Author’s Note: Of all the examples of hubristic hypocrisy exhibited by Trump, Hegseth and the other administration sycophants, nothing – NOTHING – so clearly portrayed Trump’s Vietnam cowardice and Hegseth’s carefully coiffed “combat service” (how much of the DOD budget does Hegseth spend on hair gel and facials?) than posing for cameras during the transfer of remains for the four most recent service members killed as a result of Trumph’s and Hegseth’s war of choice – all the while thinking as the coffins passed them by how to manipulate the dead to control the political damage.
Their solution? To remove the fallen service members’ names from the official Pentagon’s list of KIA combat casualties.
This ultimate insult to every American who has ever served his country has earned Trumph and Hegseth a special place in Hell:
Trump v. Iran
As predicted, the body count continues to rise.
Trumph’s threat to inflict greater “pain” on Iran for every American service member killed is bullshit. Iran doesn’t feel pain. It’s the American people who feel the pain – or should. Polls show MAGA minions don’t care about the war as long as it doesn’t affect the economy. That hedonism is why Trump is getting away with murdering our troops for no viable, achievable strategic interest.
Trump / Hegseth remind those of a certain age of the 1959 song High Hopes containing the phrase “Everyone knows a Ram can’t. Punch a hole in the dam – But he’s got HIGH HOPES!”
Back before The Left and the Counterfeit Conservative media performed their Social / Political frontal lobotomy on American society, sterilizing Disney and our multi-cultural American heritage, folk tales with moral lessons abounded in literature.
One of these was Walt Disney’s Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings created by white journalist Joel Chandler Harris in his 1886 book containing stories he heard told by black slaves working on a plantation in the South. The book became a massive bestseller in the late 19th century. It brought southern black folklore into mainstream global literature.
The underlying moral messages of the stories show:
– a small, less physically strong force can win using intelligence instead of muscle.
– stories (like parables) send messages that can be used as hidden weapons of protest against masters and oppressive systems.
– stories proving mental agility and creativity can navigate dangerous “sticky” traps like the Tar Baby story.
If only Trump and Hegseth had received a good old-fashioned, classical education they might have avoided their current Tar Baby – Iran. Neither Trump nor Hegseth have learned from millenia of history that overwhelming force never permanently triumphs over idiology.
Overwhelming force didn’t deny us freedom in 1776. It didn’t deny us victory (or national unity) in 1812 at New Orleans.
Overwhelming force didn’t guarantee victory for the French or the United States in Algeria, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq or Afghanistan.
Trumph and Hegseth chose to start a war on fictitious pretexts using outdated and feckless World War II Eighth Army Air Corps massive bombing tactics. FYI: the Normandy beaches were flat as a pancake on D-Day because the mission commander of the Air Force squadron who led the pre-invasion bombing of the beaches (in order to set off land mines and create craters for soldiers to maneuver toward cover)- despite months of precise timing rehearsals – decided to delay dropping his bombs at night by a few seconds for “safety reasons.” This not only left the beaches a killing zone (earning the nickname “Bloody Omaha“) but killed thousands of innocent French civilians instead of Germans.]
World War II daylight bombing raids cost more American lives than were lost by Marines in the entire Pacific campaign. Massive bombing raids in which thousands of American crewmen died had negligible effect in shortening the war – even when they hit their target. The Schweinfurt ball bearing factories cost over a thousand lives and were quickly rebuilt. The oil fields at Ploesti cost hundreds more and were quickly rebuilt.
Westmoreland and McNamara depended on the same tactics during Vietnam – and lost.
Trump and Hegseth are using an antiquated military strategy while operating under three misconceptions:
1. that air power alone will cause the Iranian regime to capitulate.
It won’t.
2. the American people will continue to support a president during a time of war.
They aren’t. Not when Trumph and Hegseth are lying to the American people about everything in this war.
Iran won’t capitulate for the same reason Vietnam didn’t during Operation Rolling Thunder or Iraq and Afghanistan during Shock and Awe.
The U.S. may have occupied the ground for decades but it never had the moral high ground nor the perceived legitimacy of the population – and ended up retreating with their tails between their legs just like Vietnam.
Even with a massive ground force occupying hostile, Muslim terrain for decades Iraq and Afghanistan never capitulated.
Muslims don’t surrender. They go low tech and win with “death by a thousand cuts” in the best Oriental tradition of Tsun Tsu.
To the American service member that translates into a climbing body count for no real definable victory.
Climbing numbers of KIAs. Increasing “transfer of remains” at Dover, AFB attended by the political / military sycophants’ hypocritical demonstration of respect for those they continue to murder – and disrespect by removing them from the list of battlefield casualties.
If I were a parent attending the “transfer of remains” of one of my children at Dover, AFB, I would slap the shit out of every one of those God-be-damned, hypocritical generals and politicians.
3. The third major misconception Trumph and Hegseth are operating under is that Black Propaganda will win this war.
Trumph and Hegseth are operating under the same principle as Hitler’s propaganda chief Goebbels “If you tell a Lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.”
Before political correctness overtook military doctrine, the Field Manual on Psychological Operations classified Propaganda (now called “Information Operations“) as White, Grey and Black.
White propaganda consists of true and accurate information disseminated to a target audience to influence them to support U.S. geo-political interests.
Grey propaganda is a mixture of true information embellished to a degree to slant the opinion of a targeted audience in favor of U.S. interests.
Black propaganda is totally false information disseminated to a target audience with with the intent to at least prevent their active participation against U.S. efforts. Trumph has accomplished this with his control of the GOP testicles in the Senate and “House of Representatives“.
As long as Americans remain brainwashed thinking the United States government can’t function without just two monopolistic, oligarchic political Parties, all U.S. administrations will continue using all three colors of propaganda to maintain power.
“Most brainwashing is done by Party leaders aimed at Party members.” – Posner, Public Intellectuals: A Study of Decline, 2003; 464 pgs.
Trumph and Hegseth, hoping to drive the population to fury against the regime by bombing “strategic infrastructure”, are only setting the unarmed and oppressed Iranian people up for another massacre.
In the meantime, the body count will continue to rise – regardless of how many times they try to gerrymander the official toll in American blood.*
* The Pentagon did the same thing to the four Marines tortured and killed after being left on the Cambodian island of Koh Tang after the botched rescue of the crew of the Mayaguez.
