BlackFive

A New American Grand Strategy by someone called "James Mattis."  Sounds like he knows what he's talking about.  He must have an interesting background.

Airmen aboard a patrol boat speed through the water near Dock Charlie on Joint Base Charleston – Weapons Station, S.C., Feb. 11, 2015. The airmen are assigned to the 628th Security Forces Squadron. 
U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Clayton Cupit 

This is the policy likeliest to succeed, provided that you're willing to accept the secession of Western Iraq.  Our government is opposed to that, but I see no reason why we should be at this point.  Baghdad has proven it was, and remains, unwilling to treat the Sunni population justly.  It held together while the US remained in Iraq to enforce the peace, and perhaps in time if we had stayed they would have learned to trust each other and work together.  We left, and the Shi'a led government chose the path of fear.  

It is that very dynamic that allowed Daesh, the so-called "Islamic State," to spread rapidly through Western Iraq.  They are horrible people, though, and are preferable for Iraq's Sunnis only to the hostile and corrupt government in Baghdad.  I would not be surprised to see a Sunni kingdom built around one of the larger tribal groups emerge from this conflict, a state perhaps like Jordan itself:  not perfect but better than what they have now, and a buffer against Iranian efforts to dominate the Levant.

Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Adrian Martinezgarcia, left, instructs Petty Officer 2nd Class Jerry Williams as he directs a landing craft air cushion into the well deck of the amphibious assault ship USS Essex in the Pacific Ocean, Feb. 12, 2015. The Essex is underway completing certifications in preparation for an upcoming deployment. 
U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 1st Class Jason M. Graham 

Search and rescue swimmers assigned to Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 4 train from an MH-60S Seahawk helicopter during qualifications in San Diego, Jan. 28, 2015. 
U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 1st Class Shannon E. Renfroe 

Airman 1st Class Ryan Galante blows an overnight snowfall from a KC-135R Stratotanker on Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., Feb. 17, 2015. Galante, assigned to 108th Maintenance Squadron, 108th Wing, New Jersey Air National Guard, operates the de-icing system from a cabin at the end of a 42-foot boom. 
Air National Guard photo by U.S. Air Force Tech. Sgt. Carl Clegg 

Article here by Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post...

His three combat tours in Afghanistan had been boiled down to a 38-second video clip, played and replayed on YouTube more than a million times. In it, Rob Richards and three other Marine Corps snipers are seen urinating on the bodies of Taliban fighters they had just killed.

“Total dismay” were the words then-Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton used to describe the video when it surfaced on the Internet in January 2012. “Utterly deplorable,” agreed then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. Richards’s career in the military was finished.

More than two years later — long after the rest of the country had moved on to other scandals — Richards, 28, died at home and alone from an accidental painkiller overdose...

Now an ammunition can carrying his cremated remains sat on the table of a hotel bar in Arlington, Va., as his family, friends and fellow Marines swirled around it....

Read the whole thing.  

Godspeed.

The Military Sealift Command fleet replenishment oiler USNS Guadalupe delivers supplies to the amphibious assault ship USS Makin Island during a nighttime vertical replenishment in the Pacific Ocean, Feb.12, 2015. The Makin Island is returning to homeport in San Diego from a seven-month deployment to the western Pacific and U.S. Central Command areas of responsibility. 
U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 1st Class Ronald Gutridge 

President Obamas Countering Violent Extremism Summit has shown just how far his team will stretch to avoid the blisteringly obvious fact that Islamism is the root cause of the terror around the world. State Dept. Spokes person Marie Harf made the comical statement that if they just had jobs the jihadis would stop the slaughter. Crazy thing is she also said something I completely agree with, a once in a lifetime occurrence. Watch and see.

Right in time for President Obama's extremist-riddled Countering Violent Extremism Summit comes an honest report on the horrific treatment of women in Islamic states. It starts with the abuse she suffered personally at the hands, and gun barrels, of our supposed allies the Saudis during the First Gulf War. But the real issue is the infiltration of this oppressive and backwards culture into free western society. For every "strong" woman telling the press how wearing a veil empowers her, there are dozens in the shadows being beaten, forced into arranged marriages and dying in "honor" killings.

For those who don't know, the Airborne Girl is my better half, much better as many of you have informed me.