[Vision2020] Free Speech and Crazy Bush

[Bob Hoffmann]

Thank you, Don, for the references.  Since "he with the most references 
wins," I guess you won.  If we were keeping score on the most relevant 
references, you'd be tying your sneakers at the starting line.  I never 
sought to define war.  I merely spelled out the conditions under which the 
U.S. now engages in war.  You haven't assailed my views on that.  You 
merely quoted a man, Patton, who a long time ago was fighting a real war, 
one which he conceivably could have lost, as evidenced by the huge body 
counts on both sides.  World War II and a U.S. attack on Iraq are simply 
not comparable in any intellectually stimulating or morally equivocal way.

I hope you don't think Clauswitz the final authority on the definition of 
war.  While he was a great military theorist, there are reasons intelligent 
people study more than one theorist, and they also study practitioners.  To 
whit, Mao Tse Tung, whose war craft accomplished something singular in all 
of history:  Uniting a nation of one billion people.  Mao defined war quite 
simply as the destruction of one's enemy.  I propose that the U.S. has done 
wonders in uniting both Maoist and Clauswitzian theory.

Could I also give a reference from another man fighting a real war, William 
Tecumseh Sherman:  "War is Hell."  This definition is no less valid than 
Mao's or Clauswitz's; it simply has a different perspective, one that every 
Iraqi can take to heart, and few Americans can understand in this day of 
vast American military supremacy.

I don't know who put Clauswitz on his head, but it has also been said, 
"Diplomacy is war by other means."  We see this in the U.N. sanctions on 
Iraq, which have resulted in more dead (overwhelmingly civilians) than the 
actual military strikes on Iraq.

In the conduct of this diplomacy/war, the U.S. has caught Iraq in a 
beautiful Catch 22.  If Iraq is found to be harboring weapons of mass 
destruction, it will be attacked.  If Iraq is not found to be harboring 
weapons of mass destruction, that is proof of its noncooperation, and it 
will be attacked.  U.S. seems bent on attacking Iraq under any 
circumstance.  This from a benevolent administration.

With regard to secret evidence, I'll apply the observations of another 
political theorist, Noam Chomsky.  He notes that the purpose of covert 
actions are not to keep secrets from the people under attack.  The people 
of Nicaragua under the Sandanistas, for example, knew that their harbors 
were being mined, their crops were being poisoned, and their civilian 
villages and institutions were under attack by mercenaries funded by the 
U.S.  The purpose of covert actions was to keep these attacks a secret from 
the U.S. public, which might object to its tax dollars being used to 
terrorize a far weaker neighbor.

And so we segue to secret evidence against Iraq, which, I submit, is being 
kept secret not due to considerations of the enemy, but due to 
considerations of U.S. public opinion.  After the first U.S./Iraqi "war," 
the first Bush administration admitted that it mislead the press and the 
public about Iraqi troop movements, claiming that Iraq was not withdrawing 
from positions along the Saudi border, but in fact reinforcing 
them.  Admittedly a lie to gain and maintain public support for military 
action.  When we cannot believe the non-secret evidence presented by an 
administration bent on war, why should we believe secret evidence?

Bob Hoffmann
820 S. Logan St.
Moscow, ID  83843

At 05:04 PM 1/29/2003 -0800, you wrote:
>Bob:
>
>So, knowing that you are the repository of all things military, and 
>thinking that I somehow did a brain dump between graduating from, and then 
>teaching in, the United States Army Command and General Staff Course, I 
>went first to the syllabus and then to the indicated reference, Karl von 
>Clauswitz' "Vom Krieg"(On War), searching for the generally accepted 
>definition.
>
>It seems that the people who fight wars define one as "The continuation of 
>diplomacy by other (violent) means".  That's a lot different than " We 
>only attack countries that have no real possibility of fighting back", and 
>"under the principles of war, if your enemy cannot fight back or 
>reasonably defend itself, there is no war, merely a massacre."
>
>Can you cite an accepted reference for this definition?  If not, perhaps 
>you should read von Clauswitz and maybe Nicolo Machiavelli more 
>closely.  And by the way, although I am not particularly enamored with a 
>war in Iraq, it is my earnest desire that all wars the United States 
>becomes involved in be concluded speedily, with maximum force applied 
>consistant with the mission and its goals, and with the fewest possible 
>U.S. casualties.  You would prefer, perhaps, a bunch of American kids 
>coming home in body bags?
>
>General George Patton once said to his troops before battle," It is not 
>your job to die for your country... it is your job to make the other poor, 
>dumb, S.O.B. die for his!"  A lovely sentiment.
>
>Regards,
>
>Don Kaag