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Months ago introduced labels and added them even to older posts. Two dozen different labels characterise the blog's texts now. Actually, that's way too much.
The blog is - and always has been - about only three big topics - all else being mere fillers, such as humour.
These topics are
(I)
The creeping introduction of domestic spying and additional authority powers over citizens in Germany.
I gave a vote to the FDP last time and was rewarded with Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger as Germany's new secretary of justice. She's our most reliable civil liberties bulwark and stopped the despicable trends once in office again.
(II)
Own thoughts on military theory, about solving military problems with as much smart thinking as possible in order to minimise the need for brute force.
Sometime in late 2009 I decided to hold back the real diamonds for a possible book publication in a few years. The blog gets only hints about a theoretical work that began patchy and is growing into a large mosaic where astonishingly much fits and comes together.
(III)
Pushing against the widespread attitude in several Western countries where the military is still considered not only as a tool of national policy, but as a promising one for offensive use.
This problem is rooted in history, traditions, myths - and lack or rational thinking. Some nations have actually made big leaps backward on these topics and became much more belligerent in the last generation.
Their belligerence is illegal because they signed and ratified (thus giving law-like weight) treaties such as the Kellogg-Briand Pact, Charter of the United Nations and North Atlantic Treaty. All of them banned the threat and use of force for anything but defence.
The huge wealth of mankind's history documentation also suggests that wars extremely rarely paid off for a country or tribe. Most often even supposedly "won" wars gave a net benefit only the tiny share of the "winning" people. Nevertheless, millions of people are ready to say that they want an expeditionary military (costing billions to hundreds of billions extra per year) for the mere "potential" that's supposedly in the threat and aggressive use of force.
The Western civilisation has to address the herculean task of ending this foolishness. We might end up with a Third World War after all if we refuse to learn from mankind's history.
Sven Ortmann
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Would you accept that there is a difference between Blair's expeditionary model that has been with us since the 1990s, and a change of focus to concentrate more on the rapid projection of force, by air, sea and special forces?
ReplyDeleteOne is aimed at toppling nations and reshaping them in your image, the other is limited to the kind of operations typified by Sierra Leone or perhaps the Falklands conflict.
http://www.currentintelligence.net/columns/2010/8/1/the-army-after-afghanistan.html
The choice between crime and waste - I disrespect both models.
ReplyDeleteEven the most noble construct of an expeditionary force runs danger to be exploited for aggression by the next aggressive head of government.
This is in fact a problem for all armed services. It's the reason why it's so important to lay out the purpose and mission very clearly and to reject all ideas for non-defensive purposes.
Even intervention against genocide is a tricky thing, as evidenced by the intervention against imaginary genocide in Kosovo.