Chincken-hawks or What Triggers Me.

It is one of my most favorite videos but this hilarious representation of the Korean Conflict applies fully to many US legislators whose only skill is barking. 

I abhor ANY war-monger, anywhere, who never having a real service and background to make even tactical, forget about operational and strategic decisions in their lives bark their non-sense into the air due to their recognition of the fact that they themselves will never have to go and fight, let alone die for the principles they love to show off as their moral compass, while in reality being nothing more than political prostitutes and chihuahuas in human terms. Enter couple of such guys: 

1. Senator Richard Blumenthal. His bio states this:

Born in Brooklyn, New York, Blumenthal attended Riverdale Country School, a private school in the Bronx. He graduated from Harvard College, where he was editor-in-chief of The Harvard Crimson. He studied for a year at Trinity College, Cambridge, in England before attending Yale Law School, where he was editor-in-chief of the Yale Law Journal. At Yale, he was a classmate of Bill and Hillary Clinton. From 1970 to 1976, Blumenthal served in the United States Marine Corps Reserve, attaining the rank of sergeant. After law school, Blumenthal passed the bar and served as administrative assistant and law clerk for several Washington, D.C. figures. From 1977 to 1981, he was United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut. In the early 1980s he worked in private law practice, including as volunteer counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. ... Blumenthal received five draft deferments during the Vietnam War, first educational deferments, then deferments based on his occupation. In April 1970 Blumenthal enlisted in the United States Marine Corps Reserve which, The New York Times reported, "virtually guaranteed that he would not be sent to Vietnam". He served in units in Washington, D.C., and Connecticut from 1970 to 1976, attaining the rank of sergeant. During his 2010 Senate campaign, news report videos that showed Blumenthal claiming he had served in Vietnam created a controversy. Blumenthal denied having intentionally misled voters, but acknowledged having occasionally "misspoken" about his service record. He later apologized to voters for remarks about his military service which he said had not been "clear or precise"

Yes, Stolen Valor and draft dodging are very wide-spread among US political class, enough to remember Hillary's "courage under fire" and then Brian Williams' being fired upon in Iraq. All of it, obviously, turning out to be a complete BS. So, it is not a bug but a feature. 

2. Representative Joe Courtney. Yet another lawyer pretending to "serve American people", who saw military service on TV in such shows as M.A.S.H. and movies by Oliver Stone, who, BTW, is a bona fide Vietnam Veteran. 

So these two "heroes", who wouldn't know the difference between targeting and firing solution, came up with a brilliant idea: 

American sailors should be prepared to take on Russia and show their strength as the country goes “head to head” with Moscow amid fears of a possible invasion of Ukraine, two US legislators have demanded. ...Blumenthal said that he agreed with President Joe Biden that the US should not send soldiers to fight in Ukraine, but insisted that increasing NATO capabilities in the region would be an important part of showing strength “around the world in other areas where we go head-to-head with the Russians.” In particular, he pointed to the role submarines can play in confronting Moscow. “Undersea warfare – because we’re talking about the Mediterranean, about the Black Sea as potential areas of tension and conflict – is very much in play even though it isn’t directly involved in the confrontation in the Eastern Ukraine area or Crimea or in the northern borders of Ukraine, which represent perhaps the greatest immediate threat in Belarus, where Putin is amassing forces right now.”

I have some news for Blumenthal and his side-kick. The fact that Blumenthal sits on the Armed Services Committee and is privy to some chit-chat by people who know and has access to classified briefings doesn't make him a specialist on naval warfare or any warfare to start with. They don't teach that in Law Schools and it is much harder to command a modern submarine than passing a bar exam. In fact, several order of magnitude harder. But the main news, of course, is the fact that US Navy's submarine forces ARE present in Med and have been there for a long time. So, how "going head-to-head with Russians" in submarine warfare looks like, Blumenthal will not understand even if I, out of goodness of my soul, will agree to give him a course of lectures on hydrology, non-acoustic sensors, tactics and operations, review with his a variety of highly classified tactical and operational manuals related to submarine operations, and maybe even explain to him basics of signal processing and why one doesn't want to use a cookie cutter. Even after that, he still will not understand that, including the fact that this "head-to-head" thing is happening in Med right this very moment as I type this. 

So, I am triggered always, when some uneducated hack (or collection of hacks) who do not know shit from shinola and have ZERO military professional background at least of the tactical officer level begin to wax "Top Gunnish" and based on their Hollywood military porn "expertise" begin to offer their advice on matter they have no clue about. And clue they don't have. Everything they do when offering their nauseating war-mongering fodder is done for a PR purposes only, and serve ONLY one thing they desire above all--to be re-elected to maintain their position of power and possible financial benefits which US Congress affords its members. Considering a very high susceptibility of the American population to military porn and aggressive rhetoric, due to America's utter illiteracy about real war and warfare, this works for people like Blumenthal. It doesn't work, however, in real life and real war, but neither of these two would know anything about it. Nor do they understand how they look like barking chihuahuas when proposing something which is already in place and is ongoing. But then again, look at the video above.

No Sh.t Moment.

It is a Victory Day in Russia and elsewhere in the world where people of good heart and will celebrate those who sacrificed so much to save civilization. But...life never stops and a major No Shit moment just occurred with POTUS. 

Donald Trump is questioning his administration’s aggressive strategy in Venezuela following the failure of a US-backed effort to oust Nicolás Maduro, complaining he was misled about how easy it would be to replace the socialist president with a young opposition figure, according to administration officials and White House advisers. The president’s dissatisfaction has crystallised around national security adviser John Bolton and what Mr Trump has groused is an interventionist stance at odds with his view that the United States should stay out of foreign quagmires. Mr Trump has said in recent days that Mr Bolton wants to get him “into a war” – a comment he has made in jest in the past but that now belies his more serious concerns, one senior administration official said.

Ahhh, Mr. President, it is called YOUR (that is Trump's) Administration for a reason--You, nobody else, out of your own free will (and ignorance), stuffed (or deliberately infested) this administration of yours with most imbecilic, incompetent war-mongers, who even failed the smell test in W's admin. That is some crafty bottom feeding you performed which would impress even "Buck" Turgidson. So, Mr. President, now it is a time to own it. War and serious international relations are not your run of the mill New York real estate shyster dealings--they do require real qualifications and skills. But, let Mr. Trump deal with this smelly business himself, after all, according to sources:

Despite Mr Trump’s grumbling that Bolton had gotten him out on a limb on Venezuela, Mr Bolton’s job is safe, two senior administration officials said, and Mr Trump has told his national security adviser to keep focusing on Venezuela.

A classic case of serious bi-polar syndrome which afflicted current Administration which, evidently, is not really Trump's, methinks. It is akin to asking a plumber (nothing against this highly needed profession) to continue to perform open heart surgery on a dying patient. Or, for that matter, letting a fox guard chickens in a chicken coop. No shit. 

Stephen Cohen Makes A Slight Mistake.

When Dr. Stephen Cohen speaks, I listen. So, I read his latest piece on pathological neocon war-mongers (most of them draft-dodgers or humanities "professors" thousands miles away from theaters of operation) in RT. It is a good piece:

Anyone who has lived through or studied the preceding forty-year Cold War will recognize the ominous echoes of its most dangerous periods, when actual war was on the horizon or a policy option. Here are only a few random but representative examples: In a March 8 Washington Post opinion article, two American professors, neither with any apparent substantive knowledge of Russia or Cold War history, warned that the Kremlin is trying “to undermine our trust in the institutions that sustain a strong nation and a strong democracy. The media, science, academia and the electoral process are all regular targets.” Decades ago, J. Edgar Hoover, the policeman of that Cold War, said the same, indeed made it an operational doctrine.

But then Doctor Cohen makes a slight mistake when states that:

But the preceding Cold War was driven by an intense ideological conflict between Soviet Communism and Western capitalism.

Here, we have to be very clear that on the West's (primarily Anglo-Saxon West) side this war was against historic Russia, not "communism" (grossly misunderstood and deliberately misinterpreted) and Russians. Hans Morgenthau was explicit in 1957, as were explicit American ideological doctrines that emphasized:

   "I would say, and I have said many times before, that if the czars still reigned in Russia, that if Lenin had died of the measles at an early age, that if Stalin had never been heard of, but the power of the Soviet Union were exactly what it is today, the problem of Russia would be for us by and large what it is today. If the Russian armies stood exactly where they stand today, and if Russian technological development were what it is today, we would be by and large confronted with the same problems which confront us today."

US problem was not with "communism", which was merely a propaganda cliche, it was with Russia and Russians as  such, as a nation.  It still is. It was and is the issue of precious bodily fluids from the get go, especially today between neocons and so called interventionist "elites". I totally get where Cohen comes from, I addressed this issue myself not for once--US "strategists" (let alone utterly corrupt media) are for the most part unqualified and not that well educated people, as last 20 years, or so, so manifestly demonstrated. The danger of these people such as Kagans, Petraeuses, or this mindless bimbo AOC is that these people are utterly unqualified for a statesmanship and, maybe with some caveat for such military "leader" as Petraeus, have no a faintest idea what real war is. So, I also have issues with calling such a pseudo-"thinker" as Robert Kagan, or coward John Bolton or anyone from this pool of ignoramuses running US foreign policy and military disasters, "warriors"--none of those people have any idea what being real warrior is and that too is a problem. As I stated not for once, I feel slightly more secure when I know that Dunford and Gerasimov talk to each-other--talking to Bolton or Pompeo is a waste of time. 

Today, observing an American wasteland of military and geopolitical thought which follows in step with complete political and ideological degeneration of the American state, one is forced to prepare for war which, in a current American case, could be unleashed by people who have no clue. 

P.S. I don't think that Dr. Cohen serves his noble cause well when references the name of Solzhenitsyn who played his, however small, role in helping to topple one of the versions of the historic Russia and maybe Dr. Cohen has to ask himself a question why the monument to this self-proclaimed "consciousness of Russia" in Moscow is under specifically setup 24/7 video surveillance. But that is a separate topic of Russian history and here I and Dr. Cohen may have different views altogether.