that.
So the horrified may shout, like the Scottish congregation, "We didna ken" ("We didn't understand").
But the message from Washington is "Well, ye ken the noo" ("Well, you understand now").
