Month: October 2005

by Col. Patrick Lang (Ret.)

This area could — if substantial Iraqi forces are not added, or if U.S. forces are trimmed during a pullout — foretell a future where Sunni tribes with ties to the insurgency rule large parts of Iraq. Antonio Castaneda for the AP (PDF)

If you read this carefully, you will hear the marines telling you that what we are doing along the Syrian border is necessary but inconclusive in terms of the ultimate outcome in the war.

There have to be IRAQI troops who can hold the towns, especially the towns in this western beduin-descended Sunni Arab part of Iraq. Without that, we can do this kind of thing forever.

The administration is now considering further action against Syria in the evident belief that the Syrian government is more than a passive actor in the also beduin-descended area of eastern Syria. Evidently Elliot Abrams and his NSC crew wuold liek the air forces to bomb a group of towns inside Syria.

Both DIA and CIA have told the NSC that the evidence is inconclusive concerning Syrian government involvement in cross-border infiltration but, no matter.

Maybe they can come up with another Office of Special Plans (OSP) to do “better analysis.”

Personal Blog: Sic Semper Tyrannis 2005 || Bio || CV
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Novel: The Butcher’s Cleaver (download free by chapter, PDF format)


“Drinking the Kool-Aid,” Middle East Policy Council Journal, Vol. XI, Summer 2004, No. 2

I’m bored.  Listening to Monday Night Football and contemplating the end of the Republic as we had known it.  (Man, I hope we can still post two diaries a day.  Because if we can’t, I may get kicked out of one of the only places I feel even close to sane anymore).

So, bored, and reading some of the crazy crap on dKos (another meta-diary about if it is cool to hate Bush or not) I got to thinking.  There was some speculation that the new diary was some kind of troll-based operation to make the site go nuts and argue with itself.

And that got me to thinking, maybe, just maybe, it is time for another life-experiment.  Something far less radical than quitting blogging for a month and a half to be misinformed by the New York Times, mind you.

Uh Oh:

an indulgence Ductape. For all the Europeans that are reading this, please visit our sister site: European Tribune

The Crime of “Unauthorized Reproduction”
New law will require marriage as a legal condition of motherhood

Just got this from Central Ohio DFA:

STRICKLAND EVENT
Tomorrow, Vietnam veteran Senator Max Cleland will endorse Ohio gubernatorial candidate Congressman Ted Strickland at events across Ohio Tuesday. Cleland will join Strickland and Iraq War veteran State Representative John Boccieri at an event here in Columbus, as well as additional events in Dayton and Youngstown. The Columbus event will be at 12:30 PM at the Ohio Statehouse Lawn Veteran’s Memorial (S. 3rd St).  For more info visit www.tedstrickland.com.