Tag: war

The military geniuses at File 770

I never stop finding it amusing how the File 770 idiots will defend literally ANY position rather than accept the fact that I am correct about anything, no matter how obvious. Aaron is reliably the least intelligent commenter there, as he demonstrates with this comment in defense of the tactical incompetence demonstrated by military commanders Jon Snow and Ramsay Bolton on A Game of Thrones:

I wonder if Beale actually watched the show, or if he just had it badly recounted to him. Bolton sent his cavalry first after goading Snow into the open, clearly hoping to kill Snow before help could arrive. It was only because the Stark cavalry counter charged that there was a cavalry battle. There was never an option for Bolton to receive the Stark cavalry with pikemen, because the Stark cavalry weren’t going to charge them but for Snow being exposed. For their part, the Starks had no pikemen to deploy against the Bolton cavalry.

All of Beale’s complaints about the battle that follow assume that Bolton could have simply waited for the Stark forces to launch their cavalry at the Bolton line and stop them with pikes, which would have required abject stupidity on the part of Snow. The complaint about not being prepared for the Knights of the Vale to arrive assume that Bolton could see the future and predict the arrival of reinforcements that even Snow didn’t know were coming. To be fair, Bolton should have had scouts out to look for additional forces, but he thought he knew the entire disposition of the Stark forces already.

In short, it seems that Beale didn’t pay attention to what was shown on screen, and didn’t understand what was happening.

That conclusion seems entirely credible, as anyone who has ever read A Throne of Bones, read any of the books by Lind or van Creveld published by Castalia, or played ASL will no doubt agree.

  1. Aaron is defending how Ramsay sent out his ENTIRE cavalry to ride down a single man on foot instead simply killing Snow with a single arrow himself, or having his entire archery contingent turn him into a pincushion with dozens of arrows. Bolton had absolutely no need to put his cavalry at risk, or even to issue an order to anyone at all, to kill the enemy general.
  2. What competent general would fail to understand that the enemy cavalry might ride out if he was dumb enough to give up his tactical and numerical advantages advancing it while leaving his infantry behind? At least the British tank commander who drove past his American infantry screen into the sights of the German tank destroyer in Band of Brothers was obeying what he knew to be suicidally stupid orders.
  3. There was an option for Bolton to receive the Stark cavalry with pikemen; all he had to do was order his cavalry to disengage and circle back as soon as the Stark cavalry charged while advancing his pikemen. Ancient and medieval armies did this sort of thing all the time, particularly experienced, well-equipped, well-trained armies of the sort Bolton was commanding. That would have actually been a barely credible ruse that would depend upon the Stark cavalry being dumb enough to a) believe Bolton was launching a cavalry-first attack and b) respond to it with their own charge.
  4. First, Bolton could have simply waited for Stark to launch their cavalry, or their infantry, for that matter, at them. Stark was attacking, after all, and Bolton had the leisure to choose to engage or not, as he saw fit. Second, the statement that it was implausible because it would have required “abject stupidity on the part of Snow” is laughable, considering that Snow is observably dumb enough to single-handedly charge the entire enemy army by himself.
  5. Bolton didn’t need to see the future to know the Knights of the Vale were on their way to the battlefield. As a West Pointer noted yesterday, this marks the fourth time on the show that reinforcements have unexpectedly arrived and saved the day, because apparently no one in Westeros has ever heard of pickets, patrols, or even establishing a command post on a hillside that provides good visibility of the surroundings in all four directions. And it’s not as if Bolton was unaware of the relationship between Littlefinger and his wife or should have failed to at least anticipate the possibility of the Vale’s intervention. Remember, Ramsay Bolton was the commander who beat the man lauded as the best general in Westeros.
  6. And there it is. The Gamma tell: “it seems….”

It’s clear that neither the producers of the episode, nor Aaron, has any idea how cavalry was, and is, used on the battlefield. It is a secondary arm; it is the infantry that is “the queen of the battlefield”. Hollywood likes horses because they are exciting and dramatic, but one should never allow oneself to be misguided into thinking that the tactics one is seeing on the screen are even remotely reasonable, let alone realistic or historically plausible.

It’s too bad, because during the planning session, it sounded as if they were setting up for a recreation of the Battle of Cannae and its famous double-envelopment. I wasn’t surprised when they didn’t, though, as soon as I saw the cavalry being prominently featured. Contra Hollywood, cavalry is primarily used to launch flanking and rear attacks, to strike the killing blow, and to exploit the victory that the infantry has already won, not to play the primary role in the outcome of the battle.

4GW in Orlando

Glenn Reynolds contemplates the Orlando shootings and gives a shout out to William S. Lind in USA Today:

In the wake of the Orlando shootings, people are trotting out the usual
post-massacre talking points about gun control, terrorism, etc. But the
solutions aren’t so easy. Gun control is much stricter in Europe, but that hasn’t stopped mass shootings like the ones at Charlie Hebdo’s offices or at the Bataclan concert hall. (It’s also very strict in California, but that didn’t stop the shootings at San Bernardino.) Talking about gun control is mostly a way of avoiding a tough problem.

Donald Trump, meanwhile, was quick to tweet out that this vindicates his positions: “Appreciate the congrats for being right on radical Islamic terrorism, I don’t want congrats, I want toughness & vigilance. We must be smart!” But Trump’s proposal of a temporary moratorium on immigration of Muslims to America wouldn’t have prevented shooter Omar Mateen’s actions. Mateen wasn’t a recent immigrant but a  U.S. citizen born of Afghan parents, and he pledged allegiance to the Islamic State terrorist group, according to a Department of Homeland Security report cited by Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif.

The thing is, proposals such as gun control are basically peacetime remedies, which don’t apply in time of war. But traditional wartime remedies might not work, either, because this is not a traditional war.

Instead, what we are facing is what William S. Lind calls “fourth-generation warfare.” Or maybe it’s even fifth-generation warfare: We’re not fighting armies. We’re not fighting guerrillas. We’re not even fighting traditional terrorists. Instead, we’re fighting an opponent who turns apparently law-abiding citizens (Mateen was licensed as a security guard and thus had passed background checks) into killers without anyone noticing. They’re not actually “lone wolf” terrorists; they’re more like human drones, attacking distant targets on command without warning.

While I disagree with Reynolds on the root of the problem – the problem is Islam’s physical presence in the West, not merely addressing “the jihadist strain of Islam” – it’s good to see him bringing a more sophisticated modern take on warfare into the public discourse. There is simply no way a conventional military approach, much less a conventional police approach, is going to suffice to address the challenge being posed by the third great wave of Islamic expansion.

It will take time for people to realize that this is an existential crisis for the West, as existential crises are, by their nature, much larger in scope than the average person can readily comprehend.

But, as those who have read the 4GW Handbook know, the answer to 4GW is either a) eliminating the fish by draining the sea, or b) more effective 4GW utilizing a better light infantry. It will be several years before either option will be on the table, but the sooner they enter into the conversation, the better.

Something has to give

And somebody has to win. Fred Reed sees interracial war on the way amidst “the Shards of America”:

If Latinos become another hostile racial group, Katie bar the door. We face as part of the larger conflict a tricorn race war of, now, low intensity. This makes no sense as most of all races just want to live in peace, but the civilized inevitably get sucked into hostility started by extremists. White nationalists are spoiling for a fight, as are Black Livists and an indeterminate number of Latino hot-heads.

Latinos are key in what is coming. There are at least 55 million in the US–I suspect the numbers are deliberately understated by the government–and most, being legal, are not going away.

Cracking down appears to be beyond the powers of governments whose politicians will temporize, back away, make polite noises, and hope it doesn’t blow on their watch. If we have Hillary, she will do nothing. It is not clear that Trump could change much, though he would try.

There is a large racial element in the social battleground no matter how much we pretend otherwise.

Race is only a part of the onrushing disaster. America is no longer a country, but a riot of hostile races, sexes, and political extremes, of self-serving politicians and extractive corporations of the extremely rich who have no attachment to the US. The mild competition between Republicans and Democrats of the Fifties has given way to hard Right and weird Left who bitterly hate each other. They are irreconcilable.

Somebody has to win.

If the internal stability of the USA depends upon the dedication of the Hispanic population to altruism, tranquility, and sweet reason, we can safely conclude that it is doomed. Those who value civilization and traditional America are going to have to come to terms with supporting the hard Right; better sooner than later. Remember: it takes two to tango, but it only takes one side to start a war.

With whom are you going to side when it comes? More importantly, with whom are you going to be permitted to side?

And on a not-necessarily-unrelated note, I should mention that Cuckservative is not only newly released in paperback, but is already #1 in Nationalism.

Review: This is a sledgehammer book — rigorous empirical analysis, ruthless, relentless logic, historical depth, fearless, muscular rhetorical challenge — better than anything else I have read in capturing the pathetic cultural surrender that has been underway now for the last fifty years in the USA. “Racism” in the US is now what “imperialism” and “capitalism” were in the decaying Soviet Union, empty incantations designed to confuse a demoralized people and distract them from the treachery and incompetence of their masters. This book puts Vox Day and John Red Eagle in the Alexander Solzhenitzyn’s class of courageous writers documenting the dishonesty and cowardice of our entrenched and corrupted ruling class.

Your skin is your uniform

Everywhere you go, from San Jose to Melbourne, the race war will find you. Vibrants don’t give a damn that you are a good anti-racist. They could not care less that you deplore racism with every bone in your body. They are totally indifferent to the guilt and shame you feel over the actions of your ancestors. They understand, as you do not, that there is no such thing as racial equality, there is no such thing as a “proposition nation”, and there is no such thing as a Brotherhood of Man.

They hate you for the very simple reason that you are not them. And they will attack you, unprovoked, every chance they get.

A 14-year-old Melton boy has been bashed relentlessly in a shocking unprovoked attack at a Melbourne shopping centre. The horrific assault was captured on video by cowards who encouraged the violence instead of stepping in to stop it.

With his hands in his pockets, 14 year old Haydyn Wilson is kicked in the face so hard he falls to the ground.

He can do nothing but cover his face while the group of five continues to inflict shocking violence.

The screams in the video are coming from his girlfriend who witnessed the terrifying assault but could do nothing to stop it.

Homogeneous nations come out of heterogeneous ones. The demographic lines have been crossed, and now there will be no peace until the white nations are either a) predominantly white again or b) extinct. See: Rhodesia and South Africa.

Choose one. There is no other option. The situation is only going to get worse. Not only is there no virtue in virtue-signaling, because there is no virtue in denying reality.

There will be peace through segregation or there will be war for dominance and control. The various races can be friendly and respectful neighbors or they can be locked into a violent death struggle for power over one another. Whites from Australia to America must accept the simple fact that the fruit of the equality doctrine is a poisonous one.

And those who profess to believe in racial equality, civil rights, and immigration are going to have to come to terms with the fact that THEY are the party responsible for the evils that are already beginning to come to pass. The violent nationalists who WILL address the problems you caused are no more to blame for the necessity of their terrible actions than white blood cells can be blamed for the diseases they attack.

You are the cigarettes. You are the carcinogen. You caused the cancer. And it is only because you refused to listen to those you called racists and bigots that the operation has become not only necessary, but inevitable.

The convergence of the US military

Fred Reed foresees the inevitable developments:

It was an epochal moment for the military and perhaps for all of society. Screwing up her courage, Air Force First Lieutenant Kara-Ann McBee walked into her commander’s office on the D-Ring of the Pentagon and announced that she was a giant squid.

Kara was slender and tomboyish, with an upturned nose, freckles, and an attractive brush-cut hairdo. She could have been Tom Sawyer’s sister. She did not appear to be a giant squid.

“But I am, sir,” she said, rigidly at attention and clearly nervous. “I’ve known it since I was a little girl. I…sir, I am a squid trapped in a woman’s body. I’m trans-phylum, sir.”

The commander, Colonel R. Boyd Gittim, was stunned. He was a compact, graying man in his mid-fifties, a combat flier who had slipped through the screening process to high position in what insiders called the Five-Sided Wind Tunnel. He was not well suited to the complex personnel issues of the modern military.

He had to say something. What, he wondered?

“Squids have lots of arms. Ten, I think.”

“Yessir, ten. But…you see, sir, I feel their presence. Like ectoplasm or something.”

Colonel Gittim sighed. He knew of course about LGBT, which he thought of as Lettuce, Bacon, and Tomato, and he knew there existed crucial military questions about whether boys could use the girls room. Squids were too much.

It wasn’t his Air Force any longer, he thought grayly. Wars were fought by remotely-controlled drones now, and the best pilots were probably fifteen-year-old gamers with no social life. They could do it from home by internet. He decided to retire and drink himself to death.

But consequences were to follow this modest beginning. Kara-Ann, not particularly militant, said that just wanted to be respected as a cephalopod, although she did say that she thought the Air Force ought to provide her an aquarium to sleep in. But, inevitably, the affair came to the attention of DACOWITS. This was not a Polish mathematician, but the Defense Advisory Commission on Women in the Services. They were Boadiceas of social justice, fighting against the oppression, brutality, contempt and unremitting assault to which women were subjected everywhere, except anywhere that anyone could find.

Dacowits needed something to do. Things were slow in the trenches of discrimination. Most victories had been won. A woman commanded the SEALs, who had been disarmed to prevent violence. The new main battle tanks had changing tables, and urinals had been outlawed throughout the services or converted to flower pots to preclude uncomfortable spaces. The warriors of social justice needed a Cause.

Virtual squids were just the thing.

One would be inclined to say that could never happen, until one recalls that the US Army is now wearing red high heels.

No room for refugees

Pitying poor refugees and granting them sanctuary in large numbers is always a mistake. Wikipedia on the Gothic War of 376-382.

In the summer of 376, a massive number of Goths arrived on the Danube River, the border of the Roman Empire, requesting asylum from the Huns. They came in two distinct groups: the Thervings led by Fritigern and Alavivus, and the Greuthungi led by Alatheus and Saphrax. Eunapius states their number as 200,000 including civilians, but Peter Heather estimates that the Thervings may have had only 10,000 warriors and 50,000 people in total, with the Greuthungi about the same size. The Cambridge Ancient History places modern estimates at around 90,000 people total.

The Goths sent ambassadors to the Eastern Roman Emperor Valens requesting permission to settle their people inside the Empire….

Many Goths inside Roman territory joined Fritigern, as did assorted slaves, miners, and prisoners. Roman garrisons in fortified towns held out, but those outside of them were easy prey. The Goths created a vast wagon train to hold all the loot and supplies pillaged from the Roman countryside, and they had much rage against the Roman population for what they had endured. Those who had started as starving refugees had transformed into a powerful army.

34 years later, Rome was sacked by Alaric. The same thing is going to happen to various cities in the USA and Europe if the “poor refugees” are not expelled from the West within the next 15-20 years.

But if your society collapses amidst ethnic violence, at least you can console yourselves with the knowledge that no one called you racist.

A terrible peace

Robert E. Lee is supposed to have said, “It is well that war is so terrible, or we would grow too fond of it.” But when I look around at the wreckage of what now passes for Western culture, when I see the ongoing degradation and decline of Western civilization, I cannot help but think that perhaps peace is more terrible still.

Seventy years of relative peace and prosperity has made our young men hedonists and homosexuals, cravens and cowards who are more inclined to literally emasculate themselves than demonstrate even a modicum of courage. Seventy years of relative tranquility and safety has made our young women into shameless sluts and whores, barren harridans and harpies devoid of self-respect and self-control.

What has peace done for our morals, for our arts, for our sciences? What has peace done for our universities, for our churches, for our moribund civic and social institutions? What has peace done for our nations, invaded by pagans and barbarians and prostrated before them, too helpless to even complain, let alone resist? What has peace done for our minds, our souls, even our bodies, fat, bloated, soft, and weak?

Is it possible that too many generations of peace and pleasure have proven to be little more than an enervating cancer on our culture? Is it possible that peace is more terrible than war?

If these are the fruits of peace, then peace is a dreadful thing. If this is truly the best that peace has to offer, then for the sake of Man and Western civilization, let there be war.

The best argument for Trump

From a comment at Althouse:

Once you’ve allowed the barbarians through the gates, any swashbuckling
ruffian who is willing to pick up a sword and push them back out again
is an ally. We can worry about what the city should look like
once we’ve put out the fires and have stopped the barbarians from
actively setting more of them.

And, ideally, sent the barbarians back to their homelands. It’s not about “illegal aliens”. It’s not about documentation. It’s not about legality. It’s about the largest invasion in human history. It’s about the biggest mass migration in the recorded history of Man.

Mass repatriation or war. Those are the choices left to both America and the European nations now.

Choose wisely.

In attempted defense of chickenhawks

Ben Shapiro’s defenders are more than a little sensitive to his hypocrisy and shameless, well-documented cowardice:

Ben Shapiro ‏@benshapiro
Trump speaks at a fourth-grade level. His WSJ piece is written at a ninth-grade level.

Supreme Dark Lord @voxday
And you went to law school instead of serving your country while calling for other Americans to go to war.

THE Chris Coon ‏@Coondawg68
these PC SJW Trumpkins are now yelling “Chickenhawk!!” “Bu$Hitler lied!!” FFS…

Supreme Dark Lord ‏@voxday
Now? I observed that the coward @benshapiro was the Littlest Chickenhawk back in 2005

From my August 29, 2005 WND column, The Chickenhawk Clucks

 I – like 62 percent of the soldiers and veterans who frequent Vox Popoli and Blackfive – am in accord with the notion that “chickenhawk” is an appropriate label for a warmongering young columnist who urges others to make sacrifices he has no intention of making himself.

    Most of us realize that during wartime, sacrifices must be made … But taking such a stand requires common sense and the knowledge that we are in the midst of the great battle of our time.
    – Benjamin Shapiro, WorldNetDaily, July 28, 2005

I would be remiss if I did not note that many of these military men and women favored a different 11-letter word that also begins with “chicken.”

The genuine flaw in the use of the “chickenhawk” label is that in most cases it is being applied years, even decades, after the fact, and inherently attempts to equate two different historical situations. However, due to Mr. Shapiro’s precocious position in the national media, this common flaw does not apply. While his peers are dodging sniper bullets and IEDs in Afghanistan and Iraq, Mr. Shapiro is bravely urging them to invade five more countries in the establishment of global empire from the safety of his Harvard dorm room.

    Did Iraq pose an immediate threat to our nation? Perhaps not. But toppling Saddam Hussein and democratizing Iraq prevent his future ascendance and end his material support for future threats globally. The same principle holds true for Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Egypt, Pakistan and others: Pre-emption is the chief weapon of a global empire. No one said empire was easy, but it is right and good, both for Americans and for the world.
    – Benjamin Shapiro, WorldNetDaily, Aug. 11, 2005

The America Bar Association already boasts more than 896,000 lawyers, America has no desperate need for another one. The U.S. Army, on the other hand, is currently 8,000 men short of its 2005 recruiting goals. I am only one of many non-pacifist, non-leftist Americans who believe that Mr. Shapiro would do well to heed his own words of Aug. 26, 2004. “Now’s the time: Either put up, or shut the hell up.”

And before you ask, on January 18th, 1991, my friend Big Chilly and I went to the Roseville, Minnesota recruiting office and attempted to enlist in the United States Marine Corps. Our enlistments were not accepted, in fact, the recruiter ripped up the papers after reading them over and asking us a few questions, but he also shook our hands and thanked us for being willing to serve our country.

So we never served, but we were ready and willing to do so without being asked. And that is something that Ben Shapiro, for all his hectoring bluster about the pressing need for Americans to die in war, was clearly not willing to do.

As further evidence The Complete List of SJW is effective, several of Shapiro’s defenders are extremely intent on having him removed from it. But unless and until he recants his public statement about hunting down and disemploying racists, (and assuming no further evidence of his social justice sympathies is discovered) he quite clearly belongs on it.