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Gun Owners Will Agree, Military Folks Won't
trstone
Member Posts: 833 ✭✭✭✭
This is an interesting viewpoint which I KNOW will cheese off the military folks here (veterans and actives alike) but will leave the average gun-owner more'n likely agreeing, if only to a degree...The issue at hand is elucidated at the end of the fourth and beginning of the fifth paragraphs, so feel free to skim until you reach that point.
Oh, and by the way: BY POSTING THIS C&P I DO NOT NECESSARILY AGREE OR DISAGREE WITH WHAT IS STATED THEREIN, so don't start screaming at me.
**********************************************************************
I Still Owe the Military Nothing
by Brad Edmonds
My article on the military drew more emails than I've seen since I wrote a couple of years ago that Sheriff Andy Taylor of Mayberry was a commie rat. Then Paul Craig Roberts wrote this week a few good reasons why it's sometimes no fun to be a columnist. Just because it's enlightening and amusing (and a little informative), I thought it would be interesting to discuss the responses to my military article.
Free Republic was the most fun. As Paul Craig Roberts pointed out, some people will invent things they believe were in your article, and focus on those. One reader acted offended that I considered the rank of major "lowly," which I didn't suggest (I was putting it in relation to 2- and 3-star generals); another assumed my dad retired as a major, which I didn't suggest, and which wasn't the case. Others understood that I retired from the CIA, which I didn't. I was there for a relatively short time, and left in 1990. There was little of substance - mostly empty invective - on Free Republic, though one reader successfully corrected my simplification of US foreign policy in the Middle East to "40 years of bombing." I should have linked this article by Adam Young, and referred to "50 years of ham-handed, violent, dictatorial, capricious intervention" instead of "40 years of bombing." I stand corrected. Freepers, as they're called, are self-selected, and virtually all neocons; almost no libertarians are among them. I counted, just for fun, about 70 different posters, 65 of whom were opposed to my viewpoint (about 60 of those without substance).
My emails, also subject to self-selection, were just the opposite. I counted, just for fun, and heard from 114 different people - so far. 105 were in agreement, nine disagreed. Of those who identified themselves as military veterans, 32 agreed while only three wrote to disagree. None of the three claimed to have been a combat veteran, while many of the 32 mentioned the wars in which they saw combat.
Without exception, those who disagreed simply restated the point I wrote to dispel: That we owe our freedom to the military. A few thought they had me on a legal point: Since I noted that Americans' freedoms have decreased, some readers thought I'd confused the purpose of the military (defense from foreign invasion) with civil government (the enactment of laws, the existence of which limits freedom). No, they didn't have me; they made my point - that the military has little to do with freedom.
The only thing the military can do for our freedom is to repel an attack from an invader who, in occupying, would offer us a less free society than we have now. I mean, we must consider the possibility that an occupying force can increase our freedom, right? Isn't this Bush's point in Iraq? So, for our military to have been effective in protecting our freedom, the enemy must be (1) credible; (2) willing and prepared to attack; (3) likely to reduce our freedom if he wins; and (4) repelled by either the action, or the threat, of our military.
This circumstance has never obtained in our history, and probably never will. The British, in 1812, were the single most credible invading threat we've ever faced, and if the British invaded successfully they still might not have had a tremendous impact on our liberty either way. (Remember the Whiskey Rebellion? Our liberty was threatened by our own government in 1791.) Further, the most effective defense we had in 1812 was privateers - private ships, paid only in captured booty (which gave them incentive to preserve the enemy and his ships). So much for the government's military there.
The next "invasion" was the Union army invading the sovereign CSA, which only established once and for all that there was nothing voluntary about the US government. We have never been in any credible danger of being forced to speak Spanish, Japanese, German, or frankly, Russian. (We were in some danger of being hit by Soviet nuclear weapons, but the only deterrent was our own bombs - not men and women, not command structures, since ICBMs could be launched on Moscow from inside the US.)
The USSR was credible, likely to reduce our freedom, and somewhat hampered, if not repelled, by our military (but really mostly by our under-the-table payments to, for example, Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan; and our placements of missiles in Europe), but the USSR was never prepared to attack us. Hitler and Germany never constituted a credible threat to the US, and Hitler himself made no secret that he thought the new world order should consist of Germany, England, and the United States. Japan was goaded into Pearl Harbor, starving and desperate to break up our blockade of oil, steel, etc. against their island; but Japan never had any wish to invade the US. (Freepers take note: Yes, Germany, Japan, and the USSR were evil. Yes they were. I agree. They were still never a threat to us, with our without our military.)
What has made the US an uninviting target for 200 years is the oceans and our gun ownership. As Iraq and Afghanistan have proven in the last three years, making war halfway around the world is expensive, risky, and difficult even for the US, even today, even when attacking pathetically weaker opponents. Universal gun ownership means an occupying force can never succeed. To occupy, you have to step out of your planes and humvees and move on foot. The more the natives own guns and want to resist, the more ground area you have to occupy continuously. With a nation full of rifle-toting rednecks, a hostile foreign power can never succeed. To obliterate us, they would be forced to nuke us.
There is no incentive for any nation to do that to any other: There would be nothing of value to steal afterward, and it would be costly and dangerous for the nation using the nukes. America did it to Japan because we knew Japan was already defeated, and we were the only ones in the world who had nukes. Indeed, to prove the disincentives work: Truman bombed Japan because the Japanese demanded as their only condition of surrender that the emperor remain emperor. They continued to demand this after both bombings, so Truman just gave in. The bombings were for nothing. And with no retaliation for Truman or the US to fear, Truman still stopped, and gave the Japanese what they wanted. They didn't even have rifles.
We have rifles.
Heck, I'd be more prone to believe we owed our freedom to the military if they were here, defending our borders (or even their own headquarters). They're not.
And as to my point that the military is just a tool for Congress and the president, you don't have to listen to me. Listen to a retired Marine general, twice winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor, on the subject.
We don't need a standing federal military. If someone invades, militias can pop up, with rifles and perhaps a government commission (while we still have forcible government) to get the job done and then disband until the next invasion. I'll be there, ready to go. Let me know when it happens.
February 4, 2004
Brad Edmonds [send him mail] writes from Alabama.
**********************************************************************
Oh, and by the way: BY POSTING THIS C&P I DO NOT NECESSARILY AGREE OR DISAGREE WITH WHAT IS STATED THEREIN, so don't start screaming at me.
**********************************************************************
I Still Owe the Military Nothing
by Brad Edmonds
My article on the military drew more emails than I've seen since I wrote a couple of years ago that Sheriff Andy Taylor of Mayberry was a commie rat. Then Paul Craig Roberts wrote this week a few good reasons why it's sometimes no fun to be a columnist. Just because it's enlightening and amusing (and a little informative), I thought it would be interesting to discuss the responses to my military article.
Free Republic was the most fun. As Paul Craig Roberts pointed out, some people will invent things they believe were in your article, and focus on those. One reader acted offended that I considered the rank of major "lowly," which I didn't suggest (I was putting it in relation to 2- and 3-star generals); another assumed my dad retired as a major, which I didn't suggest, and which wasn't the case. Others understood that I retired from the CIA, which I didn't. I was there for a relatively short time, and left in 1990. There was little of substance - mostly empty invective - on Free Republic, though one reader successfully corrected my simplification of US foreign policy in the Middle East to "40 years of bombing." I should have linked this article by Adam Young, and referred to "50 years of ham-handed, violent, dictatorial, capricious intervention" instead of "40 years of bombing." I stand corrected. Freepers, as they're called, are self-selected, and virtually all neocons; almost no libertarians are among them. I counted, just for fun, about 70 different posters, 65 of whom were opposed to my viewpoint (about 60 of those without substance).
My emails, also subject to self-selection, were just the opposite. I counted, just for fun, and heard from 114 different people - so far. 105 were in agreement, nine disagreed. Of those who identified themselves as military veterans, 32 agreed while only three wrote to disagree. None of the three claimed to have been a combat veteran, while many of the 32 mentioned the wars in which they saw combat.
Without exception, those who disagreed simply restated the point I wrote to dispel: That we owe our freedom to the military. A few thought they had me on a legal point: Since I noted that Americans' freedoms have decreased, some readers thought I'd confused the purpose of the military (defense from foreign invasion) with civil government (the enactment of laws, the existence of which limits freedom). No, they didn't have me; they made my point - that the military has little to do with freedom.
The only thing the military can do for our freedom is to repel an attack from an invader who, in occupying, would offer us a less free society than we have now. I mean, we must consider the possibility that an occupying force can increase our freedom, right? Isn't this Bush's point in Iraq? So, for our military to have been effective in protecting our freedom, the enemy must be (1) credible; (2) willing and prepared to attack; (3) likely to reduce our freedom if he wins; and (4) repelled by either the action, or the threat, of our military.
This circumstance has never obtained in our history, and probably never will. The British, in 1812, were the single most credible invading threat we've ever faced, and if the British invaded successfully they still might not have had a tremendous impact on our liberty either way. (Remember the Whiskey Rebellion? Our liberty was threatened by our own government in 1791.) Further, the most effective defense we had in 1812 was privateers - private ships, paid only in captured booty (which gave them incentive to preserve the enemy and his ships). So much for the government's military there.
The next "invasion" was the Union army invading the sovereign CSA, which only established once and for all that there was nothing voluntary about the US government. We have never been in any credible danger of being forced to speak Spanish, Japanese, German, or frankly, Russian. (We were in some danger of being hit by Soviet nuclear weapons, but the only deterrent was our own bombs - not men and women, not command structures, since ICBMs could be launched on Moscow from inside the US.)
The USSR was credible, likely to reduce our freedom, and somewhat hampered, if not repelled, by our military (but really mostly by our under-the-table payments to, for example, Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan; and our placements of missiles in Europe), but the USSR was never prepared to attack us. Hitler and Germany never constituted a credible threat to the US, and Hitler himself made no secret that he thought the new world order should consist of Germany, England, and the United States. Japan was goaded into Pearl Harbor, starving and desperate to break up our blockade of oil, steel, etc. against their island; but Japan never had any wish to invade the US. (Freepers take note: Yes, Germany, Japan, and the USSR were evil. Yes they were. I agree. They were still never a threat to us, with our without our military.)
What has made the US an uninviting target for 200 years is the oceans and our gun ownership. As Iraq and Afghanistan have proven in the last three years, making war halfway around the world is expensive, risky, and difficult even for the US, even today, even when attacking pathetically weaker opponents. Universal gun ownership means an occupying force can never succeed. To occupy, you have to step out of your planes and humvees and move on foot. The more the natives own guns and want to resist, the more ground area you have to occupy continuously. With a nation full of rifle-toting rednecks, a hostile foreign power can never succeed. To obliterate us, they would be forced to nuke us.
There is no incentive for any nation to do that to any other: There would be nothing of value to steal afterward, and it would be costly and dangerous for the nation using the nukes. America did it to Japan because we knew Japan was already defeated, and we were the only ones in the world who had nukes. Indeed, to prove the disincentives work: Truman bombed Japan because the Japanese demanded as their only condition of surrender that the emperor remain emperor. They continued to demand this after both bombings, so Truman just gave in. The bombings were for nothing. And with no retaliation for Truman or the US to fear, Truman still stopped, and gave the Japanese what they wanted. They didn't even have rifles.
We have rifles.
Heck, I'd be more prone to believe we owed our freedom to the military if they were here, defending our borders (or even their own headquarters). They're not.
And as to my point that the military is just a tool for Congress and the president, you don't have to listen to me. Listen to a retired Marine general, twice winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor, on the subject.
We don't need a standing federal military. If someone invades, militias can pop up, with rifles and perhaps a government commission (while we still have forcible government) to get the job done and then disband until the next invasion. I'll be there, ready to go. Let me know when it happens.
February 4, 2004
Brad Edmonds [send him mail] writes from Alabama.
**********************************************************************
Comments
Rafter-S
In fact, our Founding Fathers warned about a large standing army, though I believe their main concern wasn't about it being used against us, but about the enourmous public cost.
I remember an anecdote I heard, not sure if it's true or not but makes sense anyway, about an FBI agent talking with a former KGB agent after the fall of the USSR. The FBI man asks the KGB op if they ever had any plans to actually invade the continental US. The KGB op replies: "He!! no! You people have too many guns."
We owe our military a lot, for the people in uniform are giving anywhere from 2-25 years to serve their country, and they deserve a thank you, but our freedom isn't the sole responsibility of the military, but of all Americans, and it is our duty to be ever vigilant in its defense.
"Sure, you can trust the government. Just ask an American Indian."
-Bumper sticker
The greatest safety device in the universe, when used properly, is the human brain.
"Keep your eyes open, do your own thinking, and be your own man."
-Marshal Matt Dillon
When the Saddams of the world, or the chinks control most of the oil in the world then we will find out just how free we really are. The baddest * on the block has the most freedom.
mag
The successful overseas operations performed by our nation's military is a fairly regular reminder to those that WOULD invade that such an action would be futile. The deterrent factor of a ready military force stands between the enemies of freedom and unorganized loose-knit militias and gun owner groups that would certainly be capable of defending our nation but would do so with greater casualties were our military reduced to THEIR ranks.
What an idiot.
I would like to know the name of the Marine general who is/was awarded the MOH twice!!
Probably Gen. Smedley Butler, who was decorated in World War I and possibly the Phillipines. He wrote a well-known article entitled "War Is A Racket." That's my guess, though I would check it.
"Sure, you can trust the government. Just ask an American Indian."
-Bumper sticker
The greatest safety device in the universe, when used properly, is the human brain.
"Keep your eyes open, do your own thinking, and be your own man."
-Marshal Matt Dillon
I agree. While I found the article humorous, it makes a lot of assumptions that don't stand up under scrutiny. The military is a defense whose strength is best realized when it's not used... the mere threat of its use being enough to defend our borders.
Mag,
Try not to be such a lunatic racist. China-bashing may get you free drinks at the local watering hole, but we're trying to have an intelligent conversation here.
Am I wrong, here?
God Bless America and...
NEVER Forget WACO
NEVER, EVER Forget 911
You are FOS. The chicoms will be a major problem for the US and the rest of the free world in the near future. As their industrial base grows their need for oil will skyrocket putting them in direct conflict with the US, Japan, Europe, etc. Their style of doing business follows a different set of rules than the west. Their is a lot of money flowing into China right now and very little coming out.
Their posturing over Taiwan makes no sense globally except for their desire for dominion. They have far more to lose by using force than they stand to gain so what is the point? Logic is rare in the communist way of thinking.
Lou Dobbs had the chicom premier on his show and the next day the movie "The Bridges at Toko Ri" was on AMC. Very fitting to remind us that we are still dealing with the same government with just a few new faces.
Monkey, it probably tears you up to know that you have another term of Bush to look forward to.
mag
See? That wasn't so hard to articulate your thoughts without resorting to the racist rhetoric found so often in this nation's better monkey houses. So let me respond.
Yes, oil is an important and dwindling resource... if you believe the oil companies who stated that we'd be out of oil by the year 2002.
As of right now, there are enormous reserves around the Caspian Sea and Siberia that have yet to be fully exploited as does West Africa.
It also assumes that other forms of energy aren't used to fuel their energy needs. The Three Gorges dam, for example, was not put up just to flood their own territory.
I could go on and on, but this thread is supposed to be about the role of our standing military and its impact on our national freedoms, so I'll cut it short right here.
Sorry, the article doesn't hold water.
How you doin'!
http://www.lewrockwell.com/edmonds/edmonds181.html
He invites people to e-mail him about his articles, so feel free to swing on over there and tell him he's either dead-bang-on, partially correct, or full of crap as you see fit. I think the feedback would be beneficial to him.
the military is a deterrent, in at least one sense. Battles have been fought, wars won, wars not decided, and wars that were not wars waged in purported defense or our (US Citizens) freedoms, etc., or those of other countries citizens ... some were or are questionable, others less so ... regardless our military comprised of citizen and professional soldiers went forward and tens of thousands lay down their lives so people like this, our the Super Bowl entertainers and "others" can do what it is that they do.
I don't like it ... but, sadly, I understand it, and ... it's why I fought for it and would do so again!
If you only have time to do two things so-so, or one thing well ... do the one thing!
so I'll cut it short right here.
Monkey,
Not short enough to hide your lack of knowledge or self esteem. Personal attacks or attempted insults over the internet are the province of cowards.
mag
quote:Originally posted by mag
quote:Originally posted by ElMuertoMonkey
so I'll cut it short right here.
Monkey,
Not short enough to hide your lack of knowledge or self esteem. Personal attacks or attempted insults over the internet are the province of cowards.
mag
Yes, oil is an important and dwindling resource... if you believe the oil companies who stated that we'd be out of oil by the year 2002.
The United States has plenty of oil that is pumped every day. It is not the same grade of oil that we use here, and they haven't figured out how to manufacture it here. The US exports our oil out to other countries and imports other oil here. If the US figured a way to use our own oil, we wouldn't have a problem. So, therefore, Oil is not the real problem.
I am retired military, but I still agree that the Military does not get our freedom here. It is the wrong doings of other citizens that slowly takes our freedoms away. The law enforcement is more of a freedom keeper locally, at least what I percieve.
You get out of life what you put into it. If you put nothing, you get nothing.
quote:Originally posted by ElMuertoMonkey
Yes, oil is an important and dwindling resource... if you believe the oil companies who stated that we'd be out of oil by the year 2002.
The United States has plenty of oil that is pumped every day. It is not the same grade of oil that we use here, and they haven't figured out how to manufacture it here. The US exports our oil out to other countries and imports other oil here. If the US figured a way to use our own oil, we wouldn't have a problem. So, therefore, Oil is not the real problem.
I am retired military, but I still agree that the Military does not get our freedom here. It is the wrong doings of other citizens that slowly takes our freedoms away. The law enforcement is more of a freedom keeper locally, at least what I percieve.
You get out of life what you put into it. If you put nothing, you get nothing.
WHAT?????????? The wrong Doings of other citizens...Oh you mean the MInority of citizens that use guns for ill will and that sort of thing??????
...says the guy who resorted to the racial epithet "*."
I cannot believe the handwringing I am seeing on this. I obviously used the term to identify the government of mainland china. It was not directed towards an individual or group of innocents.
The gov of mainland china is an enemy to the average American worker or any other free people and as such deserves no respect from us.
mag
quote:chinks control most of the oil in the world
Think before you speak, some of the board members, such as myself are chinese/part chinese. [xx(]
Go Army Beat Navy
IF you wanna have fun join the cavalry
Who wrote it Michael Moore?
Trinity +++
"Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it."(Proverbs 22:6)
Think before you speak, some of the board members, such as myself are chinese/part chinese. [xx(]
By your thinking I am British but for some odd reason I consider my self American. My race is caucasion, not British or American. I would think that your race is asian or oriental.
mag
Go Army Beat Navy
IF you wanna have fun join the cavalry
So why does it matter what one friggin' hippie thinks?
Oh, and Mag, as a ex-11bravo of asian heritage I too agree with the others. Poor choice of wording.
James
Whats next? A ban on automatic transmissions?
What this fella is failing to see is that we now have our freedoms as Americans. I like to think that he does indeed owe his American freedoms to the American military. If it were not for a military, all of this fool's freedoms, that may exist under some other form of government, would not be American freedoms, they would be the freedom allowed by the new government, nothing more, nothing less. I for one may not like a lot of what is taking place in America today, or the rest of the world for that matter, but so long as I am an American, living under an American government, exercising my freedoms that in some instances only exist here in America, I know where my thanks and gratitude is deserved, and it is to those that have died in the past fighting for these freedoms, those that die for them today, tomorrow, and in the future.
God Bless those in harms way tonight.
Semper Fi
"Never argue with an idiot.... They drag you down to their level then beat you with experience."
"I don't have an attitude problem, you have a perception problem."
Ryan
James
Whats next? A ban on automatic transmissions?
There are, however, circumstances where such slurs are intentionally and purposefully used to immediately bring to mind a specific stereotype, which may be considered legitimate useage. Not tasteful, but occasionally justified to make a connotative point.
God Bless America and...
NEVER Forget WACO
NEVER, EVER Forget 911