War and Luck
Luck is a peculiar word defined as success or failure apparently brought by chance rather than through one's own actions. As noted, it comes in two flavors--good and bad.
Good luck played a part in the allied victory in Europe in WWII. The lucky break came through the circumstances of having Adolph Hitler as leader of the Axis.
Hitler considered himself the smartest human in existence at the time. He believed that he was destined to be to be a new Holy Roman Emperor with a much larger domain than his predecessor.
Although his only military experience had been as a corporal in the Kaiser’s trenches during WWI, he believed his vastly superior intelligence to any mortal trumped any thoughts of mere generals. He routinely ignored or vetoed the thoughts and recommendations of his military leaders.
His attitude toward mere military geniuses is portrayed in the 2004 German film Downfall. The film is based in part on the memoirs of Traudi Junge, one of Hitler’s last secretaries, and Albert Speer, Hitler’s good friend and Minister of Armaments, and records the last days as the Soviets are closing in on his bunker.
Although he had lost any semblance of rationality by this time, the scenes of Hitler berating the generals and ignoring their advice that it was impossible to carry out his orders is a fair portrayal of his normal attitude toward his professional military advisors.
Some historians concentrating on wars of the 20th Century believe that if Hitler had been smart enough to call in his commanders with Prussian General Staff’s experience and tell them, “Go conquer the world for me. I will give you all the men, money, and material you need,” and then stepped back and let the generals run the war, German might have become the common language of the world.
History is now repeating itself. In his relations with the Department of Defense, President Obama is following the trail blazed by Hitler.
The beliefs of some of the President’s sycophants that he and his closeknit cabal of Valerie Jarrett and Susan Rice are smarter even than Hillary Clinton are accepted as gospel by Obama.
Jarrett and Rice were with him during his community organizing days, so they know how to handle urban violence. After all, gang style warfare is what those overseas Muslim Jihadists are all about. The simple solution is just to follow big city mayors and their disruption of criminal gangs.
Essentially, that was the President’s message to the White House Summit to Counter Violent Extremism last Tuesday. He believes the Jihadist threat can be defused by reducing or eliminating its supply of recruits. Just use social media like Twitter to explain the evil programs of Jihad and attack the root causes of violence, e.g., poverty and unemployment.
Attorney General Eric H. Holder then expanded on this brilliant strategy at the same conference. He told attendees that the administration was initiating two studies as part of its counterterrorism effort. The University of Maryland-College Park, for example, will explore the similarities between violent extremist groups and criminal gangs. At the same time, an in-depth analysis at the Children’s Hospital Corp. of Boston will look at the relationship between gang affiliation and radicalization among Somali youths who have resettled in the United States.
What more could possibly be needed? After all, in the brilliant assessment of the talented Commander-in-Chief, ISIS is a mere varsity team. Plus we have Jihadists on the defensive in Yemen and Libya. Or we did until the central governments crumbled in those countries a week or so ago.
These are just temporary setbacks in our grand strategy to decimate and neuter this nonreligious threat. As we cut off the supply of raw recruits like the three teenage girls who left London over the weekend to join the ISIS brigades in Syria, this Islamist Jihad will wither on the vine. This strategy will be every bit as effective as our destruction of al Qaida when we assassinated bin Laden.
As a sop to those silly generals in the Pentagon, we will warn the rebels in Iraq to get ready. We are coming to get you and take back Mosul in April and May. Building on our superior forces that gave up Mosul last year, this operation should be completed in 90 days, and that is all the combat we are planning and arming for.
That announcement will have the same effect as a similar one would have had 70 years ago. Think what would have happened if President Roosevelt had announced in early 1944 that, “Hey, Herr Hitler, we are sending some landing parties ashore on the Normandy beaches in June and plan to wipe up your juggernaut in 90 days.”
So here’s the perspective.
Unless there is a radical change in the thinking and planning in the White House, we are faced with two years of increasing threats of Muslim extremist attacks in this country. The plan to eliminate this threat by denying it recruits, even if successful, would take a minimum of 30 to 40 years to show results.
While the flow of raw recruits was slowly dried up through manipulating Twitter accounts, the existing Jihad forces would just get stronger with age and experience and continue to expand its territory and terror.
That strategy seems to be coming straight out of the Berlin bunkers of 1945.
Looks like good luck is on the side of the enemy this time.
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