Former Secretary of Defense Robert S McNamara made a
documentary titled The Fog of War lessons from the Life of a
Robert S McNamara. He was Secretary of Defense
during the Cuban Missile Crisis as well as the war in Vietnam.
He says lesson #1 empathize with your enemy.
That's what I call empathy. We must try to put ourselves
inside their skin and look at us through their eyes just to
understand the thoughts that lie behind their decisions and their
actions. This is why even serial killers
get to take the stand during their trial.
This is why you have to hear the defense, not just the
prosecution in the Cuban Missile Crisis.
At the end, I think we did put ourselves in the skin of the
Soviets. In the case of Vietnam, we
didn't know them well enough to empathize, and there was a total
misunderstanding. As a result.
They believed we had simply replaced the French as a
colonial power, and we were seeking to subject South and
North Vietnam to our colonial interests, which was absolutely
absurd. And we saw Vietnam as an element
of the Cold War, not what they saw it as a civil war.
I have been researching the topic of warfare, politics,
history along with 911 for more than a decade.
Here are some lessons I think we can take from this tragedy and
hope to find some productive way of going about things in the
future. Lesson #1 Do not let tragedies
put you in the state of mind which allows you to be
manipulated into becoming the very thing you claim to oppose.
Warfare is based on lies. Politicians engage in threat,
inflation and explicit lies. Unnecessary tactic to get people
to put their lives on the line unnecessarily.
Doing nothing is better than doing something bad and
counterproductive. Civilians frequently have to
bear the cost of decisions made by politicians, known as
blowback, when a few politicians and contractors and soldiers
benefit at the expense of their domestic population.
People who pay no price for being wrong or acting immorally.
Politicians are more likely to act recklessly since they are
coercively funded with taxation and face legal immunity with
regard to killing civilians. God says thou shall not murder.
He does not make exceptions for people born in distant
geographical areas. The inequality between the state
and the citizenry is the most dangerous inequality in society.
Finally, it shouldn't take an act of terrorism for Americans
to unify. Americans should be proud of the
achievements of workers and entrepreneurs in the voluntary
sector who raised the world's living standards to heights
never imagined by kings or Queens of the past.
The following excerpt is from a speech I gave in New York City
at the Blockchain Center titled The State is the Health of War.
Thank you for watching the Libertarian Institute and Keith
Knight Don't tread on anyone. Go back to September 20th of
2001. President George W Bush
addressed Congress and said the following Americans are asking
why do they hate us? They hate what they see in this
chamber, a democratically elected government.
Their leaders are self appointed.
They hate our freedoms, our freedom of religion, our freedom
of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with
each other. Here are Osama bin Laden's
actual words published in a book titled Al Qaeda in Its Own
Words, published by Harvard University.
Section is titled Tactical Recommendations, Bin Laden says.
Then the fighters realized that the gang in the White House
could not see things clearly and that their leader, that idiot
they obey, was claiming that we envied their lifestyle.
When the truth, which this Pharaoh would like to hide, is
that we are attacking them because of their injustice
toward the Muslim world and especially Palestine and Iraq,
as well as their occupation of the land of the two sanctuaries.
When the fighter saw this, they decided to come out of the
shadows and take the fight into their territory, into their
homes. And herein lies the importance
of libertarianism. We are going to be in a
continuous back and forth of fake divides, Black versus
white, man versus woman, rich versus poor, Muslim versus
non-muslim, Russia versus America, China versus America.
The only justifiable divide in society that we should tolerate
are those who achieve their ends by initiating fraud and violence
against peaceful people, and those who achieve their ends
through peaceful trade and voluntary cooperation.
Even the invasion of Afghanistan after September 11th, 2001 was
not necessary. But because the state is the
health of war, the politicians who got us in there knew they
weren't going to have to pay the price.
In fact, it would actually win them a lot of friends along with
the defense contractors, and none of them were afraid that
they owe. They might go to jail if they
kill any civilians or wage an unjust war.
That is another example of how the state is the health of war.
The Guardian October 14th, 2001 Bush rejects Taliban offer to
hand bin Laden over The president said the bombing would
not stop unless the ruling Taliban turn bin Laden over,
turn his cohorts over, turn any hostages they hold over.
He added, No need to discuss innocence or guilt.
We know he's guilty. Haji Abdul Kabir, the third most
powerful figure in the ruling Taliban regime, told reporters
that the Taliban would require evidence that bin Laden was
behind the September 11th terrorist attacks in the US, but
added we would be ready to hand him over to a third country.
If the Taliban is given evidence that Osama bin Laden is involved
and the bombing campaign stopped, we would be ready to
hand him over to a third country, Mr. Kabir added.
Along with the invasion of Iraq, another example of how the state
is the health of war. This invasion was a base, but
primarily on lies. George W Bush in his 2003 State
of the Union address said the British government has learned
that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of
uranium from Africa. This was refuted in an article
titled What I Didn't Find in Africa by Joe Wilson, who was
the alleged source of this uranium purchase.
He is the husband of Valerie Plame.
Vice President Dick Cheney went on to Meet the Press December
9th, 2001 and was referring to Muhammad Atta, the infamous
September 11th hijacker, saying it's been pretty well confirmed
that he, Atta did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior
official of the Iraqi intelligence service.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was interviewed by
George Stephanopoulos on ABC News March of 2003, saying we
know where they are, Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.
They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east,
West, South and N somewhat when it comes to the invasion of
Syria. Here is another lie that the War
on Terror has something to do with fighting against al Qaeda.
It actually involves allying with al Qaeda in a number of
instances. Here is Jake Sullivan, the
current National Security Advisor for President Joe Biden.
In a e-mail sent to Hillary Clinton on February 12th, 2012,
Sullivan says see last item AQ is on our side in Syria.
Otherwise, things have basically turned out as expected.
This is high level officials knowing for a fact that the US
is on the side of Al Qaeda in Syria for the sake of taking
down the Bashar al-Assad regime, which Obama publicly came out
and said Assad can no longer be the Prime Minister of Syria.
He's an illegitimate ruler. When it comes to Libya, 2
headlines from the New York Times will do.
First one from 2011 says US tactics in Libya may be a model
for other efforts. A couple years later, 2015 New
York Times says ISIS's grip on Libyan city gives it a fall back
option. So the foreign policy to take
out a terrible dictator, Moammar Gaddafi, ended with the Islamic
State controlling large portions of Libya.
This is the organization they were allying with in Syria.
These wars are to the point where they are so unjustifiable.
Major neoconservative Max Boot published an article in Foreign
Affairs to his credit, titled What Neo Cons Got Wrong and How
the Iraq War Taught Me About the Limits of American Power.
Boot says March 10th, 2023 regime change obviously did not
work out as intended. The occupations of Afghanistan
and Iraq were in fact Fiasco's that exacted a high price in
both blood and treasure for both the United States and even more
of course, the countries it invaded.
Robert Apape and James K Feldman wrote a book titled Cutting the
Fuse, The Explosion of Global Suicide Terrorism and How to
Stop It. On page 8.
They describe the book as the first complete data set of all
suicide terrorist attacks around the world from 1980 to 2009.
Their research concludes with nearly all emerged from
communities resisting foreign military occupation.
From the introduction from 1980 to 2003, there were 345
completed suicide terrorist attacks by 524 suicide
terrorists who actually killed themselves on a mission to kill
others, half of whom are secular.
The world leader was the Tamil Tigers, a secular Hindu group
who carried out more attacks than Hamas or Palestinian
Islamic Jihad PIJ during this period.
Further, at least a third of the suicide attacks in predominantly
Muslim countries were carried out by secular terrorist groups
such as the Kurdistan Workers Party, PKK in Turkey, instead of
religion. What over 95% of all suicide
terrorist attacks before 2004 had in common was a strategic
goal to compel a democratic state to withdraw combat forces
that are threatening territory that the terrorists prize.
From Lebanon to Sri Lanka to the West Bank to Chechnya, the
central goal of every suicide terrorist campaign has been to
resist military occupation by a democracy.
The authors go on to summarize their findings #1 strong
confirmation for the hypothesis that military occupation is the
main factor driving suicide terrorism.
The stationing of foreign combat forces, ground and tactical Air
Force units on territory that terrorists prize accounts for
87% of the over 1800 suicide terrorist attacks around the
world since 2004 #2 strong evidence for new hypotheses
about the causes of transnational suicide terrorism.
Dying to Win, Robert Pape's previous book, explain that
nationalism, the desire to perpetuate the local political,
religious and social institutions of a community
independent of foreign interference, is the taproot
explanation for why individuals from a community facing foreign
military occupation would undertake costly measures to
defend it. In concluding in Extremist
suicide Terrorism, it was the Hindu avowedly anti religious
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam LTTE in Sri Lanka whose 157
suicide terrorists totaled more than Hamas and all other
Palestinian suicide groups combined.
Of the Palestinian suicide terrorists, more than 1/3 were
from secular groups such as Alaska Martyrs Brigade and
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine PFLP.
Of the suicide terrorists associated with Hezbollah in
Lebanon during the 1980s, only 21% were Islamic
fundamentalists, while 71% were Communists and socialists, 8%
were Christians. In Turkey, 100% of the PKK's
suicide attackers were secular. Overall, Islamic fundamentalism
can not account for over half of the known affiliations.
Of the 524 suicide terrorists from 1980 to 2003, 184 were from
Islamic fundamentalist groups, 35% comprising 73.
Al Qaeda 5. Lebanese 5.
Kashmiri rebels, 69. Hamas, 34.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad and 236 from secular groups. 45%
comprising 157 Tamil Tigers, 42. Alaska, 22.
Lebanese, 15. PKK, while 1221% had unknown
ideological affiliations. The authors then quote three of
the alleged Saudi hijackers. First, Abul al Jarrah al Gamiti.
What is happening in Muslim countries today?
Blatant occupation about which there was no doubt.
There was no duty more obligatory after faith than to
repel him. Second, Abu Musaf Walid al
Sherry. The occupation and deterioration
in the land of the two sanctuaries is a plot by the Jew
and the Nazarenes, foremost among them America, may Allah
destroy it, which has been among the chief causes of every
misfortune suffered by Islam and the Muslims.
Thus repelling the Americans. Occupying the land of the two
sanctuaries is the most obligatory of obligations.
Finally, Hamza al Gandhi and I say to America, if it wants its
armies and people to be safe, then it must withdraw all of its
forces from Muslim lands and depart from all our countries.
If not, let it await the men, prepare the coffins and dig
graves for its citizens. The authors finished the
introduction saying further notice that there are no suicide
attackers from Iran, one of the largest Islamic fundamentalist
populations in the world, with a population greater than Iraq,
Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan and Syria combined.