One of my small Afghan War threads as it is in the news and there are so many militarily and geopolitically illiterate takes floating around this accursed website π
Generally try not to get into personal stuff here but re Afghanistan, solidarity for those who spent much longer there esp when Iraq was 'the big war' in the AO that matters & the Afghanistan theatre was .... not.
If this is your war's campaign plan, as conceived by your 'best and brightest' in command, then it was always a fool's errand - and the lions were led not by donkeys but by McKinsey rejects. Two decades of "Omnicluster".
"One of the crucial pillars of the liberal international order is fighting a hopeless war for two decades while allied to pederastic warlords & a Kabul officialdom so corrupt that the Taliban are considered the preferred government. Whither, indeed?"
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The weather on the northern beaches has been torrential albeit Brookvale Oval looks to have drained quite well. Time for Souths to put last week's defeat behind us. When Souths are on top, Rugby League is on top. #NRLManlySouths
If you are a professional rugby league player and you cannot safely mark the ball, you need a new profession. #NRLManlySouths
Souths need to regroup while this poor fellow is seen to - it is a wet day, play it down their end of the soggy field, make your tackles etc and the game will take care of itself. #NRLManlySouths
Not sure if the NY Times is just trolling but asking France to cancel Napoleon is, itself, a heroic request. The French, commendably, see Wokery as an American puritan idiocy, and refuse to countenance it. Even the French Left thinks Wokery is culturally effeminate absurdism.
If the NY Times wants 'multi-faith, multi race' history, well, General Franco's Army was mostly Catholic with a significant Moor Muslim component (Franco's own guard were Moor Lancers) ... and on capturing Madrid in 1939, Franco re-opened Synagogues the Communists closed & looted
Have been watching The Baader Meinhof Complex (imagine German Boomers reliving their youth) and, so far, the main takeaway is BMWs were much more reliable getaway vehicles in the 1970s. Also everyone - male or female - looked like Joachim Low for some reason.
One curious aspect of The Baader Meinhof Complex is that, bourgeois poseurs thought they all were ('nein' working class heroes here), they were actually trying to be urban guerillas in a way that the Antifa types would like to be but lack the fortitude for "the struggle"
In a globalised world where everyone's crisis is, apparently, yours, it was noticeable in The Baader Meinhof Complex (as with the real life Red Army Faction) just how much esoteric (for them) Vietnam and Arab-Israeli conflicts drove these young Germans.
I generally ignore most legal 'trends' (as actually practising lawyers tend to) but note two strong claims in 2021:
A/ 'Believe Victims'.
B/ 'Abolish prisons & a criminal justice that incarcerates innocent people on racist (etc) premises'.
You can have A or B but not both.
Judges, prosecutors, public defenders, etal, all have their own personal views, but that all goes to one side & cases turn on the evidence and whether the evidence supports the case that is being made. Especially in a criminal trial.
We are all (yes, even people you do not like) are presumed innocent (both in and out of a court) until we are found guilty of all elements of a specific crime beyond a reasonable doubt - by either a judge sitting alone or a judge with a jury - based upon *the evidence*.
Very interesting discussion on a new book, "The Imperial Russian Army in Peace, War, and Revolution, 1856-1917" - the enormity of the Russian imperial armies, their recruiting & command structures is fascinating, as well as lessons learned from Japan war podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rogβ¦
Left: then General Sir Bernard Montgomery's 1 page plan for D-Day in 1944 (WW2 ended in victory less than one year later).
Right: former General Stanley McChrystal's plan for Afghanistan in 2011 (this war has been going for ~20 years & no 'victory' is remotely in sight).
Superb presentation @Hillsdale by @ArthurLHerman on "Douglas MacArthur: American Warrior", covering the man who would become General MacArthur from his childhood through his many Wars and to his confrontations with at least two US Presidents.
Anyone doubting the rule of law - and the integrity of police investigations and prosecutorial discretions - is in for a torrid future should see today's unceasing media push for, in effect, prime ministers & premiers to become involved in and direct police investigations. Crazy.
I, for one, am sure the same media that believes Cardinal Pell 'got off on a technicality' - when his appeal was allowed, his convictions quashed & judgments of acquittal entered by a unanimous High Court - will treat these allegations of grave crimes in a sensible & calm manner.
The deafening silence of our very online and opinionated lawyer soviet - who have all kept quiet or ridden the digital herd, thinking this will never happen to them or their clients - is noted. Absolutely appalling.