| From: LindyBill | 9/16/2007 9:09:27 AM | | | | | | No War For Oil?
DAILY PUNDIT
By Bill Quick on Islamofascism
Alan Greenspan claims Iraq war was really for oil - Times Online
"in his long-awaited memoir, to be published tomorrow, Greenspan, a Republican whose 18-year tenure as head of the US Federal Reserve was widely admired, will also deliver a stinging critique of President George W Bush's economic policies.
However, it is his view on the motive for the 2003 Iraq invasion that is likely to provoke the most controversy. "I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil," he says.
Greenspan, 81, is understood to believe that Saddam Hussein posed a threat to the security of oil supplies in the Middle East."
i hope he's right. And defending US energy supplies is not the worst reason to go to war I've ever heard. Keep in mind this is a bit different rationale than the leftist antiwarriors offer. It wasn't a matter of "stealing" Saddam's oil - there was no need to do that, since the US could simply have bought it from Saddam on the open market a hell of a lot more cheaply than invading Iraq for it. It was a matter of preventing Saddam from gaining nuclear weapons, and then taking control of Kuwaiti and Saudi oil, and conceivably Iranian oil as well. That would have precipitated an energy crisis for the entire western world, not just the US, although from the craven assumptions of the Euros - that they could deal with the devil Saddam even if he did have them simultaneously by the throat and the balls - made it seem as if they didn't think he was a threat.
That said, I've long assumed that Saudi fear of the Iraqi threat was a, if not the, prime mover behind Bush's decision to make Saddam target number one after Afghanistan. If that is the case, perhaps Saudi fear of a nuclear Iran in control of Iraq will lead them to pressure Bush to take out the Mullahs before he leaves office.
Then the next President can take on the Oilbags and the Wahabbist serpent they nurture in their, um, bosoms. |
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| From: LindyBill | 9/16/2007 9:57:20 AM | | | | | | The Sunday Paper (Repackaged Edition)
DEFENSE TECH BLOG
This is somewhat redundant, and for that I apologize, but here's how The Washington Post covered my meeting with the President in today's edition:
"President Reaches Out to a Friendly Circle in New Media
By Michael Abramowitz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, September 16, 2007; A07
The day after his prime-time speech on Iraq, President Bush sat down for a round-table interview not with traditional White House reporters but with bloggers who focus on military issues, including two participating by video link from Baghdad.
Judging from some of the accounts of the Friday meeting, the president offered up little news. Here is what one of the 10 bloggers, Ward Carroll of Military.com, described from his notes as some of Bush's most notable comments:
• "This strategy is my strategy."
• "I'm defining a horizon of peace."
• "I don't mind people attacking me. . . . That's politics . . . but I do mind people impugning the integrity of our generals."
Still, the hour-long meeting in the Roosevelt Room offered Bush another opportunity to break through what he sees as the filter of the traditional news media, while also reaching out to the providers of a new source of information for soldiers, their families and others who follow the conflict in Iraq closely.
"More and more we are engaging in the new-media world, and these are influential people who have a big following," said Kevin F. Sullivan, the White House communications chief.
Bush told the group that, to his knowledge, it was the first time a president had met with bloggers for a chat at the White House, one of the participants wrote. The blogs represented at the meeting are generally pro-Bush and pro-military, and the ensuing reports were highly sympathetic to the president.
"At this meeting President Bush came off as more comfortable with the message than I've seen him appear on TV or in speeches," wrote Carroll, a journalist and former Navy pilot. "No deer-in-the-headlights stuff here. Truly unwavering and passionate. Facts on the ground notwithstanding, he believes the United States can win the Iraq War. And to be honest, being around him made me believe it at that moment too."
Matthew Burden, a former Army officer who blogs under the name Blackfive, raved about how Bush slapped his hand and called him "brutha."
"The President was very intelligent, razor sharp, warm, focused, emotional (especially about his dad), and genuine," Blackfive wrote. "Even more so than this cynical Chicago Boy expected. I was overwhelmed by the sincerity -- it wasn't staged."
Bill Ardolino, who participated from Baghdad, wrote on indcjournal.com that he asked Bush about progress in Anbar province and Fallujah and that Bush's answer "honestly surprised me in its length, level of detail and grasp of events on the ground."
Bush told Ardolino: "The military can only do so much. There has to be follow-up with jobs and hope. We recognize that the man on the street needs to feel like his government cares about him."
Bush talked about the difficulty of setting up workable bureaucratic processes in Iraq, according to Ardolino's post, and the growing pains "that this society needs to go through" to achieve stability. "We shouldn't expect instant results with a society that was brutalized by Saddam Hussein," Bush told the group.
When it was all over, the bloggers seemed wowed. "All in all, it was an amazing day for Military.com and one I'll never forget," Carroll wrote. "In fact, I'd rank the event a close second to the time I sat in with Cheap Trick. It was that good."
-- Ward
defensetech.org |
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| To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (219878) | 9/16/2007 10:43:01 AM | | From: Geoff Altman | | | | The Israelis figured out how to jam it?
My forte was ASW not ECM so I'd have to talk to Hawkmoon my military advisor....<g> I do know that the travelling wave tube was a huge boon to ECM and the general tactics used to jam radar.
To tell you the truth Nadine, I must have read the chapter on TWTs 15 times and never really grasped it, just never clicked, Thank God they never asked me any theory questions about it on my rating exams...<g>:
sdphca.ucsd.edu
I've yet to hear of a radar that can't be jammed if you can deduce what type of radar it is.... I wouldn't doubt that Israel has an exact road map of radars in Syria. Those to avoid on the entrance and egress and those to jam at the target. |
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| From: Mr. Palau | 9/16/2007 10:55:59 AM | | | | | | "You have an unpopular President going onto prime time television, interrupting Americans' TV programs, to remind them of why they don't like him."
-- A "frustrated Capitol Hill Republican strategist with ties to the G.O.P. leadership," quoted by Time magazine, on President Bush's recent address on Iraq.
politicalwire.com |
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| To: Snowshoe who wrote (219877) | 9/16/2007 11:02:30 AM | | From: ManyMoose | | | | Charlie Russell knew the west. His art depicts action as though he were able to clip a single frame out of a movie.
Other artists, Frederick Remington for example, did almost as well, but I think Russell is incomparable.
Some artists, like Karl Bodmer, painted Native Americans in their actual dress and habitat. His paintings are faithful to detail but lack the power of Russell's, in my opinion. However, we owe a lot to him for capturing an ephemeral moment in history with paintings such as this one.
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| To: JDN who wrote (219895) | 9/16/2007 11:06:59 AM | | From: ManyMoose | | | | I'm afraid I don't know where I can get that particular Russell Print. I have several others that I've picked up over the years. Check out the art dealers whenever you get a chance.
I had difficulty finding a Russell print that would display on SI. Most of them seem to be protected and don't display, but I got that one from Wikipedia.
Here's an on line link where you can get some prints. artcyclopedia.com |
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| To: LindyBill who wrote (219882) | 9/16/2007 11:10:42 AM | | From: Geoff Altman | | | | If such boats are equipped with good (and very expensive) passive (silent) sensors, they can be the most difficult subs to detect. This has caused all the major naval powers to increase research in ASW, and increase ASW training.
This is a good thing. I worked in ASWOCs (Antisubmarine Warfare Operations Center) over half my career from 83 on so I know that our equipment is comparable to the task but there were some cut backs in training after the end of the (First..<g>) Cold War. But not too much as far as we were concerned. The Admirals that were, decided the best course of action was to change the name ASWOC to TSU (Tactical Support Center) in order to reflect our true nature..<g>...and therefore keep the funding and expanding the mission some to boot. |
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| From: Glenn Petersen | 9/16/2007 11:19:17 AM | | | | | | I have always liked Lindsey Graham. He strikes me as a no-nonsense, no bull-shit type of guy, a rarity in our current political climate. I would not be surprised to see him as the GOP VP nominee this year, and I am sure that he will run for the top spot sometime in the future.
Lindsey Graham's Realism
By David S. Broder
Sunday, September 16, 2007; B07
Now that the president has endorsed the Petraeus-Crocker plan for Iraq, it is worth noting one exchange from their Senate hearings.
Some senators, such as Barbara Boxer of California, were so self-absorbed they could not manage to ask a single question in their allotted time, even when they had Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker ready to provide answers.
Lindsey Graham of South Carolina is not like that. An Air Force Reserve officer, Graham is an incisive questioner whose unexpected and provocative inquiries often produce revealing answers, whether the subject is Iraq, immigration or a Supreme Court nomination.
A Republican with a notable record of independence, Graham has been an outspoken advocate of the surge strategy -- claiming real success on the ground and urging its continuation.
But Graham's first question to Petraeus called on the general to "put on the table as honestly as we can what lies ahead for the American people and the U.S. military if we continue to stay in Iraq. . . . It's highly likely that a year from now we're going to have at least 100,000 troops in Iraq?"
"That is probably the case," Petraeus said. "Yes, sir."
Graham's follow-up was even more surprising. "How many people are we losing a month, on average, since the surge began, in terms of killed in action?"
"Killed in action is probably in the neighborhood of 60 to 90."
Graham then noted that "we're spending $9 billion a month to stay in Iraq. . . . So you're saying to the Congress that you know that at least 60 soldiers, airmen and Marines are likely to be killed every month from now to July, that we're going to spend $9 billion a month of American taxpayer dollars, and when it's all said and done, we'll still have 100,000 people there. You believe it's worth it in terms of our national security interests to pay that price?"
Petraeus said: "Sir, I wouldn't be here, and I wouldn't have made the recommendations that I have made, if I did not believe that."
After a few more questions, Graham turned to Crocker and confronted him with a surprising question: "What's the difference between a dysfunctional government and a failed state?"
Crocker replied: "In a parliamentary democratic system such as Iraq has, there is a mechanism for the removal of governments that people get tired of. Parliament can simply vote no confidence."
That sounded to me -- and to Graham -- like a hint that the United States would welcome a change from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki if new and more flexible leadership were to appear in Baghdad.
Graham wanted to underline that message. "Would you agree with me," he asked Crocker, "that Iraq is a dysfunctional government at this moment in time?"
"Certainly, it is a challenged government," Crocker replied.
"You've called it dysfunctional," Graham said. "The point I'm trying to make is, to anybody who's watched this, this government is in a dysfunctional state. The point I'm trying to make, there's a difference between still trying and not trying."
When I talked with Graham on Thursday, he said he had asked those questions because "I am sick and tired of people posing choices between the two extremes; I want reality-based policy. [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid is as bad as Rumsfeld was in rejecting reality. He said in April that the war is lost, and he refuses to accept anything else."
But Graham said that he thought Crocker was "making a pretty major statement that the clock is running out on the Maliki government -- and we can have an effect on it by what we do here."
"There are alternatives," he said -- Shiite political leaders who are willing, for example, to tour the Baghdad jails with Graham and be photographed with Sunnis who are protesting the imprisonment of so many of their coreligionists. "The good news," Graham said, "is that Kurds and Sunnis and Shiites are ready to play politics. Judges feel more secure because of the surge, and that is important, because all of them have experienced rough justice.
"What we do can affect the outcome. But if we don't see progress on two of the three big issues -- oil revenues, de-Baathification, provincial elections -- in the next 90 days, it may not happen. And Iraq could be a failed state."
Despite the president's words, that sounds realistic.
davidbroder@washpost.com
siliconinvestor.com |
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