I have to admit, I never thought of it this way. Although I imagine that the lessons of the failed Iraqi Occupation are making more than a few federal strategists think twice about the wisdom of trying to push the American people anywhere they don’t want to go:
At its peak the state department estimated 300,000 militia members nation wide.
Once again the State Department was impressed. We know they were impressed, because federal officers began reaching out to the militias. The ATF and FBI in particular were very friendly with the bigger militias in New Mexico and Montana. They were continually interviewing and meeting with the leaders… asking things like, “If another Waco happened… in another state… you’d really pack up and go there?”
The best answer I heard to that question came from a militia leader in New Mexico. He said, “Hell no. Why would we? We’ve got plenty of you sum-bitches around here.”
The message varied state to state… but in the end it was received loud and clear. The militia movement viewed Waco as an act of war upon the American People by their government, and if it happened again… there would be a wide response… not a localized flash point response. It wouldn’t be one incident. It would be a series of incidents.
Now recall that Donald Rumsfeld estimated that there were 20,000 militants in Iraq prior to the Coalition forces, um, advancing back to their fortresses. The lesson of 4th Generation warfare, (if you want to call it that), is that large, well-armed, well-trained militaries can kill lots of less-armed, less-trained militants, but they cannot kill militants faster than they make new ones.
We should have learned it in Vietnam, but the NVA and our bizarre refusal to fight the organized military confused the issue. But the Soviets learned it after 10 years in Afghanistan. The Brits learned it after decades in Northern Ireland. We’re still learning it in Iraq.
What’s happening in Iraq is what the Bloggerblaster is pointing out here. The net effect of the Waco killings was to create more armed radicals than it killed, in this particular case, several orders of magnitude more.
We do appear to live in interesting times, unfortunately. I don’t think things are likely to go that way, though, as the globalists are achieving everything they want through their ever-expanding treaties and trade agreements, but you really never know.