Articles by Herschel Smith

To his children’s children.  So says the wisdom literature (i.e., Proverbs 13:22).  But that’s not what is happening, according to this (h/t/ Glenn Reynolds).

Nearly 40% of Generation Z, those ages 13 to 22, expect to receive an inheritance, according to a recent TD Ameritrade study. As a result, they don’t believe that they will need to save for retirement.

“There is a little bit of the halo effect of youth vs. the reality of what the situation will be like,” says Carrie Braxdale, managing director of investor services at TD Ameritrade. In fact, the odds are slim that young adults will inherit wealth because their parents face a less secure retirement world, with stock market turmoil and mounting health care costs.

Only 16% of parents said that they expect to provide an inheritance, says the TD Ameritrade study.

Among many other reasons, this is why the state playing god with the economy (viz., John Maynard Keynes) is inherently evil.  First of all, the very notion that the state can be omniscient and actually know and do everything necessary to propel it in the direction it needs to go is ludicrous on its face.  Second, even if it could, the state would have to decide on winners and losers, yet another reason that this concept is evil.

Outside of the fact that the older generation has given up on leaving an inheritance (sad enough by itself), when a state mismanages the economy to the point where a generation cannot do so, it presses them irresistably towards behavior contrary to the idea of the good man.

From CBS News:

The Obama administration on Friday declared the insurgent Haqqani network a terrorist body, a move that could undermine Afghan peace efforts and test fragile U.S.-Pakistani relations.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said she notified Congress of her decision, which bans Americans from doing any business with members of the Pakistan-based militant group and blocks any assets it holds in the United States.

“We also continue our robust campaign of diplomatic, military, and intelligence pressure on the network, demonstrating the United States’ resolve to degrade the organization’s ability to execute violent attacks,” she said in a statement.

According to a senior U.S. official, it will likely take seven to 10 days for the designation process to be completed. The Haqqani network has been behind a large number of the attacks on U.S. and NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan, and which U.S. officials have long pushed Pakistan’s leaders to target more aggressively.

Designating the Haqqani network a terrorist organization is a complicated political decision as the U.S. withdraws from Afghanistan and pushes for a reconciliation pact to end more than a decade of warfare.

Enraged by a string of high-profile attacks on U.S. and NATO troops, Congress set a Sunday deadline for the administration to make a decision. U.S. officials say there were disagreements within the administration over what to decide.

The U.S. already has placed sanctions on many Haqqani leaders and is targeting its members militarily but has held back from formally designating the al Qaeda-linked network a terrorist group amid concerns about hampering peace efforts in Afghanistan and U.S. relations with Pakistan.

The Haqqani network is also believed to be holding U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl captive – the only U.S. service member held by militants in the region.

Analysis & Commentary

This move shows the degree of disconnectedness from reality of the Afghanistan campaign.  We are ten years into the effort, and as my coverage has shown, Jalaluddin Haqqani, his son Sirajuddin, and their network of fighters, have been at the center of the problem from the beginning.  His camps trained al Qaeda fighters, and it was from Haqqani that many of the jihadists from around the globe learned their military skills.

They are ensconced in the Hindu Kush in both Afghanistan and Pakistan, and freely operate against U.S. forces from both sides of the border.  They have done so for a decade, and are responsible for the most recent high profile attacks in Kabul.  This interview of Sirajuddin Haqqani is remarkable for its content, in that the network currently operates regionally but thinks globally based on the ideals of Islamic jihad.

And yet it is still begudging.  Note that there was debate within the administration as to whether this was undue presusre on our “ally,” Pakistan.  The State Department took this action because of Congressional pressure.  Within little more than one year, the bulk of U.S. forces will have been withdrawn from Afghanistan, and we are just now declaring one of their major military enemies to be a terrorist group.

This is a sign of desperation within the administration.  Population-centric counterinsurgency and state-building has been a failure in Afghanistan, as has temporary imprisonment of fighters in the hopes of rehabilitating them (a distinctly American imagination, with the truth here also begrudgingly acknowledged by the plans to retain responsibility for more than 600 fighters even after turnover of the prisons to Afghan authorities).

Richard Johnson makes an entry at National Post that is well worth the study time.  Richard is embedded near Tur-Muryani hill, which, if I am not mistaken, is near Sheykhan in RC East.  Some of Richard’s report is included below.

The mission on the face of it was simple and straightforward for the Afghan National Army’s (ANA) 6th Kandak – drive out to a specific highpoint overlooking the intersection of two rivers and build an outpost on Tur-Muryani hill. Unfortunately, the confluence of the Arghandab and Mizan valleys is home field for Taliban sympathizers, facilitators and the Taliban themselves — and is a main route for the materials of their war. They were likely to be less than happy at the more intense scrutiny from this new outpost, right in their back yard.

There were also a couple few hundred civilians – sympathizers or not – living in each village in the valleys to protect.

I have been living, drinking, sleeping and sharing wet wipes with U.S. Security Force Assistance Team (SFAT) 42 for the past week.

The U.S. SFAT mission here now is less aggressive, less invasive and much less visible to the average Afghan than the previous U.S. Army doctrine of military ownership of the battle space. According to their SFAT Standing Operating Procedures Manual (Feb 2012) their task now is to “improve the operational effectiveness of the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), expand security gains throughout the region” that will “ultimately lead to the ANSF defeating the insurgency.” Nothing to it.

In the very early morning light the 6th Kandak and elements of their Engineer Corps from the 2nd Kandak readied itself for their mission. Men were rushing from side to side. Orders were shouted. Heavy equipment was loaded. Trucks were being fuelled. All within the narrow confines of the base.

I really felt like I had bonded with SFAT42 during the last week, but they dropped me from their road crew in lieu of someone actually useful — an interpreter. ‘NICE!’ guys?. They did arrange alternative wheels for me along with the Joint Terminal Attack Controller (JTAC) team commanded by U.S. Air Force (USAF) Staff Sergeant Justice Stevens alongside USAF Senior Airman (SRA) Frankie Larez on the Common Remotely-Operated Weapons System (CROWs).

All of the U.S. SFAT and support elements moved out of COP Mizan behind the ANA units, but not until a suitable time had passed. This was an ANA mission after all. The road to the hill was a bumpy one. I concentrated on the seat in front of me and talked to JTAC SSgt. Stevens.

Staff Sgt. Stevens had been along on the last SFAT operation into the Arghandab Valley back in April. SFAT42 plus ISAF support elements, and the 6th Kandak had been air dropped by Chinook into an area near Rabajuy village on the other side of the river from where we were now headed.

“The initial mission was planned as the first unilateral Afghan operation. All we were supposed to do was support them and advise them in how to operate. I am there to just give them the ability of air support, so we don’t put them in a situation where they are getting creamed” said Staff Sgt. Stevens.

On that day Staff Sgt. Stevens — along with SFAT42 Major Ethan Allen, 6th Kandak Colonel Altafullah and Cha-Cha, (Major Allen’s interpreter) — eventually situated on the top of a ridge line watching the ANA clear the villages below.

“We were in a circle. And the interpreter stood up and an IED detonated. It was like one big thud. I thought at first it was a mortar strike. Next thing I knew I was laying on my side. It blew my headset all to shit but it probably saved my hearing … the Major and the Colonel were initially blown unconscious by the blast … the interpreter had heavy damage to his head and leg. Then the Taliban started shooting at our location. At that time I requested an immediate show of force from two F16s on station just to suppress the small arms fire. Specialist Crooks and Second Lieutenant Collins arrived. Then we dragged everybody below the ridgeline out of the line of fire.”

The interpreter had a gaping head wound and a severed leg. Lieutenant Redlus arrived and helped me with him. We bandaged his head first. At one point I had my hand in his mouth to stop him swallowing his tongue while I synched the tourniquet on his leg. I synched it so much the pain brought him around..”

Over the next 15 minutes, Staff Sgt. Stevens and two ANA soldiers carried the wounded interpreter down off the ridgeline while under sporadic fire. Eventually – Sgt. Barraza the SFAT medic – arrived with a litter and they moved down the hill to the casualty evacuation point. Staff Sgt. Stevens then ran back up the hill.

“I went back up the hill to coordinate an airstrike on the enemy. But we could not locate them. Didn’t know where the ANA where either. So even if we found the guys we thought were Taliban we couldn’t fire in case we hit the ANA.”

It was a frustrating first mission for SFAT42. Staff Sgt. Stevens was hoping that the taking of this Tur-Muryani hill would be different.

Progress was slow on the drive. I’d felt ill all day, and had taken gravol. As we drove I drifted in and out of nausea and consciousness. In the Mizan Valley on our left the ANA were clearing the villages. I barely noticed much of this as I kept nodding off, drifting in and out listening to the radio chatter. The ANA discovered an IED. Asleep. A “boom” as they blew it in place. Awake.

When we finally reached the base of Tur-Muryani hill, I felt sturdy enough to at least get out of the vehicle. I watched the Explosives Ordnance Disposal (EOD) guys sweep the area. I think I stood for an hour like this in the shade of the truck, breathing diesel, squinting into the bright light before finally venturing farther.

Six of us in a line climbed straight up the hill, with me dragging at the end – sucking water from my Camelbak. It was the hottest part of the day.

It wasn’t much of a hill really. Not by Scottish standards, anyway. But by the time we got to the top, we all were wheezing. Everyone collapsed for a while and found a rock to lean against. The view from the top was nothing short of spectacular. For 270 degrees we could see everything in both Valleys. I could understand why the Taliban might contest this ground.

The view into the valleys was quiet and idyllic, peaceful and green. No sign that this basin was the launching point for the almost nightly mortar, recoilless rifle, and machine gun attacks on the Afghan National Police (ANP) checkpoint on a hilltop behind me. There were some goats, a lot of pomegranate orchards, some grape fields and … laundry.

An hour or so later – trying to keep out of the way of the soldiers busy setting up the security perimeter – I sat down with “Doc” Sgt. Frank Barraza. Doc is the medical part of the SFAT42 team. One part of his job is to attempt to bring the ANA field medic skills up to speed. He was happy to be feeling at loose ends right then. He has a love-hate relationship with his job. He loves to help but hates seeing what he sees.

“I have been giving them (ANA) classes on field sanitation and disease prevention. They can stop hemorrhage but disease prevention is where they fall down. They are at about Vietnam level.”

The ANA don’t have medivac helicopters to speak of, and so even though they may stop someone bleeding out on the battlefield, they struggle to get their wounded to hospital. According to Doc, a wounded soldier that would likely be in surgery within 20 minutes within ISAF could take 150 minutes at best by ANA vehicle. This is Doc’s chief area of concern.

“It is one of the things we are asking them. How are you going to get a casualty from point A to point B if he is urgent surgical? They said, ‘We won’t.’ Without American help, they die,” he said.

The ANA also struggles to find and keep good doctors and medics.

“They are in an education slump right now. The medics are some of the brightest in the country. So they are willing to learn and they want to learn. But they (ANA) are afraid to send them to schools because they are worried they will quit the army and go into the civilian world.”

This AO has always been one of lacking effective or regular patrolling or force presence.  The Taliban were supposed to have a difficult time coming back to this AO in the spring, but of course, this has been the case since there has been a Taliban, and a spring, and great expectations set in place by the ISAF.

Read the whole report.  But one remarkable thing from the report is the degree to which the ANA is dependent on U.S. air power, MEDEVAC and logistics.  There is the problem of green on blue violence, but even if one ignores those problems, it isn’t obvious that Afghanistan will last a half year out of Taliban control without U.S. troop presence.

Police running everywhere.  That’s what I saw last week.  Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police, County Sheriff, N.C. Highway Patrol, men with suits, sunglasses and ear pieces, something called the Federal Protection Police (yes, for those who haven’t followed, this is part of the Department of Homeland Security), the guys associated with the Federal Protection Police who run around wearing khaki pants, white polo shirts and badges, and on and on it went.  There are also many police departments represented in Charlotte, and apparently, they like to visit a local gun shop.

Charlotte gun stores, while opposing President Obama’s effort to restore the assault weapons ban, are taking aggressive action to make sure that they don’t inadvertently supply protestors or lone wolf attackers with weapons to disrupt the Democratic National Convention.

“We’re from Charlotte and we don’t want anything to happen here,” said Larry Hyatt, of Hyatt Gun Shop, a big and popular supplier of guns and reloading equipment including gunpowder. “We’re capitalists, but we do live here,” he told Secrets in his sprawling and well-stocked store 2.5 miles away from the convention.

Silly concern in my opinion, that anyone would suddenly decide to become a “lone wolf” shooter at the President and then send someone into Hyatt to conduct a straw purchase and lie on form 4473 thinking that they will be successful.  Just silly – and more than a little paranoid.

But we do learn something from the report.  Apparently, police departments around the nation have become interested in Hyatt’s large inventory.

But he has an advantage in his effort: His store has become popular with police from the dozens of departments from around the country helping out with convention security.

I purchased my Rock River Arms AR from Hyatt Gun Shop.  I know this store, and have spent a good deal of time there.  Perhaps the Chicago Police have never seen so many law abiding citizens with guns in one place before?  I’m just saying.

Beat your wives, so says a very important Muslim cleric:

Egyptian cleric Abd Al-Rahman recently explained on Al-Nas television how a man is permitted to beat his wife.

“A good woman, even if beaten by her husband, puts her hand in his and says: ‘I will not rest until you are pleased with me.’ This is how the Prophet Muhammad taught his women to be,” Al-Rahman said in comment aired in August, according to a translation provided by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).

“Islam instructs a man to beat his wife as a last resort before divorce, so that she will mend her ways, treat him with kindness and respect, and know that her husband has a higher status than her,” he said.

“I say to every husband: Do not rush to beat her whenever a problem arises. O servant of Allah, Allah said: ‘Admonish those of them on whose part you fear disobedience, refuse to share their beds, and beat them.’ One should not beat out of anger.”

Just recently I remarked that I listened to a sermon where the pastor said, “Don’t you ever strike a woman and call yourself a Christian” (a statement with which I heartily agree).”  Yet we find that the DNC has reached out to Muslims, inviting them to hold an officially sanctioned two hour prayer service as part of the convention.

Don’t think for a moment that this is something unique to the Middle East.  With the proliferation of honor killings in the U.S., what Islamic clerics in the Middle East say is more important than most people know.  In fact, the very sect being represented is part of a separatist Islamic movement within the U.S. who wants to replace the constitution with the Qu’ran.

All of this coincides with the removal of the word “God” from the DNC platform.  As I’ve remarked before, it’s remarkable how illiberal liberals can be.

We’re all painfully aware of the impotence of the curent administration in the area of foreign policy.  The world simply doesn’t listen to us – or, they do, but it’s only to gauge the timing of their next move.

But this recent signal from an administration representative is about as clear a statement of withdrawn interests and intentions as one can imagine.

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of U.S. armed forces, said he does not wish to be “complicit” in a unilateral Israeli strike on Iran.

Dempsey said Thursday that such an attack would “clearly delay but probably not destroy Iran’s nuclear program,” the London Guardian reported. He added, “I don’t want to be complicit if they choose to do it.”

This statement does three things.  First, it demonstrates the administration to be liars when they have claimed that they will not allow Iran to go nuclear.  Second, it clearly shows that if Israel launches an attack on Iran, she will go it alone.  Essentially, Israel is thrown under the bus.  The additional assertion in the report that we do not know Iran’s nuclear intentions, “as intelligence did not clearly reveal them,” is code for saying that we will never know because our intelligence community will never go on record saying that Iran has designs on a nuclear weapons program.  Timing isn’t germane to this conversation according to the statement.  The context is whether we know Iran’s “intentions,” a precondition that always supplies plausible deniability and makes everything else irrelevant.

Third, and most important, it explicitly acquiesces to a nuclear Iran.  Read again:  ” … such an attack would “clearly delay but probably not destroy Iran’s nuclear program.”  This also makes everything else about intentions an irrelevant obfuscation.  The balance of the communication from Dempsey is just a smoke screen.  This administration believes that they cannot stop an Iranian nuclear program.

The signals to the Iranian Mullahs couldn’t be clearer.  Proceed apace with your nuclear weapons program, we don’t think you can be stopped anyway.  There are others within the U.S. military community who foolishly believe that the U.S. can live with a nuclear Iran, John Abizaid for one ( I suspect that there are many more).  But here, Dempsey is speaking for more than just himself.  Despite what the administration has claimed, they do not believe they can know the intentions of the Iranian program, they do not intend to assist Israel for fear of appearing complicit, and they don’t even think they can stop Iran if they tried.  Case closed.

Upon inauguration, Mitt Romney’s second duty should be the dismissal of the joint chiefs of staff, including the chairman, and replacement of them with men who have some backbone.  That includes flag officers who work for them and make excuses for green on blue violence in Afghanistan by asserting that the pressures of the Ramadan fast made them do it.

But the 50,000 foot view is one of wreck.  The Obama foreign policy has collapsed, and it is obscene and unseemly.  It’s as if I am passing by some awful, bloody crash on the highway, and want to look away but can’t.  It should shame every American to witness what our country has wrought.

Little seems to be known about it at this point, but three are dead, including the shooter.

Three people died early this morning, including an alleged gunman who apparently killed himself, after a shooting inside a New Jersey shopping plaza.

Police in New Jersey responded to shots inside a Pathmark supermarket on Route 9 in Old Bridge, N.J., at 4 a.m.

“This is the worst phone call a mayor can receive,” Mayor Owen Henry told NewJersey.com of the information he obtained about 6:30 a.m. “You can prepare for these things but you can’t prevent them.”

The suspect has been identified as a man in his 20s who was a current or former employee, WABC-TV reported. There’s no word on his motive.

Authorities believe the man killed two before turning the gun on himself, according to WABC.

Several employees were inside the store, which was preparing to open at 6 a.m. Two windows near the entrance to the Pathmark were shot out.

Numerous employees were taken across the street to a T.G.I. Friday’s and many are being treated for trauma at waiting ambulances.

The scene is now under control, according to WABC, and there are emergency responders in the plaza parking lot who have been standing in front of the store for the past hour.

Expect the wailing over guns laws to continue, maybe even crescendo, as a result of this shooting.  But take note that no one in this instance could have legally defended himself.  New Jersey is a “may issue” state.  State Senator Jeff Van Drew has tried to change that, apparently without success.

Current state law only gives carry permits to those who demonstrate a “justifiable need” to their local police chief and then a Superior Court judge — a nearly impossible hurdle, Van Drew says.

“You have to fear for your life, that you’re going to be killed, in essence,” said Van Drew. “It’s virtually never done.”

Van Drew owns two handguns — but he can’t carry them around.

New Jersey residents may purchase handguns through a permit process that involves being fingerprinted by local police and undergoing a background check. A permit must be obtained for each handgun purchased, and the buyer must go through a background check each time he or she wants to buy another pistol.

The state also has strict regulations guiding how handgun owners may transport their pistols outside their homes, requiring the pistol to be placed, unloaded, in a fastened case and carried in the trunk of a vehicle. If the vehicle has no trunk or separate compartment, the unloaded handgun must be kept in a locked box out of reach of passengers.

Those rules also apply to the handgun owners who hold special “carry permits” unless otherwise specified in the permit that allows them to have their handgun on their person. Each “carry permit” is tailored to the person holding it, setting the specific hours in a day, days in a week and the exact locations and circumstances in which a handgun owner may carry his or her gun.

Also apparently, bills to make New Jersey a shall-issue state have come up before, and they never go anywhere.  Note to the progressives.  New Jersey has some of the most restrictive gun laws in the nation.  More laws wouldn’t have stopped this crime.  Someone engaged in concealed carry, on the other hand, might have had a decent chance.

There has been a recent proliferation of commentaries advocating the notion that no one needs an AR for self defense or hunting.  They are good for nothing except killing and maiming innocent human lives, and should be banned.  Some even go so far as to claim that we have no constitutional right to own an AR, which elicited my response in Do We Have A Constitutional Right To Own An AR?  While I do not believe that the government has a moral right to dictate my belongings, and we do in fact have a constitutional right to own weapons of all sorts, it’s always good to retrieve the conversation from the theoretical and ensconce it squarely in the practical.  A recent incident in South Carolina does exactly that for us.

The owner of the Guns and Ammo Gunsmith store in North Augusta, S.C. thought he was going to die tragically. Three men had driven a van into his store, executing what they hoped would be a quick “smash-and-grab” robbery.

Instead, they met owner Stephen Bayezes, who opened fire on the three intruders after the commotion set off an alarm, hitting each one at least once. He says he is not proud of what he was forced to do, but added sometimes “you’ve got to.” The incident occurred on Aug. 9, but the owner says a set of tire marks on the store’s floor and an unfinished wall are daily reminders of the night that he almost lost his life.

“It’s a haunting thought. It literally is a haunting thought when you see the tire tracks, you hear the tires,” Bayezes told WRDW-TV. “Everybody assures you that you just did what you had to do to protect your family. They say it’ll heal over time, but when does time go away? It’s something that nobody ever wants to do.”

But he says he had no choice after he heard one of the robbers shout, “Shoot the mother f**ker!,” followed by the sound of a gun cocking. “I mean, they would’ve shot me. In my mind, with no reservation. If that firearm had been loaded, I might’ve been a statistic.”

With his fight-or-flight reflexes in full gear, Bayezes started shooting, striking all three men, killing one while the surviving two escaped.

So, what happened to the two suspects? WRDW explains:

The Aiken County Sheriff’s Office says Eddie Stewart and Franklin Robinson will be charged with burglary 1st, grand larceny and possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime. Both suspects are still in the hospital and will be taken into custody once they are released.

The Aiken County coroner says the third suspect, 20-year-old K’Raven Goodwin of Eastover, S.C., died from multiple gunshot wounds on Thursday morning.

The whole altercation took but one minute, he said. The burglars escaped with roughly 50 guns that night, however all of them have been returned safely.

The scene below shows the carnage sustained by the business.

The report says that this is the same type of weapon Bayezes used to defend himself and his wife.

This report doesn’t clearly state the details of Bayezes’s reaction, but the Aiken Standard does.

A North Augusta gun store owner used a semi-automatic weapon when he opened fire on three men who broke into his business early Thursday, killing one and sending two others to the hospital with gunshot wounds, officials said.

The break-in occurred around 4 a.m. at the Guns and Ammo Gunsmith, located on Edgefield Road in North Augusta, said Aiken County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Jason Feemster, a spokesman for the agency.

Stephen Bayazes Jr., 57, who lives in an attached apartment in the rear of the business with his wife, said he awoke to a loud bang and the silent store alarm going off.

Police said he got out of bed, grabbed his AR-15 weapon and found three men inside the store.

The men crashed a vehicle into the business and were smashing display cases and taking guns when he said he heard one of the men shout, “kill that (expletive deleted ).”

He told investigators he emptied a .223-caliber 30-round magazine and then retreated to his room to reload.

When he returned, he said he saw the vehicle pulling out from the business.

He used one of those evil “high capacity magazines” to defend his home, one of those features on so-called assault weapons that no living man is supposed to need.  He emptied his magazine.  I would have too.

But on to hunting.  Discovery Channel viewers may have taken note of a new series called Yukon Men.  It’s an interesting show on the hardships of living in the Yukon, but more to the point, take note of what happens in this video.

The young man uses an AR to take down the Caribou, and it’s a good size animal.  I also know someone who has taken down a large deer with the same caliber round (5.56 mm, or .223, and my friend was using “pointed soft point” ammunition for the deer).  The young man smartly remarks that the caliber he is using is good because it doesn’t destroy the meat.  This is meat he needs to eat in order to live.

It’s preposterous to assert that a high capacity magazine isn’t useful for self defense.  Clearly it is, and just as clearly, use of an AR (or similar modern sporting rifle) is useful and in common use for hunting.

From Heavy.com, where the author points out ten things we allegedly need to know, this is extracted.

The Navy SEAL Team 6 member who used the pseudonym Mark Owen to write No Easy Day, the tell-all book about the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, has been outed by Fox News. His name is Matt Bissonnette, age 36. What do we know about him?

According to White House and CIA officials, the military didn’t know about this book until the story was leaked online. When ex or current military personnel release a book about their military service, standard protocol is to give a copy to the Pentagon before the book is released publicly. This enables officials to comb through it and make sure that no confidential information gets leaked to the public. Bissonnette didn’t do this and is now taking heat for it. Dutton publishing house (a subsidiary of Penguin) claims that it did go through the book and deemed none of the information confidential. White House reps were quick to respond that Dutton’s vetting was not sufficient. If confidential info gets released in this book Bissonnette could face major jail time.

Word on the street is that Bissonnette is releasing the book in order to fight President Obama accidently (sic) taking credit for Bin Laden’s death. Bissonette was quoted saying “It’s time to set the record straight about the most important mission in US Military History.”

The SEALs are not happy with Bissonnette and his book. Fox News quoted one SEAL saying “How do we tell our guys to stay quiet when this guy won’t?” Other accounts have members of the SEALs going as far as calling him a “traitor.”

The only real description I can use to describe Seal Team 6 is “Scary Awesome.” SEAL Team 6’s official name is “ The United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group” (DEVGRU for short). DEVGRU is “awesome” because it is one of four counter terrorism/special mission units in the military and is so covert that most of the details and techniques of Seal Team 6 are not even commented on by the White House or DOD. Seal Team 6 is “scary” because it has the ability to work outside of both U.S. and international law. Bissonnette achieved the rank of chief in this elite group. He retired last summer.

Analysis & Commentary

Make sure to read the entire report, and there are others available as well.  In no certain order, I offer up the following observations.

I am not impressed with the whole OPSEC / FOUO classification.  It is a knee jerk, reflexive reaction to literally everything that the military produces, from mission details to PowerPoint presentations.  Oftentimes (or more correctly, most often) no thought whatsoever is given to the classification of some piece of knowledge, signals information or report.  The information released by Bradley Manning is a prime example, and except for the release of information with names of informants (which ultimately led to their deaths), I remarked at the time that the Manning information was mostly boring and worthless, and not useful for someone who had followed the details of the campaign for years like I had.  I basically learned nothing from it.

The instance surrounding the release of the presentation on Taliban tactics, techniques and procedures is a more detailed example of the reflexive tendency to classify everything.  In this case the presentation was classified FOUO, obtained my Michael Yon and posted to his site with some observations, linked by Glenn Reynolds, and then linked and discussed by me.  The officer who authored this presentation at one point attempted to force me to take the presentation down, but I refused, and for the better.

The Taliban already know of their own procedures.  The enemy doesn’t learn of their procedures by reading my web site, but our own Marines might be better equipped and prepared by doing so.  No matter, said this officer.  It was classified as FOUO and thus it should ever remain whether it had been released on another web site or not.  I again refused, still do so, and am convinced that some Marine somewhere (many Marines read this web site) benefited from knowing information that they would have never seen if it had not been made available by Michael and me.

One final example would be the information I describe about satellite patrols.  The things I learned from my son about them are based on what they did in Fallujah in 2007.  Al Qaeda doesn’t need to read this web site to learn about these things.  They observed them as they are happening, and they can no more (while it is happening) do anything about the fact that they don’t know where the next fire team will show up than if they read this web site.

Operations by Special Forces is similar in my opinion.  They are so secretive that names, dates, locations, TTPs, equipment, orders, logistics, etc., etc., are all off limits for conversation or even training items for the other forces.  Oftentimes I am convinced that it doesn’t necessarily have to be this way, or another way to put it is that the secretive nature of their operations adds to their mystique but not the success of the mission.

So what TTPs were used is not important regarding secrecy.  What might indeed be of great importance is the fact that helicopter technology apparently fell into Pakistani hands, and then ultimately into Chinese hands.  The greatest failure of the mission for UBL was the fact that inadequate barriers were in place to prevent this from happening.  Whether the mission included Matt Bissonnette, how long they trained, what weapons they brought, where they trained, what happened to UBL’s body, timing of mission details, names of other team members, and so on and so forth, aren’t critical to past or future missions.

Knowing when a ship is going to be in a strait or knowing when a patrol is going to pass by is OPSEC, and it is traitorous to divulge it.  Knowing that Matt Bissonnette was on the raid to kill UBL is not, and talk of traitorous actions on Matt’s part is juvenile.  Knowing the materials in the design of the helicopter they used that night is OPSEC; knowing that someone killed UBL with a double-tap to the head is not.  Some of my military readers will disagree.  So be it.  You won’t change my mind.

Next, to Matt’s claim that this was “the most important mission in US Military History.”  Oh my.  Oh goodness. Of all of the Marine Recon missions in the South Pacific, of all of the Ranger missions in Europe in World War II, of all of the recon missions during the War of Independence, this one was the most important.

Um, I don’t think so.  Not by a long shot.  I have made it abundantly clear that I am no advocate of the high value target campaign.  While being one pseudo-useful tactic, it doesn’t even nearly rise to the level of a being a functional strategy, which is what we have tried to do in Afghanistan.

It would have had far greater strategic value to have killed the Haqqanis, Hassan Nasrallah or especially General Suleimani than bin Laden.  There is no question that a generation of Americans had a sense of accomplishment when bin Laden was killed.  But making this out to be something that it isn’t is no better than the administration being offended at the “OPSEC” divulged in the book.

No one questions that the SEALs are the best on earth at what they do.  No one should question the bravery of those who conducted the mission.  I just think we should keep this all in proper perspective.  And I would be happy to review the book – for a free, signed copy.

In Guns: The Great White Male Right-Wing Freak-Out, we heard Katha Pollitt ridiculing the very notion that a concealed handgun carrier might just have saved lives in the recent Aurora, Colorado shooting.  “All those moviegoers in Aurora needed to make their misery complete was to have a bunch of armed freelancers shooting off their weapons in a dark theater,” she dryly commented.

I wondered if she might be mistakenly referring to the incident where the New York Police Department fired off 84 rounds at a single shooter, missing with 70.  Now we learn from none other than Mayor Nazi himself that the NYPD might have again neglected to maintain situational awareness of their backstop.

Bloomberg says the suspect had been fired from his job at the address about a year ago.

He says some of the people injured in the melee may have been accidentally shot by police officers firing at the gunman.

I’m just wondering if any white, freaked-out, right-wing males might have been able to help in this situation if they had been carrying?

UPDATE #1:

“These officers … had absolutely no choice,” Kelly said. “This individual took a gun out very close to them and perhaps fired at them.”

Kelly said authorities believe police may be responsible for some of the injuries because of the limited capacity of the gunman’s weapon.

Erica Solar doesn’t know who shot her in the back of the knee while she walked to get coffee on her way to work, said her brother, Louis Lleras.

“She just heard shots and she fell to the ground a couple of steps forward and noticed that she was shot,” Lleras said.

Ercolino’s profile on the business networking site Linkedin identified him as a vice president of sales at Hazan Import Corp. It said he was a graduate of the State University of New York at Oneonta

A man who answered the phone at Ercolino’s home in Warwick, northwest of Manhattan, said he was too distraught to talk.

“He was a good son, that’s all I can say, said the man, who didn’t give his name

The two officers fired a total of 14 rounds at Johnson, Kelly said. Mayor Michael Bloomberg said some of the nine wounded may have been shot by police in the mayhem. Johnson’s semi-automatic weapon was equipped to fire at least eight rounds; at least one round was left in the clip, police said. Another loaded magazine was in his briefcase.

You mean that he didn’t need a high capacity clip, er … magazine to cause all that carnage?  You mean that the NYPD officers were “very close” to the shooter and still shot innocents?

On another front, Katrina Trinko says:

I’ve been past the Empire State Building many, many times now; it’s one of the most crowded areas in Manhattan. There’s always tourists to see the building itself, and there’s plenty of non-tourists, too, going about their daily business. Unbelievable that it would be a scene of violence like this.

That’s the problem with Mayor Nazi and his gun laws, and all of those who acquiesce to them.  It’s “unbelievable” that someone would be shot there.  It needs to become very believable, right now, especially if it is a crowded area.  I was attending worship services a few weeks ago and took note of the very large, seated crowd.  What a horrible target  for a crazed shooter!  That’s why I was armed while sitting in the service, and thus, the service was safer for everyone in attendance.

UPDATE #2:

Based on other sources, it appears that the sequence of events is basically as follows: (a) gunman had an eight round magazine, (b) fired two (or possibly three) shots at former supervisor (or co-worker, it isn’t clear), holstered his weapon and walked away, (c) someone witnessed these events and security personnel followed him, (d) he appeared to unholster his weapon and aim it at the police officers, (e) NYPD officers fired approximately 14 rounds in his direction, killing him and shooting nine bystanders in the process.  In the sequence of events it is apparent at the moment that the perpetrator didn’t fire a single round at the police.

Now.  Expect the following things to happen in the MSM.  First, they will walk back the idea that a gunman shot eleven people.  They will not clealy state that the NYPD shot nine of them.  They will issue new calls for a ban on high capacity magazines even though the gunman didn’t have one.  Finally, they will call for even more stringent controls on the purchase of firearms by law abiding citizens, including increased waiting times, even though the gunman waited approximately one year from the date of the offending action to perpetrate the crime.

Watch it and see.

UPDATE #3: Thanks to Dan Riehl for the attention!