You are a 19 year old woman living in London. Your parents have provided you with a comfortable but not quite prosperous life. You were raised in the public school system and are entering your second semester of college. As a young woman, you tend to keep more to yourself, especially in public, focused more on dodging traffic on your way to catch the morning train for your 10am class.
On this particular day, something (or rather someone) catches your eye. There is a young man with a beard on your train. He is clutching a backpack much more closely than someone normally would, embracing it like a sick child. He is rocking front to back, not like the other passengers who rock irregularly side to side with the movements of the train. His eyes close and he is speaking in a barely audible whisper; he is praying, but not in a tongue that you recognize. Something is definitely not right. You know something is not right. There is a young man of Middle Eastern descent sitting in the tube nervously clutching a bag. He is obviously in distress, and could be up to no good. “But wait, am I being racist?” you ask yourself. Maybe he is just having a bad morning, perhaps a family member is ill and he was up all night with worry. Perhaps his movements and prayers are not uncommon in his culture. “It’s fine,” you tell yourself. And then you are ashamed for just assuming a young Arab male is automatically a terrorist. This is not how the schools and your parents raised you. The train stops and out of the corner of your eye you see he has disembarked from the train. This is his stop, in the hospital district. Everything really IS fine! Oh wait, “Sir, you’ve left behind your bag!” And then the train explodes. Just hours before that horrific bombing at Manchester Arena, Salman Abedi (obviously an American, southern hate group leader) posted an ominous warning to Twitter:
Abedi was the son of Libyan immigrants, and part of a close-knit community of jihadists loyal to Colonel Gaddafi. He was known by British security services and had recently traveled to Libya and then returned to the UK. How was this warning missed? Especially when the warning came from a man known to be a security risk? Was it because he lived in one of the UK’s well-known but little talked about “no go zones?” Was it because, as in the case of the Rotherham child abuse scandal, authorities did not want to be perceived as racist? Even more chilling, is it because Manchester’s citizens saw something but said nothing for fear of being prosecuted under the UK’s ridiculous hate speech laws?
Abedi was of the “lone wolf” variety of terrorists. Hard to track, even harder to stop. The very best defense governments have against a lone wolf attacker are the eyes and ears of an alert and wary populace. However, these same governments undermine the security of their best and only line of defense by branding anyone suspicious of an oddly acting Arab as a racist. Abedi detonated a bomb laden with ball bearings outside of the ticket office of an arena packed with 21,000 people, and a large number of people gathered outside to collect their children after the show. A young, Arab male carrying a bag who was about to blow himself up without a doubt displayed some type of erratic behavior. There would have been police and other security people in that very near vicinity. In other words, there were eyes and ears all around Abedi as he stood outside, preparing to receive his gift of rivers and virgins. But no one said or did anything. Civilized people are now taught that to maintain civilized status, one must not judge the actions of a person, even if that person is vastly more likely to carry out a murderous act. 22 people, children mostly, were murdered in an act that could have been stopped or at least mitigated by someone alerting to his behavior, which was no doubt suspicious at the very least. But yet again, within hours of another terrorist act committed by an Arab male, British leaders lectured the world not to judge an entire religion based on the actions of a few. At least until the next time there is a terrorist bombing and the entire world, correctly, assumes it was carried out by an Islamic jihadist. Long live The Republic.
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A Memoir: Part Nine
"The Pragmatic Volunteer" is a twice weekly series. Check back every Wednesday and Friday for the latest installments!
Part One -- Part Two -- Part Three Part Four -- Part Five -- Part Six Part Seven -- Part Eight
Author's Note: What follows is the poorly thought-out and loosely examined history of the life of a guy who didn’t much matter in the grand scheme. But he mattered. We all matter. And I had a hell of a lot of… fun and such along the way. I intend to chronicle some of the experiences of a 23-year career in the United States Air Force.
In early October, we were advised the Wing would be deploying KC-135 and support personnel for combat operations out of several forward locations. We were sending one intel troop and one communications security (COMSEC) specialist to each of them. We were running out of intel people who were qualified to perform all aspects of the daily flying mission, and I recommended to my boss that I be one of the intel folks deployed. She was hesitant, arguing that I was new to the unit and to the mission. I mean, my last job was teaching people how to do harm in an academic setting. This was the opposite of all of that. The lady was smart. In fact, she was a nuclear physicist (and now holds a Ph.D). I countered that though I was new there, I had been an intel guy for a long time and was familiar with the requirements of supporting flying operations. I don’t know if my ‘I’m good enough, doggone it’ convinced her or if it was the fact that it was either her or me, but I was deploying. We had no one else.
The first place myself and my COMSEC section leader were sent was Rhein-Main Air Base. These folks were assigned to the intel flight because we shared security needs, and we all worked directly with the aircrews on mission support. The flying squadron also ran a piece of their planning activity in my vault, but they were not subordinated to my flight. At Rhein-Main, there were no spaces save an old vault in a condemned building awaiting demolition. The vault was in the basement at one end of the facility. There were several other rooms one walked past to get to the vault. Many windows were out and there was mold and mildew everywhere. It was odoriferous. But the vault was secure enough and had an approved type of door, and we had a modern GAO-approved digital combination lock installed before we started storing classified in there. The things we had to go through during those few days to ensure we adhered to proper security procedures would make a certain failed presidential candidate laugh and email someone for a glass of iced tea. And since the things we had to talk to the crews about were classified, the crews (and on one occasion, several American reporters – that was tricky) had to come to our stinky vault to take their mission briefs. So they all got to experience the love of that nearly-subterranean palace we worked in. Since TSgt COMSEC and I were the lone specialists in our fields, we were busy. We worked the flying schedule. That is, we went in before missions to brief the crews and we went in again to debrief them when they returned. Both of us, every mission. I had managed to acquire each of us rooms to ourselves in the old (also condemned, but not in nearly as bad shape) billeting building we were assigned. This was because we would be napping and moving around at all hours, and other people had more regular schedules. Still wasn’t fun, but at least no other fucker was snoring during my naps. After about ten days, we were sent to Souda Bay on the northwestern portion of Crete. Great! Another exotic island for me! Yeah. Our mission didn’t change, and there were still just the two of us. The things we do for you people. We moved from Frankfurt to Crete on one of our KC-135s. The minimum crew aboard the aircraft is three: A pilot, a copilot, and a boom operator who is also the loadmaster. On this transfer, in addition to moving all the personnel and equipment needed to do the job at Souda, we had receivers scheduled along the route. These were C-17s doing missions in Afghanistan. C-17s need a lot of gas, so we were heavy. Within scant pounds of maximum allowable loadout for flight operations. The boomer was nervous. Between and a couple feet behind the two front crew seats, and with the boomer’s station on the starboard bulkhead, there was a steel ‘jumpseat’ which pops up from the deck and is locked in place to support an observer. On the takeoff from Rhein-Main, I was in the jumpseat and on headset. As we gained speed and approached the end of the pavement, I could sense Boomer’s nervousness, but he remained silent. Finally, as it looked like that red line might get crossed by rubber (which would be a VERY BAD THING), the pilot calmly said “Rotate.” Boomer immediately, and I mean before the pilot had the word all the way out, said “Thank God.” He was nervous. So was I, but he knew to be. I was just freaked out. And the front wheel left the ground and everybody lived ever after. Or at least after. Our receivers had overestimated their fuel needs and only took about half the load we had taken aboard for them. Makes you think, huh? Had they been able to be more accurate, we’d have been able to “rotate” in a normal fashion and Boomer wouldn’t smell so funny. But militarying ain’t easy. I did get a chance to go into the boom pod while Boomer was washing the windshields of those Globemasters. Might as well. There was nothing else to do and the in-flight movie sucked. It was incredible. Getting that close to another big jet in the sky… it is a thing to behold, I promise you. Still think we should have force-fed them that extra gas they made us bring, though. When we got to Crete, we were too heavy to land because we still had all that extra fuel aboard. There are a lot of rules about that shit. You can’t just spray out jet fuel from cruising altitude traversing various countries who allow you in their airspace. That's what makes chemtrails! So the driver asked Crete to allow us to dump the stuff in the Med. That was an unpopular idea with the tower, so we flew in circles around that part of the Sea for an hour and a half. Can’t spill it in the ocean, but it’s alright to burn it. Greeks, man. We. Are. Sparta! I don’t recall how long we were on Crete, but it wasn’t as long as we’d been in Frankfurt. Maybe six or seven days. But we did get a couple moments of down time. We were in a hotel on a small mountain overlooking the bay – yes, I admit: it was a beautiful view. And the calamari was to die for. The things you people do for us. We took taxis down to the nearby town, which was exciting. Like Korean Honey Badgers with deeper tans. By the end of October we were back at Mildenhall. Still running 24/7 ops, of course. We would be for a long while. In the coming days and weeks, I rewrote schedules time and again as our spaces were required to accommodate personnel from the Air National Guard back home who had been called up to help in the massive efforts underway against the Taliban and others who had helped al-Qaida attack our homeland. The unit I remember working with the most was the Tennessee Air National Guard. I had always thought of Guard guys as somehow lesser than we active duty folks, mainly because at Bergstrom there had been an Air Force Reserve unit who used to visit our snack bar and they looked like poor facsimiles of Air Force guys. Uniforms, hair, boots… bro, do you even military? But these guys were professionals, and they helped change my opinion of weekend warriors. For one thing, my entire job was to suit up and serve every day. These guys had jobs and families back home and they had to leave all that behind to serve. That has to be a tough life. Tougher than mine. My views forever shifted. Still, I never could get used to their enlisted guys calling officers by their first names. As it happens, one E-6 was the supervisor of one of the O-5s in their ‘real’ jobs back home. Life is funny. In March 2003 we invaded Saddam’s Iraq for the second time in my career. My unit was again called to action because of our long legs and other assets besides our pretty smiles (which were pretty fucking charming if I do say so). The same month, Tex and I decided we weren’t working out so well. She went back to the Republic, and I lost my mind for a little while. I finally got approved to take a little leave and went back to my hometown. This was the first time I’d ever flown home for leave while stationed overseas. It was therapeutic and sorted me out pretty well. My head cleared and I was back to whatever normal means. Shit happens. And then in remarkably short order, I met a girl. One night in my local (this is what British, or at least English, people call the pub they frequent most in their village), a big, easily-angered but mostly not-too-irritating gym rat whom I knew from the pub decided I was macking on this bird he fancied. I was talking to her and this girl I met, but none of that mattered to Sir Charles Atlas. He was drunk. I was wearing a heavy leather jacket and he grabbed it by the collar, lifted me enough so I couldn’t gain traction, and took me out into the courtyard of the pub. I might have been able to do something, but I had no idea he was mad or why he was doing this. He could sometimes be an alright bloke, and I didn’t want to risk making things worse. He knew where I lived. And thick as he was, he was a hard bastard. You wouldn’t fight him. As we crossed onto the pavement outside the back door, Sir Charles released me back to terra firma and left my back to the big window in the door. The guy knew tactics. Some little dingleberry who decided he was the Gymlord’s personal protector (this happened a lot... Fennies, man), punched me in the back of my head. When I say “punched,” I don’t know what I mean. But it was irritating, nothing more. I stood facing Sir Charles and at that moment, I raised my index finger in the universal ‘gimme a second here’ sign to him. He nodded. As I turned to address this gnat, a very large woman of my acquaintance was grabbing it bodily and flung it into the hedge by the wall. It was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. And Sir Charles also found it a bit amusing. It broke his rage. So I didn’t get killed and am still here to write this. Lucky you. And luckier me. I also met Bruce Dickinson (the front man for Iron Maiden) during my time at Mildenhall. He was doing a show about human flight on the Discovery Channel and came to our unit to film an episode. The flying squadron, which was in the same Ops Group as my squadron and situated downstairs from my vault, walked him through various aspects of mission planning and I went downstairs just to say hello. So it was that the guy known as “The Air Raid Siren” flew with a unit which had been known as the 100th Bomb Group in WWII. It was part of The Mighty Eighth. One of my guys even brought his guitar for Dickinson to sign. I thought that was a bit much, but allowed it because, well, I wanted to meet the guy too. I get it. I just don’t ask for autographs. When my tour at RAF Mildenhall was up after four years, I still had enough time on my current enlistment that I was required to choose another duty station. I did not wish to leave England so I tried to extend at my current assignment at Mildenhall. My CO decided to disapprove my request and called me into his office to tell me himself. He also told me why. I couldn’t disagree with his logic or his leadership. I was disappointed, but that guy has my enduring respect. Sir, I salute you.
Next in the FINAL installment:
Rex Marries a Girl. Tune in for the drama.
Four months into his Presidency, Donald Trump continues to create chaos throughout the political universe, including major schisms within his own party. Not only are Republicans still re-litigating the (largely irrelevant) Cruz-Rubio-Kasich battles of early 2016, but various voices on the right have now begun clashing on the appropriate way to deal with an anti-conservative Republican president. These range from those who have bought red hats and jumped willingly onto the #TrumpTrain, all the way to those who seem intent on purging not only Trump supporters, but also anyone who doesn’t seem to be sufficiently outraged at Trump’s every action.
The most recent iteration of this debate revolves around the newly-named Anti-Anti-Trump designation, reserved for conservative voices who take great joy in the rantings and ravings of the hysterical left. A week ago Sunday, Charles Sykes penned a piece in the New York Times Sunday review that raised the very serious concern that hyper-focus on the insanity from the left is not, in actuality, any kind of a policy position. There may be some joy to be taken in mocking the daily pearl-clutching over every Trump offense, real or imagined, but none of that effort does anything to forward any kind of conservative ideals. With a big-government authoritarian in the White House and a Congress of questionable loyalty to conservative ethos, conservatives cannot afford to be passive, but must instead drive actual policy ideas within the party. It is probably worth noting that the biggest offenders cited in Sykes’ piece – Hannity, Palin, Limbaugh – represent something less than a murderer’s row of conservative policy wonks. These are not the places where great conservative ideas have ever hatched or developed. Nevertheless, strawmen need slaying, too, and his basic point is worth heeding: simply noting that many of Trump’s critics are batty is not all that productive. Taking it a step further, Damon Linker suggested in The Week, and Jay Cobb of The Buckley Club re-stated, that criticism of Trump’s critics amounts to cowardice. Trump is evil, they argue, and even if the left’s criticism of Trump is flawed (a point that I don’t believe either has actually conceded), it pales in comparison to the dangers posed by the Trump presidency. Therefore, noting the insanity of any criticism of Trump is, in fact, an explicit support of Trump. There is no anti-anti-Trump, they argue, there are only people who really, really want to be Trump supporters but find it socially unacceptable. Besides betraying their geographic location, there are a number of problems with this line of double-negative thinking; most notably that the application of this logic-leaping is almost automatically self-defeating. Within two sentences, Linker excoriates The Federalist’s Sean Davis for hyperbolically calling the actions of Susan Rice “worse than Watergate” before immediately citing a rumored investigation of the Trump campaign as “making Watergate look like a triviality”. The irony appears to have been missed. Cobb wants to claim that “opposing Trump doesn’t mean you have joined the other team” while also maintaining that opposing Trump’s critics very necessarily means that you have joined up with Trump. Left out, obviously, is the truly crazy idea that adults of even moderate intelligence can maintain more than one thought in their heads at any one time. To pull an idea from @molratty, perhaps a more reasonable plan is to voice your opposition based on principles, not personalities (which, in the interest of self-analysis, I have sometimes struggled with). Taking this kind of enemy-of-my-enemy approach is a perilous decision for any conservative. You may, for this moment, be aligned with the left in your desire to resist the President, but your motivation for doing so is very different from theirs and it absolutely does not make you friends. The hysterical left is out to not only impeach Trump because he is a bad President, but because doing so will help to dismantle the GOP and irreparably harm the conservative cause. They’ll be happy to treat anti-Trump conservatives as useful idiots towards that goal, but there is no goodwill to be earned nor fair treatment to be expected afterwards for those who were on “their side” before a Trump implosion. The left’s opposition to Donald Trump is not entirely personality-agnostic (it is more intense under Trump even than it was for the reviled George W. Bush), but it is incredibly naïve to think that they will treat a run-of-the-mill Republican substantially better than Trump. Bill Maher acknowledged as much quite eloquently before the election in November, and lest we think that any lessons have been learned, I would direct you to the burgeoning volume of “Mike Pence is worse” work that has already begun circulating. I’ve written a lot of (so far fruitless) words pointing out what I consider to be Donald Trump’s large number of unforgivable personal and professional flaws. I’ve nearly exhausted my ability to think of pejoratives to describe him and interesting new insults to call him. I think I have identified two things he has ever said or done that were even remotely defensible (Neil Gorsuch and one idea that was almost certainly an accident). I’ve spelled out my reasons for never, ever voting for him and for my unwillingness to “give him a chance”. Heck, I even voted for Hillary Clinton. HILLARY CLINTON!!! All of which is to say: I am pretty confident in my anti-Trump bona fides. And yet, I don’t find it remotely difficult to also identify the absurdity of the seven month tantrum we’ve seen from the left. Like other reasonable people, I am perfectly capable of finding Trump to be unfit for the office and a national embarrassment, while also finding humor in the feverish histrionics of the detached left. Even the most ardent Trump-hater on the right should be able to step back and acknowledge that organized riots perpetrated by Antifa or calls for impeachment by Al Green based on innuendo are wildly irresponsible and counterproductive to an ultimate goal of rescuing conservative principles. I can do this by choosing not to dwell on Trump’s flaws at every moment of every single day or blindly supporting even his most absurd critics. Beyond an inability to tolerate disagreement, these anti-Trump conservatives are suggesting that we can’t even tolerate a variance in the severity and frequency of our agreements. Anything less than a full-time, full-throated protest is tantamount to making phone calls and knocking on doors in support of Trump. I, for one, reject this notion, and suggest that you do, too. Idiocy is idiocy, regardless of whether or not that idiocy is committed in support of my desired outcome. |
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