In April 1862, a group of 22 Union commandos known today as the “Andrews Raiders” made their way behind Confederate lines, stole a train in Georgia, and headed for Chattanooga cutting telegraph lines, tearing up tracks, and burning bridges as they went. The episode became famous as ̶[...]
Posts Tagged ‘Military’
Does Trumpian military strategy make sense?
In a wide-ranging Foreign Affairs op-ed published Tuesday, Trump’s last national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, decried “American weakness” and called for “peace through strength” (read Politico story here). That’s a meaningless political jab coupled with a [...]
June 12th, 2024 - 6:35 pm § in News Media, Republicans
Inflated valor
Rep. Troy Nehls (R-TX; bio here) was an Army reservist who served as a civil affairs officer in Afghanistan with the 101st Airborne Division. The Pentagon just revoked his Combat Infantryman Badge (CIB), which he’d been wearing on his civilian suit jacket, because he wasn’t an infantryma[...]
June 18th, 2023 - 9:10 pm § in Politics, Republicans
DeSantis and Pence vouch for Confederate traitor
Braxton Bragg (photo, left) got a free college education at West Point, at the expense of taxpayers of the United States, then waged war against his benefactors. Although Bragg committed treason (per Const. Art. III, §3), he arguably deserved a medal for incompetence, thereby contributing to the Co[...]
April 22nd, 2023 - 7:42 pm § in Misc.
USS Arizona crew: Now there’s one
With the death of Ken Potts (photo, left) at age 102 on Friday, April 21, 2023 (read story here), Lou Conter (photo, below right), 101, is the only remaining USS Arizona crew member from the Pearl Harbor attack who’s still living. Potts, a crane operator, was on Ford Island when the battlesh[...]
Can we trust our military?
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[...]
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[...]