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	<title>FrontPage Magazine &#187; Generals</title>
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		<title>Purging and Transforming Our Military</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/matthew-vadum/purging-and-transforming-our-military/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=purging-and-transforming-our-military</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 08 Nov 2013 04:56:45 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Matthew Vadum]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Daily Mailer]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=210042</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[How the president's cleansing campaign will handicap the armed forces long after he's gone. ]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/51ddc046h.300id.9264m.fillw_.540.jpg"><img class="alignleft  wp-image-210044" alt="51ddc046!h.300,id.9264,m.fill,w.540" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/51ddc046h.300id.9264m.fillw_.540.jpg" width="283" height="209" /></a>President Obama hasn&#8217;t just been hollowing out the military since taking office, he&#8217;s been gutting it, purging it of ideologically hostile personnel, and fundamentally transforming it into something other than a war-fighting force, military experts say.</span></b></p>
<p>Although few with military ties are willing to say it openly, it seems the administration is leading an orchestrated effort to seriously undermine the readiness of the military. Some reports indicate that Obama has purged 197 senior military officers since moving into the White House and that many of the retired officers have been harassed at their new civilian jobs for criticizing the president&#8217;s policies. The effects of these purges will be felt long after Obama leaves office.</p>
<p>This is, of course, the same through-the-looking-glass administration that goes out of its way not to label actual Islamic terrorists as terrorists, that calls terrorist attacks “man-caused disasters,” and refers to the Global War on Terror as the “Overseas Contingency Operation.”</p>
<p>A retired senior military officer and combat veteran who remains involved in national security affairs, told FrontPage in an interview that President Obama is involved in social engineering of the United States military.</p>
<p>&#8220;Having women in combat is bad,&#8221; he said. &#8220;It is changing the social complexion of the infantry and we now have this epidemic of sexual assaults.&#8221;</p>
<p>Soldiers are told not to be mean to gays, he said. &#8220;Do you really think the individuals who are joining the all-volunteer force will be joining to pull triggers or to get sensitivity training?&#8221;</p>
<p>The former officer said that President Obama is getting rid of experienced war fighters for no apparent reason.</p>
<p>The &#8220;poster child&#8221; for such firings is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Mattis">James Mattis</a>, a real soldier&#8217;s soldier and four-star general in the Marine Corps who retired unexpectedly this past May at age 63. As a brigadier general Mattis led a brigade into Kandahar in fall of 2001 and a Marines division into Iraq during the invasion in 2003.</p>
<p>&#8220;Mattis should have been the next chairman of the joint chiefs of staff but mysteriously he gets retired,&#8221; the officer said. Mattis had been asking questions about Obama&#8217;s policy toward, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Iran, that the powers that be didn&#8217;t want asked, he said.</p>
<p>In early 2009 Obama cashiered David McKiernan, the general in charge of the Afghanistan war. He was replaced by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, whom he also fired. Obama canned his intelligence chief, Gen. David Petraeus. Gen. John Allen, another key figure in the Afghanistan war, resigned unexpectedly, according to an analysis by the &#8220;Vernuccio/Allison Report,&#8221; a radio show carried by WVOX 1460 AM in New Rochelle, N.Y.</p>
<p>Gen. Carter Ham fell on his sword soon after the White House denied permission for a rescue mission to save officials trapped at the besieged U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya. Admiral David Gaurette, who oversaw an aircraft carrier group in the Middle East, also had retirement thrust upon him, as did Marine Gen. James Cartwright.</p>
<p>Vice Admiral Tim Giardina and Major Gen. Michael Carey, military commanders involved with the nation&#8217;s nuclear defenses, have also been shown the door by the president.</p>
<p>Retired Army Maj. Gen. Patrick Brady <a href="http://www.wnd.com/2013/10/top-generals-obama-is-purging-the-military/#wWjIH8v1e9vfzSXv.99">told</a> WND that President Obama has forced out so many military leaders who have doubts about his policies that the nation&#8217;s armed forces no longer feel prepared to fight or to try to win armed conflicts.</p>
<p>“There is no doubt he is intent on emasculating the military and will fire anyone who disagrees with him” over such issues as “homosexuals, women in foxholes, the Obama sequester,” said Brady, a recipient of the military’s highest decoration, the Medal of Honor.</p>
<p>“They are purging everyone, and if you want to keep your job, just keep your mouth shut,” another top retired officer told WND.</p>
<p>&#8220;Not only are military service members being demoralized and the ranks’ overall readiness being reduced by the Obama administration’s purge of key leaders, colonels – those lined up in rank to replace outgoing generals – are quietly taking their careers in other directions,&#8221; the media outlet reports.</p>
<p>Retired Army Lt. Gen. William G. “Jerry” Boykin said four-star generals are being retired at an alarming rate under Obama. “Over the past three years, it is unprecedented for the number of four-star generals to be relieved of duty, and not necessarily relieved for cause.&#8221;</p>
<p>“I believe there is a purging of the military,” he said. “The problem is worse than we have ever seen.”</p>
<p>Retired Marine Corps Lt. Col. Oliver North weighed in on the issue on Mark Levin&#8217;s radio show last night.</p>
<p>Although &#8220;there&#8217;s a lot of dead wood wearing flags and stars &#8230; [who] wouldn&#8217;t know how to fight their way out of a paper bag,&#8221; a suspicious number of flag officers have been given walking papers by the Obama administration, he said. He continued:</p>
<blockquote><p>There&#8217;s a group of people, and I don&#8217;t think it&#8217;s anything close to a hundred, but there&#8217;s probably several dozen who tried to do the right thing and they weren&#8217;t promoted by this administration because it was contrary to their policy whether it was the administration&#8217;s stated narrative that we&#8217;ve ended al-Qaeda, therefore we&#8217;re safe in the world, or whether it&#8217;s the stated narrative that we&#8217;re doing a pivot toward Asia which is total baloney because there&#8217;s no money to do it with, or it&#8217;s the people who want to defend America with a real serious ballistic missile defense and they were fired because they said, &#8220;hey gosh, we&#8217;re not doing what we need to do to protect the American people.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>Generals and admirals who &#8220;feel strongly that something has gone wrong and something isn&#8217;t being done right, you have a moral obligation to know, first of all, your career is probably over anyway, so have the courage to stand up at a podium, take off your stars, throw &#8216;em down [on] the podium, and tell the truth to the American people on your way out the door.&#8221;</p>
<p>This &#8220;has not happened yet and it should have happened a long time ago,&#8221; North said, adding:</p>
<blockquote><p>The military is being turned into a laboratory for radical social engineering experiments. They&#8217;re wrecking the finest military force the world has ever known &#8212; brighter, better educated, trained, led, and now the most combat-experienced military force in the history of the world. And they&#8217;re not standing up and saying, &#8220;stop wrecking it.&#8221; This administration is intent on wrecking it.</p></blockquote>
<p>The president has also taken some steps that seem aimed only at harming morale. Obama <a href="http://nypost.com/2013/10/23/obama-wants-marines-to-wear-girly-hats/">plans</a> to force Marines of both sexes to don unisex headwear that critics mock as &#8220;girly hats.&#8221;</p>
<p>According to former Navy SEAL Carl Higbie, ranking SEAL commanders have <a href="http://dailycaller.com/2013/11/01/navy-seals-ordered-to-remove-dont-tread-on-me-navy-jack-from-uniforms/">banned</a> their subordinates from wearing the Navy&#8217;s traditional &#8220;don&#8217;t tread on me&#8221; insignia. The patch depicting a coiled rattlesnake ready to strike is typically worn by SEALs and is a variation of the Gadsden flag, a Revolutionary era vexillological device that has been used by the U.S. Marines and Navy since 1775. In 2002 the secretary of the Navy ordered that a variation of the flag, the Navy Jack, be flown on all U.S. Navy ships for the duration of the Global War on Terror.</p>
<p>The Left abhors the Gadsden because it is carried at Tea Party rallies and has been used as a symbol of resistance to Obama&#8217;s authoritarianism.</p>
<p>Leftist influencer and all-purpose crackpot Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center describes the Gadsden flag as a symbol of hate that in “contemporary society [is] the flag of the militia movement.” The flag says “Don’t mess with us,” and implies, “Don’t mess with us at the point of a gun,” says Potok.</p>
<p>Since taking office in 2009, the Obama administration has been on a relentless drive to stigmatize and delegitimize opposing points of view. The administration has instructed Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials to treat conservatives and libertarians as potential terrorists. Obama&#8217;s IRS targets conservative and Tea Party groups for harassment and special investigations.</p>
<p>Americans ought to be alarmed that the administration <a href="http://frontpagemag.com/2013/matthew-vadum/conservative-enemies-of-the-state/">is now using</a> the same heavy-handed, un-American tactics to turn members of the nation’s armed forces against its domestic political adversaries.</p>
<p>We know, for example, that a January 2013 Department of Defense (DoD) diversity training center “student guide” entitled “Extremism” instructs soldiers that conservative organizations are “hate groups” and Tea Party supporters are potentially dangerous extremists.</p>
<p>The DoD materials not only take aim at modern conservative groups but label America’s Founding Fathers as extremists who would be unfit to serve in today’s military. The teaching guide advises that instead of “dressing in sheets,” radicals today “will talk of individual liberties, states’ rights, and how to make the world a better place.” American patriots who fought for Independence from the United Kingdom in the 1700s are identified as adhering to “extremist ideologies.”</p>
<p>“In U.S. history, there are many examples of extremist ideologies and movements,” the document states. “The colonists who sought to free themselves from British rule and the Confederate states who sought to secede from the Northern states are just two examples.”</p>
<p>The materials advise soldiers to rely on the Alabama-based neo-Marxist Southern Poverty Law Center as a resource in identifying hate groups. A 2006 report from the SPLC, essentially an anti-conservative attack machine funded by George Soros, claimed improbably that “large numbers of potentially violent neo-Nazis, skinheads, and other white supremacists are now learning the art of warfare in the [U.S.] armed forces.”</p>
<p>This is what happens when you make a radical left-wing community organizer Commander-in-Chief of America&#8217;s armed forces.</p>
<p><strong>Freedom Center pamphlets now available on Kindle: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&amp;field-keywords=david+horowitz&amp;rh=n%3A133140011%2Ck%3Adavid+horowitz&amp;ajr=0#/ref=sr_st?keywords=david+horowitz&amp;qid=1316459840&amp;rh=n%3A133140011%2Ck%3Adavid+horowitz&amp;sort=daterank">Click here</a>.</strong></p>
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		<title>Victor Davis Hanson on the &#8216;Savior Generals&#8217;</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/paul-schnee/victor-davis-hanson-on-the-savior-generals/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=victor-davis-hanson-on-the-savior-generals</link>
		<comments>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/paul-schnee/victor-davis-hanson-on-the-savior-generals/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 21 Aug 2013 04:26:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Paul Schnee]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Daily Mailer]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=201382</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Revealing the shared traits of the great men who turned around lost battles. ]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/hansonjpg-e1ceadbeecba7ea4.jpg"><img class=" wp-image-201443 alignleft" alt="hansonjpg-e1ceadbeecba7ea4" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/hansonjpg-e1ceadbeecba7ea4-417x350.jpg" width="250" height="210" /></a>Victor Davis Hanson is an American military historian, former classics professor, scholar of ancient warfare, a senior fellow of the Hoover Institution and the author of some 20 books. He has been a commentator on modern warfare and contemporary politics for National Review and is a nationally syndicated columnist for the Tribune Media Group. Thus, it was particularly interesting to hear him talk about his new book, &#8220;<a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Savior-Generals-Commanders-Ancient/dp/160819163X">The Savior Generals</a>,&#8221; at the David Horowitz Freedom Center&#8217;s Wednesday Morning Club luncheon held at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills on August 12th.</p>
<p>The major theme of the book, he said, was how contrarian and unpopular generals have often saved the day, defying the odds, snatching victory from the jaws of defeat to win a campaign and sometimes an entire war. To illustrate this, Hanson spanned almost 2,600 years, choosing Themistocles, Belisarius, Sherman, Ridgway and Petraeus as examples. Hanson noted they all shared certain traits: They all enjoyed their reputations for bucking conventional wisdom; they were all highly literate; they all spoke well and they all led by example.</p>
<p>When confronted with catastrophe, all of Hanson&#8217;s examples had one question in mind: &#8220;What is the plan of attack?&#8221; These great men also understood that in war the status of aggressors and defenders and of the victors and the vanquished is not interchangeable. Hanson lamented that in the current political climate, this one simple fact seems to get overlooked. He expressed his dismay when shortly after army psychiatrist Major Nidal Hassan, who was a Muslim, murdered 13 troops and injured 32 others at Fort Hood, the best that Army Chief of Staff General Casey could say was that he hoped that the U.S. Army&#8217;s &#8220;diversity&#8221; would not become a casualty of this massacre.</p>
<p>None of Hanson&#8217;s generals led from behind or were what Byron called &#8220;those Pagod things of sabre-sway/With fronts of brass and feet of clay.&#8221; Nowhere in the &#8220;Art of War&#8221; by Sun Tzu, Caesar&#8217;s &#8220;Commentaries&#8221; or the war manuals of von Clausewitz will one read that one should love one&#8217;s enemy. What one will read is the categorical imperative that one should kill, crush and defeat one&#8217;s enemy and keep on doing so until he has had enough of it. Themistocles, Belisarius, Sherman, Ridgway and Petraeus were all soldiers who forged their own path and who knew that without victory there would be no chance of survival.</p>
<p>For these men, however, fate has often been unkind. Themistocles was subjected to trumped up charges of corruption; Belisarius had an unfaithful wife and an ungrateful emperor; Sherman was slandered as a terrorist because he had humiliated the enemy and often had many personal feuds; Ridgway was forced to resign as Chief of Staff by President Eisenhower with whom he had strong disagreements about the role of the U.S. Army; and Petraeus resigned as Director of the CIA due to an extra-marital affair.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, when President Reagan awarded General Ridgway the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidential_Medal_of_Freedom">Presidential Medal of Freedom</a> on May 12, 1986 saying that &#8220;Heroes come when they&#8217;re needed; great men step forward when courage seems in short supply,&#8221; he could have been talking just as much about Themistocles, Belisarius, Sherman and Petraeus as he was about Ridgeway.</p>
<p>Victor Davis Hanson spoke for 45 minutes without notes and it was clear that he took delight in his subjects. He displayed an encompassing range of historical knowledge and, with his subjects in the &#8220;The Savior Generals,&#8221; confirmed that people of great courage and character can change the course of history.</p>
<p><strong>Freedom Center pamphlets now available on Kindle: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&amp;field-keywords=david+horowitz&amp;rh=n%3A133140011%2Ck%3Adavid+horowitz&amp;ajr=0#/ref=sr_st?keywords=david+horowitz&amp;qid=1316459840&amp;rh=n%3A133140011%2Ck%3Adavid+horowitz&amp;sort=daterank">Click here</a>.</strong></p>
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		<title>Patton on Islam</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/bosch-fawstin/patton-on-islam/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=patton-on-islam</link>
		<comments>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/bosch-fawstin/patton-on-islam/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 15 May 2013 04:41:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Bosch Fawstin]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Cartoon Corner]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=189437</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[If men like Patton ran today's war, the war would have been won years ago.]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div>To compare Patton with today&#8217;s U.S. General in wartime: <a href="http://fawstin.blogspot.com/2012/09/obamas-general-stamping-hugging-out.html">Click Here</a>.</div>
<div><a href="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Patton-on-Islam-4-FPM.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-189443 aligncenter" alt="Patton-on-Islam-4-FPM" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Patton-on-Islam-4-FPM.jpg" width="500" height="936" /></a></div>
<div></div>
<p><strong>Freedom Center pamphlets now available on Kindle: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref%3dnb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&amp;field-keywords=david+horowitz&amp;rh=n:133140011%2ck:david+horowitz&amp;ajr=0#/ref=sr_st?keywords=david+horowitz&amp;qid=1316459840&amp;rh=n:133140011%2ck:david+horowitz&amp;sort=daterank" target="_blank">Click here</a>.</strong></p>
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		<title>Obama’s War on American Generals</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/dgreenfield/obamas-war-on-american-generals/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=obamas-war-on-american-generals</link>
		<comments>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/dgreenfield/obamas-war-on-american-generals/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 19 Feb 2013 04:55:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Daniel Greenfield]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Daily Mailer]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[Afghanistan]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=178094</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Firing a few good men.]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://frontpagemag.com/2013/dgreenfield/obamas-war-on-american-generals/picture-18-13/" rel="attachment wp-att-178169"><img class="alignleft  wp-image-178169" title="Picture-18" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Picture-18.jpg" alt="" width="280" height="216" /></a>During the Bush administration there were only two American commanders of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan. Under Obama there have so far been five. There has been a new ISAF commander nearly every single year that Obama has been in office. The only exception is 2012 when Obama was too busy trying to win an election to bother further sabotaging a losing war.</p>
<p>The parade of musical chair generals began when Obama demanded the resignation of General McKiernan. The Washington Post called the firing of a wartime commander a “rare decision.” It was the first time since the days of General Douglas MacArthur that a four-star commanding general had been purged during a war.</p>
<p>The decision may have been rare, but it was not unexpected. General McKiernan was fired for the same offense that General McArthur had been targeted during the Korean War: He had demanded competency from an incompetent Democrat.</p>
<p>McKiernan had embarrassed Obama by demanding more troops to fight the war. The situation came to a head as General McKiernan pressed an indecisive Obama to make a decision. It was a devastating scene for an administration which had covered its pivot away from Iraq with concern trolling about winning in Afghanistan. The troops would be delivered, but McKiernan would pay the price.</p>
<p>General McKiernan’s firing was put down to the need for fresh ideas. McKiernan was deemed too “old school” because he wanted to fight an old-fashioned war against the Taliban while Obama Inc. believed that the war couldn’t be won by beating the Taliban, but by winning the hearts and minds of Afghans. It was a fashionable and doomed strategy that required sacrificing the lives and limbs of thousands of American soldiers to political correctness.</p>
<p>The old-school general who had once said, “I don&#8217;t understand ever putting your men and women in harm&#8217;s way, without their having the full ability to protect themselves. That also means operating on actionable intelligence to defeat insurgents, and protect your forces. That&#8217;s how you keep your soldiers alive,” was clearly not the man for that job.</p>
<p>Replacing him as ISAF commander was General McChrystal. McChrystal was everything that McKiernan wasn’t. He was hip fresh blood. He voted for Obama, listened to the right music and was a big fan of counterinsurgency. He hooked up with Greg Mortenson and handed out copies of Three Cups of Tea to his staff. The book proved to be a fraud and so did the COIN strategy for winning over the Afghans.</p>
<p>American soldiers were prevented from defending themselves to avoid offending the Afghans and the war was not moving forward. McChrystal claimed that he had presented a plan to Washington for defeating the Taliban, but Washington only wanted their capabilities degraded. The relationship between McChrystal and Obama also degraded, and McChrystal was fired over a negative Rolling Stone article that revealed that the ISAF commander held Obama and his cronies in contempt.</p>
<p>Urgently, Obama swapped out General McChrystal for General Petraeus, a former enemy now turned wartime ally. In only two years, Obama had gone through three generals and fired two wartime four-star generals, setting a new record for mismanaging a war.</p>
<p>Petraeus’s move from Central Command to commanding the ISAF was unprecedented and did not last long. With the Taliban undefeated and the conflict shifting from a military war to a campaign of drone strikes and targeted assassinations, General Petraeus shifted over to the CIA to command the new fallback position of the war effort as Director Petraeus. But a year later, Petraeus met the same fate as McKiernan and McChrystal after alienating the CIA top brass which enmeshed him in a scandal.  It did not help matters any that Republicans were salivating over the idea of a Petraeus candidacy in 2016.</p>
<p>Petraeus had been replaced by General Allen, who became enmeshed in the same scandal, and the confirmation hearings of his replacement, General Dunford, were sped up. This month, Dunford has taken command of an ISAF in retreat as Afghanistan has become the new Iraq. And Dunford has become the fifth ISAF commander under Obama. Of his four predecessors, all have ended their careers under a cloud.</p>
<p>The War in Afghanistan has been lost and so have the careers of most of its commanders. Obama has constantly swapped out generals, and unlike the rotating allied ISAF commanders during the Bush era, many of them were fired because they threatened Obama politically in some way.</p>
<p>The record is an ugly one, but it is not limited to the war theater in Afghanistan. After the Benghazi disaster, General Carter Ham of AFRICOM was reportedly edged out after telling a Republican Congressman that he had not received any requests for support. His replacement, General Rodriguez, had earlier taken over part of McKiernan’s job after Obama had forced him out.</p>
<p>More recently General Mattis, the commander of United States Central Command, Petraeus’s old job, was booted out without even a personal phone call for being too hawkish about Iran. The insult was unprecedented and the reason was the same. Like McKiernan and McChrystal, Mattis had offended important people in the Obama administration. And for that he paid the price.</p>
<p>General Dempsey, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, exemplifies the costs of career survival in the age of Obama. Dempsey echoes everything that the civilians tell him. He never disagrees with them in public and likely not in private. Whatever new gimmick comes out of the White House, whether it’s Green Energy or homosexuality, he’s right there behind it and out in front of it.</p>
<p>Dempsey has no ideas of his own and he doesn’t need any. He has nothing to bring to the table except a willingness to act as Obama’s pet parrot in a uniform. When McChrystal first met Obama, he recalled thinking that Obama was “uncomfortable and intimidated” by the room full of military brass. That observation helped get McChrystal fired and these days it’s the military brass that feels uncomfortable and intimidated by Obama Inc.</p>
<p><strong>Freedom Center pamphlets now available on Kindle: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref%3dnb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&amp;field-keywords=david+horowitz&amp;rh=n:133140011%2ck:david+horowitz&amp;ajr=0#/ref=sr_st?keywords=david+horowitz&amp;qid=1316459840&amp;rh=n:133140011%2ck:david+horowitz&amp;sort=daterank" target="_blank">Click here</a>.  </strong></p>
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		<title>The Brewing Egyptian Hostage Crisis</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2012/alan-w-dowd/the-brewing-egyptian-hostage-crisis/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=the-brewing-egyptian-hostage-crisis</link>
		<comments>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2012/alan-w-dowd/the-brewing-egyptian-hostage-crisis/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 10 Feb 2012 04:25:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Alan W. Dowd]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Daily Mailer]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[19 Americans]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=122063</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The world is watching and waiting for President Obama. ]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/obama-wiping-forehead1-e1305400756777.gif"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-122071" title="obama-wiping-forehead1-e1305400756777" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/obama-wiping-forehead1-e1305400756777.gif" alt="" width="375" height="249" /></a></p>
<p>Not long ago, I used this space to <a href="http://frontpagemag.com/2011/02/01/1979-1989-or-2009/">ask</a> if the Arab Spring was like 2009 (the failed Twitter Revolution in Iran), 1989 (the democratic revolutions in Eastern Europe) or 1979 (the Islamist revolution in Iran). Like others, I believed the end of Mubarak’s autocratic rule was something to celebrate, but I worried that what ultimately replaces Mubarak may not be worth celebrating. And sadly, a year later, elements of the Arab Spring are starting to resemble 1979, as evidenced by the brewing hostage crisis in Egypt.</p>
<p>Nineteen American citizens working for well-known and well-established nonprofit groups are being held on trumped-up charges that they tried to destabilize Egypt. Their offices were raided in late December, some are holed up in the U.S. embassy and all of them have been barred from flying out of Egypt. As <a href="http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,2106420,00.html">Time</a> magazine notes, December is significant. December is when Congress passed a number of conditions for aid to the Egyptian military, including proving a “commitment to Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel, progress toward democratic reforms, and the protection of free expression, association and religion.” Not only are the last two of those conditions not being met by Egypt, but Time adds that Cairo’s case against the Americans is “propagated by the military-led regime.”</p>
<p>That’s also an important part of the story. To its credit, the Egyptian military played a key role in persuading Mubarak to cede power, and in preventing Egypt from careening into chaos. The Egyptian military is now trying to serve as something of a referee/power broker/king-maker. Up until this crisis, Washington recognized that while having the Egyptian military in charge is not ideal, it may be necessary to hold the political pieces together in Egypt. But if this is how the “responsible” parties in post-Mubarak Egypt are going to treat Americans, then it’s time to reevaluate everything about this interests-based relationship. Hopefully, Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey is conveying that very message in his talks in Cairo.</p>
<p>The clear, unambiguous and indeed private message should be threefold:</p>
<p>• The U.S. aid spigot—an average of $2 billion per year since 1979—will be shut off if these hostages aren’t freed and if post-Mubarak Egypt continues to resemble post-Shah Iran. As Time puts it, “if Egypt’s generals get away with the NGO crackdown and the political humiliation of its biggest foreign benefactor, it’s going to set a dangerous precedent for other regimes testing the waters of democracy.”</p>
<p>• The United States is prepared to radically rethink its security posture and force structure in the region. There are many other countries in the region that will take U.S. aid dollars and assist the U.S. in protecting its strategic interests.</p>
<p>• U.S. force will be employed if American interests or citizens are again threatened. Washington cannot allow another far-off revolution to hold America hostage.</p>
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		<title>A Half-Hearted Afghanistan Strategy &#8211; by Michael Reagan</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2009/michael-reagan/a-half-hearted-afghanistan-strategy-by-michael-reagan/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=a-half-hearted-afghanistan-strategy-by-michael-reagan</link>
		<comments>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2009/michael-reagan/a-half-hearted-afghanistan-strategy-by-michael-reagan/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 04 Dec 2009 05:10:21 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Michael Reagan]]></dc:creator>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=40327</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The pitfalls of a publicized end date.]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-40335" title="obama" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/obama.jpg" alt="obama" width="450" height="341" /></p>
<p><span><span>As many of you will recall, in previous writings I urged President Obama to do the right thing when it came to providing Gen. McChrystal with his requested troop increases in support of the war effort in Afghanistan. And during the early debate over troop levels, I even accepted the president’s request for reasonable time to meet with his advisers to discuss all options available to obtaining military victory in Afghanistan.</span></span></p>
<p>I am pleased and encouraged to see that President Obama heeded the counsel of his generals on the matter of increased troop levels that are so critical to our continuing battle against terrorists and those who house and support them. He has called on us for unity and support, and that is how we should respond.</p>
<p>Sadly, we are already seeing many members of the president’s own political party take exception to an increase in troop levels &#8212; many pushing for a retreat from the fight against those who took the lives of so many innocent victims on September 11, 2001 and who are continually plotting for the next great attack against Americans on our home soil and/or abroad. How did so many Democrats forget that fateful day &#8212; a mere eight years ago?</p>
<p>The Taliban and Al Qaeda are now on notice that 30,000 more of America’s best and brightest military personnel are gearing up to take the fight against terror to the nearest town, village and even cave to track down and eradicate those who have done or desire to harm America and her interests.</p>
<p>But I do take exception to the fact that the Taliban and Al Qaeda have also woken up to news that this massive American military surge, one that will increase our troop levels to close to 100,000, already has a publicized end date.</p>
<p>Yes, that is correct. Our enemy has been put on notice by the president himself that by July 2011, we will begin pulling back our troop commitments in Afghanistan. What makes this date even more disconcerting is the fact that it will take us several months to implement the 30,000-troop influx that is so central to this new security offensive &#8212; hopefully in time for the often-called “Spring fighting season” there.</p>
<p>This means we will begin leaving just a year after all the troops arrive &#8212; but conveniently in advance of the beginning of the 2012 election season.</p>
<p>Now I am not a general or even a military historian, but it doesn’t seem to me that it makes any sense to let your enemy know when you are coming and when you plan to leave. All they should need to know is what you plan to do: win. And our troops on the ground need to have the confidence that these decisions and timelines are based on sound military principles rather than political calculation.</p>
<p>In his speech, President Obama had a golden opportunity to borrow a line from my father &#8212; one that would have brought the house down and instilled more confidence in the plan he appeared half-heartedly to support. All he had to do was announce: “We win &#8212; they lose.” But rather, the president’s message and demeanor presented more of a détente approach to American foreign policy, in a speech where he never once made victory our goal.</p>
<p>Gen. David Petraeus, leader of the Iraq surge and now head of U.S. Central Command, acknowledged after President Obama’s speech that there was “tension” between the desire to win the conflict and the desire to pull out quickly. Those desires are both real and understandable, but no one knows better than Gen. Petraeus how much meeting both can sometimes prove impossible.</p>
<p>Moving forward, the American people, Afghan President Karzai, and our NATO allies must now rise to the task before us. But even as I move to follow my president, I can only hope that it is this pattern, rather than political timelines, which he follows in the next two years.</p>
<p>To the men and women who now bravely go to serve, you have my deepest thanks, hopes, and prayers. You are the soul of this country, and your service will not go unmarked.</p>
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		<title>Congressman: Generals may quit if Obama stays pat in Afghanistan – The Hill</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2009/mb-snow/congressman-generals-may-quit-if-obama-stays-pat-in-afghanistan-%e2%80%93-the-hill/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=congressman-generals-may-quit-if-obama-stays-pat-in-afghanistan-%25e2%2580%2593-the-hill</link>
		<comments>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2009/mb-snow/congressman-generals-may-quit-if-obama-stays-pat-in-afghanistan-%e2%80%93-the-hill/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 01 Oct 2009 16:24:06 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[MB Snow]]></dc:creator>
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		<description><![CDATA[Congressman: Generals may quit if Obama stays pat in Afghanistan
By Jordan Fabian	 &#8211; 10/01/09 09:34 AM ET
A conservative congressman said on Thursday that top generals may resign or retire early if President Barack Obama does not make a significant changes to the military&#8217;s Afghan strategy.
&#8220;Sure, I think that&#8217;s a legitimate concern,&#8221; Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) [...]<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=sroblog.com&#38;blog=5470193&#38;post=16509&#38;subd=ladylibertytoday&#38;ref=&#38;feed=1" />]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class='snap_preview'>
<h2><strong><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-16511" title="88134089MW007_ARMY_LT_GEN_S" src="http://ladylibertytoday.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/alg_general.jpg?w=420&#038;h=301" alt="88134089MW007_ARMY_LT_GEN_S" width="420" height="301" />Congressman: Generals may quit if Obama stays pat in Afghanistan</strong></h2>
<p>By Jordan Fabian	 &#8211; 10/01/09 09:34 AM ET</p>
<p>A conservative congressman said on Thursday that top generals may resign or retire early if President Barack Obama does not make a significant changes to the military&#8217;s Afghan strategy.</p>
<p>&#8220;Sure, I think that&#8217;s a legitimate concern,&#8221; Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) told Washington Times Radio this morning. &#8220;If the president chooses [not to readjust the strategy] but stay there, I think you&#8217;ll see that kind of a thing happen, then I think you&#8217;ll see those kinds of resignations.&#8221;</p>
<p>Ryan expressed worry that the current strategy in Afghanistan is not working. Administration officials have said they are conducting a strategic review of the conflict there. He called for the White House to enact changes quickly.</p>
<p>via <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/61097-congressman-generals-may-quit-if-obama-stays-pat-in-afghanistan">Congressman: Generals may quit if Obama stays pat in Afghanistan &#8211; The Hill&#8217;s Blog Briefing Room</a>.</p>
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