Subject: [Homestead] How wars start and how wars end
Date: Wed, 08 Sep 2004 14:26:09 -0700
Wars have a simple logic---kill or be killed. The grunts who do the
fighting and dying have that choice, no other. The last man standing
wins. The sweetly moralistic (make that never-shot-at) Eric Hall thinks
he can change human nature. The U.S. intervened at 30,000 feet to
minimize and finally stop Christian Serbs from wiping out Muslems in
Bosnia---with no gratitude from the Muslim world whatsoever, and of
course none from the Orthodox Serbs..
The U.S government has stupidly, and since 1948 called on Israel to
employ sweet reason, not artillery,, tanks and aircraft to avoid
extinction by circumscribing Arab states who have never given up the
desire (or efforts) to drive the Israelis into the sea---and who have
shown no inclination to stop The only reason the U.S. made such
irrational demand on Israel is because their ox wasn't being gored.
Israelis have the good sense and survival instinct to distinguish
between politicobabble and military reality.
Similarly, the U.S. government has irrationally called on Russia to
"negotiate with" Chechen/Ingusha "terrorists"---the most recent
euphiemism for guerrillas. No, they aren't fighting because Stalin
deported 600,000 of them to Central Asia in 1944---that stopped the tit
for tat business until recently when the Chechen and Ingusha guerrillas
decided an economically and militarily weaker Russia could be safely
attacked because earlier attempts weren't met with the crushing force
Stalin employed.
Putin isn't greatly impressed with U.S. moralistic exhortations---the
Russian people won't permit it. He will be lucky if they don't throw him
out for NOT doing the Stalin bit on the guerrillas and the population
giving them cover after this schoolhouse massacre is to see if the
Russians respond by total war. So be it.. It should be enertaining to
watch.
September 08, 2004
Putin rips Washington's calls for diplomacy with Chechens
By Nicholas Kralev
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The United States and Russia clashed yesterday over a way to end the
conflict in the breakaway republic of Chechnya, with Washington calling
for a political solution and Moscow vowing to crush the separatist movement.
Days after a school siege in the Northern Ossetia region that claimed at
least 350 lives, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the West — and
the United States in particular — of having a double standard when
dealing with terrorism.
"Why don't you meet Osama bin Laden, invite him to Brussels or to the
White House and engage in talks, ask him what he wants and give it to
him so he leaves you in peace?" Mr. Putin told foreign reporters in
Moscow late Monday.
"You find it possible to set some limitations in your dealings with
these [terrorists]? So why should we talk to people who are child
killers?" he said, according to one of the translations of his remarks
in the British press.
About half of the casualties of last week's attack in the southern town
of Beslan were children. Foreign fighters are said to have joined the
Chechens in the attack. It came a week after two plane crashes and a
Moscow subway station bombing, all of which have been attributed to
Chechen terrorists.
Mr. Putin said the West should have "no more questions about our policy
in Chechnya," where Russian forces have been fighting the separatists
for more than a decade.
The Bush administration strongly condemned the school siege and called
it an act of international terrorism.
"There really are no free passes in this struggle, this war," said
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. "No free passes for countries, no
free passes for individuals."
But the State Department said, "There must be a political settlement" to
the Chechen conflict.
Challenging Mr. Putin's blanket definition of "terrorists" as everyone
working for Chechen independence, the administration has made a
distinction between the terrorists responsible for the attacks and
legitimate separatist leaders.
"There is no question that the people carrying out these acts have no
political affiliation; they have a terrorist affiliation, and one
shouldn't confuse the two things," said State Department spokesman
Richard Boucher.
Mr. Putin accused the United States of undermining his country's war on
terrorism, citing meetings that mid-level U.S. officials have had with
Chechen leaders.
"President Putin is making references to occasional visits, not one
recently, by Chechen personalities to staff members in the State
Department as part of our way of keeping informed about the situation in
the region," Secretary of State Colin L. Powell told reporters.
Later, U.S. officials said the last formal meeting with a high-level
Chechen leader took place in September 2001 and was hosted by the Russia
desk at the State Department. They did not specify a name, but on Jan.
23, 2002, the Russia desk director met with Ilyas Akhmadov during a
conference in Washington.
Mr. Akhmadov, "foreign minister" in the self-styled government of
separatist leader Aslan Maskhadov whom Moscow has accused of terrorism,
was granted political asylum in the United States earlier this summer.
"As we have said before, we recognize Russia's sovereignty over
Chechnya," Mr. Boucher told reporters on Jan. 24, 2002. "We did not meet
with Mr. Akhmadov in any official capacity, but as an individual with
particular insights into the Chechen conflict."
"We do have a policy that says we will meet with political officials,
leaders who have different points of view. We've done that in the past.
We may or may not do that in the future, depending on who these
individuals might be," Mr. Boucher said yesterday.
"But we do not meet with terrorists and people who are involved in
terrorism," he said.
Having repeatedly leveled harsh criticism of Moscow's wars in Chechnya
in the 1990s, the United States became more sympathetic to Mr. Putin's
challenge in the province after the September 11 terrorist attacks in
the United States.
In 2002, the State Department designated several Chechen groups as
foreign terrorist organizations.
The administration yesterday tried to shift the focus from the sharp
disagreement over policy to solidarity with the victims in Beslan — and
all of Russia — in the wake of last week's attack.
"We are absolutely united in condemning this horrible action that took
place in this small town," Mr. Powell said.
Mr. Boucher said two C-130 U.S. cargo planes had flown medical supplies
worth about $580,000, which were stockpiled in Germany, to Russia and
planned an additional flight from Italy.
The U.S. ambassador to Russia, Alexander Vershbow, released $50,000 in
emergency assistance, Mr. Boucher said.
In Moscow yesterday, about 130,000 people rallied outside the Kremlin in
a government-sponsored demonstration against terrorism.
Mr. Putin said he would authorize an internal investigation into the
tragedy in Beslan, but not a parliamentary or independent inquiry,
because it would turn into a "political show."
"I want to establish the chronicle of events and find out who is
responsible and might be punished," he said.
[Homestead] How wars start and how wars end,
Tvoivozhd, 09/08/2004