It’s hard to trust the military when top brass look stupid. In 1971, Charles M. Fair (bio here) wrote a book, “From the Jaws of Victory, A History of the Character, Causes, and Consequences of Military Stupidity, from Crassus to Johnson and Westmoreland,” whose title aptly describe[...]
Posts Tagged ‘Military’
What now, now that soldiers won’t have to get Covid shots?
I’m ex-military. I served in the Vietnam war, then was an Army Reserve instructor. I know all about how military life works. It’s all about teamwork. Nobody accomplishes anything by themselves in military service; the tasks are too big. The mantra is, you look out for your buddies, and t[...]
November 9th, 2022 - 1:23 am § in Politics, Republicans
Election denier can’t deny this
“Josh Shapiro, the Democratic attorney general for Pennsylvania, is projected to become governor after defeating Republican state Sen. Doug Mastriano,” Huffington Post reported on Tuesday night, November 8, 2022 (read story here). It wasn’t close. With 93% of the votes counted, Sha[...]
GOP Senate candidate wants to politicize the military
Few things in American democratic traditions are more sacrosanct than the idea that the military must be an apolitical institution. But Blake Masters, the boyish 36-year-old GOP nominee for the Arizona Senate seat once held by John McCain and currently held by Mark Kelly, a retired Navy officer and [...]
August 31st, 2022 - 5:39 pm § in Donald Trump, Politics
What’s in a name? Plenty
As part of a story (here) about a Ku Klux Klan plaque that still adorns West Point’s science building (WHY????), CNN said, “The renaming of bases with Confederate monikers has been a years-long process. It first became a hot button political issue in the final months of the Trump adminis[...]
August 19th, 2022 - 6:44 pm § in Donald Trump, Politics
Don’t expect a draft dodger to know what a soldier’s oath means
Everyone serving in the U.S. military swears an oath as follows. Enlisted men: “I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and th[...]
August 8th, 2022 - 6:15 pm § in Donald Trump
Trump prefers military parades without veterans
Trump likes military parades. He reportedly wanted tanks and missiles in his inauguration parade, but the Pentagon nixed the idea because tanks would destroy the streets (see story here). What he didn’t want was wounded veterans in his big military parade. “Look, I don’t want any wound[...]
USA politics circa 2022
Salon sizes things up thusly: “The summer of 2022 is hot and furious. We are dealing with a world literally on fire due to climate change. We are dealing with a world metaphorically on fire with a continuing war in Ukraine. We are dealing with monkeypox, a continuing pandemic, haters, baite[...]
July 7th, 2022 - 12:28 am § in Russia
Are tanks obsolete?
Western military leaders say they’re not, and explain the Russians’ problem in Ukraine is they don’t know how to use them. That’s why their advance on Kyiv failed. The Russian army is better at handling artillery, which is how they’re pushing back the Ukrainians in Donb[...]
June 5th, 2022 - 4:27 pm § in Misc.
Why do you need an AR-15?
You don’t. The AR-15 is a civilian version of the M-16 rifle lacking the selector switch to fire automatically (unless it’s been illegally modified with a readily-available kit) and a bayonet lug. I trained on both the M-14 and M-16 in basic, and was married to an M-16 for 13 months in V[...]