The best defense

By Linda A. Prussen-Razzano
web posted September 13, 1999

On the wall of my father's bedroom, next to his Mensa membership letter and bachelors degree, hangs a certificate from the United States Army. This faded, slightly yellowed document certifies his completion of a course in the building of bomb shelters. As a civil engineer who worked extensively with the government, he could provide interesting insight into the physical requirements necessary to adequately protect human life from the effects of a bomb blast.

After having been treated to one of his brutally thorough, scientifically specific dissertations on this topic, I concluded I would rather be caught at ground zero than survive. It would be mercy for my beloved family and I to meet our Maker than to live in the aftermath.

From the 1950s until the recent collapse of the Soviet Union under President Reagan, several generations of Americans grew up under the shadow of nuclear war. It was an ever present, if peripheral threat that worked its way into novel plot lines, songs, and made-for-television movies. The term MAD did not represent anger or insanity, but Mutually Assured Destruction.

Our military leaders recognized that our best defense was a good offense. If anyone dared to threaten our great country, we could assure that they had only moments to celebrate their attack before they, and everyone they knew and held dear, met their final demise. The notion that the launching of just one aggressive missile could end all life, worldwide, kept the superpowers in check.

Sadly, we no longer maintain the same aggressive posture. Our military has been gutted, our soldiers' families are receiving sensitivity training and living on food-stamps, our nuclear stockpiles are being destroyed, and our resources are stretched thin. Americans are finally beginning to understand just how serious our situation is; in response, Congress is now pushing for a missile defense system.

Should President Clinton actually implement it, it's still too little, too late.

Congress should accept the July 15, 1998 recommendations by the Commission to Access the Ballistic Missile Threat of the United States, which warned that our national defense must be "revised to reflect the reality of the environment in which there may be very little or no warning" of an eminent nuclear attack. Sources inside the FBI International Terrorism Task Force warn that foreign agents operating on American soil are a very real threat. The White House, in conjunction with the Department of Defense and Department of Justice, has formed several rapid response teams to deal with biological and other types of warfare conducted on American soil.

Our greatest threat no longer lies in a distant land. It is much, much closer to home.

Instead of shelling out millions to bulk up Russia's nuclear detection system and providing $6 billion on loans to foreign armies, Congress should instead institute the following changes:

  • Stop allowing the Clinton Administration to use our military personnel as handmaidens for the United Nations. Every time they do, we pay for it.

  • Stop allowing the Clinton Administration to use our military personnel as babysitters for terrorist factions. Every time they do, we pay for it.

  • Raise the pay for our military personnel. The families of American soldiers should not be reduced to government handouts, especially when they are devoting their lives in defense of our country. This is a national disgrace.

  • Make standards for basic military training gender neutral. I'm all for women in the military, so long as they can carry their weight and deal with real life in the barracks. If they don't meet the basic requirements that men must meet, they shouldn't be there. If they are going to whine about rough language and crude behavior, they should go work for the United Nations or the Peace Corp. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

  • Stop "coddling dictators" and "terrorists." Kill them instead.

  • Stop the Administration from spending valuable military funds on silly programs such as "sensitivity training." Our folks in uniform should be trained to kill the enemy and survive against the enemy, in that order. Stop pretending they enlisted to pick flowers or act as social workers; they enlisted to defend America.

  • Stop cutting funding to our Navy, America's first true world-wide defense. When we have battlegroups departing from our shores at only 67 per cent of basic allowance, instead of the mandated 90 per cent, we are in serious trouble. In other words, we are in serious trouble.

  • Stop the Administration from ordering military personnel to show up at carefully orchestrated Presidential photo-ops. It only depresses them; morale and the re-enlistment rate are low enough already.

  • Pay attention the Panama Canal, and stop presuming that Hutchinson Whampoa's presence is not a military threat. Approximately half of China's current arsenal can strike American soil in minutes from the Canal.

  • Revoke China's MFN status. The cowards in Congress had an opportunity to do so recently, and failed miserably. Get rid of them.

  • Stop closing bases and stop allowing Chinese front companies to lease the empty ones. Cox, Inhofe, Weldon, and a handful of others can't continue to do this by themselves.

  • Stop cross-training troops from other countries. Stop giving military aid to countries that are a known threat to the United States. It's the same as inviting criminals into your home and then giving them your gun so they can shoot you.

  • Stop funding to Russia's disarmament program. The intelligence community has confirmed that they are using to funds to arm, not disarm. Stop paying them to build weapons they can use against us.

  • Refuse to fund the Clinton Administration's military "agreements," which in essence carry the same weight as treaties. The terminology is just a formality that allows them to sidestep approval by Congress. If Congress doesn't approve it, don't appropriate funding for it. America is a representative republic, not a monarchy.

  • Kill Executive Orders, such as EO13083 and it's descendants, upon arrival. They violate various sections of the Constitution, specifically those protecting the rights of the people and the states. Again, America is a representative republic, not a monarchy.

  • Demand that spies like Peter Lee be executed, instead of allowing the courts to give them a slap on the wrist and community service. Treason is a capital offense.

  • Bring our level of military spending and readiness back up to Cold War standards.

  • Demand the resignation of Madeline Albright, who has created more international messes than I care to count.

  • Beg General Norman Schwartzkopf to come out of retirement and show General "Sensitivity Training" Sheldon the door.

  • Fumigate the White House and muzzle Joe Lockhardt. Need I say more?

  • Demand Reno's resignation and install an Attorney General who will take requests for wire-taps on potential spies seriously.

  • Release the LaBella Memo and LaBella's unredacted report, so that Americans can see for themselves just how thick Reno's "presidential knee pads" are.

  • Release the unredacted Cox Report, so that Americans will understand just how badly our national security has been compromised.

  • Increase funding to the FBI to counter terrorism threats in the United States. The enemy is already here; let the FBI find them.

  • Stop decreasing the restrictions on encryption. Why make it easier for the enemy to communicate privately?

  • Increase funding to our forward ops. Enough said.

  • Stop hoping to make Chinagate an "election year issue." Start hosting daily press conferences so folks like Weldon, Cox, and Inhofe will not feel so alone when they rage about the gross betrayal of national security.

  • Stop giving a darn what the President thinks about the Defense Budget. He "loathes" the military, anyway. Take your case to the American people, and demand they put pressure on their representatives.

In other words, bulk up the military to the same mean fighting machine that won the Cold War, and install leaders and advisors who understand the World Theater. Don't let ignorant incompetents make policy or issue policy statements, which only prompt laughter from our foes.

These are just for starters, and half of them won't cost a dime.

If I think of anything else, I'll let you know.

Linda Prussen-Razzano is an advisory board member and frequent contributor to Rightgrrl and a columnist for the American Partisan.




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