Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?” “Here I am,” I said; “send me!”
When the Nation calls, “whom shall we send?” A Spartan will respond, “Send Me!”
2nd Armored Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, "Spartans"
"Send Me" is also the title of a new documentary featuring former US Special Forces Operator, and Task Force Pineapple member, Tim Kennedy. Task Force Pineapple, you will recall, was a volunteer effort by some of us to rescue American citizens and allies from the collapse in Afghanistan. My own role was stateside and limited to facilitating international negotiations and trying to help set up a private airline to move refugees. Kennedy went on the ground.
He was there to do what the US Government failed to do, then refused to do, then actively blocked attempts to do. If there were any justice, the new documentary ought to bring down the government -- and not violently or through insurrection, but by their heartfelt and proper rejection by the American people.
A US Army colonel turned away busloads of Americans, allies and orphans trying to flee Afghanistan during the chaotic evacuation of war-torn country last August, a new documentary claims....
They were met by an unidentified official from the 82nd Airborne Division who would not let the buses through.
“There was a colonel that who came out and wanted to show that essentially he was the one that could decide whether or not somebody could get on a plane or not,” said a member of the team whose identity was concealed by the documentary’s producers.
The colonel made the call to ‘put everybody back out,” MMA fighter turned-solider Tim Kennedy said.
“‘I don’t care who they are, they get back on those buses and those buses go back into Kabul,'” he said, according to Kennedy — even after the team explained their bags had been screened and were already in the airport.
The colonel could not be pleaded with, and would not even make an exception for people with US passports because he didn’t know “if that’s fake or not,” the anonymous team member recalled.
He then ordered the refugees back into the bus and off the base at gunpoint, where they would pass through a vengeful Taliban security force.
No one in the military or the administration has paid any price for this betrayal of duty, of country, and of countrymen. Fourteen thousand Americans were abandoned; only God knows how many finally made it out.
9 comments:
Here is the problem.
" a colonel "
" unidentified official "
Hard to pay a debt if no one knows who owes it.
That’s -a- problem. It’s not -the- problem. The problem is that they’re all guilty, and the system is devoted to protecting itself.
I agree that you've put your finger on the problem.
Only, there is not any realistic option for changing that. The "system" that has been co-opted into protecting itself is not going to tolerate any serious effort to change it. [Suppose someone were to begin beating the drum about this corruption in a way that seriously started to move the needle on popular opinion in this country? How long would it be before the DOJ "investigated" that person (including well-publicised raids to serve warrants). And her lawyer? And her accountant? And anyone who had contributed money?]
When our forefathers shook off George III's villainous grasp, they had the advantage of existing colonial governments to organize behind. There's not any reasonable analog this time around.
I'm increasingly convinced that there's no fix for the mess we're currently in. If the rot's as deep as what you're showing, I don't know how you salvage anything (if, indeed, there even is anything to salvage.) At least not until the existing system collapses fully under its own weight - then maybe someone can organize a decent alternative out of the ashes
When our forefathers shook off George III's villainous grasp, they had the advantage of existing colonial governments to organize behind. There's not any reasonable analog this time around.
Lots of State government to organize around, and they're no more fractious among each other--less so, in many respects--than were the separate colonial governments. It's a big enough core that it won't even necessarily take any sort of revolution other than via the ballot box and enough elected officials and appointees to force the issue.
Couple ways to force the issue, too, and they're not mutually exclusive; although they'll need to dovetail, and they'll require a durable set of electeds and appointees, and especially a durable set of We the People. One way is to reduce the civil service employee force by a large lot--either by firing them and beating the unions in court, or by altering the law regarding civil service union authorizations to bar striking, and to weaken union ability to object to firings--switching to at-will employment, for instance--etc. Another way is to alter the anti-patronage laws, which is another way the civil servants got so embedded, to limit how long any civil servant can be a government employee--say to 10 years, and then never again. Another way is to eliminate a broad number of Agencies and Cabinet Departments altogether, and return the job losers to the private economy. We went nearly 100 years, for instance, without a Department of Justice, and the only reason we have one now is from the explosion of Federal laws, especially criminal laws. The DoEd is a brand new Department that we didn't need until well into the 20th century, and one we still don't need. Another way is to simply withhold funding from Departments and Agencies until they become responsive to their elected official bosses. Another way is to get individual and personal: apply the Holman Rule to recalcitrant civil servants and political appointees who still misbehave.
In DoD in particular, it's time to eliminate roughly 90% of the civilian contractor positions in the Pentagon and to return roughly the same per centage of the officers and enlisted to field service--the combat commands and associated support facilities. The Pentagon doesn't need that many personnel. The field commands have to deal with REMFs enough as it is; they shouldn't have to deal with them from the top. Especially given that the Pentagon REMFs keep insisting on interposing themselves into the chain of command.
Eric Hines
This morning I notice that the Spartans’ motto has substituted the Nation for God quite explicitly. It thereby qualifies as fascist under AVI’s proposal for that, which is in the later comments on the ‘semi-fascist post below.’
I think Thos. point may be that we can never expect such a corrupt system to endure being reformed in such ways. It will have to collapse, because such wealth and power will not be yielded simply because an election says it should.
The junta is paying, just not in a way that will prevent a repeat performance.
via Instapundit
fter its Saigon moment, the Biden administration has been paying “approximately $300,000 per flight to a Taliban controlled airline in order to allow U.S. citizens and Afghan allies to continue evacuating.” Air Taliban is being funded by the United States with State Department officials confirming “that the cash-strapped Taliban are profiting from these payments.“
Eric Hines for President 2024!
If only we could get someone viable to run with that kind of sensibility.
Thanks, Douglas, but I can't. My wife is a very private person, and I will not drag her into the spotlight that would result.
Aside from that minor detail, I probably wouldn't succeed. As some of you may have noticed, my concept of tact and politic discourse makes Trump look like a choir boy. And I take fewer prisoners than he does. Though, IMNSHO, my target selection is quite a bit better.
Eric Hines
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