Fire and Ice

But we in it shall be remembered - we few, we happy few, we band of brothers; for he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile, this day shall gentle his condition; and gentlemen in England now-a-bed shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here, and hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks that fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.
- William Shakespeare, Henry V

This is a post about things that are heating up, and things that are cooling off; hence the title. The quote above is in remembrance of D-Day, when thousands of heroes paid our national blood and treasure that we and our brothers in Europe would be free.

The first item is something that will likely be appreciated more by Mighty Mo than by Father Time: a bumper sticker I saw in the parking lot at work Monday, and immediately took a picture of.

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Following up on this post, Secretary of Defense Gates has reiterated that Taliban fighters are using Iranian weapons. The SecDef didn't level any accusations against Tehran, and Afghan President Karzai isn't making a big issue of it. I'll reiterate what I said before: while it's technically feasible that Tehran isn't involved, it's difficult to believe that Iranian weapons are getting to the Taliban without at least having the blessing of Ayatollah Khameini and President Ahmedinejad.

Meanwhile, there's some intense fighting going on in Lebanon between the Lebanese Army and "Palestinian" terrorists linked to al Qaeda. The leader of the Fatah al-Islam group has pledged to escalate the violence; a second group, Jund al-Sham, is under assault from the Lebanese army elsewhere in the country. There's limited information about Jund al-Sham at Global Security.

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No pleasure, no rapture, no exquisite sin greater... than central air.
- Jason Lee, Dogma

I live in the hottest place in America: the Mojave Desert. As the crow flies, I'm less than an hour away from the hottest place in the United States, Death Valley.

During the Summer of 2006, I only turned on my air conditioning when I had visitors; and it was then that I learned that it did not, in fact, work. For various reasons, mostly financial and philosopical ones, I didn't run my air conditioner; this was convenient, because it didn't work. I've tried to run it lately, and it still didn't work, so I asked the maintenance guys to look at it, and it's all fixed and operational. I won't turn into an air conditioning addict, and I'll probably only run it a couple of hours each evening, but it's nice to have the option after thirteen months.

I also made a very simple purchase that I should have made during my first weekend in town: ice cube trays. I bought a pack of four, plus a special "Ice Tube Tray" that makes cylindrical ice for use in bottled drinks. I'm getting plenty of use out of that one in my Nalgene bottles.

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A survey of American troops says that they want weapons with more stopping power, particularly when it comes to handguns. A buddy back in College City told me recently that Special Operations Command (SOCOM) has reintroduced the .45 caliber pistol.

In my opinion, the caliber is similar to the question of armor on vehicles: just as more armor on a HMMWV merely serves as a slightly tougher target for terrorists to destroy, any gun caliber will eventually be too small of a punch to finish off a target. Of course, while I'm big on firing discipline and marksmanship, I understand that there are frequent instances in which a soldier or Marine needs to drop his target regardless of whether or not his aim is perfect. While I prefer a 9mm weapon, the guys on the ground have a good idea of what would make their fight more deadly to the enemy.

One mistake the United States made was adopting the 5.56mm M16 assault rifle/M4 carbine over the 7.62mm M14 rifle. I learned in a recent conversation with Desert Rat Tim that the Department of Defense is fielding the M14 in Iraq in as many situations as possible, limited primarily by available inventory. The M14 is more reliable than the M16/M4, and the 7.62 UN round offers more stopping power than the 5.56 NATO round.

Even though hind sight is twenty-twenty, the Department of Defense would do well to implement such changes. We owe America's heroes the equipment needed to accomplish the important missions to which they are assigned.

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I got this E-Mail from Father Time today; something tells me he wouldn't mind me sharing it.

Oscillate my metallic sonatas with your plan for the Iraq withdrawal.

- Father Time

That's a pretty complex question, but I think that I can give it a fair shake. Basically, I like the idea of setting benchmarks for the Iraqi government to achieve. I believe that when these benchmarks are achieved, we can gradually begin to withdraw portions of our deployed forces.

I believe that timelines are counterproductive. I believe that withdrawing if the benchmarks aren't met is counterproductive. I am comfortable with staying the course until the mission is done, because I believe a politically-motivated withdrawal would be a mistake and tragedy of epic proportions for both the West and the Middle East.

As far as complete withdrawal? I don't see it happening. When will we complete our "redeployment" from the Korean Peninsula? What about Japan? What about Germany? What I do know is that a country like America doesn't build the biggest embassy in the world and then withdraw completely.

As for oscillating metallic sonatas, perhaps my friend and colleague should consider seeing a hearing specialist.

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Let's be honest with ourselves, folks. What story involving news would be complete without a couple of stories... About Somali pirates!

On 16th May, two fishing boats (either two flagged by South Korea, or one Korean and one Taiwanese) were seized... By Somali pirates! On Monday the pirates claim to have killed one of the Taiwanese hostages, and the same article reports that they've seized a Danish freighter. The United States Navy fired on the Somali pirates(!), and maintains a presence in the waters off East Africa in an effort to fight piracy.

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Your friendly neighborhood Super Fly has to keep moving. I have most of next week off, and I won't be going back to Hometown or fighting Somali pirates(!), so one of my primary goals is to get that piece on ballistic missile defense finished up; that task will be facilitated by the arrival of air conditioning and ice!

Thanks for reading!