GENERAL THINKING

Dangerous Times: Gimme a General Who Won't Fight!

By James Lewis 

It was Lincoln who said "Give me a general who will fight!" That was after the North was defeated over and over again by Robert E. Lee's smaller and more agile armies. Lincoln's first generals fought desperately hard, but not hard enough to win. In the upshot, the Civil War dragged out to became our bloodiest war ever, 600,000 dead -- mostly white folks. And yes, it was triggered by Christian Abolitionists who made slavery morally intolerable to half the nation. 

Lincoln was therefore forced to find generals who would fight, and he found Sherman and Grant, who wreaked terrible destruction on the South. He could see no alternative.

Soldiers who survived the Civil War lived with their painful wounds for the rest of their lives. They had no modern painkillers, no antibiotics, just liquor, morphine and silent suffering. Fifty years after the Civil War, Oliver Wendell Holmes still ached from his near-fatal war injuries. 

In stark contrast to Lincoln, who demanded to know the truth, Obama is now firing our most successful fighting general -- for telling the truth. 

That's really all we need to know. 

Mr. Obama likes to compare himself to Lincoln, but baby, he ain't no Lincoln! Not even a Ford. Not even a Prius. Martin Luther King was genuinely like Lincoln, because he knowingly risked his life for a cause greater than himself. And like Lincoln, Dr. King was martyred.

Real human progress comes hard, very hard. 

There are heroes in the world. Most of humanity doesn't come close. Compared to Dr. King and Abe Lincoln, Obama is a hollow man, clinging to a faith outworn.

General James Mattis is being fired for insisting on complete contingency planning, according to Pentagon reporter Tom Ricks. Truth-telling isn't welcome in this administration, and that means big trouble ahead. General Mattis and the military understand that. The general insisted on full planning for all predictable outcomes.

Obama is a gambler, and he doesn't want to think about what might happen if his wild gambles don't pay off. He is amazingly overconfident. General Mattis is a thinker. He is a responsible combat leader. 

The differences are huge. 

Lincoln was driven by the conviction that the United States Constitution was the "last, best hope of Mankind." He believed with real justice that only in the New World could a profoundly new form of self-government plant deep roots. Historians like Niall Ferguson continue to make Lincoln's case on the facts. Ferguson points out that in South America, even Simon Bolivar gave up on the possibility of constitutional government. Spain and Portugal did not sow the seeds of self-government in their colonies. They sowed Hispanic caudillismo, the cult of macho heroes like Francisco Franco, Fidel Castro, and Hugo Chavez. 

For all its faults, Britain left a legacy of political compromise and electoral legitimacy all over the world. That is why English-speaking countries still practice electoral self-government today. Hong Kong has a British-style political culture. India does. Mainland China does not. 

Political culture matters. 

General Mattis rose to fame by the success of his combat strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was Mattis who taught his Marines to tell the population that "we are your best friend and your worst enemy." In Iraqistan a lot of people got that. 

In Afghanistan, after the Brits withdrew from Helmand Province with serious losses, the U.S. Marines took over the battleground. They practiced the Mattis Doctrine, walked combat patrols and risked personal death and injury to let the people decide. Today Helmand Province is pacified -- at least until Obama skedaddles outta there.
The Taliban are now holed up in the mountains. They are very patient fanatics. 

At her media-spun Senate testimony Hillary Clinton said "We now face a spreading jihadist threat... We have to recognize this is a global movement." The media were more interested in the soap opera, of course, but that was Clinton's real confession about the Benghazi fiasco. Even the Democrats are willing to tell the truth when it suits their politics. 

Meanwhile the Left still hates George W. Bush for recognizing the truth, and fighting the War on Terror after 9/11/01. 

My crystal ball looks foggy today, but I'll bet we'll hear about the Mattis Doctrine again before the Long Jihad War is done. The Muslim jihad has been going on for fourteen centuries since Mohammed. It doesn't have to be declared, because it is in the Koran. But they declare it anyway everywhere Muslims are indoctrinated, except to the liberal suckers. We will hear all about the Mattis Doctrine as soon as this country is ready to face the obvious truth. Truth tellers will be in demand again. 

Meanwhile, Obama is mentally locked into the idea that Marxism Lite is better than the U.S. Constitution. 

But Lincoln was right and Obama is dismally wrong. In Lincoln's time, Europe had gone back to its ancient ways after the horrors of the French Revolution, turning away from elected governments in favor of Napoleonic emperors -- like the various Kaisers, Hitler, and Stalin. 

The world wars of the 20th century all started with European imperialism: Austro-Hungarian, German, Soviet. They all imitated Napoleon and the Prussian Reich --- which inspired Karl Marx. Marxism is Prussian Kaisertum writ large. The Marxists don't admit that, but they have a problem with the truth anyway. They constantly lie to themselves; don't expect them to tell the truth about their own horror story. 

Obama is a Euro-socialist who imagines that socialism has finally discovered the solution to peace and war. This is so delusional that it's not even worth arguing over. Only fantasy mongers believe it. But like his Kenyan father, Obama is mentally stuck in Marxism Lite. He wants to copy Eurosocialism at the very time it is breaking down in front of our eyes. 

So Mr. Obama wants to withdraw from the world. Well, then let the Germans defend Europe, let Japan defend Asia, and leave South America to Hugo Chavez. America can then pretend there are no ballistic missiles armed with nukes only 20 minutes away in Russia, Iran, China, and North Korea. Ballistic missiles float free once they leave the atmosphere. The Iranians have launched satellites, proving that their rockets can also float around the world and hit New York City. Obama wants to cut the military to the bone while China and Iran, and soon Egypt (financed by the Saudis) have nukes and missiles. 

Obama wants to have it both ways, spending tens of trillions to keep the Democrats in power forever while pleading poverty to take the American cop off the world beat. Obama doesn't dare to think about failure. But failure of leftist fantasies is the norm, not the exception. Mass delusion is what killed the Soviet Empire. Mass delusion is what we are seeing in America today, spread by the mass media. 

Our military are smarter and more morally responsible than our demagogues. They constantly plan for what might happen, not just what they wish for. 

General Mattis is a morally responsible individual. Obama is not. 

So General Mattis has to go. 

In Obama's America the voters still hope that delusional fantasies will turn out to be true. Doctors will work for free, miracle drugs will be developed free, taxes are only for the rich, and Democrats are really compassionate. 

They're happy to give free liquor to the drunks, in exchange for a vote.

Well, the truth will out. As usual. 

Meanwhile, General Mattis has taught his Marines and Soldiers to practice the Mattis Doctrine. Maybe some retired officers will do the needed contingency planning for unwanted futures that are sure to come. George Patton didn't stop planning when he was demoted. He knew he would be needed, soon enough. 

That might save the United States when we turn to the truth tellers again. 

Semper Fi, General.  No one has done better.