'Chickenhawk War Pundits Are Calmly Telling U.S. Allies to Commit National Suicide
By Gary Brecher, AlterNet.
By Gary Brecher, AlterNet.
Posted September 13, 2008.
Telling Georgia to keep attacking Russia is like telling a 98-pound weakling to rematch with the hulking thug who just put him on the floor. I'd hate to be Georgia right now. So many American pundits have plans for the Georgians, brilliant schemes designed to get Georgia into a big war with the Russians. "Here's what you oughta do." It's like listening in on bar talk -- some drunk trying to talk a 98-pound weakling into a rematch with the hulking thug who just put him on the floor. Funny thing, they never want to prove their theory themselves.
The backseat generals started early. On August 16, a week after the fighting between Russian and Georgian troops started, the neocon magazine Weekly Standard featured a chirpy, upbeat article listing all the hardware we could ship to the Georgians to help them fight a nice, long, bloody guerrilla war.
It was classic Tom Clancy stuff, all based on the idea you make war with stuff, not people. These guys just won't face the fact that for the guerrilla, the key weapon, the only weapon that matters, is people -- and starting a guerrilla war means sentencing most of the people in your address book to a very nasty death.
Now we've got Sarah Palin, everybody's favorite sniper-mom, volunteering to go to war with Russia over South Ossetia.
As far as I know, Palin isn't volunteering to go there herself. She sticks to targets that don't shoot back, like moose. But then that's what all these eager volunteers have in common: none of them are actually going to go over and fight the Russians themselves, and as far as I know none of them even thought about asking the poor Georgians whether they're up for the sheer Hell of a guerrilla war. All the Georgians wanted was to join NATO, make a little money and maybe get a used car. They're like a guy who joins the Army for a college scholarship and finds himself on the front lines -- except they're not even in NATO yet. We're volunteering them to make the ultimate sacrifice and we haven't even let them in the club yet.
The absolute craziest cheerleading came out of an article in DoD buzz by Greg Grant, quoting an anonymous Department of Defense source who wants Georgia to become the new Hezbollah.
Greg's anonymous warmonger got a big, way-too-enthusiastic boost from Noah Schachtman who writes for this lame-named war site, "The Danger Room," in Wired magazine. His article, "Should Georgia Become A Black Sea Hezbollah?" seems to come up with a gung-ho answer, basically, "Sure! Do it!" Wrong question, and definitely wrong answer.'
The backseat generals started early. On August 16, a week after the fighting between Russian and Georgian troops started, the neocon magazine Weekly Standard featured a chirpy, upbeat article listing all the hardware we could ship to the Georgians to help them fight a nice, long, bloody guerrilla war.
It was classic Tom Clancy stuff, all based on the idea you make war with stuff, not people. These guys just won't face the fact that for the guerrilla, the key weapon, the only weapon that matters, is people -- and starting a guerrilla war means sentencing most of the people in your address book to a very nasty death.
Now we've got Sarah Palin, everybody's favorite sniper-mom, volunteering to go to war with Russia over South Ossetia.
As far as I know, Palin isn't volunteering to go there herself. She sticks to targets that don't shoot back, like moose. But then that's what all these eager volunteers have in common: none of them are actually going to go over and fight the Russians themselves, and as far as I know none of them even thought about asking the poor Georgians whether they're up for the sheer Hell of a guerrilla war. All the Georgians wanted was to join NATO, make a little money and maybe get a used car. They're like a guy who joins the Army for a college scholarship and finds himself on the front lines -- except they're not even in NATO yet. We're volunteering them to make the ultimate sacrifice and we haven't even let them in the club yet.
The absolute craziest cheerleading came out of an article in DoD buzz by Greg Grant, quoting an anonymous Department of Defense source who wants Georgia to become the new Hezbollah.
Greg's anonymous warmonger got a big, way-too-enthusiastic boost from Noah Schachtman who writes for this lame-named war site, "The Danger Room," in Wired magazine. His article, "Should Georgia Become A Black Sea Hezbollah?" seems to come up with a gung-ho answer, basically, "Sure! Do it!" Wrong question, and definitely wrong answer.'
Lees verder: http://www.alternet.org/audits/98617/
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