Vox Popoli

I wish I had my set with me, but this is an interesting bit from one of the appendices of Churchill’s illuminating History. Note Churchill’s attitude with regards to invasion possibilities is not only heavily sarcastic, but completely focused on the logistics:

My favourite example appears in Appendix C to Volume III, The Grand Alliance, where Churchill responds to General Brooke’s report on an invasion exercise called VICTOR, which presupposed that the Germans landed five divisions on the Norfolk coast and established a beachhead within forty-eight hours. Churchill writes:

“I presume the details of this remarkable feat have been worked out by the Staff concerned. Let me see them. For instance, how many ships and transports carried these five Divisions? How many Armoured vehicles did they comprise? How many motor lorries, how many guns, how much ammunition, how many men, how many tons of stores, how far did they advance in the first forty-eight hours, how many men and vehicles were assumed to have landed in the first twelve hours, what percentage of loss were they debited with? What happened to the transports and store-ships while the first forty-eight hours of fighting were going on? Had they completed emptying their cargoes, or were they still lying in shore off the point protected by superior enemy daylight Fighter formations? How many Fighter airplanes did the enemy have to employ, if so, to cover the landing places?…I should be very glad if the same officers would work out a scheme for our landing an exactly similar force on the French coast at the same extreme range of our Fighter protection and assuming that the Germans have naval superiority in the Channel….”

From Slashdot:

Defense Tech reports the U.S. government is proposing to exempt satellite images from the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The proposed exemption has already passed the Senate and awaits House/Senate conference committee this month.

I’m sure they’ll have a truckload of arguments prepared about why this information shouldn’t be accessible by the people who supposedly control the government, a concept that is steadily becoming less and less relevant.

But that’s a good thing, I’m sure, since we’re so much safer now as a result.

From Inside the Ring:

Asian military affairs specialist Richard D. Fisher says North Korea’s new long-range missile “poses a significantly increased threat to the United States and Japan.” The missile is described by Mr. Fisher as derived from the Soviet-era SS-N-6 submarine-launched ballistic missile. It was Moscow’s first sub-launched missile.

Air Force Gen. Ralph Eberhart, commander of the U.S. Northern Command, also said recently that the danger of ship-based missiles is growing. “I believe it’s just a matter of time until the terrorists try to use a … maritime attack against us,” he said. “I believe that attack could come in terms of bringing a ship into port, whether it’s [carrying] high explosives or whether it’s weapons of mass destruction.”

Notes Mr. Fisher: “Should North Korea adopt this strategy, it would have the option of trying to infiltrate and pre-position its missiles in Canada, Central America or even the continental United States. U.S. missile defenses do not currently defend against either launches from the south of or within the contiguous 50 states.”

Clearly the Korean fifth column in this country would be tremendously helpful in infiltrating and pre-positioning these missiles in the continental US. The military necessity is obvious; if only we could get access to Mr. Fisher’s diary we’d have the incontrovertible proof that we need to lock up those treacherous yellow dogs now!

From Inside the Beltway:

“We need to talk about government workers differently,” advises the latest report from the Partnership for Public Service. “Using the word ‘bureaucrat’ has a devastatingly negative impact.”

How so?

“The word ‘bureaucrat’ is used frequently by politicians, the media and others as if it were a neutral descriptor, when in fact it carries very strong editorial freight,” the report states.

My suggestion is that we adopt a policy similar to the Human Society. Give them a week in their office for a private employer to hire them and put them to productive use, and if after a week it’s clear that no one has any use for them, it’s bye-bye bureaucrat.

That splashing sound you hear is Palooka pouring gasoline over himself. He has been stubbornly, and almost randomly, throwing out wild and unsupportable defenses of the internment. His case boils down to his assertion that certain things were unknowable, such as the implications of the delta between the two nation’s productive capacities, the amount of sabotage necessary to have a perceptible effect on the war effort, etc, and therefore it was right to intern people on the basis of their ethnicity in order to save American lives and shorten the war.

And yet, when it’s pointed out that his arguments in defense of internment can just as easily be applied to justify similar internments in “the War on Terror”, he suddenly does a 180, saying: “World War II promised to be concluded–one way or another–within a relatively short historical time frame.”

And why is that? Surely, he can’t be suggesting the 42,000 troops Japan could have landed were going to first wipe out the 260,000+ American troops in California, then march their way across the country to Washington in a relatively short period of time. No, he must be talking about the American defeat of Japan. And why did it promise to be concluded in a short period of time? Because the production delta demanded it, spot raids and sabotage notwithstanding.

Palooka understands this too, for all his unwillingness to publicly admit it. But admit it he now inadvertantly has, unless he wishes to argue for the impossibility of a Hundred Years War, or even a Thirty Years War.

scratch, hiss, FWOOMP

In no particular order:

The Beagle – Aren’t I cute? Aren’t I cute? Hey, look at me! Hey, what’cha doing? Will I ever shut up? Sure, sure, whenever you want! Oh, you mean, like, now?

The Viszla – Can you even believe how good-looking I am? Once, I thought I saw a better-looking dog, but then I realized I was walking past a mirror. Do a trick? Sure, no problem, um, what’s a trick?

The Ridgeback – i’m just a baby, i’m just a teeny, tiny 95-pound little girl, please be nice to me *strange car passes by* DEMONS WILL GNAW UPON THE SPLINTERED SHARDS OF YOUR BONES! COME BACK HERE AND I’LL CRACK YOUR SKULL LIKE A [Oedipal gerund] CRYSTAL CHANDELIER HITTING A MACK TRUCK! *car disappears* i’m just a little girl, give me a treat, pretty please? look how cute i am.

The Malamute – Yeah, yeah, I know, everyone says I look like a wolf. Whatever, it’s all good, we’re all mellow here, it’s cool. Sure, I could rip your leg off if I got a little hungry, but we’re all friends here, right? You gonna eat that? Yeah, I didn’t think so. *gulp*

The Bulldog – umph, grunt, *snort* Whas’sup? Not you? Umph, not me either. Let’s take a nap.

The White Buffalo beat me to Lamar Gordon. Oh well. As compensation, that just makes it all the more likely that Stephen Jackson will see some quality playing time this season… I can live with that.

A few weeks ago, HSLDA reports, a German homeschool family escaped to Central America under threat of a judge who wanted to take custody of the couple’s school-aged child. A social worker helped the family escape by warning them of the judge’s intent and delaying the paperwork needed for the seizure.

In another instance, a family escaped with their child to Austria. According to HSLDA, even though the family no longer lived in Germany, a judge gave custody of the child to the state and let the family know if it ever returned to Germany, the child would be taken.

Another German homeschool family lost a recent court case when the judge ruled that the parents had no rights to have input into the manner and method of education in government schools. In this case, hard-core pornography reportedly was being used to teach the children in their German-language course. The judge also ruled that fundamentalist Christians who do not want their children to attend the government schools are not protected by the nation’s constitution.

Some years ago, a few Germans started messing with a black member of the US bobsled team. It was a big mistake, as the bobsledders kicked a little German Hinterteil because, well, you know, USA USA and all that. Anyhow, Stern was going off on the Teutonics and unveiled his Churchillian theory that the USA should go in and kick Hinterteil every twenty years just on principle. I thought that was wise at the time, now that we’ve seen how they used the French to talk the entire continent into volunteering for the Fourth Reich, he looks like a prophet.

Since some of you don’t seem to share my enthusiasm for intellectual bloodsport, I shall endeavor to provide you with at least a few posts unrelated to the internment debate every day. Those of you who know me are no doubt rolling their eyes, knowing full well that this will not end until Malkin proves herself to be a complete coward afraid to leave her corner or waves the white flag.

So, without further ado, here’s a new game the White Buffalo has gotten me into. Sixteen games, predict the winner, okay, that’s simple enough. Now, here’s the good part. RANK each game from 1 to 16, so that you get 16 points if you nail the game of which you are most confident, and 1 point for your least important game. Yeah, now that’s where it gets tricky.

Anyhow, I’m hooked up with Chokechain this season, and we’re calling Pats over Colts on his say so for the first game.

“Muller, clearly losing all sense of academic propriety, has now taken to associating himself with the uninformed and bitter mutterings of Vox Day.” – Michelle Malkin

Bad professor! Bad!

Dear Ms Malkin,

As you did not respond substantively to any of the points I raised in my column or my first email to you, I am addressing the following questions directly to you.

1. I have asserted that there was no reasonable risk of invasion.

This opinion is supported by modern military experts. You have

written that “the risk of full-scale invasion was low”. Did this

“low” risk alone justify the internment?

2. Was the number of troops stationed in California, Oregon and

Washington in February 1942 sufficient to deal with Japan’s

trans-Pacific troop transport capacity?

3. The production figures for 1940 through 1945 show a significant

delta between the United States and Japan. Could sabotage have

accounted for enough damage to, as you suggest, potentially

cripple the war effort, and what percentage of lost production

would you describe as “crippling”?

4. Did this potential risk of sabotage alone justify the

internment?

5. Was the potential for cumulative damage from sabotage and spot

raids on the West Coast greater or less than the cumulative

damage to Germany wrought by the Allied bombing campaign of

Germany in 1943 and 1944?

6. 160 planes were destroyed at Pearl Harbor. Based on 1940-41

production figures, how long did it take to replace those planes

and how many planes were left to American forces?

7. Were any subsequent “spot raids” likely to cause more or less

damage than Pearl Harbor?

8. Considering that the Japanese lost 29 planes in the Pearl Harbor

attack, what is the probable number of spot raids they could

have made with the three carriers you cite were available to

them for use in such a capacity in 1942?

9. Since German military production increased 278 percent from 1942

to 1944 while being bombed on a daily and nightly basis, while

US production increased only 206 percent over the same period,

is it reasonable to assume that Japanese spot raids would have

slowed US production or the war effort at all? If your answer is

yes, please explain how and why.

10. Did the risk of these potential spot raids alone justify

internment?

Please provide clear, specific and unevasive answers to these questions; you can offer qualifiers, explanations and assertions of whatever you like in a separate rebuttal.

Uninformedly yours,

Vox Day