|
|
|
|
David Petraeus: No Worries
|
Diana West
Sunday, March 17, 2013 7:31 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
CNN reports that David Petraeus will make his first public appearance since resigning in multi-varied if only partly limned states of disgrace, all overshadowed by L'Affaire Broadwell. He will deliver a speech this month at a dinner honoring the military.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Update: Petraeus and Benghazi
|
Diana West
Sunday, March 03, 2013 5:12 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
|
Fox News reports that following Senate fury (when?) over a heavily redacted set of White House documents pertaining to the 9/11/12 attack on the US compound in Benghazi, a second set of documents "were delivered to Capitol Hill Thursday night which had... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
The Petraeus-Kagans-COIN-Complex
|
Diana West
Wednesday, December 19, 2012 6:12 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
|
Long frontpage takeout taking out the Kagans today in the Washington Post. The so-what-else-is-news headline -- "Civilians Held Petraeus' Ear in War Zone" -- almost caused me not to read it, given this obvious fact has driven so many posts and columns... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Fox News: The Latest to Hop into Bed with Petraeus
|
Diana West
Thursday, December 06, 2012 6:43 PM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
And I didn't even mention Prince Talal bin Alwaleed's stake in News Corp....
---
This week's syndicated column:
No doubt in the spirit of the season, somebody bestowed an audio sweetmeat upon Bob Woodward of the Washington Post – 13-plus minutes of an off-the-record conversation that took place in spring 2011 between Gen. David Petraeus, then ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) commander in Afghanistan, and Fox News analyst K.T. McFarland, who was visiting Petraeus’ Kabul HQ.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
King on Petraeus
|
Diana West
Tuesday, November 20, 2012 2:20 PM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
|
Below is a CNN transcript of Rep. Peter King's appearance before the press after David Petraeus appeared before the House Intelligence Committee on November 16. King is clearly struggling with what he has heard from Petraeus: a version of Petraeus' September... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Why Did Petraeus Lie Again?
|
Diana West
Saturday, November 17, 2012 9:18 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
As CIA Director, David Petraeus testified before the House Intel Committee in a closed hearing on Benghazi on September 14.
(Mistake #1: These hearings should have been open.)
A recap from a post of October 20 titled "What Did the CIA Know... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
Petraeus of Benghazi
|
Diana West
Saturday, November 03, 2012 6:01 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
|
First, the WSJ, now the NYT: CIA Director David Petraeus is feeling a little heat from the spotlight regarding Benghazi. It's an extremely soft-focus spot, however, one that obscures the most important question regarding Petraeus' role in Obama... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Running Interference for Petraeus?
|
Diana West
Sunday, October 21, 2012 4:42 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
|
As the Benghazi storyline clears to a point where CIA Director Petraeus' personal testimony is absolutely required to establish how the White House came to perpetuate a lie for at least two weeks -- namely, that a "spontaneous" but, we now know, non-existent... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Benghazi Burns and Petraeus Goes to Princeton?
|
Diana West
Friday, October 12, 2012 12:52 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
David Petraeus accepting the James Madison Medal at Princeton, 2010
---
Two weeks ago, I wondered whether CIA Director Petraeus was politicizing the intelligence after a source told Fox News on September 27 that three days after the Benghazi... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
Petraeus Always Gets a Pass
|
Diana West
Saturday, July 16, 2011 7:01 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
ISAF caption: Dr. Rangin Dadfar Spanta, Afghanistan's National Security Advisor, and General Petraeus discuss the importance of reducing... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Petraeus Watch
|
Diana West
Monday, July 11, 2011 5:08 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
Gen David Petraeus: "No country has suffered more from Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida than Afghanistan."
That comment from a June interview with Military Times stopped me cold. Partly, it was the pat sweep of the superlative. But it was also the gratuitousness of the flip-side demotion of the American experience and sacrifice. The catastrophic terror attacks of 9/11 on our political and economic centers caused and still cause quite a lot of suffering, and they were just the beginning of a decade-long American crack-up, a self-ignited meltdown of reason and judgment that blinded us to the markers of the classical jihad in progress, causing us to set foundationally flawed policies accordingly, from war (COIN) to energy (dependence) from immigration (unprotected borders) to "outreach" (Muslim Brotherhood penetration). Blinkered, our strategists have spent billions and billions of dollars to send infidel armies to the umma to win "hearts and minds" (impossible) at a cost of thousands of young lives and tens of thousands of wounds, many lifelong, both physical and psychological. These cause quite a lot of suffering, too.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Steele's Trap and Petraeus' "Human Terrain"
|
Diana West
Friday, July 09, 2010 2:30 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
This week's syndicated column:
I've sworn off predictions, having guessed wrong that a deeply apologetic Gen. Stanley McChrystal would keep his Afghanistan command. But what about GOP chairman Michael Steele? So far, at least as I write, he is... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Petraeus Flashback: Shying Away from Hearts and Minds
|
Diana West
Wednesday, July 07, 2010 9:19 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
|
Ruth King of Ruthfully Yours sent around this Washington Times piece by Rowan Scarborough that notes the apparent irony that "in less than three years, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus has risen from the brunt of ridicule by Democrats to President Obama's... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Petraeus Pledges to Continue McChrystal's "Great Work"
|
Diana West
Wednesday, June 30, 2010 11:13 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
I'm not kidding with that headline up there, although I can't say I've read one like it anywhere else. But here's what Gen. Petraeus told the Senate Armed Services Committee to earn it yesterday during his confirmation hearing (99-0) when fatal ROEs came up:
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Updated: Petraeus "Sets the Record Straight"?
|
Diana West
Thursday, March 25, 2010 8:17 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
2
|
|
The American Spectator reports that Gen. David Petraeus has "poured cold water" on the controversy caused by reports, later corroborated by testimony he submitted to the US Senate Armed Services Committee, that he views the Israeli-Palestinian conflict... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The Real Culture War
|
Diana West
Thursday, September 13, 2007 6:07 AM
|
Diana West
General
|
Hits:
2
|
|
What was the big story of the week?
Gen. Petraeus' testimony? Nope.
Another 9/11 come and gone? Nope.
The biggest story of the week--in many ways, the age--took place in Brussels, the so-called capital of Europe. There, a small band... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Naturally, Dhimmi Gen. Allen Supports Hillary
|
Diana West
Monday, August 01, 2016 9:40 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Watch around Minute 8 to see Allen rationalize Muslim-on-infidel "insider attacks" as resulting from Ramadan fasting, bad weather and "operational tempo."
---
Ret. Marine Gen. and former ISAF commander John R. Allen, who spoke for Hillary... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Sangin 2015
|
Diana West
Monday, December 21, 2015 7:36 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
.jpg)
US Marine marksman, Sangin district, Helmand Province, Afghanistan, June 2011
Sangin is falling or has fallen.
What is Sangin? A 200-square-mile... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Missing Islam
|
Diana West
Thursday, September 17, 2015 4:51 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
US Army soldier at Saddam Mosque, Al Zarai, Iraq, 2008 / DVIDS photo.
Four months ago, when "Iraq" first popped up as an... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Goodbye to All That -- Let's Hope
|
Diana West
Sunday, December 29, 2013 4:58 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Sgt. 1st Class Frank Limtiaco, left, exults as 1st Battalion, 294th Infantry Regiment, Guam Army National Guard leaves Afghanistan on December 28. (U.S. Army National Guard photo by Sgt. Eddie Siguenza/Released)
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
My Last Syndicated Column of 2013
|
Diana West
Thursday, December 26, 2013 7:14 PM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
In the interest of tying up some loose ends, here are a few updates before the new year.
Principle, what principle?
Remember how 2013 began with much ado over Al Gore’s unseemly $500 million sale of Current TV network to Al Jazeera, aka “the Muslim Brotherhood channel”? Even anything-for-a-buck Time Warner Cable saw fit to drop the Qatar-owned “news” organization from its package. Well, TWC this month announced that, yes, it will be bringing Al Jazeera America into 55 million American homes after all. “Financial terms weren’t disclosed,” USA Today reported.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Is Benghazi an Iranian Secret?
|
Diana West
Sunday, August 04, 2013 5:15 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
Mark Langfan writing at IsraelNationalNews.com advances a plausible theory that it is not a CIA gun-running pipeline to Al Qaeda that the Obama administration is stonewalling on Benghazi, but rather an Iranian attack on a CIA gun-running pipeline to Al... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Little Orphan Benghazi
|
Diana West
Saturday, February 09, 2013 2:57 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
Despite media coverage of the Panetta-Dempsey Benghazi hearing best described as extra-terrestrial -- as in, what planet are these reporters on? -- several new pieces of information are now part of the record. They are not,... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
About Chuck Hagel and US Foreign Policy
|
Diana West
Friday, February 01, 2013 7:51 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
About Chuck Hagel.
Watching yesterday's morning session of his Senate confirmation hearings on C-SPAN made me nothing if not uneasy. There are, I have to confess, aspects of Hagel's foreign policy that intersect with my own beliefs: those that stem from his apparently sincere drive not to see US troops wasted in foreign interventions that have nothing to do with American interests. I am alarmed, however, by his apparently visceral and unveiled attitudes toward Jews and Israel, which dovetail with the Arabist worldview.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
The Most Admired Woman in the World
|
Diana West
Thursday, January 03, 2013 7:36 PM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column:
Americans, Gallup tells us, admire Hillary Clinton more than any other woman in the world – again. This latest accolade marks the 17th time Gallup has found Clinton to be the Most Admired Woman (MAW?) since she became... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Year-Ender: COIN's Casualties Must Be Reckoned With
|
Diana West
Wednesday, December 26, 2012 8:39 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
On August 2, 2012, while many millions of Americans were either on, refreshed from or perhaps contemplating their summer vacation, Army Staff Sgt. Matthew Sitton and another US soldier stepped on an IED in a mine-riddled field in Afghanistan. They were both... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Benghazi White-Out
|
Diana West
Wednesday, December 19, 2012 5:55 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
The "independent" Benghazi Report has concluded the White House remained in the dark.
---
The Benghazi Report is out and it's official: President Obama, SecState Hillary Clinton, CIA Director Petraeus all had nothing to do with the US government response to the attack on the US mission in Benghazi. Indeed, the names Obama, Clinton, Petraeus, Panetta, Rice do not appear anywhere in its 39 pages. DoD -- Panetta? -- however, is singled out for having deployed unarmed drones that, for example, "provided visual surveillance during the evacuation."
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Susan Rice, Distraction: The Real Benghazi Questions
|
Diana West
Friday, November 30, 2012 5:22 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column
It is neither “racist” nor “sexist” to question U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice’s role in the Benghazi scandal. It is, however, almost entirely beside the point.
Rice wasn’t making life-and-death decisions on Sept. 11, 2012, when the U.S. compound in the Libyan city of Benghazi came under attack; President Obama was. Rice, therefore, is unable to answer the all-important question about what order President Obama issued upon hearing that U.S. diplomats in Benghazi were under fire. She can’t look America in the eye and answer whether the U.S. military was ordered not to rescue Americans fighting for their lives.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
The Incredible, Disappearing Anne Casper
|
Diana West
Monday, November 19, 2012 8:38 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
This is a photograph of Anne Casper, the new US Consul General in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. In the photograph, she is beaming about the 25,000th visa presented in Saudi Arabia in 2012 on October 21 (93.7 percent of Saudi visa applicants have been approved this... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Where Is Samantha Power?
|
Diana West
Saturday, October 13, 2012 4:13 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Libya's "humanitarian vulcans" Susan Rice, Hillary Clinton, Samantha Power (Thrice the brinded cat had mew'd...)
---
At her indispensable blog Refugee Resettlement Watch, Ann Corcoran wonders: "Are they keeping Samantha Power under wraps... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
A Nation Betrayed
|
Diana West
Friday, September 21, 2012 4:03 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
SSG Matthew Sitton (1986-2012)
---
Below is an extraordinary, heart-stopping and historic letter. It... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Fire General Allen
|
Diana West
Friday, August 24, 2012 4:32 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
One word for General John R. Allen's recent explanation for the spate of Afghan murders of our men is despicable. Ramadan fasting,... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
Dissing Israel: The Ultimate in Dhimmitude
|
Diana West
Wednesday, July 11, 2012 5:38 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
The Free Beacon reported this week on the continuing omission of Israel from the new Global Counterterrorism Forum (GCTF). At a recent forum meeting in Spain, Maria Otero, US Under Secretary of State, delivered a speech titled "Victims of Terrorism"... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Uncle $ucker, Karzai & His Capos
|
Diana West
Tuesday, April 03, 2012 4:56 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Would this man lie?
No -- better question: How will we feel if/when we find out we wasted all that blood and treasure standing up a Hezb-i-Islami government in Afghanistan?
From The Wall Street Journal :
American officials are pressing... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
In Jihad We Trust
|
Diana West
Saturday, March 03, 2012 6:14 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
The AP reports:
A trend of Afghan treachery that has taken the lives of six American troops over the past week is poisoning a key ingredient in the international coalition's formula for winding down the decade-long war: trust.
Not just "a"... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
The Incredible, Shrinking US Embassy in Iraq
|
Diana West
Thursday, February 09, 2012 7:46 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
Like a postmodern-day ziggurat, the $750 million US Embassy in Iraq stands as a grotesque symbol of Washington hubris, not to mention dumbness. It is now practically approaching white elephant status, according to a New York Times report, but not soon enough.... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
The New "Twinkie Defense"
|
Diana West
Monday, January 23, 2012 7:21 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Flash:
KABUL: An Afghan soldier who shot dead four French troops says he did it because of a recent video showing US Marines urinating on the dead bodies of Taliban insurgents, security sources say.
The attack on the soldiers, who were unarmed, happened last week at a base in eastern Afghanistan and left 15 other French troops wounded, eight of them seriously.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
The View from the Tower
|
Diana West
Monday, December 12, 2011 5:28 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
If I were a psychiatrist I could find the perfect label for the depths of denial or the heights of delusion that manifest themselves in Frederick and Kimberly Kagan's latest declarations on Iraq published in the Washington Post as "opinion." "Fantasy" is... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Would Patton Have Slept Here?
|
Diana West
Monday, November 21, 2011 3:30 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
As Americans move on out of Iraq, they are figuring out what to take, what to leave behind.
From the New York Times (via Business Standard)
One item staying is General David H Petraeus's bed. For nearly a decade he and all other commanding... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Shine a Light Down the Iraqi-Afghan Sinkhole
|
Diana West
Friday, November 18, 2011 6:43 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Gen. Petraeus ordered up the renovation of a water park in Bagdhad in 2008. It opened to much fanfare in 2009, and was nearly waterless and in ruins by 2011. The loss of $1 million in costs (not including military resources), is just a drop in the bucket.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
US Marines: No Spitting Toward Mecca
|
Diana West
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 1:47 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Gen. David Petraeus, Col. David Furness, and Shafiq Mubarak (far right). Mubarak served as Furness's "right hand" during a recent deployment. "I can't do anything without him," Furness said.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Is COIN Fantasy Worth the Real-World Cost?
|
Diana West
Friday, September 23, 2011 3:30 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column:
Only the U.S. military could build a defensive wall of words -- "dismounted complex blast injury" (DCBI) -- around the bare fact that single, double, triple, even quadruple amputations are up sharply among U.S. forces on foot patrol in Afghanistan. So are associated pelvic, abdominal and genital injuries, according to a newly released report.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Looking Back on the Crystal Ball
|
Diana West
Saturday, September 10, 2011 6:06 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
During a semi-bi-annual clean-up of my study, I came across an undated scrap of Washington Post on which Brookings' Robert Kagan briefly but thoroughly excoriated George Will for advocating US withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan. It apparently dates... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Is COP Margah Another COP Keating Waiting to Happen?
|
Diana West
Monday, August 15, 2011 5:47 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Gen. Petraeus bestowing medals at COP Margah on the Afghan border with Pakistan in October 2010
---
Command Outpost (COP) Margah didn't make "the news" back in October 2010 when there was an attack by hundreds of jihadists "armed to the teeth... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
The Tunnel Vision of the COIN-bots
|
Diana West
Saturday, August 06, 2011 6:16 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Marine BG John Toolan: More stuff for Afghans ... or else.
---
At the very end of this story lies the money quote on the thunking bankruptcy, military and political, of the American strategy in Afghanistan. It is the bankruptcy of Petraeus-McChrystal-Bush-Obama-Petraeus... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
COIN Is Dhimmitude
|
Diana West
Friday, July 22, 2011 4:00 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column:
This week, the madness of the counterinsurgency doctrine (COIN), which drives the war in Afghanistan, reached new heights -- or depths -- as revealed by two news stories.
In Great Britain, a former Royal Marine... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Churchill, Lennon and China
|
Diana West
Friday, July 01, 2011 3:25 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column:
In his slim book on Winston Churchill ("Churchill," Penguin, 2010), Paul Johnson reveals the secret of Churchill's strength as a wartime leader: He didn't treat military brass as the Oracle at Delphi and Solomon combined.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Churchill: The Generals Aren't Always Right
|
Diana West
Wednesday, June 29, 2011 7:03 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
In his slim book on Churchill, Paul Johnson unearthed a highly instructive quotation to highlight the foundation of some of Churchill's greatest strengths as a wartime leader: He didn't worship, defer to, and otherwise treat military men as the Oracle at Delphi and Solomon combined.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
The Missing Part
|
Diana West
Wednesday, June 01, 2011 8:22 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
AP photo: A Marine carry team moves a transfer case containing the remains of Lance Cpl. Peter J. Clore Tuesday, May 31, 2011... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Congratulations, Bin Laden's Dead
|
Diana West
Monday, May 02, 2011 3:24 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Rejoice.
But.
The turd was killed in a mansion located in a "densely populated" area called Abbottabad, 30 miles outside Islamabad -- not in that dark, wet cave in the North West Territories where, it was often imagined, his only luxury would... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Of Massacres and Birth Certificates
|
Diana West
Thursday, April 28, 2011 3:49 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
I sat through darn near two hours of Fox News last night, something I rarely do, and heard not one word about the Kabul Airport Massacre that left nine Americans dead yesterday at the hands of an Afghan Air Corps officer. There was, however, a recurring crawl reporting the incident along with the killer's possible motive -- financial pressures. ABC News, meanwhile, ran a deeply disturbing report that the killer disarmed all of the Americans and Afghans in the room priot to killing the Americans, execution-style. Why? Because, as many in the media would spin it, the killer had had to sell his home recently, which is what his alleged brother claimed.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Time to COIN Another Strategy -- Now
|
Diana West
Friday, April 15, 2011 1:01 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column:
Reading about another catastrophically maimed casualty of the counterinsurgency strategy (COIN) in Afghanistan, I was struck by a biographical note. This young American, now a triple amputee after stepping on an IED... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Ann Barnhardt: Vox Populi? Let's Hope
|
Diana West
Tuesday, April 05, 2011 5:42 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
Below, I am posting links to a 2-part video by a gal in Colorado named Ann Barnhardt whom I am most pleased to call a fellow citizen -- as opposed to such fellow citizens as the craven Lindsey Graham, the battle-stressed David Petraeus and the Islamophile... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Afghanistan Poker
|
Diana West
Thursday, March 17, 2011 3:41 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
US Army 2nd Lt. Stephen Petraeus, Wardak Province, A-stan, September 2010: Now we know -- what?
---
Some fireworks at Gen. Petraeus's appearance before Congress yesterday. I would like to see the plain, unadorned transcript but so far all I... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
General Fragile and Reversible
|
Diana West
Wednesday, March 16, 2011 4:40 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
Once upon a time, it was kind of a big deal when Gen. David Petraeus came to town to testify before Congress about "the war." That was when the wars in Iraqistan weren't exactly young, but also hadn't yet execeeded the 100-Year-War, and hadn't stretched... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
What Do You Get When You Mix Rose Petals, Pentagon Brass and Too Many Cups of Tea?
|
Diana West
Saturday, January 29, 2011 4:26 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Mark Durie has a must-read article today -- "Aslim Taslam, Three Cups of Tea and Pakistan's Blasphemy Laws" -- which flags the phenomenon of Pakistani Christians converting to Islam to protect themselves and their children from the nation's blasphemy laws. "Blasphemy" -- crossing or critiquing Islam in any way -- is a capital offense in fabulous "ally" Pakistan, as many Americans are now finally learning. So, in paying out billion$ a year to Pakistan, mostly Christian Americans are also in effect subsidizing such blasphemy laws.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Can We Go Home Now?
|
Diana West
Friday, January 14, 2011 5:59 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
Last week, I posted Col. Douglas Macgregor's excellent piece entitled "No Existential Threat to US in Afghanistan; So Why Are We Propping Up a Narco-State?" But now I take issue with the premise, ironically speaking. There is indeed an existential threat... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
Meanwhile, Back in Iraq ...
|
Diana West
Monday, December 06, 2010 2:47 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
The State Department has a new job: Clear, hold and build -- inside the Baghdad Embassy complex.
The next time someone tells you about the lasting victory in Iraq George W. Bush, COIN, and Gen. Petraeus secured, could you please pull out the following... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Bottom Line: Karzai Wants a Rent-a-Cop, Too
|
Diana West
Monday, November 15, 2010 5:13 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
Much brouhaha over an interview with Afghanistan's Karzai in Sunday's Washington Post in which he called for a reduction in American military activities in A-stan that would essentially gut the Petraeus strategy, such as it is, of running down "extremists,"... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Hail to the Junta?
|
Diana West
Friday, October 01, 2010 6:55 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column:
Bob Woodward's latest publishing event, "Obama's Wars," includes maybe the most significant scoop of his career: Directing not only Obama's wars, but also America's, is a veritable military junta.
I exaggerate --... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Madness at the Top
|
Diana West
Wednesday, September 22, 2010 6:24 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Petraeus as quoted by Woodward:
"You have to recognize also that I don't think you win this war. I think you keep fighting. It's... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
The Constitution Trumps Islamic Law
|
Diana West
Friday, September 10, 2010 3:57 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column:
When reading stories about that formerly obscure Florida preacher who wants to mark the ninth anniversary of 9/11 by burning a stack of Qurans, bear in mind that the only law he breaks in doing so is Islamic law. With... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Quotables
|
Diana West
Monday, August 30, 2010 4:58 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
"If Iraq is to teach us anything, it must be that a new idea cannot be beat into a society."
Maj. Walt Cooper, Baghdad, 2006 via today's Washington Post.
"General Petraeus, winning the hearts and minds of the Afghans is not the... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Stoning: A Nightmare
|
Diana West
Friday, August 20, 2010 4:07 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
Tariq Ramadan holds an MA in Philosophy and French literature and PhD in Arabic and Islamic Studies from the University of Geneva. In Cairo, Egypt he received one-on-one intensive training in classic Islamic scholarship from Al-Azhar University scholars.... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
The Problem with COIN (I Think) or: 沃勒斯坦：在世界萧条中无可选择
|
Diana West
Friday, August 20, 2010 3:48 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Word about COIN seems to be getting around:
某些行动确实采取了。拉姆斯菲尔德让布什总统解除了职务。拉姆斯菲尔德最强大的辩护人副总统切尼，其影响力输给了国务卿康多莉扎·赖斯和拉姆斯菲尔 德的继任罗伯特·盖茨，后者倡导更“温和”的观点，强调运用外交手段。新军事战略突然之间获得了支持，即反叛乱[counter- insurgency]（用缩 COIN表示）。它是由先前不知名的军官戴维·彼得雷乌斯[David Petraeus]提出来的。
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Eyeless in A-Stan
|
Diana West
Friday, August 06, 2010 3:18 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's column:
"Live our values," Gen. David Petraeus wrote recently to troops in Afghanistan. "This is what distinguishes us from our enemies."
Unfortunately, this is also what distinguishes us from many of our "friends." This culture-chasm... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Desperately Seeking a Wedge in A-Stan
|
Diana West
Thursday, July 22, 2010 2:58 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
From the Wall Street Journal:
"Petraeus Sharpens Afghan Strategy"
WASHINGTON—Gen. David Petraeus plans to ramp up the U.S. military's troop-intensive strategy in Afghanistan, according to some senior military officials, who have concluded... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Overdue GOP Reckoning
|
Diana West
Tuesday, July 20, 2010 2:17 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Ann Marlowe of the Hudson Institute considers "the war over the war" among Republicans sparked by Michael Steele, arguing we're due for a belated "reckoning" on controversial if prevailing counterinsurgency policy. She also cites recent comments by Newt Gingrich on the cultural disjunction between us and Afghans that is at the flawed heart of the matter.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Perry Mason Goes to Afghanistan
|
Diana West
Monday, July 19, 2010 11:04 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
For actual years now, I've been writing that the foundational fallacy of COIN, whether in Iraq or Afghanistan, is that success depends not on what American forces do, but on how alien peoples react to what American forces have done.
In Iraq, that translated... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
The Military-Journalistic Complex
|
Diana West
Thursday, July 08, 2010 5:24 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
The Politico headline on this story -- "Petraeus' emails on Israel leaked" -- is misleading. The story here is "Leaked E-mails Show CENTCOM General and Journalist (Max Boot) Work Damage Control on Petraeus' Israel Problem."
Background -- lots... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Four-Star Heaven
|
Diana West
Wednesday, July 07, 2010 3:58 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Catchy cover story by Mehdi Hasan in the British weekly the New Statesman.
Opening question:
David Petraeus,... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
Updated: GOP Cracking?
|
Diana West
Saturday, July 03, 2010 11:50 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
RNC Chairman Michael Steele's comments on Afghanistan -- Afghanistan is a war of Obama's choosing, and if Obama is a student of histroy (who said?), he should know that you don't engage in a land war in Afghanistan -- have triggered calls for his resignation... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
The COIN Nightmare Continues
|
Diana West
Friday, June 25, 2010 1:46 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
This week's syndicated column:
So Gen. Stanley McChrystal lost his job. Does it matter?
Aside from the fact that with Wednesday's announcement the nation's capital could finally exhale for the first time since news broke about the profanity-laced... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
Pakistan's Puppets
|
Diana West
Sunday, June 13, 2010 2:51 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
The Taliban: The ally of my "ally" (Pakistan) is my ... ?
A bunch of stories today trumpet a new London School of Economics report on Pakistani... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
Q & A Time
|
Diana West
Thursday, April 22, 2010 8:16 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
At Family Security Matters this week, Ruth King of Ruthfully Yours has interviewed me about Petraeus's Israel Problem, the Conservatives'... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
Dear Contentions
|
Diana West
Thursday, April 08, 2010 7:08 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
While we're on the subject, I think today is as good a day as any to post a letter I emailed last Wednesday to Commentary magazine's blog Contentions, where Max Boot posts amok. I had hoped for some form of a public correction attesting to my reportorial... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Kamdesh Was an Intelligence Failure, All Right
|
Diana West
Thursday, February 11, 2010 8:14 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Touching down at COP Keating, March 2009
----
The battle of Kamdesh on October 3, 2009 is the focus of this week's upcoming column -- specifically, the Pentagon's reported decision to punish mid-level commanders for intelligence failures that preceded the brutal battle that left eight Americans dead. According to an investigation, commanders ignored local intelligence indicating that a large attack against COP Keating was likely andfailed to take appropriate defensive measures.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
Questions No One Will Ask General McChrystal
|
Diana West
Friday, December 11, 2009 6:22 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Last week, a friend of mine on the Hill invited me to suggest some questions for Gen. McChrystal prior to Tuesday's hearing. His invitation finally prompted this somewhat hasty list here (which prompted this not-to-be-missed Marine vet's list here).
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
COIN Blues
|
Diana West
Thursday, October 22, 2009 7:45 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
I wish I agreed with Dick Cheney but I don't. How could I? He, along with the rest of the conservative... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Evergreen, Alas
|
Diana West
Friday, September 04, 2009 12:28 PM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
Looking for an old quotation, I came across this April 2007 column (below). Change a place name, a proper name (or not), and it could slip right into tomorrow's paper. Unfortunately.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Meanwhile, on the Sunni Side of "the Street"...
|
Diana West
Tuesday, April 01, 2008 5:58 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
|
While trying to assess the Sadr-Badr, Shiite-Shiite, Maliki, Moqtada, Baghdad-Qom-Basra machinations of the previous week, let's not forget about the so-called Sons of Iraq--those Sunni former ("former"?) insurgents, many of whom have US blood on their hands--whom... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
|
Gee, Ya Think?
|
Diana West
Friday, March 14, 2008 5:40 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
The Washington Post reports:
BAGHDAD, March 13 -- Iraqi leaders have failed to take advantage of a reduction in violence to make adequate progress toward resolving their political differences, Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said Thursday.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|
|
The Surge of 2007
|
Diana West
Thursday, December 27, 2007 9:29 AM
|
|
Diana West
|
Hits:
1
|
I agree with my good friend Michelle Malkin that the American infusion of troops into Iraq, well known as "the surge," was The Story of 2007. Certainly not the Virginia Tech massacre, and not the Barry Bonds steroid scandal, as MSM organizations maintain.
... |
|
Read More »
|
|