Tag: GWOT

Government

I Need To Stop Reading

I’ve come to the realization that I need to stop reading. And watching podcasts. It makes me angry and probably isn’t good for my blood pressure. I’ll give you an example. I started out my week by reading the book “The only plane in the sky“. It’s an oral history of the 9/11 attacks. Minute by minute recounts of the events of that day by everyone from survivors, police, fire, and government officials. Excellent book that at times was hard to read. Going through the transcripts of peoples last phone calls to their loved ones is heart wrenching. It rekindled the anger we all felt after that day. I’d forgotten how big and devastating the attack was. Hard to believe that was more than twenty years ago now.

After finishing the book, a long-form interview popped up from Shawn Ryan. He interviews Sarah Adams who is an ex CIA targeting officer who specialized in Libya and Pakistan. This is her second interview with Shawn. It’s basically a masterclass in how we managed the end of GWOT and what the Islamic armies are up to now. Want to be angry at your government? Go watch this.

In a nutshell our government is corrupt, incompetent, and so driven by politics we’ve dumped everything we did since 9/11 into the wastebasket. Al Qaida is now more powerful than they were pre-9/11. And the best part? We’re funding them. Yep, we fund the Taliban to the tune of $40-87 million dollars… A WEEK. Yes you read that right. A plane with pallets of cash land every 7-10 days. Ostensibly it’s for humanitarian work, but it’s all siphoned off by the Taliban, to terror leaders, by ISIS, and the bin Laden group. We’re funding everyone we’ve been at war with. Isn’t that special?

It’s hard to comprehend the magnitude of the Afghanistan withdrawal debacle. Two decades of fighting and untold loss, blood spilled, and trillions spent – for what? We’ve now rearmed the Taliban, funded them, and Afghanistan is once again the terror training capital of the world. In a previous post I described how we developed our biometric monitoring systems over there during the long GWOT. Massive databases containing biometric data on virtually everyone in the country. The Taliban now has those systems and in the last six months, with the help of the Chinese and Iranians, have gotten it all back up and running. Every poor soul the US paid or was a member of the Afghan army, the Taliban now knows exactly who they are. Tens upon tens of thousands of people have already been “disappeared”. It’s simply disgusting what we’ve done.

Here’s an even better one – the United States Government pays a monthly stipend to the families of Taliban members who were killed… fighting against us! It’s hard to believe it’s real. It makes your head spin it’s so outrageous.

I don’t understand how anyone involved can think this is ok? Where are the whistleblowers at the State Department? The CIA, the FBI, DOD, there isn’t anyone who raises their hand and says this is not right? Where are our elected officials whose job is providing oversight of all this? Isn’t there anyone willing to put party politics aside and be an American first? Never mind, don’t answer that. There’s a reason the deep state exists and exerts the power it does.

I can’t imagine what it must feel like to have served during the GWOT and now see this. What a punch to the gut. What a waste of blood, lives, and trillions of dollars.

So that’s it. Until my blood pressure returns to normal, no more reading unless it’s weight loss or gardening books. And definitely no more podcasts. Or Twitter. I was much happier with my head in the sand. At this point I wish I could take the blue pill and go back to blissful ignorance.

Motivation, Solving the wrong problem

Uncomfortable Truths

As a forewarning, I’m ’bout to lay down some uncomfortable truths that might make you a little squeamish. Ready? The nature of man is violence. Always has been, always will be. I know you don’t want to hear that, but it’s true. The problem is that the “civilized” West has forgotten this and I fear we’re going to be reminded of it at some point.

I can already hear the pink haired liberal arts students and latte sipping soccer moms denouncing me as a Neanderthal who probably lives in one of those fly-over states (I bet he owns guns too, they whisper). To not think that violence is at the very core of our being, ignores history. I suppose it’s understandable. Roughly three quarters of the population is under 60. World War Two, Vietnam, Korea, the Ku Klux Klan… are already ancient issues in history books. Almost fifty percent of the population is under 40, which means they were likely brought up in the modern, woke education system. A system that tells children that our most pressing issue is climate change and that white colonizers are the most dangerous people on the planet.

I get it. We have been blessed with a level of security unimaginable in most of the world for the last fifty years. When you’re blessed with financial and physical security it’s easy to make the plight of the spotted owl your top priority. I don’t think that’s going to last much longer.

Man is a violent and brutal animal. The history of the world is built on conquest. From the Romans to the Vikings, and up to our own settlement of the nation – it was done through violent conquering of existing people. Mankind has always understood this and knew that violence was kept at bay by… violence. If you tolerate criminals, you’re going to get more crime. If you don’t prepare for invasion, you’re going to get invaded. These are not hard concepts to grasp.

But apparently they are. Somewhere along the line we decided that prioritizing clean energy electric buses was more important than having cops on the street. We decided that prosecuting criminals and keeping them in jail was bad for their self-esteem. And the results have been predictable. I guess we’re not allowed to talk about it because of race or DEI or something. But hey, if nothing else the New York City police department now has a killer new dance team. All cities should follow their lead. Just imagine, we can have a nationwide police dance-off!

And while police departments are dancing and criminals are looting stores at will, we have a literal invasion happening at our border. We don’t even pretend anymore. I guess as a nation we simply decided that everyone on the planet is welcome to come. No worries, we’ll just print more money to take care of all our wonderful new residents. What could possibly go wrong?

Well clearly there’s about a thousand things on the list that could go wrong, but number one… October 7th. You know, that little incident in Israel. The savage, barbaric nature of that attack IS the true nature of man. That is what historically happened when towns were invaded. Do you think the Romans took care to spare civilians when they conquered a city? What do you think the aftermath of the various crusades looked like? When one group hates another, or needs resources, all bets are off. Mankind will do some truly horrible things to one another.

I know that here in the West we don’t want to think of such things. We’re more civilized than that. We’ve evolved. Besides, those are problems for over there. We’re untouchable.

Lest we forget, 19 people carried out 9/11. We’re currently at 7.5 million people who have streamed across our border in the last three years. You don’t think out of all those people there are another 19, or a thousand, or ten thousand who wish us harm? You’re a fool if you don’t.

The Islamic Caliphate is real. They hate us and Israel with a passion. Do you think that went away when we left Afghanistan? Silly rabbit. October 7th? It’s going to happen here, mark my words. Meanwhile, there’s nothing to stop the cartels from simply moving in and taking over US cities mob-style.

Mankind hasn’t changed. Weakness begets violence. Israel got complacent and worried about left-wing public opinion. Hamas, prompted by the Islamic State, took advantage. And given a chance, they’ll do it again. And because of that, Israel is doing the right thing in their response.

Historically when you invaded a city, you killed all the fighting age males, kept the children, and sold off the women as slaves. Why? Because if you didn’t, they’d come back and invade you in retaliation. Do you really think things are different today? Wars and conflicts end when the enemy has lost the ability to continue. It’s not pretty, but if Israel doesn’t end Hamas completely… they’ll be right back at the same place in a few years.

And the same holds true for us. If we don’t end the nonsense at the border and sort out who’s here, we’ll be right back in the Global War on Terror. We’re going to suffer a 9/11 on steroids, we’ll respond with a bombardment of Iran, and then we’re off to the races.

I know it’s not fashionable to say, but man is violent. Roman Emperor Hadrian first said “peace through strength or, failing that, peace through threat.” Reagan repeated it in the 1980’s. It was true then and it’s true today. It holds true for crime in the streets as well as keeping the Mongol hordes at bay. The latte sipping leftists are going to learn it one way or another.

History is a bitch, ’cause it just keeps repeating.