Marines should toast Buchwald

Marines should toast Buchwald

Charles Norton/For the Tracy Press Friday, 26 January 2007

— Letter from Charles Norton

Marines owe the memory of columnist Art Buchwald, 1925-2007, a heaping handful of gratitude. The trouble is many of the post-Vietnam and perhaps pre-Vietnam veterans don’t know why. Buchwald’s contribution to Marine Corps history could quite possibly be held on a plateau equal to the legends of “Chesty” Puller, Dan Daley or “Manila John” Basilone. His contribution may be not equal on the heroic deed scale, but certainly significant on the scale of tradition.

Buchwald enlisted in the Corps in 1942 before his 17th birthday. The legend says he bribed a drunk with a bottle to pose as his father to give parental consent to his enlistment. According to recruiting standards, this is a fraudulent enlistment because of age. But what the heck At the time, we were in a war for survival. This already contributes to the making of a legend. Art Buchwald served with the 4th Marine Aircraft Wing in World War II.

Fast forward to the 1960s. Robert McNamara was defense secretary under first, President John Kennedy, and then, President Lyndon Johnson. McNamara was tabbed one of the administration’s “whiz kids” because of his reputation as a cost-cutter at Ford Motor Co. McNamara’s Holy Grail was to cut defense spending by elimination of duplicate or redundant procurement. Uniform procurement differences among the military branches fell into his sights. McNamara gained fame or notoriety by his analysis of brassiere procurement. He was said to have questioned why the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines Corps each had different specifications for uniform brassieres for their female members. I won’t go there.

But I do remember the “McNamarazation” of the Marine Corps uniform in the 1960s.

The herringbone twill “dungarees” of World War II and Korea vintage went the way of the fair leather belt and collar clips to be replaced by a rather blah uniform identified as “sateen utilities” that were identical in appearance to the Army “fatigues.” Our combat boots and field shoes, aka “boondockers,” were replaced with the combat boot, universally maligned by Leathernecks worldwide as “McNamara Boots.” The latter were one inch shorter and eschewed the eyelet and hook lacing arrangement required by amphibious troops. The Marine Corps working uniform could be distinguished from soldiers by the USMC transfer on the breast pocket and a distinctive utility cap not resembling what we called the “Beetle Bailey” cap worn by our Army brethren.

One distinguishing Marine Corps uniform article survived McNamarazation.

The defense secretary decreed that all the services would procure identical belts and buckles as a cost-cutting measure. McNamara reasoned that the primary purpose of a belt was to keep one’s trousers in the proper position, regardless of the color or buckle. Here is where the secretary’s reasoning failed and where Art Buchwald saved a venerable tradition. Then a columnist for The Washington Post, Buchwald provided a logical reason for preservation of a distinctive buckle and belt for Marines. “The Marine Corps belt buckle is the only buckle that can be used to open a beer bottle,” he wrote.

Today, Marines can thank Buchwald for our belt buckle, which has survived the war in the Pacific, the Inchon landing, Beirut, the Cuban missile crisis, Khe Sanh, the Dominican Republic, the Mayaguez, Grenada, Desert Storm, Bosnia, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Djibouti and a cost-cutting secretary of defense.

How about a cold one, Art Hand me that bottle and I’ll open it for you.

And Semper Fi, Marine.

Charles Norton, the Tracy Press Our Town Paws for Thought columnist, is a 25-year Tracy resident. He served 25 years in the Marine Corps, retiring in 1980 as a lieutenant colonel. He served in Vietnam with the 3rd Marine Division.
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Gunny G's Marines Sites & Forums -- LINKS

Gunny G's Marines GLOBE and ANCHOR Sites & Forums--The Best Damn Marines Sites On The WWW!--was originally composed mainly on topics of interest to Old Salt Marines of what was known as "THE OLD CORPS!." --Mostly those years between the wars (WW I and WW II), and The Banana Wars, Nicaragua and Haiti, The China Marines, etc. But it was also heavily into WW II and Korea, leaving all that came later to the boots to boast and brag over.Keep in mind, there has not been an official "declared" war since WW II.

Politics was avoided, but with every coming year we find what was once known simply as "politics" has now become warp and woof of everything in our daily lives. Therefore, the GunnyG webpages now includes information relating to topics political, social, politically incorrect, unusual, history (Marine Corps, and other military, and much little-known and/or little mentioned items relating to history), and so on and on.

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POLICE AS A STANDING ARMY...?

PART II

POLICE AS A STANDING ARMY

It is largely forgotten that the war for American independence was initiated in large part by the British Crown's practice of using troops to police civilians in Boston and other cities.244 Professional soldiers used in the same ways as modern police were among the primary grievances enunciated by Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence. ("[George III] has kept among us standing armies"; "He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to the civil power"; "protecting them, by a mock trial....").245 The duties of such troops were in no way military but involved the keeping of order and the suppression of crime (especially customs and tax violations).

Constitutional arguments quite similar to the thesis of this article were made by America's Founders while fomenting the overthrow of their government. Thomas Jefferson proclaimed that although Parliament was supreme in its jurisdiction to make laws, "his majesty has no right to land a single armed man on our shores" to enforce unpopular laws.246 James Warren said that the troops in Boston were there on an unconstitutional mission because their role was not military but rather to enforce "obedience to Acts which, upon fair examination, appeared to be unjust and unconstitutional."247 Colonial pamphleteer Nicholas Ray charged that Americans did not have "an Enemy worth Notice within 3000 Miles of them."248 "[T]he troops of George the III have cross'd the wide atlantick, not to engage an enemy," charged John Hancock, but to assist constitutional traitors "in trampling on the rights and liberties of [the King's] most loyal subjects ..."249

The use of soldiers to enforce law had a long and sullied history in England and by the mid-1700s were considered a violation of the fundamental rights of Englishmen.250 The Crown's response to London's Gordon Riots of 1780 — roughly contemporary to the cultural backdrop of America's Revolution — brought on an immense popular backlash at the use of guards to maintain public order.251 "[D]eep, uncompromising opposition to the maintenance of a semimilitary professional force in civilian life" remained integral to Anglo-Saxon legal culture for another half century.252

Englishmen of the Founding era, both in England and its colonies, regarded professional police as an "alien, continental device for maintaining a tyrannical form of Government."253 Professor John Phillip Reid has pointed out that few of the rights of Englishmen "were better known to the general public than the right to be free of standing armies."254 "Standing armies," according to one New Hampshire correspondent, "have ever proved destructive to the Liberties of a People, and where they are suffered, neither Life nor Property are secure."255

If pressed, modern police defenders would have difficulty demonstrating a single material difference between the standing armies the Founders saw as so abhorrent and America's modern police forces. Indeed, even the distinctions between modern police and actual military troops have blurred in the wake of America's modern crime war.256 Ninety percent of American cities now have active special weapons and tactics (SWAT) teams, using such commando-style forces to do "high risk warrant work" and even routine police duties.257 Such units are often instructed by active and retired United States military personnel.258

In Fresno, California, a SWAT unit equipped with battering rams, chemical agents, fully automatic submachine guns, and 'flashbang' grenades roams full-time on routine patrol.259 According to criminologist Peter Kraska, such military policing has never been seen on such a scale in American history, "where SWAT teams routinely break through a door, subdue all the occupants, and search the premises for drugs, cash and weapons."260 In high-crime or problem areas, police paramilitary units may militarily engage an entire neighborhood, stopping "anything that moves" or surrounding suspicious homes with machine guns openly displayed.261

Much of the importance of the standing-army debates at the ratification conventions has been overlooked or misinterpreted by modern scholars. Opponents of the right to bear arms, for example, have occasionally cited the standing-army debates to support the proposition that the Framers intended the Second Amendment to protect the power of states to form militias.262 Although this argument has been greatly discredited,263 it has helped illuminate the intense distrust that the Framers manifested toward occupational standing armies. The standing army the Framers most feared was a soldiery conducting law enforcement operations in the manner of King George's occupation troops — like the armies of police officers that now patrol the American landscape.

Ref
http://www.constitution.org/lrev/roots/cops.htm
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ARE COPS CONSTITUTIONAL?

Roger Roots*

ABSTRACT

Police work is often lionized by jurists and scholars who claim to employ "textualist" and "originalist" methods of constitutional interpretation. Yet professional police were unknown to the United States in 1789, and first appeared in America almost a half-century after the Constitution's ratification. The Framers contemplated law enforcement as the duty of mostly private citizens, along with a few constables and sheriffs who could be called upon when necessary. This article marshals extensive historical and legal evidence to show that modern policing is in many ways inconsistent with the original intent of America's founding documents. The author argues that the growth of modern policing has substantially empowered the state in a way the Framers would regard as abhorrent to their foremost principles.

PART I

INTRODUCTION................................................................686

THE CONSTITUTIONAL TEXT..............................................688

PRIVATE PROSECUTORS....................................................689

LAW ENFORCEMENT AS A UNIVERSAL................................692

POLICE AS SOCIAL WORKERS.............................................695

THE WAR ON CRIME..........................................................696

THE DEVELOPMENT OF DISTINCTIONS................................698

RESISTING ARREST............................................................701

THE SAFETY OF THE POLICE PROFESSION............................711

PROFESSIONALISM?..........................................................713

DNA EVIDENCE ILLUSTRATES FALLIBILITY OF POLICE........716

COPS NOT COST-EFFECTIVE DETERRENT.............................721

PART II

POLICE AS A STANDING ARMY...........................................722

THE SECOND AMENDMENT........725

THE THIRD AMENDMENT...................................................727

THE RIGHT TO BE LEFT ALONE...........................................728

THE FOURTH AMENDMENT................................................729

WARRANTS A FLOOR, NOT A CEILING.................................733

PRIVATE PERSONS AND THE FOURTH AMENDMENT..............734

ORIGINALISTS CALL FOR CIVIL DAMAGES...........................739

DEVELOPMENT OF IMMUNITIES..........................................743

THE LOSS OF PROBABLE CAUSE, AND THE ONSET OF PROBABLE SUSPICION................................................744

POLICE AND THE "AUTOMOBILE EXCEPTION"......................745

ONE EXCEPTION: THE EXCLUSIONARY RULE?......................747

THE FIFTH AMENDMENT....................................................751

DUE PROCESS...................................................................752

ENTRAPMENT...................................................................754

CONCLUSION...................................757

PART I

INTRODUCTION

Uniformed police officers are the most visible element of America's criminal justice system. Their numbers have grown exponentially over the past century and now stand at hundreds of thousands nationwide.1 Police expenses account for the largest segment of most municipal budgets and generally dwarf expenses for fire, trash, and sewer services.2 Neither casual observers nor learned authorities regard the sight of hundreds of armed, uniformed state agents on America's roads and street corners as anything peculiar — let alone invalid or unconstitutional.

Yet the dissident English colonists who framed the United States Constitution would have seen this modern 'police state' as alien to their foremost principles. Under the criminal justice model known to the Framers, professional police officers were unknown.3 The general public had broad law enforcement powers and only the executive functions of the law (e.g., the execution of writs, warrants and orders) were performed by constables or sheriffs (who might call upon members of the community for assistance).4 Initiation and investigation of criminal cases was the nearly exclusive province of private persons.

At the time of the Constitution's ratification, the office of sheriff was an appointed position, and constables were either elected or drafted from the community to serve without pay.5 Most of their duties involved civil executions rather than...
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The role of teaching and learning ...

The role of teaching and learning is actually reversed in the thinking of the world. The reversal is characteristic. It seems as if the teacher and the learner are separated, the teacher giving something to the learner rather than to himself. Further, the act of teaching is regarded as a special activity, in which one engages only a relatively small proportion of one's time. The course, on the other hand, emphasizes that to teach to learn, so that teacher and learner are the same. It also emphasizes that teaching is a constant process; it goes on every moment of the day, and continues into sleeping thoughts as well.

To teach is to demonstrate. There are only two thought systems, and you demonstrate that you believe one or the other is true all the time. From your demonstration others learn, and so do you. The question is not whether you will teach, for in that there is no choice. The purpose of the course might be said to provide you with a means of choosing what you want to teach on the basis of what you want to learn. You cannot give to someone else, but only to yourself, and this you learn through teaching. Teaching is but a call to witnesses to attest to what you believe. It is a method of conversion. This is not done by words alone. Any situation must be to you a chance to teach others what you are, and what they are to you. No more than that, but also never less.

The curriculum you set up is therefore determined exclusively by what you think you are, and what you believe the relationship of others is to you. In the formal teaching situation, these questions may be totally unrelated to what you think you are teaching. Yet it is impossible not to use the content of any situation on behalf of what you really teach, and therefore really learn. To this the verbal content of your teaching is quite irrelevant. It may coincide with it, or it may not. It is the teaching underlying what you say that teaches you. Teaching but reinforces what you believe about yourself. Its fundamental purpose is to diminish self-doubt. This does not mean that the self you are trying to protect is real. But it does mean that the self you think is real is what you teach.

This is inevitable. There is no escape from it. How could it be otherwise? Everyone who follows the world's curriculum, and everyone here does follow it until he changes his mind, teaches solely to convince himself that he is what he is not. Herein is the purpose of the world. What else, then, would its curriculum be? Into this hopeless and closed learning situation, which teaches nothing but despair and death, God sends His teachers. And as they teach His lessons of joy and hope, their learning finally becomes complete.

Except for God's teachers there would be little hope of salvation, for the world of sin would seem forever real. The self-deceiving must deceive, for they must teach deception. And what else is hell? This is a manual for the teachers of God. They are not perfect, or they would not be here. Yet it is their mission to become perfect here, and so they teach perfection over and over, in many, many ways, until they have learned it. And then they are seen no more, although their thoughts remain a source of strength and truth forever. Who are they? How are they chosen? What do they do? How can they work out their own salvation and the salvation of the world? This manual attempts to answer these questions.
ACIM
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IS THE SECOND AMENDMENT ABOUT HUNTING???

"The Second Amendment isn’t about hunting, it’s about keeping our government in line when all else has failed to do so."
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http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig7/tonso3.html

LewRockwell.com

Second Amendment Lessons From Iraq

by William R. Tonso

Like all informed Second Amendment supporters, I don’t trust any politician who claims support for that amendment and then goes on to relate how much he/she stands up for the rights of hunters as if the rights of hunters were what that amendment is all about. We know why the Second Amendment was put in the Bill of Rights. The Founders left us a clear paper trail including the following succinct statement from Tench Coxe: "As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow citizens, the people are confirmed in the next article in their right to keep and bear their private arms" (emphasis added).

The Second Amendment isn’t about hunting, it’s about keeping our government in line when all else has failed to do so. It’s the teeth of the Bill of Rights. And that there are still Americans who take seriously the right to defend themselves against a government gone bad worries advocates of dictatorial social engineering through judicial activism and of the ever-increasing centralization and intrusiveness of our government. But are those of us who take this right and its related concerns seriously being realistic? If our government gets to the point where it’s widely considered to be oppressive, could our heavily armed populace do much against the even more heavily armed and highly trained military and police forces that would be the instruments of our government’s oppression? After all, wouldn’t the situation existing in Iraq before Saddam Hussein was ousted seem to undermine our assumptions concerning the protection against oppression afforded by a heavily armed civilian populace?

The official justification for going to war with Iraq, of course, was to get rid of that nation’s weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). Since no Iraqi WMDs have been found, the Bush administration’s justification for going into Iraq has shifted to liberating that nation’s people from the horrors inflicted on them by their brutal dictator, Saddam Hussein. That Saddam was a brutal dictator, there’s no doubt, but if his people were so terribly treated by him, why didn’t they rise up against him? I can just hear the scoffing response to this question from the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and other Bush-administration shills: "Idiot, how can an oppressed people rise up against a brutal dictator and his military and police forces?" But the answer to this question should be obvious to those who believe that a heavily armed populace serves as a safeguard against oppression. Gun ownership was apparently widespread in Saddam’s Iraq.

"The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence/Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence" claims, "According to media reports, Iraq is one of the most heavily armed countries in the world. It is believed that there are enough guns in Iraq for at last [sic] every person in Iraq to possess one, a level similar to gun ownership in clans in Yemen and Somalia, as well as in the United States. With a population of approximately 24 million, that means there could be millions of small arms in the hands of civilians. The gun culture is pervasive in Iraq. There is even an Iraqi saying, ‘Give everything to your friend, except your car, your wife, and your gun.’"

This anti-gun organization goes on to report that "in February, 2003, Saddam’s governments [sic] held a parade of thousands of small arms-bearing civilians to march down the streets of Mosul to demonstrate the capacity of ordinary Iraqis to wage war." What kinds of guns? All kinds, many old but also many new, the latter including AK-47 true assault rifles capable of full-automatic fire, and "Israeli Uzis and German MP5 submachine guns." Civilians even had rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs). A retired Army Special Operations officer with whom I swap e-mails now and again confirms that that part of the world, with which he is very familiar, is awash in guns. And a soldier returned from Iraq once told Limbaugh about the widespread civilian possession of guns in that country. Rush was surprised, but I’ve never heard him mention it again. So, if Iraqi civilians were actually heavily armed even before they were "liberated" (Ha!), why didn’t the Iraqi people rise up against their brutal dictator and save the United States the trouble of "liberating" them?

Does the failure of heavily armed Iraqis to liberate themselves undermine the arguments of Second Amendment supporters in the United States, few of whom seem to be aware that Iraqi civilians were heavily armed even in Saddam’s day? I’m surprised that the gun prohibitionists haven’t used the Iraq situation to jump on this pro-Second Amendment argument with both feet. "Look! The heavily armed Iraqis couldn’t do anything against Saddam’s police state. Any attempt to overthrow his oppressive regime would have brought about the swift and brutal eradication of rebel forces by his military and police forces. Why, his oppressed masses couldn’t even assassinate him, because he had so many doubles standing in for him and he had spies everywhere. You Second Amendment yahoos are caught up in a bunch of romantic nonsense if you think that you can stand up against the military and police forces of a modern nation state gone bad." Somewhere, I believe on the Internet, I’ve seen at least one Second Amendment-supporter’s response to the Iraq situation. He argued that since the Iraqis didn’t liberate themselves, reports that they were heavily armed must be false. But both the argument that Iraqis couldn’t overthrow Saddam even though they were heavily armed, and the argument that the fact that they didn’t overthrow him proves that they weren’t heavily armed are questionable.

Had the Iraqis been as willing to take on Saddam’s military and police forces as they obviously have been to take on American and British forces far more powerful than any that could have been mustered by Saddam, they could have got rid of him themselves and been less worse off than they are now. As Saddam apparently hoped they would, Iraqis have proven that they can fight and that they’re willing to take casualties, and in doing so they’ve also shown that even if they had the means they didn’t have the will to get rid of him. They’re currently demonstrating that they have both the means and the will to take on rival factions and those whom they consider to be occupiers of their country and despoilers of everything they value. As the retired Army Special Operations officer I mentioned previously e-mailed me: "Every country I have ever spent time in, to include Iraq, the people living there are as free as they are willing to be. This is not just opinion, it is true by definition. Otherwise they would be dead or in jail trying to overthrow people like Saddam. What Americans mistakenly do is transfer their beliefs regarding distrust of government onto others. The vast majority of people around this world believe government to be a good, not evil, force in their lives." Well put. Even a well-armed populace can be oppressed if it doesn’t have the will to rebel. I might add that even in the United States, detractors of the Second Amendment, and even many of its supporters, tend to trust government too much and see it as a force for good as long as their side is in power.

December 13, 2006

William R. Tonso [send him mail] a retired sociology professor (University of Evansville) who has written a lot on the gun issue, both sociological and pro-Second Amendment. His recent book, Gun Control=People Control, is a collection of eleven of his essays previously published in Liberty, Reason, Chronicles, and Gun Week.

Copyright © 2006 LewRockwell.com



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Suribachi Flag: Living Japanese Survivor, Etc.

http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/waiwai/news/p20061211p2g00m0dm003000c.html

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Mainichi Daily News
INTERACTIVE

Flags of Our Fathers:
Japanese Iwo Jima eyewitness tells it in his own words

Joe Rosenthal's famous photo of the flag-raising on Iwo Jima. (AP)
"The Iwo Jima Memorial standing at Arlington Cemetery. The photo showing six U.S. Marines raising the Stars & Stripes on Mt. Suribachi was not only staged, but the summit was retaken twice by Japanese forces, who raised the Nissho-ki (Sun flag) in its place. A young Japanese serviceman who witnessed it all recounts his memories from 61 years ago." (Shukan Bunshun (12/14)

Actually, the U.S. flag was raised by five Marines and one Navy corpsman. The USMC Iwo Jima memorial stands in Rosslyn, Virginia, nearby, but not within the boundaries of, Arlington Cemetery. And allegations that AP cameraman Joe Rosenthal "staged" the famous flag-raising photo have been thoroughly debunked.

Following this acerbic and partially inaccurate lead-in, Shukan Bunshun introduces Tsuruji Akikusa, age 79. In 1944, the 17-year-old Akikusa was dispatched to Iwo Jima as a signalman for the Imperial Japanese Navy. He had enlisted two years earlier following his school graduation.

Akikusa points to a photo in a movie program showing actors portraying American GIs sitting on a patch of grassy turf.

"That would have been impossible," he scoffs. "After the naval bombardment, there wasn't a blade of grass left on the island."

Out of a total Japanese garrison of 21,000 men, only 1,023 men survived, including Akikusa. He was seriously wounded during the pre-invasion bombardment in February 1945 and did not take part in the fighting. Found unconscious in the battle's aftermath, he was evacuated to a hospital in Guam and repatriated the following year.

In "Junana-sai no Io-to" (a 17-year-old on Iwo Jima, Bungei Shunju, 840 yen), his personal memoirs released this month, Akikusa provides a rare eyewitness perspective of what happened on Mt. Suribachi from the opposing side.

Suribachi, the highest point on the island, harbored about 2,000 Japanese defenders. Akikusa himself was situated at a communications post some 3.5 kilometers to the northeast, on a lower peak called Mt. Tamana.

On the morning of February 23, he saw the first U.S. flag go up on Suribachi's peak, followed shortly thereafter by the second, larger flag, the raising of which was immortalized at 1/400th second in Rosenthal's famous photograph. Akikusa's descriptions up to this point correspond completely to American accounts of the event. But what followed afterward appears to contradict the official U.S. Naval version of the battle.

The following morning, as Akikusa relates in his book, "It was not the Stars & Stripes, but the Nissho-ki (Japanese Sun flag) that was waving. Even though the peak was the target of attack from every direction on the island, I thought how hard they must have fought, and tears naturally came to my eyes. The valiant fighters were defending Mt. Suribachi to the death."

The U.S. troops quickly hauled down the Japanese standard and replaced it with their own flag. But early the next morning, February 25, "the Nissho-ki was once again fluttering in the morning sunshine. It was a dazzling, beautiful sight."

"The flag was a different one from the day before," Akikusa recalls. "It was a smaller one, and square. It may have been improvised. The red circle in the center looked brownish, so it could have been blood."

"It may have been made out of a shirt. It moved me to tears. 'Our guys are still up there,' I thought. 'They're giving everything they've got. So will I.'"

"I had hoped to see the Nissho-ki still flying the next morning, but that miracle was not to be," Akikusa writes. "I said to myself, 'Well, I guess that's the end of it.'"

By March 8, the US attackers had turned their overwhelming numerical superiority on Mt. Tamana. Akikusa, wounded in the left leg and right hand, witnessed scenes of incredible carnage. Unconscious from multiple wounds, he awakened in a POW hospital on Guam.

Repatriated after the war, Akikusa called on the families of comrades killed in the fighting. But his visits were not necessarily welcomed.

"Their reactions were about half positive and half negative," he relates. "Many of them told me, 'We've already completed our Buddhist memorial services.' I guess they wanted to put it behind them as quickly as they could."

Shukan Bunshun asks Akikusa if he felt deaths of his comrades in arms was meaningful.

"Considering how this country has been without war for the past 60 years, I think it's commendable," Akikusa replies. "If you regard them as 'sacrificial stones' who caused Japan to relinquish what it sought to become in those times, then I want to believe their deaths were not without meaning." (By Masuo Kamiyama, contributing writer)

December 11, 2006
Copyright 2004-2005 THE MAINICHI NEWSPAPERS. All rights reserved.
Under the copyright law of Japan, use of all materials on this website, except for personal and noncommercial purposes, is prohibited without the express written permission of the Mainichi Newspapers Co. The copyright of the materials belongs to the Mainichi Newspapers Co. unless stated otherwise.
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China Marines by Eric Niderost By Eric Niderost

HistoryNet

China Marines
In the twilight of peace, the China Marines found themselves on the front lines of conflict.

By Eric Niderost

The United States Marine Corps had served with distinction in many parts of the world, but those serving in China in the 1930s faced a unique set of challenges. From 1937 to 1941, as relations between the United States and Japan steadily deteriorated, the "China Marines" became the subject of heated debate between the State Department, the diplomatic corps and the military. The disagreements were in part a reflection of the deep divisions that plagued the U.S. government and the nation at large.

In the final years prior to Pearl Harbor, Marines were stationed in several parts of north and central China protecting U.S. interests as they had done since the Boxer Rebellion of 1900. Perhaps the most famous of these isolated detachments of leathernecks, at least in terms of popular imagination and historical association, was the Embassy Guard Detachment at Peking.

In addition to that assignment, after the departure of the Army's 15th Infantry Regiment in early 1938, Marines could be found in Tientsin, about 83 miles or so from the capital and the traditional gateway to Peking. An additional 20 were stationed at Chinwangtao, a major port 140 miles northwest of Tientsin where much of the China Marines' support arrived from the States.

The largest detachment was the 4th Marine Regiment, which had been stationed in Shanghai since 1927. Its assignment was to safeguard American lives, property and commerce, not only in the great city, but in the Yangtze River valley as well.

First called to the area when China was overrun by warlords, by the 1930s the Marines were still performing the same mission as Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist Party, the Kuomintang -- fighting warlords and Communist forces under Mao Tse-tung in a country that seemed forever beset by chaos. A fervent anti-Communist, Generalissimo Chiang seemed so obsessed at times with destroying Mao that he ignored an even more ominous threat.

In 1931 ultranationalist officers within the Japanese army hoped to expand the borders of their country's empire at the expense of China, which they saw as weak and unable to defend itself. They staged an explosion along the Japanese-funded South Manchurian Railway near Mukden and used the incident as a pretext to seize Manchuria from China. Still obsessed with his anti-Communist campaign, Chiang did little to prevent the takeover. Other than delivering a few verbal protests, Western governments were silent, and many people believed that it would not be long before the Japanese continued their expansion.

While it did not noticeably raise the ire of Chiang or the interest of Western leaders, the Japanese seizure of Manchuria outraged ordinary Chinese citizens. An active anti-Japanese resistance movement soon sprang up. The center of that resistance was located in Shanghai. Fighting broke out in 1932 between Japanese troops guarding their settlement in Shanghai and Chinese troops at Chapei, a district of the city just north of the International Settlement.

The International Settlement was a foreign enclave that was home to thousands of diplomats, businessmen and their families. Although technically Chinese soil, it was governed by the multinational Municipal Council. The Shanghai Volunteer Corps had been created to protect the settlement, but real security was provided by the troops sent out by their respective home governments. For the Americans, that meant the 4th Marine Regiment.

When the fighting between the Japanese and Chinese nationalists intensified, the Marines helped maintain a defensive perimeter around the foreign delegations and kept the warring parties from entering until the fighting subsided somewhat.

By 1937, however, the relative calm of the previous five years began to fade. In July the Japanese military accused the Chinese of kidnapping one of their privates in Peking. The charge was patently false, and the missing man was found in a brothel, but the Japanese used the incident to launch a full-scale war against China.

Thousands of Japanese troops poured into northern China, quickly occupying Peking and Tientsin and crushing all opposition. Finally motivated to act, Chiang Kai-shek ordered two of his best divisions to Shanghai to try to stop the Japanese. The Chinese leader knew that the city's foreign community would guarantee a large international audience once battle was joined.

With heavy fighting in Shanghai's Chapei district, the commander of the 4th Marines, Colonel Charles F.B. Price, met with American Consul General Clarence Gauss and Maj. Gen. A.P.D. Telfer-Smollett, commander of the British Shanghai Area Force, to discuss the best course of action. Price could consult with officials within the perimeter, but the colonel ultimately took his orders from Admiral Harry E. Yarnell, the commander of the U.S. Asiatic Fleet. The admiral told Price in no uncertain terms that armed troops from either side would not be allowed into the American sector of the International Settlement and that if any foreign troops tried to breach the perimeter, the Marines were authorized to use force if need be.

The Chinese fought courageously, but they were finally forced to withdraw from Shanghai in mid-November 1937. The International Settlement and neighboring French Concession became small isolated enclaves of Western governance. Despite Japanese control of the city, the Anglo-American portions of the settlement were inviolate -- at least for the moment. Protected by its neutrality, the Chinese government was free to operate within the confines of the settlement -- a fact that made the Japanese grind their teeth in frustration. Chinese customs, post, radio and telegraph offices and Chinese banks all conducted business safe from Japanese interference. Patriotic Chinese newspapers within the settlement were free to report the war and publicize the plight of ordinary Chinese by exposing Japanese atrocities, which occurred with frightening regularity. Such reports only served to secure increased public support in the West for Chiang and his forces.

Anxious to continue their war of conquest without raising the ire of the international community, the Japanese wanted to seize control of the nettlesome Anglo-American settlement. They knew that any overt aggression might lead to war, so they instead relied on a series of confrontational moves that increased tensions and made life for the foreigners increasingly uncomfortable. On December 12, 1937, Japanese planes attacked and sank the gunboat USS Panay, killing two sailors and wounding many others. Americans were outraged, but strong isolationist sentiments coupled with a quick Japanese apology and generous reparation payments averted armed conflict.

Another crisis had passed, but the basic problem remained: How should the United States respond to Japan's brutal conquest of China? In 1935 Congress had passed a series of neutrality acts that rigidly controlled American trade with belligerents in foreign wars. Many isolationist politicians in Congress believed that only strict neutrality would keep the United States from finding itself in another war.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt was sympathetic to China, and he got around the neutrality laws by simply ignoring them. He refused to acknowledge that a state of war existed between China and the Japanese empire. It was a legal fiction helped by the fact that no formal declaration of war had ever been made by either side. Roosevelt was therefore free to send arms to China -- some $9 million worth in 1938 alone. This was a boon not only to Chiang, but to the American economy as well.

Even within his own administration there were diverse opinions of the president's actions. Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau believed that U.S. interests in China must be protected by a military and economic buildup. He thought that, like the proverbial schoolyard bully, Japan would back down when faced with firmness and resolve. Others were not so sure. Secretary of State Cordell Hull and U.S. Ambassador to Japan Joseph Grew believed a hard line would only weaken the position of Japanese moderates and would ultimately lead to war.

While the debate continued, the Marines in Shanghai were forced to carry on in an increasingly difficult situation. Since they could not openly seize the International Settlement, the Japanese military kept up the pressure on the remaining foreign delegations through intimidation and veiled threats. In December 1937, they announced that they were going to stage a victory parade though the International Settlement. The Municipal Council protested but, with no real support available from the Chinese government, had no choice but to permit the intrusion.

Chinese citizens within the settlement were told to stay off the street, and the municipal police were placed on full alert. As the Japanese parade tramped into the international area, a Chinese man tossed a hand grenade that killed three soldiers and wounded three policemen. A Chinese constable shot and killed the attacker, but the Japanese used the killings as an excuse to search for more "assassins" within the International Settlement. After creating a good deal of unease with these searches, Japanese authorities announced that they wanted to take control of the settlement to restore order. At this Colonel Price protested and warned the Japanese off in no uncertain terms.

As before, the immediate crisis passed but tension in the city increased as everyone prepared for the next emergency. By 1940, with Europe again at war, the situation for the Marines in Shanghai had become even more precarious. The garrison was about 1,000 men. In the past, this force could have been supplemented with reinforcements from the other delegations in an emergency, but the international situation now meant this was no longer the case. There were 750 Italian troops, but their Fascist government's warm relations with Imperial Japan made any cooperation with American interests unlikely. The French had about 4,000 troops; that force, however, was unreliable following the defeat of France and the establishment of a pro-German Vichy government. That left the British, but after a string of defeats in Europe, all but a small portion of that force was withdrawn from Shanghai on August 26, 1940. If tempers flared, a mere 1,000 Marines now found themselves defending the settlement from the nearly half million Japanese troops operating in the region.

In 1939 Admiral Thomas C. Hart took over the U.S. Asiatic Fleet from Admiral Yarnell. Uneasy about the vulnerability of his badly outnumbered forces, he slowly began withdrawing American naval units from Chinese waters. Eventually all that remained of the once powerful Asiatic Fleet was a handful of gunboats belonging to the Yangtze River Patrol (YANGPAT). Meanwhile, as the Chinese and Japanese carried out their own brutal guerrilla war against one another in the side streets and back alleys of Shanghai, the Marines found themselves acting as a local police force.

On January 3, 1940, Price was replaced by Colonel DeWitt Peck. The new commander was quickly immersed in a bewildering array of military, diplomatic and security problems that would have taxed the ingenuity of King Solomon and the patience of Job. Peck did have a friend and ally in Rear Adm. William A. Glassford, YANGPAT's commander.

On July 7, 1940, the third anniversary of the incident that started the Sino-Japanese war, the foreign delegations in the settlement were put on full alert. It was feared that the Chinese might use the anniversary to demonstrate or even stage a guerrilla-style attack on local Japanese authorities. Those fears were heightened when it was announced that Japanese General Juzo Nishio would be coming to the settlement on an inspection tour. As part of the visit, members of the council proposed that a reception for the general be held in the Cathay Hotel.

Nishio, however, said he would prefer that the reception be held in some other venue outside the perimeter of the British portion of the settlement, where the hotel was located. The Municipal Council bowed to his wishes and the reception was moved to the Park Hotel, which was squarely within the 4th Marines' defensive sector. That placed security during this very tense situation in the lap of Colonel Peck and his Marines.

On the day of Nishio's scheduled arrival, Peck received an urgent call from the settlement's municipal police asking for immediate assistance. He sent Lt. Col. Eugene F. Collier and 25 Marines from the 1st Battalion to Bubbling Well Road. They arrived to find 16 Japanese men loitering in the area, which was not far from the Park Hotel. Not only were they acting suspiciously, all seemed to be armed, their guns badly concealed under bulging coats.

These men were probably Japanese military and it was clear that the situation called for the utmost tact. Any major confrontation might well have international repercussions. The Marines feigned disinterest at first, lulling the suspects into a false sense of security. Then, at a prearranged signal, the leathernecks pounced on their unsuspecting quarry, and all hell broke loose.

The loitering Japanese were finally subdued, but most remained uncooperative and had to be bodily thrown into a waiting truck for transport to the Marines' headquarters on Haiphong Road. One of the prisoners spoke excellent English and finally admitted they were with the military police. He claimed they were an advance party detailed to protect the Japanese general.

Legitimate or not, this was a clear violation of the established rules within the International Settlement. When the commander of troops from one nation wanted to enter or cross the sector patrolled by troops from another, permission had to be asked and at least 24 hours' notice given. A phone call was placed to General Saburo Miura's headquarters. If Miura, the commander of Japanese military police forces, or his representatives could identify the prisoners, they would be released. If not, they would be charged and put on trial for carrying concealed weapons without a permit.

While things were being sorted out, the Japanese were held in a building that housed an indoor rifle range. The door was guarded by a single Marine. Seeing an opportunity, the prisoners rose as one and started for the door. "We are officers of the Japanese Emperor," the English speaker declared with as much authority as he could muster, "and you dare not detain us!"

The Marine instantly grasped the seriousness of the situation. He could not allow them to escape, but he was not in a position to use deadly force. Instead, he laid aside his rifle -- making sure it was out of reach of the prisoners -- raised his fists and prepared to stop them. In the wild free-for-all that followed, four of the would-be escapees were knocked down. Three of the four lost some of their front teeth and much of their courage. Although he had been badly outnumbered, the Marine had stopped the attempted escape.

In the meantime, General Miura had arrived at Marine headquarters for a hurried conference with Colonel Peck. The Japanese officer apologized for the incident, and for not notifying the colonel that his men were going to enter the International Settlement undercover. Peck accepted Miura's apology -- or seemed to -- and the prisoners were released.

The arrest of the 16 men had uncovered a larger, more sinister plot. While the Marines had been busy dealing with the lurking Japanese military police, seven Chinese men who were also hanging around in the area had tried to avoid observation by other Marines providing security. Alerted by the strange behavior of the seven men, several of Peck's men gave chase. In an effort to shake off their pursuers, they ducked into a large YMCA building next door to the Park Hotel.

The Marines managed to arrest three of the seven, and took them back to headquarters for interrogation. They were Chinese criminals who hailed from Formosa (now Taiwan), which at that time was a Japanese colony. The Chinese had been captured with revolvers and hand grenades, and they quickly confessed that they had been working with Miura to carry out an assassination of Nishio when he arrived at the Park Hotel. Further questioning revealed that the 16 Japanese agents arrested earlier were to be on hand to assist the Chinese assassins by firing weapons into the air and creating sufficient confusion for the attack to be carried out. If Nishio had been killed or wounded, there was little doubt that the Japanese would have used the incident as a pretext for moving troops into the Anglo-American sectors of the settlement.

It may seem incredible that a Japanese general would have hatched a plot to assassinate a brother officer. But such was the state of affairs in China at that point, and so anxious were the Japanese to shut down the settlement, that such a plot is not completely beyond belief. The difficulty was further compounded because Miura was deeply involved in a variety of criminal activities in the western suburbs of Shanghai that were known as the "badlands." Bounded by Yu Yuen, Jessfield and Great Western streets, the area had become a notorious center of Japanese-controlled vice. Opium dens, brothels and gambling halls provided a steady stream of kickback income to Miura and a small group of Japanese officers.

What could have been an incredibly disastrous incident had been narrowly averted thanks to a little bit of luck and the vigilance of a handful of Marines. But the situation was still serious -- serious enough to prompt the United States to send all Navy and Marine dependents home in December 1940.

In May 1941, Colonel Peck was replaced by Colonel Samuel Howard, who soon came to the conclusion that his Marines -- indeed, all remaining American military forces -- should be withdrawn from China. Faced with similar challenges of maintaining a minuscule force in the midst of an increasingly hostile situation, Glassford, still in command of YANGPAT, agreed.

The officers brought their concerns to the U.S. consul general in Shanghai, Frank B. Lockhart, who relayed a message to Secretary of State Hull on August 14, 1941. Lockhart began by saying that Admiral Glassford and Colonel Howard had sent a recommendation to the Asiatic Fleet commander, Admiral Hart, that all Marines be withdrawn from China. The consul general went on to say that he concurred with their conclusions without reservation. Not only was the military situation untenable, but Lockhart considered the situation politically untenable now as well.

The consul general explained that the Marines' functions "are now becoming more and more those of a police force, thus increasing the possibility of serious incidents." If there was an open break with the Japanese government, the Marines would find it difficult if not impossible to withdraw: "Their presence apparently has not been a deterrent to the Japanese in implementing their economic policies in this area. Also the strength of the force would be wholly inadequate in the case of military operations directed against them by an organized force."

The U.S. ambassador to China, however, wanted the Marines to stay. Clarence Gauss responded to Lockhart's observations two days later by stating, "I do not believe the Marines should be withdrawn from China unless and until it becomes evident to the American Government that relations with Japan have deteriorated to a point where a rupture appears inevitable, when, if the Marines are withdrawn, facilities should also immediately be afforded for the withdrawal of American [citizens] who do not elect to remain on their own responsibility."

Gauss complimented the Marines as "one of the most important factors in insuring the safety of our nationals during past years." This was true enough, but Gauss was in Chiang's capital at Chungking, roughly 1,000 miles from the Japanese-dominated area around Shanghai and had little true idea of the day-to-day challenges faced by the isolated leathernecks.

The debate on the future of the China Marines was being played out in the shadow of much larger international events. In September 1940, Japan had forced the Vichy government in France to allow their troops to occupy northern Indochina and had also signed the Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy. Earlier that same year, Yosuke Matsuoka had become Japanese foreign minister and General Hideki Tojo Japan's minister of war. The appointment of these two known hard-liners doomed the hopes of moderates within the Japanese government to avert further confrontations with the United States.

On July 24, 1941, about three weeks before Gauss' response to Lockhart, the Japanese moved their troops into southern Indochina. In response, Roosevelt imposed a heavy trade embargo on Japan. Ninety percent of the emperor's oil supply was taken away by the president's action. He hoped that such a drastic step would force the Japanese to withdraw from Indochina as well as slow their expansion in China.

As the world watched and waited anxiously to see what would happen following Roosevelt's embargo, the debate over the fate of the China Marines continued. Four days after Gauss' note, the assistant chief of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs in the State Department, a Mr. Adams, wrote in support of Gauss. Discounting the reservations of the military officers on the scene, Adams said Gauss "knows his China better than any of the four officers mentioned above." Admiral Hart fired back, in the third person: "The Commander in Chief favors the withdrawal of all our armed forces." That meant all Marines and the few U.S. gunboats still operating in China. In Hart's mind, "in the event of war with Japan they would be quickly contained or destroyed, probably without being able to inflict even a comparable loss on the enemy."

The State Department finally came around to Hart's views -- but it was an eleventh hour decision that was carried off in the very nick of time. The U.S. Yangtze Patrol, namely USS Oahu and Luzon, left China in late November. The gunboat USS Wake remained behind in Shanghai as a communications station ship for the American consulate. USS Tutulia was upriver, marooned in Chungking, so it was not included in the withdrawal order. USS Mindanao, the flagship -- indeed the only ship -- in the grandly named "South China Patrol," was included in the evacuation.

The 4th Marines left Shanghai in stages. The 2nd Battalion, half the headquarters and service company, and half the regimental hospital boarded the liner President Madison on a cold and rainy November 27, 1941. Colonel Howard and the rest of the regiment, including the 1st Battalion and the band, left the next day.

November 28 was a cloudy day, though the sun made a belated appearance. Colonel Howard and his staff led the way, marching on foot with the rest of his command. The 50-piece band was next, smartly playing the "Marines' Hymn" and "Semper Fidelis," followed by the rifle companies in heavy marching order shouldering Model 1903 Springfield rifles. Thousands of Chinese lined Nanking Road and the Bund waterfront, many pressing gifts into the hands of departing leathernecks and waving Chinese and American flags in farewell. A chapter of U.S. and Marine Corps history was coming to a close.

The last of the 4th Marines boarded President Harrison for the long voyage to the Philippines. They managed to reach the islands safely, and fought alongside U.S. Army and Filipino units during the epic siege of Bataan and Corregidor. They courageously endured six months of hunger, wounds and hardship before the last of the U.S. forces surrendered in May 1942. Thereafter, one kind of hell was traded for another, when the 4th Marines endured 312 years of torment as POWs.

The departure of the 4th Marines still left 203 leathernecks at the U.S. Embassy in northern China. They were due to leave on December 10, 1941, but the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor altered their travel plans. There was a brief hope -- a vain one, as it turned out -- that a so-called "Boxer Protocol" would give a measure of diplomatic immunity to Marine guards serving with the American Embassy.

Captain John White, the executive officer of the Marines at Tientsin, got an urgent radio message on Monday morning, December 8, that Pearl Harbor had been bombed. White immediately relayed the news to the Tientsin detachment commander, Major Luther Brown. The Japanese soon demanded that the detachments at Tientsin and Chinwangtao surrender by 1 p.m. that same day.

Major Brown phoned Colonel William A. Ashurst of the Peking Embassy Guard for instructions and was told to surrender. It was a bitter pill to swallow -- it is a tradition for Marines to never surrender without a fight -- but Ashurst believed his unit could do little else. Brown, devastated and choked with emotion, reluctantly complied. At Chinwangtao, 2nd Lt. Richard Huizenga sent a message that his machine guns were ready and that his 21 men "had a chance to stand them off," and, "Request instructions." Orders were orders, however, and Brown told Huizenga to lay down his arms.

The final chapter was a sad one. Ashurst and the rest of the Embassy Guard were soon made prisoners of war, and at Tientsin Sergeant Robert A. Smith's eyes began to tear as the Stars and Stripes came down to be replaced by the Rising Sun flag of Japan. When the ceremony concluded and the Marines prepared to enter captivity, Smith turned to a nearby comrade and pointed to the circle in the center of the flag's white field. "Look at what's there now," said Smith, "a flaming red asshole."

An era had ended. Why were the Marines allowed to stay so long? Their position was militarily untenable by the summer of 1940, when the British withdrew all their own forces. Some might argue it was hopeless to leave troops there even before that date. But a combination of inertia, isolationism, national pride and the stubborn belief that the Japanese would not risk war had made Washington blind to the situation until it was almost too late. Sixty years on, the issues and underlying causes can be debated, but there is no question that the China Marines performed an impossible mission with the Corps' customary courage and dedication to duty.
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This article was written by Eric Niderost and originally appeared in the November 2005 issue of World War II magazine. For more great articles subscribe to World War II magazine today!
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...Defends His "Bomb The Hell Out Of Them" Statement...

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http://atlanta.bizjournals.com/atlanta/stories/2002/01/14/daily14.html

Miller defends 'bomb the hell out of them' comment, calls for action against Iraq
Atlanta Business Chronicle - January 15, 2002
by Walter Woods

In a rousing speech Jan. 14 that he himself described as "angry" U.S. Sen. Zell Miller defended some of the most controversial positions he's taken since being elected, including his comment that the U.S. should "bomb the hell" out of those responsible for Sept. 11.

"So far 12,000 tons -- 24 million pounds -- of bombs have been dropped on our enemies. If that's not bombing the hell out of them, I don't know what is," the former governor said to loud applause. "I received some criticism [for the remark, but] the criticism did not come from any who, as I just a few days after the attacks, had stood on Ground Zero amid that smoldering pile of rubble that had become the graveyard for thousands of innocent Americans."

Miller's speech also called on the U.S. to "go after" Iraq and Saddam Hussein, reinstate the military draft and drill in the Alaskan wildlife refuge to reduce dependence on foreign oil, among other proposals.

Miller spoke to a crowd of about 1,000 business and political leaders at the Georgia World Congress Center Monday night, including his colleague, Sen. Max Cleland and many members of the Georgia General Assembly.

The speech, for the Georgia Chamber of Commerce annual meeting dinner, was the first major address Miller has given in his home state since being elected just over a year ago, said a spokesperson, "and he wanted to make an impression."

His remarks, which Cleland described afterward as "great," were reminiscent of Miller's thunderous speech to the Democratic National Convention in 1992.

Miller blasted the Congress and federal government for its political partisanship, its waste of taxpayer money and the soft money from special interest groups, which he called "nothing short of bribery."

"One of these days someone smarter and younger and more articulate than I is going to get through to the American people just how really messed up it has become [in Washington]," Miller said. "And when that happens, the American people are going to rise up like that football crowd in Cleveland and run both teams off the field."

Miller was referring to an unruly Cleveland Browns football game in December when fans threw beer bottles on the field after some questionable calls by the officials.

"As Churchill said, `Democracy is based on reason and a sense of fair play,'" Miller continued. "And there is nothing reasonable or fair about this system."

Miller also insisted that he would continue to buck the Democratic Party line and support ideas from both parties and President Bush, whom Miller described as the "right man" for the job.

"We have the right man in the White House," Miller said to loud applause. "George W. Bush has been magnificent."

Miller also spoke highly of Republican Congressman Johnny Isakson and said he enjoyed working with North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms.

Miller has been criticized for being a sponsor of Bush's tax cut and for being the first Senator to publicly support the nomination of John Ashcroft for attorney general.

Comparing Sept. 11 to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, which he remembered as a boy, Miller said he supported a "wider war" against terrorism.

"And as far as I'm concerned, it means at some time -- maybe not next, but some time -- going after Saddam Hussein," Miller said. "We don't have to prove he was involved with Sept. 11 or with Al Qaeda. We know he hates the United States."

Miller also said he will be a co-sponsor of a bill with Sens. John McCain and Joe Lieberman to set up a powerful investigative panel to look into intelligence and diplomatic failures that may have lead to the Sept. 11 attacks.

"I also think we should give serious thought to resuming the draft," said Miller, a former Marine. "It is clear that we're going to have to restructure our military as we prepare for this new kind of war."

Miller said drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska would upset only three square miles of land in an area the size of South Carolina, while it would yield more than 16 billion barrels of oil -- "the equivalent of 30 years of Saudi Arabian oil imports."

Miller closed by promising to fight the status quo in Washington.

"I just don't think I'll ever be able to accept the way things work up there," he said. "Perhaps Washington will never change, but you know something, neither will I."
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The Failure Of The All-Volunteer Military

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Boston Globe
January 21, 2007

The Failure Of An All-Volunteer Military

By Andrew J. Bacevich

"WAR IS the great auditor of institutions," the British historian Corelli Barnett has observed. In Iraq, the United States has undergone such an audit and been found wanting. The defects of basic US national security institutions stand exposed. Failure to correct those defects will only invite more Iraqs -- unnecessary wars that once begun prove unwinnable.

The essential guarantor of US national security is the all-volunteer force. In its hey day -- the 1990s -- the all-volunteer force underwrote America's claim to global preeminence. Its invincibility taken for granted, the volunteer force seemed a great bargain to boot. Maintaining the world's most powerful military establishment imposed a negligible burden on the average citizen. No wonder Americans viewed the volunteer military as the most successful federal reform program of the postwar era. What was there not to like?

In fact, questions of efficacy or economy did not figure significantly in the decision to create the all-volunteer force. Back in the early 1970s, the object of the exercise had been quite simple: to terminate an increasingly illegitimate reliance on conscription. During the Vietnam War, thanks in no small part to the draft, the armed services had become estranged from American society. The all-volunteer force creation severed relations altogether.

This divorce had large implications. After Vietnam, citizenship no longer included an obligation to contribute to the nation's defense. Military service became a matter of personal preference, devoid of political or moral significance. Although providing for the common defense remained a primary function of government, federal officials no longer possessed the authority to command citizens to bear arms. Henceforth, they could only encourage young Americans to enlist, offering inducements to sweeten the invitation.

Historically, Americans had viewed a "standing army" with suspicion. After Vietnam they embraced the idea. By 1991 they were celebrating it. After Operation Desert Storm -- with its illusion of a cheap, easy victory -- soldiers like General Colin Powell persuaded themselves that "the people fell in love with us again."

If love, it was a peculiar version, neither possessive nor signifying a desire to be one with the beloved. For the vast majority of Americans, Desert Storm affirmed the wisdom of contracting out nation al security. Cheering the troops on did not imply any interest in joining their ranks. Especially among the affluent and well-educated, the notion took hold that national defense was something "they" did, just as "they" bus ed tables, collected trash, and mowed lawns. The stalemated war in Iraq has revealed two problems with this arrangement.

The first is that "we" have forfeited any say in where "they" get sent to fight. When it came to invading Iraq, President Bush paid little attention to what voters of the First District of Massachusetts or the 50th District of California thought. The people had long since forfeited any ownership of the army. Even today, although a clear majority of Americans want the Iraq war shut down, their opposition counts for next to nothing: the will of the commander-in-chief prevails.

The second problem stems from the first. If "they" -- the soldiers we contract to defend us -- get in trouble, "we" feel little or no obligation to bail them out. All Americans support the troops, yet support does not imply sacrifice. Yellow-ribbon decals displayed on the back of gas-guzzlers will suffice, thank you.

Stipulate for the sake of argument that President Bush is correct in saying that failure in Iraq is not an option. Then why limit the "surge" to a measly 21,500 additional troops? Why not 50,000? With the population of the United States having now surpassed 300 million, why not send 100,000 reinforcements to Iraq?

The question answers itself: There are not an additional 100,000 Americans willing to commit their lives to the cause. Even offering up 21,500 finds the Pentagon scraping the bottom of the barrel, extending the tours of soldiers already in the combat zone while accelerating the deployment of those heading back for a second or third tour of duty.

After the Cold War, Americans came to see war as something other than a human enterprise; the secret of military superiority ostensibly lay in the microchip. The truth is that the sinews of military power lie among the people, who legitimate war and sustain it.

For the United States to remain a great military power will require a genuine reconciliation of the military and American society. But this implies the people exercising a greater say in deciding when and where American soldiers fight. And it also implies reviving the tradition of the citizen-soldier so that all share in the burden of national defense.

Andrew J. Bacevich is a professor of international relations at Boston University
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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Boston Globe
January 21, 2007

The Failure Of An All-Volunteer Military

By Andrew J. Bacevich

"WAR IS the great auditor of institutions," the British historian Corelli Barnett has observed. In Iraq, the United States has undergone such an audit and been found wanting. The defects of basic US national security institutions stand exposed. Failure to correct those defects will only invite more Iraqs -- unnecessary wars that once begun prove unwinnable.

The essential guarantor of US national security is the all-volunteer force. In its hey day -- the 1990s -- the all-volunteer force underwrote America's claim to global preeminence. Its invincibility taken for granted, the volunteer force seemed a great bargain to boot. Maintaining the world's most powerful military establishment imposed a negligible burden on the average citizen. No wonder Americans viewed the volunteer military as the most successful federal reform program of the postwar era. What was there not to like?

In fact, questions of efficacy or economy did not figure significantly in the decision to create the all-volunteer force. Back in the early 1970s, the object of the exercise had been quite simple: to terminate an increasingly illegitimate reliance on conscription. During the Vietnam War, thanks in no small part to the draft, the armed services had become estranged from American society. The all-volunteer force creation severed relations altogether.

This divorce had large implications. After Vietnam, citizenship no longer included an obligation to contribute to the nation's defense. Military service became a matter of personal preference, devoid of political or moral significance. Although providing for the common defense remained a primary function of government, federal officials no longer possessed the authority to command citizens to bear arms. Henceforth, they could only encourage young Americans to enlist, offering inducements to sweeten the invitation.

Historically, Americans had viewed a "standing army" with suspicion. After Vietnam they embraced the idea. By 1991 they were celebrating it. After Operation Desert Storm -- with its illusion of a cheap, easy victory -- soldiers like General Colin Powell persuaded themselves that "the people fell in love with us again."

If love, it was a peculiar version, neither possessive nor signifying a desire to be one with the beloved. For the vast majority of Americans, Desert Storm affirmed the wisdom of contracting out nation al security. Cheering the troops on did not imply any interest in joining their ranks. Especially among the affluent and well-educated, the notion took hold that national defense was something "they" did, just as "they" bus ed tables, collected trash, and mowed lawns. The stalemated war in Iraq has revealed two problems with this arrangement.

The first is that "we" have forfeited any say in where "they" get sent to fight. When it came to invading Iraq, President Bush paid little attention to what voters of the First District of Massachusetts or the 50th District of California thought. The people had long since forfeited any ownership of the army. Even today, although a clear majority of Americans want the Iraq war shut down, their opposition counts for next to nothing: the will of the commander-in-chief prevails.

The second problem stems from the first. If "they" -- the soldiers we contract to defend us -- get in trouble, "we" feel little or no obligation to bail them out. All Americans support the troops, yet support does not imply sacrifice. Yellow-ribbon decals displayed on the back of gas-guzzlers will suffice, thank you.

Stipulate for the sake of argument that President Bush is correct in saying that failure in Iraq is not an option. Then why limit the "surge" to a measly 21,500 additional troops? Why not 50,000? With the population of the United States having now surpassed 300 million, why not send 100,000 reinforcements to Iraq?

The question answers itself: There are not an additional 100,000 Americans willing to commit their lives to the cause. Even offering up 21,500 finds the Pentagon scraping the bottom of the barrel, extending the tours of soldiers already in the combat zone while accelerating the deployment of those heading back for a second or third tour of duty.

After the Cold War, Americans came to see war as something other than a human enterprise; the secret of military superiority ostensibly lay in the microchip. The truth is that the sinews of military power lie among the people, who legitimate war and sustain it.

For the United States to remain a great military power will require a genuine reconciliation of the military and American society. But this implies the people exercising a greater say in deciding when and where American soldiers fight. And it also implies reviving the tradition of the citizen-soldier so that all share in the burden of national defense.

Andrew J. Bacevich is a professor of international relations at Boston University
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
RESTORE THE REPUBLIC!
R.W. "D1ck" Gaines
The Original
"Gunny G"
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GyG: YER DAMN RIGHT! - OUR "NANNY PATROL" IN RETREAT ON THE BORDER IS! BUSH'S FAULT!!!!!!!!!!

By Gunny G!--CLICK-HERE!!!!!~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is...
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THE MAN WHO WARNED OF AN AMERICAN NAPOLEON BECAME THE AMERICAN NAPOLEON

http://www.lewrockwell.com/dieteman/dieteman66.html
Utopia? Hardly

by David Dieteman

The title of Jeffrey Rogers Hummel's jam-packed one-volume history of the Civil War is Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men. Hummel's title is connected to an ongoing debate between those who profess to love liberty, namely, between conservatives and libertarians.

In particular, those libertarians who advocate not only the separation of powers into three branches of government – legislative, executive, and judicial – but the additional decentralization of power in such competing levels as municipal (city, township, and county), state, and federal, known as "states' rights" advocates for short (and, perhaps, these days, for scorn), are routinely lampooned, rather than debated, by conservatives.

Well, at least lampooned by so-called "neo"-conservatives...who are so neo, they don't very much resemble the conservatives of not so long ago. This is an oddity in itself. From the very nature of the term, one might think that self-described "conservatives" would tend to remain ideologically consistent – indeed, conserved, or unchanged – over time, at least with regard to the eternal questions, such as the best way to divide governmental powers so as to protect individual liberty.

Nope.

Perhaps it is because there is a war involved. The neo-cons appear entirely too much in favor of war as a tool of social policy. They appear to ignore the terrible evils – the genuine and unavoidable human suffering which comes with war. Bombing Belgrade, Sudan, and other places – and shooting down planes over Peru – kills men, women, and children. Killing should never be treated lightly. In other words, those who advocate militarism must do so only on the most serious grounds.

The above paragraph, of course, is at best a surmise, an exercise in psychologism. Whatever the reason, those who otherwise understand the separation of powers recoil from a robust concept of federalism. Worse, they label those who defend the American constitutional system of federal power as "utopians."

Hardly. Back to Hummel.

Although the title of Hummel's history of the Civil War may be perplexing to some, the title comes from a speech by Abraham Lincoln to the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, on January 27, 1838. As Hummel writes, "The young Lincoln was warning about the potential danger of a future Napoleon subverting the United States Constitution." (p. 366, n. 1). Napoleon's armies tore up Europe from 1799 until he was poisoned in 1821 (by French monarchists), so when Lincoln spoke, he was speaking about recent history. This is like those of us today speaking about the 1984 Olympics. Yes, that's 17 years ago.

Here is what Lincoln said:

Towering genius disdains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored. It sees no distinction in adding story to story, upon the monuments of fame, erected to the memory of others. It denies that it is glory enough to serve under any chief. It scorns to tread in the footsteps of any predecessor, however illustrious. It thirsts and burns for distinction; and, if possible, it will have it, whether at the expense of emancipating slaves, or enslaving freemen. Is it unreasonable then to expect, that some man possessed of the loftiest genius, coupled with ambition sufficient to push it to its utmost stretch, will at some time, spring up among us? And when such a one does, it will require the people to be united with each other, attached to the government and laws, and generally intelligent, to successfully frustrate his designs. (Hummel, 366)

Disturbingly, the man who warned of an American Napoleon became the American Napoleon.

Which brings me to a personal confession: Joe Sobran has softened my thinking on Lincoln. When I came to study the Civil War, and study it in-depth, over eight years, it occurred to me that, truly, the conflict is more properly named the War for Southern Independence. The Northern view of the war which I had been spoon-fed in school parrots the earlier English view of the colonial (American) War of Independence – right down to laughing at the notion that the relevant rebels could possibly claim to be fighting for freedom, merely because of the issue of slavery. By the way, the English figured things out the second time around – and rooted for the Confederacy. In that regard, see Sheldon Vanauken's The Glittering Illusion.

This Anglo-Northern myth is exactly that – a myth. Because it is false at worst, biased and incomplete at best, the telling and perpetuation of this counterfeit tale merits correction. In short, this descendent of a Federal army soldier was enraged to find injustice hiding behind a veil of justice. Sobran, however, has a point in arguing that, rather than see Lincoln merely as a villain, it may be appropriate to view Lincoln as a tragic, Oxfordian (you might say Shakespearean) figure.

But back to Hummel's essential point: the war against the Confederacy fundamentally changed the USA. The prosecution of the war turned the USA from an unobtrusive, small government into an intrusive, bloated monstrosity. When the USA forcibly re-absorbed the CSA, this "wonderful" system – now beyond reproach to "neo"-conservatives (maybe "conservatives" should be in quotation marks, rather than the neo) – became not only mandatory, but, according to the Northern theory still dominant today – inescapable.

No part of the USA can ever leave.

Hence the "pledge of allegiance" written by a Massachusetts minister – a self-proclaimed socialist, who was so far to the Left with his social gospel, he was kicked out by his own congregation. Welcome to the United States. You are now here forever, no matter what.

Say, what is the neo-conservative view of federal taxation with respect to those who renounce their US citizenship? More than a few wealthy Americans – many of them from prominent families – have renounced their citizenship in the last decade to escape punitive levels of taxation. Should Uncle Sam confiscate everything owned by such "disloyal" people?

A further question: if an individual citizen may freely renounce his US citizenship, is there a logical reason why an entire state of individual citizens cannot renounce its citizenship? The standard Northern line is that, hey, self-determination is fine in Nicaragua, Vietnam and the Balkans, but absolutely out of the question on the American continent.

The Canadians had better keep their rifles handy – oh, wait, their government is in the process of melting them down for worthless scrap metal. The Fenians, it seems, were a tad early.

And what to make of Texas. The USA backed Texas in its drive for independence from Mexico. The Republic of Texas, which won its independence from Mexico in 1836 – remember the Alamo? – spent perhaps 10 years as an independent nation. It was then annexed by the USA on December 29, 1845.

The annexation, by the way, led to a war – the Mexican War. California, Nevada, and Utah, as well as parts of Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, and Wyoming were taken from Mexico by the USA.

Sixteen years after the independent nation of Texas had been annexed by the USA – in 1861 – the USA refused to let Texas leave the USA. Sorry. There is a piece of paper, known as the Constitution, which means that although areas like Texas may declare their independence of nations such as Mexico – with the backing of the USA – an area like Texas may never declare its independence from the USA. We have different rules, and we don't allow that.

You signed away your independence permanently, and if you care to disagree, we will kill you. Forget the Supreme Court. As President Ulysses S. Grant proclaimed, the highest tribunal available to mankind is the force of arms. And so Texas – which, the Northern myth proclaims, had never left the union via the heresy of "secession" – was forced to ratify the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments in order to be "re-admitted" to a Union that it supposedly had never really left.

Notice how the Northern view of the Civil War mirrors the typical Department of Motor Vehicles view of your attempts to renew your drivers' license. It is the nature of behemoth governmental bureaucracies.

By the way, following the Northern approach to the question of secession, should we outlaw divorce?

Of course, the Northern view is merely an incoherent attempt to justify a war, and to defend the morally indefensible – the idea of a compulsory, involuntary, permanent "union" held together by force of arms, against the will of the citizens. On the Northern view, is it possible to ever dump the Constitution of 1789 for a new Constitution – even by way of Amendments or Constitutional Convention? Or are we stuck with it?

And, of course, the Northern view is wrong. The Constitution of 1789 – a document of delegated powers – does not prohibit secession, and the 9th and 10th Amendments must be interpreted to allow for a constitutional right of secession – to say nothing of the natural right of secession so eloquently described in Thomas Jefferson's Declaration of Independence (a belated Happy Fourth of July to you).

But back again to Hummel, whose Chapters Nine through Thirteen (and Epilogue) make his case rather strongly that the war – allegedly fought for "freedom" – significantly reduced American freedom.

As Hummel notes, "The national government at the time [of the war] had only two sources of revenue: a very low tariff and the sale of public lands." (p 221)

Utopia! But I digress.

"Adjusting for population, the government in Washington was spending approximately $2.50 per person in 1858, or the equivalent of $44 per person today [Hummel was originally published in 1996]. This was less than 2 percent of the economy's total output." (p 221)

Utopia!

How did people survive from the founding of the first European colonies in the New World until 1858, some 200 years (roughly)? By private initiative – also known as work and good works.

Those, such as myself, who advocate genuinely limited government, the separation of powers, and federalism (i.e., "states' rights") recognize that on questions of social policy, there are two questions which must always be answered

1. Is the suggested policy a good idea?

2. Should the government enact the policy?

The answer to the first question will depend on the facts. The answer to the second question is never "yes."

Although I agree with conservatives such as Charley Reese that genuine freedom does not include the abandonment of commitments to family, faith and country, the historical record of mankind's experiments with limited government is not encouraging. By and large, the State – logically distinct from the social order, society, and populace – whenever it has been limited by human design, whether in Venice, the United Provinces of the Netherlands, in England under Magna Carta, in America under the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution, or in ancient Athens and Rome, has managed to usurp and destroy such limits over time, all the while cooing that such usurpations were "for the better" or "for the common good."

In the USA, this mistake has been repeated. After the Declaration of Independence and the war of secession from England, those men who crafted the Declaration of Independence and fought the War of Independence crafted the Articles of Confederation – which were detested by those who longed for a powerful, centralized state, namely, the nationalists, the misnamed "Federalists," i.e., statists such as Alexander Hamilton, and also by those, like Robert Morris, who financed the War of Independence and who wanted to be repaid – by a Confederate government (as in "Articles of Confederation;" Confederate, then, is the proper term) that could not compel its member states to pay up.

The US, then, voluntarily abandoned the – utopian! – really limited government of the Articles of Confederation for the less limited government of the Constitution. Of course, to the neo-cons, the Constitution as written is, you guessed it, utopian. And so men like Lincoln, Wilson and FDR had to come along to show everyone what had been so misunderstood since 1789, and by men like Jefferson – who advocated the right of secession.

As Hummel writes of pre-Civil War America,

Most Americans paid no taxes whatsoever to any federal officials directly, and their only regular contact with any representatives of central authority was probably through the United States Post Office – if they had any contact at all. Indeed, in New York City, the government delivered only one million letters in 1856 as compared with the ten million carried by private companies. (p 222)

A government post office that isn't a monopoly? Utopia! How dare libertarians suggest a private postal service – you must be against delivering letters at all! Neanderthals! Racists! Homophobes!

Ah, almost forgot to mention that Hummel also notes that the Civil War introduced paper money, which led to counterfeiting (and the Secret Service)(p 226). The private minting of coins was outlawed. And Abraham Lincoln used federal troops to break union strikes – in the North (p 234).

And yet, and yet...these are historical facts.

The USA enjoyed 90 years of independence without government control of every aspect of human existence. And yet if you dare to question such government control today, you are branded as a utopian, a fool on an ivory tower, unwilling to confront the "practical realities" of politics. Here's a practical reality: Americans today are not very free by historical standards, and certainly not by the standards of the Sons of Liberty, who staged the Boston Tea Party.

Utopian my eye.

Roll back the state. It is bloated beyond any reasonable view of the Constitution, and is an affront to the principles of the American founding. Here's a challenge to the neo-cons: dare to imagine a different world than the status quo. There is no reason to conserve the usurpations of the Constitution which were perpetrated by Lincoln, Wilson, and FDR – to name but a few. Americans today face a moral imperative: the state must be contained within the limits of justice.

July 14, 2001

Mr. Dieteman [send him mail] is an attorney in Erie, Pennsylvania, and a PhD candidate in philosophy at The Catholic University of America.

© 2001 David Dieteman

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