Civilization Requires Deterrence
Deterrence is the ancient ability to scare somebody off from hurting you, your friends or your interests — without a major war.
Desire peace? Then be prepared for war. Or so the Romans believed.
It’s an easily understood concept in the abstract. But deterrence still remains a mystical quality in the concrete since it is only acquired with difficulty and yet easily forfeited.
The tired democracies of the 1930s learned that lesson when they kept acquiescing to Hitler’s serial aggressions.
Hitler’s Germany foolishly later attacked a far stronger Soviet Union in 1941, given Moscow’s lost deterrence after its lackluster performances in Poland and Finland, its pact with the Nazis, and its recent purges of its own officer corps.
Deterrence is omnipresent and also applies well beyond matters of war and peace. The current crime wave of murder and violent assault in our major cities is the wage of loud efforts to defund the police and contextualize crimes as somehow society’s rather than the criminal’s fault.
As a result, lawbreakers now believe there is a good chance that robbing people or hurting or killing them might result in monetary gain or at least bloody satisfaction. They no longer fear a likely sentence of 30 years in prison. So, they see little risk in hurting people. And innocents suffer.
With a border wall, an end to catch and release, and tough jawboning of the Mexican and Central American governments, a new American deterrent stance in 2019-20 discouraged once unstoppable waves of migrants.
Northern bound migrants knew that even if they reached and crossed the border, there was a good chance all such effort would be for naught, given quick apprehension and deportation.
So, in their rational calculations, migrants waited at home for less deterrent times. And they found them when Joe Biden stopped construction on the wall, renewed catch and release, and eased pressures on Mexico to interrupt caravans headed northward.
Abroad, Donald Trump restored the strategic deterrence lost by his predecessor.
Barack Obama had dismissed the murderous ISIS as “JVs” — and they thrived. He shrugged when China stole territory in the South China sea to build military bases. He dismantled missile defense in Europe to coax Vladimir Putin to behave during his own 2012 reelection campaign.
Obama loudly announced redlines in Syria while never intending to enforce them. He gave the Taliban back their incarcerated terrorist leaders in exchange for the return of the American deserter Bowe Bergdahl. And he sent the Iranians nocturnal cash to coax them to conclude an appeasing Iran deal. Aggression followed as U.S. deterrence eroded.
As an antidote to all that, Trump destroyed the ISIS “caliphate.” He obliterated an attack of Russian mercenaries in Syria. He took out terrorist masterminds like Iranian General Qasem Soleimani and the ISIS cutthroat Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
To dangerous actors, an unpredictable Trump appeared likely to strike back if provoked. As a result, America’s enemies become fearful of challenging the United States. And its friends and neutrals were more ready to join a power again deemed not just reliable, but willing to take reasonable risks to assist in their safety.
Key to deterrence is for all parties to know beforehand the relative power of each and the likelihood that it may be used. When strong powers unfortunately transmit signals of weakness, whether deliberately or inadvertently, then weak powers are confused and come to believe their rivals may not be so strong as their armed forces appear. Often, unnecessary wars are the unfortunate result.
These are quite dangerous times because Joe Biden has cut the defense budget. He withdrew recklessly from Afghanistan, leaving behind American citizens, our Afghan allies and friends, and tens of billions of dollars worth of modern weaponry and equipment.
He angered our NATO partners who were abandoned with some 8,000 troops, in a country that the United States had once implored them to enter. He has politicized the military into a caricature of an elite woke top brass at odds with traditionalist enlisted soldiers.
The result is that our enemies — Vladimir Putin’s Russia, the Chinese Communist apparat, the Iranian theocrats, the lunatic North Koreans — are now pondering whether Biden’s reckless laxity is an aberration. Or is it now characteristic of his administration? Or does it even signal a new weaker and confused America that offers enemies strategic openings?
Like the would-be felon, or the potential border crosser, our enemies know the United States has the power to deter unwanted behavior, given its vast military, huge economy, and global culture.
But they may have contempt that with such strength comes such perceived confusion. And thus, in the manner of an emboldened criminal, or migrant, they try something that they would otherwise not.
In sum, deterrence at home and abroad is now dangerously lost. And it will be even scarier trying to recover what was so rashly and foolishly thrown away.
https://patriotpost.us/opinion/82920-civilization-requires-deterrence-2021-09-23
****************************************Biden Slammed for Promising 'Consequences' for Border Patrol Agents in Whip Hoax
On Saturday, former 2020 Democratic presidential candidate and Hawaii congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard slammed President Biden’s remarks that there would be consequences against the Border Patrol agents falsely accused of whipping illegal immigrants.
As Katie reported, last week several leftist media outlets claimed that Border Patrol agents on horseback were using whips to keep Haitian migrants from entering the southern border. As she and Spencer reported, these claims were incorrect.
Following the reports, “[t]he White House and the Department of Homeland Security announced on Thursday Border Patrol's horse unit will no longer be operating in Del Rio, Texas after they were falsely accused of using whips against Haitians who were illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border,” Julio reported last week. Furthermore, the agents at the center of the controversy were placed on administrative leave amid an investigation.
“I promise you, those people will pay. There will be an investigation, underway now, and there will be consequences. There will be consequences,” Biden said on Friday. “It's an embarrassment, but beyond an embarrassment, it is dangerous. It’s wrong, it sends the wrong message around the world, it sends the wrong message at home. It's simply not who we are."
On the Fox News segment “Watters World” on Saturday, Gabbard discussed the “scandal” and slammed Biden for acting as “judge, jury, and executioner,” against the Border Patrol agents accused of whipping migrants.
“He’s absolutely wrong. He needs to apologize to the American people for saying what he said, and here’s why. He’s somebody who's been very outspoken as being against autocrats, autocracies, dictators – but what he essentially did was act as judge, jury, and executioner for these customs and border control agents on horseback,” Gabbard said in the interview.
“When the president of the United States has already declared their guilt and that they will be punished. And the other bigger issue that this points to, which is one that we all need to be concerned about, is that if we are no longer a country of laws, if we are no longer a country where we know we will be presumed innocent unless proven guilty, then we don’t have a democracy,” Gabbard continued.
Last week, as Katie reported, Gabbard blasted Biden’s ongoing border crisis and urged him to revert to immigration policies implemented during the Trump presidency.
“The Biden/Harris open-door policy has been a disaster. It needs to end now. The main beneficiaries of open borders are the gangs, cartels, and human traffickers. The Trump policy of having people wait on the other side of the border worked and needs to be reinstated,” Gabbard said in a tweet. In another tweet, she said “@JoeBiden @KamalaHarris, the humanitarian and national security crisis on the southern border is the direct result of your open-border policy. As I said in my 2020 presidential campaign, we can’t have a secure nation if we don’t secure our borders.”
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Facebook Smeared Me With Its ‘Fact-Checking.’ Now, I’m Suing the Tech Giant
Chad Wolf
Chad Wolf, acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security during the Trump administration, is a visiting fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy.
I was surprised to read The Washington Post’s recent editorial concluding that pro-choice protesters had crossed the line by demonstrating in front of the home of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
After all, The Washington Post is not exactly a conservative or rational voice on these types of issues. Almost all the points in the editorial made perfect and logical sense, including the concluding statement: “Leave spouses, children and homes out of it.”
As I finished reading the editorial, one overriding thought came to mind. Where was this logical point of view in 2020 when many Trump administration officials, including me, had to endure months of protests outside our homes for simply doing our jobs?
My experience started in the summer of 2020, shortly after civil unrest began around the country in the wake of George Floyd’s death in police custody. I was acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, which got involved because it has responsibility to protect over 7,000 federal properties, some of which were targeted by violent extremists.
For doing my job and exercising the authorities provided by Congress, my home was targeted by “professional” protesters who gathered out front week after week after week. Although I had seen other Trump administration officials endure this sort of behavior, seeing it outside your own home, on your street, gives you a different perspective.
The “protest” in front of my residence usually played out the same way. The protesters would organize roughly a quarter of a mile away and march through my neighborhood streets, holding up traffic, until they arrived in front of my house. There they remained for an hour or more to shout through loudspeakers, again while holding up traffic.
At no point did these protesters apply for a permit, which is required in the city of Alexandria. Even so, city officials allowed the illegal protests to continue.
Worse yet, a third-term member of the Alexandria City Council, John Chapman, actively participated on several occasions. His participation not only legitimized the illegal nature of the protest, but signaled that doing so at someone’s residence was valid.
From a security perspective, I knew my family and I were relatively safe because of the round-the-clock protection of the U.S. Secret Service. I knew that if any of the protesters decided to take their actions to another level, Secret Service agents were on the ready and always one step ahead.
Nevertheless, this unwelcomed activity put me on edge, since such “protests” can turn ugly quickly.
The situation also required my wife and I to have tough conversations with our two sons, who were both in middle school. We had to explain to them why people protest to express their views but why you should never do so in front of someone else’s home, where a family resides.
As a family, we altered our routines regularly. We were especially attentive to apparent strangers and newcomers to our neighborhood.
One of the most disappointing aspects was the response of some neighbors whom we had lived among for over 10 years. A few of them joined in with the protesters, who regularly mentioned my children’s names and where they went to school.
Instead of asking me about and seeking to understand my work at the Department of Homeland Security, these neighbors chose to disrespect me and my family on numerous occasions.
This was particularly difficult for my wife, who is active in our community (raising thousands of dollars for our public school, for instance) and goes out of her way to be nice and neighborly to almost everyone in our neighborhood.
Over time, the protests diminished and eventually stopped. I long have respected anyone’s right to peacefully protest, something I reiterated numerous times publicly as acting DHS secretary. But there is a time and place to protest.
Showing up at someone’s residence or at a restaurant where he is dining is not it. Such action, in my opinion, diminishes the cause that the protesters seek to elevate.
It’s unfortunate that protesting outside private homes has become part of the left’s playbook. Any conservative who lives near Washington, D.C., knows that he probably is in the minority among neighbors. But the lack of decorum and decency from some of those who live closest to us was something we had not planned on.
Fast-forward to the Biden presidency, and such neighborhood protests appear to be nonexistent despite the administration’s many difficulties on the southern border and elsewhere.
Whatever the reason for this discretion, I will be the first one to say it’s a good development and one that should endure. For the first time in a long time, I agree with The Washington Post: Leave spouses, children, and homes out of it.
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Obama Takes Shot at Biden on Border
The nation was been keeping a keen eye on Joe Biden’s first 8 months in office, even though it has been hard to watch at times. The President has been largely negligent on the issue of border security, which is ludicrous knowing that every migrant eyeing the American border was bolstered by his election.
Things have gotten so bad, in fact, that a great majority of the punditry, (some who lean left, even), have suggested that the US border is essentially wide open at this moment.
Even Biden’s former boss, Barack Obama, is growing perturbed.
Former President Barack Obama said Tuesday that open border policies on the Southern border were “unsustainable” for the United States.
“We have borders,” Obama said in an interview with ABC News host Robin Roberts. “The idea that we can just have open borders is something that … as a practical matter, is unsustainable.”
The president acknowledged that President Joe Biden was still dealing with migrant emergencies on the Southern border, calling it a “painful reminder” that America had not fixed the broken immigration system.
The statement, while somewhat vague, belies the internal strife of the Democratic Party at this crucial juncture of the Biden administration, and has telegraphed what is perhaps a long road to recovery for the liberal left.
https://flagandcross.com/bromance-over-obama-takes-cheap-shot-at-biden-on-border/
*******************************************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)
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