(C-32)
The Terrorist are Coming
Summer
‘You must understand, therefore, that there are two ways of fighting: by law or by force. The first way is natural to men, and the second to beasts. But as the first way often proves inadequate one must have recourse to the second.’
— Niccolo Machiavelli in "The Prince."
Editorial
By
Jacob Thorton.
Thoughts on the coming Election
Scary ‘is- being held hostage in a school gym and the kid next to you is parched and asks for water and the terrorist stabs him in the belly in front of your eyes.’
The school in Russian that was attacked was a reminder for all of those who needed a reminder, that the war on terror isn't a game that is played in the world’s backwaters; but a profound challenge to America and the world’s prospect of freedom.
And Hassan Nasrallah said, "Let the entire world hear me. Our hostility to the Great Satan [America] is absolute . . . Regardless of how the world has changed after 11 September, Death to America will remain our reverberating and powerful slogan: Death to America."
Could what happened in Beslan happen in the US? A simple answer YES!
In July of 2004 the Minneapolis Star-Tribune wrote a story on Mohamad Kamal Elzahabi, a suspected terrorist who'd fought in Chechnya, then found his way to Minnesota, where he'd applied for a CDL licenses to transport hazardous materials and drive school buses.
School Buses those big right yellow things you see in the morning as you drive off to work. You know the ones that stop frequently and pick up those little monsters, KIDS!
Your KIDS, our KIDS, why wasn’t this story on every news channel and the lead story on every front page, it’s the children, our children, our future that is in peril; for God’s sake AMERICA wake up.
But no the liberal media is in denial and because of that they keep most Americans ill informed, or go through the motions and bury the story on page B17. Always saying that Kofi and Co i.e. the UN will handle the problem. That we as Americans shouldn’t get on our high horse and go and cowboy around trying to pick a fight without approval.
They use the word Cowboy as if it’s a slur against decent Americans and I personally resent that. A fellow writer summed up what being a cowboy is.
My Heroes are Cowboys
By Damon Wheeler, May 5, 2003
By Damon Wheeler, May 5, 2003
‘When I was a kid, cowboys were my heroes. I loved the cowboys of the movies; I mean the ones in the white hats, not the black hats, who were the bad guys. Early on, I loved Tom Mix, Hopalong Cassidy, Red Ryder, Roy Rogers, and Gene Autry. When I was twelve years old, I had a bit part in a Gene Autry movie made in Pioneer Town, California. If you remember Gene Autry you recall how he always got the girl with a song. Then later there was James Arness as Marshall Matt Dillon, Gary Cooper, Charlton Heston, Glenn Ford, Jimmy Stewart, and of course, my favorite,
John Wayne.
What were common character traits of these legendary cowboys? Here are some that I recall:
1. They were never looking for trouble, but when it came, they faced it with courage.
John Wayne.
What were common character traits of these legendary cowboys? Here are some that I recall:
1. They were never looking for trouble, but when it came, they faced it with courage.
2. Their word was their bond. It meant something.
3. They were always on the side of right.
4. They defended good people against bad people and were not afraid of them.
5. They had high morals.
6. They had good manners.
7. They were honest. Lying didn't get it.
8. They spoke their minds and they spoke the truth, regardless of what people thought or "political correctness," which no one had ever heard of back then anyway.
9. Their reputation was important and their friends trusted them. They were beacons of integrity in tough, wild time of the old West.
10. They were respected. When they walked into a saloon, the place became quiet, and the bad guys kept their distance. They could drink their sarsaparilla, milk, or spirits in peace.
11. If in a gunfight, they could outdraw anyone. If in a fist fight, they could take it on the chin and still get the best of the big, bad guy.
12. They always won. They always got their man. In victory, they rode off into the sunset with their white hats intact.
These cowboys played out stories of the days when there was such a thing as right and wrong, something blurred in our modern world, and denied by many. Those were the days when women were respected and treated as ladies, because they acted like ladies.
Now as a senior citizen, I still like cowboys. They represent something good-- something pure that America has been missing lately.
Ronald Reagan was a cowboy. I liked Ronald Reagan, he was brave, positive, and gave us hope through strength. He wore a white hat. To the consternation of his liberal critics, he had the courage to call a spade a spade when he called the former Soviet Union what it was -- the "evil empire". Liberals hated the likes of Ronald Reagan. They prefer the style of the Ted Kennedy or Bill Clinton types, somehow able to shrug off little lapses of courage and character as "their personal life", such as leaving the scene of a drunken accident and allowing a girl to drown at Chappaquiddick and debauchery in the oval office and lying about it while sanctimoniously looking squarely into the camera lens in front of millions. No, they sure aren't cowboys, and their character lapses sure don't square with my idea of heroes.’
Now look who is calling our current President a "cowboy." It used to tick me off when the America haters in the Middle East, or the socialist detractors in Europe, Hollywood and other cesspools of America called my President "a cowboy", but the more I think about it, the more glad I am that he is. They hate President Bush because, like Reagan, he distinguishes between good and evil He called a spade a spade after 9-11 when he called terrorism and those that do it or support it "evil," without mincing any words. And more than just talking about it, he set a course of action to do something about it. He called out the regimes that harbored and supported terrorism and told them to pack their bags and get out of Dodge or be in the middle of the street wearing their iron at high noon.
And I like the cowboy talk too. "Bin Laden Wanted Dead or Alive". Our President also told the French to "put their cards on the table" (old West talk), which they did, exposing their cowardice and greed.
Remember in the cowboy movies how the heroes always had to overcome the cowardice of the town to rid it of the bad guys. Gary Cooper got no help at high noon. When our President told the Taliban and Saddam that the game was over, this shocked the liberal establishment and those so-called "allies" who have been profiteering with the evil regimes.
These cowboys played out stories of the days when there was such a thing as right and wrong, something blurred in our modern world, and denied by many. Those were the days when women were respected and treated as ladies, because they acted like ladies.
Now as a senior citizen, I still like cowboys. They represent something good-- something pure that America has been missing lately.
Ronald Reagan was a cowboy. I liked Ronald Reagan, he was brave, positive, and gave us hope through strength. He wore a white hat. To the consternation of his liberal critics, he had the courage to call a spade a spade when he called the former Soviet Union what it was -- the "evil empire". Liberals hated the likes of Ronald Reagan. They prefer the style of the Ted Kennedy or Bill Clinton types, somehow able to shrug off little lapses of courage and character as "their personal life", such as leaving the scene of a drunken accident and allowing a girl to drown at Chappaquiddick and debauchery in the oval office and lying about it while sanctimoniously looking squarely into the camera lens in front of millions. No, they sure aren't cowboys, and their character lapses sure don't square with my idea of heroes.’
Now look who is calling our current President a "cowboy." It used to tick me off when the America haters in the Middle East, or the socialist detractors in Europe, Hollywood and other cesspools of America called my President "a cowboy", but the more I think about it, the more glad I am that he is. They hate President Bush because, like Reagan, he distinguishes between good and evil He called a spade a spade after 9-11 when he called terrorism and those that do it or support it "evil," without mincing any words. And more than just talking about it, he set a course of action to do something about it. He called out the regimes that harbored and supported terrorism and told them to pack their bags and get out of Dodge or be in the middle of the street wearing their iron at high noon.
And I like the cowboy talk too. "Bin Laden Wanted Dead or Alive". Our President also told the French to "put their cards on the table" (old West talk), which they did, exposing their cowardice and greed.
Remember in the cowboy movies how the heroes always had to overcome the cowardice of the town to rid it of the bad guys. Gary Cooper got no help at high noon. When our President told the Taliban and Saddam that the game was over, this shocked the liberal establishment and those so-called "allies" who have been profiteering with the evil regimes.
Doom was forecast by all the pundits and liberal media first for our President's resolve to rid Afghanistan of the Taliban and to destroy the bases for training al Qaeda; then it was doom and catastrophe for his plan to rid Iraq of Saddam and his weapons. Righteous speeches were made at the UN touting peace as the only civilized course while the companies of the countries making these speeches lined their pockets dealing in weapons and goods that would ultimately target Americans. Sadly, even in our own country many well meaning, peace loving folks could not gather the resolve to support our President in preserving the ultimate safety of themselves and their fellow Americans. They chose instead to fill the streets with marchers who lacked the spine to stand up for the right of Israel to exist and for Americans to be safe in their homes, at work, when traveling here or abroad. And these made the bad guys lick their chops. They bet that Americans didn't have the courage to stand up to them. They determined to stone wall, deceive, and deride our President as "the cowboy" or "Little Bush". Well, now Saddam has played cowboys and Iraqis.
One thing you never saw in the old western movies was anybody holed up in the church for a shoot out, but occasionally you did find some bad guys masquerading as men of God. The Muslims are wrong. Our President poses no threat to their religion, but he has had the courage to call out those in their midst that are hiding behind their religion and making God out to be a murderer. In the old westerns the masqueraders always got exposed for what they are, and let's hope the Muslims that profess to be good Muslims discover who are the phonies. If our President hadn't been willing to say, "It's not going to be your way.", our whole country would have become hostage to the bad guys, the ruthless and the radical Muslims. In the old West, right was right. Cowboys in white hats were always on the side of right, and that was their might and right prevailed.
I am also thankful my President is a man who prays and who publicly is appreciative of those holding him up in prayer. Cowboys were close to the earth and to God. You better be close to God when you have such awesome responsibilities. And you better give God the credit when your prayers are answered. I've heard our President do that. So, I am glad my President is a cowboy and a man close to God. Watch out Bin Ladens and Saddam Hussein's of the world. He will get his man. Cowboys always do, you know.’
I am also thankful my President is a man who prays and who publicly is appreciative of those holding him up in prayer. Cowboys were close to the earth and to God. You better be close to God when you have such awesome responsibilities. And you better give God the credit when your prayers are answered. I've heard our President do that. So, I am glad my President is a cowboy and a man close to God. Watch out Bin Ladens and Saddam Hussein's of the world. He will get his man. Cowboys always do, you know.’
Damon Wheeler
Now my fellow flatlanders back to the war on terror.
After seeing last week’s massacres, and the proud Islamists' with his pile of Israeli, Iraqis Nepalese and Russian corpses, it hardened my resolve. Then when the UN and Kofi Annan issued the following statement: "The secretary-general strongly condemns all hostage-takings and killings of innocent civilians."
Yeah right, it’s not your throat on the chopping block Kofi, when the next hostage is beheaded will you complain, Again.
Well no thanks Mr. U.N. that maybe your policy in the Sudan, the Congo, or anywhere else in the world you have your grubby little fingers dripping with bloody money, or rapes or what ever corruption your up to today. Americans don't want it to be our policy in this war on terror.
I’m sorry for the Russian people that they are in the cross hairs of the terrorist, the same as America, I think they understand that far better then most elitists in the US of A does.
As for the UN and most other Europeans leaders, they haven’t realized or don’t want to know that the fight against terrorism is the fight of every self-governing nation and it’s freedom loving ideals. They don’t understand yet, that this is their war too, not just our war. Maybe that’s because most Americans have not forgotten the lessons from Pearl Harbor and that terror and tyranny are the enemies of democracy, a lesson hammered to us again on 9/11.
That's why I’ll stick with Bush.
Until next week, sincerely, Jacob Thornton
(C-33)
Separate the Grain from the chaff.
Early Fall
Gen. Tommy Franks ended his interview with a less-than-optimistic note. “It’s not in the history of civilization for peace ever to reign. Never has in the history of man. ... I doubt that we’ll ever have a time when the world will actually be at peace’
"Muhammad is the messenger of Allah.
Those who follow him are merciful to one another
but ruthless to the unbelievers"
-- Qur'an 48:29.
‘In the Name of Allah, The Most Gracious, The Most Kind’
‘Because Allah will never change the grace, which He hath bestowed on a people until they change what is in their own souls: and verily Allah is He Who heareth and knoweth (all things).’ Muslim Prayer
Let the Americans think that the intensity of the fighting against them was on the decline because they had captured Saddam Hussein. He knew the reason, the Americans had no idea why.
Kalida looked over the crowd of fighters he was gathering, he needed experienced men but there was only a few veterans among the throng. Some from fighting the Zionist Christian allies in Lebanon. Others had just returned from Iraq after fighting the Americans there, combined their numbers were small in comparison to the overwhelming majority of new recruits that needed to be trained. And so little time if he was to keep his promise to lead them against the infidels in their own land. Those gathering here today might number two thousand at the most but when you added that to the six other such meetings he had held scattered across this war torn region in the last month, it would total a sizable force. But he would need more men then this, a lot more.
Howard was a very valuable assist. Last week in England he had promised to recruit at least a dozen new faces some in America, he had eighteen in training already and with the twenty or so that Hoffman had provided from Germany, together with our Albanians and Chechens, these non-Arab looking brothers will make us a great fifth column a small force, but just the deception and distrust needed for our plan to succeed.
Right now he had Howard in Mexico making more plans with groups there, laying the foundation for our success. We may not like the allies we have to work with to achieve victory, but you use what’s at hand. The old saying that ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend.’ Sounded good but it wasn’t the way it will be, The enemy of my enemy will be destroyed, if he’s an infidel. After I have used him to achieve the glory for the prophet, convert or die.
He still wondered why there was a sudden change in plans, the director said to move up all planned actions and be ready with a force no later then August of 2006. His keen mind told him that it was one year if not two years to early for such action. But the people in charge they saw things different then he did. Maybe with the Americans winning in Afghanistan and Iraq, then with Libya selling out, changing with out a shot fired, were they afraid?
Afraid that the Arab world would be stabilized, not the allies when needed to defeat the Great Satan. They didn’t know the depth of hatred most Arabs felt for the kaffiers, who tried to impose their filth in music, dress, and the perversion from Hollywood. Well the time was approaching; it was coming sooner then expected, for a major payback, as the Americas would say.
Ali who stood at his side was glassy eyed from the excitement such a large crowed generated, with such a force we will strike a blow that the world would never be the same afterward. And he would be a leader in this; it was good that he had stayed on. How many times he had dreamed about taking a plane to Syria and just walking across the border into Iraq. To pick up a weapon and join the jihad against the Western Crusaders, to drive them from the sacred ground of Islam, that had been his wish.
But when Kalida changed his stand from hitting softly and planning attacks, to becoming one of direct hard hitting involvement, now was the time to rejoice, we will repay the west for all the humiliation and insult they have heaped on the faithful.
The Mullah with them on the raised platform stepped forward to address the excited gathering.
“There is no divinity but Allah and Muhammad is the prophet of Allah,” he paused for just a moment.
“In the name of Allah, the merciful, the compassionate.”
“Praise be to Allah, Lord of the world;
“The merciful, the compassionate; King of the Day of Judgment.”
“You we worship and Your aid we seek.”
“Guide us on the straight path,
“The path of those You have blessed, not those who incurred your wrath, nor those gone astray.”
“The merciful, the compassionate; King of the Day of Judgment.”
“You we worship and Your aid we seek.”
“Guide us on the straight path,
“The path of those You have blessed, not those who incurred your wrath, nor those gone astray.”
“Brothers/Sisters, Fighting for Islam in the Arab world is taking a new turn. Our current pathetic leaders of the people have agreed that they can't agree on anything. They are smug but stupid and inept when it comes to dealing with the west. They have no idea they are but tools, and yet all of a sudden a total genius when it comes to saving their own jobs and how to protect it. This is true evil, and total corruption.”
“May Allah destroy their plans and destroy their hate against us. And for those that make war against Allah and his one true apostle and spread disorder in the land shall be slain.”
“Egypt is the leader of the Arab world, and when the leader is a coward, what would you expect from the rest of the pack! I loath, and wonder which day when Egypt will take its' rightful place as the leader of the Arab world. Honoring the way of Allah and his prophet, by bringing back the old Arabic values. Values of honor and thought that when added to Islam brought humanity to its' highest peak.”
“Once the leader is honorable, the rest of the Arab world will have no option but to follow suit! Ya Allah please, give Egypt a leader worthy of its history, not someone so stupid as to go on public TV and say ‘who do you think I am! Superman!”
“Ya Allah, we are not very good Muslims but if you leave us to leaders like this we are assured a miserable place in hell. Please, save us from our selves and give us the courage so that we can be saved from such trivial rulers, and thereafter, hell fire. May Allah protect and save you from all evil.” *
“The leader we seek stands with us today, he is righteous and strong, he has a plan that comes straight from the Quron. Jihad is to be a soldier of Allah, when the cry went out for defending the faith, he answered, now you should be the first to answer his call, to join the ranks for Jihad.”
The audience was silent; the prayer had struck a cord in them that needed an answer, some way for them to feel justified in their existence.
The Mullah stepping to one side turned and looked at Kalida, his eyes said it all. I have their undivided attention it is now up to you to take them with you.
Stepping to the edge of the dais, Kalida raised both hands above his head and shouted as loud as he could, “ALLAH ACABUR!”
The crowd responded with thunders, “ALLAH ACABUR.”
Kalida again yelled, “ALLAH ACABUR!”
The crowd again responded with an even louder “ALLAH ACABUR.”
Kalida said no more holding his hands out to silence the waiting throng; he waited holding their attention with his silence. As he gazed across the assemble slowly moving his head, not looking at any one man but each person thinking he was the one being looked at. He held the silence and the two thousand men gave him silence in return. In this gathering quiet you could fell that something was about to happen. Something profound and that would shape the world in their eyes, to the righteous path of the true believers.
Kalida knew what that was; it had been always present in every Islamic fighter’s desire. Most of the fighters present wouldn’t recognize that the answer to the question of the Jewish State, present in there midst, was the power of the United States in the world. This power had to end, and we will be the beginning of that end.
With the United States smothering power gone, all nations that had the means and the will could right old wrongs, to settle debts without fear of offending and receiving retribution from the Western ideals of so called fair play, and their desire for freedom and peace. Let old scores be settled, not set aside, the victor always writes the history books.
“In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful. All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be upon His Messenger.”
“Islam is Almighty Allah’s message to all humankind that aims at establishing right and justice among all people. Thus we are the chosen ones.”
“Islam is Almighty Allah’s message to all humankind that aims at establishing right and justice among all people. Thus we are the chosen ones.”
“Allah sent Mohammed to teach the true religion so that it should rule over all other religions. If one does the fasting, preys five times a day, undertakes the Hajj, live a pious life performing good deeds not ones of evil, he is to have success here on earth and in the hereafter.”
“But above all of these things the one assurance to achieve the greatest glory for Allah is Jihad. As it will give one the greatest blessings and dignity in Paradise.
There are one hundred grades in Paradise, and the highest ones are reserved for the Mudahidin who fight in 'His cause.'
Thus it is written and thus it will be so when the whole world becomes a Muslim world, and now it is time, the whole world will be subdued under the rule of Islam. Wherever you have anything but Islam, you will have war, the world for now is divided into only two regions: Dar al Islam and Dar al Harb – the region of peace and the region of war. All outside true Islamic rule is considered the area of war and continuing conquest.”
“We can not achieve Justice or victory in our home, unless we win our battles by stopping the Crusaders in theirs, they must suffer in the name of Allah. Any who slander the name of our prophet Mohamed will be slaughtered. We must smite the Unbeliever for it is written in the Qur'an that we are to never take the Jews or Christians as our friends.” Kalida spoke in an even tone as if he was leading a class lecture. His voice amplified over speakers hanging on the madrassas walls, this Muslim school that taught respect and faith.
His voice was not shrill or carried shouted excitement, but level and measured as he continued, “Our homes, our countries did not ask for or need these western ideas to be imposed by force of arms. If the people of Iraq wanted to be rid of Saddam Hussein, they would have done so themselves.”
“Other countries here in the Arab world make changes we want with out this outside help. But the self-delusion born of the Saudi royal family's desire for its continued support of the west is now running out of time. Our brothers in arms have training camps and growing strength in that country and within the royal family as well. It is just a matter of time before control is taken away, and given to the true faithful, there will be no elections or the lies told to sway people of weak minds. Our revolt will depose a dynasty founded upon a supposed piety, one that has long been corrupted by the ways of the world.”
“Other countries here in the Arab world make changes we want with out this outside help. But the self-delusion born of the Saudi royal family's desire for its continued support of the west is now running out of time. Our brothers in arms have training camps and growing strength in that country and within the royal family as well. It is just a matter of time before control is taken away, and given to the true faithful, there will be no elections or the lies told to sway people of weak minds. Our revolt will depose a dynasty founded upon a supposed piety, one that has long been corrupted by the ways of the world.”
“The faithful will rule, lead by the people’s clerics, we reject this democratization the Americans are heaping on us. We do so arguing our holy warriors are not attacking Saudi Arabia because of its lack of democracy. They don't believe in democracy, and neither do we, it’s the fruit of the devil, look at the Western World do they offer us anything but diseased thoughts and previsions?”
Not wanting the audience to answer, “We sympathize with Osama bin Laden his ideas and the movement he has started, they showed us a way to hit the Americans, to make them feel what it is like to have loved ones killed by bombs from the sky.”
“Only Osama stopped too soon, we won’t, now watch the scene projected on the walls,” the lights which had slowly dimmed now went out. And on several clear walls a film clip was projected, it was the final moments of an American’s life as he was tortured and beheaded. Most of the gathering laughed as they watched the very graphic and bloody film of the mans forced confession. ‘I am an American, and I am a Christian.’ It then ends with the victim’s captors cutting his throat and severing his head from his body. The final frame shows one of the captors holding up the severed head by the hair.
“If you will join me I’ll show you how to kill them, just as we did this one American, in their homes, in their beds. Not by our dying but by making them die in untold numbers, to take the war to the Western heathens, in their own land, to make this next fight the beginning of the death of the West. Does not Surah two say, ‘slay all non-believers wherever they are found!”
“To do that, every one of us must become a mujahid, a soldier of Allah. And we can only become soldiers by working hard, working together and training to be an Army of Allah, and then the west will tremble and fall because they are weak and divided. The western world led by the American infidels lack the resolve to persevere. They ran in Korea, they ran from Vietnam. In both wars they had great loses in life and they were winning and ran away. But when faced with fighting against the faithful they ran even faster, in Lebanon when that dog Reagan was president and again in Somalia under the liar Clinton.”
Kalida knew what he was about to say was a lie, he had shown them the truth, but now a lie would move most of them to his cause. “In Iraq It hurts my heart knowing that the filthy kaafir dog Americans are bombing our Muslim brothers and sisters when ever and where ever they want to, and attempt to shift the blame onto the faithful and righteous, the crusaders are killing anyone who opposes them. If innocent Muslims are gunned down then we have to set the scale right by killing their innocents as revenge. They rape the women and young girls when ever they want, some of their soldiers are so perverted they even rape young boys.” The howls of out rage and shouting was deafening in the packed hall, he let them yell for a few minuets, until some of the people were starting to get hoarse.
Then he held up both of his arms and the room fell silent very quickly, they wanted to hear more of his message.
“I showed you the film clip and I tell you these truths, ‘Allah willing,’ because we can drive them from our land and take their lands. To do this we must be willing to wage war on a world wide scale, for the global Islamic state, we will create.”
“The Qur’an states, ‘you will soon be invited to fight against a nation of mighty prowess. Fight them until they submit.’ Soon very soon that fight will come and you need to train to be warriors of Islam, with out training you are like sheep bleating easily defeated and slaughtered.”
“The United States is the Great Satan that abuses our region and the faithful world wide, as the Americans are all lacking in morality and law, they must be shown that what they do here, can also be done there in America. We should all pray to Allah that we will soon be given the opportunity to go to America to slaughter these unbelievers these Christians. Our fight must be loud and deadly, and any means to damage and destroy the Great Satan is allowed by Allah.”
“In the name of Allah, the most compassionate, the most merciful I ask you for the strength to show these American first hand the same destruction they have wrought in our lands. For them to see that it can happen in their homeland and among there loved ones. We will not leave their children as orphans or their wives as widows like they are doing in Iraq, for we must be strong and kill them all, every one that we can. To see their wives and sons killed, their daughters raped, as they are doing to ours in Iraq. If we can kill enough of them in their homeland, make it the Dar-el-Harb -- the land of war, to be conquered by the sword. We will show them, they are not invincible, that is the only way to make them leave us alone, forever.”
“In 1968 our fathers took the war to America, the Democratic presidential candidate Robert Kennedy was killed by Sirhan Sirhan. A great fighter who is revered today by all of us.”
“This Kennedy was in Israel when it declared their illegal stealing of our land. Twenty years later he was the first American politician killed, he won’t be the last. If we kill their leaders and their sons and daughters, the great Satan will know just how powerful we are and leave our lands forever.”
Kalida looking across the gathering at all of the upturned faces, and knew they were listening to every word. “It will take years of hard work and more recruiting, and more training. As we must learn to work as if we are the arms and legs of a single man, with the goal of fighting as one as a well-oiled machine, a machine that will destroy the Crusaders; and let us stand as men in our world.”
Kalida looking across the gathering at all of the upturned faces, and knew they were listening to every word. “It will take years of hard work and more recruiting, and more training. As we must learn to work as if we are the arms and legs of a single man, with the goal of fighting as one as a well-oiled machine, a machine that will destroy the Crusaders; and let us stand as men in our world.”
“The Americans say they know the truth and will give it to the whole world. We want nothing of their world; or their truth; it is not our way. They have only given us vulgar speech and clothes, lies and distortions never the truth.”
“In Europe we have millions of followers who wait for our help. In America there are millions who await for our assistance, and soon they will have it.”
“Hussein Massawi, the leader of Hizbullah struck 20 years ago when they bombed the American barracks in Beirut killing hundreds of Americans. If we take the war back to America we will kill them in untold numbers. Our goal in fighting them in their home is to eliminate them, to kill them in such numbers that the soil is stained with their blood for generations. We must rise up and inflame a war on them everywhere. And we will not differentiate between a military and a civilian person. As they struck against our women and children, we will kill their women and children.”
“That is the way to win this war against these new crusaders, we the faithful will pick up the sword and finish the work that was set aside 500 years ago in Spain.”
“We must become like the mujaheddin in Afghanistan, the soldiers the true believers from all the lands of Islam. Only our battleground will be in the belly of the great Satan.” With out raising his voice he then says, “Allah yinsur el-mujaheddin fe-America” (God grant victory to the mujaheddin in America).”
Pausing for a second he then repeats, “Allah yinsur el-mujaheddin fe-America,” in the same level tone.
All of the men in the hall follow his lead by saying not shouting, “Allah yinsur el-mujaheddin fe-America.”
Again in a normal speaking voice he asks them, “Will you rise up with me as men to learn to be soldiers, if we do this we will win. Together we will become the Fedayeen al-Islam" (Soldiers of Islam) and we can then destroy the Crusaders and their Christianity. After that we can establish a new Khilafah, were only the faithful live in peace.”
Taking the cue from Kalida and seeing the words that were projected on the walls and again with out shouting. “Yes, teach us, lead us.”
‘This is good, for Kalida has them with us,’ Aymen says to himself as he nods his head. He had quietly slipped in just another man in the crowded hall to get the feel, the energy level assessment of our future soldiers. ‘Allah will send us the true believers and we will kill the Americans like dogs, more savagely by tearing their hearts out, cutting off heads, tearing their limbs from their still living bodies, and their blood will fill rivers. And Allah will show no mercy and let them burn in the fires of hell for all eternity.’
Kalida continues, “We will show the world what the truth really is, the Peace of Allah as preached by Mohammed and written in the Quran, practiced by the faithful, this will be done by us the humble servants. We will be the stones in Allah’s sling, sent forth to kill the Americans in their homes.”
“This task we take is the will of Allah, this is the path we must follow if we are to win. And we will win, so it is written and so it will be, a war between us the true Believers waged against the Infidels. As the Prophet wrote down the spoken words of Allah for all of us to read in the Koran, ‘to show them no mercy, no pity, but only the hell that awaits them’. For in this war against the infidels we must fill their hearts with fear and terror so they will stop their resistance and accept us and the one true religion as it is written.”
“Inshallah (God willing), we will bring true enlightment to the Kefirs, with the sword. Then they will understand that there is only one God and his name is Allah, and there is only one prophet Mohammed. And his peace will reign through out all the lands of the world.”
By the expression in their eyes, and the look he could see in the upturned faces told him they knew he was correct, expressing their beliefs in his words with their respected silence. That is where I want them, for I know they are with me, all good and well. I will now give them to the clerics; they will help cement my control. That is what they the Imam's are best at. To instill hatred, blind hatred. To set the stage for genocidal murder on a world scale, for the global rule of our Islamic world.
So he finished the way he had won them to him, not by shouting as before but in the same way he had delivered his speech, by softly saying, “ALLAH ACABUR, ALLAH ACABUR.”
When the answer came back spoken by his soldiers, “ALLAH ACABUR, ALLAH ACABUR.” Even though it was said by the gathering in a hushed voice, everyone present felt the strength, the power of the righteous. As not one voice was raised or yelled, he thought, “this is a good start,” as he smiled inwardly and turning bowed toward Mecca. All present followed his lead.
(*Idea for prayer taken from Islamic thought, adapted for use in the story.)
(Some Arabic words and phrases are from jihadwatch.org)
‘It has been estimated that up to 80%of the Mosques in the United States is ran by extremist bent on the destruction of us. In testimony before the U.S. State Department in 1999, Muhammad Hisham Kabbani, chairman of the Islamic Supreme Council of America, affirmed extremists run most of the mosques in the U.S. "We would like to advise our government, our congressmen, that there is something big going on and people do not understand it," he said. "You have many mosques around the United States ... . So the most dangerous things are going on in these mosques that have self appointed leaders throughout the United States. The extremist ideology makes them very active. We can say that they took over 80 per cent of the mosques in the United States ... . This means that the ideology of extremism has been spread to the youth and the new generation.’
‘Last July 2003, a member of CAIR's national staff, Randall Todd "Ismail" Royer, was among 11 men indicted for conspiring to train on American soil for a "violent jihad." Another CAIR figure, Bassem Khafagi, was arrested in January 2003 while serving as the group's director of community relations. In December, Ghassan Elashi, the founder of CAIR's Texas chapter, was indicted for financial ties to Hamas leader Musa Abu Marzook.
CAIR's leaders also have provided evidence the group has aims beyond civil-rights advocacy.
As WorldNet Daily reported, CAIR's chairman of the board, Omar Ahmad, was cited by a California newspaper in 1998 declaring the Quran should be America's highest authority.
He also was reported to have said Islam is not in America to be equal to any other religion but to be dominant.’
So how soon will it be before we hear the phrase ‘convert or die’ here in America?
(C-34)
Sunny Mexico
October
‘Act as if it were impossible to fail.’
Dorothea Brand
Things were going better then planned. There was already in place a sizable movement afoot to take back the American Southwest not just from inside Mexico but in some portions of California and Arizona too. Howard liked that, as things were moving faster then he would have thought possible only a month ago.
Especially after he linked up with the El Salvador-based Salvatrucha also known as MS-13, and the Zetas, an ex Mexican Para, anti-drug group that had been trained by the US Special Forces. These two groups had formed an alliance and they were very strongly entrenched along the Northern Mexican border and just as busy openly recruiting in Mexico for coyotes and drug runners. Howard didn’t care if they were a criminal gang pushing drugs and illegal immigrants across the border as fast as they could, it made a good cover for the plan. As for the setting up of training bases, that was already done, and was being well run by The Zetas. Again it didn’t matter if they worked with the local drug gang, for a price they would help anyone.
They were already busy training a sizable number of people in small unit tactics including some Americans and we would be adding some, O.T.M. the border patrols slang for other-then-Mexicans, to the training. As long as the money was good the Para’s would have no problem to include our people, even if we are jihadists, to them money equals friends.
It also help cover the O.T.M’s that the local gangs, known as ‘maras,’ prey on the Spanish speaking illegal migrants traveling from Central America up through Mexico using the cargo trains in the hope of reaching the United States. Once those intimated people move on into the US with some of our people among them he knew they wouldn’t turn on them. They feared the ‘maras’, because they would kill them, a whole lot more then the American police who would only arrest them, and send them back. “Fear works wonders,” he said out loud as he smiled… now to purchase or rent more safe houses for our sizable force we will assemble, the training camps can only hold a couple a thousand at the most.
Recent News
Reports about stolen government and company identity cards, trucks and uniforms have been coming in from across the United States in recent months, leading to warnings the incidents might be related to a terrorist plot.
Terrorists could try to use uniforms and vehicles to evade security at airports and other sensitive sites, according to U.S. intelligence reports that noted Islamic terrorism groups have employed similar tactics overseas. US Postal authorities worried about vehicle theft ie giving access to areas easier. In Calf. Over 300 Fire fighter uniforms were stolen in the spring of 2004
U.S. and Mexican law enforcement authorities say the Zetas operate special training camps in the Mexican states of Tamaulipas and Michoacán, where newly recruited Zetas take intensive six-week training courses in weapons, tactics and intelligence gathering. U.S. law enforcement officials say they now number more than 700. Their numbers also include some Mexican army deserters and former federal police officers. (Worldnetdaily.com June 21, 2005)
From the Tombstone Tumbleweed
TWO GROUPS OF MIDDLE-EASTERN INVADERS CAUGHT IN COCHISE COUNTY IN PAST SIX WEEKS
On or about the evening of June 21, 2004, agents from the Willcox Border Patrol station apprehended 24 members of a larger group of Arabic speaking males located just east of the Pierce/Sunsites area of Cochise County. At least half of the males escaped capture and disappeared into the United States.
The information was corroborated by a local rancher in the area who reports that sightings of groups similar to these are on the rise. The rancher reports that groups of heavily armed paramilitary drug smugglers have also been seen in the same area.
“We’ve have groups in the hundreds coming through again. They were gone for awhile but now they're back. And of course we have the drug mules again and many armed guards with they that are carrying automatic weapons.
The information was corroborated by a local rancher in the area who reports that sightings of groups similar to these are on the rise. The rancher reports that groups of heavily armed paramilitary drug smugglers have also been seen in the same area.
“We’ve have groups in the hundreds coming through again. They were gone for awhile but now they're back. And of course we have the drug mules again and many armed guards with they that are carrying automatic weapons.
‘In Europe al Qaeda has cells in France that gained between 35 and 45 thousand members; in Germany, 30 thousand; in Great Britain, 10 thousand. These volunteers are assigned to terrorist cells that train regularly in “…the use of weapons, explosives, and chemical/biological warfare.” Former FBI agent Williams reports.’
In 1938, people wise people saw the face of the gathering storm, led by a fanatical, aggressive, openly declared enemy of the West, and the world did nothing.
Today we can see the gathering storm clouds, again led by fanatical, aggressive people who are well funded openly declaring themselves enemy of the west, and they are on the march. They hide behind their religion demanding we respect them, yet offer no respect in return and most people do nothing again.
By David Meir-Levi
FrontPageMagazine.com | August 9, 2004
FrontPageMagazine.com | August 9, 2004
Dot # 1: A Growing Threat in the Tri-Border Area of South America. (Terrorist and Organized Crime Groups in the Tri-Border Area (TBA) of South America. A Report Prepared under an Interagency Agreement by the Federal Research Division, Library of Congress, July 2003.)
Since the early 1980’s, Arab terrorists have been sending thousands of their cohorts to the almost inaccessible jungle and mountain region between Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay (known as the TBA, Tri-Border Area or La Triple Frontera). Terror training camps and arsenals have been established, virtually out of the reach of local law enforcement or defense forces; and elements from Hezbollah, al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya, Islamic Jihad, al-Qaeda, Hamas, and the Lebanese Drug mafia operate in partnership, freely and openly in conjunction with local organized crime and corrupt government officials.
The TBA has become a virtual haven for Islamic terror groups and a base for terror operations against South American targets. The large and growing Arab population of these states (in excess of 750,000 by local estimates) provides a community highly conducive to the establishment of Islamic terrorist sleeper cells throughout the area. The attacks in Buenos Aires on the Israeli embassy (3/17/1992) and the Jewish Community Center (7/18/1994) are believed to have originated from terror bases in the TBA. Since the mid-90’s, government forces have foiled many more terror attacks against American, Jewish and Israeli targets, arresting some of the perpetrators.
CNN reported that an Islamic terrorist summit meeting was held in the TBA in late 2002, to plot attacks in South America and abroad. Security forces believe that future targets include USA and Israeli government offices, Jewish community buildings, hotels, tourism centers, airports and facilities of multinational corporations.
The TBA terrorist haven also operates an immense money-laundering project, reaping profits from their partnerships with the FARC and narcotics traffickers in the widespread South American drug trade. Government estimates place the total amount of money laundered since 1992 at more than 172 billion dollars.
There is currently no effective surveillance or containment of these terrorist activities.
Dot #2: Increased Terrorism in northern Venezuela (U.S. News & World Report, 10/6/03, pp. 18ff.)
Another South American hub of Arab terrorism has emerged recently in northern Venezuela near the border with Colombia. Thousands of terrorists now occupy an unknown number of camps in that region, and move about with the support and collaboration of the Venezuelan government. President Hugo Chavez plays host to a growing horde of Middle Eastern terrorists from some of the USA’s most notorious enemies, including Libya, Saddam’s Iraq, Syria, Egypt and Pakistan. Thousands of Venezuelan identity cards have been legally issued to these foreigners. Such cards can be used to obtain legal travel documents and passports for unimpeded entry into other South American countries and into the USA.
These terror groups are known to work in conjunction with the Colombian anti-government insurgency group, FARC. They offer FARC terrorists safe haven in mountainous and unpatrolled regions of Northeastern Venezuela. They may provide Hugo Chavez with a covert force that can be used to support FARC against the Colombian government. Venezuelan cooperation with these terrorists may buy President Chavez a guarantee that terror assaults will not be perpetrated in his country.
Currently there are no known terror attacks that can be attributed to these groups.
Dot #3: Illegal Immigration at the Southern Border…Not Just Hispanics, Anymore. (“U.S. seizes 77 Mideastern aliens in southern Arizona,” World Tribune, 8/2/04; “Two groups of middle-eastern invaders caught in Cochise county in past six weeks,” Tombstone Tumbleweed, 7/18/04; “Breaking silence over possible terror threat,” Defense Watch, 7/23/04.)
American border patrol agents arrested 158 illegal aliens in Cochise County, Arizona, on 6/13/04. One agent, who speaks Farsi and Arabic, overheard dozens of detainees speaking Arabic in the back of the detention vehicle. He counted 53 of Middle Eastern rather than Hispanic origin. His superiors told him to keep that information to himself; but he reported it to the local newspaper, the Tombstone Tumbleweed.
Just one week later, on June 21, 2004, another group of illegals were apprehended, including 24 Arabic speaking men. But at least as many or more escaped apprehension and disappeared into the United States.
Border Patrol officials deny that there have been any Middle Eastern illegals among those arrested, but individual arresting officers attest to the accuracy of that ethnic description.
Upon deeper investigation, the Tumbleweed editor learned that since October 1, 2003, Arizona border patrol agents have arrested 5,510 illegals from countries other than Mexico, Central and South America. In addition, the arresting officers noted that all of the Middle Eastern illegals sported identical haircuts and moustaches; and while their clothes were the typical illegal immigrant jeans, baseball caps and jerseys, the Middle Easterners all wore brand new clothes, still spiffy looking and clean (quite the opposite of the usual rather frazzled appearance of illegals).
Connecting the Dots:
We are witness to expanding Islamic terrorist bases in South America, operating with almost no interference from, or in collaboration with, the host countries’ governments; thousands of Arab terrorists training in these bases; and credible evidence that hundreds or even thousands of Arabic speaking illegals have been entering the USA through our porous border with Mexico for almost a year. Given the Border Patrol leadership’s refusal to divulge the ethnic or national identities of the 5,510 non-Hispanic detainees, we cannot know how many of these thousands are Arabs.
Why would Middle Eastern terror groups spend untold millions of dollars to set up bases in South America? Certainly to benefit from the drug trade and money-laundering opportunities that lax or corrupt governments afford. Clearly, to attack South American targets (inter alia, Israeli or American embassies, Jewish communities, and/or other institutions that are involved in South American financial, political, or military interaction with the USA). Probably also to facilitate the planning and execution of future terror attacks in South America or abroad.
Why would Arabs enter the United States in such large numbers? At least some of them are likely bona fide terrorists who, once they have eluded the Border Patrol, can connect with established contacts in the American Muslim community and lay the groundwork for future terror attacks within this country. It takes a minimum of five “support-staff” to launch one terrorist action. How many terror attacks can we expect, now that we know now that hundreds or perhaps thousands of Arab terrorists have entered this country illegally during the past year, and are completely untraceable by law enforcement or military agencies.
Why would hundreds of these Arab terrorists sneak into America illegally via the Mexican border? The credible scenarios are:
These Arabs are known terrorists who could not enter in a simpler and more direct fashion, via our legal ports of entry; or…
The terror planners and strategists foresee that if our legal ports of entry were suddenly flooded with dozens or hundreds of entrants recognizable as Arabs but bearing legal South American travel documents, our immigration officials might get suspicious.
Thus, to infiltrate very large numbers of terrorists into the United States in anticipation of future massive terror assaults, it would be necessary to create a base for the invaders in neighboring safe areas from which large numbers of terrorists could be transported en masse.
Questions:
Why do the official spokespersons for the Border Patrol in Arizona refuse to acknowledge what their field force tells us? Surely corroboration by several different guards on different occasions warrants public concern.
Why are Border Patrol guards instructed to keep silent about the presence of Arabs and Iranians among the many thousands of non-Hispanic illegal aliens? Surely this unusual and alarming phenomenon merits the scrutiny of the Border Patrol’s leadership.
Why have no mainstream media outlets publicized this infiltration of terrorists into our country? Surely such a phenomenon is newsworthy.
Conclusion:
Once we connect these dots, it becomes obvious that the presence of thousands of Arab terrorists in two separate areas of South America and the illegal entry of hundreds of Arabs via the Mexican border portend massive terror assaults against American and other targets in South America and within this nation.
It does not require much imagination to foresee that the many current Arab terror sleeper cells scattered throughout the USA and Canada today are being re-enforced with the influx of Arab terrorists from South America, an influx of such numbers that normal ports of entry cannot be used.
Can the purpose of this re-enforcement be other than an Arab terrorist plan to mount major attacks on numerous targets throughout North America? Such imaginative terror masterminds as Imad Mughniyyah or Osama bin Laden himself would surely have little difficulty figuring out how to best utilize an untraceable sleeper army of Arab terrorists waiting patiently for the signal to strike at centers of telecommunication, transportation, electric power, and even law enforcement and military bases.
Election time
Every two years they come around, and in the fourth year we vote on a new leader. Win or lose America carries on. Sometimes we have good leaders and sometimes not; now isn’t our Republican system of Government great? Yes it is. It sure beats all others tried so far.
(C-35)
Bear and Dragon
Friends?
‘Beware the smile of the Crocodile, the lips hide the teeth,
And behind the laugh of the Hyena hides a savage beast.’
Anon
‘China and Russia announce that they are planning on holding a joint Military training exercise.’
Oh fools will they never learn from history.
Between World War II and Hitler’s rise to power, the German Army was forbidden by treaty, to have any tanks or fighter aircraft. To get around this they had an agreement with Russia to train on their equipment in the Soviet Union.
When WWII started the Germans knew the capabilities of the best the communists had to offer, in equipment and in the Soviet General Staff.
Those who fail to learn the lessons of history,...
In August of 1939 the Soviets signed a non-aggression pact with Hitler who lived to their west beyond Poland.
In August of 1939 the Soviets signed a non-aggression pact with Hitler who lived to their west beyond Poland.
After the Sept. German invasion of Poland the Soviet Army also attacked and took over a fifth of eastern Poland. Good friends sharing the spoils of war.
Less then two years later they barely survived that treaty as Germany took almost one third of their territory.
If not for one of the coldest winters in several decades and the United States lend lease program and both the US and British intensive bombing of Nazi Germany, the USSR wouldn't have survived.
One would think the old bear wouldn't fall for the same trick again? Will the Eagle and the Lion rescue the bear once again from his folly?
If not for one of the coldest winters in several decades and the United States lend lease program and both the US and British intensive bombing of Nazi Germany, the USSR wouldn't have survived.
One would think the old bear wouldn't fall for the same trick again? Will the Eagle and the Lion rescue the bear once again from his folly?
People of Russia beware of the Dragon. Beware of the horsemen from the East!
The Russians will need us again, and will we fall for that same old excuse, the enemy of my enemy is my friend? ????
But then birds of a feather flock together.
The current leader of the Russian people is a want to be Stalin. To make a new Russian Empire like the old, but he’s no uncle Joe.
He covets the weak countries that made up the former USSR and desires to bring them back under control i.e. The Ukraine problem that is in the news for now, and Uzbekistan, to name two. And more…
The countries of Turkmenistan, Kazakistan, and Uzbekistan; all three are full of Oil and other nice minerals that the Communist didn't know were there or had the ability to get too before.
China has invested along with the west 'beau coup' money and time to hunt and find out these treasures.
China is having trouble with the Islamic people in its western province that borders Kirgisistan, who are busy stirring up there Muslim brothers in China. How long will China let this sore fester? Two years maybe? Don’t bet on that, the Chinese know the best way to stop an upraising is to use tanks right now.
The current leader of the Russian people is a want to be Stalin. To make a new Russian Empire like the old, but he’s no uncle Joe.
He covets the weak countries that made up the former USSR and desires to bring them back under control i.e. The Ukraine problem that is in the news for now, and Uzbekistan, to name two. And more…
The countries of Turkmenistan, Kazakistan, and Uzbekistan; all three are full of Oil and other nice minerals that the Communist didn't know were there or had the ability to get too before.
China has invested along with the west 'beau coup' money and time to hunt and find out these treasures.
China is having trouble with the Islamic people in its western province that borders Kirgisistan, who are busy stirring up there Muslim brothers in China. How long will China let this sore fester? Two years maybe? Don’t bet on that, the Chinese know the best way to stop an upraising is to use tanks right now.
They did it at Tienamin, and the west did nothing.
The same thing the west did back in 1936 when Hitler sent his small army to occupy the whole Rhineland, and soon after Austria and then over half of Czechoslovakia. Following the Japanese example in Manchuria, and the Italians in Ethiopia followed them. A three country were soon very busy raping helpless countries, because the West did nothing.
And again the west set on their hands and watched the Soviets in Eastern Europe during the 1950’s, and again the west did nothing.
China knows the west will do nothing again, sanctions are a joke, and before this recession started China made a lot of the consumer goods the west depended on. Come on now are we going to give up our TV’s, and cheap shoes and cloths to help some country most of us don’t even know existed, let alone find it on a map?
The west sort of reacted when Franco started his march to power during the Spanish Civil War. But then it really wasn’t the Western governments that acted; it was a random odd group of individuals and some of course came from the organized communists parties in various countries with the backing from the USSR. Yes good portions of them were communists but in the pure sense, not like the Stalinists leaders.
The larger part of the volunteers were just your plain average every day folk, alert to what is happening in the world, all of them were looking out for freedom. A lot of them came home after fighting disillusioned, some like George Orwell who later wrote Homage to Catalonia and 1984, warning the west of the Communist deceit and it’s desire of world control.
A lot of those individuals who were they’re fighting for freedom and liberty are the same type of spirited individuals that make up the US Militia movement today. Alert and well read, warning others of the coming storm. Pointing to the dark clouds that have just come over the horizon, and feeling the wind shift as it blows in their face, sensing the static charge building in the air.
Few listen, very few indeed, most people are lulled by the siren voices of the elites, as they make excuses for the enemies of freedom; again. I say most but not all some of us are training getting ready, just in case we are needed.
And China? Well China wants it all, the current leaders are control freaks who want the nice life that prosperity brings. And they need oil, lots of cheap oil to lubricate their booming economy and to prepare the war machine they are assembling. A nice shiny machine they want to take for a test drive soon, to show the world. And they desire the riches just outside their doorstep, waiting for some one with the will to take them.
Now they have the will, and the means, and the leader.
China has claims to these lands to their west from the time of the first Kahn's victories, they have always believed in “Might makes right,” to the victor goes the spoils.
China has claims to these lands to their west from the time of the first Kahn's victories, they have always believed in “Might makes right,” to the victor goes the spoils.
The new Kahn is marshalling his forces and he will march when he thinks the time is right to pluck the fruit from the tree. In which direction will he strike to conquer his Ethiopia, then to have his Poland? And his allies will repeat the rape of Nanking, but it will be murder on a global scale this time around in many countries.
Stay tuned because we live in interesting Times.
Stay tuned because we live in interesting Times.
PS, it might be a good idea to have more then the weeks worth of food that Homeland security suggest, and one thing they forgot on the list, the means to defend your loved ones and the will to use it. And if necessary to help protect your community too.
(C-36)
There are no former Marines
"Semper Fidelis-Always Faithful."
‘Once A Marine, Always A Marine’
James Glaser
A free people ought not only to be armed and disciplined, but they should have sufficient arms and ammunition to maintain a status of independence from any who might attempt to abuse them, which would include their own government.
— George Washington
The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.' The right of the whole people, old and young, men, women and boys, and not militia only, to keep and bear arms of every description, and not such merely as are used by the militia, shall not be infringed, curtailed, or broken in upon, in the smallest degree; and all this for the important end to be attained: the rearing up and qualifying a well-regulated militia, so vitally necessary to the security of a free State. Our opinion is that any law, State or Federal, is repugnant to the Constitution, and void, which contravenes this right. [Nunn vs. State, 1 Ga. (1 Kel.) 243, at 251 (1846)]
Oscar Morales and his next-door neighbor Pepe Sinclair saluted the flag, then both men stepping up to the flagpole then lowered it. This is the same routine they have been doing every evening at 6:30 PM since retiring from the Corp back in 98’. It was a daily routine that both men enjoyed after a hard day of work, sometimes a few of the neighbor hood kids would join in and this made the task even more enjoyable.
Both men were fortunate to have been next-door neighbors growing up, and life long friends, then serving their first few years together in a line company, afterwords keeping in touch with each other by regular mail or phone calls. They were best man at each of their weddings and godfather to each other’s kids, they were as close as brothers, maybe even closer as they were brothers in arms, and members of the Corp.
And both were down right lucky to have purchased their parents homes when then got to old and needed to move into assisted care housing. The cost of housing in California had gone up way past ridiculous in the last two-dozen-years, and they both knew it.
A car pulls up and the driver says, “You know the guys in the burrio laugh at you two for raising and lowering that flag each day.”
“Let them laugh,” Oscar says turning to see who’s talking. “Well good evening Ricardo, as I said let them laugh, someday your so called friends will see the light. That the flag represents a free people, a good people, our people.”
Ricardo smiles and says as he drives off, “What ever.”
Pepe and Oscar just smile and wave, both know that with time and age the young will learn as they mature.
Both men enjoyed working at the same salvage company too, cutting up and scraping old worn out ships, as any other day, today had been a busy one and Oscar had to work two hours late trying to finish his current job. This morning the tug boats had brought in the next job, an old LST; that’s a landing ship tank, an old world war two built ship, that had been in the Philippines since the end of the Korean War.
Pepe said off handedly, “I finished the safety inspection around three o’clock today on that LST. Do you think your crew will finish cutting up that old coal freighter by tomorrow afternoon?”
“We should, but it will be late in the day. I don’t know if we will be able to haul our equipment over before closing time, why,” Oscar asked?
“Oh, this ship is another interesting one,” Pepe said. His smile and the gleam in his eyes showing his mischievous nature. “It’s another early war model like the one we did two years ago, and it was modified the same way, I’m sure after the battle of Leyte Gulf. Maybe done by the same people and the same repair crew too, cause they welded in more of the heavy support beams and the sheet steel bracing on the port side to carry the added weight of the extra AA guns to fend off those Kamikaze attacks.”
“The same,” Oscar asked with a smile?
“Yeah, the exact same, as we saw on the last one, again covering the small arms locker door aft of the radio room.”
Oscar smiled, “If it’s half as good a haul as the other one that will be great. Did you check it out?”
Pepe laughed , “Yes, went into the old officers mess deck and cut through into the crawl space for the power cables. Then had to cut the bolts off holding the other access plate into the locker.”
“And what did you find?”
“Well it’s not as good in some ways and in other ways it’s a lot better gold mine this time. Just ten 1911’s, and only four 1919’s, two with tripods the other two had the pintail mounts, and only six Thompson’s this time, but ten BAR’s, and at least 20 magazines for each of the 45’s and 30.06 weapons. A lot less rifles too, only forty-five M1 Garand’s, and ten M1 carbines with plenty of the 15 round magazines for them. There were thirty of the wood and wire bound cases, containing five Ammo cans each in 30.06, and ten of them were labeled ‘belted four ball one tracer’, and two cases of AP/Incendiary. Two cases of 45 and three cases of 30-carbine ammo, all of the ammo is dated 1944. Not as much ammo as last time either but we will still have at least two thousand rounds for each weapon.”
Oscar suggested, “I think we will both need to take our pickups in today.” Doing the math in his head he quickly said, “This will give us 105 Garands and 25 Carbines, 14 BAR’s, 10 Thompson’s, and twelve 1919’s.”
“Let me finish will you,” Pepe scolded, “I saved the best news for last, there are also nine cases of grenades. Three are the old MarkIIA1’s you know the pineapples, with twenty-four to the case. One case of Willie Pete, which will be nice to have. Three cases of the MarkII rifle grenades, and two cases of M9A1 HEAT anti tank grenades. Tucked in the corner were two long barrel 60mm ship mount mortars with aiming sights, and four cases of HE ammo and one case each of WP and one Para-illumination for the mortars, we can make up our own field base plates later.”
“We are going to need help getting it down to our pickups, good thing the yard isn’t working on weekends,” Oscar added.
“Yes we will need help, there are four more weapons to tell you about, two of them are the M20 2.36 inch Bazooka’s still in shipping crates, with 4 cases of rockets.. That’s 24 shots foe each one,” Pepe said as he smiled from ear to ear.
Oscar was speechless, this time he just stood their staring at his friend, dumb struck.
Pepe’s smile got even bigger then before, as he continued, “The last two crates hold one each of the M2A1-7 flamethrowers still in their shipping boxes, complete with original army manuals, and there is a small ammo can with each that hold at least 60 of the igniters I tested one and it worked. The pressure tank o-rings and the rubberized pressured hoses have perished, but since they are all standard size, we can get them from any hardware store.”
“Holy shit, now that’s good news a couple of flamethrowers. I hate to say it but it’s damned good there is a recession on and we have only a skeleton crew working now a days, and it’s a good thing we are in charge so we can get a large enclosed truck in to the yard and out, without worry or being questioned.” Oscar said, “To top that off I’m glad that Marcus is on guard duty over the weekend, a fellow marine just like us, worrying and preparing for what ever happens to pop up.”
“My feelings too, when we get the stuff home we wait until after the sun goes down before we unload anything. I’ll have my two boys and the son-in-law over to help unload and carry it all into the shelter under our garages. If you can get your three boys over too we can make it a cook out then the work of unloading will take less then ten minuets.”
“You know my boys, offer them steaks or any free food, and they’ll gladly paint the whole neighborhood in an hour.” He laughed as he added, “Don’t worry they’ll come, we’ll just call it a family get together on a Saturday evening, we’ve done it often enough and the neighbors won’t suspect a thing. I’ll have Tommy take about a quarter of the stuff over to his place later on, as we don’t want to store all our eggs in just one basket.”
“That’s for sure, my son-in-law Hank took some stuff over to his new place last month, he has a fallout shelter just like ours but not as big. It has a hidden doorway that’s behind a concrete wall leading from his basement, out under his back yard.”
“You know we have enough weapons to equip a light company right know, especially since we got all the boys to go to that DCM shoot two years ago they all have a least two M1’s each, from the Gov’s arsenal that are refurbished. You know I thank the lucky stars both of our parents got paranoid during the fifties and had those two large bomb shelters built under their garages and had them connected.”
“A just in case things go bad plan, but it didn’t and we can thank the Lord for that, but it helps us now. I only had my big LED soft blue flashlight with me but I didn’t see any rust on the weapons, it just looked like they had a light coat of dried grease covering them, it didn’t smell at all like cosmolean.”
“That’s even better news, you know that M1D I bought two months ago, it took me over a week of work to get that junk off and it had only been coated and stored since Nam. What would stuff from WWII be like?”
“Hammer and chisel work, lots of elbow grease, or soak them in gas for a month,” Pepe added with a laugh. “No easy way to remove that crap that I know of.”
“With all of those M-1s I think we will need to make a trip to the next gun show down in Phoenix next month, and pick up a few more cases of the Korean ammo that’s clipped and in bandoliers?”
“Always nice to take a little trip and see TC and David, I’ll drop them a line and see if they need any help with some fence mending. Before then I’ll work on one of the flamethrowers and get it ready to take along, we can make up fuel for it down there and test it out. It just takes about fifteen minuets to stir up some. I’m also going to give them a nice present, one of the Thompson’s and two of the BARs with twenty mags each, and at least one of the 1919’s with two thousand rounds belted, they’ll be in for a surprise.”
“Well I’ll be dipped in shit,” Oscar said with a deadpan voice that sounded a lot like David’s rancher drawl, both men burst out laughing.
(C-37)
Plans within Plans
Spring
‘History teaches that wars begin,
when governments believe
the price of aggression is cheap.’
-Ronald Reagan
"There is no safety for honest men except by believing all possible evil of evil men."
- Edmund Burke.
“Admiral, I like the improvement on the plans, but what you ask only the Premier can grant that for now. The new Secretary General will schedule this proposal for next weeks meeting and at that time I’m sure it will be approved. As for the Americans, they will jump at the chance to see some of our newest ships up close.” Xo liked the plan and it showed on his face, one could see the many possibilities that must be running through his mind.
“It’s an excellent deception. If we are sending some of our newest Navy ships on port calls around the world, it proves we aren’t planning a war, for now. By doing these good will visit they will see this as part of our ongoing efforts to improve relations, ha I like it.” Xo couldn’t help but laugh at the idea of the west being taken in by so simple of a deception.
Ju said, “But once action is started this scattered force would be their first target, or at least ones they would want to destroy in the first few days. I don’t think we want them isolated and destroyed so a week before any action is taken we call them home.”
Xo said, “This mild depression the world is in helps us, if we time the dumping of the counterfeit American dollars and the following further decline in their economy again triggers an international crises that will cause the price of oil per barrel to skyrocket, it gives us an excuse to bring them home half way through their tour.”
“When oil is too expensive to continue our show, I like the reasoning sir,” Ju responded then continued with. “Their satellites will be so busy tracking the show force, and the mobilization of our task force forming against Taiwan at the same time, they won’t see the slight increase in normal container shipping traffic as a threat. If asked our people will say it’s due to the increased orders they placed for the Christmas season, so we use their holidays against them. With normal shipping and delivery planned at the end of September; that makes good times as we will be able to seize our objectives and to consolidate well before winter sets in. The Americans will have to wait to counter attack after winter, and try to recapture the lost ground; all the while our forces in Asia are on the march. ” Admiral Ju said this with satisfaction and a smile even though Xo was a very good land General it was even better that he picked up modern navel strategy so well. The new China that would explode on to the world could not have a better leader.
“Speaking about oil, the 200 millimeter pipeline from the new oil fields west of Alma Ata in Kazakhstan to Yining Gulja is completed, three months ahead of schedule. The small refinery there can only process 50,000 barrels a day. With that size of pipeline it’s practical to triple the refinery size and then divert the fuel as needed. No one will suspect the four hidden storage containers we are building underground in the Borohoro Shan Mountains with the ability to store one million barrels each of refined fuel. When those are completed and filled it will be enough to supply our four Armies main supply depots for two years without our seizing the fields and the larger refinery located there. The plan is moving ahead and taking shape, in most areas we are ahead of schedule.”
“That is good Xo, we can then have the new army units make several, small scale practice maneuvers at either the company or battalion level, with their division commanders watching and making critiques. That will get the new men past the nervous stage.”
“That is a good idea and now more good news Admiral, we have the worlds newest and best radar jamming equipment. The units will be completed in the quantity needed so that each Division will have two units and all ships will have one unit that will stay with them, until the unloading is complete then the commander can use it to cover his shore based supply depots.”
“With the new mobile anti-air units this radar jamming equipment, and GPs scramble system, we will neutralize the American hi-tech Air Force, or at least scale back their advantage to something we can deal with. It will take them months to figure out the new systems we have and for them to develop a method to defeat them.” Ju said with complete assurance.
“You have done well my friend,” Xo exclaimed. “One thing though, when all is ready I don’t want the containers with the new jamming systems to be placed on the OP Orders or ship manifest. They must be completely separate and loaded as one of the last units. When unloading starts they must be right after the first 50 containers of soldiers are offloaded along with the anti-aircraft missile batteries, by then the ports will be completely secured. That way we will have control of the airspace above the harbors within the first half-hour. Only the Corp. and Deputy Corp. Commanders must know and they can’t tell their staff until the unloading reaches that stage. By keeping our secrets in just a few hands the chance that the West’s intelligence agencies find out about our new technology will be all but impossible. And only after we have our beachhead secured then the word can be disseminated to each and every division commander and his staff. ”
“I see the wisdom in your wish, it will be so,” Adm. Ju said as he shook his head in agreement. “I will follow the Army plan and only the Navel Captains will know of this, not the commercial ship captains.”
“We have finished compromising most of the local ports American bound container inspectors and they now only look at the containers we want them too. When the day comes to load the ships with the troop containers they will only be inspecting the few we want them too with vehicle parts and never suspect our plans.”
“When a great power is relaying on weak men, that power is no longer great.”
“So true, and they don’t even have a clue how far they have fallen either.”
“They will very soon, after we deliver the bill that is past due,” Xo stated with a smile.
(C-38)
Checking it Out
‘I know that.’
Maxwell Smart
D asked his boss, “I thought the Coast Guard had interpreters of their own Jim?”
“They do D, all I can figure is that this has something to do with your discovery and written report including the pictures of the Chinese SF in Arizona. Besides this request comes directly from the Coast Guard asking for you, you look worried, something bothering you.”
“Not anything really, I just have reservations about boarding a large ship at sea, with a bunch of folks I’ve never worked with. I don’t know their procedures, how they back each other up, and what we can open, ask or question?” The look on D’s face showed that he wasn’t happy about this assignment.
Jim with a mischievous smirk asked, “Afraid of getting sea sick?”
D answered with a good hearty laughed, “No, haven’t been sea sick ever. And it’s not that I don’t trust the Coast Guard, as I said I just don’t know how they work.”
“Would you feel better if I assigned you a back up or two of our own people?”
“Yes I would boss, if the info from Hong Kong is good, and this is another load of men and weapons plus equipment for a group of Chinese SF that is already here, they might have added security working as part of the crew.”
“OK, I’ll call the CG’s base Commandant and let him know that a team of four agents will be there by noon. Now any thing else?”
“Still no word from Washington or any local information about where those SF might have ended up? And how far up the chain has my latest report of the O.T.M. in large numbers south of the border gotten? Those numbers reported should have gotten someone’s attention up in Washington.”
“Washington considers us last when it gives out intelligence, those guys are like a giant sponge always absorbing, but not letting any info out, that is except for leeks from time to time. You know as much as I do, maybe more since you spend a lot of time in the field,” Jim answered raising one eyebrow in question?
“In complete honesty boss, it’s like those guys never existed once they crossed the border, or what’s going on south of it to. None of our informants in China town have heard a thing, or any of the arrested illegal Mexican gang members has heard even a wisp of a rumor. By now something would have surfaced if they were being used as muscle for the Gangs,” D shrugged his shoulder as he replied.
Jim shook his head in agreement as he said, “Oh well you better get a move on, pick the three agents from who’s ever in the office that you want as back up, brief them and make tracks. Let the office manager know and pick up two MP5’s and two pump shotguns for the team, never know you might need the intimidation factor of being well armed and ready.”
“Something your not telling me boss,” D asked with a question voice?
“Not really, it’s just that the number of Chinese being smuggled by ship into our ports is up by over ten percent. And it’s not the normal 3 to 1 mix of young men and women that’s been the average the last few years. And most of them before now had that cowed, frightened and desperate look. The last six months we are getting quite a few hard cases they number close to twenty percent of the total, and after being arrested they wouldn’t talk except to an official from their consulates office. And not a one of these hard cases, and I mean not a one has asked for political asylum, or fought being deported. Makes you wonder what is going on doesn’t it especial when you add it to the info you got last fall? Anyway when the CG is finished needing your skills come back here with your team, I damn well need you guys.”
D just nodded his head as he left Jim’s office; he had that 1000-yard stare, as he thought, hard cases, don’t like this one bit. Something’s up, that’s for sure but what is going to happen and how soon? No one knows a thing, just have to wait and see. The waiting is always the hard part.
(C-39)
Winter Training
Let it snow!
February
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance Accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."
---Robert Heinlein
---Robert Heinlein
Si vis pacem, para bellum –
(prepare for war if you want peace)
Roman saying
‘The Strength of the Pack is in the Wolf, and The Strength of the Wolf is in the Pack.’ Rudyard Kipling
‘Planning ahead is proper, training and being prepared is wise.
And that's what we in the Militia must do, plan to be an assist.’
And that's what we in the Militia must do, plan to be an assist.’
JN
As usually the weather forecasters had gotten it wrong again. We were suppose to get the two to three inches of snow and Kansas City was to get the twelve inches not vice-a-versa. Oh well it makes for good training, even if only two-thirds of the men who had committed decided to show up. After we set up the tents and the rest of the camp, Andy was giving a little show and tell on using cross-country skies and snowshoes to the people who had arrived; as he told them you never know when you might need the knowledge. To bad we only had nine set of skies and six set of snowshoes to use, but in Eastern Kansas you almost never needed them. Still the training would be a change and a challenge for the men, who didn’t ski. There were several large snowdrifts just behind the campsite, excellent for training. It was only a half a mile to the trees over by the big creek, and he estimated that it would take almost all morning to relay the men in for training, then lunch would be served.
Before Andy started his demonstration Dan had announced, at ten AM we would hold a senior NCO, and Company Commanders meeting.
Back at the range office, “Are you sure you we are ready to break up the Battalion into four units, Dan?” Jeff asked.
James White, B company’s first sergeant added, “I’m not sure its such a good idea either sir. We would be very short on good 1st. Sgts. and instructors for training. And I doubt we would have enough officers who are prior service to fill the three command slots; let alone to select new platoon leaders from the rank and file members, that would stretch our best people very thin?”
“You both are correct to a point, I’ve explained the reason behind my proposing the plan, but let me add this to think about too. Since we returned from Arizona last year, and making the evening news, we have almost tripled our unit in size and we have a very large number of raw recruits, the people with no prior military experience. They are all willing and quiet a few of our new members have to travel over one hundred miles one way just to train. That’s almost two hours of travel, on old two-lane county and state highways for some of them. Right now we have almost nine hundred people scattered over half the state, we are getting too unwieldy.”
“And to answer the 1st. Sgts. doubts, there is a lot of good talent in our organization, given half-a-chance our guys will surprise us, they are eager and willing. The goal we started out with was that every man trained would be able to step into at least a squad leaders position after a few years of training. We have achieved that and more, we have many men that are corporals right now, they have been around long enough to know what is required to lead a platoon with very few problems. Gen. Patton once said ‘Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.’ In the long run I think we will be a better organization, especially in the ability to serve our local communities and counties.”
“And if we do decide to reorganize, I have in mind two people who would make excellent new Battalion Commanders. They both have just recently joined us; one was a former Air Force assistance wing commander, he retired with the rank of Major. The other was a former Army Artillery Lt. Colonel, who was the S-3 for a Brigade, that’s training, plans and operations. I don’t want people to think I’m pushing these two off on to them, but both have experience and the training, plus the ability to motivate people, besides they would be elected by their people not chosen by me. Our voting members have done a good job so far in selecting quality commanders.”
“Also by having the three other battalion sized units in a different quarter of the state most of the training would then be local, not half-way across the state for people to drive to. A lot of the men are just getting back to a regular work schedule and less miles means more money for them to spend on their families.”
“I agree with the whole idea, just look at the weather this last week freezing rain and now deep snow on top of it, I’ll be surprised if we have more then two hundred out of the three hundred people who signed on show up. If by making all of the training local except for two large events per year open to everyone, we will increase our number of instructors, and that will gain us more units and people, both former military and civilians who have never served but want to learn how to function as a team.”
“There are a lot of people out there who want to join but can’t make the training, either because of the distance to travel, money reasons and having to work that weekend. A more flexible schedule, and by having say A company train the first weekend of each month, and B company training the next and so on for D and E companies. With training every weekend in smaller groups I know our numbers will increase, as will the quality of the people we train.”
“I think Dan is right on this one,” Bill interjected. “Since I took over recruiting, and after we made national news in reference to our trip to Arizona. I have had added up the numbers reported by the company recruiters that they said were serious in wanting to join. We have had just over five hundred people request permission to observe a weekend training session; several that I personally handled said they were representing small groups of patriots. These request have come from all over the state, others wishing to join but the distance to travel is too great. In one case to verify that no bull was being said, I went to see one man and his group out by Great Bend, they had fifty people training that weekend; their first Sgt. told me he had almost one hundred people in the company. And that he knew of a couple of smaller groups who had recently approached them and wanted to be affiliated, they cited our success as a larger organization.”
“Safety in numbers,” Dan said.
Bill smiled as he finished, “Any way he called me last night and said if the weather wasn’t so crummy he would have made our training today. He said he had to drive a salt and sand truck for the County, I told him that no excuse was needed and his work came first, besides it’s his job to clean the roads, so others can get to work or around and about their communities.”
“That can be a good or bad job to have, just depends on the weather,” Cody said with a chuckle, stating the obvious.
Bill then said, “I know Dan is right in wanting more flexibility by us setting up several separate Battalions, ever since Andy told me about the Chinese in the photos, and Jeff said he’s called Eli a couple of times for up dates. There has been no news or arrest or anything, especially nothing about a drug gang war happening down there. I know I worry too much but I don’t like the many different possibilities that keep popping into my mind. I may be slightly paranoid but that doesn’t mean that the US has seen the last of a major terrorist attack or worse. I say the more people who are prepared to render assistance or help, the better.”
“Thanks for the support Bill, all of us present have the same worries,” Dan said. “Also I want you all to know, if my proposal is accepted by the guys? I don’t want to be more then just a Battalion commander, our Battalion that is if I’m voted back into office. These others new units would be there own Battalions, independent from us.”
“I would like to see them accept our training methods and standards, and to use our four-man fire teams concept. They could use our by laws or make up similar ones, but I would also like for all of the units to run the same training schedules and the sub units have the staggered weekend training, that we we are all working from the same page, with similar goals. So if someone missed training on the first weekend of the month with say A Co. he could drive the following weekend to where B. Co. was conducting the same training that he missed. That way all who wanted to join and participate wouldn’t miss out on any activities.”
“And the most important is to have centralized testing for the Medics, Communications personnel and other specialized people, that way we can keep those standards the same. ”
A loud cheering erupted outside, the four paused and looked out the windows, two crew cab pick up trucks painted in camouflage colors, had driven up to where Andy was giving his class. Seven men wearing winter poncho’s over there BDU’s were out of the vehicles with three of them talking to Andy. The other four were busy unloading snowshoes, skies, and poles, several of our men had joined in and were busy helping them stack the equipment in two separate piles, they were then quickly joined by at least a company of the militia members all lending a helping hand, making very short work of the job.
“I don’t recognize the trucks, but they brought a lot of equipment that we can use for this weekends training. Any body know them,” Dan asked to no one in particular?
“Who ever did the paint jobs on the trucks did a real good job, they almost look like regular Army or National Guard,” the Sgt. Major answered with a chuckle.
Andy after talking to the three men shook hands with them and pointed in the direction of the office. Andy then did a strange thing, he took a step back and saluted, the salute was returned by the shortest of the three men, then they then turned and walked toward the office door.
Cody said, “I’ll get the door for our unexpected guest.”
Dan knew his Sgt. Major was up to something, he could see the mischievous glint in his eye and the slimmest of smiles starting.
As Cody opened the door for them, he came to attention turning his head toward the men in the office, and said in a loud commanding military voice, “Gentlemen, 'Ah-tennnnn-SHUN!''
The three officers Dan, Jeff, Bill and First Sgt. White snapped to attention as they saw the two stars on the shorter man’s BDU cap, who said, “Stand at ease gentlemen. That’s not necessary Sgt. Major, I wanted things to be more informal, and relaxed,” he said to Cody with a chuckle. “I think you and my Command Sgt. Major had this all planned?” As he half turned and looked at the third man following him, he cocked his right eye and said “That’s why you insisted I wear my BDU’s and then had me wear this winter camouflaged parka over them, right?”
You could see the Command Sergeant Major Rank on the Cap of the third man, and with a smile on his face, he intoned, “Sir, I would never reveal how an NCO gets his commanding officer to do the right thing, or make the proper impression, Sir.”
Laughing the General blurted out, “Ha, bullshit sarge, I suspected a set up, but I decided to play along.” All the men in the office had a good laugh at that; they all knew that good NCO’s make for good Officer’s.
Cody then said, “I’ll do the honors sir, since I know everyone present. Major General Greene, this is Lieutenant Colonel Dan Marion our Battalion Commander.”
The two men shook hands and General Greene said, “I’ve heard some good things about your unit Dan, and since you’re not a real Lt. Col. you can call by my first name, it’s Tom.”
Before Dan could answer him the CSM said, “Sir I don’t think that is proper, Lt. Col. Marion was elected by his men to be their commander, the Bn. Sgt. Major calls him Colonel. His officers address him as such, and the rest of his people have followed their lead. They may not be a state-supported unit but they are a state charted Militia unit. With all due respect sir, if his men elected him and call him Colonel, he should only refer to you as general or sir.”
“Well I’ll be,” General Greene said with a smile, “You are a conniving Sgt. Major. I’d hate to run afoul of you, I think you would have my hide and the Colonels’ too, if we didn’t show the proper respect to each other.”
“I’m pleased to met you General Greene,” Dan added in, “I think we both just got our marching orders, from the powers that be.”
Again the men all laughed as the CMS said with a sly smirk, “I be just doing my job sir, just doing my job.”
Cody continued the introductions, “General Greene, this is Major William Summers he wears more then two hats one as the Battalion Executive Officer, the other as the operations and training officer or S3, and is in charge of recruiting sir.”
Both men shook hands and said, “Pleased to meet you Sir.”
“And our Alpha company commander Capt. Jeff Green, and Bravo Company First Sgt. James White,” again a pleased to meet you as they shook hands.
General Greene then introduced the two men with him, “Gentlemen, Major James Dix my Armor training wing commander, and as you’ve heard this is my Command Sgt. Maj. Dennis Cooper.”
After the hand shaking Dan asked, “Sir, I noticed the equipment your men were unloading, if you don’t mind, how did you know about our training today?”
“I’ll let the CSM answer that one, it was his idea.”
“That’s an easy one,” the CSM explained, “your training schedule which I happen to have a copy of, called for this overnight FTX. The weather forecaster said a 90% chance for snow, and for once they got it right; it just made sense to loan you the equipment. Especially after Cody called me and said that you had less then a dozen pair of snowshoes or skies to train with. We both agreed that such a small amount of equipment wouldn’t do for your whole Battalion.”
“So I called around to the various units on the Fort, Major Dix’s training unit had the only ones to offer, sixty pair of snowshoes and seventy-two sets of skies and poles. I made a request for the equipment and four of his NCO’s offered to come along and be assistant instructors to your Lt. They know some of your people here, and have used your range to do some shooting. They figured it would be a good way for them to do a pay back.”
“But loaning the equipment is only a small part of my reasoning. I wanted the General to meet you Colonel, to see your organization and people first hand.” The CSM turned and asked Cody, “do all your people present know about Arizona?”
“Yes,” Cody answered? “I’m telling you Dennis this has been hard one to keep quiet.”
The CSM shook his head in agreement and said, “Most secrets like this are Cody.” Looking around he continued, “We meaning all of us have to keep quiet for a while longer about that incident. After Cody told me what you guys had stumbled onto in Arizona I informed General Greene. Both of us had to make a couple of calls to the Pentagon, at first we were told that it was classified, and we didn’t have a need to know. Finally the General made a last call to Ft. Bragg before an old friend would agree that we might possible be facing a big problem.”
“Big problem,” Dan asked?
“Yes, a big problem. General Greene had to call in a few favors owed, and he was able to get some questions answered, but without a single word on any recourse or action being taken.”
“You see Dan, sorry, Colonel” General Greene cut in, “your men stepped into a no-mans’ land. Several agencies have jurisdiction, but it seems not a one of them is wanting or willing to talk to each other, or to answer the few question I asked.”
“The ones that know more, hopefully are doing more then just looking at it. But who knows, as I said no one is talking? The friend I called, Maj. General Puckett at Ft. Bragg, on the first of the month he said not to worry it was being handled. I got a hand written letter from him, four days later mentioning your Militia unit and that you guys knew first hand some details. He suggested I look you up, and that maybe your people could fill me in, he wouldn’t say any more. Since it was a hand written letter, sent by regular US mail service I knew this to be far more serious then he was able to let on over the phone.”
“So I had the CSM call Cody, excuse me I mean CSM Wolf, to come in and personally brief me, as he told you, he filled in on all the details and some of the concern you guys have. If you don’t mind telling again what happened and what you think, you see Col. Marion. Maj. Dix here has only a second hand story from me.”
Dan told the story again about Jeff’s patrol meeting the border agent D and his friend Eli and the rancher, that they overheard them talking about some ex-Chinese military people and having photo proof. Then about D’s implied warning they were given that it must stay quiet, supposedly because it was an ongoing drug war investigation? But since that time, nothing on the news and no one was telling them a thing.
“All I have to go by is my intuition, sir,” Dan intoned, “but I think we are seeing some stepped up assistance for a large terrorist operation. We know about the Zetas that rogue Mexican Army unit helping a drug cartel south of the border. They want to control an area on both sides and help smuggle drugs. Who’s to say that a terrorist outfit hasn’t paid for the service of a rogue Chinese Army unit? And being Ex-Special Forces, hey they could really do some serious damage here in the US, sir!”
“That’s a fair assumption Dan, but what makes you think they would hire some Chinese, the Middle East is full of trained men who will work for very little pay, especially if the target is America. By any chance have you read the The Quranic Concept of War, by Brigadier General S. K. Malik of the Pakistani Army, ” Gen. Greene asked?
“Yes sir I did, several years ago, but I don’t think our elected leaders have. Lt. Andy Whitmen, our Battalion S2 officer, you met him outside leading the training Sir, his theory on hiring the Chinese, is because the terrorist want to get away from the stereotype of only using middle-eastern men. By their use of Asians or others to help them in their cause, this would get us so paranoid watching everyone that we waste time and effort just like the airport security people are doing now, Sir,” Dan answered.
“Besides the local paper down there ‘The Tombstone Tumbleweed’ has interviewed several local rancher’s on the number of middle-eastern men or other ethnic groups they have helped round up crossing the border illegally. Their stories are painting a grim picture and something….”
There was a knock on the door, Cody was the closest and opened it, Andy and about a dozen others were waiting outside. Dan looked at his watch and said, “General Greene we’re suppose to have a meeting now, I have some business that needs the attention of all officers and the senior NCO’s. But I’d like to finish our conservation later if you don’t mind sir?”
“No problem with that Colonel it’s your show, but if you don’t mind I’d like to stay and see how the Militia conducts a command and staff meeting?”
“You’re more then welcome to stay sir,” Dan answered as he turned toward the door? “Sgt. Major have the men come in and take a seat please.”
After the last man entered and took off his winter jacket and found a seat Dan introduced their guest, “Gentlemen as you all know from when the training equipment arrived, we have the honor of hosting Major General Greene, Major Dix, and Command Sgt. Major Cooper, from Ft. Riley. They heard about our training needs and were very gracious to loan us some equipment to help make today’s instruction a little more manageable if not enjoyable, thank you sir.” Dan started clapping and all present joined in, and applauded.
General Greene stood up and held his hand up for them to stop. “Your welcome, but you can thank the CSM, oh by the way, the loan of the equipment is unofficial and so is our being here.” He looked out the window and saw the men training, they were divided into four groups, and two of Maj. Dix NCO’s were teaching snowshoes and the other two were teaching the use of skis. More people must have arrived, as there were smaller crowds off to the side of each group watching the training. “I wish we had enough equipment to loan so that all your people could train at the same time, we were lucky to have what we did, I guess getting this much snow around here doesn’t happen very often?” He looked at Dan as he asked the question, and sat down.
“It’s been eleven years since we had this much snow, sir,” Dan answered. Turning to Andy he asked, “it looks like a few more people showed up?”
“Another forty five just after the General arrived sir, that brings us up to two hundred sixty present for training. I expect by the end of the day we’ll have more, maybe over three hundred total cause several of the men used their cell phones and called friends when the Army equipment showed up. Most of them said their friends will get here since we had the equipment to train with now.”
Bill let out a low whistle as he said, “That’s almost a third of our total man power, we haven’t seen that good of a turn out since last summer!”
Dan turned to their guest and said, “An all volunteer unit that is scattered over half the state, especially one the size of Kansas is really hard to bring together for training. With the weather as bad as it has been this week I’m surprised at the number that has show up already. Your loaning us the equipment makes this an excellent opportunity to train in a different weather environment then we would normally have.”
Turning back to the assemble staff Dan continued, “That brings me to the reason for this staff meeting. Guys we are getting too spread out to hold one large training session or meeting, every other month. Some of you have had to drive over two hours one way just to train. Many of you know of others who would like to join but the long distance driving puts them off.”
“We also know there are several other groups across the state that want to be affiliated with us, to share in our training and use our facilities. These groups hold monthly training sessions the same as us, a couple of the larger groups have indicated they would like to come and train at a central location for one or two large events during the year.”
Phil Gordon the public relations officer said, “A large scale disaster training scenario set up and ran by an all volunteer group would make good head lines.”
Someone said, “Yeah. Militia hold rally including disaster response training, they were all armed with ugly rifles.”
Several of the people chuckled, and the CSM said in a fatherly manner, “All right, gentleman,” to bring the group back into focus.
Dan turning to a large Kansas map on the wall behind him that was divided into four sections. “We have been talking for two months now to split our Battalion into four separate Battalions based on the following regions as I’ve shown on this map.”
“Each Battalion would be independent under their own commander, but all would follow a common training schedule set for all four battalions. I want to suggest that we do not have a Brigade commander to make the decisions, thus keeping unit command and control local. Instead there would be a staff comprised of the command personal from each Bn. to coordinate all training and set standards. The Brigade would share a common training company made up of the best instructors from all four of the Battalions.”
“1st. Sgt. Doug Peters of E Company has offered his place just south of Topeka for meetings and joint planning sessions. He also expressed a desire to work with this training unit; he says being 60 years old has its drawbacks when it comes to fulfilling the job as Top for a line company, where the average age is around 38. Something about having a hard time keeping up with the youngsters.” There were a few laughs from the room, Doug was a long distance runner and would but to shame a lot of men half his age.
Tracy Cole, the E. Company commander raised her hand to be recognized Dan saw her and said, “Yes Capt. Cole?”
Tracy stood up to say, “Top Peters and I talked this over last week, I hate the idea of losing my right hand man, and the troops will miss him just as much as I will. But we have several good people within our Militia Company that ought to be able to step right up and fill the slot. I suggest Sir that as officers we exclude ourselves from the selection process and leave it up to the Senior NCO’s to select the best man or women to replace him.”
Tracy continued, “That is if we agree to form the Brigade, I like the idea and can see the reasoning behind your proposal. I’m not complaining but it would save me a three hour trip each way for a weekend of training, as you know I have missed only one training date in the year I’ve been the Echo company Captain.”
“Looking at your map I would be in the 3rd. Battalions AO, and I know a rancher who would gladly let us use part of his land to train on, its just north of Great Bend on the Smoky Hill river not quiet in the center of the AO but still a good location to train.”
Other hands were raised and by the consensus of questions, it seemed that the idea was more then acceptable to all present.
After about twenty minuets of discussion Dan said, “OK ladies and gentleman, I will have the Battalion Sergeant Major present the plan to the troops present just before lunch is served. That way they can talk it over as they eat, and we will take a vote after the Sunday morning formation and prayer.” Most of the staff nodded their heads in agreement, Dan turned to CMS Wolf and said, “Your turn Sgt. Major,” and set down.
Cody stood up and addressed the meeting, “Now for the last item of business before we break for lunch, the Brigade shoulder patch! We had over a dozen well drawn entries, several with the Jay Hawk and or Wild Cat theme in them. The committee decided no on both of those as it could open ourselves to legal questions or challenges from the two universities.”
“Also the use of the sunflower is out, as several of our National Guard units already have it in their patches.”
“After looking at the rest we came down to one which I think has the most merit,” Cody turned and uncovered a large poster. On it was a drawing representing a circular patch, the majority of the background color was a light brown khaki color. The foreground was a mixture of lighter khaki and a medium green both slanted slightly from the lower left to the upper right, looking like tall grass. In the center of all this you could just make out the outline of the shoulders and head of a gray colored wolf.
Following the curve at the top of the patch were the words, Prairie Ghost. At the bottom of the patch, 1st. Bn. 1st. Bde. Kansas Militia.
Before anyone said a word, Jeff Green stated, “The committee’s vote was unanimous when we saw this enlarged drawing. I personally liked it because it reflects my opinion of the Militia; the colors and the tall grass depict Kansas the Prairie State. The wolf, us the Militia, always presents not always visible, but watching and waiting.”
Cody continued, “I checked with a friend of mine who owns an embroidery shop, he printed up a dozen patches three inches across, just like this enlarged drawing.” Opening a small plastic sack he passed the patches around. “He said if we were to order in quantities of a 100, he can make the patches at a cost of four dollars each. It doesn’t matter if we want a mixture with either first, second, third or fourth Battalion on the patches as its all computer controlled.”
Doug Peters raised a hand to ask a question.
Cody said, “Top Peters, you have a question?”
Doug stood up and said, “I’m not being PC but might some of our American Indian members be offended? I mean the wolf is a scared symbol to some of them, and I don’t know but might the local tribes take offense. And other people might not see a wolf, instead a dog and start calling us Dog Soldiers, in reference to the Cheyenne warrior society.”
Cody laughed as he said, “Way ahead of you Doug. As I’m sure all of our people know I’m a full-blooded Kickapoo and I liked the idea of the wolf, but I went ahead and checked it out with the tribal council. They didn’t see any reason why we couldn’t use the wolf, a couple of them even said it would be an honor to see it used as a symbol of respect.”
“We also have several members who belong to other tribes, three who are Cheyenne, so I bounced the Dog Soldier idea off of one of them. He said he didn’t see any problem; and that we should be proud if people wanted to call us Dog Soldiers. He said that our militia represents the ideals of their people, willing to help others if necessary. And if needed we were willing to step into harms way to protect the nation.”
“We have several other tribes represented within our ranks, two brothers who are Sioux, two more who are from the Cherokee nation. One Hopi, one Apache and one from the Comanche Nation, that’s Sgt. David Little in the reconnaissance platoon.”
Jeff and Dan both chuckled when he mentioned Sgt. Little. The CSM then explained with a smile, “Sgt. Little submitted a very good drawing as a joke. It showed a muscular, bare chest Plains Indian wearing a buffalo skin and horn war bonnet on his head, standing over a downed enemy. He had the guys hair in one hand and a bloody tomahawk in the other, the caption he had at the top said, ‘Who’s Next!’ We as a group, rejected that one first, though it did make us all laugh.” Cody couldn’t stop his own chuckle as he finished.
The other six members involved in the selection process were all laughing now and everyone in the room that knew Sgt. Little joined along as they visualized the drawing in their minds eye.
Dan with a guffaw and a smiled turned to General Greene and Major Dix, “Sgt. Little is quiet the character, he used to be a stand up comedian and lived for several years in LA working the circuit there.” An idea comes to mind as he thinks, ‘I’ll have to get a copy of his drawing it gives me an idea for psyops if we ever need it.’
Cody asked Dan, “Sir what is your opinion of the Wolf for our unit symbol?”
“I’m just one vote here, CMS.”
“Yes sir you are, but I would still like your input.”
“OK, for what it’s worth, I like it, the wolf represents a lot of what we stand for, who we are. Strength, honor, loyalty to the pack, the individuals depend on the pack and the pack can depend on it. They take care of each other, young and old alike.”
“In Africa they don’t have wolves, but they do have the wild dogs, and they act just like a wolf pack. They are very rare, but they are Africans best hunters. Like the wolf they use teamwork and tactics to bring down prey that out weighs a single unit member by as much as 20 to one. Like the wolf they are very successful hunters, as the old saying goes, the strength of the pack is in the individuals, the strength of the individual is in the pack.”
“I’ll be voting yes, on these. Our strength is in our communities, as we are its strength.”
After a short discussion on the other two designs that had been selected as runner-up and second best, the staff voted 100% in favor of the using the Prairie Ghost as the unit patch. The meeting had lasted a little over an hour and broke up just as the unit was called to lunch. The idea for the unit patch and the breaking of the Battalion in to four separate commands would be presented to all members after the prayer and before the serving of the meal begins.
With the meeting over and the people filing off to lunch Dan asked, “General Greene I hope you and your people weren’t bored while listening to our discussion. You are staying for lunch I hope?”
“We wouldn’t miss lunch, I’ve heard the training wing senior NCO under Major Dix say you have some of the best mess hall chow he has ever tasted. And as for this meeting, no I wouldn’t say I was bored, it was a different style of staff meeting then I’m used to. If the unit patch is approved I would like to get one of them Col. Marion, I would also like to see Sgt. Little’s drawing; I like his sense of humor.”
The three men laughed as the general continued, “To be honest, I’m thinking we just witnessed some living history Maj. Dix, this is how the militia meetings were held back before 1775. Where every one’s opinion was considered and every man and women that wanted too had their say.”
Major Dix speaking for the first time since they were introduced said, “Rebels that became patriots! Farmers and merchants that became our founding Fathers! A lot of good questions and good ideas came out today, you have some bright people in your unit Col. Marion.”
“Thank you General and you too Major Dix, kind words for good people, but it’s not my unit it belongs to all of us who are active. I was voted in to do a job and to lead, each year we have a vote at our mid-December meeting, so far they have faith in me and where I’m leading.” Dan replied. “I only give orders on small things and during tactical training and maneuvers. I don’t rule and for now I don’t give orders on things that affect people’s lives, every one of our members are here because they want to be here, to make a difference. We have voted on all of the major decisions that affect the unit and we always will. The only time that would change is if the State were to call us to active duty, and the people here all know that.”
“It’s your system, it’s a time honored method, and if it works that’s even better. To lead by example and to get others to believe in and follow you, that’s the sign of a good unit with spirit.” Dix didn’t say that it was the mark of a respected leader. “From the discussion I just heard on your reorganization plan and for the unit patch, and as I said you do have a motivated group of people. They aren’t followers, their individuals who think, and it looks like they want to work toward a common goal,” Dix answered.
What Major Dix also hadn’t said, was that his opinion about the militia hadn’t changed if any thing it was confirmed. These were people who wanted the best for their families and for their communities they represented, they weren’t politicians, instead they were the unspoken leaders who get things done without fanfare or recognition.
He said instead, “General Greene, I think the CSM did the right thing in having us come along today. If the State Adjutant General were to make a formal request with your office to allow a once or twice a year joint training session for the Militia to use part of Ft. Riley, it wouldn’t be a bad idea. Of course the Militia would have to pay all its own expenses, we could help too provide the manpower with volunteers from the base units for a weekend training mission and assist them that way?”
General Greene and Dan both laughed at the same time, as the Gen. said “I’m not laughing at you Jim, but that’s a pretty good joke. I wish it was that easy, but I can assure you that the State of Kansas under its current administration will never make such a request. And if they did and I accepted it without going through the Pentagon? They would have me out of here fast, I’d either be retired or stationed in Antarctica wishing I had retired.”
Dan added, “I like the idea too Maj. Dix but as General Greene said it won’t happen. Not unless something happens as bad or worse then 9/11, something that really shacks the politician’s world and wakes them up. Then and only then will some of the politicians, and a small some at that, maybe then realize it’s been a bad mistake to ignore their constitutional duties, in the equipping and training of the Militia.”
Sooner then Dan or any one else would realize, sadly, he would be proven right.
(C40)
The guard on the Wall
Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.
Winston Churchill
“You know your not bullet proof Eli,” D said on the phone. “Especially since the groups coming across have been getting larger you really need to start working with at least one other man. To be brutality honest friend, it’s the drug runners and the way they are armed and ready to shoot, that’s what bothers me most.”
“Your not telling me something I haven’t brought up with my bosses more then once D. I even suggested the idea of asking Ranch Rescue for some help but they said no. In fact it boils down to just one man, one rancher, the big State Senator nixed that idea. He’s a Democrat and he said it would look bad, it wouldn’t be good publicity for him to use a group he is badmouthing to the press. Yet he wants his property protected and he’s got the money to spend. Just by himself, he could hire another man and afford to pay all the expenses necessary but no, the hell with the average Joe who is out of a job and having a hard time making ends meet. And heavens forbid if several friends get together and patrol their land or offer to help someone else. Most of all how dare other ranchers, that they ask for and get outsiders to assist, it would sound too much like a bunch of vigilantes.”
D laughed as he said, “Some people want it both ways especially liberal politicians. The people are only doing what the politicians swore and oath to do but won’t, and that’s enforcing the law.”
Eli said in disgust, “I know, politicians say a lot, pass all types of laws but still they do nothing. If I had a choice I would like a team of four good people, the guys with the money keep saying it’s a matter of cash flow, people aren’t cheap. But neither is fixing fences rounding up cattle and replacing damaged pumps and irrigation pipes.”
“You know, it’s really to bad we can’t get some help from the state or your outfit D?” Eli’s voice lit up with an idea, “hey if I started a tracking school would your boss send any people for me to teach them the basics?”
D thinking paused for a few seconds and then said, “You might have something there, on more then one occasion the boss has stated that we need more trackers. Of course it would have to be approved by the Bureau Chief and that would take several months, if he grants the request at all. If he did, that still leaves you with no one as back up in the mean time.”
“I’ll just have to be extra careful then, I changed my MO a couple of weeks ago. I don’t get within a half mile of the border now, in some places it’s a mile. I’ve hurt some of the drug runner’s profits and I’m sure they wouldn’t mind if I had an accident. I got’s to be extra careful I do,” he said with a smirk in his voice.
Changing subject he then said, “Enough talk on gloom and doom, I’m taking this weekend off and heading up to the cabin. Grab the wife and kids and come on up, we can get some late season cross-country skiing in. There have been several good snow’s lately it would be a shame to waste what God intended us to play in,” Eli said with a smile in his voice.”
“You’re on, I’ll bring along a new friend, and his family I’d like you to meet, he’s an ex navy seal, and just moved in a couple of doors down the block. The kids are always looking for any excuse to get up there, and it would be nice just to get away for a while, let me call you back Wednesday night to finalize what we need to bring. Since we started home schooling the kids we’ll more then likely head up late Thursday night, I’ll let you know then, bye for now,” D said in ending.
“Your new neighbor would be welcome, talk at you later friend, bye,” Eli answered, hanging up the phone.
(C-41)
Action /Counteraction or Reaction
’ Destiny - A tyrant's authority for crime and a fool's excuse for failure.’
-Ambrose Bierce
“Do you think the world will do nothing if we continue to assert or make attempts in controlling the 300 kilometers zone off our coast. The West will use force if necessary to insure the freedom of the sea’s concept they have embraced for over 200 years. They have gone to war several times to enforce this policy.” Tu Pol said sarcastically and was instantly silenced by the intense look that Xo directed at him.
Admiral Ju scolded the young up start politician, “Do not lecture Xo every again. It was he and his followers that elevated you to your lofty position in the Party. You are in that position because you can that do the job very well, never make the assumption that you can’t be replaced.” will youth never learn he thought. The position that Tu held was just that of a head administrator nothing more, his job was to see that things were done in proper order, and efficiently.
Yes he may hold the title of Party Secretary and it would appear he out ranked all others present, but that was the old China, the China of six months ago. The Communist China that the world knew had died this last winter. It was dead and buried, and the world none the wiser. When those in the Western World awoke to find out about this change it would be too late.
The coming of the new age, the reawakened Middle Kingdom as the world’s leading economic power, and soon the only super power would be a fact.
A visionary that looked beyond the old ways of the communist party now held power. Except for a few former high-ranking Party officials that knew and were allowed to keep there lofty position; and to a very few of the top ranks in the Military also knew that the power had changed quietly it would be kept secret for a while longer. The average rank and file of the dead party suspected nothing, as did most local commanders in the military.
The only outwardly visible changes the world had seen, a few of the most corrupt political appointed managers had been found out and charged with crimes against the state. They had a quick trial, with overwhelming evidence to prove their guilt, and were quietly executed to save their families and the country embarrassment.
Military officers all across the country with impeccable records now watched all political appointed positions. This had been the joint recommendation of the President and the Premier and seconded by the standing committee, all of it engineered by Xo as he set quietly during the heated debate. Secure in his position as the head of all PLO forces and with six of the nine voting positions held by men that shared his vision.
It had been so simple and with out a shot fired, no public killing of the old men who had stood in his way. All who had lost the passion and fire of their youth, what they hoped for now is to continue in their pampered lives and if lucky they would die in their beds, the hell with fighting for the party and the people.
Well Xo knew one thing they were right about, they will die. In fact most of them will die soon, long before old age would claim them.
Once the war began there would be of no purpose to keep them around. As for the younger party officials, most would be drafted and sent on special assignments, unfortunately all would be missions with 100% fatality rates, thus will be the end the last believers in the failed Communist dream. Their deaths would be of use, the Muslims showed us that suicide bombers were the poor countries equivalent of the smart bombs that the Americans used. If they resisted the idea, their families would suffer, and they would still die, a choice they would make, not I.
Dim said smiling, as he tried to lighten the mood, “Admiral Ju you should be nice to the Party Secretary he is a young man doing a difficult job. Did we not select him unanimously?”
Ju answered with his cat smile that held a warning as he looked at Tu, never criticize Xo again, “You are correct. He has streamlined his department, firing almost half of them as inept, useless, redundant or worse, corrupt. As for the numerous secret trials he quickly arraigned; very efficient, I commend him. He is a very able administrator, and I again commend him for his hard work and enthusiasm. It is a fact he has also saved the treasury over one billion Renminbi in these same few short months, I apologize for my tone but not for my words, Secretary Pol.”
Tu knew he had voiced doubt, a new capital offense, so he quickly changed his tone, “I may have voiced my opinion in the wrong manner. But if we push too hard won’t the Americans take action if we stop ships and inspect them?”
Ju laughed as he answered, “Last year we stepped-up surveillance and conducted fifty-three inspections alone of thirteen marine research projects involving foreign ships, all within our economic zone.”
“The Americans did the same, stopping and inspecting ships before they invaded Iraq, are we not able to do the same to secure our territory?”
“I don’t think the Americans want to provoke us in the Taiwan Strait that could possible lead to a military confrontation. It’s the one place where any miscalculation would result in a terrible incident and lead to an expanding wider confrontation. Right now it’s the largest point of contention in our relationship between the United States and us. The Americans will allow us some leeway, they can’t afford not too. Especially if they wish for our continued support in the talks with North Korea.”
“All because America is occupied elsewhere and they see no indication of imminent military action, we will continue or plans to retake Taiwan. In fact the island is holding elections while we speak, and both parties in the Taiwan government have plans to continue cutting its defense budget. Soon it will fall into our hands without a lot of fighting they haven’t the will to resist.”
“And the Russians, we are now taking their lands in the Primorye Region and they are too foolish to see, yes the western world has lost the will to resist.”
Tu knew he had to regain the trust of these leaders what better way then to act like a good student that was willing to learn. So he asked, “the detest we hold for communist is from lessons learned. But why do we continue to prop up the bankrupt and misruled government of North Korea? It cost us millions of Yuan each year and in turn we get insults from them not respect?”
“They have one million two hundred thousand troops armed and ready to go yesterday, North Korea keeps the Americans looking more at them, we do not want the Americans looking to closely at us. A little insult in return for money spent are well worth not having that American eye on us.” Ju replied.
Xo with the hint of a smile on his face thought, one thing you do not know my young friend, In a little over a year it will be the time of the horsemen to return. And the whole of Korea will be part of our Empire again!
Russian geologists have discovered massive gold deposits in the southern region of Altai with estimated reserves of up to 1,000 tons of the precious metal, a regional official was quoted as saying on Friday.
Anatoly Zaitsev, Altai's top geologist, was quoted by Itar-Tass as saying that the total discovered reserves of gold, silver, copper, zinc and lead in northern Altai are estimated at 60 million tons.
Undiscovered reserves could be five times higher, he said.
By comparison, Sukhoi Log, the world's second-largest undeveloped gold deposit also located in Russia, has estimated reserves of 1,029 tons of the metal.
Altai's biggest deposits include Rubtsovskoye, Zarechenskoye and Korbalikhinskoye, where exploration has already started.
The earthquake-prone Altai region sprawls along Russia's border with Mongolia, Kazakhstan and China and is one of the country's biggest grain-producing areas.
China is presently crushing the Muslim Uighurs in Xinjiang. Quietly, can’t let the world know who is rising to power.
(C42)
Evil has no Honor
‘History tells us that appeasement does not lead to peace. It invites an aggressor to test the will of a nation unprepared to meet that test.
And... those who seemingly want peace the most, our young people,
pay the heaviest price for our failure to maintain our strength.’
-- Ronald Reagan
“We still hold down a sizable portion of the American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, and they don’t see the why because they are looking at this fight as a regional situation. We have effectively separated them from some of their Allies as we did with Spain and the Philippine’s.”
“The French will continue to help and at the same time to spit on them, waiting for the next business deal with us, they are corrupt and not worthy of contempt. The Germans Green party is really yellow to use an American phrase. They are worried about winning the next election with their radical base, and staying in power for now, they do not worry about the future. Both countries are thoroughly infiltrated, we have over 100,000 men across Europe we can draw from. Five thousand of them are highly trained and just waiting for the word to spring into action.”
He paused to let the translator finish in Chinese then said, “Our plans move slower in Russia, west of the Urals. How close to completion are yours in the East?”
The General took a sip of the thick coffee his host had offered him, too sweet and bitter at the same time, a cup of tea would have been more to his likening. He smiled as he set the cup down and answered, “We are stealing them blind. They think we are conducting business, not occupying the land. We pay them in worthless dollars as we strip vast quantities of minerals and oil from them. We report less then half of what we ship and they are happy, their officials are too eager and willing to be corrupted.”
“With what looks like the majority of our forces massed along the coast facing Taiwan, but we do worry about them finding out the true threat and the potential to expose it,” he lied. Let the man think that China is weak, only able to face one enemy at a time, soon he would find out his peril.
His host laughed, “Don’t worry about the Russian military we have plans that will whip their heads around and around. Planes falling out of the sky, suicide bombers by the dozens, and attacks where they are weakest, many more school attacks, and that is just the beginning.”
The General nodded his head in agreement, thinking ‘Brave men don’t attack helpless school children, that will just enrage your foe. But if you weaken our enemy and yourself, you will both fall into our hand like ripe fruit falls from a tree.’ Smiling he said, “Maybe we can help you with the first problem, the Americans. We will assist you to smuggle in men and more weapons so you can attack them where they are the weakest. Your enemy is my enemy!”
As his translator finished saying the words in Arabic, his host had to nod his head in agreement; Allah’s will be done. His second thought was, you make us stronger at your own expense. The world is closer to the day when only the true believers will be left standing. He masked his plans behind his dark eyes as he answered, “Your help will be rewarded.”
The General with a smile again gave a single nod of his head in agreement, but thinking ‘I see the plans you are making. You think when this is all over you will then come after us, you have no concept of the total fighting manpower and armaments we will unleash on the world. Once before we cleansed the land of your people and our ancestors could ride for days seeing only their white bones bleached by the sun. That will happen again, your people’s death will just be a small portion of what the world will see, when the new horsemen ride forth.’
(C-43)
Training Riflemen
To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace. A free people ought not only to be armed, but disciplined.
- George Washington, First Annual Address, January 8, 1790.
- George Washington, First Annual Address, January 8, 1790.
Amendment II
A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Lay low,
Go slow,
One shot,
What he's got,
Is now mine.
A friend, a long time ago,
Go slow,
One shot,
What he's got,
Is now mine.
A friend, a long time ago,
in a far land spoke those words.
True then, still true today
True then, still true today
JN.
“Why? You have got to be kidding, right?” Sgt. Curry shook his head in disbelief, how could such a question be asked by people who were as smart as this group?
“Really it’s a known fact that, bombs, machine guns and Artillery kill more people on the battle field then individuals shooting rifles do,” Jim Kepert answered the rhetorical question with a slight smirk on his face.
“That is true if your army has planes, artillery and machine guns. We are not so fortunate, look around you, what do you see,” Sgt. Curry didn’t pause as his students glanced at the other people on the range.
“A whole lot of riflemen, or as this group in training, to become riflemen. I have been in the Militia for over eight years now and I have yet to see one machine gun. As for artillery, I don’t think that you could call the muzzleloader that D Company in 2nd. Battalion uses in its Civil War reenactments as modern equipment. Impressive yes, but not practical! As for planes, I wouldn’t call the two Cessna 150’s that 3rd Battalion have as tactical bombers, just a couple of reconnaissance and emergency response planes yes, fighters or bombers no. The same with the Intel platoons radio controlled model’s,” Several of the new guys laughed at the thought of the small RC planes being used to carry more then cameras.
Sgt. Curry continued, “As I was saying ‘Many times has a superior force met a group of riflemen, and fled the battlefield because the riflemen made each shot count.’ I’m not sure if that quote is from Fred’s out of Shotgun News, or not. But I do know that Riflemen can and do make the difference, i.e. all the bombing in WWII didn’t defeat the Germans or Japanese. It took guys with rifles to take and hold the ground and deny the enemy its use.”
“Sergeant, you know the atomic bomb ended the Japanese will to resist, the Emperor didn’t want to see his people annihilated,” Kepert retorted back.
“You’re correct, the bomb did end the war, but our fathers had to take a lot of small islands first, it showed that the Japanese soldiers could be beaten by better riflemen. That fact shamed the Japanese government that we, the American soldier were the better men, and better fighters. And it took a lot of American riflemen fighting and dying to get us close enough to drop the bombs.”
“This country was founded by Militia riflemen, at Lexington and Concord and Bunker Hill in 1775. Re-affirmed again in the war of 1812, by Gen. Jackson and a bunch of Militia down in New Orleans. During the Civil War the carnage was horrific because of the poor tactics and the good American riflemen on both sides.”
“In the Spanish American war, we didn’t have the better rifle’s, but we did have better riflemen. How else could you explain the victory of the 1st. United States Volunteers i.e. the Militia under Colonel Teddy Roosevelt’s bold attack on Kettle hill?”
“Jump forward to WWI, and Sgt. York in the US Army, a self taught civilian trained sharpshooter, he helped capture a German company of 132 soldiers, during the fighting 25 Germans most of them were manning machine-guns killed either by Sgt. York’s very accurate shooting, or in forcing the Germans to expose themselves to the other eight Americans by his flanking movement. If you haven’t seen the old black and white movie with Gary Cooper it’s a must; rent it you won’t be disappointed, Oh by the way Sgt. York has been called one of the first World Wars greatest American Civilian Soldiers.”
“That’s why today in Iraq the Marines have a dedicated marksman in each squad, some of my Army buddies from Ft. Riley say they now have added a marksman to each squad size unit armed with a 308 semi-auto rifle. He hangs back and provides that added punch when needed, the Muslim fanatics don’t like the sharpshooters, it saps their morale because he takes out key people, or nails one of them when they think they are safe. The sharpshooters of the Marine and Army mostly use the 7.62 NATO round, it’s a real stopper and the same round that my FN uses. That is the standard rifle of our Militia Battalion and you will be asked to buy a similar one sometime in your first year. Do you have a question Jim?”
“Yes the FN is a good rifle I’ve shot a friends a few time, but my question is why us the term riflemen, wouldn’t sniper be more fitting?”
“Good question but being called a sniper refers to a man who has had special training, just like I had in the Marines. That was a very intense training course and it took eight-weeks to complete, and for us to be at the same standard it would take up to a year or longer to train. As an example. we have a group of twelve that have been training every other weekend, less their unit’s normal monthly training. They are a little over half-way through our sharpshooter course and this is the seventy month, before they started the course all of them had to be a rifleman first.”
“The term riflemen means and I’ll quote directly from ‘Fred’s, rifleman is pronounced, Ri fle man, 1) soldier armed with a rifle. 2.) man skilled in the use of a rifle. Synonym, Backbone of freedom, ‘minuteman’, teeth of liberty, protector of the tradition, defender of home, family, community – and country.”
“Backbone of freedom is pretty heady stuff, but when you’re finished with our training and have shot the course scoring the necessary points, you’ll start to understand. Then after learning the drills necessary for small unit tactics well enough so you can teach others, then and only then, you will have earned the right to wear this small patch that you see almost all of our militia members wearing, the rifleman tab above their name tape. Like mine here that says,
Rifleman
Curry
“Rifleman, it’s something I’m proud of, and you will be to when you earn it.”
“One other thing when we are finished today and you guys head home stop in at a local store or a café, chances are you will see one or two old guys in their late 70’s. I’ll bet if you asked them, if they served during WWII or Korea, you will more then likely get a yes for the answer. Not all of them served as infantry, but if asked about rifle training the majority of them would say they were taught to be riflemen. The discipline they learned on the range to become a good shot carried over to other tasks, to make what ever you do count each time. Now back to the lesson, if you’re…”
Walking past the basic rifle and safety instruction course Lyle had stopped to listen then smiled; it was almost word for word the same speech Sgt. Curry had given him when he first came to the range years ago. It took him almost six months of learning to shoot properly, and then all of the fire team and squad training, up through the platoon tactics sometimes training every other weekend before he earned his rifleman patch.
Shooting the timed targets close in was no problem, changing magazines and immediate action drills were easy. The targets at 400 and 500 meters had been a problem, but practice, practice and more practice got him up to standard. The pride he felt in having that small cloth patch that said Rifleman above his name tape made him feel good, it was an honor he had earned from hard work and dedication.
Lt. Col. Marion and the other battalion commanders have all insisted that the people who joined the four Battalions, be they drivers, supply personnel, mechanic, medics or cooks; all of them must be trained as rifleman, not just in tactics but in their shooting abilities too.
Since every one knew the rules when they joined the complaints were minimal, and besides range time was always fun time. Working first as individuals to hone your skills and then learning new ones, such as working in four or eight man teams to support each other. Hell he bet a lot of guys joined up just for the range time, but they soon found out that the teamwork session were fun too. Soon after that came the understanding and the working for a cause beyond yourself, that’s what really counted.
Finding out that I, as an individual does not make a community; that it takes a team working together for a common goal. Maybe that’s where America went wrong years ago, to many I’s not enough us, together we can and we will do the job.
Having some of the old timers tell about their experiences training for Korea had been of great interest. The importance of having platoons and companies of trained riflemen made the difference when being attacked by waves of Chinese, when all of them were hell bent to kill one American for every 20 of them that died.
Dan said he recently read an article written by Lt. Col Dave Grossman, a former West point psychology professor, that struck a cord within him. Called 'Wolf, Sheep and Sheepdogs', a theory that relates directly to predators, victims and protectors, so Dan made copies of it and made sure that every one in the Militia got a copy especially the new people when they joined.
The wolves, the predators that prey on us and our children, are despicable. There is nothing morally superior in them. Do you believe there are wolves out there who will feed on the flock without mercy? You better believe it. There are evil men in this world and they are capable of evil deeds. The moment you forget that or pretend it is not so, you become a sheep. There is no safety in denial.
The wolves feed on the sheep without mercy. By all characteristics, the cartels thugs and sicarios are wolves.
Most people are sheep, as they are content to live their lives knowing that there are others who will protect them. Sheep are mostly gentle creatures that do not have the propensity for violence and depend on others to protect them when necessary. This is not mean to disparage the general population in any way by using this analogy. It's just a fact of life. Most of the people in our society and Mexico is no different, are sheep. They are kind, gentle, productive creatures who can only hurt one another by accident. Most Mexican people that live the terror of the wave of violence from the cartels become victims in so many ways, they are in essence sheep, gentle people who opt for peace and non-violence
Then there are sheepdogs. The sheepdogs are the bastions of safety. The sheepdog lives solely to protect the flock and confront the wolf. They live for the opportunity to be called to duty to protect the innocent. The sheepdog has fangs and the propensity for violence but hopes that he will not have to resort to it. However, he lives for that day when he will be able to use his warrior skills and mindset to keep the wolf from harming the sheep.
If you have no capacity for violence then you are a healthy productive citizen: a sheep. If you have a capacity for violence and no empathy for your fellow citizens, then you have defined an aggressive sociopath--a wolf. But what if you have a capacity for violence, and a deep love for your fellow citizens? Then you are a sheepdog, a warrior, someone who is walking the hero’s path. Someone who can walk into the heart of darkness, into the universal human phobia, and walk out unscathed.
The wolves, the predators that prey on us and our children, are despicable. There is nothing morally superior in them. Do you believe there are wolves out there who will feed on the flock without mercy? You better believe it. There are evil men in this world and they are capable of evil deeds. The moment you forget that or pretend it is not so, you become a sheep. There is no safety in denial.
The wolves feed on the sheep without mercy. By all characteristics, the cartels thugs and sicarios are wolves.
Most people are sheep, as they are content to live their lives knowing that there are others who will protect them. Sheep are mostly gentle creatures that do not have the propensity for violence and depend on others to protect them when necessary. This is not mean to disparage the general population in any way by using this analogy. It's just a fact of life. Most of the people in our society and Mexico is no different, are sheep. They are kind, gentle, productive creatures who can only hurt one another by accident. Most Mexican people that live the terror of the wave of violence from the cartels become victims in so many ways, they are in essence sheep, gentle people who opt for peace and non-violence
Then there are sheepdogs. The sheepdogs are the bastions of safety. The sheepdog lives solely to protect the flock and confront the wolf. They live for the opportunity to be called to duty to protect the innocent. The sheepdog has fangs and the propensity for violence but hopes that he will not have to resort to it. However, he lives for that day when he will be able to use his warrior skills and mindset to keep the wolf from harming the sheep.
If you have no capacity for violence then you are a healthy productive citizen: a sheep. If you have a capacity for violence and no empathy for your fellow citizens, then you have defined an aggressive sociopath--a wolf. But what if you have a capacity for violence, and a deep love for your fellow citizens? Then you are a sheepdog, a warrior, someone who is walking the hero’s path. Someone who can walk into the heart of darkness, into the universal human phobia, and walk out unscathed.
Dan said this was the truth behind being in the Militia it’s not about me; it’s all about us, we the community, and our capacity to be able to help them.
That’s what Lyle really liked about the Militia, being a part of a bigger community that wanted to help others. The major papers and talking heads on the boob tub, they didn’t have a clue of why the Militia was originally founded well before 1775 and are still clueless about us to this day.
They don’t understand the necessity of; a to be ready if needed mentality (they are locked into the me first syndrome). Besides his closest friends were all here, people he knew, ones that really cared about America, not just the talking about caring.
Not only do we do the talk, we do the walk. I care about America and so do my friends, those are the best type to hang with.
The Bible says in John 15:13 says, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."
And as our oath states ‘Against all enemies, both foreign and domestic.’ Just hope it never comes down to that, but if it does, having a whole lot of other riflemen around can’t hurt, and if necessary we we’ll make a difference, that’s for sure.
What July Fourth Means to Me
Ronald Reagan
Editor's note: When he was president, Ronald Reagan wrote the following piece for Independence Day in 1981. Aide Michael Deaver later wrote: "This 4th of July message is the President's own words and written initially in his own hand."
For one who was born and grew up in the small towns of the Midwest, there is a special kind of nostalgia about the Fourth of July.
I remember it as a day almost as long-anticipated as Christmas. This was helped along by the appearance in store windows of all kinds of fireworks and colorful posters advertising them with vivid pictures.
No later than the third of July – sometimes earlier – Dad would bring home what he felt he could afford to see go up in smoke and flame. We'd count and recount the number of firecrackers, display pieces and other things and go to bed determined to be up with the sun so as to offer the first, thunderous notice of the Fourth of July.
I'm afraid we didn't give too much thought to the meaning of the day. And, yes, there were tragic accidents to mar it, resulting from careless handling of the fireworks. I'm sure we're better off today with fireworks largely handled by professionals. Yet there was a thrill never to be forgotten in seeing a tin can blown 30 feet in the air by a giant "cracker" – giant meaning it was about 4 inches long. But enough of nostalgia.
Somewhere in our growing up we began to be aware of the meaning of days and with that awareness came the birth of patriotism. July Fourth is the birthday of our nation. I believed as a boy, and believe even more today, that it is the birthday of the greatest nation on earth.
There is a legend about the day of our nation's birth in the little hall in Philadelphia, a day on which debate had raged for hours. The men gathered there were honorable men hard-pressed by a king who had flouted the very laws they were willing to obey. Even so, to sign the Declaration of Independence was such an irretrievable act that the walls resounded with the words "treason, the gallows, the headsman's axe," and the issue remained in doubt.
The legend says that at that point a man rose and spoke. He is described as not a young man, but one who had to summon all his energy for an impassioned plea. He cited the grievances that had brought them to this moment and finally, his voice falling, he said, "They may turn every tree into a gallows, every hole into a grave, and yet the words of that parchment can never die. To the mechanic in the workshop, they will speak hope; to the slave in the mines, freedom. Sign that parchment. Sign if the next moment the noose is around your neck, for that parchment will be the textbook of freedom, the Bible of the rights of man forever."
He fell back exhausted. The 56 delegates, swept up by his eloquence, rushed forward and signed that document destined to be as immortal as a work of man can be. When they turned to thank him for his timely oratory, he was not to be found, nor could any be found who knew who he was or how he had come in or gone out through the locked and guarded doors.
Well, that is the legend. But we do know for certain that 56 men, a little band so unique we have never seen there like since, had pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor. Some gave their lives in the war that followed, most gave their fortunes, and all preserved their sacred honor.
What manner of men were they? Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists, 11 were merchants and tradesmen, and nine were farmers. They were soft-spoken men of means and education; they were not an unwashed rabble. They had achieved security but valued freedom more. Their stories have not been told nearly enough.
John Hart was driven from the side of his desperately ill wife. For more than a year he lived in the forest and in caves before he returned to find his wife dead, his children vanished, his property destroyed. He died of exhaustion and a broken heart.
Carter Braxton of Virginia lost all his ships, sold his home to pay his debts, and died in rags. And so it was with Ellery, Clymer, Hall, Walton, Gwinnett, Rutledge, Morris, Livingston and Middleton. Nelson personally urged Washington to fire on his home and destroy it when it became the headquarters for General Cornwallis at Yorktown. Nelson died bankrupt.
But they sired a nation that grew from sea to shining sea. Five million farms, quiet villages, cities that never sleep, 3 million square miles of forest, field, mountain and desert, 227 million people with a pedigree that includes the bloodlines of all the world. In recent years, however, I've come to think of that day as more than just the birthday of a nation.
It also commemorates the only true philosophical revolution in all history.
Oh, there have been revolutions before and since ours. But those revolutions simply exchanged one set of rules for another. Ours was a revolution that changed the very concept of government.
Let the Fourth of July always be a reminder that here in this land, for the first time, it was decided that man is born with certain God-given rights; that government is only a convenience created and managed by the people, with no powers of its own except those voluntarily granted to it by the people.
We sometimes forget that great truth, and we never should.
Happy Fourth of July. Ronald Reagan President of the United States
(C-44)
Raising Anger to the Boil
AZ Heat
If you give up land for peace;
you will soon be a smaller nation,
and you will still have no peace.
JN
“Sir this is wrong, and all of us here know that.”
“Yes it is D. But I'm like the rest of us here, I don't like it, but I have to obey orders too!”
Turning away in disgust D muttered, “Just like Israel. We are forced by the leftist to appease those who will harm us, all because they have no backbone. Dumb shits!”
Prescott heard him and whispered back, “If you don't control your own land, your just inviting someone else to do it. I don't think the powers in Washington have thought this one through, to see what the outcome will be in a few years.”
Another Border Agent added his voice to the argument, and he said it out loud for all to hear. “This will just make the drug lords south of the border bolder, they already have safe houses, sanctuary cities and all the free legal services when they get caught. So why not give them a secure strip of land, free from intrusion by us and the Mexican Government too.”
Seeing that he was losing control of this meeting the head agent said, “Alright guys, enough said. We will follow orders as directed, like it or not. There will be no patrolling within one half mile of the border, The Government is concerned about your safety, and they don't want any international incidents, where we shoot at fleeing suspects and the rounds land in Mexico.”
“Safety my ass, they are spineless and it looks like they hate America period. And hen we shoot, it's not at a suspect sir.” D said, his voice as hard as iron, “We are returning fire at criminals who fired first.”
“That’s how we see it D,” the boss replied. “But the courts and the criminal lawyers see otherwise.”
Prescott chuckled, “You got that correct sir, Criminal Lawyers. Tar and feathers would be to nice for them, a hemp necktie would straighten them out.”
Birthdays,
It's the simple things in life that mean the most.
Out shopping with the wife and a few days before my Birthday, Evelyn asked me what I would like to have?
With money being tight and living on a budget Dan replied. “Nothing special for me, but we could use a new American Flag, the old one is getting really faded and has a few stains showing.”
With a twinkle in her eye, amused by his answer, she said, “That's not a present for you, that's something for the whole household.”
“Yes it is for everyone, and that makes it for me too.”
“OK. If that is what you want go ahead and pick out one.”
So I went over to the flag display and found a nice print 3x5, American made flag for under $10. With a big smile on my face I placed it in the shopping cart and said, “Thanks.”
Evelyn didn't say anything she just chuckled.
A couple of days later, on my birthday, she gave me the flag wrapped up in birthday paper and offered an apology at the same time. “It's not much...”
Cutting her off I said, “Yes it is, you know me, I'm a patriot. I love my country and for what this flag stands for. It's one of the best presents, thank you.”
Giving her a kiss and a hug to stop her from answering, Dan continued, “It's what I asked for and what I wanted, a man can't be any happier then that.”
After taking the wrapper off, Dan goes out side and sets the new flag on the deck chair. He then lowers the old flag and folds it, gives it a kiss and places it on the chair.
Picking up the new flag he takes off the plastic wrapper and kisses it, then he hooks it to the pole and places it back into the holder.
Coming to attention, then taking one step back he salutes the flag as he said, “Thank you dear Lord, for giving me freedom, to be born in a free country. Thank you for all of the patriots who sacrifice today in lands far away, trying to help others to be free.”
Dropping the salute he then gathers up the old flag, as he makes a mental note, 'I'll have to take this to the local scout troop so they can dispose of it properly at their next ceremony.
Call me sentimental, that's OK, because I know that so many others have sacrificed so much, even their lives, so that we, the current citizens of our great country can be free.
To all of the people that serve, or have served, our freedom came from you; not from the politician, or the bureaucrats, your call to duty is appreciated and honored by me. And I know by most of the American people too. Again, Thank You.
JN
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