Tag: war

A dangerous game in Syria

Fortunately, the Russians aren’t biting as the US attempts to slow down the Syrian army’s destruction of ISIS and reclamation of its territory. The Saker explains the dynamic.

The dynamic in Syria is not fundamentally different from the dynamic in the Ukraine: the Neocons know that they have failed to achieve their primary objective: to control the entire country. They also know that their various related financial schemes have collapsed. Finally, they are fully aware that they owe this defeat to Russia and, especially, to Vladimir Putin. So they fell back on plan B. Plan B is almost as good as Plan A (full control) because Plan B has much wider consequences. Plan B is also very simple: trigger a major crisis with Russia but stay short from a full-scale war. Ideally, Plan B should revolve around a “firm” “reaction” to the Russian “aggression” and a “defense” of the US “allies” in the region. In practical terms this simply means: get the Russians to openly send forces into Novorussia or get the Russians to take military actions against the US or its allies in Syria. Once you get this you can easily see that the latest us attacks in Syria have a minor local purpose – to scare or slow down the Syrians- and a major global purpose – to bait the Russians into using forces against the US or an ally. It bears repeating here that what the Neocons really want is what I call a “tepid” war with Russia: an escalation of tensions to levels not even seen during the Cold War, but not a full-scale “hot” WWIII either. A tepid war would finally re-grant NATO at least some kind of purpose (to protect “our European friends and allies” from the “Russian threat”): the already terminally spineless EU politicians would all be brought into an even more advanced state of subservience, the military budgets would go even higher and Trump would be able to say that he made “America” “great” again. And, who knows, maybe the Russian people would *finally* rise against Putin, you never know! (They wouldn’t – but the Neocons have never been deterred from their goofy theories by such minor and altogether irrelevant things as facts or logic).

Does the Russian strategy work?

To reply to this, don’t look at what the Russians do or do not do in the immediate aftermath of a US provocation. Take a higher level look and just see what happens in the mid to long term. Just like in a game of chess, taking the Gambit is not always the correct strategy.

I submit that to evaluate whether Putin’s policies are effective or not, to see whether he has “sold out” or “caved in” you need to, for example, look at the situation in Syria (or the Ukraine, for that matter) as it was 2 years ago and then compare with what it is today. Or, alternatively, look at the situation as it is today and come back to re-visit it in 6 months.

One huge difference between the western culture and the way the Russians (or the Chinese for that matter) look at geostrategy is that westerners always look at everything in the short term and tactical level. This is basically the single main reason why both Napoleon and Hitler lost their wars against Russia: an almost exclusive focus on the short term and tactical. In contrast, the Russians are the undisputed masters of operational art (in a purely military sense) and, just like the Chinese, they tend to always keep their eyes on the long-term horizon. Just look at the Turkish downing of a Russian Su-24: everybody bemoaned the lack of “forceful” reaction from Moscow. And then, six months later – what do we have? Exactly.

The modern western culture is centered on various forms of instant gratification, and that is also true for geopolitics. If the other guy does something, western leaders always deliver a “firm” response. They like to “send messages” and they firmly believe that doing something, no matter how symbolic, is better than even the appearance of doing nothing. As for the appearance of doing nothing, it is universally interpreted as a sign of weakness. Russians don’t think that way. They don’t care about instant gratification, they care only about one thing: victory. And if that means to look weak, that is fine. From a Russian perspective, sending “messages” or taking symbolic actions (like all 4 of the recent US attacks in Syria) are not signs of strength, but signs of weakness. Generally, the Russians don’t like to use force which they consider inherently dangerous. But when they do, they never threaten or warn, they take immediate and pragmatic (non-symbolic) action which gets them closer to a specific goal.

It’s rather fascinating how the Russians, rather like George Washington, keep “losing” the direct engagements, but somehow end up in the superior position a month or two later. But that’s why strategy and operations matter more than tactical brilliance.

Anti-white hate crime

Trump supporter stabbed nine times in California:

The pro-Trump supporter Tony Forman was right in the middle of a recent protest in Cathay where emotions ran hot over the sanctuary city controversy, but nothing like the violence that’s left Foreman now fighting for his life.

“This was politically motivated. That’s a concern because he is a good friend of mine,” Omar Navarro said. “I’m just really shocked someone would do this. What happened to free speech?”

Navarro is running to unseat the long time Democrat Maxine Waters in the 43rd District of the U.S. Congress, and there are also accusations coming from others.

The stabbing attack on Foreman is a hate crime because of his outspoken support for President Trump and the conservative agenda. “We don’t know if it is politically motivated or racially motivated, but we do know there were some racial slurs for him being white that were said to him,” Tim Gionet, a friend of Foreman, said.

Santa Monica police did not mention a politically motivated crime, only confirming they arrested  two suspects.

As I have pointed out in recent darkstreams, it is time to take your own rhetoric seriously. This is a cultural cold war that is in the process of turning hot. Prepare accordingly. If you’re going to take part in protests and public events, be equipped and prepared for the possibility of violence and don’t operate under the mistaken impression that the police are going to somehow magically protect you.

Destroying mosques over there

While they build them over here. The Great Mosque of al-Nuri is no more.

The United States and Iraq said ISIS blew up a historic mosque in Mosul that was the ideological heart of the terror group and the birthplace of its self-declared caliphate. ISIS, through its news agency, said US warplanes were responsible for the loss late Wednesday of the Great Mosque of al-Nuri and its leaning minaret.

US officials told CNN the ISIS claim was “1,000% false.” Iraq Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said the ISIS act amounts to “an official announcement of their defeat.” His military commanders said militants blew the mosque up after troops closed in.

I don’t really care who destroyed the Great Mosque of al-Nuri. What I would like to know is why the West’s military forces are destroying mosques over there, where they belong, and not over here, where they do not. And even from the Muslim perspective, is an ugly community center building in London or Toronto really much of a substitute for a historic 800-year-old structure?

The only real question is if “backwards” or “retarded” is the more appropriate term for the West’s current military response to the third great wave of Islamic expansion. And here is a question: if ISIS shows so little respect for the architectural history and traditions of Islamic culture, why do you think its enthusiasts will show any more for the architectural history and traditions of the West?

Detroit cop stabbing

Feds looking into Flint airport stabbing as ‘possible act of terrorism’. Canadian born suspect shouted “Allahu Akbar”.


Police say an airport officer was stabbed in the neck Wednesday morning at Bishop International Airport in Flint. The officer was taken to the hospital. Michigan State Police said the officer is in critical condition. Police identified the injured officer as Lt. Jeff Neville. Bishop International Airport was evacuated and is closed.


No doubt the policeman will be relieved to be reminded that Islam is a religion of peace and Jihad means an internal struggle. Remember, cops being stabbed by Muslims only makes us stronger. And immigrants who live off government handouts and shut down airports are good for the economy.

Happy Father’s Day

Congratulations, gentlemen. You have accomplished the first part of your primary duty as a man.

Now for the hard part. Raising your sons and daughters to be ready for the challenges ahead.

John Adams once said, “I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain.”

That was then. This is the Current Year. Raise your sons to study politics and war. Raise your daughters to be the wives and mothers of warriors.

Mailvox: Breivik: saint or monster?

A Norwegian asks about St. Breivik:

What I still not have clear for me, is your standing concerning AB Breivik, and that actually troubles me somehow. I am self a Norwegian, I live in Oslo, and what happened 22/7/11 made a deep and difficult impression on my mind. Breivik shot down in cold blood 69 people on that island, and the majority of the victims were  teenagers (children, I could say), which «guilt» was to be an offspring of a member of the social democrat party (Arbeiderpartiet). I have indirectly heard an eyewitness reporting about a child scared to death, and with blood pouring from a wound in the throat while slowly dying.

For me, Breivik doesn’t represent any positive and decent quality, and he neither represent any legitimate way of doing resistance against a fallen political class and elite. Maybe I have misunderstood, but if you somehow make a hero out of Breivik, that makes it so difficult for me to do what I much would like to do: to make you one of several good teachers in my life.

Somehow I can look at Breivik (and other terrorists) as (almost impersonal) expressions of tidal waves in our history. But simultaneously, I can do nothing else than look at their actual actions as utterly horrific. As I see it (and feel it), no one devout to God would never ever could have done what Breivik did, and no one would neither could defend his actions.

First, let me say that I have family members who are a) devout Christians, b) good men, and c) are responsible for killing considerably more people than Anders Breivik. I also have a number of friends whose confirmed kills are in double-digits. Nor am I at all persuaded by the notion that the God who loved David, who slew “his ten thousands”, or the Jesus who praised the faith of the Roman centurion, is anywhere nearly as appalled by war as most men would like to believe.

From a philosophical perspective, I tend to regard the Norwegians, and the “Norwegians”, killed by Breivik as having been more culpable on average than the average Japanese, Korean, or Chinese infantryman were. And don’t forget, the Viet Cong were no more professional soldiers than were the Quisling Youth on Utoya, and most of them were even younger.

Breivik did not target innocents. He didn’t attack teenagers at a pop concert or families enjoying a night out on a public promenade. He struck a highly effective blow against the political machine that is still actively engaged in attacking his people and attempting to eradicate them. If you don’t believe violence is a legitimate way of resisting invasion, if you don’t think that making war on those making war on you is permissible, that’s your prerogative, but your opinion is both ahistorical and irrelevant.

The fact is that Anders Breivik not only gave up his freedom to strike back at the quislings who are actively seeking to destroy your nation and your people, but he did so alone, and in the full knowledge that he would be hated for it by many of the very people he sought to save.

You may recall that someone once said something about the quality of the love that such a self-sacrifice requires. Can you honestly say that it was nothing but simple hatred that inspired him?

Of course, those who are not religious cannot fathom that kind of love, which is why they simply deem him mad, and a monster, and try to avoid thinking about the future. I don’t expect you to simply accept my perspective, but it might give you some food for further thought. While he did a terrible thing, it is far more terrible that he was put into a position where he felt the need to do it in the first place. Focus your anger, and your disgust, for those who knowingly created the untenable situation.

In any event, my expectation is that if the West, and Norway, survive the ongoing clash of civilizations, Breivik will be considered its first hero. And if it does not, well, then Breivik will be regarded in much the same way that Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, and P.G.T. Beauregard are presently regarded in New Orleans, as an evil monster who was “on the wrong side of humanity.”

And just to be clear for the excessively slow, although I am not a Catholic, I am aware that Mr. Breivik has not died, been beatified, or canonized. Nor do I believe in praying to intercessors.

UPDATE: It is clear to me that a few readers here simply do not understand what war is. I direct your attention to Clausewitz and ask you this: was Breivik practicing “politics by other means” or not?

The only way

There’s only one way Britain should respond to attacks such as Manchester. That is by carrying on exactly as before.
– The Independent

Doing nothing is not a solution. Carrying on exactly as before is submission and surrender. But it is true, there is only one way Britain should respond to attacks such as Manchester, and that is Reconquista 2.0.

Reconquista is the relatively peaceful, civilized, and historically-proven-effective way. But if the multiculturalists, globalists, quislings, and cuckservatives absolutely insist on standing in the way, there is an obvious alternative. However, they’ll probably like that even less, considering that it involves them too.

Nationalism intensifies. And history’s great tide is going to wash over the world whether we will or no. The coming season became absolutely inevitable, and totally unavoidable, once these waves of immigration into the West were permitted to take place. I warned you. Many others warned you. Even before I was born, Enoch Powell warned the British people of “rivers of blood” that would flow throughout Great Britain.

Here is a decent, ordinary fellow-Englishman, who in broad daylight in my own town says to me, his Member of Parliament, that the country will not be worth living in for his children. I simply do not have the right to shrug my shoulders and think about something else. What he is saying, thousands and hundreds of thousands are saying and thinking – not throughout Great Britain, perhaps, but in the areas that are already undergoing the total transformation to which there is no parallel in a thousand years of English history.


We must be mad, literally mad, as a nation to be permitting the annual inflow of some 50,000 dependants, who are for the most part the material of the future growth of the immigrant descended population. It is like watching a nation busily engaged in heaping up its own funeral pyre. So insane are we that we actually permit unmarried persons to immigrate for the purpose of founding a family with spouses and fiancées whom they have never seen.

Perhaps the fathers and brothers of all the murdered children of Manchester will content themselves with candlelight vigils and platitudes, as so many others have for the last 16 years. But sooner or later, one of them will not, and that man will make Anders Breivik look like a moderate.

There is going to be a lot of talk about thoughts and prayers, as always. But, as it is written, do not neglect to leave room for God’s wrath.

America’s Indian heritage

A commenter at Steve Sailer’s explains why Americans tend to feel differently about Indians than Central and South Americans, or Canadians, do:

In America, the Indians fought back with everything they had not for years, not for decades, not for generations, but for centuries.

And the resistance began at the beginning, so to speak, as they were whipping the Spanish at least as early as 1513, when the Timucua drove Ponce de Leon off near present-day St. Augustine, Fla., and later that year the Calusa drove him out of San Carlos Bay, Fla. Four years later Hernando de Cordoba’s fleet, returning from a campaign against the Maya, dropped anchor in San Carlos bay to replenish water and supplies, but their landing party was driven off by the Calusa, who were described as “very big men with very long bows and good arrows.”

Ponce de Leon and Cordoba returned to San Carlos Bay in 1521 with 200 soldiers, settlers and supplies to establish a colony. The Calusa again defeated and drove them off, killing both de Leon and Cordoba.

Then there was the disastrous Navaraez expedition into northern Florida in 1527 with 600 soldiers, where the Spanish crossbows were no match for the Indians 7-foot long bows, as thick as a man’s arm, that could penetrate six inches of wood at 200 yards. Only four Spaniards survived the catastrophe.

In 1539, Hernando de Soto, who had been Francisco Pizarro’s chief military adviser and among the 168 who conquered the Inca empire, and a veteran of 15 years of warring against south-of-the Rio Grande Indians, landed in Tampa Bay with 330 infantry and 270 cavalry, most veterans of the Spanish conquests in the south. They had given up European armor and adopted Aztec quilted cotton armor covered with leather as more effective protection.

They marched north reaching the Choctaw town of Mabila on the present site of Selma, Ala., which they assaulted and took after prolonged fighting, estimated having killed 2,500 inhabitants. But no Indian surrender ensued. Instead, they forced the Spaniards to retreat and harried them, the Chickasaw attacking and burning de Soto’s winter camp, inflicting severe losses. Ultimately, only about half of de Soto’s force survived the expedition — not including him.

And so it went for hundreds of years, into the 20th century, if we count the 1911 Shoshone uprising, which was not called a “war” but a “riot,” as nomenclature was changed after Wounded Knee.

It is remarkable that some 350 years after the Calusa crushed Ponce de Leon and Cordoba, the Sioux defeated Crook and annihilated Custer.

So the American Indian earned respect and a place in our history that he does not have in Latin America or Canada. That’s even reflected in our language. Only the American armed forces to this day speak of going into Indian Country, and mean it ominously. Only American paratroopers legendarily shout “Geronimo!” as they leap from airplanes. Only a famous American general was named after an Indian. We speak of being off the reservation, and on the warpath. We Indian wrestle and walk Indian file. Indians are a part of, in today’s parlance, who we are in a way they are not in Canada or Latin America.

I find it fascinating that Indian ancestry is so respected that some whites will even attempt to deny that those they don’t like could possible have any. In any event, the Indian experience is one more factor that tends to separate the American colonist/settler from the later US immigrants.

The insanity of the imperial USA

This is a solid analysis of the lunacy of US imperialism and its intrinsic weakness:

When the leader of some imperial territory or vassal acts against U.S. interests, or even just gets strong enough that they might, U.S. assets stir up “popular movements”, “moderate rebels”, and “refugee” crises, or subvert their internal operation with NGOs, diplomats, and “grassroots” activism. Or, if that isn’t working, in case we have all forgotten 2003, the U.S. military directly invades in the name of “human rights” and “democracy”, neither of which need to ever materialize for this to work. One way or another, the leader in question ends up deposed.

The occasional genocide, mass rape, persecution of Christians and actual moderate minorities, enormous expense, damage to civilization, loss of historic sites, damage to our reputation, loss of the cultural and material produce that order would bring, destabilization of regions and populations that later need to be bailed out at our own material and demographic expense, and hostile mass-migration into the lands of our own people, which are the byproducts of this indirect form of rule, are overlooked as necessary collateral damage, unfortunate random happenstance, or, when the victim is of our own white race, even celebrated.

Why does this happen? Why are we, good people most of us, caught up in an evil empire? It’s easy enough to blame traitors and Jews and the devil, but the problem goes deeper.

The root of the problem is the principles by which the empire is administered. To start with, we don’t call it an empire, we call it “the international community”, composed not of vassals, provinces, states, territories, colonies, and protectorates, but of “sovereign” “democratic” “nations”.

In other words, we don’t even have language to talk coherently about the empire, which means it’s hard to think about it; we can’t issue orders to our “sovereign” subordinates, have no widely understood imperial authority, and can’t extract straightforward imperial tax, but still have to administer an empire. So, American foreign policy grabs the next-best mechanisms available to it: rebel groups, NGOs, subversion, “human rights” and associated leverage and inconsistencies, petrodollar shenanigans, exports of easily subverted democracy, weaponized mass-migration, and so on.

The worldview attempting to govern the empire and build coherent sub-states fails, because it doesn’t dare recognize what it is actually doing, and doesn’t dare use the “enemy” methods of effective statecraft that actually work. Instead of clear rights and duties of imperial provinces, states governed by clear chains of command and authority, and open negotiation for tribute and protection, we are forced to use destructive, clandestine methods to govern our empire, which in turn create the evilness of the empire.

Obviously, the people in charge of it are the bearers and purveyors of this destructive ideology, but they are not senselessly evil; there is a twisted logic to it all that is generated from the deep structure of modern political thought. Replacing the elite would be insufficient to fix our problems without a new imperial and political ideology. Any replacement elites, though they might go in with the best of intentions, would have the same incentives and would develop the same characteristics and ideology, if the formal structure of the thing stayed the same.

If we had a different imperial ideology, it would be possible to allow the components of the empire a much greater degree of peace and leeway to do what is right, while simultaneously exerting more efficient and fine-grained control over those aspects for which it is in our interest to do so. And we would no longer have to bear the negative by-products of a destructive and evil imperial operating system.

Don’t deceive yourself. The US is an empire that is held together by force and has been since 1865. The lack of a formal emperor doesn’t mean that it’s not an empire nor does its false veil of “democracy”; the US is observably less democratic than the Athenian and British Empires were. And the complete inability of the electorate to even acknowledge what the empire is means that it’s not even possible to discuss what it should, and should not, be doing.

Moreover, the empire is divided and schizophrenic. As the author notes, this has not escaped the attention of the other two global powers, China and Russia. There is absolutely no chance either of them, or a number of the lesser powers, are going to be inclined to follow the imperial USA’s lead, as it is inevitably leading to decline, collapse, and war. Indeed, if they are smart, they will gently assist the empire as it moves even deeper into self-destructive madness, in self-defense if nothing else.

A tradition, now lost

Fred Reed recalls Marine boot camp, circa 1966:

A recruit was standing on a roof at Parris Island in the burning sun at parade rest. His DI had put him there to work on the roof and somehow had forgotten him. A passing sergeant noticed, stared curiously for a second, and bellowed, “Git down from there, prive.”

The private didn’t move.

“Goddamit, git down here,” bawled the instructor, unused to being ignored.

Nothing. The private looked deeply unhappy, but didn’t so much as twitch.

Another DI came along and yelled, but nothing moved the recruit. He gazed desperately ahead, either deaf or crazed by the sun. A group formed on the sidewalk, including a warrant officer, a lieutenant, and, finally, a passing light colonel.

The colonel snapped his crispest order. The private stared ahead. The crowd conferred, decided they had a mental case on their hands and prepared to send for a struggle buggy and some big corpsmen. Then the private’s DI returned.

“Jaworski, Ten-hut! Git your butt down from there.”

Down came Jaworski. From parade rest, you see, the only acceptable order is “attention”. The manual of arms says so.

“You see,” a drill instructor explained to me, “a recruit’s in a place he doesn’t understand at all, and nothing ever works for him. Back home, he knows the rules. Maybe he’s a big dude on the block, got it made. Not here. Everybody’s yelling at him and he can’t ever do anything right.

“So he figures he’ll do exactly what he’s told. It’s his way of protecting himself. If something goes wrong, he thinks at least it’s not his fault. This is what a drill instructor’s got to learn — nothing’s too crazy for a recruit to do if he thinks it’s what you told him. And you really got to think about it. Otherwise you can get him hurt.

“One time in winter a friend of mine, Sergeant Grunderling, had evening duty at some building and he wanted to go take a leak. So he tells this recruit who’s with him, ‘I’m going out for a minute. Don’t let anyone in who doesn’t know the password. You got that?’

“The recruit says, ‘Yes, sir,’ so Grunderling relieves himself and realizes he can’t remember the password. So he hollers, ‘Minter, open the door.”

“What’s the password?”

“I forget. Open the door.”

“I can’t do that, sir. You told me not to let anybody in who doesn’t give the password, sir.”

“Goddamit Minter, now I’m telling you to open the door.”

“‘No sir, I can’t do that.”

“Minter, it’s cold out here.”

“No, sir, I can’t do that.”

“By now Grunderling’s mostly frozen and so mad he can’t see straight, but he sees threats ain’t going to help him.

“Please, Minter, let me in. I ain’t gonna yell at you. I won’t do anything to you.”

“Aww, you’re trying to trick me.”

“No, Minter, honest, I ain’t trying to trick you. Open the door.’

“You’re gonna yell at me, aren’t you sir?”

“No, Minter, I promise.”

“Finally, old Minter opens the door and Grunderling nearly kills him. But he should have expected it. A recruit does exactly what you tell him.”

Societies in decline are always shocked to discover that their militaries are no longer what they once were when they run into a harder, more disciplined enemy. Just consider Athens after attacking Syracuse. Or the Spartans when they confronted the Thebans.

Today’s Marine Corps may have more advanced weapons, but it seems highly unlikely that the changes in its preparation will prove to be for the better.