Staring Down the Barrel

Staring down the barrel from the wrong end is something most people over the age of thirty have done, either really or metaphorically. Most of us have done it more than once, as has our nation. Here’s the thing, like the James Bond intro that I bastardized this image into, we gotta win every time. The bad guys only gotta get lucky once. Today we’re going to talk about some of these experiences.

Grab a drink and let’s get started. On your way by, please notice the tip jar where we collect for the mess.

As always, I am grateful for those of you that have chipped in to keep the place running whether through a Substack subscription, or via the tip jar.

I’m going to start with the national and work my way down to the individual.

CDR Sal over at the-us-is-failing-its-own-nato-talking is having a conversation about how much we’re spending on Defense, and why that’s going to bite us in the ass. All of this, is, of course, relevant right now, because we’re (NATO) meeting each other at the Head of State level, in Turkey right now. Sal makes the point that as a percentage of GDP, we’re falling behind the target we personally are demanding our allies hit. He also points out that RIGHT NOW, we’ve fallen to fifth place on funding our military, when considered from that perspective.

Now some “Full and vigorous debate” (That’s civil service speak for a verbal knockdown, drag out fight, that goes to knives and knives to the hilt.) can/will happen over the fairness of considering percentage of GDP when our GDP is completely out of the league of any other nation on earth. (Think I’m joking?)

Note that the only outfit even in the running, is our “dear friends” the PRC, who have knives pointed at our backs, groin, and every other part of our anatomy.

Further discussion can be had over what should be allowed to be considered as part of “defense spending” with the knowledge that “Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics” is a fact of life. What the PRC reports for Defense spending doesn’t count a lot of spending that we count in the way of R&D, and defense adjacent stuff, and what our allies count includes a lot of stuff that we don’t, like ICE equivalent offices, Civil Defense stuff, and frankly, stuff that doesn’t relate to defense at all, but some little gnome in Belgum or somewhere wants to claim to pump up their numbers.

All of this discussion is good and is a reasonable part of being in a democratic world. My own contribution to it, was:
“Yes, and.

The US is not, at this point at least, staring down the very real threat of tanks rolling across her borders. Norway, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland are. It is historically hard for a republic, or a democracy, to put a massive effort into military might in peace time.

Add in the communist propaganda machine that feeds the “no one is threatening us, we need to quit threatening those poor innocent Chinese” narrative, along with all the other propaganda machine stories designed to weaken and divide us, makes convincing Joe and Sue American that we need to spend more on prepping for a war they don’t see coming, is hard.

The left, which is to say the PRC and Russia’s sock puppets, can find a million things other than a “war machine” that it’s more important to spend money on. They own the Mainstream Media.

This makes the job of bloggers and politicians who can see the collision coming vital.

Bang the drums, blow the horns, make it a steady drumbeat that “War is on the horizon, if you don’t arm up before it starts, you won’t get a chance to arm up at all!” We succeeded in this in 1937-40, which is why by 43 we had ships coming down the ways and ready to take the war to the enemy. Will we even survive long enough to have that six year window in a modern war?

Do you want to bet the future of the world on it?”

Sal’s perspective is that to lead the free world, we need to be unquestionably in the front, in all areas. I have a slightly more nuanced perspective. Honestly, at this point, I’m having a real problem giving a shit whether or not Germany falls to Russia. Even less whether or not Turkey falls to them.

Europe has, by and large, with the notable exception of Poland, the Baltic republics, and a couple of the Norse republics, already ceded their birthrights to the Islamic invasion. Defending them with American Blood and Treasure against another invading force is just low on my priority list. It comes down to “Is this a threat that will affect my nation’s survival?”

By and large, the answer to this, on the European front, is NO.

But

The trouble is that you can’t take the fall of Europe in isolation. When looked at as part of the world picture, the fall of Europe makes the fall of Asia that much easier. Do we “need” Germany (for example) to defend Asia against the PRC? Directly, NO. Indirectly though… we need places to build the missiles, aircraft, tanks, and other weapons of war that a modern war in the pacific will go through like a sailor going through free shots at the bar.

The US can’t build everything for everyone. Even if we shit-canned all the environmental and safety regulations that have hog tied modern American Industry, (as opposed to American Industry during WWII) we couldn’t keep up with the voracious hunger that a modern war has for shells, missiles, and equipment, with a true World War going on in Europe and Asia.

We NEED factories in Europe, in Asia, and in South America kicking out equipment and getting it to the front.

For that, there has to BE a Europe, that is not occupied by the enemy. I would, if I was in charge, treat the European theater in a future war, the way we treated the Pacific theater in WWII. IE, you get the stuff that we can spare from the war we need to fight first.

Make no mistake. The PRC is our deadly enemy, they’ve been trying their best for the last five decades to weaken us, ever since that never to be sufficiently damned bastard Nixon was convinced by the even worse bastard Kissinger that “we can win Communist China over to our side and use them against the real threat, the Soviets.” Ever since “Nixon went to China” they’ve been honing their knives and looking at our backs, our throats, and our balls. Far from becoming our allies, we became their “tools of convenience” to wipe the Soviet Union from the map, leaving them the heir of Marx, Lenin, and Asia in general.

Our allies Japan, South Korea, Australia, and the Philippines are all that stand in the way of their goal of owning all of Asia. Well, and of course, US.

Without us, those folks fall. Europe can stand against the remnants of the Soviet Union that call themselves Russia, with some small technological backing (AWACS, Fighters, and Air Defense systems, help in producing organic designed anti drone defenses, things like that). I don’t think they can WIN, but they can hold the line. Asia can’t. Without American troops and gear, Asia falls to the PRC. Even with our gear, as it currently stands it’s going to be LONG, BLOODY, and Expensive.

What sort of Expensive? Look at the UK, who “won” WWII but in doing so, destroyed their economy, and their empire, to the point that it never really recovered, and has now relegated the UK to a small second-rate power that probably couldn’t defend the Falklands if that invasion were to be redone.

Seriously, the RN probably couldn’t take on the Hellenic Navy and win, at this point, and India would send them packing in short order. When your navy is the weakest in the “Commonwealth” are you really in charge any longer?

I would just as soon not have that happen to the United States, if it’s all the same to you, because as I look around, I don’t see anyone standing in the wings ready to pick up the standard of civilization and continue the advance. All I see is the very real possibility of a PRC dominated Asia driving “a boot stomping on a human face—forever” except it won’t be forever, because without something propping it up, the Communist system of the PRC is doomed too.

What does that mean for humanity? Well, look at the fall of Rome, and the aftermath. Let’s not go there, huh?

How to avoid it?

Well that’s the part that’s going to be painful. We’re going to have to cut things. Foreign aid, social services, “money for the arts” a lot of oxen are going to get gored. The thing is, building ships takes time and money. A lot of it. Ships are the long leg in the war machine, and don’t look now, but ships are what we need, against the PRC.

It’s a big damn ocean, and the Navy is going to have to lead the way when we go to war against the PRC.

“But we don’t have to go to war, against the PRC” Yeah, I heard you, in the back. No we don’t… We can just surrender the idea of freedom, throw our allies to the wolves, and thus buy ourselves some breathing room.

It worked so well for Neville Chamberlin…

Or we can be so big, bad, and scary that the PRC decides the game isn’t worth the prize. This is why there isn’t a “Soviet Union” any longer. They decided that they dared not try the big game, because they would lose. That was their end, because their system demanded a steady intake of pillage to survive. They quit growing, and collapse was inevitable. If we can keep the PRC inside their borders for about ten, fifteen tops more years, their fall is just as inevitable. To do that requires that we remain just too dangerous to attack. Pain now, or a lot more pain later, if we don’t keep deterring them.

On the states level, we’ve had guns metaphorically pointed at us, by politicians who were frightened of our having guns to point back. This has been going on for my entire lifetime. For most of my life, the politicians have been winning.

In my memory we went from being able to order a gun and a suppressor mail order, to whole states where you couldn’t own a weapon that has a removable magazine, cities where you couldn’t own a gun at all, unless you’re politically connected, or you’re willing to break the law, (this of course is the rub, if you’re planning to break the law anyway, after the first one, felonies are free) states where owning a gun legally gave the state permission to barge into your home at any time, with no warrant.

Well, like the villain in the Bond opening credits, that seems to have failed, and between the voters and the courts, we’ve turned the corner. Oh they’re still trying desperately to fight it, but a wounded animal will fight to the end, even if they are bleeding out. That’s what we’re seeing now.

Yes, Virginia’s governor went on a gun grabbing spree as soon as elected. The courts in Virginia are breaking it off in her ass. SCOTUS has taken for action the bans on Semi Auto rifles like the AR platform at the national level. Yeah I’m reading tea leaves here, but… I don’t see a way that this doesn’t become another “Heller” case, with a watershed moment of “NO, the mechanism of firing, the number of cartridges the magazine will accept, how ‘scary looking’ the firearm is, none of that matters, what part of “shall not be infringed” so confuses you stupid bastards?”

Hawaii got spanked by the Supreme Court, Illinois has been spanked by them a couple times, California has been spanked so often that I’m beginning to think “You don’t come here for the hunting, do you?”

Also on the state level, in Maine, we have what looks at first glance like a “final straw” piece. Graham Platner, democratic candidate for Senate, has been a target since he showed up on the scene. The bare chested pictures of him with a (since covered up) Nazi Totenkopf tattoo was, shall we say, problematic? His history of issues with women, and other bad judgement weren’t enough to get the DNC to officially shitcan him, although he’s become more and more of a albatross around the neck of their body politic.

But now ‘divine providence’ seems to have handed the party the excuse they need to get rid of that smelly bird, some “ex-girlfriend” named Jenny Racicot is throwing the Rape Card on an incident of 5 years ago. Suddenly the heads of the DNC are all demanding he pull out of the race, now while there’s still time to change the ballot.

Pardon me, but finding some gal to cry rape seems to be awful ‘on brand’ for the DNC whenever there’s a man they need to get rid of. (Clarence Thomas, black courtesy phone, please, Donald Trump white courtesy phone please)

Seriously isn’t it funny how anyone who gets too difficult for the Democratic machine to deal with suddenly has some gal come out and say “well back in the day, he had sex with me, without my permission!” When you tack onto that, the hush money fund that exists within the “Office of Compliance” to pay for the victims of congressional sexual (and other) harassment to keep their mouths shut… It’s all just so convenient, isn’t it?

Now at the local level, our saga with our house continues… The wiring is hooked up, but we can’t turn it on without a representative from a company that is probably as dead as Marley’s ghost. We have had no progress in contacting the company: Yurezz Home Centers, registered letters get signed for, but not responded to, our finance company still thinks that they (Yurezz) will make good on their promises in spite of the lack of contact and radio silence, and the house still sits just as it did when the contractors walked off the job part way through.

There is some news though, another finance company: 21^st mortgage, has filed suit against the owners of Yurezz, (Richard and Heather Altman) saying basically, “they haven’t paid us, we want all the houses that we have notes for, OR we want our money.” Said company has also sent out forms to the folks that are in our situation, that offer to have all the work completed by contractors 21^st hires, in return for signing over the rights to any money recovered from Yurezz in future lawsuits, and holding 21^st blameless in future suits, among other considerations.

How this is going to end, I have no idea. It appears that to sue the company I will have to go through Appling County Georgia, so I will end up seeing what I am permitted to do, while bigger guys like my finance company lead the legal charge… SIGH.

And to add insult to injury, I had to be outside in what I can only describe as a firehose downpour Sunday… I dried out, my phone did not. So, I am phoneless until I get a replacement. Well, like kidney stones, this too shall pass.

QOTD: “21^st mortgage has agreed to provide monetary assistance to you in order for a contractor selected by or approved by 21^st mortgage to complete the following services that were included in your home purchase.

(later in the document) In exchange for this monetary assistance, you hereby agree to assign any and all claims you may have against any party you engaged with… ”

21^st Mortgage document.

Yours in Service,

William Lehman