BLUF: “But Trump won Barry County. He won by 65 percent of the vote, so I don’t
know where they’re thinking that any kind of chips were in any of our machines or thinking that something had happened to them. The whole thing is nutty. It is nutty, totally nutty.”
"Nutty” would sum this up only if we were dealing with “nutty” people, crackpots, etc., actually behind this “cognitive campaign,” and
not the duplicitous, odious right-wing Trump operatives waging what is similar to “cognitive warfare operations” predominantly run by the US and Israel, as they are who have the most high-level expertise in such operations. But we know, if we’re paying attention, that
with Arthur Finkelstein’s “Six-party theory,” election campaigning was taken into an entirely different domain beginning with the 1972 election of Nixon, under Finkelstein’s direction (inspired by CIA coups?), and then to ever higher levels in getting both
Likud and Republican (I repeat myself) candidates elected with such success that their opponents too would adopt such methods, particularly Hilary Clinton with similar fallacious charges in Michigan in 2016 (listen stupid!, they use paper ballots there, always
subject to a manual recount!).
The technique of “suggestiveness” aimed at the “unconscious” mind is one of the most effective “cognitive campaign” techniques as shown
in how trial lawyers study and apply these techniques at trial. It’s also one technique that the CIA developed in coup operations, such as relentlessly using labels in disrepute to tarnish their targets. Like “communist” in its many coups from the 1950s on, and
today, how the “Right” labels even the most moderate Democrats as “socialist.” But for the 2020 election, one that has been thoroughly reviewed even by some Republicans who have upheld it, the “propaganda meme” in preparation for future elections is that the
election was “stolen” from Trump. Making this a very ripe issue yet, as we’re already in the 2024 POTUS election cycle.
So forgive my on-going criticism of the Trumpite/National Conservative media platform The American Conservative,
and its “satellites,” as they have been in the forefront of declaring, without evidence (echoing Rumsfeld’s: "The absence of evidence is
not evidence of absence, . . .”), as they seem to be actively, and duplicitously, working with their fellow Straussians the Claremont Institute and Hillsdale College, in getting Trump elected again with false “narrative” of
how Trump stands for “realism and restraint” even though he and his fellow Republicans, with the collusion of right-wing Democrats, did so much to heighten military tensions with all of China, Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, and Russia. But in the eyes of TAC and its
fellow Straussians, Trump’s gigantic military buildups encircling China and Russia and serving as “provocations” today (and now Biden, following in Trump’s footsteps), as much as similar buildups did for triggering WW I, are Trump’s “realism and restraint?”
Or in the alternative, what Trump accelerated, as initiated by Obama, is analogous to “Who Sank the Boat,”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CmXIntGElQ.
So with that as introduction and background, let me say in this 2024 POTUS election cycle, the greatest danger for independent “thinking” the Committee for the Republic
and this email List faces is the always present danger of “group think,” especially prevalent when “unquestioning loyalty” is demanded, and dissent to, or criticism of, associates or associated institutions, is discouraged. Or worse, suppressed, that is, "censored.”
Jon Utley, the one-time publisher of The American Conservative, and a friend of many here, including me, recognized that a gradual change had taken place in the magazine sometime after about 2015-2016. That
‘change” is what I have been a critic of, and didn’t hesitate to share with Jon, as I haven’t here, which he didn’t disagree with, including the last time I saw him when the Committee hosted Stephen F. Cohen for a Salon on Russia in 2020 just before covid
hit, and I sat next to him at the dinner afterward.
My main criticism has been, especially after Daniel Larison left (fired?), that “Claremonters” Burtka and Mills advocated a Claremont Institute/Bannonite foreign policy of heightening/provoking tensions
with China and Iran, compatible with Claremont’s/Hillsdale’s longtime hostility to each, while concealing Trump’s military expansionism/encirclements of all our “Enemies,” including Russia (remember Camp Trump?)
That was duplicitously hid with some breathtaking announcements from TAC variously describing how Trump or the USMC Commandant was “fighting the blob,”some time ago. I called that Trumpist propaganda meme
as propagated by The American Conservative, and unfortunately on at least a few occasions, by the Quincy Institute, into question by pointing out that USMC Commandant General Berger may have been withdrawing Marines from the Mideast, but not as a challenge,
nor in opposition, to the so-called “Blob,” that the "New Right” (as self-identified on a recent foreign policy event of TAC’s, QI’s, and the American Moment) always alleged Trump was “battling” (by throwing vast sums of money toward, so I couldn’t even keep
a straight face just typing that).
Under the Claremonter Trump, and his alliance with Netanyahu/Israel, that one-time opposition by TAC to foreign “adventurism” came to an end. Though to keep genuine “non-interventionist conservative” readers,
it was done gradually, and deceptively, though the readers were smarter than the Straussian editors gave them credit for, as the comments section to articles usually revealed. There are too many examples to list here of the subtle and not so subtle “propagandizing”
against China (similar to the cognitive “suggestiveness” campaigns run) while concealing Trump’s military buildups against both Russia and China, and his enrichment of the so-called “Blob,” which began with the ascension of the aforementioned “Straussians”
(I hate to use that term as the historical literature always makes clear there was never an actual ideological divide between Strauss and prominent “Traditional Conservatives”), other than some slight minor disagreements.
"But it’s also “subversive,” as the Marine veteran of Afghanistan
told me. “If Berger is right, if it’s possible to do better with less, than why can’t the Army, Navy and Air Force do the same?” he asks.”
Both the articles above carried the “suggestiveness” that what Berger was/is doing with his encirclement of China is both “fighting the blob” (it is not,
unless the “Blob” will run away whimpering under the assault of so many billions of dollars being heaped upon them!, similar to what we did against the Taliban in Afghanistan), and “called for,” when “preparing for war” against China (and Russia) predictably
has the same effect as “war preparedness” did when nearly all of Europe mobilized in 1914.
So here is an update on General Berger’s “battle with the Blob:”
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Marines Ready to Double Down on Pacific Presence, Says General
U.S. Marines with 3d Marine Littoral Regiment, 3d Marine Division, post security during a field training exercise at Marine Corps Training Area Bellows, Hawaii, May 30, 2022. US Marine Corps Photo
This story has been updated to correct comments made by Gen. Eric Smith.
The United States will not be moving its military presence from the Western Pacific any time soon due to Beijing’s “continued bad behavior” toward Taiwan and its bullying of immediate neighbors like Japan and South China
Sea nations, the Marine Corps second in command said on Monday.
America needs to be able to “get to the fight” in the vast Indo-Pacific, access provided by already present stand-in forces, Gen. Eric Smith said during remarks at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and co-hosted
by the Naval Institute. The Marine Corps and other services are also reviewing logistics chains to overcome those distances in a Western Pacific potential conflict.
Marines have reduced units’ signatures, making them more difficult to find while also increasing their lethality with High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems [HIMARS], adding advanced anti-ship missiles with 100-mile plus
ranges and loitering munitions, similar to Switchblade now used in Ukraine, Smith said, citing the updated
Force Design 2030 guidance.
“What’s different today [with the Marine Littoral Regiments vs the past] is the threat,” Smith said. “That unit must be organized to fight tomorrow. …You can’t wait until it is full baked” to determine what might be needed
in organization, equipment and training.
He said the Marines are taking back valuable lessons from its
exercises in Luzon, Philippines, that can be adopted in the future as the organizing concept spreads across the force.
The process of what’s needed and size of units begins with a concept that is then wargamed and experimented with in the field, Smith said. The feedback loop leads to necessary changes
like recognizing the projected size of an infantry battalion of 730 was too small but 810 would work. That sized battalion also would also require added transport and artillery.
“[Littoral regiments] have to be able to fire and move,” Smith said in combat today. The six- or seven-minute window to escape with towed artillery no longer exists. Loitering
munitions, like Organic Precision Fires – Infantry and Organic Precision Fires – Mounted, have been successfully field tested and now “it’s how much we can procure” in future budgets, Smith said.
“If you’re static, you’re not going to do too well.”
The Marines now have an “airborne quarterback,” capable of sensing what’s out there and pass that intelligence “to the best qualified shooter” for quick action even when space communications have been disrupted thanks to
the ability to better “see” threats using MQ-9A unmanned aerial system, he said. Another advantage the medium- to high-altitude, long endurance hunter-killer drone has is cataloguing information to precisely identify threats and target.
“I’m able to pass that data … to everyone.” Smith said. This was successfully tested with the Army’s Future Command field experiment of its Project Convergence, the Army’s testing way to achieve Joint All-Domain Command
and Control [JADC2].
Marines with 1st Platoon, Charlie Company, 3rd Assault Amphibian Battalion, 1st Marine Division and Japan Ground Self-Defense Force (JGSDF) soldiers with 2nd Amphibious Rapid Deployment Regiment receive a safety brief prior to executing amphibious operations
during Exercise Iron Fist 2022 at the Del Mar Boat Basin, Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California, Jan. 11, 2022. US Marine Corps Photo
As for Marine possessing armor units, Smith said a large issue comes down to weight. With advanced protective systems used by the Army its M1-A2 tanks, the vehicles’ weight is 74 tons, making it extremely difficult to move
from ship to shore. He noted that if Marines needed armor the Joint Task Force commander could order the Army to send them over as was his experience in Iraq.
The Navy and Marine Corps agree that naval services require 31 amphibious vessels, 10 large deck, Smith said. When asked about an amphibious readiness group not being able to answer a request from European Command to respond
in wake of the invasion of Ukraine, Smith said the
Marine Expeditionary Unit was ready to deploy early. The ship was not.
“The readiness of our vessels is a challenge,” with many of the nearing the end of their service life, he said.
