Month: May 2006

The National Rifle Association recently held its annual banquet. The keynote speaker? Gen. Tommy Franks. From an AP account of Franks’ speech:

Those who count the increasing number of dead American soldiers in Iraq are missing the bigger picture, retired Gen. Tommy Franks said on Saturday night.”What we’re talking about is neither 2,400, 24,000 or 240,000 lives,” Franks said at the National Rifle Association’s annual banquet. “Terrorism is a thing that threatens our way of life. It doesn’t have anything to do with politics.”

More than 2,400 soldiers have died since the beginning of the invasion of Iraq that Franks is credited with developing and coordinating. He also drew up military options in Afghanistan for President Bush after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

“I watched as America changed,” Franks said. “That’s not near done. We have to secure ourselves. We have to secure our Constitution.”

Franks was loose and wryly funny in his 30-minute speech. Some of it was self-deprecating, but he also didn’t mind taking an occasional jab at the media and fellow generals for attacking Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

“We haven’t got any generals here. They’re all in front of TV cameras complaining about Don Rumsfeld,” Franks deadpanned. “Difference is, I know what I’m talking about.”

Franks staunchly defended his friend, even as he called him “grumpy” and “grouchy.”

“I don’t care about your politics. I don’t,” Franks said. “Don Rumsfeld is an American patriot.” …

Franks didn’t touch on [the NRA’s domestic agenda], but said he appreciated being with a crowd that knew the difference between citizens and criminals, and that the United States would prevail in the world’s “global war.”

What in the world does this have to do with the NRA’s mission? I ask this, by the way, as a libertarian who believes in the individual right to self-defense and, therefore, the right to bear arms. In fact, I’m a former NRA member (who quit over precisely this sort of thing – the group’s endorsement of candidates and causes inimical to personal liberty). Now I don’t expect the NRA to come out against the U.S. government’s gun-grabbing in Iraq, but good God, why are they cheering on the international wing of the ATF?

If you are an antiwar member of the NRA – and I know there are some of you out there – please contact the organization and ask them why they’re spending your dues to promote ultra-statists like Franks:

E-mail: membership@nrahq.org

Phone: 1-800-NRA-3888

Here is an anti-war song sent to me from a reader. He says that it was written and sung by the British in protest to that Empire’s wars around the turn of the century. The song was revived for WWI. It then became “Americanized,” and was used to protest the USA being engaged in the WWI.

Below is the British version of the lyrics. I have linked to an American version of the song with slightly different lyrics.

I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
I brought him up to be my pride and joy
Who dares to put a musket on his shoulder
To shoot another mother’s darling boy
Why should he fight in someone else’s quarrels
It’s time to throw the sword and gun away
There would be no war today
If the nations all would say
No I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier

I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
To go fighting in some far-off foreign land
He may get killed before he’s any older
For a cause that he will never understand
Why should he fight another rich man’s battle
While they stay at home and while their time away
Let those with most to lose
Fight each other if they choose
For I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier

I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
To go fighting heathens round the Horn
If God required to prove that boys are bolder
They’d have uniforms and guns when they were born
Why should we have wars about religion
When Jesus came to teach us not to kill
Do Zulus and Hindoos
Not have the right to choose
For I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier

I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
I raised him up to be a gentleman
To find a sweet young girl and love and hold her
Bring me some grandchildren when they can
Why can’t we decide that the Empire
Is just as large as it requires to be
And I’d rather lose it all
Than to see my laddie fall
For I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier

We have installed a new blogging software. While I work out the bugs and move it back to the old format, please be patient. Thanks!

UPDATE: All the old posts should redirect to the new ones. If you find one that doesn’t, please email me at mike at this domain dot com and I will fix it.

Saddam’s Mercedes

Federal agents seized a Mercedes-Benz from an Army reservist who said the armor-plated, bulletproof luxury car probably belonged to Saddam Hussein. First Sgt. William von Zehle said he bought the car while serving in Iraq. U.S. Immigration and Customs enforcement agents said the car, which was also equipped with loudspeakers and hidden microphones, was being treated as a “possible war trophy.”
“It belonged to the former Iraqi regime,” ICE spokesman Dean Boyd said. He said investigators were unsure whether the former Iraqi dictator actually owned it.
[…]
Federal agents are holding the car while investigating possible violations of federal smuggling laws and an executive order barring the importation of property from the former Iraqi regime.

Saddam’s Pistol

US President George Bush has been given a pistol Saddam Hussein had with him when he was captured and now proudly shows it to selected guests, Time magazine has reported.

The gun was taken from Saddam by US special forces when they caught him in a spider hole near his home town, Tikrit, last December, the report said.

The military had the pistol mounted, and it was presented to Mr Bush privately by some of the troops who ferreted out Saddam, Time said, citing unnamed sources.

Mr Bush now takes select visitors to see the pistol in a small study next to the Oval Office, the magazine said.

“He really liked showing it off,” the report quotes an unnamed recent visitor to the White House as saying. “He was really proud of it.”

The Mercedes story made me think of the embarrassing, childish, elitist and, as it turns out, illegal Saddam Pistol episode from back in the days before the phrase “Mission Accomplished” caused Bushies to wince in pain. As Bush explained to reporters in his characteristically rambling and grammatically-challenged way, “What she’s referring to is a — members of a Delta team came to see me in the Oval Office and brought with me — these were the people that found Saddam Hussein, the dictator of Iraq, hiding in a hole. And, by the way, let me remind everybody about Saddam Hussein, just in case we all forget. {Blah, blah …mass graves…blah, blah…torture chambers…blah, blah…hands cut off}
So this is the person. So needless to say, our people were thrilled to have captured him. And in his lap was several weapons. One of them was a pistol. And they brought it to me. It’s now the property of the U.S. government.”

I guess if First Sgt. von Zehle had presented the car to Bush it would have been all okay.

Our newest columnist, Doug Bandow, a trenchant critic of interventionism, was formerly a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. He worked as special assistant to President Reagan and editor of the political magazine Inquiry. He is the author of The Politics of Envy: Statism as Theology (1994) Tripwire: Korea and U.S. Foreign Policy in a Changed World (1996), and Beyond Good Intentions: A Biblical View of Politics (1988), and served as editor for several books.
His articles have appeared in Foreign Policy, Harper’s, National Interest, National Review, The New Republic, and Orbis, and in major newspapers, such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post.

Doug is a principled opponent of global interventionism, and a talented writer: when he was caught up in the recent lobbying scandal in Washington, because he took payments from lobbyist Jack Abramoff for writing articles that took a position he would have taken anyway, our suddenly moralistic media went ballistic — this from the same people who swallowed George W. Bush’s lies about WMD in Iraq, and shamelessly cowered while the War Party relegated them to the role of court stenographers!

His column, “Foreign Follies,” is going to be one of the most popular features of Antiwar.com. I can see that in the first installment, and here is a taste:

“A shining city on a hill. A light unto the world. That’s what early Americans hoped their land would become. A beacon of liberty, beckoning others to follow. A place of refuge and hope for those fleeing tyranny or seeking opportunity. An oasis in the midst of conflict and chaos.

“This once described the United States. But no longer.”

Watch out, War Party — because the party’s over. Bandow’s column will be appearing every week, on Fridays: his wide-ranging knowledge of foreign affairs, and politics in general, is a huge asset, and we are proud to feature his work on Antiwar.com.

Retired Col. Sam Gardiner lays it out for Steve Soto at the Left Coaster:

“I. Period of Building Pressure: This could be 60 days or even six months in which the US and European leaders continue to talk to their publics on the failure of the Iranians to comply with “the wishes of the international community.” There will be talk and work on sanctions but those, will be for the purpose of building US and international support; they will not be done with any hope of changing Iranian behavior. We should see the US surface a smoking gun during this phase. (Note: this has already happened with the recent “revelation” about Iran’s uranium possession in excess of what was anticipated) Some military deployments might take place. Most visible would be three aircraft carriers in the vicinity.

II. Initial Strike: This would last 36 to 48 hours. It would only be moderately visible to the global publics. Most of the attacks would take place at night. To prevent retaliation, most targets would be other than nuclear facilities.

III. Pause: The strikes would stop. Iran would be warned that if it were to retaliate the strikes would resume. The pause would probably not be long, maybe 72 hours. Either Iran would conduct an operation against US or Israeli targets, or there would be an event that is blamed on Iran. (Note: Gardiner says that it is very likely, especially in the wake of last week’s announcement from Iran that any strike by Bush against Iran would be considered as an attack from Israel also, that Iran will hit Israel in response to any attack from America)

IV. Regime Change Targeting: The attacks from this point would shift to targets that could cause the regime to fall. It would include direct attacks on the leadership of Iran.”

More.

Larisa Alexandrovna’s recent article on the subject.

Thanks Lukery.