On 31 January 1968, the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese army broke a cease fire brokered for the New Year’s holiday, launching massive attacks throughout the south. Initially thrown back on their heels, the South Vietnamese defense forces and their allies rallied, delivering a crushing blow to the Communist forces. As an organized fighting force, the Viet Cong never fully recovered.
It was a massive defeat that became spun into a huge propaganda victory for the Communists. After Walter Cronkite surveyed the battlespace at Hue City and declared victory unachievable, President Johnson is quoted as having said, “That’s it. If I’ve lost Cronkite I’ve lost middle America.” Cronkite was the most trusted face in millions of American households, and public opinion – the strategic center of gravity for any democracy – turned sharply against the war.
The rest, as they say, is history.
On 13 July 2008, the Sky Soldiers of 2nd Platoon, Chosen Company, 2nd Battalion 503rd Infantry Regiment were rousted from their sleep at 0330 in preparation for a suspected Taliban assault from the hamlet of Wanat, Nuristan Province, Afghanistan. They had moved to their new positions from another village known as Bella a few miles closer to the Pakistani border, after what had been a more or less fruitless effort to interdict a Taliban ratline for personnel and material reinforcements just four days previously. The Sky Soldiers were too few to have much operational impact at Bella.
But their movement to Wanat seems to have been poorly supported. Material for building a defensive perimeter did not arrive, ammo was scarce, the soldiers lacked adequate water supplies and were working on the borderline of dehydration. Their only Predator drone was shifted to a higher priority area of operations. A helicopter assault on an insurgent train two days previously also killed doctors and assistants from the area’s only medical clinic. Civil engagement was not a priority, and the locals were – quite literally – up in arms.
The assault, when it came, was a bloodbath:
The first RPG and machine gun fire hit the forward operating base’s mortar pit, knocking out the 120mm mortars and exploding the stockpile of mortar ammunition. The insurgents next destroyed the TOW truck inside the combat outpost with RPGs. The explosion of the mortar shells hurled the anti-tank missiles into the command post. The attack concentrated on the base’s observation post, where nine soldiers were positioned on a tiny hill about 50 to 75 meters from the main base. Of those nine, five died, and at least three others were wounded, with four of them killed in the first 20 minutes of the battle. Three times teams of soldiers from the main base ran through Taliban fire to resupply the observation post and carry back the dead and wounded.
Coalition troops responded with machine guns, grenades, and claymore mines. Artillery support was provided from Camp Blessing; 96 155mm artillery rounds were fired in support of coalition forces. The Taliban briefly breached the wire of the observation post before being driven back. After almost half an hour of intense fighting at the observation post only one soldier remained. He fought alone and seriously wounded until reinforcments (sic) arrived to secure the OP. Some militants also managed to get into the main base’s earthen barriers. Two American soldiers, Lieutenant Jonathan Brostrom and Corporal Jason Hovater, were killed trying to deliver ammunition under fire to their comrades in the observation post who were running low. American soldiers were at times flushed out of their fortifications by what they thought were grenades, but which were actually rocks thrown by the attackers. Brostrom, Hovater, and another soldier may have been killed by an insurgent who penetrated the wire perimeter.
Coalition soldiers managed to repulse the attacking militants. AH-64 attack helicopters and a Predator unmanned aircraft drone equipped with Hellfire missiles responded to support the base with close air support about 30 minutes after the battle began. Later, a B-1B Lancer bomber, A-10, and F-15E aircraft were called in to strike militant positions. The militants withdrew about four hours later. After the militants retreated, mop up operations followed, and the Taliban withdrew from the town.
Nine U.S. soldiers were killed in the attack, mainly in the observation post, including platoon leader First Lieutenant Jonathan P. Brostrom, 24, of Hawaii. Between 21 and 52 militants were reported killed with another 20 to 40 wounded, but coalition forces found only two Taliban bodies after the battle. The attack was the highest death toll for American troops in the country since Operation Red Wing three years earlier.
The Army was sufficiently agitated that an 800-page report was generated, detailing the operational missteps involved in placing a single, unsupported platoon in an indefensible position in the midst of a hyper-religious, illiterate and hostile population. Former WaPo journalist Thomas Ricks wrote an analytical series based on the report that was harshly critical of brigade and divisional leadership.
Yesterday the Post personalized the fight in the name of young Lieutenant Jonathan Brystrom, 2nd Platoon Leader, “brave, reckless, impulsive” and 24 years old forever. Tonight CBS News – Walter Cronkite’s outfit – will run a special on Wanat, emphasizing the debacle even as the president and his advisers mull over the forward commander’s request for additional forces.
As analogues go, Wanat plays somewhat poorly as Tet. The Taliban were repulsed with very high casualties, but the combat outpost was abandoned. Unlike the Viet Cong after Tet, the Taliban movement remains unbroken. But although 2nd Platoon and it’s ANA allies suffered 75% casualties – a shocking rate for a successful defense, and a testament to the bravery of the soldiers that served there – at the end of the day 9 good men fell in battle, never to rise again. Each loss is a personal tragedy, but in proportion Tet was a far more significant campaign, with over 28,000 allied casualties including over 6000 killed in action.
But to dither over the tactical is to miss the strategic. General Stanley McChrystal has unveiled a new strategy that involves a more classic COIN “oil spot” strategy of clear, hold and build. This strategy places the protection of the Afghan population as its main effort, relegating kinetic engagement of hostile forces as a by-product of troop presence in protected areas. A more or less static defense over large areas will require many more soldiers than he currently deploys in sweeping operations from Forward Operating Bases and platoon-sized interdiction missions from Combat Outposts.
The media has a compelling need to help shape the public debate over Afghanistan. Their interest on last year’s battle makes for good history, but poor decision shaping. The questions they should be asking have less to do with last year’s physical terrain, and more to do with this year’s human terrain: Clear, hold and build worked well when adopted and resourced in the urban enclaves of Iraq, but the Afghan population is far more agrarian and widely dispersed. They are, in the aftermath of a more than ordinarily corrupt national election, manifestly dissatisfied with their government in Kabul.
The media ought to ask not whether 40,000 new troops is too many, but whether it is too few.
They ought to ask Washington, if it is to deny the general’s request for forces, what the alternate strategy will be, and follow up with penetrating questions on how exactly that strategy will add to our security.
Facing a number of difficult issues, some of which were indeed inherited – but many of which were self-inflicted – the administration has been given a friendly pass from the Washington press corps for some nine months now. But something has to change in Afghanistan, and it has to change soon. When change comes, it will come at the direction of today’s National Command Authority. Our political, military and media strategy going forward with troops fighting and dying requires something more than collegial good will and press room conviviality and it involves more than muck raking last year’s missteps. This is far too important to get wrong.
With 100,000 coalition forces already deployed to Afghanistan, the media’s focused coverage of a combat engagement of one platoon on 13 July 2008 makes for compelling theater, but not much else. Warfare is almost irreducibly complex. It will be tempting for many watching and reading to go from this specific enagement and draw sweeping conclusions about our prospects in Afghanistan.
Just as in 1968, those conclusions may be misinformed.
“It appears we have appointed our worst generals to command forces, and our most gifted and brilliant to edit newspapers. In fact, I discovered by reading newspapers that these editor/geniuses plainly saw all my strategic defects from the start, yet failed to inform me until it was too late. Accordingly, I am readily willing to yield my command to these obviously superior intellects, and I will, in turn, do my best for the Cause by writing editorials – after the fact.”
~Robert E. Lee, 1863
******************************************************
“Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale, and undermine the military are saboteurs and should be arrested, exiled or hanged.”
~President Abraham Lincoln
That would describe nearly the whole of MSM, and makes me wonder if those ‘worst’, in a former life, have now come back to haunt us modern day, um, journalists.
Someone help me out here…
should have read ‘haunt us as’
Oops!
“Strategy for Defeat” by ADM US Grant Sharp might be a good read right about now….
I was in wespac…on a ddr..when he was Com7flt
Lee’s point should be well taken, but it won’t be.
The left is already spooling up the spin machine. I hope McChrystal has his resignation ready to submit. I think he’ll need it soon.
Thanks for sharing Lex…I agree with QM. The fact that Gen McChrystal was summoned to Copenhagen to meet with POTUS in the wake of his 60 minutes piece is telling.
I have very reluctantly come to the conclusion that it is time to withdraw all US military forces, aid agencies, and diplomats from Iraq and Afghanistan. The hard-won achievements of Marines in al Anbar, which virtually won the war, are being reversed under new policies. New Rules of Engagement in Afghanistan are resulting in large increases in US casualties. The advice and requests of General McChrystal, the man hand-picked to lead the new strategy, are being ignored and even suppressed. While President Bush made many errors in the two campaigns, he, at least, was trying to win. It is daily more apparent that the current administration has no intention of providing the resources or allowing the strategies that could bring the wars to a successful conclusion. They seem to be looking for a way to lose without being blamed for losing. Once again, as in Vietnam, our miltary members and senior officers are becoming sacrificial pawns in a game of domestic politics. We lived that nightmare once and it took 25 years for our armed forces to recover. We can’t let that happen again. We must withdraw and stop the useless effusion of blood and treasure. Let’s rest and reconstitute our forces in preparation for the time when we must fight again, as we surely will, hopefully under leadership that truly wants to defend our country. Those of you who know me well will understand how awful it is for me to reach this conclusion. My son, a U.S. Marine, is willing to sacrifice his life for his country. As a father and Vietnam veteran, I understand and accept that. However, we must not sacrifice such young people foolishly. Just War theory holds that a just war must have a “reasonable hope of success.” That reasonable hope must begin with the intent to succeed and I fear we now lack that.
Excellent article as usual Lex,
The price to be paid by having one who never had to lead! Was never trained in leadership, and seeks placation first. Today we are suffering these fools.
I don’t know what it will take, but I fear what it will…
-JC
“Misinformed” my ass. Outright lies to suit an agenda is what it will be, the same as that ass Cronkite.
The MSM does not give a damn about anything but the Pulitzer so do not expect any reasonable and rational discussion of the issue of winning the Afghan war. Plus, you have an administration that does not give a damn about winning this war either coupled with the Congress full of people who truly believe that whatever will happened to this country won’t affect them and their families. This combination is deadly for our troops and our country. Literally.
McCrystal should call up Tom Eagleton, er, channel the now dead guy and ask him how it feels to be backed “1000%” by a Presidential Candidate when one is his running mate.
If a guy who fancies himself to be Presidential timber can do that to his own VP political blood-brother, what do you think an egomaniac lefty like Obama can do to a General who rose to power under Bush and the Elephants? And being hand-picked by Obama is cold comfort–so was Eagleton by Mondale. I bet right now WH “operatives” (i.e. dirt-digging weasels) are picking through McCrystals’ wife’s trash, every bank account he ever had, and interviewing every HS girl he ever dated to try to find some disqualifying moral or financial defect to justify testing out the shock absorbers of the Obamabus with our poor sap, er, good General.
Af is what colonial surrogate forces were invented for.
Perhaps it would be better to start calling it NorthWest Greater Pakistan and Southern Imperial Uzbekistan. If the US and the RSFSR, or whatever incarnation of latin letters the Soviets prefer these days, can’t muster the troops or the support of the masses needed to provide a happy hunting ground of easy access for terror investigations (after all, it is a police matter) the answer could be found in the Chamberlain tradition of selling out what isn’t ours.
An enthusiastic territorial expansion of Pakistanis and Uzbeks in search of greater strategic depth (and the income available from taxing poppies) could be helped along by plentiful supply of small arms and light trucks, training of soldiers, suppression of dissent in problematic areas of their homelands, and liberally applied palliatives to regional competitors- discounts for an Indian Navy LHA built in the US?
If it doesn’t work? well Pakistanis and Uzbeks have to look their own security after all, and maybe the ISI and its successors will be more aggressive going after a threat to their homeland than to ours, and as is well known, US allies are subject to considerably greater danger from US actions than US foes, and it would serve the greedy bastages right for trying to take over the peaceful (sic or lol) neighbors.
I haven’t heard if Biden likes this plan or not. It is pretty dumb, but I don’t know if it is quite dumb enough…. more an expression of frustration than a strategic outreach, but hey, whatever… we could always nuke it from orbit.
“US allies are subject to considerably greater danger from US actions than US foes…”
Not that Pakistan should be considered an ally, but in all other facets, an utterly true statement. One need only consider the fallout from the Suez crisis to understand why European countries might consider Arabs trustier allies than the morally indignant Americans. When an Arab can be seen as more dependable than an American, something is surely and deeply wrong (wronger than just the Won, that is).
I fear that Virgil may be right. A White House administration operating under Chicago political rules is not to be trusted. To them the notion of duty, honor and country is not a virtue but a handicap to be exploited.
One should ask the “Lightworker” why he so earnestly supported General McChrystal, hand-picked him for the job, enumerating all of his sterling credentials, and, now, seems willing to repudiate him.
The “WON!” is either criminally naive, or so poorly served by his advisers (sycophants) that he is rendered incapable of making an informed decision, or both.
Either case should be grounds for impeachment, for the sake of our nation’s safety, if for no other reason.
I agree with CHAPS. Either we go all-in, that is, assign what resources are needed to accomplish the task(s) to hand, or we get out completely and set about cleaning house in Washington.
I am sick to death of this political posturing regarding the Great War on Terror. It reminds me of the scene in “300″ where the Senate is listening to leonidas’ wife implore them for support for him and his men, and then watching a crapweasly crapweasal of a politician accuse her (falsely) of all manner of things, then finding that he himself was in the pay of Xerxes.
Our elected officials do not deserve the nation they are representing. In deference to the gentleman who owns this place, I will refrain from offering my personal opinions as to watch should become of the whole lot.
Yeah…AM!
Chaps,
I pray that your son, and those with him, live through this debacle. As to the rest of your comment, it deeply saddens me to find myself in concurrence with your assessment. I wondered, as a young man, at my Father’s change of heart regarding support of the Vietnam War. Now I understand. Oh, that we could learn…
To all:
Notwithstanding our considerable efforts in Iraq toward helping the people there establish some sort of ‘democratic’ society, if our end game has transmogrified into simply voting ‘Present’, then how can we expect to return our forces home with any result that would differ from Vietnam?
I curse this ‘Obamanible’ fool in the White House, but I curse more those who were either foolish and/or gullible enough to put him there. How could so large a portion of our population have become so taken in? It is my firm belief that Lincoln’s statement above should be directly applied, forthwith, to the successor who so brazenly used his Bible at inauguration.
PJ,
IMO, Af was a bitter lesson for Ivan and we shouldn’t let it become one for us. Pull the troops, keep UAV’s in the air patrolling/attacking the exit routes (of which there are many), and let the whole frickin place implode…along with Paki. Neither alliance has borne much sweet fruit, and, given our penchant for throwing just enough cannon fodder into the fray to keep the body count up, there seemingly can be no good war to be fought. We cannot count on judicious executive leadership at a time and place when it is so desperately needed, and the afterward of Af, should we remain, will be a national bitterness and resentment toward the WH, regardless of who is there, that may require a generation to heal the wound.
I admit to being overly biased in this situation. My own son is headed over to AF within a few weeks. In light of the CinC vacillations and focus-group driven politics regarding that theatre, I would honestly wish for him to NOT go.
But that is a father speaking, who sees the larger picture, rather than the immortal youth who champs at the bit to enter a race he has not yet experienced, nor fully comprehends.
Such is every father’s dilemma, mine.. my father’s, and his father’s and on and on.
AW1 Tim/
Tim, in what capacity is he going? I’ve forgotten…if I ever knew. He’s eager despite Obama, eh? The way things are going he’ll learn fast. Nothing like walking out to the flightline and seeing every bird with but a single (1) Mk. 117 750 pounder hanging from each station–both MERs & TERs. despite the the fact that Robert “Super Genius” MacNamara is publicly swearing there is no bomb shortage. Nobody here but us chickens! (Of course he was “technically” correct in terms of world-wide inventory, but it just hadn’t made it down the pipeline to us yet. Made us feel oh so much better to know that)
I’m sure he’ll appreciate all the full support–both logistics and Nat. Command Authority that Obama will give him. Obama’s got his back. Trust me, a whole bunch of people here know what it’s like to wake up each day fully secure in the knowledge that we had nothing but no-holds barred total support from the the home front………….right……………. Just tell your kid to learn to embrace the suck–big time. It’s Yogi Berra time all over again.
He’s an Infantryman with the 173rd Airborne Brigade. Carries an M-4 with a grenade launcher. He’s a red-blooded conservative and is eager to jump in with his buddies.
It’s good that I already have that grey-beard thing going. As I told a friend, I now understand completely why my own father drank..
Lewis Puller, son of Lewis “Chesty” Puller, said he saw his father cry two times, once when he went to Vietnam, and once when he came back maimed.
Chesty came though Haiti, Nicaragua, WW2 and Korea, but couldn’t stand to see his son go off to war.
Godspeed to your youngin, Tim, and ‘Good Hunting’.
The fruits of the long Gramscian March are now visible. Our only hope is that they got too impatient and have struck too soon and too visibly. The body politic begins to discern the shroud that has been crafted. Is there yet enough life in it to reject the idea that America is not exceptional.
Remember that the majority of TARP has yet to be expended. In true Chicago style, the largess of buying people with their own money will take place in the months just before the 2010 election.
I am sad for the Afghani people. I am terrified for the women and children. There was so much hope. The women and children will lose the most… and what we have before us is a culture that will never pull itself out of the depths of ignorance. The travesty of what will continue to become of this country will haunt us in years to come.
What our short-sighted & self=centered left-oriented Congress did to the people of South East Asia must never be forgotten, or forgiven. Million and millions of innocents died so that Democrats could spite Nixon, and curry favours from the whacko anti-war folks. People like Ayers, BFFF of the CinC.
A pox upon ALL their houses, and their children to the last generation.
We’re going to see it replay itself. I have friends that were in Vietnam that immigrated here, friends whose fathers were in the S Vietnamese military and had to get out with their families after the fall of Saigon. My Dad was there. His friends were there. We learned nothing. Watch. And I suspect that what happens in Afghanistan as well as Iraq will haunt us for generations. It will haunt us in ways that Vietnam did not. My children and their children will pay for the mistakes that are being made now.
Agreed. The North Vietnamese didn’t come over here and start killing us as part of a millenial religious mission. Not so sure that whoever fills the vacuum we would leave in Afghanistan would want to or be able to prevent that.
Let’s get Sammy Davis up from his dirt nap to do a new tune “The Taiban Man.”
Geez…maybe I’ll even try a bit of hacked lyrics for fun.
re: General McCrystal
Diogenes put down your lamp.
It will be interesting to see the fate and history’s judgement of such a man.
A “White House staffer” is quoted (elsewhere) as characterizing the good general as “an upstart” and “naive”.
I leave it to others to comment.
From a White House staffer with a bunch of naive and anti-military people. That’s rich….I saw Hugh Hewitt on CSPAN Book TV yesterday: He said the MSM types in DC and NYC were like fish….they swim in the ocean and don’t know they are wet. I’d say the same thing applies here regarding “naivete” and “upstartedness” at this White House.
We know who our foreign enemies are in the war on terror.
Domestic?
Intel is getting clearer by the day.
Xformed/
New Intel. Just warched Jim Webb on “Morning Joe” laying the groundwork for marginalizing McCrystals analysis of the situation as “dated” and making the point that AQ should be the focus–and they are in PK points out Webb. They’re getting ready to pull the rug. And in same interview also strongly adds to the attack on McCrystal for not following chain of command being too “public” etc. Also pointedly said in reply to question that Patraeus had been noticably “silent” on McCrystal with tone of voice of implied disapproval about that. But, LOL, he suddenly changed directions mid-sentence to another topic as I could see in his face the quick realization that the next question would be about Mullen as CHJCS and if forced to admit that Mullen ALSO has publicly supported McCrystals views, THAT would be a trifecta of Flag officers–the top three directly under Gates—that all felt the same way–and Webb obviously did.not.want.to.go.there–so quickly changed the subject. They’re warming up the engine on the bus.
PS to xformed. Erick Erickson has a dead-on take on this slo-mo process over at Red State yesterday in a 5 Oct, article. Go see @
http://www.redstate.com/erick/2009/10/05/hiding-behind-syndrome-obama-begins-campaign-to-throw-gen-under-the-bus/
Damn, xformed, they’ve changed link. Just hit “recent posts” on header once you get there, then scroll down to article and click on it.
Besides the point, but why is the U.S. unit part of “Chosen Company?” Where did “Charlie” go?
Junkball,
Some units use nicknames, rather than the ICAO alphabet, to denote the letter designation for a company. Thus, I know of a D Co that, in stuffy official correspondence, is Delta; in common usage, it is Destroyer.
I imagine the moderns wouldn’t like “Dog” Company. A number of WW2 troops wore it with pride.
surfing!
Buck up…as they say. Here is some good news for a change.
A decisive blow
Papa Ray
It’s still true.
Concentrate, meet us in the open or stand and fight; die.
That’s the tactical reality.
As for the strategery…
Lest we forget. History vindicated Leonidas.
Leaving a fight sticks in my craw — even with a son most the way through the enlistment process (dropping out and leaving his NROTC$ behind and doing his damnest to get to MCRD and A’stan). This isn’t a business ROE calculation. Our countrymen’s and allies blood spilt there is not a sunk cost to be disregarded in the spreadsheet of history’s formula. There’s no going home with honor at this point in the game. This is not a crap table where we can cut our losses and leave. This is a game where leaving now guarantees a much higher cost in the future.
Underestimate the cost of leaving a fight unfinished at our childrens and grandchildren’s peril. The power of our legend is at stake. I estimate the cost of abandoning this fight to be unacceptable. Bear up under it until a new CINC with some brass ones and will to win is elected to replace the Lightbringer.
Walking away isn’t what got us here as a nation. Don’t give up the ship, dammit! Stay in the fight as long as the leaders will let us stay in and as long as the people will bear it. Meanwhile we on the home front need to support and spread the word of our troops valor, and the difficulties they face as a result of a reckless CINC.
The American people do not want to live with another Viet Nam. We want to rub that out with fresh victory in the face of an even greater challenge. Inspite of this CINC and MSM, we need to show every case where our troops are winning and shed light on the foolishness of the adminstration so that we can replace it or neuter it come next election cycle.
Maybe not best to listen to me. You know how we Ulster Scots are about a fight. Add some fresh Scot immigrant blood to that in the last generation and you can guess my predisposition. Momma’s dad was a Cameron Highlander in WWI who was awarded the DSC for doing some reckless things out front with a Lewis gun at St Louie and Ootegham.
I’m still mulling yesterday’s link to the Paki officer’s alt strategy in A’stan. From my spot in the peanut gallery is seems like a bit of wisdom…
In 1973, Richard Nixon accepted a “peace” agreement on terms almost identical to ones he could have had the day he took office in 1969. Tens of thousands of US troops died in the interim. Talk all you want about not giving up the ship and future costs but those costs will come no matter what we do because our political leadership, now and in the future, will not ask the country to sacrifice for victory as much as they ask the troops. There is no future Commander in Chief likely to take the threat seriously. No, repeat no, contemporary politician sees any value higher than politics.
Until the General says it’s time to attack in the other direction and head home…
Reckon I’m just a 3-percenter. Had a couple gr-grandpa’s stick around with a lost cause and survive a winter at Valley Forge and wounds at Saratoga.
That probably puts me on a watch list somewhere. As for the VN winddown, I had an older brother as an unintentional guest of the NVA in a hotel in Hanoi during the last of those Nixon days so it’s not an entirely theoritical construct.
It’s that Scot-Irish thing. As long as the General will lead and as long as there’s ragged bearded barbarian with an AK-47 out there; there is going to be some sons of ragged bearded barbarians in kilts willing to go after him. That whole staying with a lost cause thing down is still pretty engrained. Why else vote Republican?
As for the politicians? I can think of a couple who might see some value higher than politics. For starters that crazy conservative woman in Congress from Minnesota, an uppity ex-weatherbabe from Alaska and a first term Congressman from East County San Diego recently returned from 2nd tour in Iraq.
We’re beat when we say we’re beat.
I’m not willing to say we’re beat. Not yet. Not after what we’ve seen from “we the people” since the election at tea parties etc.
with appropriate apologies….
“Forward, the Light Brigade!”
Was there a man dismay’d?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Someone had blunder’d:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Flit, those apologies should be tendered to every man who stood in the breach so you could act like an a$$.
The “Charge Of The Light Brigade” doesn’t even come close to applying here, other than in your childish leftist mind.
It’s past time you grew up and thought with your mind instead of your heart.
Q/M, If I recall corectly, and I usually do, our man flit wore the uniform… and as you say “stood in the breach” in the way back… he earned his spurs …suggest you cut him some major slack. I might not agree with all he has to say…but as that old saw goes I’ll defend his right to say it…Sweet Jesus… lets leave lock step thinking to the flippen Liberal/Progressives. Best
Ulster Scots, eh?
Imagine my difficulties… I’m Irish/German… Means I like to drink heavily and wear uniforms…
Drink heavily? Hoot Mon!
Can I loan ye a kilt laddie?