Grim's Hall

Place bets DPRK

Place Your Bets:

The line on North Korea is now available.

Chuck Z Liberia

Military Science, Gangsta Style:

Chuck Z gives us the lessons from Liberia. I'm trying not to laugh, Chuck, and it's not working. Dude brought a feather-duster to a firefight?

I've had the honor of guest-blogging alongside Bill Faith, at Mudville back when Greyhawk went off to war. Bill's opened a new blog for older veterans, called Old War Dogs. "Rurik," a Grim's Hall reader and friend of the blog, is one of Bill's new co-bloggers. It's a pretty impressive crew, in fact, as George writes:

Bill Faith of Small Town Veteran, Steve Gardner, "the Tenth Brother" (ask John "Magic Hat" Kerry if you don't remember what that means), Russ Vaughn the Poetrooper, and several other angry hounds, including 1st Cav Page, Gene "Blood-n-Fire" Harrison, John Werntz, proven bloggers Zero Ponsdorf and Jim Bartimus, and myself, Rurik.

Each of us is a military veteran, each with opinions founded on experience. Between us I believe we have 3 CIBs, 2 Navy Combat Action Awards, 1 Purple Heart, 2 Bronze Stars, an Air Medal, an Army Commendation Medal, 2 Croix de Guerres with palms, and lots of other awards. One is an emeritus Ivy League professor, and another a published commercial author. Not too bad for nine old dudes. Enough to justify an opinion or two?

Just having Russ Vaughn on board is a coup. I'd be glad to have him blog here, even if it were just to post his poems (which I always mean to do, but only sometimes get around to doing). They've got him, and several other good writers and thinkers besides.

You might want to check them out.

Heh-heh-heh

Heh-heh-heh:

If IANSA isn't happy, I'm happy.

But Rebecca Peters of the London-based International Action Network on Small Arms accused governments of letting a few states "hold them all hostage and to derail any plans which might have brought any improvements in this global crisis."

Well done, then. Anything that makes Ms. Peters frustrated in her professional capacity is a thing I'm glad to see. Odd list of allies this time, though:

IANSA identified the main players blocking agreement as Cuba, India, Iran, Pakistan and Russia. Other gun control activists named China, Egypt and Venezuela as well.

I'm not accustomed to seeing my interests line up with Venezuela's and Iran's. We'll need to look into that, after the party.

Still, I'm glad to see my letters got there all right:

The meeting was dogged from the start by zealous members of the U.S. National Rifle Association, who flooded the United Nations with letters falsely accusing it of secretly plotting to take away Americans' guns on July 4, a U.N. holiday marking U.S. Independence Day when delegates did not meet.

This is a news story, right? Not an editorial? Which part was false? That they were meeting the week of Independence Day? No, they were, and the fact that they didn't hold formal talks on that one day hardly means there were no meetings or conversations going on behind the scenes.

That they were plotting to take away America's gun rights? No, that part was true too. Ms. Peters said so herself.

I think American citizens should not be exempt from the rules that apply to the rest of the world. At the moment there are no rules applying to the rest of the world. That’s what we’re working for.

American citizens should have guns that are suitable for the legitimate purposes that they can prove.

I think that eventually Americans will realize that their obsession with arming themselves in fear, in a paranoid belief that they’re going to be able to stave off the ills of the world through owning guns, through turning every house into an arsenal, eventually Americans will go away from that.

I think Americans who hunt—and who prove that they can hunt—should have single-shot rifles suitable for hunting whatever they’re hunting. I mean American citizens should be like any other citizens of the world.

So -- if you can prove (to Ms. Peters and her ilk) that you have a legitimate purpose, she thinks it might be proper for you to have a single-shot rifle (suitable for hunting). But the Second Amendment has to go -- Americans must live under the same rules as the rest of the world. Rules she wants to write. Yet, of course, it is a fearful-paranoid-false-accusation to say that... well, to tell the truth about what she herself says she wants.

If I said I thought "the rest of the world should live under the same laws as Americans," that would be jingoistic Cowboy-speak. Reverse the formula -- "America must live by the same rules as the rest of the world" -- and it's progressive wisdom.

Not on Independence Day. That's what "Independence" means.

Molon Labe. Remember the Spartans? Remember the Alamo?

I do.

BACK TO IRAQ.

BACK TO IRAQ.

Soon I will be leaving our fair shores to return to Iraq. Consequently, I will be taking a hiatus from all blogging activity for sometime. However, I do hope to resume posting upon my return. In the meantime I am sure that my co-bloggers will continue the good fight for freedom.

Semper Fi.

21 yr brk

An End To Rest:

Our friends at Military.com, who sponsored so much of I MBC, have a great story today. It treats the story of New York City Police Detective Evan L. "Pappy" Schwerner, who recently rejoined his Marines following a short twenty-one year break. Well, who doesn't need a break now and then?

I'm sure the Marines around here will be only too glad to say, "Welcome home, Corporal... that is, Pappy."

NORTHCOM DPRK Missiles

NORTHCOM Speaks:

The Northern Command has said that they were good to go for intercept, but determined there was no need. It's good to know that NORTHCOM detected all the launches, and it's good that they didn't say exactly how they did.

Just what is going on here?

According to Reuters, the AP, CNN and Fox, North Korea actually test fired that ding-dong missle of theirs. It appears to have "failed".

But other missles were fired, too.

Like, 5 or 6 in all.

In a two hour period.

All the accounts above are just slightly different.

I'm wondering if that Taepodong-2 missle was in fact, shot down, and the other missles were a response to that.

A battle may just have occurred.

Bookies are cheap

Bookies are Cheapskates:

Australian bookies are paying $201 on Bush to win the Nobel Prize this year. Given the nature of the Nobel committee, I'd have to say that a thousand-to-one would be ripping people off. $201 is shameless.

Roundup

Roundup:

Quite a few excellent posts today. MilBlogs has a good running tally, but here are some I noticed:

Cassidy writes about love songs.

The Geek has posted his starry flag on high.

Mudville has posts old and new on the subject of the celebrations worldwide, wherever American servicemen tred.

Laughing Wolf at BlackFive has reposted the Declaration of Independence. However often you've read it, read it again.

Sharp Knife

Sharp Knife:

Normally one can count on Noel for a powerful post on Independence Day. I trust he is delayed by some honorable purpose. In any event, if you missed his Flag Day meditation, it's worth a look today.

Scorpions

Scorpions & Independence Day:

I recall that, just prior to the invasion of Afghanistan, there was an interview with a Talib who impressed the Western journalist by conducting the interview while smoking scorpions. This was meant to be terrifying -- after all, how tough would you have to be to smoke a scorpion?

A few years later, we have our answer:

A discerning guest at a Manhattan cocktail party removed a scorpion from its bed of cheese atop an endive leaf and popped it in his mouth, determined to savor the taste unadulterated.

"Nutty, sweet," was the verdict of Gourmet magazine food editor Ian Knauer at the recent soiree.

See? Even the sort of American who attends "soirees" can munch a scorpion, then give you a critique of its flavor to boot.

Plus, a lot of Americans are descended from Scots, where there was that... well, read it for yourself.

Happy Independence Day. Remember the example of Little Bill, and don't take guff from anyone today.

Hedging your bets department:

Sentator Joseph Lieberman, (Democrat from Connecticut) has announced that he's going to gather signatures for a petition to run as a write in candidate for Senate 'just in case' he loses the Democratic primary.

Plenty of people are not happy with him.

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised at the Senator's decision, really. I mean, he simultaneously ran for Senator and Vice President in 2000.

But what is interesting here is how Lieberman, who has been vilified by the anti-war wing of the Democratic party, is setting fire to his bridges behind him.

I can't imagine that the DNC is happy with this.

So, either the Senator wins his primary, in which case its 'business as normal' sorta/kinda/maybe, or he loses the primary, which sets up a three way contest in which the Senator, by splitting the Democratic vote (assuming that he really does split the vote), may actually give the contest to the Republican candidate.

I'm sure that the RNC is hoping for the latter, but of course, we'll have to wait and see.

I think Bush Derangement Syndrome has just given rise to Lieberman Derangement Syndrome.

(via Memorandum)

Big problems in that chain of command.

The BBC has more on the incident in Mahmoudiya, Iraq in March:

A former US soldier has been arrested and charged with killing four Iraqi civilians after raping one of them, the US Justice Department said.

This is a pretty ugly incident if the guy's squadmates were involved, as is reported in this article from the Army Times.

The Army Times' article reports that:

The affidavit, filed by FBI special agent Gregor J. Ahlers of Louisville, said Green and three other soldiers from the 101st’s 502nd Infantry Regiment were working a traffic checkpoint in Mahmoudiya on March 12 when they conspired to rape a woman who lived nearby.

Which implies to me that a squad team leader is involved, because somebody had to be incharge of that traffic checkpoint.

So the soldier charged was a PFC and was discharged for having a 'personality disorder', which means he had to have been a 'problem child' even before this happened. Now, I can see one crazy guy going off and doing this. But an entire fireteam? There is something wrong in that chain of command.

What a mess this is going to be.

A kind word for KOS

A Kind Word for Kos:

Southern Appeal noticed this diary on Daily KOS, a hate-filled diatribe against the South and Southerners. It is not the first, and doubtless will not be the last, so I was prepared to write it off in that spirit. I hadn't intended to comment on it at all.

The only reason I'm going to do so is the follow-up post at the author's homepage noting that Kos and company had run him off ("like Saint Patrick casting away the snakes," in the author's own words). He has words for Kos in the same spirit as his earlier words for the South, but leave off what he has to say; it doesn't matter.

What does matter is that this was an act of decency by Kos, from whom I had not expected one. It is noted and appreciated.

Hamdan

Hamdan:

The body politic is in an interesting place. The most important distinctions are decided time and again by razor-thin margins, yet the winning side gets all. Thus, in 2004, the electoral margin was very thin -- yet the Republicans won both houses of Congress and the Presidency. Though the margin of victory was only a few points, the whole power of the state passed into Republican hands.

In Hamdan, a 5-3 decision that would have been 5-4 if Roberts had participated decided the day. The margin was as narrow as can be, and yet the intent of the other two branches of government was set aside, and the most hardline liberal ruling in years became, for now, the law.

The SCOTUS is designed to 'tack behind' the rest of the government, as lifetime appointees of previous administration continue to hold to an older understanding of propriety. This has a conservative effect on government, in the sense that it slows and moderates change. That is the real effect of Hamdan -- to hold us to a Cold War understanding of the Geneva Conventions.

During the Cold War, terrorists and guerrillas were the regular proxies of both sides, though particularly the Communists. As such, the great powers had an interest in pretending that those groups had a kind of legitimacy they really never deserved -- whether it was the Contras or the proto-Taliban on the one side, or the Viet Cong or the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine or various quasi-Marxist African militias on the other. The Cold War superpowers each adopted a false morality in order to pursue the real goal of disemboweling the other sides' interest through proxies. We chose to treat these people as if they were noble freedom fighters -- at least the ones whose defiance of the laws of war was beneficial to our own side -- and now we are paying the price. The community of legal scholars who came up during the Cold War considers terrorists to simply be disadvantaged soldiers, and considers the violations of the rules of war that terrorists engage in to be simply a balancing of the playing field. We must treat them as if they were moral equals, if only to show how much better we are.

SCOTUS will come around on this one, as more justices retire and are replaced. Justices chosen after 9/11 will not be soft on terrorists, as the old-school justices have learned to be.

Nor will the international situation continue to be so kind. The Cold War is over. The great powers have changed: they are now the United States, China, and a declining European Union. There is a rising India. Of those, only the EU has an interest in continuing to treat terrorists as a sort of criminal, rather than as a sort of barbarian. The EU's power declines steadily, as it strangles itself with regulations and tries to force economies as different as Frances' and Greece's to obey the same rules. India has no love for terrorists, as it suffers more from radical Islamic terrorism than anyone; China has already adopted the issue as a way of dealing with "splittists."

The tide is strongly against Hamdan and its advocates. I join those who suspect that the Bush administration and the Republicans in Congress will set out to overturn it as their major business between now and the 2006 elections. They will not find it hard to do, as the groundwork is already lain. Hamdan, though stern, is a last stroke from a once-strong champion. Once that model of thinking bestrode the world. This was its last hour of strength.

As for what lays beyond, Chester has some interesting thoughts. I myself simply believe that the Republican Federal powers will undo the work of the SCOTUS, and gain political strength in doing so. The Congress will be asked for new authority, and will grant it gladly. Abroad, there is nothing at the international level that is strong enough to resist the combined interests of the United States, China, India, and Russia into the bargain.

There will be no great new rights for terrorists. They will not enjoy the full protections of courts martial, as if they were honorable men. The tide turned long ago. All we see in Hamdan is proof that a few old men and women failed to notice.

Birthday Cake

Birthday Cake:

The boy is four years old now. We were moving during his birthday, so the celebration was postponed until tonight. My mother, his grandmother, made him a birthday cake.

I haven't said much about my mother (here and here are the only times I recall), but you probably know that Southern women are polite and sweet, yet stern and iron-willed.

My mother is all those things, and also rather assertive on the question of health food. This is a departure from when I was a boy; in those days, she hardly cooked at all. I left home knowing how to make everything from pancakes to lasagna from scratch. At our house, if you wanted to eat it, you'd better know how to cook it. At some point, though, she decided that she wanted to eat right and have better health, and naturally therefore she accomplished both goals. Nothing in her house is low-fiber, full-fat, or otherwise potentially unhealthy.

Which brings us to the birthday cake.

I swear this is true: his grandmother made him a prune-bran birthday cake.

She really did.

Move

The Move South:

I've been quiet for a few days while moving house. A few notes on the experience:

1) I've never driven a truck quite that size before. It was a very large Penske rental, right at the upper limit of what a non-commercial license allows.

2) Naturally, therefore, the first part of the drive included crossing the Blue Ridge mountains.

3) In the worst rainstorm on record.

4) Having gotten off the mountains and into the Shenandoah valley, where the rain was even worse, we came across (in the little village of New Market) an absolutely horrendous wreck involving six semis and numerous smaller vehicles. "Great," I thought. "Even the professionals can't keep the big rigs on the road today."

5) "Perhaps it was a fluke, though," I thought, carrying on down the road. About ten miles later, there was another wreck, this one involving two semis.

6) The rain was so bad that, on some occasions, traffic just stopped. After a while, people shut off their engines and waited for a break in the rain.

7) A "break" still meant very heavy rain.

8) Penske's trucks are top-notch. I loved the thing -- beautiful, powerful, outstanding.

9) Penske's service sucks. The truck was more than half a day late showing up. Nothing they told us about it was true. No proper instructions were given for anything, including the question of whether it could accept low-sulfur diesel fuel or how it was to be returned.

10) Did I need a truck that large? Yes and no. Only about one third of the truck was actual furniture or household goods. The other two thirds? About half of that was the wife's art supplies and artwork in progress. The rest was flowers. Tons of them, pot after pot, three shelves full lashed together to make big platforms and then all the floor space. I can't understand how she could acquire so many flowers.

11) OK, I can understand it -- she grew most of them from seeds. But still.

12) In spite of everything, we survived. All is well, more or less. Hope you've had a good few days.

Sending a message.

If this report is true,

Israeli warplanes buzzed the summer residence of Syrian President Bashar Assad early Wednesday, military officials said, in a message aimed at pressuring the Syrian leader to win the release of a captured Israeli soldier.

I think the Israelis are about to take the gloves off.

Update:
I guess it is true.

This doesn't leave much wiggle room, either:

Earlier, Justice Minister Haim Ramon said that Mashaal, was a target for assassination due to his ordering of the kidnapping of Shalit.

"He is definitely in our sights ... he is a target," Ramon told Army Radio. "Khaled Mashaal, as some who is overseeing, actually commanding the terror acts, is definitely a target."

Well, it isn't like Hamas isn't asking for it.

Life Changes.

The fellows over at Situational Awareness are going through a major change.

I wish them good luck in their new endevors, and it seems that they already more to say. Yeah, I agree. Keep bombing.

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