Listening to Mattis

Former Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel with Gen.James Mattis. Both are technically international war criminals.

I watched US Secretary of Defense ‘General’ Mattis live on 19 January and I’m reasonably sure a lot of us either watched him or know what he said. Pretty good performance for someone who should know better and I can not determine if the good Tovarich General actually believed what he was saying or not. He was a political general, pure and simple, I don’t care if and where he ‘cut his teeth’ (in my opinion he has not done so) but at his rank he says what he’s told to say. What he looked like to me, with his clear message of ‘obey us or else’, was a low level street thug trying trying to impress the crowd with his strength and prowess. Didn’t work for me and I can only imagine the cringe and face palm factor from those company grade and lower combat soldiers who saw this utmost display of foolishness.

He pulled out the usual [fabricated threats to USA: Russia and China’s ‘revisionist regimes’ trying to undermine Nato and EU with economic and military ‘threats’ on the very borders of EU; ‘rogue regimes’ of Syria and Iran ‘destabilizing’ the Middle East; terrorist organizations of ISIS, Al Qaeda and ‘Lebanon’s Hezbollah’ doing likewise. His threats were very clear to anyone expressing discontent with the dictum emanating from Foggy Bottom and Five Points: “To those who would threaten America’s experiment in democracy: if you challenge us (read don’t obey us), it will be your longest and worst day.” But where is the willingness to negotiate, to speak to others of different cultures and regions who may or may not share the same goals as USA? There is no such willingness, USA has shown a marked tendency to simply ignore any signed or de facto agreement they have made at their will. In other words, The World knows very clearly now that the USA is not to be trusted and because of past activities is never to be trusted and will never be trusted.

Bottom line is this: USA today has arguably the largest and most heavily equipped military force on this rock. It has the ability to project ‘strength’ anywhere in the world on relatively short notice but that strength is not by any stretch of the imagination overwhelming. To project ‘overwhelming’ forces to an area of conflict takes them many months and that projection is based on the supposition that their lines of transport and supply are free of any threats whatsoever. All well and fine when you are dealing with a country or region that has few if any strategic assets but on the other hand, this world is changing, witness the Yemen mess and more than one vessel ‘under US contract’ and units of the Saudi ‘navy’ getting a missile up their noses. Anyone who thinks that cannot happen to US assets and/or transportation contractors is living in a different world.

[dropcap]S[/dropcap]ince the beginning of somewhat organized warfare over 5000 years ago, supply and transport interdiction has been practiced alongside of organized armies. For eons this interdiction involved foot-soldier based attempts at individual convoys of materials and food. With the advent of somewhat accurate artillery some centuries ago along with controlled explosives a little over a century ago, interdiction of supply units was more serious and led to ever growing counter measures. With the advent of air assets interdiction attempts became even more widespread and with the availability of both submerged and missile assets this interdiction could, and in many instances did, become a far more serious and effective effort. Today, with the readily available shoulder fired missiles interdiction can be a very serious problem. Who is to say that the innocent little fishing boat does not have a dual charge thermobaric antitank missile sitting on the hull floor, said missile having a range for some in excess of 500 meters. What are you going to do, machine gun every little boat within a klick of your ship or convoy?

Air transport assets are likewise becoming increasingly vulnerable. So far the USA has been amazingly lucky in that respect. I remember the laughter when the CIA armed the Taliban in Afghanistan with Stinger missiles, sat back and laughed at the resultant disruption of Soviet air assets. Perhaps they don’t think the same can happen to them? With today’s readily available shoulder-fired anti air missiles, all it will take is one lad on a high hilltop to do significant physical and psychological damage to any effort to deliver or supply the ‘overwhelming force’ being transported to the next hot spot of USA choosing.

Additionally, the day will come when one of those floating aerodromes will not be as safe and secure as it was a scant few years ago. The winds of fortune are beginning to be adverse, witness an incident a couple years ago in the Black Sea following which virtually the entire US fleet of carriers was pulled out of service for an emergency modification. Something scared the pants off of them. Do you think the Yemen Houthi units do not have missile assets? They’ve already shown they do and know how to use them. Of course the missiles were all ‘provided by Iran’ but that’s a different topic. For a floating aerodrome, you do not have to come anywhere near sinking it or damaging its engine system; damage to the superstructure landing deck will suffice to put it out of action for a very long time, let alone the possibility of subsequent fires and destruction of aircraft and ordinance as secondary damage. If you think not, just look at what J. McCain did to the USS Forrestal with one errant missile launch on the flight deck.

Economically, USA can not void its bladder in the Chinese bowl of Cheerios, to do so will destroy the current bedrock of the US economy, this bedrock being China and to a slightly lesser extent South Korea. Likewise, the USA will not attack the DPRK for the same reason that the capital and financial hub of South Korea is within easy artillery and missile range of the DPRK. USA will continue to ratchet up the sanctions on Russia and China for ‘breaking’ the total trade embargo on DPRK, these sanctions being, each and every one of them, an Act of War.

On 17 January 2018, R. Tillerson, the US Secretary of State, said the following, courtesy of Russia Today on 19 January and the interview was posted on Youtube by the US Department of State:

https://www.rt.com/usa/416354-tillerson-un-sanctions-north-korea/

“Signs of starvation and death in North Korea indicate that US diplomatic strategy (sic) works fine, says the secretary of state. The objective now is not to let Pyongyang evoke sympathy around the world for its sanctions-induced woes.”

This unexpectedly revealing description of what R. Tillerson apparently considers successful diplomacy came from his own mouth on Wednesday as he was speaking at Stanford University with former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice.

If either or both of these clowns think the entire world does not know what they are saying and doing, they are so far out of touch as to be ludicrous. Such a callous statement from a current and a former US Secretary of State shows the entire world exactly what they think of us, but then we already knew that. What would these coddled and insulated worthies think if it was their citizens, their families, wives, husbands, children, starving to death to make a ‘diplomatic’ point?

And then we have that lovely term, “Collateral damage”, as in maimed and dead civilians who ‘got in the way’ simply because they happened to live or be in an area that was being bombed by the air forces of USA/NATO? Look what you have done in the last not quite 3 decades:

None of the aforementioned countries, politicians and military commanders entertained the least thought of fighting what have been proven to be the US and EU bought and paid for terrorist organizations of ISIL, IGIL, Daesh, and a dozen of other names, all of which have done their damnedest to destroy President Bashar al-Assad and his government. In 4 years, the terrorist organizations grew in numbers and equipment exponentially, as almost the entire country was occupied by terrorist organizations with the direct, on sight, hands on assistance of operatives and serving military of USA, Germany, UK, Canada, Jordan, Turkey and France and vast infusions of money and equipment from NATO, USA, Canada, Poland, Bulgaria, Romania, Czech Republic, Germany, Holland, France and UK.

Late generation Russian MIG fighter bomber deployed to Syria. Introduced in 2015, just a small contingent of Russian aviation soon began to turn the Takfiri tide against Assad, and Syria began to reclaim her raped sovereignty. The hated hegemon was not amused.

In late summer of 2015, President al-Assad was estimated to be less than two weeks from total defeat. He appealed to President V. V. Putin of Russia for help. President Putin agreed to assist Syria and as such is the only LEGAL foreign entity in the entire country (besides Iranian and Hezbollah forces, also operating with Damascus’ permission). Every other foreign military and serviceman is an illegal fighter against the Government of Syria. In 6 months with an air unit that never numbered more than 50 airframes at any given time, Russia stopped the advance of the terrorists, brought entire units of the Syrian Army to Russia for intense training and equipage and assisted the Syrian Army in their fight against the NATO/US coalition. In a year and a half, the coalition was to all intents defeated. The hegemon is not amused and the fighting is ongoing but Syria will not fall. With time President al-Assad will again rule over a hopefully peaceful country again. He will also spend the next 20 years rebuilding what the coalition destroyed.

This entire war in Syria was towards one simple goal: Run the oil and gas pipelines to the Syrian coast from the oil rich countries of the Middle East and destroy Russia’s profitable supply business with Europe. No other reason. They failed.

There is no need to detail the other crimes of USA in Ukraine, central Africa, Afghanistan, Panama, Nicaragua, Brazil, Venezuela and Korea. The self-described “shining light of freedom, democracy and prosperity” has done nothing but foment death, fire and destruction for 65 years and now the Secretary of Defense has told The World to either obey Washington or suffer the consequences. However, he did not say who would suffer the consequences. Perhaps he should look in a mirror.

As for President Trump, I don’t recognize him today. I’ve been on this rock a long time and I’ve never seen the vitriol poured on any sitting or past president of the likes thrown at him every day and all day. We’ll see how this all pans out, I have not a clue, but I do know that, while his bedrock of support is still solid, if he gets US in a war with Iran and/or DPRK, that support will evaporate like the sound of the gossamer wings of a spring butterfly when the body bags start coming back in Lord forbid their hundreds or their thousands. Neither country is a pushover; if they were they would have already been invaded and the US PTB knows this fact very well. All whoever are actually running США can do is shout, bluster, snarl and toss ever more sanctions on those who ‘do not obey’. This is a fool’s errand that will eventually trigger blowback in spades. Just think of the numbers of countries and populations out there who are longing for the chance to return some of that ‘collateral damage’…..in like kind and with glee. What you sow, so shall you reap, a saying that apparently the USA PTB never learned. But they might.

—Auslander