We Ain't Got No Enemies

"As America has been targeted by Islamic forces, America's political establishment refuses to see Islam as an enemy. In fact, today's Western culture adroitly fends off the notion that traditional Islam signifies universal submission to the will of Allah. Regardless of the fact that nominal Muslims readily coexsist with Westerners, the teachings of Islam are unequivocal. The only reason Europe is not under Islamic law today, is because Europe's military power surpassed that of Islam in the sixteenth century. This point is lost on nearly everyone, and shows the extent to which emnity has been marginalized in the West. As noted above, the West has a societal motive for marginalizing enmity. First and foremost, we have become a commercial civilization, increasingly Epicurean. From the perspective of commerce, war is less and less thinkable as the methods of warfare become more and more terrible. ... From the standpoint of atomic warfare, however, commerical civilization is absurd--in the same sense that mounted chivalry was absurd in the face of effective archery or gunpowder. For those who have deep bomb shelters, plenty of underground supplies, and the ruthlessness to sacrifice billions of lives, nuclear war might be viewed as an effective tool for sweeping away commercial civilization in favor of another type of civilization. ... Why would today's totalitarian governments, in Moscow and Beijing, refrain from using nuclear weapons to achieve their objectives in the twenty-first century? What is to stop them? It is well known that the West leaves itself open to annihilation, relying on a retaliatory version of the Maginot Line (i.e., 'mutual assured destruction'). For that matter, the West is not building bomb shelters; neither are they determined to build an effective missile defense. In the dead reckoning of commercial civilization, the price tag on survival is too high. Better to eat, drink and be merry--and hope the fatal day is many years off. ... On the other side of the Great Divide, the haters of the western bourgeoise, the grandchildren of Stalin's and Mao's revolutionary cadres, will never give up their nuclear weapons in favor of genuine peace. If they pretend to disarm, we should not believe them. Nuclear weapons as essential tools in their calling. ... The first 'relevant question' should not be 'which weapon threatens mankind.' The first relevant question should be 'who are our enemies.' ... Fear of nuclear weapons has overtaken fear of the enemy. ... 'Today,' writes [Dianne] Feinstein, 'there are enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world hundreds of times.' This statement is sadly misinformed. Today's U.S. arsenal cannot even guarantee the destruction of the main military targets in Russia", my emphasis, underlined original emphasis, JR Nyquist (JRN), 3 January 2009 at http://www.financialsense.com/stormwatch/geo/pastanalysis/2009/0103.html.

"I read Sen. Dianne Feinstein's Jan. 3 opinion piece, 'Let's Commit to a Nuclear-Free World' in horrified fascination. Please tell me she doesn't think that a 'nuclear-free' U.S. would inspire North Korea's dictator and Iran's mullah's to give up their pursuit of nuclear weapons. I'm certain Vladimir Putin would also welcome such a situation", Bill Brockman letter to the WSJ, 7 January 2009.

"Sen Feinstein makes an unsubstantiated claim that nuclear weapons are 'not a deterrent'. I respectfully, but strongly, disagree with her", Steven Stevens letter to the WSJ, 7 January 2009.

JRN is spot on. I read the Dianne Feinstein (DF) piece JRN refers to which appeared in the WSJ. I had difficulty believing a US Senator, a Stanford graduate, could be so ignorant of America's strategic arsenal's capabilities. DF is a dangerous ignoramus.

I agree with Brockman.

Unlike Stevens, I disrespectfully disagree with DF.