A reader points out an irony of Obama's War:
These Libyan rebels need a white messiah, that charismatic person able to lead them to victory: e.g., T.E. Lawrence, Orde Wingate, Brooks Rajah of Sarawak, Homer Lea.
Those persons still exist? NOT sure.
Not to mention, the white messiahs of Avatar, Dances with Wolves, and The Last Samurai, all of whom David Brooks was so upset over in 2009.
Isn't Mark Zuckerburg supposed to be it, what with rebels using facebook to lead the freedom struggle?
ReplyDeleteIn the end, Lawrence didn't do much for the Arabs. The man who really brought democracy to a part of the world was George W. Bush, but I don't think any other 'great white man' wants to play that role anymore.
ReplyDeleteOr at least a Lord Byron to popularize their cause. And I suppose that all hinges on how charming those Libyan girls are.
ReplyDeleteSend Biden. The man hasn't done anything in a while.
ReplyDeleteAs Obama once said about Vice President Biden, "Don't mess with Joe!"
I will note to opponents of gays in the military that two of these four heroic gentlemen were gay or bisexual.
ReplyDelete"These Libyan rebels need a white messiah."
ReplyDeleteOff-hand, I can't recall ever reading anything more offensive here than this statement.
Even if it was meant as a joke.
Don't forget Glubb Pasha
ReplyDeleteThese Libyan rebels need a white messiah. That charismatic person able to lead them to victory.
ReplyDeleteErr... you mean someone like Gadfly? hahahahaha, I read somewhere that his dad was probably French, which would explain why he hates Europeans so much.
Libya is historically of course roundabout where Carthage was, which was a potent power in it's day. But modern day Libya is really just the backyard of the Med countries, so it would make sense for Sark (Berlusconi is too weak) to dictate who should rule the place. Too bad Uncle Sucker butted in and made the mission essentially impossible to complete. I guess the German angle is that they resent having to finance France's regional hegemony.
Homer Lea, another famous ancestor I never knew about. From Wikipedia I read that "In 1908, he also contrived a bold and audacious military venture in China called the “Red Dragon Plan” that called for organizing a revolutionary conspiracy to conquer the two southern Kwang provinces." Compare this with another distant cousin, Luke Lea, who hatched a plan to capture the Kaiser at the end of World War I. There's a wild ass gene in there somewhere and I'm afraid I inherited it. ;)
ReplyDeleteSend in one of the neocons. Talk is cheap. Let's see what they can do on the ground.
ReplyDeleteLots of candidates for the job HERE. Seemingly.
ReplyDeleteWill a half-white messiah do?
ReplyDeleteBob, that's stupid. Nobody denies that gays can be good soldiers, the issue is unit cohesiveness and how gays fit in with straights in military units. Lawrence and Byron were leaders not line troops so it's a non sequitur.
ReplyDeleteDuring the Spanish Civil War, the Spaniards had a black American messiah.
ReplyDeleteIt's striking how often insights into truth turn out to be offensive.
ReplyDeleteObama must be thinking: "Isn't it ironic that the Libyans are looking to a black guy to pick up the white man's burden."
ReplyDeleteLest one think that only Britain has produced such men, let us not forget those american mercenaries who went native:
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Gardner_(soldier)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Townsend_Ward
No outsider no matter how talented and charismatic can make the average soldier "better." Ground is won or lost, armies destroyed or destroyed by them, most of all based on the quality of the average fighting man.
ReplyDeleteThe rebels are a rabble without professional military experience or the time to train their people in military affairs. Up against professionals. Not very good ones, but still they are toast.
"'These Libyan rebels need a white messiah.'"
ReplyDelete"Off-hand, I can't recall ever reading anything more offensive here than this statement."
Perhaps it was not meant as a joke. The rebels are a rabble without leadership. And any potential leadership is probably fragmented and ineffectual, without a consensus as how to proceed. The "outsider" with a military background will be trusted MORE than the variety of locals who have their own interests.
And, historically, such men as Brooke, Lea, Lawrence, Wingate to a degree, have succeeded.
Anonymous: "The man who really brought democracy to a part of the world was George W. Bush, but I don't think any other 'great white man' wants to play that role anymore."
ReplyDeleteI hope not.
The Arabs are doing fine, it's the Whites that are losing their ancestral lands.
Whiskey has got it right. Gaddafi is going to win and most of the rebels who stay in the country are going to end up dead. What the rebels need is a way to sneak over the border into Egypt and some idea what they will do when they realize they can't go back to Libya, ever.
ReplyDeleteBut this is all a bunch of speculation about which of two groups of Libyan tribes are going to come out on top. Arabs killing Arabs. I couldn't care less. The more dead the better.
My regret is that Obama is president. My regret is that we are involved in this stupidity in any way whatsoever.
"And any potential leadership is probably fragmented and ineffectual, without a consensus as how to proceed. The "outsider" with a military background will be trusted MORE than the variety of locals who have their own interests."
ReplyDeleteAs Peter O'Toole says, "Sherif Ali, so long as the Arabs fight tribe against tribe, so long will they be a little people, a silly people, greedy, barbarous, and cruel, as you are."
"'These Libyan rebels need a white messiah.'"
ReplyDelete'Off-hand, I can't recall ever reading anything more offensive here than this statement.'
Perhaps it was not meant as a joke. The rebels are a rabble without leadership. And any potential leadership is probably fragmented and ineffectual, without a consensus as how to proceed."
I agree with what djf said..."But this is all a bunch of speculation about which of two groups of Libyan tribes are going to come out on top. Arabs killing Arabs. I couldn't care less. The more dead the better."
Have Bill Gates build military schools there to teach rebels how to use guns and bazookas. But if they still can't defeat Gaddafi's forces, maybe Gates can have Deasy ask the principal what he's gonna do about the low-performance among the rebels.
ReplyDelete"I will note to opponents of gays in the military that two of these four heroic gentlemen were gay or bisexual."
ReplyDeleteThe gay identity hadn't been invented yet, and these guys were "in the closet" in any case. No one claimed that homosexual/bisexual men couldn't be good soldiers or good military leaders. "Gays in the military" issue is about allowing openly gay people to serve.
Arabs? I thought they were Berbers.
ReplyDelete"Or at least a Lord Byron to popularize their cause. And I suppose that all hinges on how charming those Libyan girls are."
ReplyDeleteOr boys.
"As Peter O'Toole says, 'Sherif Ali, so long as the Arabs fight tribe against tribe, so long will they be a little people, a silly people, greedy, barbarous, and cruel, as you are.'"
ReplyDeleteSomeone on the Lawrence of Arabia messageboard asked the inevitable, "Where are the women?"
Someone else replied, "Apparently the women had better sense than to wander around the desert, shooting each other and arguing over well water.
I imagine they were comfortably camped on an oasis somewhere, sharing the water peaceably and getting 'allover tans' with no pesky, homicidal males around demanding they set up a tent, make goat stew, etc."
O'Higgins, Brown, Liniers, and many other leaders of South American wars of independence.
ReplyDeleteSteve,
ReplyDeleteForgive me, but this is NOT Obama's war, as you term it.
It's Cameron's war or even Hague's war.
Obama was just the dupe, the patsy, the played fool.
Strangely enough, many of Turkey's great military men (Turkey was the hegemon in Libya before the Italians engineered a nasty little war in 1912), were infact white Europeans who were either forced into Turkey's military in boyhood or enetered Turkish service voluntarily as adults.
ReplyDeleteThen I heard an old grizzled, long-haired Central Asian chief, who had come down with the Amir, asking questions of a native officer.
ReplyDelete"Now," said he, "in what manner was this wonderful thing done?"
And the officer answered, "An order was given, and they obeyed."
"But are the beasts as wise as the men?" said the chief.
"They obey, as the men do. Mule, horse, elephant, or bullock, he obeys his driver, and the driver his sergeant, and the sergeant his lieutenant, and the lieutenant his captain, and the captain his major, and the major his colonel, and the colonel his brigadier commanding three regiments, and the brigadier the general, who obeys the Viceroy, who is the servant of the Empress. Thus it is done."
"Would it were so in Afghanistan!" said the chief, "for there we obey only our own wills."
"And for that reason," said the native officer, twirling his mustache, "your Amir whom you do not obey must come here and take orders from our Viceroy.
Kipling, "Her Majesty's Servants"
Frederick the Great was gay, as was Baron von Steuben.
ReplyDeleteI think they need independence.
ReplyDeletedjf said...My regret is that Obama is president. My regret is that we are involved in this stupidity in any way whatsoever.
ReplyDeleteYes, but if Obama were not president McCain would be, and the only difference would be that we would have immersed ourselves in this morass three weeks earlier. HOO-RAH!
"It's striking how often insights into truth turn out to be offensive."
ReplyDeleteIf you're referring to my finding the idea that Libyans need a white messiah offensive, let me clarify.
Yes, that's what they need. But I don't give a flip about what they need. I find the notion of yet another white man helping The Other offensive beyond what any words can convey. It's long past the time when whites need to think about what whites need and only about what whites need and everyone else be damned.
The real Last Samurai was so much more interesting than the movie version. Saigo broke with the Meiji apparently in a dispute over access to some young boy. The movies never depict the homosexuality of the Samurai.
ReplyDeleteSaigo had been trying to get himself killed in some noteworthy manner for many years. He had, for example, hoped his death by the Koreans would serve as a pretext for an invasion.
In the Satsuma rebellion Saigo raised an army and fought but not with swords and spears. In fact the cassus belli was a imperial threat to their ammunition factory. Only when they ran out of ammunition did they resort to the older weapons - and then they were indeed slaughtered.
Saigo was a modernizer not a silly military reactionary as he was depicted in the film. He had set up schools and had imported westerners to teach in them. He was well acquainted with American, French and German military practices and arms.
Finally he was unlikely to have ridden into battle on a horse. He suffered from elephantiasis of the gonads. Ouch!
Albertosaurus
I was reading the other day about the reign of Charles X - the Bourbon king who got France involved in North Africa. It seems that the French ambassador was hit by the Algerian ruler - with his fly swatter.
ReplyDeleteA century ago Europeans in North Africa were more admired. I have been trying to get a complete score of The Desert Song. That's the operetta in which the Red Shadow a sort of singing "white messiah" leads the Riffs to glory.
Albertosaurus
Mel Gibson was nearly a foot too short to play William Wallace but Peter O'Toole was nearly a foot too tall to play Lawrence. I guess it all balances out.
ReplyDeleteThe real Lawrence looked remarkably like Woody Allen and was of a similar stature. However in terms of personality the masochistic Lawrence was more like James Dean - known in Hollywood as "The Human Ashtray".
It's tough getting your "White Messiah" cast properly.
Albertosaurus
"Yes, but if Obama were not president McCain would be, and the only difference would be that we would have immersed ourselves in this morass three weeks earlier."
ReplyDeleteYeah, I forgot about McCain. There are important (to me) differences between the policies McCain would peruse vs Obama's (Obama's politics of energy starvation and ObamaCare for example) but absolutely yes, you are correct sir, as for getting the USA involved in some mess like Libya, there is not a lot to choose between McCain and Obama.
"Saigo was a modernizer not a silly military reactionary as he was depicted in the film."
ReplyDeleteCome to think of it, Indians loved guns too.
"Frederick the Great was gay"
ReplyDeleteThe book HIDDEN HITLER says Hitler was gay too. And lately, I heard Gandhi and Malcolm X were gay.
"Mel Gibson was nearly a foot too short to play William Wallace but Peter O'Toole was nearly a foot too tall to play Lawrence. I guess it all balances out."
ReplyDeleteWhat Libya needs is Mad Max, not Lawrence. Remember the final battle in ROAD WARRIOR? That was cool.
Blow the trumpet! Whiskey has written something sensible!
ReplyDeleteTo wit:
"The rebels are a rabble without professional military experience or the time to train their people in military affairs. Up against professionals. Not very good ones, but still they are toast."
Of course, in his next post, he'll use this to justify sending in the Marines.
Libya is historically of course roundabout where Carthage was...
ReplyDeleteNo, that would be Tunisia. Tunis, it's capital, is geographically close to the site of the ancient city.
djf said...
ReplyDelete"Yes, but if Obama were not president McCain would be, and the only difference would be that we would have immersed ourselves in this morass three weeks earlier."
Yeah, I forgot about McCain. There are important (to me) differences between the policies McCain would peruse vs Obama's (Obama's politics of energy starvation and ObamaCare for example) but absolutely yes, you are correct sir, as for getting the USA involved in some mess like Libya, there is not a lot to choose between McCain and Obama.
You forgot the leftist Dems and MSM would be critical of any Rep military adventures as opposed to shamelessly covering for Obama.
The Libyan foray seems especially pointless, destablizing the ME region without any upside. We trade one reformed tinpot dictator for another likely unreformed tinpot dictator, spike the price of oil and risk putting a more fundamentalist Islamic party/leader in power.
"Frederick the Great was gay"
ReplyDeleteThe book HIDDEN HITLER says Hitler was gay too. And lately, I heard Gandhi and Malcolm X were gay.
As are Hillary and Obama (purportedly).
Kylie, I completely misunderstood your intent. Sorry. And as for examples of such — John Carter of Barsoom.
ReplyDeleteThe man who really brought democracy to a part of the world was George W. Bush, but I don't think any other 'great white man' wants to play that role anymore.
ReplyDeleteI remember GW's strong campaign push about "no nation building".
Given his subsequent decisions in office, it seems the more vehemently a campaign promise is made the more it's likely to be a lie.
See McCain's recent relection tagline: "build the dang fence".
Synchronicity. I'm watching Bruce Campbell being a White messiah in Colombia right now.
ReplyDeleteNo, what they need are advanced-anti-tank and anti-aircraft guided missiles. War is above all TECHNICAL.
ReplyDelete"Anonymous said...
ReplyDelete"Frederick the Great was gay"
The book HIDDEN HITLER says Hitler was gay too. And lately, I heard Gandhi and Malcolm X were gay."
That's the latest thing in biographies: claiming that the subject was a homosexual.....and (sometimes) an anti-semite.
I'm still waiting for a biography of Ernst Roehm which makes the shocking claim that he was ......... a homosexual ........ and an anti-semite.
"As are Hillary and Obama (purportedly)."
ReplyDeleteYou can find the same rumors about Reagan.
"No, what they need are advanced-anti-tank and anti-aircraft guided missiles. War is above all TECHNICAL."
ReplyDeleteTechnical means skill... Someone needs to teach them to use such weapons in an effective manner
"Truth said...
ReplyDelete""As are Hillary and Obama (purportedly).""
You can find the same rumors about Reagan."
Why, yes. I remember you making up just such rumors.......just now.