Shell Shocked

 

 

"This is no time for PC. This is no time for theory. This is a time for tried and testing measures to save our Marines and turn the tide on ISIL..."

Time for a game changer. Not next week. Now. Today. We have over 300 troops in harm's way. In serious danger. Our battle philosophy of "strategic patience" has worked as well as a bikini in a blizzard. What should we do? I say we go back to the future.

During the View Nam War, the base I was stationed at on Okinawa was next to Kadena Air Force Base. Kadena was one of the hubs for B-52 activity. They would take off every day in a group of three. They were followed shortly by a KC-135A tanker, brimming with much needed fuel. The bombers were so ladened with fuel and bombs, by the time they got to altitude, they consumed half their fuel. Once refueled by the tanker, they were one their way to Viet Nam to drop tons of "dumb iron" bombs. Often times these bombs would be dropped in a "carpet" fashion. To be on the receiving end of one of these bombing raids was not a pleasant experience at all.

In fact after the war was over, I remember reading stories of surviving NVA and Viet Cong who had experienced carpet bombing. Just the concussions alone from 500 bombs hitting close to them took a lot out of them. Some said prolonged bombing destroyed their will to fight. To make matters worse, for a while in the late sixties the Battleship New Jersey was reactivated. It would sit off the coast and lob 16" shells into the DMZ. This along with the carpet bombing was about as bad as it could get for the enemy.

Last night, the town of al-Baghdadi fell to ISIL. Just five miles from the Iraqi air base where our brave Marines are held up. We have B-1s and B-2's just sitting around gathering dust. Time to put them into immediate service. Full of "dumb iron" bombs. Time to call in some AEGIS class Cruisers and Destroyers. Time to use our state of the art VLS system to launch a few dozen (or more) Tomahawk missiles. Time to load a couple of MOABs (Fuel Air Explosive Bombs) on to transports and get them into the area. Then, after we bomb this blood thirsty group of thugs back into the stone ages, send in our First Cavalry, Marine Recon, and whomever else is needed to mop up.

The people have to speak up. I am almost horse from shouting from the rooftops. None of us want another war. Trust me, none of us. But this group of Islamic terrorists want us dead. Our families dead. Our way of life dead. Yesterday Glenn Beck played something that Bono from the group U2 recently said about America. (If I may paraphrase) "America is not just a country, it is an idea. An idea which is now shared with the entire world. Ireland is a great country, but it is not an idea. Only American is an idea, and now it belongs to the world."

And this idea that Bono is talking about, is what freedom loving people everywhere love. And what the Islamic terrorists hate. They hate and fear the American dream. The American idea. The freedom American represents. We need to fight these thugs not just because they are so evil. Not just because of what they are doing to innocent people worldwide. We need to destroy them before they destroy the idea. The dream. Us.