I was never much of a sports guy until 1986, when my
best friend would invite me to watch the 1986 Brazilian team in action. Victories
were celebrated but the defeat to France in a penalty shoot out in the quarters
brought tears. It was this experience that made me understand that victory was
a thrill and defeat was tragic.
After Hamburg, my stepdad got transferred to England
and I entered Churcher’s College. Prior to joining Churcher’s, it was stressed
to me that it was important to be seen on the “playing fields,” if I was to fit
in. So, whilst I was not anyone’s idea of an “athlete,” I took part in house
level rugby and hockey (the field variety to Americans). I now joke that one of
the best things about being in an English Public School was that I could talk
rugby with guys from the Southern Hemisphere and cricket with people from South
Asia, two groups that I would end up working with closely in my working life.
Sports are fun and it’s easy to know who has won and
who has lost. The score board is visible. In a race, it’s pretty obvious who crosses
the finishing line first.
However, this isn’t exactly the case in war, which is
often said to be the thing that we substitute with sports. The point is often
made when you talk about America’s post World War II military adventures. Think
of Vietnam, where the world’s strongest military dropped a ton of bombs on the
country and all we remember is the Americans running away on the rooftop of the
American Embassy in Saigon. Many years later, we saw something similar with the
return of the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Why do we have such memories of the what is
undoubtedly the world’s strongest military machine ever? The answer is this
simple – unlike sports, there’s no obvious score board. It’s not a case of I
kill more of yours than you kill more of mine or I won more battles so I win
the war. In the case of Vietnam, the Americans won all the battles. In Iraq, American
forces steamrollered what was left Saddam’s army. In both cases, America ended
up having to pull out with loss of treasure and blood.
The current administration puts it down to “stupid”
rules of engagement and “woke” ideology. If you believe the current Managing
Director of the Pentagon, you’d think that all America needs is to be allowed
to hit harder.
Given that the MD of the Pentagon is an alcoholic who
reports to a draft dodger who can only fight toddlers when their hands and legs
are tied up, it’s clear that the decades military knowledge in the vaults of
the Pentagon have been wasted. America has lost wars because of a “woke”
military but because of politicians who failed to understand what war actually
is. The situation is worse in the age of mass media. Politicians cannot resist
looking good with the troops but when flag draped coffins come home, they start
panicking. Now, you have a president who is a former reality TV star whose
entire world view is fixated on “appearance” rather than actual work.
In Venezuela he looked cool. Delta Force did a
masterful job of entering the country, capturing Maduro and getting out.
Venezuela’s new leader agreed to work with him and everything is cool.
Then, he just decided to bomb Iran, which was
negotiating and giving the pretense of being a good neighbor in a volatile
neighborhood. It even looked good for him in as much as the 86-year-old Iranian
leader, Ali Khamenei was killed on day one of strikes. The ever ready, TV star
has gone around talking about how the war is a “12 or 15 on a scale of 10” and
even mentioning that the war has already been “won,” and accused British Prime
Minister, Keir Stramer of joining too late:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9dn3j04lydo
Trump is talking “fury” if the Iranians don’t open up
the Straits of Hormuz. Hegseth has talked about unleashing fury. Why do you
need to say all these things if you have already won?
The Iranian foreign minister has said “we’re ready.” Israeli
newspaper, Haaretz calls whatever the American administration is thinking a “fantasy.”
Here’s the thing, if you want to get into a fight, you
got to understand that people are going to hit back. I go back to the point of
the fact that the person in charge can only fight toddlers but only in the
toddler’s arms are tied behind his or her back. In trade, he started slapping tariffs
of countries. Most of the world didn’t want to pick a fight with the world’s most
prominent economy. The one country that hit back was the one he wanted to “reign
in.” Put tariffs on China and China put them right back on him. China knows its
economy is smaller and more fragile but the Chinese had leverage and used it. The
Toddler Fighter told China not to hit back and he’s at the negotiating table.
Now he’s bombing the living day lights of Iran. Many
people are saying that its part of clever strategy to get leverage over China:
Perhaps it would be leverage but only if you actually
win. He’s saying he’s won and everything will be over soon. Yet, the Iranians
are still firing missiles and they’ve made a point to the GCC (Oil Rich
American allies who buy American hardware) that American protection isn’t what it
is cracked up to be. It took 20-years for the Taliban to be replaced with the Taliban.
It taken two weeks for Khamenei to be replaced by Khamenei. The only Iranians dancing
in the streets and thanking him are the exiles. The ones in Iran proper have
now rallied around what was an unpopular government. How is that winning?
America is winning on the battlefield. However, just
about every credible analyst is making the point that it isn’t winning the war.
Sure, China pays more for oil – but so does America. The Iranian regime is
still there. Trump wants investment but who wants to invest in a place where
the leader is willing to tear everything down? He’s asking Iran to not retaliate.
Why would they do that when you’re bombing them?
In the first Gulf War, there was a president who knew
what he was doing. Bush the Elder came to defend Saudi Arabia. He went out of
the way to not make it a “holy war” against Muslims by keeping Israel out when
Saddam sent Scuds. He saw to it that he got an invitation from the Saudi’s
after Saddam had marched into Kuwait and he made damn sure that he got things
done before Ramadan was even mentioned. Today, you have an American President
who does what an Israeli Prime Minister convicted of genocide wants, hitting
first in the middle of Islam’s most sacred month. How is that a win for America
on the global stage?
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