True Story...

Luke AFB is west of Phoenix and is rapidly being surrounded by civilization that complains about the noise from the base and its planes, forgetting that it was there long before they were. A certain lieutenant colonel at Luke AFB deserves a big pat on the back. Apparently, an individual who lives somewhere near Luke AFB wrote the local paper complaining about a group of F-16s that disturbed his/her day at the mall.

When that individual read the response from a Luke AFB officer, it must Have stung quite a bit.

The complaint: Question of the day for Luke Air Force Base:

Whom do we thank for the morning air show? Last Wednesday, at precisely 9:11 A.M, a tight formation of four F-16 jets made a low pass over Arrowhead Mall, continuing west over Bell Road at approximately 500 feet. Imagine our good fortune! Do the Tom Cruise-wannabes feel we need this wake-up call, or were they trying to impress the cashiers at Mervyns early bird special?

Any response would be appreciated.

The response:

Regarding 'A wake-up call from Luke's jets' On June 15, at precisely 9:12 a.m., a perfectly timed four- ship flyby of F-1 6s from the 63rd Fighter Squadron at Luke Air Force Base flew over the grave of Capt. Jeremy Fresques. Capt Fresques was an Air Force officer who was previously stationed at Luke Air Force Base and was killed in Iraq on May 30, Memorial Day.

At 9 a. m. on June 15, his family and friends gathered at Sunland Memorial Park in Sun City to mourn the loss of a husband, son and friend. Based on the letter writer's recount of the fly by, and because of the jet noise, I'm sure you didn't hear the 21-gun salute, the playing of taps, or my words to the widow and parents of Capt. Fresques as I gave them their son's flag on behalf of the President of the United States and all those veterans and servicemen and women who understand the sacrifices they have endured..

A four-ship fly by is a display of respect the Air Force gives to those who give their lives in defense of freedom. We are professional aviators and take our jobs seriously, and on June 15 what the letter writer witnessed was four officers lining up to pay their ultimate respects.

The letter writer asks, 'Whom do we thank for the morning air show? The 56th Fighter Wing will make the call for you, and forward your thanks to the widow and parents of Capt Fresques, and thank them for you, for it was in their honor that my pilots flew the most honorable formation of their lives.

Only 2 defining forces have ever offered to die for you....Jesus Christ and the American Soldier. One died for your soul, the other for your freedom.

Lt. Col. Grant L. Rosensteel, Jr.

USAF

In a democracy, silence is not golden; it is condonance in the face of injustices; it is fear, where the thought of reprisal fosters control. – Rodney A. Davis

Israel Promises to Continue...

It is extremely unfortunate that the Palestinian Authority did not fully understand what it was about when it held elections that resulted in Hamas winning a majority of seats in Parliament. A failure to have primaries in advance to the general elections yielded the results that we know of today. That, however, is no excuse for the violent take-over of the Gaza strip by the Hamas.


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Nor does this does exclude the responsibility of the Palestinian people to have known the MO of Hamas when they decided to vote for Hamas in the general elections. Furthermore, the Palestinian people, by their silence are condoning the rocket attacks against indiscriminate targets in Israel. As President-elect Obama has said, if someone is firing rockets into the bedroom of my house, I am duty-bound to protect my children at all cost.

Hamas should stop forever the firing of rockets into Israel, the use of suicide bombers, and the use of other forms of terror before any consideration is made to stop the bombing of Gaza. Peace will come in Gaza when the Palestinian people revolt against Hamas and chose to sit at the table and negotiate a lasting peace. Hamas has used the Palestinian people as bargaining chips; they have used them as pawns in every confrontation with Israel – knowing full well that any bombs that land within the close confines of Gaza will inflict great damage on the people of Palestine.

Other factors that give Hamas free rein to continue their evil ways are embedded in the response of neighboring Arab countries. Syria, Iran, and the people of other Muslim nations are demonstrating in the streets against the armed offensive mounted by Israel in response to the continuous rocket attacks against the Israeli people, but not once did they demonstrate against the rockets that Hamas fired into Israel. The chief complaint of Hamas is that they don’t want the blockage of the Gaza strip because it is a violation of their right of freedom of movement, but the past has shown that Hamas takes advantage of the freedom of movement to bring in new arms to support its fight against Israel.

Freedom of movement affords Hamas the opportunity to deploy suicide bombers in the streets and cafes of Israel. Israel has a right to protect its people and the borders of Israel are sovereign. The decision to restrict the movement of Palestinians within its borders has greatly reduced the incident of suicide bombings.

If it takes the rest of this year to rid itself of Hamas, Israel should take every opportunity to do so until that goal is achieved. Terror has no place within the civilized world. Terrorist are to be eradicated as if they are an infestation of vermin.

The Threat Of A Nuclear Iran

During the course of my twenty year stint in the United States Navy I was in the Navy’s Reliability Program for most of that time. People in the Navy’s Reliability program have security clearances that allow access to nuclear weapons as part of their daily routine aboard ship. They have been scrutinized and found sound of mind and exhibit no outward indications that they would under any circumstances conspire to sabotage a nuclear device. They are reliable! In fact, in the early days before they realized that it was not the prudent thing to do, I attended a curriculum that taught me how to make, maintenance, and repair nuclear weapons.

For the pass three or four years the United States’ best intelligence has professed that the Iranians are as smart as I am, in that they are yelling at the top of their lungs that the Iranians have the capacity to make and will deploy a nuclear weapon any day now. Hmmm… didn’t we hear something similar to this just prior to the invasion of Iraq? If I am not mistaken, elements of this same highly technically proficient intelligence group produced evidence that contradicted the final report of the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) that there were no WMDs within the borders of Iraq. In fact, the IAEA had conducted two hundred fifty inspections at the behest of the Bush-Cheney Intelligence group into areas of Iraq that were singled out as sites positively accessed to have been used by the Iraqis to manufacture WMDS.

All of the factors that would have indicated the mass production of nuclear weapons by Iraq are now being deployed by this administration to support the case that the Iranians are doing the same thing. I should point out here that the detonation of a nuclear device by the North Koreans has yet to be decisively proven as an event that ‘did’ occur. Japan, windward of North Korea, never detected any of the elements that would normally be associated with the detonation of a nuclear device. In addition, analysis of debris at the Syrian site has yet to indicate the present of a nuclear reactor as claimed by the Israelis in justification of their attack within the borders of Syria. The only thing that can be positively indentified is residue from the denotation of a nuclear device – namely the Israeli bombs used to destroy the buildings at that site.

Is it a good thing for the Iranians to possess the capability to produce a nuclear bomb, or a nuclear bomb itself – NO! Given the irrational behavior of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, current President of Iran, and the history of Iran under the Grand Ayatollah Ali Khomeini, I would not want Iran to possess a nuclear capability. As to whether the United States or Israel should be the one that has to make the decision to attack Iran, if it can be proven beyond a shadow of doubt to be in possession of a nuclear weapon, is another question that I would not want to answer at this time.

War is ugly and we should prevent the possibility of war by practicing diplomacy to its fullest extent. It is this writer’s belief that the Iranians are definitely in pursuit of the knowledge to fabricate a nuclear weapon, however; I don’t see them ever getting to the point that they will have a weapon and the capability to deliver it accurately. There are reliable equipments that will detect the detonation of a nuclear device. Iran will not be able to hide that test on the day that they attempt to join a unique club. On that day the free world, and all others who would be concerned, will have to make a terrible decision that will affect the way we live thereafter.

The Military-Industrial Complex

The Military-Industrial Complex is mentioned in a song written and performed by Gil-Scott-Heron –Work for Peace. In his last speech to the American people before leaving office President Dwight Eisenhower warned America of the dangers associated with the forming of a military-industrial complex. So what is a military-industrial complex and how does it affect our lives? Why would the President warn of impending danger when he, as the most powerful man in the civilized world, could just as easily have ordered someone to eradicate it like they eradicated two cities in Japan? I mean, if it was that much of a danger, use your most lethal weapon to stop it once and for all.

Unfortunately, the military-industrial complex was much more than that. In fact, the danger of the military-industrial complex has evolved into the threat to life that President Eisenhower envisioned and warned us about without much detail. It is alive and thriving… automatic weaponry, the smart bomb, the stealth fighter plane, and the sleek ‘run silent-run deep’ submarine that carries enough fire-power to destroy the world in less than sixty seconds flat. The military-industrial complex is so vast, encompassing, and so entrenched that it is the means by which countries measure their influence in the world. Every buyer wants the best that money can buy and we make the best.

Dwight Eisenhower alludes to the idea that the diverting of the manufacturing abilities of the United States away from plowshares to tanks would; in the long run, create major economical problems for the United States. He knew more than he cared to mention and America was not smart enough at the time to realize what he was saying. The American economy was developed with manufacturing as its base. The conversion to a wartime manufacturing military-complex was instrumental to our winning World War II. The continued production of instruments of war has taken America out of the commercial manufacturing arena, creating a vacuum that others have rushed to fill.

On the list of global arms suppliers by nation, the United States leads in sales by a volume of thirty-eight percent. Russia is second at nineteen percent. The United States supplies most of the free world – Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, etc., while Russian weapons find their way into the hands of most third world countries and terrorist groups. The fighting in the Congo, Sudan, and the other hot spots on the continent of Africa are supplied by Russian and Chinese weaponry. Not surprisingly, the weapon manufacturing business is very lucrative – gross global production returns over one trillion dollars each year.

Why didn’t Eisenhower speak plainly?

Here Is My Take

Iraq/Afghanistan

It is absolutely imperative that we divorce ourselves of the responsibility of ‘waiting’ until the Iraqis decide to unify under one flag and redistribute the profits from oil as one nation. A major problem with tribal nations is their inability to overcome the obstacles to unification that has been embedded in their minds since birth. We can’t wait; the President must declare an ultimatum and allow the chips to fall as they may. In doing so, we quickly release our armed forces from further obligations to Iraq; reduce the Defense budget outlay for the war in Iraq which in turn will give us an opportunity to address the dire situation in Afghanistan.

We must quickly ramp up our armed forces in Afghanistan; seal the border electronically between Afghanistan and Pakistan and patrol by fly-over a two mile wide zone in the mountainous border area. With the border under surveillance, we should put the backs of our troops to the mountains and move east eradicating the Taliban and Al Qaeda as we move eastward. It will take a year to eighteen months to secure the border.

We should use that downtime to rest the troops coming from Iraq. Once we have gotten the two mile zone depopulated (Afghans must move out of the de-populated zone) and fully under electronic surveillance, we should insert the troops and began the sweep to rid Afghanistan of the Taliban and Al Qaeda. If the same amount of troops that were used at the height of the occupation of Iraq is use, this operation could be over in less than three years after mass troop insertion.

Employment and Re-tooling of the Work-Force

The Economy of the United States is ‘trickle-up’ and the current state of affairs on Wall Street and Main Street proves it to be just that. When credit dries up, the only thing that will open the doors to credit again is cash flow. We have to get the consumer spending again and the only way to do that is make jobs available to the workforce. We need the same kind of nationwide work projects that jumpstarted the economy the way the interstate highways did back in the late fifties and sixties. The new projects should be mass transit and the modification of the types of fuels that we use to produce energy.

Mass Transit

We have to reduce our dependence on oil and the method to complete it is three-fold. We must re-invent the way we get from point A to B. Applying the same intensity to mass transit that we applied to developing the interstate would give us the relief that we need in least than three years time. We must demand that our automotive engines meet new design specifications that make it possible to triple the miles per gallon that we currently accept. All vehicles should meet these new design specifications within three years from setting the mandate – no exceptions!

We must, in addition to reducing our dependence on oil, re-invent the way we produce energy. Mass usage of wind, gas, hydro-electric, and solar energy is the answer to achieving a reduction in the use of oil and, as a by-product, the reduction of pollutants in our atmosphere. Integrating these solutions into the workforce equation will further increase the employment of our workers in jobs that cannot be shipped overseas.