Good or Bad for the Jews

"Good or Bad for the Jews"

Many years ago, and for many years, I would travel to Morocco to visit uncles, cousins, and my paternal grandmother. Some lived in Tangiers;...

Saturday, January 11, 2020

Soleimani and the "Imminent Threat" Furor: Usual Nonsense from the Anti-Trumpers

OK. Qasim Soleimani is dead as dead can be--and that is a very good thing. As noted here and many other places, ol' QS was both a serial and a mass murderer on an international scale. He took particular "joy" in plotting and executing the death and maiming of Americans. He was a brutal fanatic who did not hesitate to murder his own countrymen, as well. He had risen to the near top of the Iranian gangster state and was the architect behind that state's campaign of international terror. Shed no tears for QS.

Well, shed no tears for QS unless, it seems, you're a member of the Trump Derangement Syndrome Squad (TDSS) and just can't see that President Trump was absolutely within his rights as President, absolutely right as a matter of principle, and absolutely required by his oath of office to protect and defend the United States in ordering the lethal attack on QS. He violated no laws; he acted in the best interests of the United States and the civilized world.

In fact, Trump likely did Iran a favor by removing the malignant QS tumor from the Iranian body politic, thus allowing the other gangsters in Tehran the opportunity to reassess their current path to total destruction. We see some preliminary reports--unverified, so far--of a mini-purge within the ranks of QS's old outfit, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. I hope that's true, and results from the Tehran Dons trying to make some course adjustments. The belated admission by the Tehran gangsters that, yes, indeed, they accidentally shot down the Ukrainian civilian jet over Tehran would seem an indication of possibly some change underway. Perhaps. Let's not be too optimistic, but . . . well, we'll see.

I don't understand the furor coming mostly from the TDSS over the "imminent threat" piece of the rationale to hit QS. That comprises a minor factor, an almost irrelevant one. "Imminent," of course, is a judgment call. Did we have to know with 99.99% certainty that QS and his band of merry thugs planned to hit US targets within a day, a week, a month, a year? Who cares? Why had QS gone to Baghdad to meet the leadership of the proxy Iranian militia that had just assaulted the US Embassy and previously killed a US civilian? They had future attacks in mind, and of that we can have no doubt.

The police do not have to show that a known murderer presents an "imminent" threat to others to take that murderer off the streets. They can remove him for actions already committed. Reasonable people could see a murderer who has killed multiple times over many years, bragged about it, and vowed to continue, as posing an "imminent" threat to the community--however you define "imminent."

I have worked a great deal with the product of US and other intelligence agencies. Some of it proves good; some not so good, to say the least. In this case, however, and again, there can exist no doubt--for reasonable people--that given QS's track record over the past nearly thirty years, that, at a minimum, he continued to pose a threat to Americans and others. Did Bin Laden or Al Baghdadi pose an "imminent" threat? I don't know, you don't know, none of us knows, and it's not relevant. What they already had done put them outside the boundaries of civilization. They deserved to die. Period.

Soleimani presented a proven, clear, and continuing lethal threat to American citizens. Period.

Soleimani deserved to die. Period.

13 comments:

  1. Pleasant options, like unicorn rainbow poop, can be hard to come by.
    Trump's actions were downright saintly here in comparison. QS' departure was quick, something QS didn't provide to most of his victims.
    As Feinstein said to Pelosi on the "impeachment", "if it's important, send it quickly... if it's not, don't" which is obvious to translate as "it's either quick and important, or it's politics as usual". Democrat objections to eliminating QS are the same. Do something expeditiously, or admit that your objections are pure partisan politics.

    - reader #1482

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  2. But, he was supposed to be the Democrat nominee at a brokered convention.

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    1. Wow! I guess I hadn't through all the consequences . . .ha!

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  3. Di-Fi the chi-spy got a call from soros and changed her tune immediately. Haha

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  4. It is TDS plain and simple. It doesn't matter how much good for the country Trump achieves. The Media and Democrats (One in the same) will always spin negative. What will matter is more of the historical base of the democrat party benefiting from the policies of President Trump, and coming to the realization that the Democrats do not run a party, they run a vote plantation.

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  5. Two parts here - first as regards the rending of garments & the gnashing of teeth over not consulting Congress. Though a different foe the context is essentially identical.

    How quickly they forget:

    Question - "I wonder if you could explain why you don’t think you need legal authorization from Congress."

    SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL - "But, to be clear, we do not believe the President needs that new authorization in order to take sustained action against ISIL. We believe that he can rely on the 2001 AUMF as statutory authority for the military airstrike operations he is directing against ISIL, for instance. And we believe that he has the authority to continue these operations beyond 60 days, consistent with the War Powers Resolution, because the operations are authorized by a statute."

    https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2014/09/10/background-conference-call-presidents-address-nation#.VBH-xrMzc7I.twitter

    ***

    Now as regards the "Imminent Threat" questioning.

    I find it extremely curious that the media doesn't seem to realize the implications of what they themselves pre-empted their own evening news broadcasts when they reported our forces were under attack by ... ballistic missiles!

    Not cruise missiles which staging and fueling can be a fairly quickly done thing but ballistic missile attacks are necessarily a more deliberative operation entailing some not inconsequential time to set up.

    Certainly enough time that an orbiting platform would have time - perhaps a week even - to detect early stage preparations.

    The question then arises; would a President think it wise to tip his hand to a hostile Congress that he might choose some course of action to influence any who look to be 'upping the ante' following a failed, for instance, embassy takeover?

    JK

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  6. It seems clear that we could have had Marines shoot "mourners" in the embassy entrances around the Middle East, and those same Marines would be denigrated by the US media. Or, one missile to take out the person directing those operations and responsible for so many in the past. With the bonus to "shake the box" of the IRGC and Iranian power brokers. Oh, and instead of blame being heaped on Marines, the US media and Democrats pile it on Trump, who as the leader should take the brunt of the external abuse protecting the rank and file.

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    1. Excellent point - and the media has been waiting to Benghazi Trump at the drop of a US ambassador - but instead he got out in front of his attackers both here and abroad.

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  7. There is another clear message from the timing of this targeted killing: Iran, don't think you can pull another 1979 EMbassy and hostage taking stunt. Our Embassy in Baghdad was attacked a few days before QS was taken out, and by a Shi'ite group with which he was associated.

    Even so, the recent events in Iraq show that we have no business staying there. When we imposed plebiscitory democracy, the Shi'ites won, and the Sunnites rebelled, morphing into Daesh. We now take out QS, and the formerly pro-Daesh and furious Sunnites start breaking out in dancing and passing around sweets. We'll never satify either side, and by staying, we become a convenient excuse and scapegoat for why Iraqis can't get their own act together. Instead of trying to guarantee all the borders in place when the UN Charter was signed, maybe we should re-tool our foreign policy towards a frank admission that history is still going to happen, especially to those who really want it to happen. We have, after all, all but bankrupted ourselves playing the world's policeman.

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    1. "We have, after all, all but bankrupted ourselves playing the world's policeman."

      One of the greatest achievements of the US was the benign way in which the US invested labor & treasure in rebuilding defeated Japan and Germany in the aftermath of WWII. That compares so favorably with the evil "Kick them while they are down" approach the English & French applied after WWI. The 7 decades of relative peace following WWII is a clear demonstration of the wisdom of then-leaders of the US.

      But that was over 3 generations ago. It is time for the US to kick those ungrateful chicks out of the nest and let them look after themselves.

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  8. I, for one, trust and hope that we have a list of these jerks, and when an opportunity arises to shorten that list, do so with minimum consultation on high. "Public enemy" fits.

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  9. killing soleimani in 2020 is like killing himmler in 1938. yeah, nobody was at war with the nazis...yet. himmler’s demise may have accelerated the war...or not, or emboldened antinazi germans. we don’t know, but adding another depraved soul to hell sure feels good.

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