News Commentary Essays - Poignant Responses to Fourth Estate Rancor.

By Charles Henderson

The years 2013 to 2015 were significant in American history because they were filled with news stories about epic and, sometimes controversial, events. Those include the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, coupled with the Republicans' relentless criticism of Obama's handling of the same, the Supreme Court's ruling in favor of same-sex marriage, which produced an unprecedented social upheaval, and most importantly, the Edward Snowden affair, which resulted in the unauthorized release of US top-secret documents that caused incalculable damage to America's national security. In the midst of it all was The Washington Post, a widely recognized newspaper with liberal leanings but mostly conservative syndicated op-ed columnists. Charles Henderson, a creative writer with a strong grounding in biblical scripture, challenges many of The Post's articles, op-eds, and editorials by means of his book titled News Commentary Essays - Poignant Responses to Fourth Estate Rancor. This book contains over four hundred essays, covering eighteen topics, including religion, foreign and domestic policy, politics, same-sex marriage, morality, etc. The author's goal is to entertain and yet bring reasoned insight into complex political policy and social issues""many of which could be solved by a search of a biblical scripture.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Jan 4, 2019
• ISBN: 9781642586695

Book preview

Chapter 1

Drones

1.1

Drone Wars: Good or Bad?

Once again, The Washington Post editors take a position that is detrimental to US national security, apparently for reasons of allowing their reporters greater access to military plans and strategies. The editorial titled Drone wars in The Washington Post , November 2, 2012, calls for less secrecy in the management and conduct of drone wars. Well, that is absurd! Why not tell a baseball catcher that he should not hide his signs to the pitcher; or tell the third-base coach that he should yell out his instructions to the batter and the runners on base; or tell a football offensive coordinator that he should not cover his mouth when giving a play to the quarterback via the helmet microphone? You simply should not do things that will give an advantage to your opponent.

Drones serve a function that was previously done by manned aircraft. But unlike onboard pilots, drones do not get tired during a long mission, or have to use the potty, or have to orbit high above enemy surface-to-air weapons, or result in the loss of a highly trained pilot and an expensive aircraft to enemy fire. Both armed and unarmed drones are a perfect weapon system for counterinsurgency warfare.

Unless a drone mission would lead to the start of World War III, bringing Congress into the picture prior to a strike would be a mistake. A blabbermouth congressman or his aid could not only result in a target getting away, but it could possibly lead to the loss of the drone. Also, the CIA is more likely than the military to have agents on the ground for targeting purposes in a clandestine war. Finally, should drone wars remain in the shadows? If you want the wars to be successful, then the answer is a resounding Yes.

1.2

Drone Program Transparency versus Program Effectiveness

Karen DeYong’s article titled Drone use remains cloaked despite pledge for more transparency, which appeared in the April 7, 2013 edition of The Washington Post , is just another example of journalistic interference in the war on terror. What she does not realize (or perhaps doesn’t care) is that the increase in transparency is inversely related to the effectiveness of the program. For example, if terrorists know that midlevel threats will not be targeted, then guess who will take on the bulk of the terrorist activities? If the terrorists also know that American citizens, regardless of their status as a traitor, will not be targeted, then shouldn’t we expect that Americans will be heavily recruited by the terrorists?

Some people mistakenly think of a drone strike as being like the unprovoked assassination of a world leader. This couldn’t be further from truth. High-level terrorists do not come out in the open to attack US troops. Instead, they plan their bombings of innocent civilians while hidden and unobserved. It may take days for US operators to find their location and to then wait for a clear shot that minimizes collateral damage. Using a manned aircraft for this type of mission would not only be a wasteful use of highly trained manpower, but it might endanger the pilot and risk the loss of a very expensive fighter bomber. Enter the unmanned drone into the picture. It doesn’t get tired, presents a low observable presence in the target area, and is more expendable than a manned aircraft. Its precision in striking the target with one shot is without question.

Complaints about the drones come from the terrorists themselves and their sympathizers. Reporters who do not have security clearances want to glean information about the drone program and then be awarded a Pulitzer Prize by criticizing the program and blabbing that information to the terrorist enemy. Being the one who causes a very effective military program to be curtailed or limited in its effectiveness is not worth the regret that will follow when untargeted terrorists successfully detonate car bombs all over the United States. If the drone program keeps the terrorists on the run and off guard, then any calls for more accountability are shortsighted and counterproductive.

1.3

Aftermath of an Act of Terror: Hand-Wringing but No Criticism

David Ignatius’s article titled Deadly simplicity in the April 17, 2013 edition of The Washington Post includes a very interesting statement. It is as follows: A sort of calm seemed to be returning after the counterterrorism storm [prompted by 9/11]—until the Boston attack. In other words, how quickly the public forgets the nature of terrorism until it hits close to home here in the United States. When it was convenient for the political right (and left) to criticize President Obama’s drone program, many persons showed more concern for the civil rights of the terrorist than for the victims of a terrorist attack. Now when the carnage against innocent civilians is fresh in our minds, there is no mention of what tactics (or restraint) should be used in going after the perpetrators.

Suicide bombings, truck bombs, and IED explosives have each become a part of the war zone in Iraq, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, where US troops are stationed. It was only a matter of time before similar bombings were brought to US soil by either foreign terrorists or homegrown terrorists. Senator Ron Paul received a lot of praise for goading the US Justice Department into saying that drones would not be used on American soil against US citizens suspected of being terrorists. Well, suppose the terrorists are holed up on a mountaintop and have shoulder-fired rocket launchers that can be used to bring down manned helicopters, should the US authorities do nothing or just continue to watch their helicopters be shot down? Drones are clearly a viable solution.

A terrorist is a terrorist is a terrorist. He or she is someone who has no concern for innocent life and, in some cases, not even a concern for their own life. It is unfortunate that a tragedy such as the bombings at the Boston Marathon was necessary to wake people up to the realization that when dealing with terrorists, the United States needs to bring to bear on that problem all necessary resources available in its arsenal. Any attempts by naysayers to tie the hands of law enforcement or the US drone program will only allow the terrorists to escape and to detonate their bombs elsewhere.

1.4

Unhelpful Debate on the Most Effective Weapon Against Terrorism

The article by Ernesto Londono titled Drones instill hatred of U.S., Senate panel is told in the April 24, 2013 edition of The Washington Post has caused me to make the following remark: So what else is new? This is not the first time that the United States is hated for something and probably won’t be the last. The drone is a weapon with high precision. The number of collateral-damage casualties from a drone strike is minimal. Where is the outrage against the suicide bombers who indiscriminately destroy life and limb in a marketplace in countries like Iraq, Pakistan, and Afghanistan? Week after week, we hear about suicide bomber explosions that kill scores of innocent individuals and wound or maim hundreds.

Enemy terrorists, who are disrupted and thrown off-balance by the drone strikes, obviously want to see the program curtailed by the US Congress because they have no other answer to the drones. When a Senate panel listens to the sob stories from a few individuals who may or may not have been impacted by a drone strike, that panel unwittingly plays right into the hands of enemy terrorists. The war on terror does not contain well-defined battle lines; otherwise, the United States could line the enemy up and mow them all down with helicopter gunships. Instead, the United States must painstakingly search for the enemy hidden among innocent bystanders and wait until a clear drone strike can be made when the enemy emerges from a safe house. The drone is most effective in fighting that type of war.

Prioritized targeting lists are required because there simply are not enough drones or human intelligence sources on the ground to engage all of the terrorists planning to do harm to the United States or its allies. In regard to the hatred for the United States instilled by the drone attacks, it would be easy for Congress to shut down the drone program; however, to do so would be to invite their own peril. What about the Muslim radicals who hate the United States because of the raunchy sitcoms plastered all over the TV from morning to night? If those TV shows represent freedom of speech, then that freedom is just as much an affront to Muslim radicals as the freedom the United States uses to target enemy terrorists. I don’t see anyone trying to placate the Muslim world by eliminating sexual immorality in the United States and preventing it from being spread around the world through various electronic media.

1.5

The Blame Game Continues

Eugene Robinson in his op-ed piece titled The new al-Qaeda menace in the August 6, 2013 edition of The Washington Post has adopted a chapter out of Charles Krauthammer’s book, and that is to blame the US government and, in particular, President Obama for everything bad that happens in the world. Because America has not had to face a major terrorist attack since 9/11, people like Robinson have grown complacent, even to the point of trying to dismantle the NSA, our primary counterterrorist means for detecting and foiling possible terrorist attacks. His statement: The truth is that U.S. foreign policy helped to create the decentralized al-Qaeda, a branch of which is believed to be trying to launch some kind of strike is misleading. US drone strikes are needed to decimate the al-Qaeda leadership and disrupt its plans for killing Americans. The fact that remnants of al-Qaeda have shifted their location to other parts of the world is a part of their strategy, not US foreign policy.

Robinson seems to be confused in his logic. He says the United States should engage the enemy but should not intervene in the geopolitical region where al-Qaeda has sought to take up operation. Well, that is why we are using drones to track down terrorist leaders rather than using troops. The focus of US drone strikes has shifted from Iraq to Afghanistan to Yemen because that is where the most lucrative drone targets have turned up. The United States should not stop those strikes just because it may engender anti-American feelings from the locals. Collateral damage is minimized when using a drone strike. When you compare that damage to the damage caused by suicide bombs (which are exploded weekly in the midst of innocent civilians), there is no meaningful comparison.

Robinson also wants to eliminate the term war on terrorism because he says that the struggle is fundamentally ideological. Well, that might be true, but the United States is not going to change from being a purveyor of sinful social behavior, backed up by militarily aggressive behavior in Muslim countries, and, conversely, the Islamic extremists are not going to change their behavior of despising and wanting to terrorize all Americans because of those two dominating US characteristics. So the war on terrorism goes on and to forget that for one moment will only lull Americans to sleep where they will wake up (if they are unlucky) to the sound of terrorist bomb explosions. For those reasons, we should support both the use of NSA surveillance and the use of drones to fight terrorism wherever US interests are threatened.

1.6

Anti-Drone Propaganda

The article by Craig Whitlock titled Civilian drone deaths are far from rare, reports say in the October 22, 2013 edition of The Washington Post is another example of yellow journalism. President Obama has already given in to the media controversy surrounding legitimate drone strikes against suspected terrorist by promising that in future strikes, collateral damage involving civilians will be minimized. You would think, then, that the drone controversy would go away since the terrorists can now foil a drone strike by merely surrounding themselves with women and children, thereby, negating the effectiveness of one of the United States’s most valuable weapons against terrorists. But not to be denied an attention-grabbing headline, The Post publishes the Whitlock article, which is based largely on unsubstantiated evidence and questionable claims that the number of civilian casualties in previous drone strikes is higher than previously thought.

Once again, rational people must ask the question: What is the point? There is no smoking gun! There may be a trail of smoke from the missile launched by the drone, but the civilian population is never the intended target. In fact, the drone targeting system is so accurate that you could not destroy a vehicle or building with greater precision than if you placed the explosive directly in the target by hand. Collateral damage is caused to civilians if they are not seen entering a targeted vehicle or building, or else, if faulty intelligence leads the drone to the wrong target. History has shown that the United States is compassionate and will compensate the relatives of victims of an accidental missile strike mistake.

The civilian casualty numbers shown in the article are suspect. The article admits that the UN report, which estimates that 2,200 people have been killed in drone strikes over the past decade in Pakistan was based on statistics provided by Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry. Of those casualties, at least 400 were civilians. Look at who is the source of that data—Pakistan. It is a well-known fact that Pakistan has objected to drone strikes because they claim that drones violate that country’s sovereignty. Similar reports by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International are not credible because those organizations are antidrone, antiwar groups.

Whitlock’s article is nothing more than antidrone propaganda. If the human rights groups spent as much time condemning the indiscriminate killing of civilians by terrorist car bombs as they spend berating precision strike drones, we would all be better off.

1.7

More Quid Pro Quo Transparency is Needed

Whose side is The Washington Post on anyway? Is it the side of America or the enemy, specifically, terrorists who want to harm Americans, all Americans? The front-page article by Greg Miller and Bob Woodward titled Secret deal with Pakistan on drones in the October 24, 2013 edition of The Washington Post does not provide the general public with anything but more sensationalism about drones. However, The Post ’s unauthorized release of top-secret CIA documents, plus diplomatic information from behind the scene meetings between the United States and Pakistan, an ally, can only undermine the bilateral relations between those two countries, who need each other to fight terrorism, a common enemy.

Unlike the Pentagon Papers, which were classified documents released by Daniel Ellsberg to The Washington Post in the 1970s and which indicated that the US government was misleading the American public about the Vietnam War, the current barrage of classified documents distributed unlawfully by The Post to the whole world show a US government trying to do its extremely difficult job of fighting a globally spreading terrorism, despite the futile search for government wrongdoing by The Post.

The Post, as well as other parts of the news media, has repeatedly clamored for more transparency by the government. But when the government doesn’t respond quickly enough, The Post takes it upon itself to release classified documents. In that regard, there is a need for quid pro quo transparency. Pressured by media-fueled controversy and congressional oversight, the government reluctantly demonstrated some transparency in the NSA electronic surveillance programs. But who were the real beneficiaries? The enemy now knows how to avoid the NSA surveillance net. It is time for The Washington Post, with its trove of unauthorized classified documents, to show some quid pro quo transparency.

In the article by Miller and Woodward, they provided no confirmation of the information published (although the before and after pictures showing the precision of drone strikes are outstanding). A CIA spokesman, who reportedly did not dispute the authenticity of the classified documents, obviously did not attest to their validity either if he declined to discuss them. The so-called independent sources used by The Post are antidrone, antiwar activist and would be expected to enlarge the number of civilian casualties when the CIA documents said there were none. The before-and-after pictures indicate that the precision of the drone strikes cannot be disputed.

The key question is: What was the motive behind the unauthorized release of top-secret CIA documents containing diplomatic information? In this case, someone has gone beyond the realm of serving a disgruntled former NSA contractor and into the realm of interfering with bilateral agreements between allied countries. Does The Washington Post want to be guilty of that charge as well?

1.8

In a Moment of Quiet, Ignorance Abounds

Eugene Robinson has been around long enough so that you would think that he should know better. In his op-ed column titled Death from on high in the December 3, 2013 edition of The Washington Post , he pathetically tries to take the moral high ground, but instead, he stumbles badly and falls down to a level of ignorance that defies understanding. Someone with his journalistic background should know that the United States continues to be at war with the terrorists responsible for the 9/11 attack on the United States, as well as any extremist offshoots from that original group. Their goal continues to be to kill as many Americans as possible. The counterterrorist goal of the United States is to disrupt the normal operations of such groups by striking their leaders when they least expect it with armed drones.

What is so sad about Robinson’s column is that he confuses peacetime covert actions with those conducted as a part of an ongoing war. If the enemy decides to hide among the populace, then as soon as he becomes uncovered and is isolated to a vehicle or to a single building, he makes himself a prime target for a Hellfire missile launched from a US drone. The United States forces do not deliberately target innocent civilians. In fact, soldiers convicted of such crimes usually end up in prison. However, in a war zone, there will be collateral damage. It is almost unavoidable. If a drone operator is given the wrong target coordinates by local intelligence sources, or if women and children are not seen in the company of a known terrorist, but just happen to be there at the moment of a drone strike, then, unfortunately, there may be civilian casualties. But that is not murder, as Robinson incorrectly claims. If you follow Robinson’s reasoning to a logical conclusion, then every police officer commits murder when he shoots an unarmed suspect. The police have a right to self-defense, and they occasionally make mistakes.

Robinson also claims that the use of drones to target known or suspected terrorists is illegal. That is pure nonsense! Moreover, it illustrates the level of his ignorance in this matter. In a time of war, are snipers illegal? Was the elimination of Osama bin Laden illegal? The Pakistani government might think so, but it was not doing much to help the United States find that terrorist who was living right next to a military school in Pakistan. Would it make Robinson happy if the United States risked losing a pilot and a very expensive fighter-bomber every time it became necessary to target a terrorist? How about the possible loss of an entire SEAL unit in exchange for taking out one midlevel terrorist leader? As the horrific tragedy of 9/11 fades in our minds, we find ourselves in a quiet moment—the quiet before the storm. For Robinson, that quiet moment abounds with his apparent ignorance of what war and peace are all about.

1.9

Unwarranted

Anti-Drone Propaganda

The Washington Post has a way of taking an approach to writing a news story that is sometimes tainted yellow to promote sensationalism, rather than being clear and informative to promote public interest and understanding. A case in point is the front-page article by Craig Whitlock titled When drones fall from the sky in the June 22, 2014 edition of The Washington Post . In order to drive home the desired impact of the article’s title, it is accompanied by an array of twelve small color photographs of crumpled, demolished, burned, and partly submerged drones, which actually did fall from the sky. The subtitle reads as follows: "More than 400 large US military drones have crashed in major accidents around the world since 2001, a record of calamity that exposes the potential dangers of throwing open American skies to drone traffic," according to a yearlong Washington Post investigation.

If a person just scans the news and doesn’t have time to read the entire article, then he might immediately notify his congressman and tell him to prepare legislation that will ban the flying of drones in American airspace. By not reading all of the article, this hypothetical hurried reader would have missed two important points: (1) most of the drone crashes occurred either in the war zone or near US training sites and involved no fatalities, and (2) the basic reasons for the unmanned drone crashes are the same as for manned aircraft—mechanical malfunctions, pilot error, and adverse weather conditions. Nevertheless, the hysteria already planted into the minds of readers because of the alarmist tone of the article will most likely influence their thinking about drones, now and in the future.

Actually, there are a few additional peculiar characteristics that make a drone more likely to have a mishap than a manned aircraft. Drones typically fly below 25,000-feet altitude, in the clouds, and subject to violent buffeting (not felt by the remote control pilot) and can experience icing on the wing surfaces. But the biggest problem with current combat drones is the fact that they are built cheaply, not designed to be man-rated (devoid of many safety features required by a pilot onboard), rely on a communications link for remote control, and must trade off the weight of adding sophisticated backup equipment against the need to carry two or more weapons and remain airborne for an extended (daylong) mission. Although the Predator drone accounts for many of the crashes, it was rushed into service—first, as a surveillance aircraft, and later armed with laser-guided Hellfire missiles. Consequently, it should not be used to predict the safety record of future commercial drones.

As always, the bottom line is economics and available affordable technology. It is theoretically possible to build and fly commercial drones that are safer than commercial aircraft. The relevant questions then are (1) how much are users willing to spend? and (2) what level of safety is acceptable for the airspace and the ground-print below? History says the lessons learned will be costly!

1.10

What a Fantastic Shot!

Every once in a while, The Washington Post editors, surprisingly, will hit a home run. Although they struck out on the overblown NSA controversy, as well as on the continued catering to gays (who reportedly represent only two to four percent of the US population), however, with regard to the Israeli-Hamas conflict in Gaza, the editors swung for the fence and knocked one out of the park. I’m referring, of course, to the utterly amazing photograph on the front-page of the August 1, 2014 edition of The Post . The short article on A10, which provided a narrative to the photo, was written by Sudarsan Raghavan and titled What an Israeli strike on Gaza building looks like.

First of all, credit should be given to the photographer, Max Becherer/Polaris Images, who in a blink of an eye captured an Israeli-guided bomb in flight falling toward a row of apartment buildings in Gaza City. The photo taken from a street intersection about a half block away from the impending explosion is dramatic. Not only are several men and boys standing on the corner (after the Israelis had sent out a warning that a building in the neighborhood was going to be struck), but a motorcycle rider and his passenger, as well as a stopped occupied automobile, seemingly are fixed in a moment of time just prior to the bomb’s detonation. Many of the people have eyes gazed at the skies in anticipation of the coming destructive event.

So why aren’t these residents fleeing the area if they were given several minutes of warning? According to Raghavan, The Israeli military had called the son of Bashir al-Ramlawi, the building’s owner, to tell him to evacuate because it was going to be attacked. Thirty-five members of the Ramlawi family are now homeless. Somehow, the word of the imminent attack spread quickly and some people remained at what they considered to be a safe distance from the ill-fated building. When Raghavan interviewed some of the eyewitnesses of the attack, they were very nonchalant. They said that usually the Israelis would first soften up a building target with three smaller strikes by drones and then use an F-16 fighter jet to drop a larger bomb to ensure complete destruction of the target. The front-page photo clearly shows that the bigger bomb (perhaps 500-lbs) is a laser-guided bomb, complete with a laser-seeker in the nose, forward canards, and rear-mounted foldout fins. Pinpoint targeting resulted in the building being completely destroyed; there were no casualties, and nearby buildings were untouched.

Why was the building targeted? That is still a mystery. But it is clear that (in this case) the Israelis spared innocent lives but demonstrated a level of advanced technology that makes Hamas’s indiscriminate launching of unguided rockets look like something out of the Dark Ages. Also, it is clear that the front-page photo is a fantastic shot!

Chapter 2

Foreign Policy

2.1

Nuclear Warheads: Déjà vu?

The article by Ernesto Londono titled N. Korea thought to have warhead in the April 12, 2013 edition of The Washington Post focuses on a reportedly unclassified statement by the DIA, which reveals that Pyongyang has nuclear weapons capable of delivery by ballistic missiles; however, the reliability will be low. What is missing from the article is an old Cold War term called missile throw weight . When the United States was competing with the Soviet Union, the concern then was not so much with the size of the warhead, but rather could it be fractionated so that each missile could carry multiple warheads.

The laws of missile physics indicate that if all the North Koreans want to do is toss a nuke across the DMZ to hit Seoul, South Korea, then their short-range Scud missile could probably lift a very crude nuclear device if it had the proper shape and form factor. The maximum range of a missile is based on some nominal payload weight; lowering that weight increases the missile range, while increasing the weight decreases the missile range. The DIA statement is in line with the laws of physics, unless they are talking about an ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile). In order for North Korea to threaten the continental United States, they would need to have an ICBM with sufficient throw weight to lift a weaponized nuclear warhead. Moreover, to ensure that the warhead falls accurately on a selected target will require practice, practice, and more practice.

History has shown that any country attempting to enter a nuclear arms race with the United States would find itself in a futile exercise. The United States already has a head start, and it can continue to expand the size of its nuclear arsenal until a potential opponent eventually realizes that nuclear supremacy against the United States would be impossible to achieve. Furthermore, as the US missile defense system continues to improve, then the number of enemy warheads that might leak through the defense shield will shrink and that, in and of itself would increase the US nuclear warhead count advantage. One cold warrior once remarked: If the US is viewed as one single entity, then for an enemy to have the capability to, say, rip off a leg, then that would be a very small consolation as compared to seeing his own entire country bombed by the US back into the stone age.

2.2

The Ultimate Streetwalker

The article by Robert Herzstein titled The dangers behind the Smithfield deal in the June 1, 2013 edition of The Washington Post is clear and well-written, but I take issue with one of his statements. It is not a stretch to conclude that Chinese ownership of Smithfield, the world’s largest pork producer, might impair US national security. Why in the world would anyone in their right mind allow a significant portion of their food supply to become vulnerable by a potential enemy? Smithfield by its greed is behaving like the ultimate streetwalker, a high-priced prostitute. And it is not alone. Corporate America has consistently done business with China and ignored the fact that China has an arsenal of nuclear-tipped warheads aimed at the United States.

Consider this perspective: If half of every dollar invested in China goes toward manufacturing high-velocity, armor-piercing bullets intended to kill American troops, then the Chinese would be able to manufacture billions of bullets. But the really tragic part of this scenario is the fact that the possibility of going to war with China is not necessarily entirely in United States’s hands. The United States is sworn to defend Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan. However, if Taiwan simply declares its independence, then it will be invaded by China and draw the United States into an unwanted war with China, a war that most likely will escalate into thermonuclear missile warhead exchanges between the two sides. Why? It is because, unlike the former Soviet Union that was willing to back down in a nuclear confrontation with the United States, China wants to save face and will not accept defeat in a conventional war.

When is corporate America going to wake up? China, a communist nation, is a potential military threat and should not even be a US business partner. Was Cuba or the Soviet Union ever a US business partner? By dangling large sums of cash and profits in the face of corporate America, China continually makes a fool of the United States and takes advantage of the greatest weakness in the United States, namely, greed. Just ask yourself the following question: Would a friend, or even a fair business partner, hack into your computers, steal highly classified secrets, use those secrets to weaken or nullify your military capability, and build a missile that can sink a US aircraft carrier, resulting in the loss of thousands of US sailors’ lives and a squadron or more of warplanes in single attack? The threat of war with China, a communist nation, is real and misguided. US corporations are ignoring that fact and are permitting US dollars to build up China’s military capability to be used against its neighbors and ultimately against US forces.

2.3

Confusion Reigns Supreme;

What to Do Remains to Be Seen

The current chaos in Iraq was predictable. Presently, among the so-called foreign policy experts, confusion reigns supreme, but what the United States, the leader of the free world, should do about the situation remains to be seen. Once the latest war in Iraq ended and US troops departed for home, it was just a matter of time before the various sectarian factions would begin fighting one another. Many Americans are both embarrassed and outraged that the US nation-building efforts in Iraq are beginning to tumble down like a house of cards.

The Iraq War was costly for the United States. Reportedly, about 4,500 Americans were killed and 32,000 were wounded at a cost of almost one trillion dollars. But what is so surprising is the way in which Iraq is starting to disintegrate. The extremist group called the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which was helping the rebels to fight Syria’s Assad, decided to methodically take over cities in northwestern Iraq and advance toward Baghdad. While President Obama contemplates his options, the op-ed writers jumped at the chance to add their two cents.

Michael Doran, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, and Max Boot, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote an op-ed piece titled The enemy of my enemy in the June 18, 2014 edition of The Washington Post. According to Doran and Boot, Iran supports both ISIS and the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government led by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. This is very strange because the ISIS insurgents are killing Maliki’s troops and apparently are intent on overthrowing Maliki when they reach Baghdad. But if that is true, then it makes sense for Obama to do the unthinkable and enter into diplomatic discussions with Iran in a last-ditch effort to stave off an all-out civil war between the Sunnis and the Shiites. However, Doran and Boot are adamantly opposed to any US dealings with the terrorist state of Iran.

In the same edition of The Post, David Ignatius wrote an op-ed piece titled Restabilizing the Middle East. He said, History tells us that the only way to restabilize this region is to gather the essential players around a table and begin framing a new security architecture. Doran and Boot made a similar suggestion, but they want to exclude Iran. All three writers insisted that ISIS be excluded because of that organization’s ruthlessness toward both Sunnis and Shiites.

In my view, both of these suggestions are flawed because of the exclusion of key players in the region at the diplomatic table. Moreover, if Maliki was criticized for causing unrest in Iraq because, as a Shiite, his government was not inclusive enough for Sunnis, then what would be the point of making a similar mistake again?

2.4

Enough is Enough! The Smithfield Deal is the Last Straw!

The article by Doug Palmer titled Senate turns up heat on Smithfield CEO in the July 11, 2013 edition of The Washington Post describes an example of the ultimate greed in America. If selling a significant portion of the US food producing resources to a (potential) enemy is not total lunacy, then I don’t know what else could match that. Our food supply is a matter of national security, although most businessmen don’t recognize that fact. With regard to the sale of Smithfield Foods to a Chinese company, I can only say enough is enough! The Smithfield deal is the last straw!

The Chinese Communist government decided quite early that the way to avoid the type of Cold War stalemate that existed between the United States and the Communist Soviet Union was to maintain strict communist control over the Chinese people, but extend an olive branch to the free world by endorsing free enterprise in business dealings with other countries. Since free enterprise is the antithesis of communism, the Soviet Union was loath to follow such an approach. However, the Chinese Communists saw a way to not only make fools of those American occidentals, but to make huge amounts of money in the process. All they had to do was dangle a carrot in front of the noses of greedy American businessmen who salivate just thinking about that market in China of over a billion potential purchasers.

Despite America’s hope that the Chinese people will throw off the yoke of communism, it is simply not going to happen in our lifetime and beyond. The ever-growing trade deficit between China and the United States proves that the dangling carrot is still working, and China continues to make fools out of those stupid, greedy American businessmen. If those know-nothings would just take their noses out of their financial statements just long enough to recognize that for every dollar China makes from the United States, a substantial portion will go toward manufacturing bullets to kill American marines, sailors, and airmen, then they would wise up and think twice about what they are doing.

Chinese communism is alive and well, and the military threat it poses to the United States grows larger with each passing business day.

2.5

Watch Out for the Dancing Elephants

The article by Anne Gearan and Philip Rucker titled Obama cancels Putin summit in the August 8, 2013 edition of The Washington Post is further evidence of the dangerous game that Edward Snowden, the confessed leaker of top-secret NSA documents, is playing. Why? It is because he has now become a pawn in the global geopolitical chess match between two superpowers: the United States and Russia. After releasing classified documents to the Guardian and The Washington Post , Snowden fled to Hong Kong, a part of China, because he knew that China was powerful enough to stand up against the United States. He was right. China stepped in and rejected a negotiated deal between Hong Kong and the United States that would have returned Snowden to the United States. Next, Snowden flew to Russia as an intermediate stop on his way to asylum somewhere in South America. Although Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, initially viewed Snowden as just small stuff, an irritant who had no significant impact on Russia, Putin later changed his mind and granted Snowden temporary (up to one year) asylum in Russia, despite President Obama’s call for the return of Snowden to the United States to face criminal charges.

In the article, Gearan and Rucker report that in reaction to the Snowden case, as well as other areas of disagreement between the United States and Russia, President Obama cancelled a summit meeting that had been planned with Putin. So, despite Putin’s words to the contrary, Snowden has had a significant impact on United States/Russia relations. This turn of events is probably music to Snowden’s ears because it must make this thirty-year-old junior intelligence analyst feel very important that he is able to impact the affairs of two superpowers in a major way. However, it brings to mind an expression that was often whispered in a technical meeting where analysts locked horns with directors and corporate vice presidents. It was Watch out for the dancing elephants. In other words, even though the analyst may have thought that he knew more about a subject than his superiors, once the anger and wrath of those senior individuals was stirred up, that analyst could be squashed like an ant under an elephant’s foot.

Edward Snowden is not the only government contractor with access to information that could harm the United States if it is released. There are thousands and thousands of those individuals working for the government, but they have all signed an oath that, under penalty of imprisonment and fines, they would not release classified documents. He violated that oath, but if he thinks he can use his whistle-blower notoriety to manipulate governments indefinitely, he is sadly mistaken.

2.6

The Blame Game Continues Unabatedly

What is it with Eugene Robinson and Charles Krauthammer? Are they in some sort of contest to see who can be the best sniper against President Obama’s policies? In the August 16, 2013 edition of The Washington Post , they delivered a one-two punch against the president. Robinson in his article titled Spineless on Egypt castigated President Obama for his inaction with regard to the rioting and bloodshed currently going on in Egypt, while Krauthammer wrote an opinion piece titled Can Obama write his own laws? in which he berated the president for overaction , specifically, operating outside the bounds of his authority when introducing presidential orders and directives. Accordingly, the blame game continues unabatedly.

After describing in detail the horror of the Egyptian crackdown on protestors that left over six hundred people dead in the streets of Cairo, Robinson criticizes the president for not calling the Egyptian military’s ouster of the democratically elected leader, President Mohamed Morsi, a military coup. President Obama apparently put diplomatic spin on his carefully chosen words when he called the situation an intervention. Then Robinson inexplicitly provides the reason why Obama did not use the word coup because it reportedly would require the United States to cut off $1.3 billion in military aid – and thus surrender the usefulness of long-standing military-to-military relationships. What Robinson failed to say is that such a cutoff of aid would severely impact US relations with an ally in the Middle East and could jeopardize Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel. Robinson is suggesting that the president should take a strong stand on principle rather than use good judgment.

Krauthammer, who is a seasoned Washington opinionator, seems to forget how a democracy works in America. The president generates policy; that policy is translated into laws by Congress; those laws are converted into regulations by the affected administration departments; and the regulations are enforced by the US Justice Department and the courts. But what should the president do when he is faced with a do-nothing Congress?" He can allow the country to fail because of the legislative paralysis in Congress, or he can take the initiative and prepare presidential orders and directives to keep the country moving forward.

Critics like Robinson and Krauthammer blame President Obama for exhibiting a lack of leadership. Then they criticize him for doing the only thing by law he is permitted to do, and that is to go around the country and rally the people with inspirational speeches and to write presidential orders and directives that carry the force of law. Give the president a break! If you, opinion-piece writers, think you can do a better job at running the country, then let us see you run for that office.

2.7

Traitor or Patriot?

That Is Not the Question

The article by Andrew J. Basevich titled How Manning and Snowden made secrecy impossible in the August 18, 2013 edition of The Washington Post is exactly what is to be expected from a liberal college professor of history. His words show a complete disdain for the difficult task faced by the United States in its war on terror. He views war, mistakenly, as a stepping stone for the government to acquire greater power and influence over a naïve public. He laments the fact that the government’s control of secrets puts them in the know. His complaint is succinct when he says, It also insulates them from accountability and renders them impervious to criticism.

Basevich, like many other antiwar critics, fails to recognize that without secrets, the United States cannot achieve and maintain an advantage over the enemy; and without that advantage, whether slight or large, the United States cannot be successful in battle and win wars; and if we lose a war and are taken over by the enemy, then college professors would not be able to sit in their ivory towers and pontificate against the ruling government. Leaks of classified documents by Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden accomplish three things: (1) they generate wasteful and meaningless controversy, (2) they embarrass their government and make it look weak and impotent, and (3) they give aid and comfort to the enemy. None of these things are positive. But the real question is not whether these individuals are traitors or patriots, but rather, who is the real enemy?

Although the United States has been involved in many wars—some were successful, others became a stalemate, and at least one was actually lost. At no time did the United States attempt to take over a foreign country and dominate its beaten people. So why should the US government seek more wars and greater dominance over its own people? That simply does not make sense. Former president Nixon demonstrated how a corrupt US president could abuse his power and target his political opponents as though they were enemies of the state. Americans should guard against such government intrusions into their freedoms.

But the war on terror is like no other war because the enemy can be embedded in our society. It could be a college student, or a professor, or the guy or girl next door. For that reason, the government has no choice but to minimize leaks about its antiterrorist activities and to treat practically every one as a potential suspect. Luggage and body scanning of every passenger before boarding an airplane is an inconvenience, but it proves that when the risks are high, Americans want safety to trump privacy rights.

2.8

Over-the-Hill Journalism

Kathleen Parker must be beginning to feel the ravages of age or else is getting ready to hang up her journalistic computer. In recent articles, she seemingly has degenerated from shallow, to silly, and most recently to pathetic. She must be desperate to find subject matter to write about and to restore her credibility, but her latest article on President Obama’s difficulties is truly cynical and pitiful. You would think that she had learned her lesson after the highly criticized August 28, 2013, op-ed column about Miley Cyrus’s performance at MTV Video Music Awards with the title A twerk too far. Instead, Kathleen Parker risks her supposedly good reputation by writing a parody in the September 1, 2013 edition of The Washington Post titled Obama, through the looking glass. Did she leave off the word darkly so as not to appear to be a racist?

When people show so little respect for the office of the US president occupied by a black man, Barrack Obama, it is fairly certain it is because they hate the idea of being led by a man of color. Former presidents Clinton and Carter were white Democrats and didn’t receive the level of hatred that Obama is experiencing. Moreover, Republican president George Bush who wrongfully got the United States into a war with Iraq was never held up to the level of ridicule that Obama faces every day.

With regard to Syria using chemical weapons, President Obama is being criticized for using the metaphor crossing a red line when, in fact, it was only used to emphasize that there would be serious consequences if the Syrian government used chemical weapons in its fight against opposition forces. If the leader of the free world said nothing about the possibility of chemical weapons being used, then Obama would be criticized, and when he, in effect, drew a line in the sand, he is now criticized by one group if he doesn’t carry out his threat and by another group because they think a US cruise missile attack on Syria will accomplish little and may widen the war. Again, this is a case of damned if you do and damned if you don’t.

People forget that former president Bush threatened Iraq’s Saddam Hussein if he used chemical weapons, and without knowing how the United States would respond, Saddam backed down. That turned out to be a big mistake on his part because he could have used chemical weapons to bombard our ports of debarkation within Scud range, and the United States would have had a very difficult time invading Iraq. The problems that Obama faces are considerably more complex, and the constant insults by an op-ed writer such as Kathleen Parker doesn’t make his job any easier. Give President Obama a break and lay off!

2.9

Pun Intended or Prophetic Warning Re: Chemical Weapons?

The article by Paul Kane and Ed O’Keefe titled Use of force will be a very tough sell in the September 2, 2013 edition of The Washington Post contains a statement that may or may not be a pun intended but, nevertheless, could be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In their reporting about President Obama having a tough sell in Congress with respect to his desire to punish the Syrian government militarily for its use of chemical weapons against men, women, and children, Kane and O’Keefe made the following statement: Added to that mix [of recent administration setbacks in Congress] a heated debate on something as consequential as war and its constitutional underpinnings, and the atmosphere on Capitol Hill could grow even more toxic. Truer words were never spoken. If the Congress does not support President Obama’s decision to punish Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad with a missile strike, then the atmosphere on Capitol Hill could really grow toxic from a terrorist attack using chemical weapons.

I don’t think anyone, except current or former war planners, realize the seriousness of this situation. Chemical weapons are weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). If congressmen knew the casualty rate projected for a chemical weapons attack on Washington, DC, they wouldn’t be sitting around playing politics with their own lives and the lives of all their lobbyist friends at risk. Syria and North Korea are two of the few countries possessing chemical weapons, and Syria is on the verge of losing government control of those weapons if the rebels overrun the chemical weapon storage facilities. Although the Syrian Scud missiles cannot reach America’s shores, a cargo ship with chemical canisters loaded in a cargo container can reach our shores.

For President Obama, as leader of the free world, to not threaten Assad with severe consequences if he used chemical weapons, even on only his own people, would be dereliction of duty for a world leader. Once Assad ignored that threat and crossed the so-called red line (in the sand), then a limited military strike by the United States against Syria’s military targets was warranted. Secretary of State John F. Kerry pointed out on a Sunday talk show that the military strike would not be intended to topple Assad; that would come from a negotiated peace settlement after the cruise missile strike. Doing nothing would encourage Assad to launch chemical weapons against his neighbors: Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey. And eventually, he, or al-Qaeda, would send a lethal cargo of chemical weapons to the United States in care of the Congress on Capitol Hill.

2.10

Way Off Base and Out of Touch with Reality

The article by Walter Pincus titled It’s time to show and tell on Syria in the September 3, 2013 edition of The Washington Post is, in a word, ridiculous. It shows what happens when highly classified documents are stolen from the government, leaked to the press, and then published by the press without authorization. Reporters like Pincus go into a feeding frenzy. They drool for more and more classified information to be leaked or reluctantly released by government agencies so that reporters will have something other than mundane stories to write about in order to sell more newspapers. But in his Fine Print column, Pincus is so far off base in his desire to obtain detailed inside information on Syria’s use of chemical weapons that he is out of touch with reality.

Look what he said, The old claim about holding back evidence to protect US intelligence’s ‘sources and methods’ no longer works. He also indicates that presenting proof of evidence provided by (communication) intercepts or human intelligence is important, even if it means losing a source. That is preposterous! Exposing a human intelligence source to the glaring light of day can often mean the loss of that agent’s life. If Pincus wants to talk about someone revealing the identity of sources, then let’s see him give up his sources first. The failure of a domestic source to give a reporter anymore inside information once that source is identified pales in comparison to a foreign agent losing his life once he is identified. Pincus apparently is behaving like someone senile.

President Obama and his senior cabinet members can make the case for a US strike against Syria by briefing Congress behind closed doors. There are plenty of high-ranking members of Congress with top-secret clearances who can listen to the classified briefings and then convince other congressmen and the general public as to the believability of the evidence presented. But declassifying the information and giving it to the news media will only result in that critical information falling in the hands of the enemy. What Pincus doesn’t realize is that once a newspaper like The Washington Post gets in the habit of publishing top-secret documents without government authorization, then the enemy becomes the biggest audience for the paper, not the general public.

With regard to revealing intelligence methods and techniques, if blurring the images of TV nudity is needed to avoid shocking innocent kiddies, then the blurring of satellite photos is certainly needed to keep the enemy from knowing that they can be seen from space putting on their gas masks. Protecting sources and methods is paramount!

2.11

Hitting the Nail on the Head

Dana Milbank hit the old proverbial nail squarely on the head when he wrote the op-ed piece titled A GOP double negative in the September 4, 2013 edition of The Washington Post . He showed time and time again how President Obama is confronted by GOP criticisms that amount to Damned if you do; damned if you don’t. It all boils down to a simple statement by Milbank: Republicans don’t like what Obama is doing in Syria – whatever it is.

Milbank provided a key example of the GOP changing its tune in midstream to avoid agreeing with the president by describing how four months ago Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Service Committee, urged Obama to show leadership by emphasizing to Syria’s Bashar al-Assad that his barbaric actions [against his citizens] have consequences. So when President Obama threatened Assad if he crossed a red line [in the sand] by using chemical weapons against his own people, Inhofe later said that Obama should not have drawn a red line in the first place. The so-called red line represents a metaphor for a well-defined threat. The fact that Assad ignored the threat and went ahead and used chemical weapons on a large scale against men, women, and children and now must face consequences is the main point—not whether or not a figurative line should have been drawn in the sand.

Although Milbank hit the nail on the head, so to speak, he failed to hammer it home. He suggested that partisanship alone was the reason that the political opposition believes that Obama is wrong, no matter what. Well, I disagree! The Republicans try to hide the real reason for their opposition to Obama because they do not want to be viewed as what they really are, namely, bigots. Previous Democratic presidents such as Clinton and Carter did not have to endure the hate and level and tone of criticism that Obama faces on a day-to-day basis. When people are so quick to say that an individual lacks leadership, it is because down deep inside, they don’t want to be led by someone who is stereotyped as being a Muslim and a man of color—and in this case, black.

What they refuse to admit to themselves is that President Obama, an African American, has been elected twice in a predominately white country. He is slowly moving the United States out of the deepest recession in history. He has ended one failed war and is on schedule to end a second one. He has killed Osama bin Laden and fractured al-Qaeda’s leadership. What more is required to show his leadership? For bigots, it is impossible.

2.12

GOP Op-Ed Bookends Showing Support, but the Bookshelf Is a Mess

The two Republican congressmen, Mike Pompeo and Tom Cotton, who gave the impression that they were writing an op-ed in support of the president by titling their op-ed piece Support Obama in Syria in the September 4, 2013 edition of The Washington Post began and ended the piece with positive statements of support but filled virtually the entire article with negatives concerning what they consider to be the failures of the president. This is analogous to a bookshelf with steady upright bookends, while the books between the bookends are a jumbled mess. What is the point of misleading the readers through partisan politics?

Look at what they said in the very last sentence: No matter the president’s party or his past failures, all Americans should want, and help him, to succeed when it comes to our national interest. That should have been their leadoff sentence, and everything after that in the article should have been positive, or else constructive criticism, taking into account the president’s attempt to deal with a very complex situation.

The Syrian civil war is complex because the United Nations is blocked by the veto power of two of American’s antagonists—Russia and China. Russia is an ally of Syria, supplies Syria with conventional arms, and may be forced to come to Syria’s aid, militarily, if the United States enters the civil war directly. Hence, the world could easily witness a military confrontation between the two largest nuclear powers. Escalation up to a strategic nuclear exchange would be difficult to prevent. But even if the Russians chose not to commit nuclear suicide and did nothing, the United States would have to take responsibility for the Syrian civil war if it used its might to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Moreover, to guarantee that Assad was toppled from power, the United States would have to use its ground troops to occupy Syria. Finally, in the absence of a negotiated settlement between Assad loyalist and the rebel opposition, including an inclusive and peaceful transfer of power, there could be a mad dash by the al-Qaeda members of the opposition to overrun the chemical weapon storage facilities, confiscate the chemical weapons, and take them back to terrorist strongholds for later use against Israel and the United States.

President Obama must walk a fine line. He has called for a limited military strike to carry out his