re: "Prine on Abrams and Primary Sources"

Gian Gentile at Small Wars Journal ("facilitates the exchange of information among practitioners, thought leaders, and students of Small Wars, in order to advance knowledge and capabilities in the field") comments on some interesting military scholarship.

Money quote(s):

"What prompted Carl’s post was a newly released set of volumes by Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) that contain a series of discussions between President Nixon and Henry Kissinger during the Easter Offensive in Spring of 1972 regarding the performance of the MAC-V commander, Creighton Abrams. Pay attention to the quote that Carl cites where Nixon and Kissinger are seriously considering relieving Abrams. Their frustration with Abrams had to do with how Abrams conceived of using firepower delivered by B52s. Abrams wanted to concentrate most if not all of the B-52s to thwart the NVA offensive along the Ho Chi Minh Trail and in South Vietnam, whereas Nixon and Kissinger saw an opportunity to use the B52s and massive amounts of firepower to pummel Hanoi and other key strategic points in North Vietnam in order to force a better political compromise at the negotiations table." (Bold type added for emphasis. - CAA.)

Two different vantage points: Saigon and Washington. Two different sets of priorities and agendas: theater and strategy/grand strategies.

JO - Come clean now, Prime Minister

From my archive of press clippings:


Jamaica Observer

Come clean now, Prime Minister

Sunday, April 18, 2010


PRIME Minister Bruce Golding reminds us of that stubborn Pharaoh of biblical times who sacrificed Egypt to plague after plague before releasing the Israelite slaves in accordance with conventional wisdom.


Read the whole editorial here.


Snippet(s):


"And we wonder how much longer he intends to carry the leaky bag of excuses that he has employed to explain his administration's handling of the US' extradition request for the strongman of his West Kingston constituency, Mr Christopher 'Dudus' Coke.

Surely he must realise that when the Washington Post, the same news outfit that brought down US President Richard Nixon in the early 1970s, begins to discredit him, the gig is up."

&

"We are going to find out why Mr Golding is taking such a personal interest in Mr Coke, an interest that he has yet to demonstrate in the countless young girls who are being forced to spread their legs for the sexual entertainment of the dons who rule garrisons."

JO - The challenge of restoring US credibility

Jamaica Observer


The challenge of restoring US credibility


CLAUDE ROBINSON

Sunday, January 11, 2009


FROST-NIXON, one of several wonderful movies showing in New York City when I was there over the Christmas and New Year holidays, has a great line which could serve to introduce discussion in the US media around President-elect Barack Obama's pick to head the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

CLAUDE ROBINSON

The movie is based on the celebrated interview of President Richard Nixon by the British journalist and broadcaster David Frost about crimes committed by Nixon and some of his top aides in the Watergate burglary and executive cover-up leading to Nixon's fall in the 1970s.

Read the whole article here.

Snippet(s):

"In one memorable sequence Frost quizzed Nixon as to whether he was suggesting that it was OK for the president to break the law. The reply was swift, if somewhat incredible: "What I am saying is that when the president does it, it is not illegal".

The exchange was a chilling reminder of assertions by the outgoing Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld administration that denial of the protections of the Geneva Conventions to detainees at Guantanamo was justified because they were not prisoners of war, as decreed by the Conventions and US law, but 'enemy combatants' as decreed by President Bush."

(Clearly this is another person who hasn't actually read the Geneva Conventions. - CAA)