Fort Hood | NoisyRoom.net

Yesterday, members of our armed services in Chattanooga, Tennessee, went to work in the service of our nation. Some went to a recruiting center to assist the young people who, like so many before them, would walk through the door on any given Thursday morning and volunteer to defend the United States of America. Four brave Marines went to a Naval Reserve Center to perform their duties to the Tennessee National Guard.

But one of the young people who visited two of those facilities was not like the others. He was there not to volunteer to serve America, but to attack America. Mohammod Youssuf Abdulazeez was there to carry out jihad, an act of radical Islamic terrorism. An act of war, in which those four brave Marines lost their lives, while at least two others were wounded.

In the wake of this vicious attack on our nation we need to rid ourselves of two dangerous delusions, first and foremost that a ‘lone gunman’–as President Obama described the shooter–is somehow isolated from the larger threat of radical Islamic terrorism. In the modern world, no one acts in isolation. Through social media ISIS, al Qaida, and other groups are infiltrating our nation with impunity while our government will not even admit that radical Islamic terrorism is a problem.

The second delusion is that this attack is somehow isolated from previous episodes, notably those in Little Rock, Arkansas and Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009—both of which were attacks on American military facilities. The Obama administration was woefully reluctant to call either an act of radical Islamic terrorism, instead suggesting ‘workplace violence’ as a justification for the killings. Finally, after years of effort, the victims of Fort Hood were properly recognized as victims of attacks by foreign terrorists when they received Purple Hearts on April 15, 2015. Likewise, the victim of the Little Rock attack received a Purple Heart on July 1, 2015.

We cannot afford to wait six years to recognize what happened in Chattanooga for what it was. We need to see with clarity right now what has happened. We can immediately hold hearings in the Senate Armed Services Committee on the need for our enlisted men and women to have the right to be armed in military facilities. Congress can pass the Expatriate Terrorist Act that would allow our government to stop Americans who travel overseas to train with terrorist groups from coming back to attack us at home. We can thoroughly overhaul our broken immigration system that is allowing this type of individual to gain citizenship. And we can accept the reality that while we might wish it otherwise, the forces of radical Islam are at war with us.

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By: Alan Caruba
Warning Signs

You know something is terribly wrong when three former Secretaries of State, Henry Kissinger, George Schultz and Madeleine Albright tell a Senate Armed Services Committee that the President of the United States is an idiot with no idea how to conduct foreign affairs. Well, they didn’t say it in those words, but that was pretty much the message. That was January 29.

Two days earlier retired 4-Star General James Matthis, former head of U.S. Central Command, former Army Vice Chief of Staff and 4-Star General Jack Keane, and Navy Admiral William Fallon, also a former CentCom chief, had also testified before the Committee. They had a similar message as the diplomats. Obama and the other idiots in the White House are completely clueless regarding the threat of radical Islam in general and a potential nuclear Iran in particular.

This is, after all, a White House that is trying to call those intent on taking over the entire Middle East and, after that, the rest of the world anything other than “terrorists.” They have used terms such as “insurgents”, “activists” and “militants.” Here at home, they are still referring to the killings at Fort Hood as “workplace violence.” Don’t any of these idiots understand that the terrorists, whether they call themselves al Qaeda or the Islamic State, Hezbollah, Hamas or any other name all constitute the same threat?

That’s what the generals addressed. They told the Senate committee that absence of a White House strategy makes the ISIS, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan wars “unwinnable.” I have been around since the end of World War II and that stretch of U.S. history is one in which we fought to a stalemate in Korea and a loss in Vietnam. After we won the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, Obama pulled out and now they are lost too. There was a time when Americans and their leaders knew how to win wars.

Indeed, there was a time when Americans preferred to elect generals to be their President, starting with George Washington. Among those with that rank were Andrew Jackson, Zachary Taylor, Franklin Pierce, Andrew Johnson, Ulysses S. Grant, Ruther P. Hayes, James A. Garfield. Chester A. Arthur. Benjamin Harrison, and Dwight D. Eisenhower. All the others had also served in the military in some capacity…except Barack Hussein Obama.

Obama not only doesn’t have experience in the military, he doesn’t seem to like them much. He has done everything he can to reduce our military capacity to fight a war anywhere or to show any genuine respect for the troops on active duty. The only uniform he ever wore was as an Indonesian Boy Scout.

Retired Marine Gen. Jim Mattis told the Congress “America needs a refresh national security strategy. We need to come out from our reactive crouch and take a firm, strategic stance in defense of our values.” Apparently those values don’t matter to the White House or to those left-wingers who wet their pants over the popularity of “Sniper”, a film that pays tribute to our troops who fought the war in Iraq.

Under Obama’s term in office, radical Islam has increased four-fold in the past five years, ISIS ten times since 2012 and Iran has masterminded control of the capitols in Beirut, Lebanon, Damascus, Syria, Baghdad, Iraq, and now in Sanaa, Yemen. It has been the power behind Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza.

Gen. Keane described Obama’s withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan as an “absolute strategic failure.” He called radical Islam “the major security challenge of our generation.”

Regarding Iran, Gen. Keane said, “In 1980, Iran declared the United States as a strategic enemy and its goal is to drive the United State out of the region, achieve regional hegemony, and destroy the state of Israel.”

“Is there any doubt that Iran is on the march and is systematically moving toward their regional hegemonic objective?” asked Gen. Keane. “Iran has been on a 20-year journey to acquire nuclear weapons, simply because they know it guarantees preservation of the regime and makes them, along with their partners, the dominant power in the region, thereby capable of expanding their control and influence. Add to this their ballistic missile delivery system and Iran is not only a threat to the region, but to Europe, as well.” The U.S. in time will be in missile range.

“We have no comprehensive strategy to stop it or defeat it,” said Gen. Keane.

Thanks to Barack Obama, the United States of America can no longer be seen as the world leader, opposing the forces that seek to impose control. Former allies, particularly in the Middle East, no longer have any confidence that we would come to their defense if they were attacked.

Thanks to Barack Obama, our enemies have been emboldened and our allies confused, but it is not that confusing. He is an idiot who lacks any grasp of history’s lessons and he is a coward who cannot be expected to seriously respond to our own and our allies’ enemies.