Having come out of the 20th century and the Cold War era, the United States has gotten into the nasty habit of thinking that *any* conflict will take 'at least a generation'. Now the argument can be made that the first two World Wars was actually just a single war with a long cease-fire between them as all sorts of underlying social and National conditions were not addressed by the first part of that two-reeler. Those two wars, however, were the first wars fought between thoroughly industrialized Nations bent on not just trading provinces or colonies, but in conquest of their neighbors and some sort of regional or global hegemony.
The second of that two-parter, finally and fully demonstrated that Total War against the economic infrastructure is the reductio ad absurdum of warfare against industrialized Nations. The strength of the fighting force is measured in direct proportion to economic output and productivity as it depends upon it as a going concern. And to get rid of the economic base that supported the warfighting capabilities, the civilian population that supports that capability, and thus the military, becomes part of the targeting. To effectively get rid of urbanized military industrial capacity, then, one would like to end the industrial part of it and the urbanized part of it. Resultant logic to that is to deliver as much destructive capability in as small a time with the least chance of going wrong of having a lot of casualties on *your* side in that doing. Nuclear war was the result.
Nuclear devices, by being a weapon that could cover a wide area fits the terminology of 'Weapon of Mass Destruction': it destroys a large area at low cost. Chemical, radiological and biological weapons address human lives over a wide area and get that same nomenclature as they are also destructive to the 'urban' part of the equation to get rid of the 'industrial' part by denying it of having a workforce. The Cold War outgrowth between the USSR and USA was the recognition that having a 'Hot War' could end up with a staggering death toll. Any small incident could suddenly flare up to a world engulfing firestorm as very few weapons were needed to achieve that.
The main modes of US political thinking decided that the Jacksonian method of actually getting *rid* of an enemy was going to get us all killed. Can't have that! And so the other three strains became predominant and infused with some of the opponent's mindset. It is strange that the Left always worried about the USA becoming more like the USSR, when they are the ones pushing the exact same attitude and nostrums of the USSR to socialize everything and make Citizens beholden unto the Government.
So here is how the other three modes worked their way to things during that struggle:
1) Jeffersonians - The main attitude was that human freedom and liberty were innate in individuals, but trying to actually foster that might get everyone killed. So, back-burner *that* thought and try to keep it whole within the West. And then let the USSR have *its* say which we will *all* have to listen to, while their people don't get to hear OURS. Luckily, Eastern Europe remembered the older bonds it had with the rest of Europe and didn't listen so much to the slowly softening Jeffersonian line, remembering, instead, more of Jefferson than his modern day followers. And while Voice of America and all that were well and good, only a few stalwarts were able to get it due to jamming and such. So liberty and freedom at home, but *listen* to your opponent and think about it from *his* point of view... which was that capitalism was corrupt, the West was corrupt, that the West was a bunch of slackards and that capitalism had us enslaved while everything was just peachy-keen back in Minsk and Kiev. The idea of 'equal time' only applies to politics, I guess, and propaganda you just have to keep on taking it.
2) Wilsonians - They were the cause of this conflict in the first place. The League of Nations failed NOT because the US was not in it, but because it had no *function*. It was a debating society that could only condemn, but not do anything. The UN calcified the post-war structure and gave it a firm and stagnant cast, so that any attempt to move *out* of that problem was attacked by every little tinpot dictator on the planet that worried about their own Nation's ability to keep them in power. Because the post-war era did *not* push for elections in the freed Eastern European Nations and because the leaders had *lost their taste for war* they allowed such elections to be rigged and for the Communists to take over. That trend followed a pattern of wherever an insurgency was able to get some support and actually force an election. This was later picked up by the current opponents of Islamo-Fascism and we now have this wonderful ditty in our diplomatic lexicon: 'One man, one vote, once.' Thanks, guys! Meanwhile, the UN sucked down huge wads of US cash and spewed forth anti-America, anti-Capitalist, anti-Israeli, anti-West verbiage and programs to a fare-thee-well. That global dream of having an 'International Community' has turned into a ghetto with the worst getting well armed and threatening their neighbors or anyone they can get their hands on. During the Cold War this arthritic concept may have served as a 'pressure valve' once in a great while, but mostly it just worked hard at curbing liberty and freedom with its propaganda. Which the USA *also* had to listen to. Remember the USSR could do *no wrong* and America, apparently, *could do no right*.
3) Hamiltonians - You didn't start the Cold War. But you sure as hell got behind it with pushing huge military expenditures that would allow things like $300 toilet seats to come into existence. Beyond that, money was spent in Congress to 'spread the goodies around' so that every district had some sort of money being spent in it, even if it didn't do a thing to help the Nation. And the reasoning behind this was that almost everything that would be produced would not get much used: a high state of need meant ready cash, ready profits, planned obsolescence and padding programs with all sorts of line items to boost cost while keeping production the same. By this system the decade long procurement cycle was invented for military hardware, so that by the time something actually got off the drawingboards, designed, scale tested, full-scale tested, design competition, award, protest, acceptance you could finally start *making* it. Then you had all sorts of other acceptance tests from design, materials, originating place, factory floor inspection, partial systems test, full systems test, roll out test, production design test, factory acceptance test, delivery acceptance test, field acceptance test. Yes, it ALL got tested. And each of those put in at least a week of work stoppage, sitting around, not much happening and heaven forbid if something was actually found to be somewhat out of spec! Well, that re-work cost just got added in because this was *vital to the security of the Nation*. Then by trumping up Soviet design and manufacturing capabilities the INTEL community actually *believed* the companies involved and speculated that the Soviet Union would be around for at least 30 more years or so. In 1985. Six years later: poof. You folks would have LOVED the Cold War and possible nuclear holocaust hanging over everyone's heads to lasted at least 30 more years. Unfortunately, the consumer side started to eat the old industrial side's lunch, then breakfast, and was just getting to the soup portion of dinner when things fell apart.
Damn that Moore's Law, anyways!
So, there is the highly biased description of what made the Cold War *go*, not its ideological underpinnings. Now all of that stuff got encapsulated into a few foreign policy strains of thought which we are still living with to this day. One is "Realpolitik", which thinks that just because you address 'power politics' you are addressing ALL of politics and is concerned with keeping a 'balance of power' and not *ending* it. Those are the same folks who threw in the towel in Viet Nam as it just might threaten the 'balance of power' if the US won... no one ever bothered to ask about the flip side of that question on the US pulling out and losing. This stuff is similar to Realism in International Relations, but that does only address States as being 'rational actors' in the World and invests so heavily in the Nation State that it is seen as the *only* way to deal with problems. It was the way forward for the Cold War and Hamiltonians adored it, Jeffersonians where mostly neither here nor there and Wilsonians *chafed* that this antiquated idea of Sovereign Nations having autonomy in their new world of Wilsonian happiness.
Thus the standoff between the 'power politics' and the 'internationalist accomodationists' was the major thing in the late part of the Cold War. The first folks wanted the 'balance of power' to continue onwards and the other folks wanted to move away from this nasty idea of war and confrontation and head into a course for world peace. While the first was willing to make 'tradeoffs' in geopolitics, the other was definitely more in line with appeasement and 'lets all get along together'ism. And the upshot of both these fine schools of diplomacy was that an ally was left hung out to dry in the Communist winds and the surrounding Nations also underwent Communist conversion. At gunpoint. And both of these schools started a long road of defeat for which we are paying heavily today.
The final school of thought was told to go home and let the 'adults take care of things' as they were obviously WAY too fractious. Those were the Jacksonians who were told to go home by these so very capable 'adults'.
In hindsight the Nation was, indeed, tired of war, but the Jacksonian concept put forth by General Patton of going after the USSR when we still had a huge army and gigantic airforce was anathema to the political class and the hierarchy. Similarly General MacArthur was prohibited in the Korean War from directly attacking China and cutting off supply lines and putting an end to that conflict because it would entail a huge, long-term cost of men and equipment to actually take on China. The question of what the true cost to the Nation would have been *then* is moot. The long-term cost to the Nation, however, has been pervasive and long lasting.
Today the United States is being targeted by non-Nation State actors that have some backing by Nations but taking out those Nations does *not* end the long term threat. And all of those folks wanting a 'balance of power' cannot come to terms with 'asymmetrical warfare' practiced by Transnational Terrorists. And those happy 'one world Wilsonians' are the first to ask: 'why do they hate us?'
Neither of these is coming to grips with the fundamental problem that individual liberty, unchecked, is anarchy and the way to address that is *not* by traditional warmaking or by traditional diplomacy that grew out of the Cold War. In point of fact these schools of 'Realpolitik' and Transnational Progressivism really don't think much about individual liberty at all and it is seen as a 'bargaining chip' by the first and something to be abolished by the second. And neither wants applecarts upset, even though others are already tipping them over. Many folks point to Jacksonians and call them 'isolationists' and with good cause: when oceans were true barriers to invasion and Nations ruled supreme, we much prefered that other Nations 'figure it out for themselves'. And because Jacksonians use the scale-free systems of honor and friendship as a foundation for their world view, we are the first to be able to place this new world into perspective while the other three schools of thought are floundering around wondering where their underpinnings went.
Jeffersonians who had signed up to the Wilsonian 'freedom everywhere' have had that dream betrayed by those advocating 'group rights' above that of individuals. Hamiltonians are *still* bemoaning the fact that their planned obsolescence cycle for military equipment has been thrown out the door by Moore's Law and refuse to get on the same page as the rest of the universe. Wilsonians are still pushing a vile and noxious dream of World Government in which you get whatever rights it wants to hand you.
Jacksonians realized that the world has turned into a neighborhood, time-wise and in shrinking distance, and that some of the new neighbors are pretty obnoxious sorts, especially those actively killing us. You want to talk about a 'Global Village'? Fine! Lets talk about fences and getting rid of some of the trash that is trying get their mafia in place and kill us. There isn't a cop to police these folks and they hide out in houses that our police can't get to but that WE CAN as individuals. Believe it or not that way of warfare is actually enshrined in the Constitution! That is because the young Republic needed a lot of help to get rid of some of the worst in its neighborhood including pirates, brigands and other less savory sorts. Lacking a real Army and a real Navy the US turned to its Citizens and gave them the ability to get rid of this trash and do it proudly as part of the Nation's need to get them.
When you ask a Jacksonian: 'why do they hate us?'
You will get this reply: 'I don't care. They want to kill us and they are not rational, so lets put an end to them before they can do it.'
This is a slap in the face to the other three strains of thought. Hamiltonians take it pretty badly because we are pointing out that the 'Arsenal of Democracy' is nearly obsolete as a conception in this fight. It requires skilled Civilians riding the crest of technology and surfing it to help the Nation avoid danger. Because our enemies are using it to go after us and Armies, Air Forces and Navies cannot stop them as they are NOT NATIONS. The 21st century has visited personal warfare back to the Republic and those that usually do the fighting are proscribed from doing so against many of them in foreign lands. We the People are not so proscribed to hunt these killers down and bring an end to them directly or indirectly at the guidance of Congress.
Jeffersonians should be in favor of this as it is a robust exercise by individuals putting themselves on the line to save their Nation and take the time honored method of doing the best they can and living or dying with the consequences. This is the *meaning* of American Rights pressed to the fullest: doing the things that no one else can do and doing it within the common framework of the Constitution. Instead we get moanings about 'is this right?' or 'what about justice?'. Since it is something that is done under Due Process and meets the needs of the Nation to go after its enemies it is BOTH 'right' and 'just'. It is just something that hasn't been done in over 150 years.
Wilsonians just despise this. It puts the ability of the individual to secure their Nation *above* that of all International Order and does *not* require a huge capital outlay. It is not amenable to review, to second guessing, to pontificating upon it because the people DOING the work are NOT working as PART of the Government just doing its work FOR IT. This is beyond what they can understand for their conception of 'World Peace' and blows it to hell and gone in one shot. Hamiltonians hate the idea of an ad-hoc Arsenal of Democracy and much prefer the older kind that gets replaced on a regular schedule. They like 'World Peace' that is well armed but doesn't use those arms much and hate the idea of individuals doing it on their own with whatever they can get their hands on. There is NO long-term money in that for SALES to the Government.
These things are why people cannot understand the Modern Jacksonian: we have simple ways of addressing the world and come to complex conclusions.
To Jacksonians honor amongst individuals scales *perfectly* to this world where the globe is no longer big nor oceans moats of protection. That is fine with Jacksonians as what is seen as an outlook on *life* works just as well within the framework of a neighborhood as it does in this new 'Global Village'. It adjusts INSTANTLY. Honor and friendship with due reciprocity and recognition work across ALL of the scales involved and Jacksonians represent and use *that* conception of how to live. It isn't *politics* it is a way to live life honorably.
To Jacksonians repayment 'in kind' for what people do is deserved. It is partly the 'Golden Rule' and partly 'You hit me, I will kill you.' It is asymmetrical as Jacksonians do not shove when they can kill and prefer to shout over shoving and, above all, prefer the quietness of family life over shouting. Shoving gets you nowhere, while killing enemies gets them dead. I do not want to talk with vermin who want to enslave me and extort me: I want them to stop doing that and since they will not, and they continue to attack, they deserve death. This scales less perfectly since the end of duelling in America and people are horrified at this notion. If that is the case with you, then you have become too civilized to survive what is coming to this world, I suggest learning how to adapt to this should be high on your agenda. The world will only change for the better if we go out and end those tearing civilization down. You can either support the fight, join in or you are an enemy. This is part of that scaling process. If you are not FOR civilization and not SUPPORTING civilization then you are tearing it down BY INACTION.
To Jacksonians using the best means at hand is just plain good sense and the most modern means are usually the best, although we NEVER throw out good working ideas. You never know when you will need to set up a dead-fall across a trail because your damn sniper rifle has gone out on you completely and your fast repair attempt went FUBAR. And Jacksonians don't have to wait for everything to be 'hardened' for battlefield use: we make do and make plans and get some basic backups in place and go forward with a workable plan. This scales from the lone huntsmen to the Armored Division. You never know what you will need to save your sorry ass when you have done some damn fool thing, all you know is that you are not going to go down without a fight. And if you can get out of this situation you will *not* do that damn fool thing again: you will find some other damned fool way to get your ass in a sling.
Modern Jacksonianism is Global in its outlook and we understand about 'bad neighborhoods' and 'the wrong side of the jihadist tracks'. These are easy concepts to scale for Jacksonians and we like to band together to get things done, even if it is just the backyard grill and keg of beer. And we like to do hard things because they are fun problems to solve and if the Nation will pay us to solve them, well... we are a damn crafty lot, too, and know good pay when we see it. As it was put by another President about his life:
I do not forget that I am a mechanic. I am proud to own it. Neither do I forget that... the apostle Paul was a tentmaker; Socrates was a sculptor; and Archimedes was a mechanic. - Andrew JohnsonAnd may I point out that Jesus was a Carpenter? Mechanics made seige warfare devices, tentmakers made tents for armies and carpenters took part in much beyond mere house construction. There is nothing bad about having a manual trade as your main skill set because it will get you a job, keep you alive and give you some basis to survive when things go south on you. Tradesmen learn to *improvise* and get things *done* and enjoy doing that.
It is good to know the trade and do what is necessary to support the Nation and defend it even if no one has fought this way in 150 years or more. Jacksonians like to work and get things *finished* so that families can be raised safely and we can enjoy the time spent with good friends so that we may enjoy life together. We would much rather clean the neighborhood up NOW than put it off for our children and grandchildren to do. Because if we do THAT there is a good chance they might not be successful because we have not shown them what it takes to survive in this world of ours.
Jacksonians use these concepts to address the world. We were isolationist when the world was one of isolation and keeping to ourselves was easy to do. It is no longer that world and we have elevated our sights a bit and understand the landscape.
What in Hell is taking the REST OF YOU SO LONG?
You can't retreat, as there is no place to retreat to.
You have been attacked in your own home and the police can't get to your attackers but YOU CAN.
The answer is the ancient one that works for a Village without reliable authority: do it yourself with your friends and help out in the aftermath. That is how you *deal* with these sorts of things. You make friends and work together to MAKE THINGS BETTER.
Is the rest of the Nation far too sophisticated to understand this?
Or do you want a simplistic answer that was predigested by someone else and then regurgitated to you?
Neither of those speaks well of this Nation.
Do you want fries with that regurgitated pap?
How about some extra generations to this war?
Supporting Friends and Allies
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