The Colonel Kids Thee Not

The recent Islamic State-inspired attack on a military recruiting office and Reserve center in Chattanooga hit the Colonel right in the small crusty cinder that serves as his heart and fired up a few neurons circulating in the vicinity of what used to be his memory.

The Colonel's last command on active duty was the 6th Marine Corps District; headquartered at Marine Corps Recruit Depot, Parris Island, and responsible for Marine Corps enlisted and officer recruiting in the Southeastern United States. He commanded more than 500 Marine NCOs and Officers, spread over hundreds of offices. Those Marines (most on temporary duty as recruiters -- outside of their primary occupational specialties) contacted, screened, and sold nearly 4000 of America's finest young men and women on the benefits of serving their nation as Marines, each year.

In addition to recruiting the best high school graduates for service as Marines, recruiters are also held responsible for preparing soft, squishy civilian minds and bodies for success at the world's foremost military recruit training grounds -- Parris Island and Quantico..

The Colonel has often told anyone he could corner that, "a Marine recruiter is the best salesman in the world." Anyone who can convince a college-bound youngster, and his Momma, that he should forego college for a few years and serve as a Marine -- in time of WAR -- well...,

That's a salesman.

And..., to walk into the most dangerous place on earth -- Momma's house -- to ask for Momma's permission to take her baby to war, takes incredible bravery.

The Colonel kids thee not.

Marines would rather face a regiment of the enemy single-handed, than Momma.

A combat Marine, now trained to be the world's best salesman, is a dangerous combination of skills.

Even as planes crashed into the towers in New York and into the Pentagon, the Colonel remained more concerned for the safety of his Marine recruiters at the hands of a jealous boyfriend or husband than any terrorist.

The Colonel kids thee not.

The Colonel lost more Marines to their own testosterone and bravado than he ever worried about losing to enemy action.

But, as much as the modified dress blue uniform of a recruiter made him an easily identifiable target, that was the whole idea. Marines on recruiting are supposed to stand out in the civilian community. They give most of the American people the only personal exposure to Marines that they ever get. That is by design.

Only the best Marines get assigned to recruiting duty.

Marines assigned as drill instructors are fine, as well. But, the Colonel would take a former recruiter as a subordinate leader in any combat organization over a former drill instructor ANY DAY.

The Colonel kids thee not.

Swords and Plowshares

In the Colonel's not-so humble opinion those who entertain the pleasant delusion that any deal with the mad mullahs in Iran lessens the probability of war in the region share that pleasantly delusional state with those who believe that the current deal with the mad mullahs makes a war in the region more likely.

In plain truth, there will be another major war in that region within the next generation with or without some agreement ostensibly restricting Iranian development of nuclear weapons.

Count on it.

The Colonel isn't cynical -- well..., he is..., but on this score he's just plain realistic.  He's read way too much history to be otherwise.

First of all, the history of grand multinational arms limitation agreements preventing war is checkered at best.  For example, the international naval limitation treaties of the inter-war years in the last century did little to prevent the ultimate rise of the Axis powers and the horrific global war that followed.

One could point out that the strategic arms limitations treaties between NATO and the Warsaw Pact "kept the peace" during the Cold War, but in reality mutually assured nuclear destruction had more to do with keeping the U.S. and the Soviets from settling their political differences on the plains of Europe.  And, proxy wars embroiled both sides in costly side-show wars regardless.

Secondly, the Iranian regime is clearly expansionist.  Sure, it hasn't overtly invaded neighbors' sovereign territory, yet; but its clandestine claws are scratching open old wounds all across the region.  They have played the game extremely well, so far.  No move has been so overtly hostile as to draw a hard response.  But, even the most calculating chess player knows that gambits are no sure bet -- the other side is is calculating, as well.  

In military planners' parlance: "The enemy always gets a vote."

So, the Colonel believes, without a significant doubt in his military mind, that the Iranians will eventually miscalculate.

The road to war throughout history is paved with miscalculations.

Lastly, over the last 100 years alone, the region we call "the Middle East" has hosted a major war every dozen years on average.

The Colonel sees no reason to believe that the tensions and motivations that led to those conflicts has abated, or will for the foreseeable future.  And, a major war caused by Iranian hegemonistic designs cannot be sat-out by the United States. 

Don't beat your swords into plowshares just yet.      

In Defense of Thought

The Colonel has said it before and it bears repeating: "the line beyond which something is considered 'politically incorrect' -- a term which in itself conjures up the most egregious aspects of totalitarianism and tyrannical socialism -- incessantly encroaches on God-given individual rights, constricts even the most conservative definition of common sense, and pushes ceaselessly against even the most harmless historical markers of custom and tradition necessary for maintaining a culture."

Orwell's "Thought Police," once anathema to the American Ideal, have come to life and taken root at the Republic's collective brain stem like a malignant tumor disguising itself by releasing emotional endorphins that overwhelm our once vaunted reputation for tolerance and respect of each citizen's opinion.

The Colonel has not flown the "Rebel" flag for nearly 40 years. He's a Rebel, to be sure -- in more ways than one -- but, his oath to "defend the Constitution" (without statute of limitation) obviated love and allegiance to all but one flag. Still, he feels great sorrow welling up as the Confederate battle flag comes down. No sorrow for the flag itself, nor for the causes that usurped the symbol for the purpose of perpetuating prejudice and hate.

Sorrow for the loss of common sense, sanity, and, ultimately, the individual freedom for which the republic was founded.

Let's be clear-eyed about the erasure of a historical marker in the life of our Republic. It will not erase the sins of pride and prejudice in our hearts, nor will it be the last target of those who seek to consolidate power by controlling thought.

Those marching at the head of today's "victory" parade, will not relinquish that "honor." No cherished ideal or beloved tradition is safe from their rapacious appetite for the amphetamine rush of power.

Eventually, the movement will turn on itself, in one last cannibalistic feeding frenzy.

Like a collapsed star whose density generates gravity so strong that not even light escapes, so will be the Republic and its once-bright torch of freedom.

Unless...

Unless each of us stands up to the tyranny of political correctness.  

Not in defense of indefensible positions and thought; in defense of the right to hold those indefensible positions and think those indefensible thoughts.

What are YOU doing to defend the Constitution of the United States? 

Sin and the State

For the purpose of the preamble to this treatise, the Colonel begs your indulgence as he dispenses with his customary use of the third person self-address.  He wishes to be crystal clear of whom and of what he speaks  –  it is his bona fides on the subject.

I am a black-hearted sinner.

Of all the sinners of whom I am aware – scores of billions since the beginning of man – I am the greatest.

I have broken every law of God, in thought if not in deed.  

Although, I deed a lot.

I lie.  I lust.  I long for the possessions of others.

I am guilty of idolatry, blasphemy, sexual immorality.

I have dishonored my parents.

I have harbored in my heart unforgiveness and hate so strong, that had the object been in front of me at the time I would have taken his life.

I am even guilty of the sin of hypocrisy – condemning sin in others of which I am just as culpable.  

I am an authority on sin.  I am in my 60^th year as a practitioner.

I take no pride in my sin.  I fly no flag proclaiming my sin.  It is self-evident.

My awful sin separates me from my Perfect Creator.

The only sin of which I am NOT guilty is rejection of my God’s plan for my salvation from the eternal death of separation from Him.  Through no other action of my own, save acceptance of God’s Son Jesus as my savior, my sin no longer separates me from my Perfect God.

The purpose of the foregoing preamble is to dispense with the highly favored counter-argument that my argument has no standing due to my hypocrisy.  I am dismounted from my high horse and have my feet planted level on the playing field with all others.

   

The Colonel (resuming his customary third person) actually agrees whole-black-heartedly with his liberal friends who pronounce that government (hereinafter: “the state”) has no business “legislating morality.”  Yet, the Colonel has great cause to question his liberal friends’ belief in that principle.  Were they true believers that the state has no business legislating morality, they would see no need for so-called “hate-crime statutes.”  Hate is at the very root of all immorality.

But that battle for the title of “Greatest Hypocrite” will have to be fought in a different forum.  The Colonel has another set of great questions for us to ponder:

Why is the state in the business of “licensing” marriage?  For that matter, why is the state in the business of providing incentives for marriage? 

If the argument is that “stable marriage is beneficial to society,” why then does the state incentivize single mothers on welfare to have more children outside of marriage?

If the role of the state in a constitutional republic is to ensure equal protection under the law (see the vaunted 14^th Amendment to our Constitution), why should a married couple receive more favorable treatment under the tax code than a single citizen?

In full disclosure, the Colonel must admit that he has benefitted from that favorable “unequal” treatment under the tax code for nearly his entire tax-paying life.  Furthermore, while on active duty in the Marine Corps, the Colonel received, by virtue of his CHOICE to marry and have children, additional benefits and allowances not given single Marines.  Those single Marines did the same job, worked the same hours, and endured the same hardships as the Colonel.  The only difference was that the Colonel had a wife and kids – who provided absolutely zero to the combat effectiveness of the Marine Corps. 

Both examples in the paragraph above are, the Colonel has come to believe, egregious violations of the 14^th Amendment’s “Equal Protection” clause.

For that matter, progressive taxation is also an egregious violation of the 14^th Amendment’s “Equal Protection” clause.

For you slow Bama and LSU grads, “progressive taxation” is the socialistic manner in which our federal income tax code is graduated so that those who make more and more money pay a higher and higher percentage of their income in taxes.  Marx would be so proud of us.

No, not Groucho; Boudreaux.  Karl.  Karl Marx. 

Anyway…,

The Colonel believes it’s time to recognize the concept of “the separation of sin and state,” that, while not specifically spelled out in the Constitution, is just as manifest in the framers’ intent as is “the separation of church and state” and “the right to privacy” – both of which have been used to legislate (by activist courts) more “morality” and limit more religious freedom over the past 50 years than to provide for the individual freedoms for which they were designed.

Homework for the Colonel’s next post:  Read, for comprehension, the 10^th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. 

Qual Day

Fridays often evoke jarring memories for this old Jarhead.

This morning, as the strong coffee courses venously, clearing the sleepy sludge like a downpour through a storm drain, the Colonel remembers the rifle range.

By this hour of this day of an old Corps annual requalification range week the loudspeakers would crackle with instructions no Marine will ever forget, though the intervening years be many and his brain cells few.

"Shooters! This is your fifth and final stage of fire -- 500 yards slow fire from the prone position -- ten rounds with a time limit of ten minutes. All ready on the left. All ready on the right. Shooters, your long range targets are in the air -- you may commence firing."

The Colonel invites you to study the accompanying picture. That's what a man-size target looks like through the iron sights of an M-16 at 500 yards.

An impossible shot.

Yet, Marines in the Colonel's day were trained to make ten of those impossible shots in a row.

500 yards.

Iron sights.

Iron sights are a thing of the past and the Colonel has lost touch with what the current Marine Corps rifle qualification requires. He, frankly, doesn't care to know.

He'd rather remember, like a pre-Chicxulub Cretaceous creature (that's a "dinosaur," for you Bama Bandwagon Boors), the sensory overload of recoil, burnt powder, the crackling cacophony of dozens of rifles to left and right, and the manly satisfaction (term used in the most gender-neutral way the Colonel can) of punching tight groups of 5.56 caliber holes in black paper at long distance with 100 year-old rifle sights.

There are five stages of fire to qualify as a rifleman in the Marine Corps, serving as an enduring waypoint in every recruit's and every officer candidate's right of passage toward earning his or her eagle, globe, and anchor insignia and the right to be called "Marine;" and also serving as a yearly touchstone to the "rifleman ethos" for the rest of a Marine's career.

At 200 yards, five rounds each are fired at a 12-inch round target, from the standing ("off-hand"), sitting, and kneeling positions. Ten more rounds are fired "rapid-fire" (less than a minute) at a foot and a half tall and two foot wide top-half silhouette, from the sitting position.

At 300 yards: five rounds, sitting, at the round target; and ten rounds, "rapid fire," at the half silhouette, from the prone position.

Those two lines of fire always felt "mechanical" to the Colonel. Hard to put into words, particularly given the Colonel's lack of education (he went to Ole Miss instead of college, remember), but it just felt like "target shooting."

The 500 yard-line, however, had a whole different feel.

Every time the Colonel wrapped his service rifle in the prone embrace and squinted over open sights at a full-size silhouette, he couldn't help but feel an affinity with some long-forgotten Marine infantryman in the defense outside of Paris in the early summer of 1918.

With their 1903 Springfield rifles reaching out and touching at long range and with such rapidity, the Marines in 1918 so impressed the Germans attacking their lines that they reported back that "every Marine seems to be armed with a machine gun."

At least that's the propaganda we Marines kept alive three generations later...

STRATEGY

An effective theater battlefield strategy – one that secures victory within parameters acceptable and profitable to the victors (Pyrrhic victories are not the result of “effective” strategies) -- is the final product of a long chain of critical assessments that begin with a nation’s Grand Strategy (determination of national interests – vital, important, and peripheral – and the resources that will be developed, maintained, and employed to protect those interests).  

The United States (particularly over the last 100 years) exerts tremendous effort in codifying Grand Strategy, from which a National Military Strategy – and the resource requirements to support it – is derived.  Literally hundreds of millions of man-hours of critical analysis and strategic assessment, by some of the finest civilian and military strategic thinkers on the planet, are expended every year to ensure that the United States is prepared to protect its national interests in any conceivable contingency.  The United States mans, organizes, trains, and equips military forces accordingly, and does so better than any empire the world has ever seen.   

Assuming that the mission given a Theater Combatant Commander is in consonance with our nation’s Grand Strategy, that commander would then, by definition, have available for his use ample resources and authority to accomplish that mission. 

In short, if the mission is important enough to our National Command Authority, a winning battlefield strategy should be a no-brainer.

If, however, the mission is less important to our National Command Authority than domestic political considerations or is colored by a current decision-maker’s  (or significant advisors’) worldview that does not place the interests of the United States absolutely and unquestionably above the interests of any other nation or non-governmental organization, then a winning battlefield strategy becomes problematic, no matter the excellence of the nation’s long-existing Grand Strategy or the amount of national treasure expended to make the supporting National Military Strategy feasible.

So, with the foregoing as instructional preamble, we find ourselves with a set of questions before us:

Is the defeat of the Islamic State a matter of vital national interest?

                a. If yes, then whose competence should be in question at present – the President’s or the Pentagon’s?     

                b. If no, then our President should say so and explain why not.

Actually, the Colonel needs no answer from the President.  It is quite clear -- even to this knuckle-draggin’, mono-syllabic grunting, academically-challenged cretin -- the President does not consider the defeat of the Islamic State to be in the “vital” national interest of the United States.

So, that would make defeat of the Islamic State either an “important” or “peripheral” national interest.   

If the Islamic State is not a clear and present danger to the United States, but still of grave concern to the security of friends and allies – an “important” national interest – then the question remains: 

Whose competence should be in question regarding the failure to develop (in over a year’s time) a “complete strategy” (his words) for the defeat of the Islamic State – the President’s or the Pentagon’s?

If defeat of the Islamic State is considered only of marginal or peripheral interest to the United States, then why are we expending any treasure or risking any American lives?

The Colonel ain’t smart and you can’t make him, but this ain’t rocket science.

The Flying Gregorys

The Colonel and his Lady, the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda, are in the midst of the final major phase of operations aimed at completing the Colonel's man cave -- aka: The Colonel's Knotty Room.


The final major phase -- installing the ceiling -- has been ongoing for an interminable amount of time owing to a plethora of distractions, hobbies, and new (according to the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda) priorities; all of which have posed a daunting challenge to the tenuous grip the Colonel has on disciplining his severe case of ADD/LIJ (Attention Deficit Disorder/Lack of Initiative and Judgement, for the LSU and Bama grads).

However, the Colonel has managed to maintain a modicum of forward progress and had, as recently as two months ago, reached the point at which it was time to install the pull-down attic stairs. For the last two months the Colonel has studied carefully all written and video instructions for the installation of said pull-down attic stairs. In fact, the Colonel's morning routine each day for the past two months has included coffee, reading the written instructions, more coffee, watching the video instructions, more coffee..., and, then, deciding to tackle some other project that day instead.

At last the Colonel's Lady, inured as she is to the Colonel's pronounced procrastination, could take no more of his dithering and declared last week that the attic stairs were going in, posthaste.

The Colonel doesn't really know what "posthaste" means, but he got the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda's intent, nonetheless.

The Colonel began last Friday morning with his customary cups of coffee and careful reading and viewing of the installation instructions, and then announced,

"Attention in the Operations Center! Installation of the pull-down attic stairs will begin, immediately!"

Sadly for the Colonel, he is the sole member of the Operations Staff here at the shallow northern end of deep southern nowhere, and no one sprung into immediate action.

About that time, the Colonel's Lady stuck her comely and kind-hearted head into the sanctified confines of the Colonel's operational, if only partially completed, man cave and asked in her most gentle and encouraging way,

"Hey, Knucklehead, you ever going to get those pull-down attic stairs installed, or am I going to have to get our sons to come do it?"

The Colonel drew himself up to his full, if diminutive, height, stuck out his formerly muscled chest, and invited the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda to climb up the step ladder into the attic and prepare for receipt of the pull-down attic stairs assembly.

The Colonel's Lady had only one tiny, little question,

"You want me to do WHAT?!?"

The Colonel showed her the diagram of the two-person operation, wherein one person lifts the fifty-pound pull-down attic stair assembly from the floor up overhead and into the rough opening, and the other person -- in the attic -- guides the pull-down attic stair assembly onto temporary supports at either end of the rough opening.

"Sweething," the Colonel asked his bride of 38 years, 8 months, and six days (but, who's counting), "which job would you prefer?"

"Neither," she intoned flatly, fixing me with the look that usually precedes pleasantries along the lines of "idiot" and other slightly less loving terms of endearment.

"Okay, then," the Colonel responded, having given his Lady the benefit of choice. "Up you go."

The comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda muttered something under her breath that included the word "up" and climbed up the step ladder into the attic.

When the Colonel was satisfied that the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda was prepared for receipt of the pull-down attic stairs assembly and subsequent guidance into position in the rough opening, he hoisted the assembly overhead and began climbing up the step ladder...

Okay, the Colonel knows what you're thinking at this point. You're thinking that this doesn't end well. Well, you're wrong -- it does end well.

It just takes a short detour through "disaster" before arriving at "well."

Having successfully placed the pull-down attic stairs assembly on the temporary supports in the rough opening, the Colonel instructed his Lady to stay put in the attic for a few minutes while he squared and secured the assembly in the rough opening. This process was going amazingly well until the Colonel decided to step up one more rung on the step ladder in order to gain better leverage with his screw gun.

This is the point at which the aforementioned detour happens.

Have you ever noticed the warning labels on step ladders that tell you not to stand on the top of the platform at the top of the ladder?

Well, the Colonel has. But, warnings are for the weak...

The next thing the Colonel remembers is the sensation of falling. The Colonel was experiencing that sensation because, as it turns out, there's a very good reason for that warning regarding standing on the platform at the top of a step ladder.

The Colonel vaguely remembers the clattering sound of step ladder bouncing off the floor of his man cave. Vaguely...because that sound was overridden by his own screaming and a loud wailing emanating from the attic.

As time slowed, as it does in his frequent mid-project detours through the disaster zone, the Colonel's cat-like reflexes kicked in and his cat-like arm-flailing was rewarded by an open hand slapping and grasping a 2 x 6 rafter.

Hanging by one arm from the ceiling, the Colonel slowly wound down his personal alarm siren and checked the landing area below his feet for obstructions. He then looked upward into the angelic face of his bride and asked her if she was okay.

The comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda's personal siren was still wailing loudly and the Colonel's one-handed grip on the rafter was reaching the limit of it's endurance, so he let go.

He didn't fall.

The Colonel looked up at the still loudly wailing Miss Brenda and noticed a trickle of blood running down his arm.

"Sweetie, please unclench your nails and let go of my arm."

The loud wailing began to abate, but the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda's grip on the Colonel's wrists did not loosen.

"Sweetie, I'm only four feet off of the floor. Please let go of my arm."

She let go, the Colonel dropped two feet and then trip-bounced off the top of the air compressor running his screw gun...

What should have been a light knees-bent, cat-like landing became another uncontrolled flailing final approach to prostration on the floor, accompanied by renewed wailing from the attic.

The Colonel lay still for several long moments listening to the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda's sorrowful siren, and then,

"Sweetie, you can quit your screeching. I'm okay."

The comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda was as loving as ever,

"You idiot! I was yelling because if you were killed, I had no way to get down out of the attic and call in a life insurance claim."

Chrysanthemum Crescendo

As the U.S.-led Allied two-pronged march across the Pacific drew inexorably closer to the home islands of the Empire of Japan in the Spring of 1945, both sides' increasing desperation for an end to the monumental waste of blood and treasure was matched by the increasing intensity of the fighting to bring about that end.

By this date 70 years ago, MacArthur's drive from Australia up through New Guinea and back to the Philippines (as he had theatrically promised when chased out by the Japanese three years earlier: "...I shall return.") had climaxed with a destructively brutal wresting of Manila from its unbending defenders. To the East, Nimitz's Central Pacific campaign had seized Iwo Jima in an unbelievably bloody 6-week prize fight whose purse was possession of a sulphurous island with only one redeeming feature -- an airfield halfway between Tokyo and the US heavy bomber base in the Marianas Islands.

Now, all eyes turned to the last major objective short of Japan itself -- Okinawa.

The Japanese viewed Okinawa in much the same way we Americans view Puerto Rico. It was centuries-long held territory, but its inhabitants weren't considered full-fledged Japanese. The Japanese Imperial high command intended to sacrifice the Okinawan people (unlike most of the Japanese-held islands on the way to Tokyo, Okinawa was heavily populated) along with 100,000 Japanese soldiers in a final battle that would give the Americans a taste of just how horrible invading the Japanese home islands would be.

Early in American Pacific War planning, the island of Formosa (Taiwan) was considered as the final island objective and jumping-off point for campaigns against Japanese forces in China as well as Japan itself. As the staggering cost of men and materiel mounted in Europe and the Pacific, war-planners shelved the idea of landings on the very large island of Formosa and subsequent land campaign on the Asian mainland in favor of seizing Okinawa and its large airfields, adequate anchorages, and large-enough troop staging area.

The Americans called the Okinawa campaign "Operation Iceberg."

The Japanese called their kamikaze defense of Okinawa "Falling Chrysanthemums."

The Okinawan people called the battle "The Typhoon of Steel."

On this date, seventy years ago -- April 1, 1945 -- four US divisions, 2 Army and 2 Marine, went ashore virtually unopposed across beaches on the western side of the island. By the end of the day, 60,000 Americans were on Okinawa at the price of a handful of casualties.

It was Easter Sunday in 1945. It would be the last peaceful day for months.

The commander of the Japanese forces on Okinawa had decided against exposing his troops to pre-landing naval and air bombardment in a defense of the beaches. Instead, he constructed elaborate defenses in depth along terrain bisecting the island in successive lines.

While American soldiers and Marines fed themselves into meat-grinding assaults against the most formidable Japanese defensive positions of the Pacific War, the 1300-ship (yes, one thousand, three hundred ships) of the supporting Allied fleet were subject to the crescendo of Japanese airpower, the majority of which were kamikaze strikes. US Navy dead (nearly 5000) exceeded that suffered by either the Army or Marines ashore.

The vast majority of the Japanese defenders were killed or committed suicide by battle's end.

Upwards of 100,000 Okinawan civilians (a third of the population) died.

As the light on Okinawa died by the middle of July, a new light flashed in the New Mexico desert.

A month later, Japan surrendered.

EDUCATING A REBEL

The Colonel is a knuckle-dragging, monosyllabic-grunting, died-in-the-wool Philistine. 

He knows it. 

He ain't smart and you can't make him.

The Colonel reticently remains rooted in the past. He glories in it. He spends so much time looking back that he is in constant peril of tripping over the most minute present ripple in time.

Don't get him wrong -- the Colonel loves a lot of the neat nifty things about modernity and looks forward to the next neat nifty things that will make his life even more leisurely and laconic.

But, the past is ignored -- and reviled -- at the peril of the future.

In our past, we find the traditions -- the very foundations -- upon which our futures are safely built.

Safely built. Our future cannot be safely built if we destroy every traditional vestige -- in the name of "progress" or "political correctness" or some other misguided attempt to equalize outcomes regardless of effort -- which, heretofore, served as unifying points around which society rallies.

Cutting ourselves loose from the moorings of our past may seem the most "modern," "civilized," or even "humane" approach to safely navigating the rocks and shoals of the next age, but that course only leaves us adrift at the whims of the fickle popular winds. The future drives us then, sucking us into eddies and whirlpools of idiocy.

There are, certainly, many idiotic beliefs and behaviors from our history that must be relegated to the dust bin of of discredited social norms. But, the valuable, society-rallying traditions far out-weigh the idiotic ones and should not be discarded solely because a tyrannical minority's overactive sense of sensitivity damns all tradition by association.

The Colonel's relative point to this rambling rant, for which you, dear reader, have long endured, is this:

Leaders -- really good ones -- know the importance of anchoring an organization to the largely innocent traditions that make it unique and distinguishable in the raft of flotsam in the sea of society.

So, we turn to the sad political melodrama once again elevating the state of Mississippi in general, and its flagship university -- University of Mississippi ~ Ole Miss -- specifically, onto the derisive national skyline.

The arcane state bureaucracy responsible for overseeing the plethora of important issues impacting the institutions of higher education in Mississippi, rather than focusing on ensuring the survival of affordable education for the State's future, picked a fight completely unrelated to that end.

They fired the leader (our "tradition" is that we call that person "chancellor" -- not "president," like the rest of the indistinguishable flotsam of public universities) of the University of Mississippi (which, it must be said, is their charter) for reasons not fathomable by the Colonel nor any of the other far more intelligent citizens with whom he shares residence in this great state.

To be sure, the Colonel has been foremost among the vocal critics of Dr. Dan Jones' tactical decision-making since he took charge more than five years ago. The Colonel vehemently disagreed with his high-handed dismissal of Ole Miss traditions, in the name of "social progress." Dr. Jones seemed not to know, or care to acknowledge, the difference between pride and prejudice.

But, dang it, Jones was OUR chancellor. He might not have been born a natural citizen of Rebel Nation by virtue of undergraduate matriculation, but we "naturalized" him with a baptism of intra-familial political fisticuffs. 

He was learning to be a Rebel.

To the good ole boys in Jackson, Butt Out!

Dan is our man, and we'll take responsibility for his education.

Iwo Payback

 

The iconic image of the flag-raising atop Iwo Jima's Mount Suribachi was snapped by war-photographer Joe Rosenthal, seventy years ago today.

Two and a half years before, the United States had begun its march across the Pacific in the War against Japan -- landing on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands.  Guadalcanal had but one resource or feature of any strategic significance -- an airfield that put Japanese bombers within reach of Australia.  

Wresting Guadalcanal and its airfield from the Japanese halted their advance in the South Pacific and gave American airpower a land base from which to carry the fight north toward Japan. 

Like Guadalcanal, the island of Iwo Jima had but one resource or feature of any strategic significance -- an airfield, roughly midway between the large air bases on the recently captured islands of Saipan and Tinian. 

Nearly seven thousand American Marines and Navy Corpsmen died taking Iwo.  

In fact, because the island was too small for use as an Army or Marine staging base and had no significant port facilities, many historians and strategists discount the worth of taking Iwo.

But, that view is narrow and short-sighted, in the Colonel's not-so-humble opinion. 


Heavy U.S. bombers attacking mainland Japan, could just make the long over-water hauls from Tinian to Tokyo and back. Any damage suffered over Japan, or any non-battle mechanical trouble (the long-range B-29 bomber -- then the most advanced of its kind -- had notoriously unreliable engines), often meant ditching in the expansive Western Pacific with little hope of rescue. 

Over the course of the next several months, as the Army Air Corps stepped up its bombing campaign over the Japanese home islands, over a thousand B-29 bombers -- each with an eleven-man crew -- made emergency landings on Iwo's airfield.   

Thousands of U.S. Army Air Corps fliers owed their lives to thousands of Marines who died taking Iwo. 

The favor was returned -- the aerial assault, culminating in the atomic strikes in August of 1945, brought the surrender of Japan and eliminated the need for horrendously costly amphibious assaults on the home islands of Japan.

Cupid is a Communist

Groundhogs are destructive creatures, ranking right up there, in the Colonel's not-so humble opinion, with that peculiar armored anteater, the armadillo.  

The armadillo, at least, has, as a redeeming quality, its taste for fire ants. 

Its greater and less-painful taste for grubs, however, drive it to pock-mark the Colonel's otherwise well-manicured lawns surrounding the Big House here aboard Eegeebeegee with miniature craters that give the yard the appearance of a between-the-trenches no-man's land. 

As far as crater creation goes, a groundhog is an armadillo on steroids.

Here aboard the Colonel's vast holdings at the shallow northern end of deep southern nowhere, both armadillo and groundhog are subject to the same "shoot on sight" orders published for coyotes, bobcats, 'coons, and other stray critters that prey on the furred and feathered game extant afield around Eegeebeegee.

The celebration of the squinty-eyed shadow sighting of an outlaw rodent with no redeeming qualities whatsoever perplexes the Colonel to nearly the same degree as the undue attention paid the Easter Bunny, the polar-dwelling elf, and the Great Pumpkin.  All are distinct targets of his disdain. 

To be clear, the Colonel has no disdain for the Christ-centered holidays into which the first two malevolent mascots above have interloped.  He celebrates the reason for the first two holidays with all his soul -- and ignores the third, as he shuns all other satanic insinuations.

The point to this ponderous post, after which the thousands of you who faithfully follow have frantically sought since the offensive opening, is that the horrid second calendar month -- one so detested by the Colonel that he is loathe to even write its given name -- is so stinking horrible that it's opening act is a large fat rat providing a long-range weather forecast. 

Seriously?  No meteorologist in North America can predict next weekend's weather with any more certainty than a coin toss, and we're all wrapped around the axle over a groundhog's climate change call. 

Sorry, fellow Februaphobes; it only gets worse.

The better part of the next two weeks will be a living hell of constant reminders that a day at the middle of the month hosts an occasion that is supposed to be the most significant day in our relationship with our most significant others.  

News flash:  If you wait until Valentines Day to show that significant other how special he, she, or it is, then he, she, nor it, ain't all that significant nor special.

On a Birthday Far, Far Away

A hundred billion galaxies in the universe we know, each with at least that many stars.

For the sake of simplicity, and so as not to confuse his friends with degrees from schools not called Ole Miss, the Colonel will limit the discussion to one not involving multiple parallel universes.  Just this universe, with it's trillions of possible worlds, will suffice.

Chances are, in a single trillion instances, there exists at least a thousand other worlds like this one.

Chances are, on at least one of those thousand worlds there teems billions like us.

Chances are, that life is like all life on our planet -- competitive for survival's sake.

Chances are, life on that planet is organized in competing societies -- warring societies.

Chances are, one of those warring societies has achieved superiority and maintained it by force of arms and a preeminent warrior class.

Chances are, thousands of that warrior class are living out their peaceful retirement in the heartlands.

Chances are, that planet revolves around its star much slower than does ours.  

The retired centurion living at the shallow northern end of the deep southern nowhere on a land mass on that faraway planet just turned 35 today.

The Colonel thinks he'll celebrate that man's birthday today, instead of his own...

Season of Seasons Assessment

The Colonel's annual season of seasons is rapidly coming to an end. As annual season of seasons go, the 2014/2015 edition ranks (in preliminary assessments) as one of the best all time.

The Colonel must admit, however, that his season of seasons assessment standards may have slipped somewhat, coincident with his slipping into advanced age.  What he means is that twenty years ago, his preliminary assessment of this current rapidly ending season of seasons would have no doubt been that it was a far less satisfying one. 

That's the beauty of notching more years in your belt -- the more seasons of seasons the Colonel experiences, the more he has with which to assess comparatively.

Season of seasons relative measurements allow the Colonel to positively assess seasons of seasons heretofore considered negatively and thereby achieve contentment and satisfaction in assessment of seasons of seasons at the end of which the Colonel may have been discontented and dissatisfied.

The Colonel will provide examples forthwith.  But, first, the Colonel feels the pressing need to explain what he means by "season of seasons."

A season of seasons begins each year with the kick-off of the college football season. Dove season, deer season, and duck season nest within, and compete with, the season of sojourns to the Colonel's season ticket seats in the hallowed confines of Vaught-Hemingway Stadium. 

A season of seasons ends with the last day of duck season and the commencement of the Colonel's endurance of the worst month on the calendar.  The month in question is so horridly loathsome that the Colonel refuses to recognize it by name; instead, referring to it as "after January" and "before March."

A season of seasons includes the Colonel's celebration of Thanksgiving and Christmas -- tightly regulated to the actual days on which those two holidays occur.

Season of seasons assessments are subjective exercises.  This is not to say that they are bereft of objective data points.  In fact, seasons of seasons assessments are replete with objective measurements.  Said measurements were once the only variables considered in a season of seasons assessment.  Not so, no more. 

The Colonel, even as unempathetic, insensitive, and unfeeling as he is, senses the frantic boredom creeping up on the two dozen of you who irregularly waste rod and cone time perusing posts here on. So, he will get to the point -- as blunt as it is. 

A season of seasons primary assessment is derived, in the Colonel's case (and, since he's the one posting hereon for your perusal displeasure, the case that matters), primarily by the gridiron success (or lack thereof) of the Colonel's football Rebels.  

No doubt most of Rebel Nation's retrospective of Ole Miss' 2014 campaign is tempered by the stinging loss to TCU in the Peach Bowl.  The Colonel's assessment also includes that data point, but views it relative to the near half century of his experience with Rebel football.  

It was a GREAT season!

Of course, the Colonel would be fine with a three-win season, as long as the wins were against LSU, Bama, and TSBU. 

Secondary season of seasons assessments rely on the Colonel's experiences throughout the hunting season components of the season of seasons.

The Colonel's game bag was more often empty than not at the conclusion of each hunt this season, and yet he assesses each season this year to have been rousing successes.  Time afield has become a far more important measurement.  That's the Colonel's story and he's sticking to it.

One a scale of one to ten, the Colonel ranks this season of seasons an A- ...

At any rate, the Colonel will be posting more regularly now that there ain't nothing more entertaining to to do with his time... 

Bring it, Punks!

A cowardly group in the Middle East, using the tactic of terrorism to further their strategic aim of reestablishing an Islamic caliphate, has threatened to attack U.S. military members and veterans here in the homeland.  The FBI has responded by encouraging America's defenders to scrub their social media accounts of military mention.

Think about that for a minute.  

The greatest, most valorous, best trained, and most loyal military in the history of civilization is being told by their government to run and hide due to a dubious threat from a bunch of cowardly, amateur, warrior wannabes. 

The Colonel, who has skin thicker than the frontal armor on an M1A1 tank, takes great offense at that notion.

The Colonel is reminded of an early September day, thirteen years ago.  After he sat transfixed by the televised terror attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon for the better part of an unbelieving hour, the Colonel was jolted by the question from one of his subordinates, 

"Sir, what have we heard from higher headquarters?"  

It dawned, slower than sunup in late December (the Colonel ain't smart and you can't make him),  on the Colonel that the better question was: what had our subordinate commands heard from their higher headquarters?

The Colonel ordered a conference call with his subordinate commanders, ASAP.

Following an insane year heading up Current Operations for U.S. Forces, Korea, 2000 to 2001, the Colonel had leaped from the frying pan to the fire, taking command of the 6th Marine Corps District -- responsible for Marine Corps enlisted and officer recruiting in the Southeast in early July of 2001.  (Anyone who has ever served as a recruiter or commanded recruiters knows that it is the most intense job you'll ever have outside of combat.) The 6th MCD then had eight subordinate commands (Recruiting Stations) spread over Mississippi, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida.  Each of those commands (small battalions in their scope of responsibility and impact) was led by a major, each with upwards of 50 to 60 Marine NCOs spread over their territories in 2 and 3 man offices.  

When all of the Recruiting Station C.O.'s were on the line, the Colonel joined them and told them everything he knew at the time.  Wasn't much.  He still had heard nothing from higher headquarters.

The Colonel then asked for reports from the field.  The first major reported that his subordinate NCO's in charge of recruiting offices across his area of responsibility were reporting that the other services' recruiters (the majority of military recruiting offices are collocated) were being told by their higher headquarters to change into civilian clothes and go home.

The Colonel opined that some local commander must be over-reacting.  

Many of the rest of the majors quickly disabused him of that opinion.  It was happening all over.  The other services, in a greatly misplaced (in the Colonel's not-so humble opinion) sense of heightened "force protection" (a term that still sets the Colonel's teeth on edge), had sent their soldiers, airmen, and sailors running home when their nation most needed them visibly on the job.

The Colonel was dumbfounded and, for only one of a very few times in his career, speechless.  

One of the majors spoke up, "Colonel, I told my Marines to stay in uniform and stay very visible.  Should I have done different?"

That was the best military decision the Colonel had heard in the past couple of hours (if not his previous two decades + of service) and he told the major so.

"Gentlemen," the Colonel commanded, "stay in uniform and stay visible.  I'll be back in touch as soon as I hear anything from higher headquarters."  

It was a no-brainer command.  

The Colonel made a career out of 'em.

The Colonel is quite certain that the vast majority of U.S. soldiers, sailors, and airmen were disgusted at the order to get out of uniform and go home that day.

So, back to the present.

The Colonel is quite certain that the vast majority of U.S. soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines share his disgust with the suggestion by the FBI (in particular) and their government (in general) that they should hide from an enemy of their nation.

We will not hide.  

We will not cower.

We will not run.

Not from China; not from a resurgent Russia; not from a drug cartel; and certainly not from that passel of punks, ISIS.

Two words:

BRING IT!

               

Mississippi Pride

The last games of the 2014 college football regular season were played in a paroxysm of prideful rivalry this past weekend.  

Here at the shallow northern end of deep southern nowhere, the annual intrastate grudge match between the Colonel's Ole Miss Rebels and the Mississippi State Bulldogs kicked off Saturday afternoon with passion and potential perhaps at an all time high for an "Egg Bowl."

Both teams began the season with great expectations.   Halfway through the season both teams were 7 and 0.  

Unprecedented.      

At one point, State and Ole Miss were together in the top 4 of the preliminary new College Football Championship playoff poll -- thanks primarily to State's wins over perennial powerhouses LSU and Auburn; and Ole Miss' wins over Alabama and A&M.

Unbelievable.

The SEC, and the SEC West in particular, seemed to be turned upside down.  The talk at mid-season was that the Egg Bowl, not the Iron Bowl, would decide the West.  That certainly was the Colonel's fondest wish.

But the SEC West wasn't so much turned upside down as it was just settled into a rare equilibrium of really good teams from "top to bottom."  That kind of high-quality balance in a seven-team division of a "power-five" conference makes for some great football.

It also makes it nearly impossible for any team to get to the conference championship unscathed.   When you have a conference full of legitimate contenders, the likelihood is that championship-chances cannibalism will result.  

Does anyone really believe that FSU would be undefeated at this point playing in the SEC? 

But, most of the above falls under the rod and cone wasting category of MOTO -- Mastery of the Obvious.  Apologies.

What probably sets the Colonel apart from nearly every other football fan in the great state of Mississippi is that he doesn't hate the other Mississippi school (far too much hate already invested in Bama and LSU -- none left for State) and he has a fairly rigid (but not completely binding) "no-gloating" rule.

To call the Colonel "old school" would be an understatement rivalling Custer's "Troopers, things are about to get interesting."

The Colonel has never been a big fan of "smack talk;" never liked taunting; never liked "rubbing it in;" never thought much of outlandish celebration of a score or victory.

Well, he says "never," but the truth is the Colonel probably did a little bit too much of all of the above early in his formative years.  At some point in the last four decades of his "adulthood" (and the Colonel uses that term as loosely as a newborn's diaper deposit) the Colonel began to emulate the example of some really great leaders (his dear old Dad among them) and sought increasingly to veneer over his fanaticism with a liberal dose of sportsmanship.

For the LSU and Bama fans who may have stumbled across this post in a cyber Monday Christmas gift search for corndog sampler gift packs or pachyderm-printed bathroom tissue, the term "sportsmanship" does not involve the following (many of which the Colonel has seen in person on more than one occasion):

Cursing at and taunting a five year old in opposing team colors.

Screaming profanities at ladies in opposing team colors.

Killing trees on the opposing team's campus.

Throwing whiskey bottles at opposing team fans.   

The Colonel could go on, but you get his drift.  At some point we should all take a deep breath and remember the words of that great humanitarian and philosopher of the human condition, Rodney King: "Can't we all just get along?" 

For the record, the Colonel is more than just a bit disappointed in the Rebel Nation derision directed toward crushed State fans.  The Colonel is not a fan of the "#FailState" meme.  The Colonel believes we are better than that.  

Take the high road, Rebels.  Love is the greater force.  Leave the hate-generation to Coach Mullen.  Our coach says it best:  "We don't play out of hate for the other team; we play out of love for each other."

The Colonel really likes that philosophy -- it's the philosophy upon which was built the really great teams of Marines with which he served.   

The Colonel congratulates Mississippi State on their best season ever.  You should be very proud.  Heck, the Colonel is proud of you.  

State and Ole Miss have a record-setting combined regular season win / loss total of 19 and 5.  Wins in bowl games will give both Mississippi schools at least 10 wins in the same season for the first time, ever!

Next year, let's finish this the right way:  Egg Bowl decides the West. 

Mississippi First!

Crumbling Empires

The "Gang of Five."  Five BLT 1/8 captains (Gregory, Foresi, 

Larriviere, Dupras, and Welsh ) on their second deployment

 to the Mediterranean together -- Italy, 1990

Twenty-five years ago, today, the Colonel was assigned as the Operations Officer (Ops O) for Battalion Landing Team (BLT) 1/8 -- a reinforced (tanks, artillery, engineers) infantry battalion -- that was the ground combat element of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, Special Operations Capable, aka MEU (SOC).  The Colonel was then still a captain, but selected for major.  He was in his third year of a demanding and exhilarating second assignment as a company grade officer with a Marine infantry battalion.  

The Colonel, and nearly a thousand of his closest friends, were on the second six-month deployment to the Mediterranean in as many years, having only returned from the last such deployment just thirteen months earlier.  He had been a rifle company commander on that earlier deployment -- leading a reinforced infantry company of some 200 hard-chargers assigned as the heli-borne raid company for the 26th MEU -- SOC.  

Commanding a rifle company was by far the most fun the Colonel had in his career in the Corps.  Lots of demanding and rewarding assignments followed company command, but no job was ever near as much fun.  

The Colonel had lobbied hard to stay in command of Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, Eighth Marines (C 1/8) for the second deployment, but as a major (select) he had been the obvious choice to fill the vacancy in the Operations Officer billet -- last filled by another Ole Miss grad, Mike Edwards.  That, and the Marine Corps has an unwritten, yet faithfully followed, rule that, "No officer shall be allowed too much fun."   

The 24th MEU had shipped out from the East Coast the middle of October in 1989, embarked on amphibious shipping -- an Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) consisting of an old helicopter carrier (LPH), and two smaller amphibs (an LPD and an LST).  The ARG had sailed slowly across the Atlantic and arrived in Rota, Spain early in November for face-to-face "Turnover" with the ARG and MEU finishing up their deployment and heading home.

After a few days of suffering through the outgoing BLT's briefs, the leaders of BLT 1/8 gladly bid farewell to their brothers heading home and leaned into the tasks ahead.

In those days, the Cold War was still frosty.  The Soviet Union was the enemy, and the Red Army/Navy and it's surrogates in the Middle East were still the focus of combat preparations for US naval forces patrolling the Med.  In particular, MEU (SOC)s, while highly prepared for operations at the lower end of the conflict scale, still kept the "Fight with the Warsaw Pact" playbook handy.  The main reason, it had always seemed, that US forces patrolled the Med, was to counter Soviet presence and influence.   

No one dared dream of a world in which the Soviet Union no longer existed.  The only way the Soviets were going away was in a nuclear winter, and that potentiality would also give the rest of the world frostbite.  The standoff with the Soviets was the framework of reality within which every American serviceman and woman planned each day, the remainder of their active duty careers, and the rest of their lives.

The Colonel's boss, BLT 1/8's commanding officer, was then Colonel, later General and Commandant of the Marine Corps, Mike Hagee.  Colonel Hagee was one of the smartest and well-connected officers with whom the Colonel ever served.  He was the first person the Colonel ever saw carry and use a portable computer -- a small suitcase-sized oddity.  Hagee tried unsuccessfully to teach the Colonel to use it -- giving up only after his student caused it to crash and lock up several times.

Twenty-five years ago, tonight, Colonel Hagee, his senior staff officers, and company commanders were bellied up to a bar in the Naval Station Rota Officers' Club.  A small television behind the bar flashed scenes of mobs of Germans destroying the symbol of Soviet domination -- the Berlin Wall.

The word "surreal" doesn't begin to describe the feeling those Marine officers were experiencing.  Never at a loss for irreverent comments and observations on any situation, this group of young men sat in stunned silence watching the wall crumble.

As the reality of the impending demise of the Soviet Union began to sink in one of the Colonel's brothers turned to their commander and asked the question on all of their minds, 

"Sir, does this mean we can go home, now?" 

It didn't.  Things actually got worse.  Chaos reigned, and has reigned for the twenty-five years since.

Today, Russia is resurgent and more and more bellicose.  

Today, China is a greater threat than ever.

The United States spent the last quarter century restructuring a military establishment from one focused on WWIII with the Soviets to one focused on fighting a nebulous war on terror.

The problem is that the United States, in the Colonel's not-so humble opinion, made a huge strategic mistake in restructuring to fight a tactic.  In 1991, the US actually used a military designed to fight the Soviets, with great efficiency and to great effect to eject Saddam Hussein's forces from Kuwait.  In 2003, the same capabilities dethroned Saddam.  In the Colonel's not-so humble opinion, the same Cold War force should have been used in a couple of short years after 9/11 to eliminate terrorism's center of gravity -- Middle Eastern regimes bankrolling the terror organizations.

Instead, the United States squandered the opportunity and frittered away blood and treasure with half-hearted limited objective campaigns.  

The United States should be the preeminent force -- one for GOOD -- in the world, today.  Instead, the United States is so weakened that a punk thug by the name of Vladimir Putin is rebuilding the Soviet Union.

The Colonel apologizes to his grandsons.  They will have to endure another Cold War.