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Last year in March, I had a small series of posts called "War Is Hard." This one being the first. Now in that post one of the readers left this comment -
A lot of folks these days have this "Rambo" image of themselves in their minds. They seem to think they can go all "Lone Wolf" against any odds and win. Hollywood warrior mentality. What they didn't get out of that first Rambo movie (I didn't bother to watch the sequels) was why he was the way he was. He had all the training, and nothing to lose. When you have nothing to lose, everything changes. You know that sooner or later, you're going to die, and you accept that as fact. From there it is just a matter of killing as many of them as possible before they kill you. That Hollywood warrior mentality assumes immortality, which is of course idiotic. The reality of death, (and your own mortality) doesn't really hit home until you see it, up close and personal.
War is hard, cold and brutal. To succeed you have to become hard, cold and brutal. War is in the mind and once there, it never leaves.
The world is the way it is today because too few have seen war, or its' effects in any way except how it's portrayed (sensationalized) in action movies. The internet is full of keyboard warriors who talk about things like how we should become more actively involved in Ukraine, and should definitely establish a "no fly zone", because it's worth the risks, to teach Putin a lesson. Starting WW3 isn't going to teach anybody a lesson that's going to do them any good, and it certainly isn't going to save the people of Ukraine. It's just going to get everybody else killed, too.
The idiot in the story at the link has a wife and son at home, and he wants to go and fight in somebody else's war? Unbelievably stupid. You fight first for your home and family.
I read somewhere that the Ukraine military is turning down civilians who are volunteering to fight, I'm sure for the very reasons you lay out above, Sarge. Untrained combatants just get other people killed. Even skilled warriors generally can't just jump into another unit without learning how their command and control works. That's why so many militaries around the world do cross training exercises, to learn how other units work. (That is also why it usually ends up being a clusterfuck¹. Ask me how I know.)
Sleep with your rifle in your hands and your helmet for a pillow, and follow orders without question, and you might get out of this alive. Or you're just cannon fodder, it doesn't really matter. You've got nothing to lose anyhow, right?
War only makes sense in 2 cases; when you've got nothing to lose, or when you have everything to lose if you don't fight back. - Tank Killer, 16 March 2022
He made some rather good points which I didn't really follow up on at the time, life being busy and the war in Ukraine heating up. But in the search for something worthwhile to post, I went back to March of 2022. Tank Killer's comment was good enough to stand on its own, so I repeat it here.
As I'm currently reading about the Hell that was the Battle of Waterloo, I also believe that General Sherman was correct in the lines preceding the quote above -
I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine.
Indeed.
As for right and wrong in Ukraine, Putin is wrong. Sure Zelenskyy is probably a crook, after all, he is a politician, but his country was invaded, not the other way around.
So to all the politicians, end this nonsense, you want to fight? Do it yourself you feckless bastards.
What say you?
¹ I was going to clean this up, then decided, "Heck, who am I to censor a fellow human?"
to elaborate further on war, I'll give you one variation on Sherman's dictum:
ReplyDeletehttps://youtu.be/-jnzyq9JOEw
alas, it takes only one side to start a war, and sometimes, just sometimes , you can't give agressor nothing short of fighting he wants:
https://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/triumph/tr-last.htm
The great problem for Hitler at this point in his career was that his own bloated ego was fogging up his formerly crystal clear insight into international politics. The Führer-god of Germany was ever so slowly succumbing to the belief that he was infallible, that if he said such-and-such a thing was true, then indeed it must be true. He was suffering from a kind of creeping megalomania and it was clouding his judgment, blinding him to reality.
However, there was nobody left in Germany willing to tell him he was wrong, no one willing to question anything he said, no matter how outlandish it seemed.
sounds familiar to Putin before February 22, right?
Why yes, yes it does!
DeleteSeems to be a trait that Russian leaders since forever have. Definitely Stalin, most of those who followed him, and quite a few who preceeded him back all the way to the Rus.
DeleteYup.
DeleteI just finished James Holland's "Big Week" so what is said here resonates. WWII was the "good war" fought for a "noble purpose". Yet the numbers of young men who were burned to death, fell miles to earth, disappeared in explosions, were torn apart by cannon and machine guns died the same as if they were on the evil side. The sheer numbers of "acceptable losses" among the bomber crews who were sacrificed to the gruesome mathematics of war were painful to read. And they still did it mission after mission with all of the terror and loss. The whole movie concept of hero just seems ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteIt was worse for their opponents, as the bomber crew time in the fight could end if they completed enough missions, unlikely as that was. The defenders stayed in the fight until they died, with aircraft that didn't keep up with the improvements in the attacker's planes. Limited resources, constant death, and still they kept on.
When I was young, my father figure was an uncle who had been the Korean War. He was the most honest man I ever knew and he spoke often about what war was really like. He did not shield me from the truth about what he went through. So I have never had a romantic view of war.
Excellent book, I've read it myself.
DeleteRelying on anything produced by Hollywood is a mistake and the older I get the more this strikes home. Can only hope that another Russian decides to take care of the Putin problem.
ReplyDeleteBut what comes after Putin?
DeleteMore profit I'll bet...at least in the short run.
DeleteThe same thing in a different skin-bag. It's a Russian problem. They like very strong men who wield power in a strong powerful way. And that gets dictators (real and 'if it acts like a dictator it is a dictator' way.)
DeleteRob - Aye.
DeleteBeans - Meet the new boss, same as the old boss ...
DeleteThe only difference is this boss openly oppresses, that boss quietly oppresses. Citizens still die, disappear in the middle of the night, get sent to Siberia and death-level work camps, just one is more open about it and the other isn't.
DeleteBoth need to seek other employment.
DeleteI've mentioned this before, but I did say a little prayer when I came on alert in Korea, both air to air alert as well as well...another type of alert. That prayer went "Dear Lord, I don't feel a particular need to be a hero today, but if you do, and the siren sounds, please don't let me screw it up." It helped, but when the siren did sound and we got to the jets waiting for the engines to spin up and the radio to come on line so we'd get the code word, well...I'd say the flight surgeon would have something to say if he took my blood pressure at that point. Fortunately, they were all practice scrambles. A lot of guys in my squadron as well as guys I knew through my Father had flown in Vietnam, none of them talked about any glamour in doing that. On the surface, I enjoyed flying fighters, but there always was that underlying realization, that "Realsies" would certainly not be. All of us took that realization pretty seriously, especially when the Nightly News started talking about "Things".
ReplyDeleteThank You, Lord!
Amen!
DeleteIt must have been the same for the SAC missile crews every time the klaxon sounded and they sealed the Hole. "Please Lord, let this be a drill".
DeleteIndeed.
DeleteSarge, I am working my way through a book by the Classicist Victor Davis Hanson called Wars of The Ancient Greeks. He makes the point that up to the Peloponnesian War (431-404 B.C.), Greek warfare was largely ritualized (there were accepted rules) and that the hoplite class that fought the wars - the largely yeoman farmer, small landholder - were the ones voting to go to war. Those most impacted were the ones deciding, and many men fought as a "sign" of their standing in the polis: Socrates the Philosopher and Sophocles the Dramatist both carried the shield and spear at one point (Of note, this fell apart after the Persian Wars as the concept of the "total war" brought by the Persians began to take hold; things happened in the Peloponnesian War that would likely not have happened 150 years before).
ReplyDeleteWar to most is just something they see on a screen, something that happens "over there" with little or no impact to what happens to us. Even as we discuss this, bullets and missiles are flying in the Ukraine; it is something we see on a stream. The fact that it could rapidly stream out of control is lost on most people: One wrong interpretation, one line crossed, one bad decision, and reality comes crashing down.
For those that have Netflix, I highly recommend the new version of All Quiet On The Western Front. It is gritty and realistic in a way that will make a great many people uncomfortable about what war looks like (and also almost completely in German, which is nice): (at the risk of promoting myself , review is here: https://thefortyfive.blogspot.com/2023/01/movie-review-all-quiet-on-western-front.html).
It took me a while to get through the Netflix version of All Quiet on the Western Front as it deviated from the book in a number of ways (as you mention in your excellent post), but I eventually watched it for its own sake and like you, found it excellent.
DeleteThe Greeks had it right, you want to go to war, you better be ready to shoulder your musket and join in. (Or shield as the case may be,)
Sarge, I had some of the same problems with the adaptation (although to be fair, it has been a spell since I read it). I do wish they had kept in the part about him going home; it would have made even more sense now where we have veterans that in 6-12 hours can go from a combat zone to "the real world", with all that means.
DeleteThe movie showed the horrors of combat (in a somewhat limited but effective way) but I think missed the overall intent of Remarque's book. Which, I think, was to show what combat veterans go through, during AND after.
DeleteWRT Ukraine and Z, I agree- he's not a saint, but he's also not the perpetrator, so I'm supportive. But how much are we willing to spend to help? We lost billions in AFG that just went missing. Is that what's happening in UKR? I think someone's hand is deep in that till.
ReplyDeleteI don't support Zelenskyy, but I do support the Ukrainian people. As Churchill said upon being lending his support to the Soviet Union upon Hitler's invasion of Russia in 1941 -
DeleteIf Hitler invaded Hell I would make at least a favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons.
In essence, the lesser of two evils.
Little doubt that many hands are in the till; many have been since the occupant of the white house was veep. Yes Russia is the aggressor; but this is NOT our fight. There is no US national interest in Ukraine, yet we're spending hundreds of millions of dollars, expending huge amounts of ordnance for no reason.
DeleteBoat Guy
Not our fight, concur. Most whole-heartedly!
DeleteI have no problem supporting people who want to fight versus our country's last few engagements for peoples who wanted us to do the fighting for them.
ReplyDeleteHear, hear!
DeleteWars happen because a politician wants something a different politician has.
ReplyDeleteThe war in the Ukraine is a terrible thing, no way around that. Russia needs to leave.
I don't think we (the US) has a reason to be there. Our national interests are not there BUT many of our leaders (politicians) have a very personal interest in what happens in the Ukraine....so my country is in that war.
The "why it happened" is another thing I can't do anything about, but I think it was because the "west" (I wonder who is pulling the strings for the "west"?) wants Russia to not be where it is... maybe they want something Russia has?
No matter why, there is really nothing I can do about it.
War has been going on for a long time...
>>Thousands of bone fragments belonging to many people have been discovered along with further corroborative evidence of battle; current estimates indicate that perhaps 4,000 warriors from Central Europe fought in a battle on the site in the 13th century BC. As the population density was approximately 5 people per square kilometer (13 per square mile), this would have been the most significant battle in Bronze Age Central Europe known so far and makes the Tollense valley currently the largest excavated and archaeologically verifiable battle site of this age in the world.[1]<<
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tollense_valley_battlefield
3000+ years ago they were doing in Europe what they are doing in Europe today. The tools are different today.
Forgot to hit "Notify Me" box...
DeleteRussia has been pissed about losing the Ukraine since the USSR fell apart. Access to all that prime growing lands and all those never-freezing-over ports is the main reason. Not to mention most of Russia (well, their leaders and leading class) feeling like the Uke, or at least the eastern portion, was, is and will ever be part of Mother Russia.
DeleteWhich is why Russia invaded the Crimea. And invaded Ukraine before. And did a 'soft' invasion by having Russian citizens move into East Ukraine and then those Russians voting to make East Ukraine part of Russia. Putin trying to do what Hitler did to Austria before WWII.
Heck, if there was anything useful in Kazakhstan besides one big cosmodrone then Russia would have tried to return there.
The Uke has too many resources and useful land that Russia thinks belongs to Russia. That's why it's been endless war of one form or another since the Bolsheviks and Stalinists took over.
I read that article on the site in the Tollense Valley, fascinating stuff. ANother article (back in 2020) in The Daily Mail speculates that it was more of an ambush than a battle. See here.
DeleteRussia always seems to be pissed about something. Also note, Khrushchev transferred the Crimea to Ukraine, Peter the Great seized it from the original inhabitants and annexed it to Russia. Crimea should never have been given to Ukraine. IMHO
DeleteRob - Ah yes, the Notify box, can be useful.
DeleteCrimea - Acquired from the Turks, who acquired it from the Crimean Khanate, who acquired it from the Byzantines, etc. On a weird historical note, that last surviving piece of the Byzantine Empire, The Principality of Theodoro, was located there and survived until 1475 A.D. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principality_of_Theodoro). At one point, the Mongols and the Genoese fought a war there (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genoese%E2%80%93Mongol_Wars).
DeleteExactly.
DeleteEvery time I find the learned pundits in the major media strongly attempting to push my thinking in one direction, I get very worried: NOT!
ReplyDeleteI already know they're attempting to turn me into a mushroom (keep me in the dark and feed me bovine excement).
With just a little bit of thought it becomes immediately apparent that, as usual, the major media is once again the "Bullhorn" of the Deep State.
The main stream media, aka the Propaganda Ministry.
DeleteI grew up a decade behind you Sarge. I had all the mental training to be a cold war warrior, too. And the history I read on my own convinced me that it was a righteous cause to fight for the US. I still will if needed. I don't see the Rus as entirely at fault, I guess. At that bothers me no end.
ReplyDeleteTheir "Euromaidan revolution" was fomented by DC to remove an undesirable, but more or less legally elected PM. This joker that's there now was our pick. The 2015 guy was more Rus-centric. I just wish we'd keep our cotton picking nose out of stuff like the Uke and Libya, etc. The districts near the Uke that voted to align with the Rus democratically did so. Then suffered artillery and military attacks for years from the Ukes. My thinking is we helped make this mess.
I really hate to accept this, but we've got germ warfare labs running there, and our "betters" are making a killing on kick backs. The "Betters" have everything to lose if the knowledge is made public, and the arc of US foreign aid used to invest in FTX then FTX contributes to US politicians goes away. I just can't see the Rus letting that crap happen in the side yard without being upset and trying to do something about it. It is a morass of corruption, and with Pres Zel cracking down on opposition parties, the media and the church, how do we support that? It's a stringy, wormy soup, that I wish we could just drop. But I'm afraid it's "tar baby stuck".
I haven't stuck my noggin in this very deep, and may just be too naive. I've been wrong before, and I probably am now. But this smells like a normal DC outhouse op, and I don't want to get zapped because our grifter class is insatiably hungry for kickbacks. So they can't / won't stop our involvement.
Plenty of blame to go around, but as soon as Russian tanks crossed into Ukraine proper, Putin has the onus upon him.
DeleteSorry to disagree completely here, STxAR but Maidan was totally grassroot reaction of the people to the government rapidly doing 180 degree on agreement to cooperate closer with EU, with formal membership in the future. Millions of Ukrainians went to work in Poland since early 2000s and they realised potential unlocked by joining EU. As Putin sees, all his opposition anywhere in post-Soviet space is CIA sponsored plot, simply because he was part of such plot of destabilising West for much of his KGB career. I rememeber back in old communists times party tended to blame even bad potato harvest on evil CIA plot of par-dropping potato-eating beetles.
DeleteThe bio-weapon labs is utter BS, as well. US has own bio-research complexes, and it doesnt need to station them in foreign, unstable lands prone to be infiltrated by GRU or SVR...
You make a good argument Paweł.
Delete"As for right and wrong in Ukraine, Putin is wrong. Sure Zelenskyy is probably a crook, after all, he is a politician, but his country was invaded, not the other way around."
ReplyDeleteExactly. In a longer view I think Putin has, or had, visions of recreating the Soviet Union of the '30s and '40s, with himself playing the role of Stalin.
Forgot to put in posting as Jo Lovell
DeleteAs I like to say, "Putin is trying to put the band back together." Ya know, the USSR.
DeleteHi Joe!
DeleteHaving read all the comments with the same attention as the post, I will comment with trepidation. What I find intriguing is the fact that Putin seems to be holding back from seeking a shock and awe finale. Why? He has the means. It would almost seem like he wants a negotiated settlement but DC is having none of it.
ReplyDeleteZellensky came to Washington and treated them like his bitch. Complained that the 40 odd Billions wasn’t enough. Then the turtle stated that victory in the Uke was the number 1 priority for the GOP! I can only surmise that there are a number of extremely interesting negatives in a safe place in Kiev.
I think you're onto something here.
DeleteRe the cost. How much is it worth to prevent Союз Советских Социалистических Республик B. 2.0
ReplyDeleteExcellent point.
DeleteThe incredible and utterly pointless devastation and the toll in human lives and I ask, why? What is in it for us? Why is our government committed to a war against Russia at the cost of the total destruction of Ukraine,
ReplyDelete"Follow the money" will probably answer your questions.
DeleteCui bono?
DeleteAnonymous - Because our government is currently composed of feckless idiots.
Delete