Mark Steyn is driven to them:
The Reuters headline put it this way: “Pirates Pose Annoying Distraction For Obama.”
So many distractions, aren’t there? Only a week ago, the North Korean missile test was an “annoying distraction” from Barack Obama’s call for a world without nuclear weapons and his pledge that America would lead the way in disarming. And only a couple of days earlier the president insisted Iraq was a “distraction” – from what, I forget: The cooing press coverage of Michelle’s wardrobe? No doubt when the Iranians nuke Israel, that, too, will be an unwelcome distraction from the administration’s plans for federally subsidized day care, just as Pearl Harbor was an annoying distraction from the New Deal, and the First World War was an annoying distraction from the Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s dinner plans…
When all the world’s a “distraction,” maybe you’re not the main event after all. Most wealthy nations lack the means to defend themselves. Those few that do, lack the will. Meanwhile, basket-case jurisdictions send out ever bolder freelance marauders to prey on the civilized world with impunity. Don’t be surprised if “the civilized world” shrivels and retreats in the face of state-of-the-art reprimitivization. From piracy to nukes to the limp response of the hyperpower, this is not a “distraction” but a portent of the future.
Not with a bang, but a whimper.
Which is a shame. I’ve always wanted to go out with a bang.
We still may go out with a bang, just not OUR bang!
BHO has run headlong into the horrible strategy of bringing some people up by bringing the rest of us down. His method for the world to accept him seems to be to diminish us.
You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for is about the end of our nation as we know it.
You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.
I find P.BO to be an annoying distraction from the important issues.
Is there anything we can do about that?
Kris, my sweet … P.BO is like the plug in the bottom of the sink. The important issues are going to be sidelined until we pull the plug and get the water running again.
By the way … I hope your recovery is proceeding apace. I’m sure that it seems all too slow to you, but I’m praying for you just the same.
Marianne
It isn’t over yet.
Steyn, works from a fundamentally flawed assumption. Namely that the US is somehow in a valid position to influence many of these events-even with a large military and lots of nukes.
The world has been becoming multi-polar for a long time now, and the “distraction” of tying one particular nation down in one other country under the guise of “liberating it”-simply accelerated the process.
So why not turn inward and strengthen our own selves to compete in that multi-polar world?
As for the pirates-everything I have read says that the US Navy already has all the ROE it needs to do what it wants to them-I suspect a desire not to kill an innocent man has them moving with caution. That’s not a bad thing-its the right thing.
Not everything that happens in the world can be blamed on Obama. Some things are going to proceed no how hard we try to prevent them.
So why not turn inward and strengthen our own selves to compete in that multi-polar world?
Skippy, I don’t see a lot of strengthing going on, In fact I see the deliberate weakining of our country. To what ends…
Sorry about the Typo, no spell-check on this work machine.
Skippy, do you have links to articles that support your statement that our Navy has the needed ROE?
The only good Pirate is a dead Pirate.
From the WSJ:
In one of its more overstretched spins on a news event involving the U.S. military, the New York Times front page yesterday opined that the hostage stand-off with the Somali pirates “showed the limits of the world’s most powerful military.” What it has in fact showed so far is the apparently still-needed distinction between the behavior of the civilized world and of barbarism.
The U.S. aircraft over the small pirate boat bobbing off the Horn of Africa are prevented from turning that boat into floating scrap only out of concern for the American hero of the moment, Captain Richard Phillips. The Somali pirates holding Capt. Phillips and many other hostages succeed only because, like all criminals confronting the civilized world today, they have reduced the value of human life to zero.
Amid the crisis Wednesday for the Maersk Alabama cargo ship, Capt. Phillips calculated without hesitation that he would put his life at risk to save the lives of his crew members. He traded one life to save many. In some corners of the nation, that honorable act is also well understood as a show of American strength. General David Petraeus, now head of the U.S. Central Command, will surely seek a way in turn to save Capt. Phillips’ life. That may require patience.
There’s probably more that can’t be talked about here-but I’m not ready to believe that Fifth Fleet has not made a conscious decision to take this situation carefully.
So… “not everything that happens in the world can be blamed on Obama”, Skippy. Getting a bit nervous, are you?
How long has it been since the minions of the liberal elite dosed all of us with repeated epithets of Bush’s responsibility for Hurricane Katrina to first graders being let out for recess a bit late? The shoe’s on the other foot now and it pinches a bit, doesn’t it!
Not nervous at all. Unlike a lot of people I knew pretty much what I was voting for-and what I was voting against. if John McCain and been able to promise a quick withdrawal from Iraq and had a running mate that was not a looney toon-I might have voted for him. Since neither of those two pre-condintions could be met, I voted my conscience.
I support an end to the Bush tax cuts, favor increased domestic spending, and don’t see Gates FY-10 DOD budget as gutting defense. I believe that most of the blame for our defense deficiencies can be laid directly at the feet of the wars and stupid decisions by civilian and uniformed DOD leadership .
I also find its pretty amazing that all the blame for everything related to anything falls on the current administration when most of the root causes started back in the late nineties and were accelerated by the actions of the Bush administration.
Has Obama made some mistakes? Yes. he’s got to face down his own party in the form of Nancy Pelosi and he’s not found a good vehicle to do so-even though he had a great opportunity by vetoing the omnibus bill.
But I also won’t be throwing away perfectly good tea bags worrying about things that have not yet come to pass-or complaining about higher taxes that I have not yet-nor will have to in the future-pay.
Pirates off the eastern coast of Africa fired on U.S. sailors Saturday as they tried to reach the lifeboat where an American captain is being held, a U.S. official familiar with the situation told CNN.
The gunfire forced the sailors, who did not return fire, to turn back, the official said.
But have no fear, lawfare is here!
The FBI is launching a criminal investigation into the hijacking and hostage-taking, two law enforcement officials told CNN. The probe will be led by the FBI’s New York field office, which has responsibility for looking into cases involving U.S. citizens in the African region. Agents from the office were scheduled to leave for Africa sometime this weekend, the officials said.
Above Stolen from Ace
What are the democrat policies? Weaken the military exactly when North Korea is sending missiles flying; make our financial position stronger by placing us neck-deep in debt; put the government in charge of everything, so that all human affairs are conducted with all the efficiency of the line in which you’re waiting at the DMV.
cribbed from House of Eratosthenes
These guys write it better than I can articulate.
Skippy – My son is a Lt. on a destroyer that just returned from a 7 month deployment. We are terribly happy that he is able to spend Easter with us. This is actually the first time in his Navy career that this is possible.
To your point; my son who is the FPO of his ship explained the rules of engagement to me and you are completely incorrect.
Unless you know something that has not been broadcast to the media regarding the current pirate standoff the ROE of Navy Destroyers completely hamstring them in this situation. Would you like to challenge the opinion of a currently serving FPO or, do you know something that no one else knows?
Until the civilians that run our gov’t give a green light to an action nothing will take place.
See my previous comments once they come out of moderation hell.
Seems to me there are two different situations that need to be discussed:
1) Was the Maersk within sight of Naval vessels before it was boarded by pirates? And if not-what is the Maersk line’s policy on “self defense of the ship”? Or why it does not alter routing to give Somalia a wide berth-there is probably an economic reason for that somewhere.
2) Once a hostage has been taken-it seems to me that the dynamics have been changed. I believe that Fifth Fleet would be actively pursuing a resolution that keeps the hostage alive.
There is, of course, the question as to why we do not convoy these ships like we did in the 1980’s in the gulf.
Having recently studied the Beslan massacre, I note a significant difference between Russian special ops planning in a hostage incident and ours–they assume from the get-go that the hostage is dead. The more hostages they can save, the better, but they will not let the presence of hostages impede the retaking of the objective. In the event that a terrorist grabs a hostage to shoot behind, Spetsnaz are actually trained to shoot through the hostage to kill the terrorist.
In our case, and this is only the slightest of exaggerations, every shot taken must be cleared through a maze of JAGs up to a four-star who thinks he will be CNO or President someday, if he can only avoid a stain on his record. Every shot taken, even if legally approved, will be subject to a Congressional inquiry. Piracy has no cost to the pirate, save a miniscule risk of losing his otherwise miserable life (weighed against rich, royal success), but suppressing piracy has every risk to our own honorable fighting sailors. Regardless of the casualties, no Spetsnaz has ever been subject to a star tribunal or public witch hunt for killing a lawless and wild dog.
“and this is only the slightest of exaggerations”
ROGER THAT! We now have a system of political commisars (and all the Byzantine bureaucratic political intrigue that goes with it) at all levels–within the services and without–that would do Kafka proud. Your last para. should be reproduced and pasted on the foreheads of every academy graduate at all three places least they labor under the illusion that once on active duty they actually might be called upon to commit themselves to being “at war” as opposed to being forever and constantly “at politics.”
Zane/
While warming to the subject, let me pose this question to you as someone who has reached a certain level of command authority/responsibility and whose active duty service is far, far more recent than mine. In the 1939 Louisiana Army War Game Joe Stillwell garnered himself the #1 rating for generalship as evaluated by George Marshall in no small part because he broke the rules and lept off 1 hr early to start the games in order to get the jump on the opfor. What do you think would happen to a general that pulled that stunt in the same situation today, given the state-of-play of our current command structure and the current ethos/weltanschauung of the profession?
VX, not to disillusion you, but I am not someone of a certain level of command authority / responsibility. As an O3, I battled corrupt O6s. I won the legal battle, but my advancement has ended at O4, and with the Navy desperately looking to squeeze out as many sailors as possible in order to buy something / anything over the next several years, I am beginning to have doubts of retiring even at that grade. From my experience since late 2001, however, I have only observed that breaking the rules has never won anyone favor from seniors, however many lives it has saved or objectives it attains.
Skippy, these are facts not arguable:
Obama is not to blame for the piracy.
Obama IS to blame for lack of action for his part in the rescue of an American citizen after an attack on United States property, aka, a flagged American ship.
No matter what party, no matter what person, no matter his history with your issues, the President is that man with the big fuzzy ones responsible for the safety of American citizens. Since you were one of the instruments providing protection of those citizens, you should understand this.
Babs, apparently Skippy prefers to switch the subject once his “exaggeration ” on ROE is challenged. Or, more accurately though less kindly, he pulled a “Biden”.
I would think that if BHO had issued a “guns free” type of ROE to our troops, that President Erkle would have made this ROE publicly known.
Skippy, surely you did not mean to use the WSJ article comments you quoted to determine what the ROE is? The link is http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123940302250809641.html.
I read the article a few times, closed my eyes tightly, clicked my heels twice; still could not discern what the ROE is from the article. BTW, “The Barbarian Coast” was a well chosen title for the article.
As you well know, there is almost ALWAYS more that cannot, or at least should not, be talked about on any sensitive topic or situation.
Nothing I have read states that our troops have been given a free hand (ROE) to do as they see fit to deal with the pirates.
Team BHO/Biden would be proud of you.
President Obama granted two separate requests from the Defense Department to go forward with a military operation to rescue Captain Richard Phillips, an administration official tells CNN.
Obama granted the authority to use appropriate force with the focus on saving and protecting Phillips’ life. The requests were made by the Pentagon Friday and Saturday. For technical reasons, authority was granted two different times, according to the official, because different U.S. forces moved in the region near the coast of Somalia.
And no he would not have made that publicly known-but neither would C5F simply wait and make it up as they went along. They’ve been thinking this through for while now.
But thanks for the indignant sneer anyway.
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