The Gathering Storm: The world is beginning to look a lot like the 1930s
Russia has been attacking Ukraine for 20 months now. Iran, through its terrorism partner Hamas, attacked Israel this weekend. China has been threatening to attack Taiwan.
The world is beginning to look a lot like the 1930s, when Japan attacked and overran much of China, and Nazi Germany and its then-ally the Soviet Union attacked and overran Poland and the Baltic States.
Former President George W. Bush has been ridiculed for describing an “Axis of Evil.” But at this point, the axis of Russia, Iran and China seems to be acting in greater unison than the axis of Germany and Japan acted during World War II. And we have no reason to assume today’s axis will turn on itself as when Hitler attacked the Soviet Union in June 1941.
No American military forces are currently fighting in Ukraine, none will surely be fighting in Israel, and no forces are currently stationed in Taiwan. But then there were no American military forces fighting in Asia or Europe in June 1941. Soon, there would be.
And conceivably, they could be again sometime soon. As military historian Eliot Cohen points out, no one lately has a good record of military predictions.
What is clear is that the United States will be called on to provide large numbers of conventional weapons to Ukraine and Israel for some unspecified time. This could be a strain for a nation concentrating in recent decades on producing high-tech weapons in small numbers.
In prolonged on-the-ground fighting, however, numbers matter. Production of artillery shells (“munitions”) in adequate numbers was the issue that ousted one British prime minister and installed David Lloyd George in World War I (see Andrew Roberts’ biography of Lord Northcliffe). And President Franklin Roosevelt’s foresighted enlistment of top corporation executives made America the world’s “arsenal of democracy” in World War II (see Arthur Herman’s “Freedom’s Forge”).
Those were the days when America was capable of building big things, in large numbers — a capacity, as liberal writers Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson have lamented, we have lost.
One reason is that our leaders lack Roosevelt’s capacity to pick men (and women) good at getting things done, which made big government look misleadingly easy for the next few generations of Americans. Roosevelt picked the leaders who built the Pentagon in 15 months (see Steve Vogel’s “The Pentagon”), and the generals and admirals who assembled from almost nothing the 16-million-men military (see Eric Larrabee’s “Commander in Chief” that produced the “absolute victory” that Roosevelt promised on Dec. 8, 1941).
Currently, American defense stockpiles are already strained in supplying arms and ammunition to Ukraine, and supplying Israel will strain them more. “The threat from China has not dissipated in the slightest while our defense spending and industry remain basically status quo as threats multiply,” former Pentagon official Elbridge Colby wrote. “We should have been on a national mobilization footing for our defense industry a long time ago.”
That would require a major shift in budget priorities, away from things such as the Biden administration’s $400 billion forgiveness of college loan debt (with benefits tilted toward above-average-income borrowers). Moreover, thanks to inflation stoked by Trump and Biden COVID-era stimulus spending, government interest costs have skyrocketed. And will American armed forces, currently failing to meet recruitment goals, need to be expanded?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is ordering a vigorous response to Hamas but in time will have to answer why his government was apparently so unprepared for the Oct. 7 attacks. And in a forthright statement on Oct. 10, President Joe Biden said unambiguously that “we’re with Israel” and “we will make sure Israel has what it needs.” But in time, he may need to answer why he and his appointees and colleagues in the Obama administration tilted U.S. policy toward Hamas’ patron Iran, to the point of releasing $6 billion to Iran in September and appointing an Iranian sympathizer and possible spy to a national security post.
Meanwhile, America is bitterly split on partisan lines, with a narrowly Republican House (which nonsensically ousted its speaker), a narrowly Democratic Senate, and a Democratic president who, like Woodrow Wilson and unlike Franklin Roosevelt, has not taken Republicans into his councils as the storms of war gather. Stormy weather ahead.
https://patriotpost.us/opinion/101264-the-gathering-storm-2023-10-13
**********************************************************The Superpower That Can’t Arm Itself
No matter how much we’d like to believe in the inevitably of human progress and the spread of enlightened norms, we’ve learned the past couple of years that we still need artillery shells — lots of artillery shells.
The Hamas terror attack, together with the ongoing Ukraine war and the looming Chinese threat to Taiwan, is putting a spotlight on the pitiful state of our capacity to manufacture the weapons necessary to the defense of our allies and ourselves.
According to a CNN report, an Israel ground invasion of Gaza would “create a new and entirely unexpected demand for 155 mm artillery ammunition and other weapons at a time when the U.S. and its allies and partners have been stretched thin from more than 18 months of fighting in Ukraine.”
We are learning to our regret that we are using an attenuated post-Cold War, “end of history” defense-industrial base to try to meet the security needs of a newly threatening international environment with the real risk of Great Power conflict.
As it turns out, the peace dividend was very expensive.
It now should be a matter of the highest national priority to use every lever of government and the private sector to bolster the defense-industrial base in all its aspects.
The Biden administration should care about this at least as much as incentivizing the production of electric vehicles most people don’t want to buy.
We aren’t being asked, by the way, to fight a three-front war in Europe, the Middle East and Asia ourselves. No, the call is simply to provide arms to allies under attack or threat. If we can’t do that, what does it say about our status as the world’s preeminent power?
In Ukraine, the hopes of Moscow for a lightning victory and of the West for a sweepingly successful Ukraine counteroffensive both appear to have come a cropper. Now, it’s a grinding artillery war.
Ukraine is estimated to need 1.5 million shells a year, and has been firing as many as 6,000 a day. Russia was firing even more at the peak of its offensive.
The U.S. had supplied 2 million artillery shells to Ukraine as of July, and has been scrounging around — along with other Western powers — to feed whatever supplies it can find into the maw of the war.
It’s not that we have been completely asleep. The U.S. was making 14,500 shells a month at the beginning of 2023, and has roughly doubled that. We hope to get to 100,000 a month in 2025. Still, highly sanctioned Russia is more proficient at producing shells.
If we can’t supply Ukraine, what if we become embroiled in a major war with China?
War games conducted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies have the U.S. firing 5,000 long-range missiles in the first weeks of war, instantly depleting our stocks. According to CSIS, the U.S. would expend all its Long-Range Anti-Ship Missiles within the first week of a conflict — when it requires almost two years to manufacture one of the missiles.
We are also in the bizarre position of being dependent on our potential enemy for the materials we’d need in a war with that enemy. China has a dominant position in the market for rare earth metals — so important to the production of high-end weapons — and is the world leader in cast products.
There is no easy way out of the hole we’ve dug ourselves. It will require more spending on defense; more reliable, long-term contracts for the production of key weapons; a focus on securing the supply chain necessary to the production of high-tech munitions; and assistance to manufacturers in training workers, among other things.
The history of empires and nations that don’t mind the need for up-to-date weapons at the scale necessary to defeat or deter adversaries isn’t a happy one. It’s in our power to avoid this fate — if we have the will and don’t waste more time
https://patriotpost.us/opinion/101276-the-superpower-that-cant-arm-itself-2023-10-13
********************************************************SNP pulls the rug on Scots who have second homes in idyllic holiday hotspots
SECOND home owners are to be targeted by the SNP as part of a radical shake-up of rural housing rules.
Amid the biggest land reforms in a generation, Humza Yousaf’s government will force families with holiday homes – or those not classed as main residences – to pay up to double their council tax from April next year.
Holiday home owners could even see their boltholes acquired by councils in compulsory purchases and converted into private rentals to ease the housing crisis.
Meanwhile, a socialist-style clampdown on lairds will introduce a ‘public interest test’ applied to the ‘sale or transfer’ of estates – which could see large landholdings being taken into public or community ownership.
The proposals outlined by the Scottish Government yesterday in its Rural Housing Action Plan are designed to make it easier for young families to buy first homes in the Highlands and Islands, as well as encourage youngsters not to leave rural communities for work.
Critics fear it will punish people who have worked hard to buy a holiday home – and could even drive money abroad.
Last night SNP rebel Fergus Ewing, the MSP for Inverness and Nairn and a former Cabinet Secretary for Rural Economy, slammed the proposals.
He told The Mail on Sunday: ‘These proposals will punish those who have invested hard-earned cash in homes and will lead many to invest abroad instead, driving money out of Scotland and damaging many local economies with less money going to local builders, shops and tradesmen.’
He added: ‘The damaging short-term let regulations have seen thousands of small businesses simply give up – so there’s already less money going into many rural communities. Added to this wilful destruction of small businesses, more new regulation will further damage these communities.’
Stephen Young, a director at Scottish Land & Estates which represents the country’s largest landowners, said: ‘Policy reform to increase housing supply in rural areas is badly needed but it needs a coherent approach which is all too often missing.
‘Between obstructive planning policy, restrictive grant funding and the recent war waged on landlords, the Scottish Government has done little to encourage new housing in rural areas.’
The Action Plan comes in the wake of the SNP’s Programme for Government last month which saw Mr Yousaf commit to introducing a £35 million council tax raid on second home owners.
Several local authorities later confirmed they will look to charge the 100 per cent levy, including Angus, the Western Isles, Edinburgh, North Ayrshire, South Ayrshire and West Lothian.
The document released yesterday shows councils will be able to impose the tax double whammy from April. The move comes despite those buying second homes in Scotland already paying a 6 per cent ‘additional homes supplement’ on top of land and buildings transaction taxes.
Meanwhile, a further clampdown on short-term lets will go ahead. This will allow councils to expand control areas, limiting the number of Airbnb-style properties in a particular location. They will also be able to force tourism lets to switch to private rentals.
The Action Plan document states: ‘The growth of online platforms has fuelled the trend for residential homes, particularly in tourist hotspots, to be changed from primary homes to short-term lets or second homes.
‘Making the best use of existing housing can make a significant contribution to increasing the supply of permanent homes.
‘This could be by limiting the number of second homes, changing the use of properties used for tourism to private rental, acquiring properties back into the affordable sector as well as bringing empty homes back into use.
‘Demand for second homes can reduce the supply of permanent homes and inflate house prices, making it more difficult for people, particularly younger people, to access the homes they need.’
***************************************************
The moral vacuum that is the Left
Their claim to care is revealed as mere pretence. Just as they once excused Soviet slaughter, they now excuse Muslim slaughter
Recent events in the Middle East and the limp-wristed response by some of our most senior elected representatives to the slaughter of the innocents that took place in Israel at the hands of Hamas show that
The response by Labor frontbenchers such as Tony Burke and Chris Bowen was muted at best and fell well short of outright condemnation.
It’s no coincidence that their electorates contain a significant Muslim population, so was it with an eye of the next election and their political survival that they failed to denounce the atrocity in the strongest possible terms lest it cost them votes?
The response of the Greens and teals was just as odious, with some hiding metaphorically under their desks and declining to offer any comment at all when asked.
We have as a nation just emerged from one of the darker periods of modern times with millions of us accused either directly or indirectly of being racists.
We shredded these accusations at the ballot box by declaring that we regard all Australians as equal, thus ensuring that in the words of Bob Hawke that “in Australia there is no hierarchy of descent; there must be no privilege of origin.
“The commitment is all. The commitment to Australia is the only thing needful to be a true Australian.”
Why is it then that while people will swear that they have never entertained a racist thought and denounce racism as one of the great evils, when it comes to calling the cold-blooded massacre of people murdered on account of their race and religion out for what it is, there are those among us who would look the other way?
Events in Sydney, with pro-Palestinian protesters chanting “gas the Jews” and preaching genocide have revealed that there are malevolent elements in our society that have no respect for our rule of law and who applaud wholesale bloodshed in the name of their religion or political beliefs.
These are the people who are not true Australians. They have no commitment to our country.
They abuse the freedom of speech and assembly our democracy grants them.
Civil libertarians have been quick to claim that the demonstrators have a right to protest, but when you incite people to murder Australian citizens – and it is absolutely clear that this what happened – you lose that freedom.
Can you imagine the outcry if a mob was to start yelling “kill the Poms”, “kill the Italians” or “kill the Catholics”?
The members of our political class would trample each other underfoot in their stampede to demand that the offenders be dealt with harshly, but when it comes to anti-Semitism and calls to kill Jews, be they be living in Australia or elsewhere, the outrage is filtered.
In Sydney, to their eternal shame, the police stood by and did nothing.
In Germany in the 1930s, the police stood by and watched as Adolf Hitler’s Brownshirts smashed and burnt Jewish businesses, dragged their owners into the street and beat them. Much worse was to follow.
Those who fail to denounce anti-Semitism are either blind to history or choose to ignore it.
Wokeism, alas, does not extend to anti-Semitism. It is not seen as worthy of attention by the virtue-seekers.
Will Qantas paint an Israeli flag on the tails of its aircraft to signal its abhorrence of anti-Semitism or will the corporate elites, who in the light of last Saturday’s result have gone strangely quiet, denounce it? Never.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was fond of warning us that if we did not pass the referendum, the world would think less of us.
I can assure him that images of crowds referring to the gas chambers of the Holocaust and the systematic murder of more than six million people will have well and truly damned us in the eyes of many in the international community.
It’s easy to dismiss those responsible as a bunch of ignorant clowns, but it would be dangerous to do so.
The Jews have an expression that encapsulates the horrors that they suffered in Europe 80 years ago. It is “Never again.”
It falls to those of us who regard ourselves as true Australians to make sure it never does.
****************************************
My other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
*****************************************
/>
Kristina Pimenova, once said to be the most beautiful girl in the world. Note blue eyes and blonde hair
Bliss: What every woman wants: to feel safe and secure in the arms of her man. Robert Irwin and Rorie Buckey. See
No comments:
Post a Comment