The Desert Fox (Turtle) Loses to the Toxic Dragon

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The Desert Turtle is not an endangered species. It is arbitrarily designated as “vulnerable” but not endangered.  They are inactive during most of the year and only come out during seasonal rains. At least 95% of their life is spent underground. Adult tortoises can survive a year or more without access to water. Their natural predators include ravens, gila monsters, and ants. But the BIGGEST threat to the desert tortoise’s habitat are WIND AND SOLAR FARMS. Do you care about the Desert Tortoise? I know I do. I believe in preserving living biodiversity. Therefore, any environmentalist worth his salt should be up in arms about the idea of the Chinese … More after the Jump…

How History Repeats Itself

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I apologize in advance for the blatantly political tone of this piece but I am flabbergasted by what I see happening on the eastern periphery of Europe and the anemic reaction to state on state aggression by the rest of the world.

I read this piece by Justin Logan from the Cato Institute this morning and was struck immediately on how similar in tone this piece is to the rhetoric of the pre-WWII America Firsters.  Is Estonia Worth a War?

I just ask myself are people so blind or so willing to seek peace at any cost that they will not stand up to tyranny until the cost of stopping it is orders of magnitude greater than if they had stood up for principle at the beginning?  The same kinds of arguments against involvement in WWII were made by isolationists in the US and appeasers abroad as Hitler’s Germany slowly re-armed and swallowed its neighbors in the years prior to WWII.

Largely the same process is in action in Russia today.  Whereas Germany felt slighted and unjustly treated after WWI modern Russia feels slighted and mistreated after the unsatisfactory (from their perspective) end to the Cold War.  It is interesting that roughly a generation passed between 1918 and 1939 and roughly a generation has passed between 1989 and 2014.  Russia was stripped of large swaths of territory in the wake of the fall of communism and Germany was stripped of territory, actually split into two separate blocks by the Danzig Corridor, in the wake of Versailles.  The German people felt they were not defeated, (hence the popularity of the stab in the back myth), while many Russians today feel that they were betrayed from within by Gorbachev and Co.  Hitler was an ideologue that fed on and amplified public perceptions of being unjustly handled by the Allies and Putin has done the same in Russia.  As Germany expanded it was only weakly opposed by the Allied powers and we are seeing the same sort of reaction in the West to Putin’s actions.

History seems to be repeating itself before our eyes as yet another European ideologue and dictator forges ahead towards war and an attempt to dominate its neighbors.  Is the West going to stand idly by and allow it to happen again until the cost of stopping it is immeasurably higher?  The stakes are higher this time around because Russia is a nuclear power.  The time to stop Putin and Russia is now and a serious demonstration of Western resolve would achieve without bloodshed what will costs thousands, if not millions of lives later on.

Has the West learned nothing from history other than that War is bad?  There are things worse than war, and if the Western leadership does not find their spine soon they will see what those things are.

 

Glossary of Modern Military Terms

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Engage the Enemy means “to blow something up.”
Surgical Strike means “to blow up something small.”
Decapitate means “to blow up their leaders.”
Collateral Damage means “to accidentally blow up something of theirs.”
Friendly Fire means “to accidentally blow up something of ours.”
Target of Opportunity means “to blow something up on a whim”
Kinetic Targeting means “to blow up something that’s moving”
Ordnance is “something that that does the blowing up”
An Asset is “something that can be blown up”
Embedded Media means “a report that’s blown out of proportion”

 

The Battle of Mantinea

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The Battle of Mantinea was part of the Great Peloponnesian War (430-404 B.C.). The war was fought in an effort to defeat and contain the growing power of Sparta in Greek Affairs. The war was ultimately a failure as Sparta won in the end and dictated terms to Athens and her allies in the process guaranteeing that Athens would not dominate the Greek world. The prelude to the battle itself was a gathering of Argive Alliance troops who attacked Tegea, about 5 miles south of Mantinea. The Spartans rallied to Tegea’s defense and began to divert a stream to flood Mantinean territory. The main source for the course of the … More after the Jump…

Book Review: No End Save Victory by David Kaiser

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[FULL DISCLOSURE: I received my copy of this book free from the author. I was not paid for this review and the opinion expressed is purely my own] No End Save Victory: How FDR Led the Nation into War is one of those books that at first glance looks like it is going to be one of those dry, difficult to read history books that is nothing more than a litany of dates and facts.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  It is an interesting and compelling account of the events in America during the 18 months prior to American entry into WWII.  Oddly, this period is mentioned in every … More after the Jump…

The Battle of Pfaffenheck – 15-17 March 1945

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I recently read The Armored Fist a unit history of the US 712th Independent Tank Battalion in WWII.  One of the events described in detail in the book is the Battle for the town of Pfaffenheck in between the Rhine and Moselle rivers in March of 1945.   The event that stuck out at me from the battle was the destruction of an American tank, which killed the driver, Billy Wolfe.  I had the opportunity to visit the town in March, 2014 shortly after the 69th Anniversary of the  battle.

The Battle of Pfaffenheck was fought between soldiers from the 357th Infantry Regiment of the US 90th IN Division, the 2nd Platoon of C Company 712th Independent US Tank Battalion, and German troops of the 6th SS Mountain Division North (Gebirgsjäger).  The 6th SS Division has an interesting history itself.  The unit spent most of the war fighting in Finland and when that country made peace with the Soviets the 6th SS made an overland trek through Sweden to Norway where they transferred to Germany and fought in the Vosges Mountains of northern France over the winter.

Pfaffenheck
Locations of actions in the battle for Pfaffenheck

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Warsaw 1920: Lenin’s Failed Conquest of Europe

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To say that the Polish-Soviet War was a continuation of The Great War would be a lie. Certainly, the vacuum of power from the Vistula to the Dnieper had something to do with it, but it does not account for behaviors that Americans will always find opaque and odd when visiting Eastern European history. The Polish side had brandished rifles at one another during the previous international conflict. They were now united for everything reactionary and terrible (in the eyes of the Bolsheviks): defense of their homeland against the international worker’s revolution (led by soft-handed bourgeois intellectuals). One anachronism would be the idea of a champion swordsman challenging the other … More after the Jump…

Now would be a good time for a bit of revisionism

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Ladies and Gentlemen: Please notice the absolute awe of silence from Western nations (and in particular, liberals) during the takeover of the Crimea…. Where are the street demonstrations? Remember 2003, anyone? Well, maybe if you live in Alaska or Europe, you may want to remember that our “allies” in WWII were the most brutal, raping animals that ever came out of the steppes. Life under Russian rule would be cold, despotic, arbitrary, hopeless and short: just like it is for Russians right now. Meanwhile, America is worried that a worthless piece of desert *may* produce a single bomb: the last time this country invaded Europe was 2400 years ago. The … More after the Jump…

Book Review: The Armored Fist: The 712th Tank Battalion in the Second World War by Aaron Elson

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[FULL DISCLOSURE: I received my copy of this book free from the author. I was not paid for this review and the opinion expressed is purely my own] The Armored Fist: The 712th Tank Battalion in the Second World War is one of the best unit histories I have read from WWII.  It is not a traditional unit history in that it is not simply a list of engagements fought, enemy killed, and casualties suffered.  It is a compilation of the recollections of the unit’s members put into chronological order from their first combat to the end of the war.  This is not traditional battle history, instead it is the story … More after the Jump…

Memorial to Allen Mosteiro

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In the early 90’s I served with Allen Mosteiro in the scout platoon from 1/8 CAV, 1st Cavalry Division.  We were roommates and party mates and served together for three years.  Our platoon was called the Ghostriders and as a platoon we worked hard and played hard.  My three years there from 92-95 were some of my best years in the army and I have stayed in contact with many of my brothers in the Ghostriders since, both those who stayed in the Army and those who got out.

Mosteiro Paver

Mosteiro was one of those who stayed in.  We did not serve together again but I did run into him a few times over the coming years.  In 2007 while serving as a Platoon Sergeant in 1/7 Cav he was killed in Taji, Iraq by a sniper.  The word quickly went out to our fellow Ghostriders.  He was buried in the Central Texas State Veterans Cemetery just outside of Killeen, Texas.  I happened to be stationed at Forth Hood at the time and could go to the funeral as a representative of his old platoon, the Ghostriders.

Last year, I discovered the National Armor and Cavalry Heritage Museum was conducting a fundraiser to help defray the costs of building their new museum and selling memorial pavers.  I quickly contacted all my old Ghostrider brothers to float the idea of buying one for Allen.  It was not a question and we all came together and purchased one.  Last week, I got the miniature paver in the mail to show what the full-size paver will look like.

Allen is not forgotten by his former comrades and will always remain our brother.

The Evolution of Warfare and the Crimea

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“History” is a problematic concept because it is very much tied to a specific culture. History departments derive from the medieval university culture of Europe and we have to accept that most people, at most of the time, have lived without any notion of it. Perception is a key to understanding this phenomena: in the history of warfare, violent confrontations have in large part been endemic. Two parties confront each other and display a show of brutal force and often the conflict is resolved symbolically by a single dual or one side is hidden behind a fortification, while tribute is discussed. A perfect example of endemic warfare would be the … More after the Jump…

Book Review: Verdun – The Longest Battle of the Great War by Paul Jankowski

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[FULL DISCLOSURE: I received my copy of this book free from the publisher. I was not paid for this review and the opinion expressed is purely my own] Verdun: The Longest Battle of the Great War is one of the flood of new works coming out about World War I this year in commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the world’s first truly mechanized war.  This book explores the ten month (or eleven, depending on how you count it) battle of Verdun between the Germans and French from February to November 1916. It consists of eleven chapters arranged thematically that examine different aspects of the battle from the operational … More after the Jump…

One Smart Private

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As a platoon of trainees stood in formation at an Army Base, the Drill Sergeant walked up and said, “All right! All you retards fall out.”
As the rest of the platoon wandered away, one soldier remained at attention.
The Drill Sergeant walked over until he was eye-to-eye with him, and then raised a single eyebrow.
The soldier smiled and said, “Sure was a lot of ’em, huh, Drill Sergeant?”

Book Review: Power Games by Richard Peters

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[FULL DISCLOSURE: I received my copy of this book free from the author. I was not paid for this review and the opinion expressed is purely my own] I get 5-10 requests a month from publishers and authors to review their books here on B&BR and usually accept 3-4 of them because I don’t have as much time to read as I would like.  When Richard Peters, the author of Power Games: Operation Enduring Unity I contacted me and inquired about reviewing his book I had a stack of 5 other books I was working through and initially almost turned him down for lack of time.  Man, am I glad I did … More after the Jump…

National Review and Cliches on the Crimea

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This is what poses as journalism in the disgenic idiocracy of today’s Western world : here. They aren’t even embarrassed that they are quoting an author that they haven’t read. If NRO wants to cut and paste the following comments, I suggest they do that, especially considering that this is the age of twitter journalism and that it is more important to Bolshevik-purge your only decent intellectual to tow the line in PC thinking than to actually read the books you are quoting from in our modern society. Here may be some reasons why Putin has taken the Crimea (perhaps he actually has read Clausewitz?) One country may support another’s … More after the Jump…

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