- Being a military thinker of the profoundest sort, I offer
the following manual of martial affairs for nations yearning to copy the
American way of war. Read it carefully. Great clarity will result. The
steps limned below will facilitate disaster without imposing the burden
of reinventing it. The Pentagon may print copies for distribution.
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- (1) Underestimate the enemy. Fortunately this is easy
when a technologically advanced power prepares to attack an underdeveloped
nation. Its enemy's citizens will readily be seen as gadgetless, primitive,
probably genetically stupid, and hardly worth the attention of a real military.
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- (2) Avoid learning anything about the enemy his
culture, religion, language, history, or response to past invasions. These
things don't matter since the enemy is gadgetless, primitive, and probably
genetically stupid. Anyway, knowledge would only make the enlisted ranks
restive, and confuse the officer corps.
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- Blank ignorance of the language is especially desirable
(as well as virtually guaranteed). For one thing, it will allow your troops
to be seen as brutal invaders having nothing in common with the population;
this helps in winning hearts and minds. For another, it will allow English-speaking
officials of the puppet government to vet such information about the country
as they permit you to have.
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- (3) Explain the invasion to the American public in simple
moral terms suitable for middle-school children at an evangelical summer
camp: We are bombing cities to bring the gift of democracy and American
values, or to defeat some vague but frightening evil, perhaps lurking under
the bed, or to get rid of a bad dictator no longer of service to us, or
to bring freedom and prosperity to any survivors. (This doesn't work in
Europe, which is honestly imperialistic.) The public can then feel a sense
of unappreciated virtue when the primitives resist. Sententious moralism
should always trump reason.
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- (4) A misunderstanding of military reality helps. Besides,
comprehension would only lead to depression. As Napoleon said, or may have,
in war the moral is to the material as three is to one, which implies that
unpleasant facts should be played down in favor of cultivating a cheerful
attitude. Most especially, it should not be noted that a few tens of thousands
of determined, probably genetically-stupid primitives with small arms can
tie down a cheerful force however gaudily armed.
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- Pay no attention to tactics, which are boring. It should
never enter your mind that in this sort of war, if you don't win, you lose;
if the enemy doesn't lose, he wins. Think about something else. Above all,
do not understand that the enemy's target is not you, but public opinion
at home. You don't need to remember this, as the enemy will remember it
for you.
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- (5) Do not forget that a military's reason for existence
is to close with the enemy and destroy him. An army is not in the social-services
business. Do not let the mission be impeded by touchy-feely considerations.
If you have to kill seventeen children to get a sniper, so be it. The enemy
must realize that you mean business. Ignore cultural traits, which are
of concern only to idealistic civilians. Grope the enemy's women. High-profile
rapes are a good idea as they teach respect. It is better to be feared
than loved. Be sure the embassy has a helipad.
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- (6) Intellectual insularity should be a primary goal,
as it avoids distraction. This salubrious condition can be achieved by
having officers read Tom Clancy instead of history. In military discourse
it also helps to encourage the use of phrases like "force multiplier"
and "multi-dimensional warfare," as these increase confidence
without meaning anything.
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- Remember that doctrine and optimism should always outweigh
history and common sense. Discourage colonels and above from reading about
similar campaigns fought by other armies, as this might lead to nagging
doubts, conceivably even to thought. Encourage the belief that other countries
have lost wars by being inferior to the United States. "The French
lost in Viet Nam? What else would you expect from the French? Never happen
to us."
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- Some military philosophers favor actually removing from
military libraries books on what happened to the French in Viet Nam, the
Americans in Viet Nam, the Russians in Afghanistan, the Americans in Afghanistan
(a work in progress), the French in Algeria, the Americans in Iraq (also
in progress), the Israelis in Lebanon the first time, the Israelis in Lebanon
the last time, the Americans in Lebanon 1983, the Americans in Somalia
the first time, and so on. However, the best thinkers hold that it doesn't
matter what books are in military libraries, as only those on stirring
victories will be checked out.
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- (7) Keep up to date with the latest nostrums and silver
bullets. Organize your military as a lean, mean, high-tech force characterized
by lightning mobility, enormous firepower, and extraordinary unsuitability
for the kind of wars it will actually have to fight. Flacks from the PR
department of Lockheed will help in this. Recognize that an advanced fighter
plane costing two hundred million dollars, invisible to radar, employing
dazzling electronic countermeasures, and able to cruise at supersonic speed,
is exactly the thing for fighting a rifleman in a basement in Baghdad.
Such aircraft are crucial force multipliers in multi-dimensional warfare.
Anyway, Al Quaeda might field an advanced air force at any moment. It pays
to be ready.
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- (8) It is a good idea to bracket your exposure. Be ready
for wars past and future, but not present. The Pentagon does this well.
Note that the current military, an advanced version of the WWII force,
is ready should the Imperial Japanese Navy return. It also has phenomenally
advanced weaponry in the pipeline to take on a space-age enemy, perhaps
from Mars, should one appear. It is only the present for which the US is
not prepared.
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- (9) View things in a large context. People who have little
comprehension of the military tend to focus exclusively on winning wars,
missing the greater importance of the Pentagon as an economic flywheel.
Jobs are more important than wars fought in bush-world countries. An American
military ought to think of Americans first. This is simple patriotism.
It is essential to spend as much money as possible on advanced weapons
that have no current use, and none in sight, but produce jobs in congressional
districts. Good examples are the F-22 fighter, the F-35, the Airborne Laser,
the V-22, and the ABM.
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- (10) Insist that the US military never loses wars. Instead,
it is betrayed, stabbed in the back, and brought low by treason. For example,
argue furiously that the US didn't lose in Viet Nam, but won gloriously;
the withdrawal was due to the treachery of Democrats, Jews, hippies, the
press, most of the military, and a majority of the general population,
all of whom were traitors. This avoids the unpleasantness of learning anything
from defeat. Further, it facilitates a focus on controlling the press,
who are the real enemy, along with the Democrats and the general population.
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- (11) Avoid institutional memory. Not having lost of course
means that there is nothing to remember. Instead, read stirring novels
and cultivate a cheerful, can-do attitude unintimidated by primitives in
sand-lot countries, who are probably genetically stupid.
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- (12) Do it all again next time.
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