[lbo-talk] Brit general says US/UK should "admit defeat" in Iraq

[Carl Remick]

>From: Michael Smith <mjs at smithbowen.net>
>
>On Friday 04 May 2007 20:47, Carl Remick wrote:
>
> > Please.  To paraphrase Dr. Johnson:  ""Sir, a military man thinking's
> > thinking is like a dog's walking on his hinder legs. It is not done 
>well;
> > but you are surprised to find it done at all."  I consider the 
>professional
> > military the lowest form of humanity.
>
>Dr Johnson's original observation was about women, and I fear Carl's 
>comments
>have an almost equal aroma of mere prejudice. This is not a rhetorical
>question, Carl, nor is it intended as a taunt -- it's really factual: do 
>you
>know many military officers personally?

No, I know none at all.  I do not seek out association with people I view as 
demented.  As for the prejudice bit, women are born female.  No one is born 
to be a military officer.  Becoming a military officer is a matter of choice 
-- a matter of poor choice.


>Reading Sherman's or Grant's or Zhukov's memoirs is instructive. Sherman in
>particular is as quirky as Melville, and unmistakably no fool.

Yes, I read a bio of Sherman, and he struck me as a dangerous lunatic.  I 
got the impression that as Commanding General of the U.S. Army after the 
Civil War, Sherman anticipated using the US Army to quell urban labor 
unrest.  He also oversaw military action against Native Americans, including 
-- replicating his destruction of civilian food supplies during the Civil 
War -- slaughtering buffalos to deprive the Plains Indians of their primary 
food.  Nifty guy.

Carl

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