Hamas Leader Dead, Good Riddance

When the story that Hamas leader Bassam al-Fara was assassinated by a Fatah party hitmen came out I had the same warm and fuzzy feeling as when one Mafia boss is rubbed out by another.

Good. At least the cops don't have to worry about convicting him.

In this case it's one less person trying to kill innocent people and the Mossad can scratch him off their to do list. al-Fasra was described as a military leader, along with being a judge in what today goes for the Palestinian government. Sounds like an interesting combination of jobs giving the old phrase judge, jury and executioner new meaning.

I'm not sure what a Fatah-Hamas civil war would do to the region, but at least the various militias would spend their time killing each other and not Israelis.

The Iraq Stufy Group Report: What is Missing

Over the last few days I've written several blogs on the report and ended up throwing them all away.

Today, while reading NRO's Andrew McCarthy it finally hit me what was wrong with the report.

It does not spell out a scenario of total, unrestricted warfare against our enemy. Of all the group's recommendations there is not one that states we should fully mobilize the country, call up every Guard and Reserve unit, I'll go to, and go to town in the region.

I'm not saying that it is the best idea out there, but to disregard this is an option that should be presented.

Personally, I think such a move would solve a great many problems. It would create new ones, as well, but in the end the Middle East and the world could be better off. Sometimes a doctor has to take out a large amount of healthy tissue in order to fully remove a cancerous tumor. The same holds true with Iraq. If you wish to make it stable and safe then a few chunks need to be removed from Iran and Syria.

This cannot be done in a half-way fashion. The entire military has to go, the country needs to be ready for an oil crisis comparable to what happened in the early 1970s, but most importantly we need a better plan for quickly leaving the region.

This plan must include setting the region on a course of civility. I think democracy is to much to ask for right now, but settling on government that are not interested in exporting terror is good enough. The pessimistic aspect of this iodea is it will only buy us some breathing room. If Muslims have managed to keep centuries old feuds going then we are not going to be able to change them, so we must change ourselves.

So, on the domestic front we need to implement laws that will cut our oil imports over the next 15 years to zero. This means more nuclear and coal power plants, mileage requirements for private automobiles, more oil drilling and research to develop a gasoline substitute for cars.

We will have to transform every aspect of our society to make this work, much like during WWII when every industry in the nation turned its attention to making war material. To say this would be massively disruptive and costly would me an understatement.

Why go to these great lengths? I believe a short, but very large fighting war, followed by a longer economic battle is preferable to the long, drawn out shooting war we are now involved in.

The end result will be a United States that is free. Free from having to worry about our oil umbilical chord that now attaches us to the Middle East. Once we are off oil we can deal directly with any nation or terror group without having to worry about disrupting our economy. After all, why else are we allowing Iran to dictate terms to us today regarding its nuclear weapons program.

The other benefit is we will develop a level of technology that will have the rest of the world beating a path to our doorstep. Would China or India rather use oil then whatever technology we develop? Doubtful. Once the industrial part of the world is weaned from the oil teat then the Middle East, Hugo Chavez, Russia and the rest of the world that depends on oil to finance terror groups and dictatorships can go to hell.

Now that I've once again solved the worlds problems, I'll go back to my day job.

Hamilton-Baker-Rear View Mirror Iraq Report

The Hamilton-Baker report on what to do with Iraq has been leaked by the NY Times, but here, for the first time, is a snippet from the even more secret Hamilton-Baker-Rear View Mirror report. More to follow.

Troop Redeployments:
U.S. and allied troops will be pulled from urban areas and sent to the Iraqi borders. The mission will be to stop the Iranians and Syrians from supplying their puppet terrorist forces in Iraq. The U.S. military is made for this type of mission. It is highly mobile, thus able to cover large amounts of territory and it has numerous surveillance capabilities, allowing the good guys to spot people sneaking in over the border. By removing our troops from the easily mined road net in and around the major cities we will eliminate the vast majority of IED attacks and RPG ambushes.

Allied troops will take over all border crossings, something that should also be done with the U.S.-Mexican border but that is an argument for another day. Two things will happen by physically controlling the crossings. First, the Iranian Fedex guy will not be able to easily bring in boxes of arms for the Shia militias, same holds true for the Syrian UPS dude. Second, if these fools insist on trying to smuggle something in such a blatant fashion then the country on the other side of the border can be held responsible. Everyone now knows they are doing this, but a little direct evidence never hurts. We can then take whatever action is necessary to stop this traffic. My suggestion on how to handle this situation involves large air strikes, but that is just my opinion.

The Iraqi Army, with U.S. advisors, will have to handle security in Baghdad and the various and any other urban hell hole in the country where violence breaks out. They need the practice.

Political Changes:
All militia's will be disarmed. Period. Sorry no private armies for anyone.

The Sunnis need to be told to behave or else we will leave and let the Shia kill them all. The Shia need to be told to behave or we will stay and keep killing them. The Kurds are the only people in the area with any common sense or decency. We give them whatever they want. Maybe the oil fields in Shiite land.