How many betrayals, notes before the second Civil War # 5

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WORLD WAR COVID
From WeaponWorld to PeaceWorld
Learner, begin

How many betrayals

Concerning the French defeat in 1940, modern historians cannot see the forest for the leaf mold they study so meticulously. The combat friction of total war would cancel all but one of the German tactical advantages, once set against  Allied advantages in numbers, fortification and equipment quality.

Three examples in history. 

First, the battle of Manzikert in 1071. The Byzantine Army, under Romanos IV, was the most professional, veteran and expensive (socially disruptive, see the third example) army in the world. However, it flew apart from mutinous mercenaries, unreliable allies, strategic over-reach (Manzikert is at antipodes of Anatolia from Byzantium), high-level political treason, cowardly abandon and runaway disobedience. The 
 Byzantine army outnumbered and was qualitatively superior to Alp Arslan, his Turkic army and many allies; but it fell apart from corruption, inertia and centrifugal politics. Numbers, troop quality and equipment were irrelevant. Anatolia was lost that day through no lack of such.

The second example, France, 1940. Marshal Petain grandfathered the French Army since WWI. He believed French society must purge itself of liberal tendencies by communal sacrifice. He and his hand-picked officers drank up Nazi ideology with a stiff pour of Catholic bigotry. As a result of decades of funding and industrial sabotage, the French Army was short of radios (the exception mentioned above), anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons, first-line fighter and light-attack aircraft. It knew it needed those things in quantity and superiority to slow down the Blitz. It had enough time and talent to field them, but somehow never got them. Modern historians attribute this lack to what? Magical mass senility? A bad mood that decade? Sour wine at lunch? Very hazy explanations so far. 

After the defeat, the entire French officer corps was debriefed in Nazi POW camps. Certified fascists were released to administer Vichy and Occupied France. Many French officers were Nazi proxies, from Petain and Gamelin down to reserve staff lieutenants who “lost” a supply train or phoned it in to the Luftwaffe. Mass betrayal outweighed every other factor. Ignoring betrayal as the proverbial thumb on the scale, that leads to the dangerous conclusion that other factors are more important than they really are. Combat friction against a peer adversary levels all of them off to nothing special. Asymmetric warfare is the frictional leveling of comparative military skills, regardless of duration and casualty ratios as long as they are endurable and non-genocide. 

Third example: the octopus of U.S. “Defense.” Pro-fa political sabotage spreads like blood-poison through the American electorate, its governing bodies and military especially. America’s super-sized military budget has hollowed out civil society. This eaten-out commonwealth leaves our politics in the hands of professional eaters-out:  warmongers among do-nothing centrists and radical rightists of every stripe. There is no political Left, no Peace Party or Green Party. Try nursing this political amputation like that in peace for any length of time.

The U.S. Air Force refused to do on 9/11 what it had done faultlessly for the last sixty years, secure our skies. The U.S. Army hasn’t won a war since WWII. And on January 6, no Army officer did what every cadet had been taught to do since the Civil War. “If there is insurrection, gather loyal troops and occupy Federal facilities until further orders from the Federal chain of command that pays your salt. Do not wait for orders, do not follow contradictory orders, do not freeze in place, man Federal facilities and wait.” A squad of Marines stationed at rest in full dress uniform behind the Capital Police would have deflated the Jan 6 riot.

Where were they? In barracks watching on TV? Gloating?

Based on the first two examples, I leave it to your imagination how this bloated bag of corruption will stand up against its next existential threat (not just the last asymmetric war speed bumps of corporate profit and convenience). The horror impending is our uncertainty.

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COMMENT?  markmulligan@comcast.net