This is a platoon of straw men. First, has Bush ever said that those who question his policy disbelieve in evil? Has he ever said that those who question him don't believe in God? This is unfair to the president. There is in Wills' essay a haughty contempt for what he apparently sees as the simplicity of Bush's faith. Perhaps Bush sees things with much more clarity than the sophisticated ex-Jesuit Wills.

Second, I agree that we must be very careful to avoid the sin of presumption re: the idea that God is on our side. That said, Wills makes it impossible for our nation ever to go to war with the assurance that we're acting justly, doing as God would have us do. Ultimately, this does go back to one's view of evil, and the responsibility a righteous man has to fight it. I don't think it necessarily follows that one who opposes the US policy on this or any other war disbelieves in evil, much less in God. But you look at the persistence among the antiwar side -- when confronted by bone-chilling evidence of the Saddam regime's brutality, its grotesque torture of its own people, and the hideous weapons they've built -- of an inability to come up with any practical way of dealing with it, and you wonder if they have any idea what evil is about, or if it even exists. In Wills-World, the only moral position for a religious believer to take vis-a-vis war is either outright opposition to it, or pained, inconclusive hand-wringing.

I mean, I'm so tired of hearing "we should work with our allies" or "let the inspectors work" or (my favorite, from an antiwar friend) "there's got to be a better way than war." They have a sentimental view of evil, I think. They don't believe in Hell, they believe in Heck (and even then they're not so sure).

Garry Wills has an historical essay in the current New York Times Magazine, in which he explores the role that appeals to religious faith have played in justifying American wars. In the piece, Wills attacks my recent NR cover story on military chaplains. The section on the chaplain story is too long to reproduce here, but if you want to read it, use the link, and go to about 2/3 of the way down.

Wills is offended by the idea in my NR piece that military chaplains, who have seen on foreign battlefields evidence of human evil and perversity that simply will not appear to most clerics in American life, have a more realistic perspective on the nature of evil than civilian priests -- and that their voices are needed in the religious debate over the war.

Wills writes: One gets the uneasy feeling, listening to the president, that the role military chaplains play in Dreher's life is provided for Bush by his evangelical counselors and consolers. Many have wondered how the president can so readily tear down whole structures of international cooperation at a time when, in the fight against terrorism, we need them most. His calm assurance that most of the world and much of his nation is wrong comes from an apparent certainty that is hard to justify in terms of geopolitical calculus. It helps, in making that leap, to be assured that God is on your side. One of the psychological benefits of this is that it makes one oppose with an easy conscience those who are not with us, therefore not on God's side. They are not mistaken, miscalculating, misguided or even just malevolent. They are evil. And all our opponents can be conflated under the heading of this same evil, since the devil is an equal opportunity employer of his agents. ... Question the [war] policy, and you no longer believe in evil -- which is the same, in this context, as not believing in God. That is the religious test on which our president is grading us.

This one's a shocker: Mel Gibson's Icon Productions has just landed a deal with Michael Moore -- Michael Moore -- to finance the Oscar-winning left-wing blowhard's next documentary. Variety reports:

Project will depict the murky relationship between President Bush's father and the family of Osama bin Laden. And it will suggest that the bin Laden family was greatly enriched by that association.

"The senior Bush kept his ties with the bin Laden family up until two months after Sept. 11," Moore said. "The bin Ladens invested heavily in the Carlyle Group, which has its hands in a number of pies and is the 11th largest defense contractor even though it mostly buys failing defense companies and sells them for profits."

Any guesses as to why Hollywood conservative Gibson would want to get involved with this kind of project from Tinseltown's most notorious socialist jackass? Could he be trying to invest in protection from a possible backlash from his upcoming Jesus movie? Or is he a Bush-hating paleocon (remember, his aged father has rather rank views about Jewish conspiracies)? Or does he simply agree with Moore that there's a story there?

Jonah, Thanks a million for your help. Less than thirty minutes in the Corner and your post of my e-mail has generated nearly 20 responses. I'm getting really great stuff, but then again, that's what I'd expect from the world's most intelligent readership. Keep up the great work and don't ever get TOO serious! Sincerely, Justin Dutton

A reader asked:

Jonah:

Saw an analysis today claiming the Iraqis are using the Soviet (surprise, surprise) strategy of "maskirovka": having us waste expensive ordnance on dummy targets, while they hide the real stuff; transmitting phony messages about troop movements, command-and-control status, etc.; not turning on radar to keep it hidden, not launching their missiles...yet.

I asked my military guy. His answer is very interesting:

Absolutely possible, and unless they are complete idiots, probably true to an extent. That said, they can also be complete idiots. This is a perfect example of Clausewitzian 'friction' that makes the Clausewitz dictum true: In war, everything is simple. It also is very difficult."

Unless the Iraqi military and intelligence services were completely asleep at the switch, they went to school on what happened in Kosovo - where the Serbs were very successful in spoofing us regarding hard targets. The Serbs had an easier time of it, living as they do in a comparatively heavily populated, forested and hilly region

I got involved in BDAA. Bomb Damage Assessment Assessment. In short, we took a look at what the BDA people were calling kills and looked really, really hard. The Serbs were doing things like using the same bomb-damaged tank and moving it around over and over again. Since we were on a pretty predictable schedule (and the press helped them here, unintentionally) they knew we'd fly over, take pictures, process pictures, build the ATO (Air Tasking Order) and bomb where we saw the tank. The problem was, they knew the rhythm. After darkness, they'd move the tank, and put something else in there - like a tractor (so it would have an engine heat signature), stick a pipe on it (so the pilot would see (from very high, possibly through haze) a thing with a heat signature, and a long barrel looking thingy. Since that's pretty much what he expected to see where he expected to see it - he 'pickled' his bomb. Still flying away, he's watching the target through his targeting pod, sees the explosion, sees secondaries (gas tank) and reports a kill. Then, the Serbs come in with an already blown up tank, clear some of the junk (not very well, that's how we finally figured it out) and left the burned out tank there for the post-strike recon.

So, Saddam can be doing the same thing - though he has less cover and concealment to do it. The other thing that militates against it being too successful is that we have been watching his stuff for months, literally. You should see some good classified imagery someday (after it's been declas, of course!). We've watched his tanks move from motor pool to laager site, to battle position. We know what his tanks look like, the markings, etc. We know how much and what kind of transport he has. One difficult thing about moving around decoys is getting your tracks right. Real track marks, not a lot of tire marks, etc. He learned a long time ago not to turn a radar on if you want to keep your radar. Fire it up, and a HARM is riding the beam right back down to the emitter. Or a Maverick, if you are in the tactical zone. There are some great camera videos of gunners suddenly realizing that the gunner's seat is about to become a very lethal place to sit, and they make Jesse Owens look slow.

From another perspective, for maskirovka to work, it is most effective when you are showing the enemy what he wants to believe, while you are doing something else. The problem here is in terms of force deployments, especially with JSTARS in the air, he doesn't have a lot of options - he pretty much has to do what we want him to do with his heavy forces - there isn't much more he can do other than concentrate them conveniently for us on nice flat open ground. And everytime he tries to move them and the JSTARS picture doesn't match the commo intercepts, well, we look hard at what's going on.

Do I think he's doing things like that. Yep. Will they preserve his heavy combat power? Nope. His irregulars, however - that's a different story. And he HAS managed to launch a few FROGs and maybe SCUDs without getting all his launchers whacked. So it can be done.

Frankly, at this point, I'm more concerned about the nightmare proposed by Formal Military Planning Guy. Though, I think it will be Widows and Orphans
day in Syria if Assad the Younger is dumb enough to move his tanks en masse towards our guys in the west. His window of opportunity is going to be open until we can get something like the 4th ID and/or 1st Cav in the region. The problem there is, that's heavy metal sitting out there staring at Syria, not Saddam. And to get us to have to do something like that, all Assad the Younger has to do is move stuff closer. Not cross the border. Which GWB will remember, and Assad may then live the nightmare of unintended consequences and self-fulfilling prophecies.

Of course, it may be Tet all over again for us, too. Dammit.

When we finally made it to Safwan, Iraq, what we saw was utter chaos. Iraqi men, women and children were playing it up for the TV cameras, chanting: “With our blood, with our souls, we will die for you Saddam.”

I took a young Iraqi man, 19, away from the cameras and asked him why they were all chanting that particular slogan, especially when humanitarian aid trucks marked with the insignia of the Kuwaiti Red Crescent Society, were distributing some much-needed food.

His answer shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did.

He said: “There are people from Baath here reporting everything that goes on. There are cameras here recording our faces. If the Americans were to withdraw and everything were to return to the way it was before, we want to make sure that we survive the massacre that would follow as Baath go house to house killing anyone who voiced opposition to Saddam. In public, we always pledge our allegiance to Saddam, but in our hearts we feel something else.”

Different versions of that very quote, but with a common theme, I would come to hear several times over the next three days I spent in Iraq.

The people of Iraq are terrified of Saddam Hussein.

This reader asked me for my advice. I told him to look up the work of John Lott and Dave Kopel. But I also offered, by way of experiment, to post his email address in the Corner and let other folks interested in the subject contact him directly. Since it's Saturday night, traffic should be manageable. But I thought this might be an interesting thing to do from time to time -- assuming it doesn't make me a full-time traffic cop. (Also, I really don't need to be cc'd on every email). Anyway if you want to help the kid out:

Jonah,

I'm a college student at a smaller state school in Oklahoma, and even though this is the "Heartland," there is a pervasive Jacobin influence in most my classrooms (I guess that's no surprise given that I'm a journalism major). Well anyway, as a core requirement for my media course I will be forced to watch your good friend Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine. In preparation for that date I have already acquired the necessary barf bags, but I am in need of statistical ammo with which to bitch-slap my professor in the mandatory group discussion that will take place after the showing. Since Moore is known for playing fast and loose with statistics, I was wondering if you knew where I could find reputable gun info that would refute some of Moore's claims. I'm specifically looking for info regarding our nation’s per capita murder rate (guns vs. other means), international comparisons, breakdowns by race and income, etc. If you could provide any help or get me in touch with a "gun guy," I would really appreciate it. I've been a G-Phile since April 2002 (one-year anniversary coming up!), and I've become irrepressibly addicted to NRO and NRODT. It's quite pathetic (my day starts and ends in the Corner every day) but extremely rewarding. In addition, I'm making steady progress in what I call my "personal conservative jihad" (reading all of Jonah's Conservative Canon).

Sincerely,

Justin Dutton
scweeber@cox.net

I've lived in Cairo for several years and studied Arabic fairly seriously for much of that time. In Egypt, the thumbs-up definitely seems to be the same as in the United States: a positive sign. This was verified for me two years ago by my excellent Arabic teacher, a culturally savvy Egyptian woman who has traveled widely and knows American body language as well as the Arab kind. I can't speak for other Arab countries.

From a reader in Gaul:

Jonah,

I wrote you earlier in the year. I am still in France and have kept a close eye on your Columns and The Corner. I want to thank you again for giving me a little outlet from the french media. Speaking of the French media, I just wanted to brief you on TF1's (France's NBC) Thursday night broadcast…….. 20 minutes of angry Iraqis yelling next to a downed Apache. 15 minutes of graphic civilian casualities, 10 minutes of the very brave Iraqi soliders looking onto the battlefield with concern and confidence, and drumroll, France will give 10 million euros to the Iraqi cause…ooohhh, ahhhh a moment of silence in the studio………. ….. and oh yeah the American offensive has surrounded Bagdad, pretty much controls the majority of the country and we have rumored reports that brave Iraqis are firing onto their civilians.

They make it sound like America is barely holding on. Please tell me differently. Please tell me that someone is actually happy we are over there. I feel that the French actually are pulling for Saddam to win just to say I told you not to invade Iraq.

Also someone had the "GAUL" to tell me that French media was run by jewish people. I fear it could be the exact opposite.

I return to the States in a couple of months, its been 10 months since i havent set foot on American soil, I have a big to-do list growing everyday.

From FoxNews.com:

Briefing reporters on condition of anonymity, Prime Minister Tony Blair's official spokesman said Saddam had sacked his cousin, Musahim Saab al-Tikriti, and replaced him with Gen. Shahin Yasin Muhammad al-Tikriti.

Ummm....how exactly is it anonymous if they say who said it?

Daily Pundit:

I have been trying to slay this thumbs up meme for two days, thanks to damned Sean-Paul and Max and atrios.

Yes, the thumbs up did at one point in time 9and in many places still does) mean something negative. However, since the first gulf war, the meaning has changed for many living in the region. The folks at the Defense Language Institute have this to say about the thumbs up sign in their most recent manual:

Thumbs up- This gesture, expressing connotations of "I am winning," historically is offensive to many Arabs. After the Gulf conflict, however, Middle Easterners of the Arabian Peninsula adopted this handmovement, along with the OK sign, as a symbol of cooperation toward freedom.

I haven't posted angry and or hate mail lately. It hasn't gone away, there was just more inportant stuff to do. But just so you know, it still comes in. Since the war began I get a lot of this sort of thing:

Dear Mr. Goldberg,

You've been an outspoken advocate of the position we now find ourselves in. I'm wondering, as you watch the carnage unfolding in Iraq, do you have any reservations? Does the destruction of Iraq, it's people and our own soldiers have any impact on you or are as cold blooded as I think you are. Do you tune out the war or IF you can STAND watching it, do you have an emotional reaction to it? Have you cried? Can you cry? Like many zealots, your perceptions weren't accurate. We're paying a high price for the absurd vision you and your neo-con friends have inflicted upon an unsuspecting public. Compassionate conservatism? The Third Reich is more like it. And I mean that sincerely.

I hope you suffer terribly for the unspeakable suffering you've promoted.

From a reader:

Jonah:

News footage keeps showing Iraqi men and boys giving our troops the "thumbs up" sign. Yet, seems like I saw somewhere that, in the the mysterious ways of the Levant, this sign is the Arabic equivalent of what an American expresses with the lone, extended middle finger.

Can Middle East guy give a definitive answer, which you could post for all of us non-Middle East expert guys?

So, I asked him:

I was pondering this myself the other day. I don't know if there's a right answer here. Your correspondent is right in most of the Middle East, the thumbs-up is a f-u gesture. (It's not in Turkey, where it's used for hitchhiking.) That said, Iraqis do watch a lot of Western movies and TV and are likely hip to the fact that it means something different to us. (I'm sure it's a big joke among 13-year-old Arabs that all those buddy-movie guys "flip each other off" after the bad guy is taken down.) So, I think it's probably a question of context. If the guy's definitely jerking it upwards, it's more likely insulting. If they're smiling and appear pleased to see you, they may be making a cross-cultural gesture of friendliness. Might there be some wags who smile and "flip off" the "dumb Americans"? I don't doubt it. So alas, I don't have a definitive answer on this.

The French government is now at pains to reassure everyone that it favors a Coalition victory. This is despite the serpentine ‘de’ Villepin’s recent refusal to give a straight answer to a questioner asking which side the French foreign minister wanted to win the war.

There are a number of interpretations for Villepin’s curious behavior. Perhaps he simply misspoke. It’s easy to do, particularly if you are, like the French foreign minister, someone who has never achieved elected office and are thus, perhaps, somewhat nervous in front of a critical audience.

A second interpretation is more likely, however. Having formally proclaimed his support for a Coalition victory on March 24th, this wily diplomat was now using a ‘slip of the tongue’ to signal to Arab regimes – and Saddam’s in particular – that French loyalties were more divided than the need to maintain some sort of Western solidarity might suggest.

If Chirac is interested in repairing the rifts he has created in the West, he could start by firing this minister. After all, there is somewhere else for Villepin, a fan of Napoleon, to go.

Saint Helena is still a British colony.

It's an attack on the journalists here. It's been expected for a long time - we've taken not to going to the information ministry at night because we believed it may be attacked. Even so I think it does take the targeting to a new phase.

From a reader:

This is my bid to be your Formal Military Planning Guy

This pause has nothing directly to do with logistics or supply. The lead time for a formal plan at General Franks' level is about 4 to 6 days. He is being tasked to prepare a major contingency response to possible actions from Syria to the rear of the Northern front.

Our Northern guys are mostly air base operations, light armored forces and infantry. The Syrians have lots of armor. We could be exposed to an attack from the northwest when we engage the Medina or Hammurabi divisions.

This is the text annotating a photo of British paratroopers before the D-Day in 1944; I found it in a web site of Time mag celebrating history and real life of the veterans from the Easy Company (which was featured in the HBO Band of Brothers):

The British paratroopers shown here were among the first to fly from England to France on D-Day, June 6, 1944. Despite careful planning, the D-Day jumps turned out to be chaotic due to fog: most of the men did not land where they expected to, and many lost their weapons in the drop.

These few lines made me pausing and reflecting. First of all, it seems to me that what prevents us from labelling D-Day as a complete military disaster is the heroism and the bravery of those guys: their most important day begun with fear, confusion and death, but ended in victory. When we look at the faded pictures taken by Robert Capa (brave father of all embedded!), we know it was a really bad day, a day with an unbearable human toll, but we can feel proud of, and thankful for what those guys accomplished.

And then, comparing this glorious past with the attitude most of the media are showing regarding Operation Iraqi Freedom, a question hit me: what would have they said were they present at D-Day? Would have they called it a big mistake, the proof of the incompetence of Eisenhower and the evidence of the weakness of the Allied forces? Imagine the long list of armchair generals, questioning each detail and assuring us all about incoming disasters...

What I'd want to tell the media is: trust our troops, trust Gen. Franks and everyone over there, and let them do their job, they know what to do. But we at home have a task, too: and our task is to never forget the courage of our servicemen and servicewomen: their hearts and minds make a difference, their hearts and minds will lead us (and us all: Americans, British, decent Iraqis, and the civilized world) to victory.

Thank you for the Corner: it's a way to stay connected with the guys and gals out there, to fight along with them all...

Put yourself in the place of an Iraqi tanker who has just seen another tank go up in flames a quarter of a mile away - without even glimpsing the source of the attack. That psychological pressure is almost as important in triggering the final collapse of Iraq's military as is the physical destruction.

Meanwhile, more evidence emerges every day that this war is worth fighting. Cache after cache of Iraqi chemical-warfare gear turns up. Our troops witness one atrocity after another. And there is ever greater proof that President Bush was right all along about Iraq's support of terrorism.

I may have unwittingly offended the clown community with my comments this morning. A reader from Texas writes:

“Clowns are hard-working professionals with vast experience and technical expertise, performing for a large group of individuals with mirth and amusement. The protesters have none of these qualities. The only mirth they provide is entirely unintentional. “

Apologies.

Received an interesting comment from a correspondent in response to the story of those anti-Saddam Iraqis returning to the side of the tyrant they loathed in order to be able to fight for their country. Isn’t there some way, he wondered, for them to be offered the alternative of fighting alongside the Coalition as some sort of national liberation force? It’s an interesting idea. There are substantial practical problems – the presence of presumably poorly trained irregulars should not be allowed to endanger US/UK troops – but the symbolic, and possibly practical, value could be enormous.

We call on Muslims everywhere, and to Arabs. We say to them: this is the day of Jihad. The Jihad has become a personal [duty] of every Muslim. To refrain from Jihad today would constitute a violation of Allah's commands. It is a sin. Long live the Jihad! The evil has arrived! The forces of disbelief have mobilized armies....

The criminal Bush is bringing back to the world all the arrogance and the insolence and all the criminality and the absence of humanity. He starts a war that has no legitimate [basis] only for the purpose of satisfying his wicked and evil soul and his thirst for pure blood. History repeats itself. But here is his army defeated by the force of faith. And here are his modern weapons falling against our simple weapon. We are fighting with the strength of Allah, the strength of our faith. We only face Allah. Allah will bring victory to those [who tell] the truth even if it takes a long time.

Fr. Joseph Wilson of St. Luke's Parish in Whitestone, Queens, says he has been reading National Review since he was a small boy. Which might explain this example of courage, clear thinking, and action.

Fr. Wilson received the following message today from an official of the Brooklyn diocese:

Please include this in your Mass announcements this Sunday: "Everyone is invited to a Mass for the Restoration of Peace at Holy Trinity Church on Tuesday at 5PM. Father Latona, the Pastor, will be Celebrant."

Well, that did it. Fr. Wilson, who has just had it with pious peacenikery in this time of great peril, sent out the following fax to all the parishes that had received the first:

Faithful Sons and Daughters of the Church are invited to Saint Luke's Church on Monday evening, 7:15PM, for a Mass, Holy Hour and Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament, imploring the intercession of our Lady of Lepanto for the safety of our armed forces. The Holy Rosary, which once turned back those who would destroy Christian civilization, will be prayed before Mass.

This just in from NRO's fabulous French Guy:

It's early spring in Paris, that's the one and only good news. French people are so happy because of what they perceive to be coalition setbacks in the war on Iraq. So I decided to be happy as well! And I decided to give my neighbors a free prime time concert... I bought "THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AMERICAN MARCH" by The Goldman Band on CD, and I'm playing it right now! It's 21:24 in Paris, a couple loudspeakers in my garden, loud enough to be heard around but law-abiding quiet enough. I hope my fellow Frenchmen are enjoying J.P. Sousa, Victor Herbert and titles like The Pride of America and The President's March. I hope all is well in NYC and the family is doing great in Dallas. And now I'm going to turn to The Corner, the best reward one can expect after a long work day.

We need to send humanitarian relief to French Guy, bravely resisting the Fedayeen Chirac behind the lines! I say we parachute P.J. O'Rourke in with good Kentucky bourbon, Hank Williams, Jr. CDs, a copy of Ray Charles' peerless recording of "America the Beautiful," and barbecued ribs from Texas. Oh, and cowboy boots. Send me your shoe size, French Guy, and I'll mail you a pair of Tony Lamas when I get down to the Great State.

How's this for understated?

Well, first of all, considering the massive kill ratios between US and Somali forces, no friend of the Third World should want 1,000 Mogadishus.

But, I wonder, if an academic can say he wants a 1,000 Mogadishus, am I allowed to say I want a dozen Kent States?

I don't, mind you, but I just think it's worth throwing out there.

Jonah’s military guy says (echoing Babbin thoughts from earlier this week): I fully expect (and hope I'm wrong) that if chemical weapons get used, they're going to be first used on civilians, and blamed on us. The Disinformation Minister is setting the stage. If they can engineer something that they can call a defeat of coalition forces (or a true defeat, possible, if unlikely) that would be a good window for them to do the dirty deed and claim we did it. A cut-off contingent, like the guys that were on the wrong side of the river when the bridge was blown would offer a perfect scenario to claim we used chem to cover the rescue of the cut-off element. Sigh.

From a reader:

Dear Mr. Goldberg:

Re: your comment “Grandparental Goldbergs here to inspect baby.”

I hope the Grandparental Goldbergs are better at inspections than is Hans Blix! If not, they will find no baby, despite the obvious diapers, rattles, toys, and bottles.

I maintain that we must give the Baby Inspections time to work. Please allow the GG’s to stay a little longer.

From promising applicant for "Back-up Navy Guy

Jonah, Here goes on one. The "market bombing" in Baghdad was almost certainly NOT an errant JDAM/GPS-guided bomb, LGB (laser-guided bomb) or TLAM (Tomahawk Land Attack Missile). To have been a JDAM, that would have meant that the Iraqis have an existing and effective GPS jammer, which they obviously do not (both ineffective and no longer in existence). To have been an LGB, it would mean that the laser spot was lost/diverted (fiery oil-filled trenches) or that the laser spot was placed on the wrong location (which is unlikely for a 1 mile error...trust me, the mission planning for an LGB mission is pretty involved, and the picture you get from military infrared pods like TFLIR and LANTIRN is VERY accurate). To have been a TLAM, it would mean that the weapon was either damaged in flight, which is unlikely given the poor showing by the Iraqi air defense system near Baghdad), or was programmed with the wrong coordinates (again, highly unlikely, as TLAM planning is some of the most involved I've ever been involved with). I think it's most likely to have been an Iraqi heavy AAA shell or missile landing at the wrong aimpoint. Then again, given the utter disregard Uncle Saddam has for his people, maybe it was an intentional "PR" moment.

Unreal stuff at Columbia University:

At an anti-war "teach-in" this week, a Columbia University professor called for the defeat of American forces in Iraq and said he would like to see "a million Mogadishus" -- a reference to the Somali city where American soldiers were ambushed, with 18 killed, in 1993.

"The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military," Nicholas De Genova, assistant professor of anthropology at Columbia University told the audience at Low Library Wednesday night. "I personally would like to see a million Mogadishus."

Can I be Jonah's Obscure Spelling Error Guy? My most recent contribution, from his 11:41 post: it's ordnance (no i), not ordinance, when you're referring to munitions.
Why do I know this? Why do birds suddenly appear...?

From a reader applying for "Tired of pussy-footing around guy":

Jonah, I am a recently retired Naval Aviator. I've been a Combat Search And Rescue (CSAR) pilot and have served on command staffs as well. I suppose I could apply for Navy guy or Helo guy or CSAR guy but that is not my intention for this note.

I'd like you to bring your analytical skills to bear on the "why they hate us" issue. It is my contention that we are largely resented and despised in certain quarters not due to our tough or arrogant policies but rather for our benign and often weak reaction to insult and attack. I believe our limp reaction to seditionists at home is equally damaging.

The Egyptian, Jordanian, and Saudi "press" just to name a few are extraordinarily anti-American. These are public information sources that are directly controlled by their governments. These countries are routinely referred to as allies and yet they actively cultivate anti-Americanism. Our leaders pass it off as internal politics that keeps these governments stable. I think that very point is wrong in the long term and in the near term we are in effect cooperating with those that are helping to breed the next generation of Osamas. I say it is high time we said "we're not going to take it anymore." We can't continue to let tin pot governments blame the USA for their miserable failures. If they do, we should threaten loss of aid then loss of protection, right up to active support of those (non anti-American) forces attempting to overthrow them. These countries populations hate us because their governments tell them to. We have to make it more painful to slander us than to confront their real failures.

Similarly we need to get tough with the "peace" activists here. If you peacefully march and hold a sign you are lawfully exercising your right to display your lack of cognitive function. However, if you block the streets you are disrupting commerce and preventing the timely provision of emergency services and you should be prosecuted for those crimes. Arresting these people and then just giving them a ticket for being a nuisance gives them a badge of honor and encourages them to come out and do something even more outrageous. Remember how Rudy cleaned up New York?

Thanks for your service to your country. Also, please pass my thanks on to the rest of the spectacularly talented staff and contributors at NRO/NRODT. And say hi to Cosmo.

Fox News reports that the Pentagon is increasingly skeptical that it was a US missile which hit that market. According to Major Garrett, the brass says it would have had to fly off course by more than a mile, something they are very dubious about. They won't definitely say it wasn't our ordinance, but it sounds like that's what they think.

Who has two thumbs and loves the ladies? This guy! There are corresponding "Gal" positions open in every category for guys, except for the obviously gender-specific categories like "homeschooling mom" or "male stripper," etc. But there's no Title IX chicanery going on here. Everyone will be held to one standard.

From a reader:

In these trying and uncertain times, perhaps you could revisit that cinematic milestone "Superman IV, the quest for peace". I know, I know, conventional wisdom says it's perhaps second only to "Batman and Robin" in its eye-bleeding awfulness, but maybe it was ahead of its time. Lotsa WMD talk, Supes at the U.N., Gene Hackman saying noo-kyu-ler through the whole thing.

Anyway, it'd be a hoot to read your take on it.

Just a thought.

Wanna re-think your position on the death penalty?

If someone would follow up on the al-Qaeda fighting in Iraq story story fronted by Drudge last night. I mean this isn't a trivial story. It's not like a report that Up With People is holding a fundraiser in Milwaukee.

The Goldberg File is up. I'd like it if you'd read it, but the least you could do is click on it a zillion times.

I have it on good authority that this is Saddam's favorite clown

This is from my longstanding cop guy, who also spent time in Bosnia (my other cop guy became Jack Dunphy -- so keep in mind there's an upside to being a ___ guy). Anyway, he makes a very good point:

Dear Jonah: I find that I increasingly resent that I am not allowed to see for myself what the bastards are doing to our people. I want to be angry, I want to feel the rage and know that this war is necessary. When the Towers fell, we were given only PG images-maybe that's one reason so many people seem to have forgotten it. -What if nobody had filmed the concentration camps in order to spare the sensibilities of amaricans?

At some point this war will end and we know that people will claim that various crimes never happened. I suggest that the media should warn us, but give us access to the truth. You NRO guys disagree, I know. It's my two cents. Thanks.

I'm still of two minds about this, but I'm coming around to this point of view. It's very similar to an argument I made last August in a column, "Bring Back the Horror." There is a point to making it clear to Americans about who and what the enemy is. Certainly, knowing that enemy is torturing or executing our soldiers would shine a light on some of the protestors out there. I'm going to keep pondering.

Andrew - I don't know. When war starts the warriors put on their uniforms. It helps identify and communicate their core functions and roles in the effort. And, similarly, when the anti-war starts, the anti-warriors put on their uniforms. Frankly, I think more of the protestors should wear floppy shoes and giant orange afros.

"I'm an NRO guy."

Simple. Understated. Masculine. And so, so sexy. A sticker like that could turn the owner of a 1982 Citation into a babe magnet.

Nobody has written me to apply for the position of "free lyposuction guy."

Lil' Lucy woke me up at 3:30 in the morning and I couldn't get back to sleep, so I wrote the G-File already, so it will actually be up this morning. It contains references to French people.
Now, Cosmo and I are heading to the park. Because, at the end of the day (and the beginning of it), he's my best guy.

While this is all terribly flattering, and I'm pretty confident that the reader who wants "Conservative Elementary School Art Teacher with Three Dogs Guy" won't have a lot of competition, I should let you know how others have achieved "guy status." My Middle East guy has been sending me interesting emails on his area of expertise for more than a year. They're concise, informative and authoritative. Military guy has been convincing me he's the real deal for quite a while as well. In short, you achieve guy status by worming your way into my confidences. Now, this doesn't mean that all of the people who want to be Star Trek guy should send me long essays and insights into all things Trek. Another important attribute of "guy" status is being timely. Law guys email me when law stuff happens that they think is particularly important and that nobody else has noticed. All the guys tend to be funny, don't take themselves too seriously and understand that not every email they send me can warrant the kind of thoughtful response they deserve. They offer sometimes brilliant criticisms of my columns, without being jerks about it. In fact, I tend to find that the more of a jerk a reader is, the less impressive his criticism is. Hmmm.

Anyway, when I think about it, this describes hundreds of you people. In fact, you're all my guys. Now get back to the hard work of being "read NRO too much at work guys."

Lots of applications for "guy" status in my mailbox this morning. Lots of requests to be "Navy guy," "Star Trek guy," "Cubicle Man," etc.

One reader wants to be my "Ex-Underpaid County Jailer Guy":

I'm just seeing if the position is open.

I'm certain I can provide valuable insight into the tactical complexities of chow time. I'm always willing to participate in a spirited discussion concerning the age-old controversy: "Does the heel of a loaf count as an actual slice of bread?"

(Seriously, you wouldn't BELIEVE how big an issue that really was.)

My resume, while not particularly impressive, is at least diverse. I'm also ready to assume duties as "Other Guitar Guy" at a moment's notice.

Another reader wants to know if the "30 yr old unemployed still lives with mom guy" slot is still open. And then there's this guy:

Jonah, I would like to apply for the "Conservative Elementary School Art Teacher with Three Dogs Guy" position. We are a relatively small coalition, but very good at sniffing out NEA Al-Qaeda types with hidden agendas and costly membership fees. Rest assured, my Dalmatian is quite pro-war, I mean pro-liberation, and my Beagle thinks he is General Patton. My Basset Hound is more of a make love not war liberal, but we can exclude her from the war effort...or distract her with a milk-bone dog biscuit, launched scud-style onto the living-room sofa. But mind you, they all hate the French. Damn Poodles...

Dominique de Villepin has been speaking in London, but not, it seems, on every topic. At the end of his talk, he held a question and answer session notable mainly for the fact that the normally voluble Frenchman refused to answer the following question:

"Who do you want to win this war?"

Blogger John Hawkins is not impressed.

From Gerard Baker in Thursday’s Financial Times:

“Anyone who is in doubt as to who has the Iraqi people’s best interests at heart should contrast the allied forces’ behavior with that of the Saddam loyalists, who are using their fellow Iraqis as human shields, executing those who threaten to surrender, and mining ports through which will pass vital food supplies. At times, it might look as if the coalition is fighting by Marquess of Queensberry rules against an enemy who is armed with a switchblade knife. But to do otherwise would cause many to wonder what we are fighting for in the first place.”

He’s right.

From China’s Peoples Daily (quoted in the New York Times):

“Armed force and coercion are the antonyms of democracy, so isn’t using tanks and cannons to spit out ‘liberty’ and ‘democracy’ a mite ironic?”

Well, not necessarily so, but there are only two words that need to be said in response.

Tiananmen Square.

Thousands of Iraqis are reportedly returning to Iraq from Jordan. Even some anti-Saddam Iraqis now say they want to defend their country. Before they go home, they might be wise to study some Soviet history. At the end of the Second World War quite a number of Russian exiles, patriotism stirred by the conflict with Hitler, returned to help rebuild their homeland. In almost all cases Stalin ordered them shot or imprisoned.

Saddam Hussein is known to be something of a fan of Joseph Stalin.

From William Safire’s New York Times column on Thursday:

“Now we are down to the essence of Saddam’s defense. If he can convince long-intimidated Iraqis that America’s humanitarian concern about casualties – its own military losses and Iraqi civilian deaths – will lead to a deal, then it will be easier for him to suppress any uprisings. Who would be so foolish to take up arms against a dictator whose regime – even if it will be Saddamism without Saddam – remains in power to exact vengeance?"

Safire's remedy?

Insistence now on unconditional surrender.

This may be apocryphal but it’s too good not to repeat. UK defense minister Geoff Hoon has reportedly described Um Qasr as being “a city similar to Southampton" [a port town in the south of England], a remark that produced the following response from two British soldiers seen, apparently, on Sky News:

First soldier: “He’s either never been to Southampton or he’s never been to Um Qasr.”

Second soldier: “There’s no beer, no prostitutes and people are shooting at us. It’s more like Portsmouth.”

From a reader:

Talking about sodomy and "guy positions" in the same Corner post really bothered me a lot!

From a reader:

Jonah, I'm a retired Navy helicopter pilot. I am hereby applying for status as "helicopter guy". Not as cool sounding as "GROM Commando guy", but I will take what I can get!

...who sent me the email from the anonymous account. Thank you, thank you, thank you. That was the best thing I've heard in weeks. Delighted to be of help. You're doing right for right.

Jonah

From a reader in Germany:

Jonah,

I am an American in Germany with the US forces. Our cars have special number plates with a NATO logo and 'USA' on them. I live on the economy, rent a house from a German landlord. Every morning I wake up wondering if this is the day I'm going to walk out to my windows smashed and my paint keyed up.

It's getting a little scary here. I've been turned away from restaurants for being an American, shopkeepers are surly, people in the street feel they have the right to scream at you. Last weekend there was a big protest outside the base, with 'peace' protesters carrying Bush is Hitler signs and flipping the bird at people driving on and off the base, and making guns with their hands and pretending to shoot. The Polizei just stood there and watched. So much for German politenesss.

But it looks cool.

From a Texas reader:

After seeing your Corner post about "guy" positions, I took pause to consider my own qualifications for some cool position. Since I was not in the military and have never lived in the Middle East, regrettably I do not offer much. I just lead the boring life of an attorney in Dallas. Given the fact that the Lawrence v. Texas case was argued before the Supreme Court yesterday, a little Texas legal perspective might sometimes be necessary. Of course, I am not too interested in being your "Texas Sodomy Guy." (not too mention, that's certainly not a position you're looking to fill).

Keep up the good work on the site. I've gotten several colleagues at the firm hooked on the Corner (thereby spreading the good word AND making by billable hour numbers look better by distracting them too).

Met with some of the locals again today.
They were excited. They are anticipating the end of Saddam’s evil regime even more than we are.
They were glued to their satellite TV set, switching between Al-Jazeera, FOX News, BBC, the local station, and Iraqi TV. They especially enjoyed the female anchor on FOX, with her short skirt.
“What city?” One asked, pointing at the woman on the TV.
“New York.”
“I must go there!” They all laughed.

Rich Many Iraqi commanders may have well picked up and moved "operations" to the corner grocery, but only in the sense that they are hiding from air strikes. Command and Control (C2) facilities are not that easily moved. You need equipment, transmitters, access to data from the battlefield, etc. Much of which can't simply be thrown in the back of a pick-up and moved. Any attempt to use anything other than prepositioned and equipped facilities at such a high command level would quickly result in chaos (which is apparently happening). You can't control three heavy RG divisions miles away with bike messengers and carrier pigeons. BTW, I have just learned that I was passed up as Jonah's "military guy" and have emailed him expressing my disappointment. You interested?

Rich - as Jonah's "military guy" and a retired, disabled vet who commanded a unit with women in it all I can say is: if they are in my unit in a combat zone - they've got to be able to go where I go, and do their jobs. Anything else is ludicrous, and not fair to the people who have to take up the slack. I had female medics, cooks, signallers, survey and meteorological specialist soldiers. My MET section, to do their job properly, is deployed AHEAD of the DIVARTYs guns and launchers, between them and the likely targets. That data is critical to first round accuracy. My survey was an equally important factor (still true in this day of GPS) My signals people had to keep the circuits up. My wounded/ill cared for, and the troops fed. That was a while ago, when we still did conventional cooking and feeding, before T-rats and MREs. The issue can't be wished away by saying that suddenly these people can't be in those places. They are either soldiers, capable of the work, or they aren't. But we can't say they are, and then say they aren't. If they get killed, wounded, or captured, then they get killed, wounded or captured. Tough.

Mufti Kaftaro said in a statement that Muslims should use "all possible means to defeat the aggression, including martyrdom (suicide) operations against the invading combatants.

From my military guy:

Aside from killing their own people, the Iraqi anti-aircraft activity sounds like a scared man whistling in the night.

If you start shooting AFTER the explosion - well, a cruise missile is just so much junk in the target area, and an aircraft is miles away long out of reach. Since Saddam has not repealed the law of gravity - all the scrap iron the Iraqi's send up, comes down. On themselves and their people. How many of the 'thousands' of putative Iraqi civilian casualties are due to the 'whistling in the dark' Saddamite AAA doctrine?

Rich - I've heard that for every bomb that hits Baghdad, nine others hit some place else in Iraq. So, there really could be a whole lot of shock-and-aweing going on.

[A] DoD family member while driving her vehicle and stuck in traffic was identified as having a DoD sticker. At the time there was an anti-war protest under way. When her vehicle was observed by the demonstrators, a member of the group yelled out "war bitch" and her vehicle was immediately surrounded. While some of the members pounded on her vehicle with their fists, others "keyed" it and wrote the word "peace" on the paint finish. ... It is recommended DoD personnel should avoid these protest at all cost. Even though the protesters proclaim on National TV that they support the military members involved in the war in Iraq, there are numerous members of the various Anti-war groups who do not share this view and will assault DOD members once they are identified."

Who knows? Maybe their editors cut the word "heroic" before "militias" in order to keep it "objective":

AL-ZUBAYR, Iraq (Reuters). - Iraqi militias are pinning down U.S.-led forces in southern Iraq (news - web sites), trapping civilians in the crossfire and thwarting the invaders' bid to advance on main cities.

Another blast about 700 yards west of the Information Ministry, possibly from a missile, sent scores of journalists fleeing. Anti-aircraft guns on the roof of the ministry opened fire, witnesses said, but there was no immediate information on damage or casualties.

Technically, Cosmo is afraid of the water. But I am sure that if the Saturday Night Live land shark ever showed up Cosmo would do this for me.. In fact, he thinks the mailman is a land shark.

I really should have posted this a long time ago. Iraqi dissident Kanan Makiya has been posting a "War Diary" over at the New Republic. It's been going on for a few days and has some great stuff.

"The Americans have one advantage over UNMOVIC, in discovering things and that is as they go around the country and more areas are under their control it seems likely that people scientists engineers military will be more ready to speak to the Americans, than they were to us because when we were there they still had the formidable police apparatus that would scare them from saying the truth, if the truth was any different from what the government said."

I might say, "How do you like them apples?" Same idea.

Harold Meyerson tries to build an op-ed around the idea that our bombs are more discriminating than our diplomacy has been. His basic point about the Bush administration's "arrogance" has, of course, been made (and controverted) before. But this comparison was new to me: "The White House has treated the global warming accords, the International Criminal Court, the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and the U.N. Charter with the same respect that the German Foreign Ministry accorded its pledge of nonaggression to Belgium in 1914. The Germans seemed truly bewildered that the British would enter the war just because the German army had violated Belgium's neutrality -- over, as the German minister memorably put it, 'a scrap of paper.' That keen Prussian sensitivity seems alive and well in the West Wing today."

So not joining some treaties--and withdrawing from others under terms spelled out in the treaties themselves--is the same as invading Belgium? It seems to me that anyone making such claims ought not to reproach others for lacking "keen sensitivity."

In a rare move for me, I'm taking the Kleenex boxes off my feet and venturing into town for lunch with my friend Nick Schulz of TechCentralStation fame. He's also written one of the several excellent pieces on Pat Moynihan today on NRO. Another is from Vincent Cannato.

Fox News reports on Coalition reports that the Fedayeen are going door-to-door seizing children and wives in order to coerce the men to fight. Also reporting that we are killing a lot of Fedayeen and attacks have diminished.

Debka claims that the 101st has stealthily moved North along the Iraqi-Saudi border and is now near Karbala. I'm on record as a Debka-skeptic (ever since they reported a massive assasination attempt on Colin Powell that never materialized, if I recall correctly). Still, it'd be great if true.

This really is so superior to TV:

Scattered through the Iraqi trenches was an arsenal hardly up to the task of slowing the American advance: a few hand grenades, some rocket launchers, three dozen magazines for Kalashnikov rifles. A pair of filthy mattresses and moldy blankets were thrown together in a pile. A dozen corpses lay splayed about in the ditch. Perhaps the only ominous articles were Iraqi gas masks strewn about the trench line.

On the roadside, the Iraqi prisoners huddled together. Only a few had uniforms; most wore tattered clothing and battered shoes. They did not seem like men who lusted for battle. American marines guarding the prisoners said they had complained that their own officers had shot at them during the battle. "I have four children at home, and they threatened to hurt them if I did not fight," another one of the wounded Iraqis said. "I had no choice."

From today's New York Times:

But the Iraqi private with a bullet wound in the back of his head suggested something unusually grim. Up and down the 200-mile stretch of desert where the American and British forces have advanced, one Iraqi prisoner after another has told captors a similar tale: that many Iraqi soldiers were fighting at gunpoint, threatened with death by tough loyalists of President Saddam Hussein.

From a reader:

It's a little reactionary, but this drives me nuts. NRO is full of nice, brilliant people. Can one of you kids please tell me how a bunch of hippie-wanna-be, rubbing-the-numbers-off-Daddy's-AMEX, will-pass-school-because-they-spout-the-same-bile-as-their-professors protestors will tell a single mother who arrives to work 1/2 a day late and gets docked for four hours pay because the bus route she rides is clogged by idiots and cretins taking the occasional bong-hit- how do any of these silly protests make any sense? There is a constitutional right to protest, although not explicit. The explicit rights regard speech and assembly. There is not a right to loiter, harass, or disrupt commerce. There is not a right to trespass. There are actually laws agaist those actions. I say arrest the leaders of these protests, and bill them and their organizations for the police protection that they inspire.

I know for a fact (as a consultant to a local city government) that even the KKK pays for their police protection when they hold one of their vile 'rallys', in which- I am proud to say- the last had four times as many counter-protesters as the rally itself.

To me, as the taxes paid on commerce help support the military and some of their 'targets' are governmental, direct impedence of entry or egress is an act of terrorism at most, sabotage at median, and harrasment at the least. Raise my taxes a 10-spot a year to print more citation books.

Since when did a 25-year-old idiot-for-hire for ANSWER, or some other crackpot organization care more about saving a brutal tyrant whos own people want him gone, than they do for a single parent that needs to get to that second job after working 'graveyard' to feed and shelter their kids in Bed-Sty or Haight-Asbury? The hypocrisy and lack of that ellusive 'grasp' is just damn near startling.

just got to my office after visiting 50th and 5th. My thoughts: This protest was straight out of Monty Python....Half of the people at the protest a) hadn't shaved in weeks b) didn't seem to know where they were. Despite the helicopters and what seemed about half of the NYPD force, I don't think there could have been more than 200 people there. My personal highlight: As I was giving a shout-out of support of the NYPD, an older, grizzled man grabbed my arm in a panic. "Your bag, man," he said, pointing at my bright blue shoulder satchel. "It's CURSED." He looked geniunely terrified and backed away. "I know these things, man, I can see it in that blue, man…" And then he went back to shouting "No war!" at the cops. If this is the fifth column, we're in good shape.

Aside from that fact that I hope no more coalition soldiers die in the upcoming days and weeks - I hope this guy not only lives, but keeps his helmet. In a celebration of this day and age - he could probably sell it on eBay and fund his kid's education! Of course, he may be like me - I still have, and only my heirs will sell, the flak jacket with the hole in the cover.

"Please examine the relative behavior of the British and the Americans and the Iraqis," he told Parliament. "Any suggestion of moral equivalence between the coalition and the Iraqis on this occasion, I totally reject."

"Now that the conflict has begun," Powell said, "we are going to see it through to its conclusion as quickly as possible, and a pause or a ceasefire would serve no purpose at this time. It would merely delay the inevitable and give Saddam Hussein some chance to believe that he could avoid the serious consequences that he has caused to befall his regime."

Iranian ambassador Javad Zarif dismissed the implicit claim in the military code-name Operation Iraqi Freedom, launched to topple the regime of President Saddam Hussein. "Democracy is not something that can be imposed by tanks and helicopter gunships," Zarif said.

Garvin said some of the Iraqi fighters were using women as shields and had given guns to children. "Unfortunately some of the children have been firing at our Marines and our Marines have been forced to defend themselves," he said.

Is how Mohammed Aldouri just described the war. Hasn't he talked to Charlie Rangel? He's against the war because the army isn't white enough.

1,000 Iraqis killed so far.

From a reader:

Jonah: MSNBC was reporting about the group of Iraqi armored vehicles leaving Basra about a half and hour ago. The anchor (whoever it was), reported that these vehicles had "escaped" Basra and that this was "another setback for the coalition forces". How is it a setback for the Iraqi armored vehicles to come out from behind civilians? Not to mention that this may mean that the Basra Uprising seems to be working!! I say LET THEM ALL COME OUT. Foxnews.com is now reporting that the Brits are all over 'em now.

From a reader:

It's telling that those who attempt to blame depleted uranium for the alleged epidemic of cancers and birth defects in Iraq, never seem to get around to mentioning the decades-long production and use of chemical and biological weapons within Iraq. Some of these materials are well-known mutagens and teratogens. There's no telling how many Iraqi weapons plant workers, ordnance handlers, and Iran-Iraq war survivors have had their gametes fried by low-level exposure to these materials.

Associated Press:
BORDEAUX, France — Vandals in southwest Bordeaux torched a replica of the Statue of Liberty and cracked the pedestal of a plaque honoring victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

From a reader:

Jonah,

It must be a tough time for sleep in the Scott Ritter household...much liberal news coverage on the War and also the broadcasts of the Girls High School State Basketball championship going on! It brings new meaning of the words March Madness!

From a reader:

I have extensive knowledge of the history and growing techniques of giant pumpkins. If you have any questions regarding giant pumpkins please feel free to consult me.

Personal Best: 637 pounds in 2002......picture upon request.

Heading for Najaf. Now, where did Tommy Franks put that MOAB?

Why hasn't the US bombed the snickerdoodles out of Uday Hussein newspaper plant? Every day I see footage of Iraqis standing around reading pro-Saddam propaganda in the newspaper. If we are trying to get rid of infrastructure which allows Saddam to maintain control, the newspapers are just as good a target as the TV station. And, apparently, some believe that Saddam is sending signals to the Fedayeen through code in the media. So let's take care of that.

Something tells me this story will end badly.

From a reader:

My favorite Marine quote so far this war came from a young Marine who was being interviewed about what the Marine Corps' mission was in Iraq.

"It is to beat the Army to Baghdad, sir."

From a reader:

Jonah --

You posted a very informative message from a reader about depleted uranium. In it, he wrote

"The war against DU usage is based solely on the fear created by the usage of the word. Uranium."

I'd add to that -- the war against DU also is based on the fear created when it flies out fo the gatling gun of an A-10 Thunderbolt.

From a reader I've long relied on for Islam stuff and who shall henceforth be known in this space as "my Islam guy."

Jonah,

I could dig up more details for you, but off the top of my head, here's the deal with "fedayeen" and the "devil worshippers" Rick Brookhiser mentioned earlier on the Corner.

1. "Devil-worshipping" Yazidis. Basically they're a sect that has an interesting take of the "Fall of Lucifer" tale as it exists in Islam. In Islam, Iblis (Satan) fell because when God created Man, he ordered all the angels to bow down before him, since Man was His supreme creation. Iblis refused. For this, he was banished. The Yazidis consider his refusal to bow to have been, in fact, a correct and pious act, since one _never_ bows before a creation, only the Creator Himself. So they consider Iblis a "good" angel or saint. They're not devil-worshippers in the western, Satanist sense (i.e., anti- the main religion).

2. "Fedayeen" comes originally, as far as I know, from the Nizari Isma'ili sect best known in the west as the Assassins (who were not, incidentally, hash-addled goofballs, but gnostic ascetics. The term "hashishin" seems to have been a pejorative stuck on them by their neighbors, perhaps like, "Those crackheads up in the fortress there.") The assassins' operatives, who were often what we'd call deep-cover agents, were called "fidâ'î" (singular) / "fidâ'iyûn." The literal connotation is "sacrificer," in the sense of one who's willing to risk his life for a cause. It's since become a general term for commandos, shock troops, etc. In the current context, your description of the "Fedayeen Saddam" as a Ba'athist brownshirts is perfectly correct.

Canadians deface statue of Wayne Gretzky because he supports war.

Click here for the anti-protestor photo gallery.

My friend and regular CNN sparring partner, Donna Brazile, gets it and supports GW Bush.

Of Assan Akhbar's treasonous attack has died from his injuries. According to Fox News.

Keep swinging our way.

Some great stuff here. Imagine if conservatives compared Colin Powell to an apeman.

Scott Ritter always boast of his experience serving with the US Marines. Do Marines really talk this way when Marines are in battle? Here's the bulk of it:

Lisbon - The United States does not have the military means to take over Baghdad and will lose the war against Iraq, former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter said.

"The United States is going to leave Iraq with its tail between its legs, defeated. It is a war we can not win," he told private radio TSF in an interview broadcast here on Tuesday evening.

"We do not have the military means to take over Baghdad and for this reason I believe the defeat of the United States in this war is inevitable," he said.

War 'already lost'

"Every time we confront Iraqi troops we may win some tactical battles, as we did for ten years in Vietnam, but we will not be able to win this war, which in my opinion is already lost," Ritter added.

Walid Phares is keeping hope alive.

Eric Alterman sounds like he greets negative war headlines with a high-five and a loud "Yessss!"

From a reader:

Jonah,

Actually, the radioactive period for DU is very long. It has a half-life of 4.5 billion years, but that is precisely why it is considered not to be dangerously radioactive. Very radioactive substances have short half lives, because the fission producing the radiation and breakdown in atomic structure occurs rapidly. The truth is that the Lincoln Memorial is probably more radioactive than DU, as marble and granite contain uranium ore, and depleted uranium is less radioactive than natural uranium. The vastly more radioactive isotopes of uranium (U-234 and U-235) have been removed, leaving a metal that is 98+% composed of the negligibly radioactive U-238.

The true danger of DU is toxicity. It is a heavy metal, and DU rounds produce uranium oxide dust which can be inhaled or ingested. But toxicity is a common component of many weapons systems. The smoke produced by solid rocket motors is highly toxic, which is why our Multiple Launch Rocket Systems batten down all the hatches before firing: the smoke will kill you.

In short, there are all sorts of reasons not to go digging around in a burned out Iraqi tank. There are many types of toxic substances and unexploded ordinance left on the battlefield. DU is no more dangerous, and perhaps less so, than many other remnants of modern battle. The war against DU usage is based solely on the fear created by the usage of the word. Uranium.

From a Marine reader:

Jonah-

As a Marine Corps Captain, I would like to pitch a gripe about all these headlines lately about the "elite republican guards" heading south toward the Marines. The headline should read "Republican Guards heading south on suicide mission toward Elite Marines."

From a reader:

Jonah,

In the case of the Fedayeen, who willingly sacrifice themselves for a murderous dictator, I think the english one-word equivalent that you are searching for is "stupid".

Yes, yes... I know we have the word "Martyr." But A) I was kind of joking. B) Martyr typically refers to those who've died, not those willing to die, as in "I will be a martyr..."

I once heard a general explain the mythology about depleted uranium shells, saying the radioactive period is very brief and the fallout very limited and even if it causes health problems, if you're on the receiving end of a depleted uranium shell, the last of your worries is whether you'll die of cancer in 20 years.

"We support our troops when they shoot their officers."

Tell me how this isn't an incitement to violence? In fact doesn't this skirt the prohibition against advocating the violent overthrow of the government?

I've got an idea for T-shirts and bumper stickers:

"I'm a Fedayeen NRO!"

T-shirts could have a small, tasteful, "Fedayeen NRO" on the chest, like a Lacoste alligator.

As best I understand it, this means something to the effect of "Those willing to sacrifice themselves for...."

The fact that we need six words for this concept to Arabic's one seems worthy of comment, no?

Embedded reporters create the illusion of real time coverage of the war. But there is a great deal that we do not know, and are not being told. Of course, the reporters themselves are careful not to reveal too much about their positions and objectives. But here’s a more striking example of major gaps in our knowledge of what’s going on. Right now, there’s a major story headlining the Fox News website. Reportedly (as The Corner picked up on earlier), a convoy of 1,000 Republican Guard vehicles is headed for an attack on Marines who are already worn down by intense fighting with irregulars around Nasiriyah.

If true, the report of a massive Republican Guard convoy headed for our Marines at Nasiriyah is a hugely important development. It would mean an audacious effort to throw us on the defensive–perhaps even forcing a fallback by forward units that might have to come to the aid of the Marines. If this report is true, it’s hard to believe we haven’t already dispatched an armada of bombers, helicopters, or A-10's to knock out the convoy. Yet, despite headlining this extraordinary report on its own website, Fox News TV seems to have nothing to say about this apparently major development in the war. Maybe the report itself is untrue. It’s hard to believe that a Republican Guard convoy would expose itself to American air dominance. But if the report is true, then we are facing a news blackout (entirely justified) on a massively important turn in this battle. Either way, all this apparently up to date war reporting is anything but a real time account of what’s happening.

The skirts are getting short again!

From a reader:

Hey Jonah, From the Canadian who tends to defend the American position--was visiting NYC over the last 5 days to have some fun and possibly see a little history. Interesting story: I'm having a few beers in a SoHo bar and strike up a conversation at the bar. My new friend was a German guy named Constantin, he's got an-anti war button on and was deeply committed to "peace." We begin to talk about the war and the idea of pre-emption comes up: I mention that the pre-emption doctrine has been around for a while, proposed in detail in the early 90's by Paul Wolfowitz but not adopted by Bush senior or Clinton. He says something that amazed me. He cuts me off at the word "Wolfowitz" and says "...that dirty Jew." So much for the anti-racism of these guys.

MSNBC seems obsessed with calling them "gangsters." But the better word for them is Brown Shirts. If you've read any of the biographies or profiles of Saddam, you know that he first rose to prominence in the Baath party as a "street organizer." This was a euphemism for his talent at pulling together the most thugs and knee breakers and giving them political objectives. Saddam's thugs would kill, beat and intimidate opponents. After the first Gulf War, Saddam created the Fedayeen -- picked from his tribe and run by his son Uday -- because he didn't trust even the Republican Guard. In short, he went back to what he knows best. The Fedayeen has been assigned the duties of "Internal Affairs," as it were, policing the loyalties of the army and the Republican Guards. If you defect, the Fedayeen brutally rapes and murders your family and then they send the defecter a videotape.

These guys are fighting so hard because they know that if Saddam goes, so do they. You can't rape and murder the way they do and expect to rejoin society. They will be torn apart. Moreover, if they are wearing civilian clothes, using civilian vehicles, hiding behind civilians and -- sometimes -- wearing American uniforms, they are in defiance of the Geneva Convention. And my understanding is that those who do not abide by the rules of war have no claim to the protections of the rules of war. No kid gloves for Saddam's Brown Shirts.

JANE ARRAF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Carol, we're in a village called Sha Idri (ph). And as we mentioned, and as you mentioned, hundreds of thousands of Kurds have fled into the mountains. Most of them are in schools and mosques and tents by the side of the road. But the location we're in now is perhaps unique. In fact, this may be a first. We are coming to you live from an ancient cave in a destroyed Yasiti (ph) village in this town.... But first, I want to show you the family that lives here. Now three families are living in this cave. One of the families belongs to Kareem Jilti (ph) and his wife, Nockmor (ph). That's astead (ph), Kareem, Island (ph). And they have 12 children. Now the children range from Kertistan (ph), who is their firstborn, 18 years old, to the youngest, who is 4 years old. He's running around here somewhere. And in between, their child is Dick Cheney. Dick -- where is Dick?. Dick. That's Dick Cheney. And yes, he was named after the U.S. Defense Secretary. Dick was born in 1991, and his father says he named him Dick Cheney because they admired the American. Now he was born in '91 during the liberation of Kuwait. And according to his father, if they are expecting another baby anytime soon, they will be naming him George Bush.

Just asked Gen Brooks at CentCom about Dick Cheney's daugher heading to Baghdad as a human shield. He shook it off.

How is the war going down in one of the places, along with the Pentagon and Flight 93, where it all started?

Much of New York has reverted to blue-country habits. This partly reflects the local political culture: The New York City Council passed an antiwar resolution, because of liberalsim and also, I am afraid, local term limits. In times past the Council was filled with dug-in hacks like Peter Vallone and Archie Spigner who were not wild-eyed leftists. Now it's more open to eddies of fruitcakes. The influence of the Times has also been baleful on educated liberal opinion. As Eliot said of the Boston Evening Transcript, its readers sway in the wind like corn. The difference between the Times and the Washington Post has become quite startling.

But the tabloids wage merry war on Saddam, and there are other anomalies. Here are two, one unclassifiable, one gung-ho.

I was buying a paperback of the Bhagavad Gita from a used book seller on Avenue A. This is a section of the Mahabharata that is a conversation between Arjuna, one of the heroes, and his adviser and charioteer Krishna, the incarnation of Vishnu, on the eve of a colossal battle. The bookseller asked me as I paid if I thought Bush was talking to Krishna, or to Rumsfeld?

I was eating at one of the my favorite restaurants, and the owner, a former model, told me he had taken all his French wine off the menu, and was serving only Saratoga Water (no Perrier). A votre sante!

The First Rule of war planning, which every soldier, sailor, airman, marine and coast guardsman knows: No plan EVER survives contact with the enemy. That's why he's the enemy. People who expect that a plan will go exactly as written are in the same General-officer class as Greta van Susteren, Aaron Brown and Janeane Garafolo. It's also the last rule of war planning. Murphy wrote all the rules in-between.

Jay Leno had a good crack tonight about Hollywood's standards. To get the joke, you have to know that Roman Polanski, who won the Oscar the other night for Best Director, couldn't be there to accept it because of an outstanding warrant for his arrest. Anyway, Leno remarked that he was driving around listening to an L.A. talk radio host going on about how weird it was that Mel Gibson is building his own Catholic parish. The deejay said that Mel must have lost his mind.

"Don’t you love this town?" said Leno. "You drug an underage girl, you rape her, you flee the country, you get an Oscar. But you build a church, and it’s 'What are you, nuts?!”

Chirac’s pal Mugabe has, it seems, had a rare moment of honesty. Speaking at a recent funeral, Zimbabwe's dictator reportedly proclaimed the following:

"I am still the Hitler of the time. This Hitler has only one objective, justice for his own people, sovereignty for his people, recognition of the independence of his people, and their right to their resources. If that is Hitler, then let me be a Hitler tenfold. Ten times, that is what we stand for."

Well, Bob, you said it.

The commander of the Operational Weather Squadron at Shaw Airforce Base is named Lt. Col. Tom Frooninckx. It's the story Drudge links to about the big sandstorm. I just love the name. It's like someone took ten letter tiles at random from a Scrabble set.

The Daily Telegraph, meanwhile, comments on the events in Basra and makes this, critical, point:

“The vast majority of Iraqis have nothing but fear and loathing for Saddam, but they need to see evidence that his power is crumbling. The allied war aims do not only involve the fall of the dictator, but also the destruction of the entire structure of his tyranny. Just as Germany, even after Hitler, could not return to democracy without undergoing a process of denazification, so Iraq needs "de-Ba'athification". That task has already begun."

From a friend in France:

This week-end, I was discussing rising antisemitism in France with a good friend of mine who's a senior officer in the French Army Reserve. And he told me something really scary, I'll try to quote him from memory: "Ten years from now, we're going to be the next Milosevics of Europe! With an important part of the Muslim-French population involved in crimes, and a smaller part involved in terrorism, and if those trends are not reversed, ten years from now the French Armed Forces will end up fighting riots on French soil, and eventually something not very different from former Yugoslavia." And when I asked him if any contingency plans existed in the French military should such riots occur, he declined to answer.

Bat Yeor's been warning us about "Eurabia" for some time now.

Mayor Vera Katz of Portland is a Communist. If you believe in guilt-by-association.

From my "military guy":

As a school-trained and experienced guy who planned and controlled air sorties - the guy on the ground will almost ALWAYS prefer the lower and slower aircraft, whether it's an Apache vs an A-10, or an A-10 versus a F-16. It's the Air Force who wants to have nothing but fast movers doing things like that -simply because they can use them for more roles.

Heck, one of the reasons the Army developed the attack helicopter was because it was way too hard to get enough air force aircraft to do the job right - and safer. The pilot can see the targets better, track them better, has a smaller error in his aiming, all of which makes it safer for the guys on the ground - unless they are in the target area.

Susteren is engaged in the usual routine of otherwise smart people who, deep in their heart, think guys like me are stupid. After all, while you wouldn't go to your barber for head surgery - anyone can be a general.

breaking out near Karbala and Najaf according to CNN. We may have killed between 300 and 500 enemy combatants. No reports of American casualties or KIAs.

Just heard a report that some 600 Iraqi exiles or "ex pats" in Jordan are heading into Iraq to fight for Saddam. Sounds like they were swayed by the media coverage which made it sound like the US was losing. I'm not making this up.

From a reader:

Regarding the cluelessness of talking heads, last evening I lounged on my couch with my chin riding my chest as I listened to Greta Van Susteren explain to a retired Major General that we should be using F-16's for close air support rather than Apache helicopters. The kind General tried explaining the benefits of going "low and slow" over a battlefield so as to facilitate hitting small targets like tanks and men when the guys on the ground called for it. Greta stared through him and then asserted "I just think that flying high and fast is safer". I thought "well, yes it is, as is sitting here on my couch, but I'm not doing much good for the troops".

Head towards the light! Canadians starting to rally 'round America.

They both like to shoot out TVs.

Fox News reporting that an attack on Baghdad has taken out Iraqi television.

I had nothing to do with the post-a-note feature. But I'm damn proud of it. And, it was the first thing I've seen so far in this war that caused me to get choked up. Congrats to the NRO team for putting it together.

The G-File is up.

Basra Shiites riot against Iraqi regime and army Tuesday afternoon. Shiite militias backed by British and American warplanes and helicopters in armed clashes with Iraqi units in city.

DEBKAfile intelligence sources: Majid Khoei, son of legendary Iraqi Ayatollah at head of 3,000-man US-backed Shiite militia is leading Basra unrest to stir up Shiite anti-Saddam uprising

Autoresponses from Portland below:

Just a quick note to let you know that we got your message. We learned about the order from the paper, and rescinded it as soon as possible. We think that it is entirely appropriate for firefighters to have American flags on their vehicles. Nobody should question the patriotism of the Fire Bureau. This was simply a mistake. The flags will stay on the trucks.

Rich Rodgers

Assistant to Erik Sten

And...

Dear Mr. XXX

The decision to remove American flags from Portland Fire Bureau vehicles was originally made by the bureau's command personnel. Since I do not supervise the Fire Bureau, my staff and I also learned of the original decision through the media. Early this morning I directed my staff to determine how and why this decision was made.

I have been informed by the commissioner in charge of the Fire Bureau, Erik Sten, that the order has been reversed. Although he also was unaware of the original order, I will let him know of your concerns.

With warm regards,
Vera Katz
Mayor

Folks, could you stop sending me the responses from Portland? I appreciate it, but they are all the exact same response and my email box is clogging with dozens of more or less the exact same email. Thanks.

Our Ambassador tells Cretien to muzzle his lapdogs.

From Fox News:

"I think the deaths of Americans gives us more incentive to fight," said Lance Cpl. Chad Borgmann, 23, of Sidney, Neb., with the 15th Marine Expeditionary Force. "Freeing Iraq is all fine and dandy ... but this gives us a personal motivation to fight."

Akbar murdered his comrade because of racism.

Her email

From a reader:

Thought you might be interested to see the some of the headlines on the war on ABCnews.com. Mostly gloom and doom (see some of the headlines below), and nothing about the uprising in Basra:

• Sandswept
Sandstorms Force Coalition Forces Into Holding Pattern

• Glorious Fight
Some Arabs Feel Pride Over Saddam’s Successes Against United States

• Keeping a Promise
As U.S.-led Forces Roll Across Iraq, Iraqis Wonder, ‘Where Is the Aid?’

• War’s Economic Impact
The Prospect of a Long War Threatens the Economy’s Health

• F-16 Fires on Patriot Missile Battery

• Bush Won't Predict Duration of Iraq War

• 11 Marines From N.C. Base Killed in Iraq

• General: No Banned Weapons Yet Found in Iraq

• Urban Warfare in Baghdad Promises Peril

• Guerrilla Fighting Persists in S. Iraq

• Coalition Troops Wonder Who Is Enemy

From a reader:

I saw the report about the hospital in Nasiriya being used as a weapons (& biochem suit!!!) storage site at least twice before you blogged it.

It wasn't until you blogged it that it occurred to me I was supposed to react to the idea of a hospital being used as an Iraqi military facility. I think my perfidy threshold is rising. Let me know if they find boobytrapped orphans at the next hospital.

At least once the Baathists started using women and children as literal shields in Basra, the Basrans started resisting.

And some people say hell is empty.

I do not like it one bit. In Portland, Oregon firemen are being told to take down their American flags because, in the words of an official, "We do not want extremists attacking our apparatus or our personnel."

Now, I don't mean to be over-dramatic, but there are men and women fighting and dying under that banner. They wouldn't take down the American flag in the face of intimidation and even death. But our firemen who, we are constantly told, are the frontline soldiers in the war on terror are expected to voluntarily take down Old Glory in the face of intimidation by some coffee house revolutionaries in the pacific northwest? Give the firemen guns or clubs or let them use their firehoses if they're afraid of attacks from protestors. But, I'm sorry, if these colors don't run in Basrah and Kandahar, they sure as hell shouldn't be running in Portland. Let the flags fly!

By the way: If ever there was a cause for conservative talk radio, email campaigns and angry phone calls, I think this is it.

From Howardstern.com. Rated PG-13.

From a reader in Switzerland:

Dear Jonah,

I'm a Swiss liberal, a leftie, a RAT (as a Freeper would put it) - and a regular reader of NRO and fan of your very entertaining column. And I happen to totally agree with your last piece, "Antiwar Shame".

I just wanted to tell you that there are Europeans who are for this war. Although I have to admit, they are few and they are even fewer on my side of the political spectrum (almost non existent, in fact). I'm not switching sides, though. Back then, in Florida, I was hoping the chads would produce another result, and I still hope that 2004 will see the end of George W. Bush's political career. But nevertheless I think your administration is absolutely right on this one. And I'm looking forward to some long faces over here after Iraq will be liberated.

Rest assured: There are Europeans who hope that there will be many more scenes like the ones at Safwan. And don't worry, I won't let the other ones forget "that they never believed these things would be worth it if the price was letting America have its way". I think it was even worth to let Dubya have his way.

BBC reports Iraqis using a hospital to store weapons:

Thousands of US troops advance through the town of Nasiriya, about 370 km (230 miles) south-east of Baghdad, following protracted clashes with Iraqi forces; a BBC correspondent travelling with them visits a hospital in Nasiriya that appears to have been used by Iraqi forces to store weapons.

Some monkeys are looking to help. But I hope we don't take them up on the offer.

Here's how Nicholas Von Hoffman summarized the war in Afghanistan literally moments before we won. Because the New York Observer is a weekly, Von Hoffman's diagnosis appeared days after the Taliban was in full retreat. From the November 14, 2001 New York Observer:

"The war in Afghanistan, the one (Bush) should never have declared, has run into trouble. Just a few weeks into it and it's obvious that the United States is fighting blind. The enemy is unknown, and the enemy's country is terra incognita. We have virtually no one we can trust who can speak the languages of the people involved. With all our firepower and our technical assets and our spy satellites, it looks like we don't know if we're coming or going. ...

"We are mapless, we are lost, and we are distracted by gusts of wishful thinking. That our high command could believe the Afghani peasantry or even the Taliban would change sides after a few weeks of bombing! This is fantasizing in high places. ...

"Moreover, as hellish as the Taliban are, it appears that the ordinary people of Afghanistan prefer them to the brigands and bandits with whom we've been trying to make common cause ... ."

Here's the story that Dick Cheney's daughter is a human shield. And its debunking

Mucking with Saddam's mug.

John - Not only are the dolphins on our side, but we've got bomb-sniffing dogs and chemical weapon detecting birds working with us too. Though I confess, only the mammals are volunteers. The birds are draftees.

From a reader:

Jonah,

McCaffrey is a serious, thoughtful guy, but I've noticed over the last 18 months, both thru the Afghan campaign and during the lead-in to the Iraq conflict, he has a tendency to downplay/nitpick any military success that makes Gulf War I (and Schwartzkopf's (sp?) and his own "heroic success" in how it was carried out) look less than the total success that it was protrayed as at the time by comparison to current operations.

Yeah, he's got legit concerns (lots of "traditional" military types - especially Army/Marine types - have been saying similar or more critical things about the plan for months and months now), but he's also in the business of McCaffrey Reputation Protection [tm] so I always take anything he or Stormin' Norman say about the job that the current military leadership is doing with a grain of salt or four.

But wouldn't sandstorms make the use of chemical weapons by the Iraqis pretty difficult? Sort of the definition of pissing into the wind?

From a reader:

It's embarrassing. My great-great grandfather was from Prussia, in a town that's now in Poland. I'm about ready to stop referring to my heritage as German and start calling it Polish.

By Grom! This blood-wine is an excellent vintage.

In case you're interested.

They're Poles. They're fighting with us. They sound like Klingons -- GROM Commandos!

"The worst thing is faith-based religion" and other insights.

This Reuters story seems a bit too excited by coalition setbacks so far. Headlined "Apache Down and Another U.S. Symbol Dented," it begins: "U.S. military prowess suffered another setback in Iraq on Monday and another omen that bullets rather than liberators' garlands may await the invasion force when it finally reaches Baghdad."

Fair enough, I suppose. But it seems to me that a half-dozen presidential palaces, Iraqi security forces, and thousands of surrenders constitute not merely "symbolic dents" in Iraqi power but, well, actual dents in Iraqi power. Lets not make every lost helicopter into another Tet Offensive, ok?

Jonah Goldberg

This guy! I've been informed that The Philadelphia Inquirer has officially picked up my syndicated column. They carried it sporadically before, but now it should be a fairly regular gig.

As glued as I am to the tube, I've got to say that television is still the least compelling of any of the news media when it comes to the war. Compare this
slide show with the images you get on TV. There's no Life magazine drama to the TV coverage. And the print accounts in the newspaper just blow away television when it comes to you-are-there-drama. TV breaks the news fastest and occassionally has good images, but it's not nearly as good as the networks think it is.

From a reader:

Jonah -

On TV here in NYC Saturday, there was this great scene from the protest in the city. This 40-something hippie lady bust through the barricade and the cops tackle her hard to the ground and the cop says "Where you from" she says "Cleveland" With that he slams her head into the street and says "Welcome to New York." Man that scene alone was worth having the war.

This South African blogger. seems to embody the anti-American international Left. I can't spend much time on it, but I thought some of you might find it interesting.

To 5th fleet base according to a reporter on the scene talking to FNC by phone. Sounds like it was part of anti-war protest. Probably not a big deal.

Huge explosion near our naval base in Bahrain. No details.

Read this post from Democraticunderground.com only if you really dig headaches.

I just read your Corner comment on the markets. It seems to me that what we're seeing today is the markets taking the 3- or 5-Day War (on everyone's minds Friday) premium out of the market, as opposed to putting in a "bad news" penalty. The markets had a huge run last week, and we're just taking the extra juice out.

That protestor is in New York.

German protester invites ass-whuping from state of Texas.

Saddam's martyr's brigade has let Iraqi conscripts know that any soldier seen trying to surrender to US forces will be shot in the back of the head -- according to MSNBC.

From a reader:

Good Lord, I've seen so many reports on other news sites regarding how "heavy" our casualties were yesterday, as well as how "casualties are mounting." Perhaps a little perspective is in order. Yes, the U.S. has lost 25 good people in the last five days, and each is a huge loss. Knowing that, and keeping in mind that we are engaged in a WAR, invading a country the size of California with approximately 250,000 troops, flying thousands of air missions daily, etc., etc., here is a brief analysis of how our people died: Marines killed by the enemy in combat on Friday: 1. Marines killed by the enemy in combat on Saturday: 1. Marines killed by the enemy during a fake surrender on Sunday: 2. (Not really a "combat loss" in the strictest sense of the word, given the cowardly tactic needed to get the Gyrenes' guard down). Marines killed by the enemy in combat on Sunday: 8. Army POWs executed well after they surrendered (captured on Saturday): 7. Army maintenance soldier killed during POW capture by enemy dressed as civilian (again, bogus tactics used to trick our folks): 1. Airborne trooper killed by own (Muslim) subordinate on Saturday (yet again, not a loss due to the 'enemy' as that term is being used right now - perhaps after a few more incidents like this we will consider broadening that definition): 1. Army officer lost in British copter crash on Saturday: 1. Not lost as a result of enemy action. Marines killed in American copter crash on Friday: 4. Not lost as a result of enemy action. That's it. 10 men killed in actual combat five days of incredibly complicated modern mechanized military action involving thousands of artillery rounds being fired, millions of small arms rounds being fired, thousands of sorties being flown by all types of aircraft, thousands of cruise missiles and bombs dropped/fired, and tens of thousands of heavily armed troops moving swiftly across the battlefield. Two thirds of the way to Baghdad already, and fighting against an army of 400,000 men with a couple of thousand tanks and the same in artillery pieces. Hmmmm, wonder who is winning so far? Keep up the good work, you and all the NROers!

Good answer, in the inbox:

Because you have class enough to recognize that picking on individual french
soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and Legionaires because of grumpiness
over their government's policy is indistinguishable from picking on
individual US soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines because you are grumpy
with our government's policies.

Plus, the legionaires would likely kick yer patootie. Even Cosmo thinks
twice before siccing a Legionaire - if only because officially, Legionaire's
aren't french.

Brit Hume will interview Colin Powell on FNC

There are more important things than the paleo-brouhaha going on. But let me just say I find Bob Novak's column in his own defense to be a pretty poor showing. Novak has one good argument on his side. He is not, strictly speaking, a "paleoconservative." He does, however, share the paleo view on Israel and the war. On more than one occassion he's suggested this war is an Israeli "plot" of one kind or another.

But in his column today, he doesn't defend his longstanding and oft-repeated views on this point. Rather, he complains that Frum is being mean for criticizing Novak during wartime. This is a pretty lame counter-attack coming from a guy who suggested in The American Conservative that Frum might have been an agent for Israeli interests inside the White House.

Novak starts by lauding Pat Buchanan for keeping mum on his opposition to the war once the fighting started. He praises Daschle for shutting up with his barbs at the president shortly after the shooting began. But, Novak complains, "Frum, on the other hand, chose that moment to begin shooting at 'paleo-conservatives.'"

I don't get it. Are pundits who claim this war is an Israeli plot suddenly off-limits in wartime? Are pundits of any kind off-limits during wartime? Bob Novak is not a government official, let alone the Commander-in-Chief. Criticizing Novak or Buchanan does not undermine troop morale or communicate a divided message abroad on issues of foreign policy. I'm all for rallying around the flag during war, but I draw the line at rallying 'round Bob. I don't usually use the "If we do X....then the terrorists will have won" formulation, but if journalists can't argue with each other during wartime, what's the point of having a first amendment? It's not like NR announced troop movements.

But, even if I'm missing something. Even if Novak is right that Frum's assault is illegitimate during war, Novak must know that neither Frum nor National Review knew the war was going to start on the day it did. The production schedule of National Review is not approved by Tommy Franks and Frum started working on this piece months ago. And, let us not forget, Frum's article came out only days after Novak himself ran a piece accusing Frum of dual loyalties while serving for the government. Why is that not beyond the pale when the nation is on the brink of war? One has to respect Novak for the work he's done in the past and the fearlessness of his approach to politics. But surely he could have spent a bit more time defending his outrageous theories about why this war is happening and a little less time complaining about the allegedly unfair timing of the criticism aimed at those theories.

Stanley - "Bath resistance" is what Cosmo does when he hides behind the couch at the sound of running water. Baath resistance is the fighting being offered by the Arab-fascist armies of Iraq. But you knew that.

A couple readers make an excellent point about our tight-lipped policy on the chem plant. The thinking is that the Iraqis have refrained from using their WMD precisely because this allows them to contend they don't have them. If we prove they have chem weapons, the propaganda value of not using them all but disappears.

About a half hour ago a bunch of my co workers clustered at the window. We're on the river in Jersey City. Moving south was a big ol' Navy frigate. I took a look at the stern and saw a flag, not ours...It was tri color, but hard to make out the colors from a distance. Went back to my cube and Google'd her hull number (f828). Turns out she's the HMLNS Van Speijk, a Karel Doorman Class Frigate of the Dutch Navy!!! She's armed to the teeth, 8 Harpoon antiship missiles, 16 Sea Sparrow Surface to Air missiles, a 76mm gun, a 30mm anti-missile gun, 2 20 mm guns, and 4 12.75 inc torpedo tubes. You can read about her here. So there is our coalition of the willing!! It may just be a port call, but I find it hard to believe that she's not aware of the current situation and standing ready to help us out should anything happen over Manhattan. I haven't seen ANY publicity about this. I wish that I had. The American people should know that our friends are here, watching over us at home while our people are out watching over the rest of the world. Really neat!! Thank you, Netherlands! (One website said she's the Willem van der Zaan, but most of them say she's the Van Speijk.)

What is the hold-up with this chemical weapons plant story? Dagnabit.

Hey look, we at National Review are hardly above using events in the news to score an ideological point. But am I the only one who detects the distinct whiff of glee from the New York Times that one of our POWs is a woman? Seriously, you almost get the sense that there would be cheers in the newsroom if half of the POWs were female and -- even better -- if half the dead and wounded were women as well. I almost expect them to advocate a Title IX style lawsuit against the Marines.

Here's how the editorial begins:

The news that one of the American soldiers taken captive by the Iraqis over the weekend is a woman serves as a reminder of how the American military has evolved, slowly and sometimes reluctantly, into an organization where the dangerous jobs of war are performed by both sexes. While women are still barred from some sorts of duty, the case for equal footing is gaining ground.

And here's the closer:

A fuller integration of women into the American armed forces would of course carry the increased risk that women might desert, make mistakes or get killed. Or, they could outperform their male counterparts. It's happened before.

I don't understand why so many reporters don't seem to understand why there aren't more surrenders along the lines of the first Gulf War. As they made clear in the CentCom briefing yesterday, enemy soldiers in the last war had to surrender in order to go home because they were stuck in Kuwait. In this wr they merely need to leave their posts or not show up in the first place. Why surrender and spend an indefinite amount of time in a POW camp, when you can go straight home to your family?