Pride Of The Marines National Guard and USAF

A pair of US Marines riding on a French train disarmed an apparently Islamist shooter intent on mass murder.

Chalk up a victory for situational awareness:

Belgian journalist Marin Buxant Tweeted that the US Marines were on leave in Brussels when they spotted the man and followed him on the train. When the suspect went into the toilet, the Marines recognised the sound of a weapon being armed and decided to act immediately.

The Marines overpowered the attacker, 26-year old Ayoub Qazzani; one of them was wounded in the neck, but his injuries are apparently not.life-threatening.

President Obama has praised the leathernecks – so i suspect the obvious case of profiling might go uncharged.

I feel a lot better about being an American today.

PS: I’m counting the minutes until Heather Martens puts out a press release noting that since the Marines resisted a mass shooter without guns, so can the rest of us.

UPDATE: The heroes were apparently, according to the AP, , an Air Force veteran and a Nationsl Guardsman, as well as a civilian college student.

Lessons learned: A) Never trust the mainstream media in any of these stories, for at least the first couple of hours. B) All American service people apparently look alike to Europeans. C) Even better; they weren’t Superman. Just average guys on vacation.

Provided the Associated Press got the story right, anyway….

Posted

August 21, 2015

War On Terror

Mitch Berg

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Comments

51 responses to “Pride Of The Marines National Guard and USAF”

Eric DeMar

August 21, 2015

OooRah!
Dans les champs de l’observation le hasard ne favorise que les esprits préparés. – Louis Pasteur.
Bill C

August 21, 2015

Some liberal dillweed on Sue Jeffers’ FB post: “They also did it without using guns.”

No one responded to him but two people liked his comment.
Prussian Blue

August 21, 2015

Come now, Berg. It is bigoted to say that because the guy was Islamic, and a shooter, that means that he was an “Islamic shooter.” Do not discount the possibility that he was an anti-government, confederate flag-waving white supremacist who took advantage of France’s slack anti-gun laws! Clearly, whatever the laws on guns are in France, they aren’t strict enough. If the liberal press follows it’s usual pattern, we will soon see op-eds claiming that in France, any person of any age can go into any of the millions of French gun shops and buy any kind of military assault weapon without so much as showing an ID!
If the marines had been armed, why, it might have become a bloodbath!
Emery

August 22, 2015

It seems rather odd spinning this story into some sort of partisan bludgeon. Two unarmed US Marines in civilian clothing took down the terrorist. Bronze stars and one purple heart in order. Legion of Honor medals would seem appropriate as well.
Mitch Berg

August 22, 2015

Emery,

It seems rather odd spinning this story into some sort of partisan bludgeon

I’m not. Merely a wry observation; according to the passage I quoted, the Marines did profile the guy. I wonder if they’re eligible for the Bronze Star, since France isn’t a combat zone (yet)?

Eric – never took French, but I think I got that. Big day for the Corps!

Bill C: I responded.
AlexG’sWankingMitten

August 22, 2015

Story says they were Air Force and National Guard.
Mitch Berg

August 22, 2015

I updated the story earlier this morning.

Using the daily Mail as a source is as close as I ever get to gambling
justplainangry

August 22, 2015

Merg! Stop spinning and stop with the facts, dammit! EmeryTheAntisemiticSici@list is over his fact quota for the week!
bosshoss429

August 22, 2015

And to think that the other branches called us Air Force guys country clubbers because they thought we had the easiest duty of any of the branches.
Prussian Blue

August 22, 2015

Emery, a partisan bludgeon is in order because most on the Left refuse to acknowledge the danger of Islamic terrorism, and the effectiveness of the military in combating Islamic terrorism. It is difficult to express how ingrained this attitude is on the Left. They believe that the evil and chaos we see in the world today has its source in a right-wing paranoid reaction to a danger that does not exist.
AlexG’sWankingMitten

August 22, 2015

Boss, when I read Air Force, I assumed he beat the gunner down with his purse 😜
Emery

August 23, 2015

Terry: Invading a country, establishing a new constitution, and holding elections has been tried and failed. Levying sanctions doesn’t make peace. Sending in bombers to hit military targets or drones to assassinate awkward leaders may have benefits but doesn’t make peace. Should we support efforts to re-draw colonial borders in a way that might make for more peaceful co-existence? Sure, but we can only support an Arab plan; the Arab world will not support an American plan. The initiative must come from those who live in the region. In the meantime, we can help to keep the peace outside the region, but I don’t see how we can make peace inside of it. The people in the region clearly aren’t ready to stop fighting.
Mitch Berg

August 23, 2015

Terry: Invading a country, establishing a new constitution, and holding elections has been tried and failed

And it has also succeeded.
AlexG’sWankingMitten

August 23, 2015

“Invading a country, establishing a new constitution, and holding elections has been tried and failed.”

http://www.bbc.com/news/events/scotland-decides

Some day Emery, you’re going to offer an observation worthy of consideration….some. day.
kel

August 23, 2015

Emery burbled: ” Invading a country, establishing a new constitution, and holding elections has been tried and failed.”

true except for Italy, Japan, Panama, and Germany to name a few – but that success took more than 2 or 3 years. The failures you praise are due to short sighted, weak willed people like your self who abandon what doesn’t provide them immediate gratification.
Joe Doakes

August 23, 2015

Kel, you’re exactly right.

When we conquered Nazi Germany (and don’t kid yourself, America conquered it, not Britain or Free French or hold-out Norwegians), there were still German adults who remembered the glory when Germany ruled Europe, who told those stories to their kids. We had to maintain control of the country until they died, and until their kids died, so that when the grandkids’ generation came to power, they’d be motivated by peaceful self-interest instead of conquest for revenge that might touch off another world war.

We started the process in Iraq but prematurely withdrew, leaving revenge-seeking adults to fill the power void. And we compounded the idiocy by knocking off fire break dictators in Libya and Syria who might have contained the violence. With Russia and China both wanting to use nuclear Iran as a proxy against the US, another world war isn’t inconceivable, it’s ever more likely.
Emery

August 23, 2015

I was under the impression Islamic terrorism was the topic at hand and not World War II.

The best the US and its western allies can do is not the direct waging of war against ISIS but taking a page out of the Romans book of strategy and quarantine the infection to prevent its further metastasizing deeper beyond the region. I don’t believe in an eye-for-an-eye, but rather believe in plucking out the right eye and squashing it in front of the left eye, therein letting the victim know what’s coming next. The Romans fully appreciated the deterrent nature of that concept, as the residents of Uxellodunum would truthfully testify.
kel

August 23, 2015

“I was under the impression Islamic terrorism was the topic at hand and not World War II.” – pathetic caviling.

Having squandered his opportunity to negotiate a Status Of Forces agreement and unlike the Romans, Dear Leader is making no attempt to “quarantine” ISIS. He just shows up at the situation room to play live action Call Of Duty when he’s bored and needs to amuse himself or his guests. A serious ideologue, yes, a serious thinker, commander, leader, No!
Prussian Blue

August 23, 2015

Emery, I really don’t care about the relative success or failure of nation building. The Left is delusional on the topic of Islamic terrorism, and the effectiveness of violence as a means of self-defense. They need to be reminded that they are delusional as frequently as possible.
justplainangry

August 23, 2015

First, it was ““Invading a country, establishing a new constitution, and holding elections has been tried and failed.” Then, after having his head shoved up even further up his arse than where it normally resides, came this: “I was under the impression Islamic terrorism was the topic at hand and not World War II.” No, seriously, you can’t make this up. Don’t know much about history… History is for chumps.
Prussian Blue

August 23, 2015

To understand the way the Left views Islamic terrorism, I strongly recommend this article by Michael Walzer (a Leftist intellectual), along with the response by Andrew March (another Leftist intellectual).
https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/islamism-and-the-left
Simply put, the Left has no theoretical apparatus for dealing with Islamic terrorism. It does not fit into their way of looking at the world. It is not supposed to exist. The Current Occupant buys into this POV. Nidal Hassan murdered thirteen people at Fort Hood while shouting “Allahu Akbar”, and gave his religion as his motivation for doing so. Obama says that Hassan is mentally disturbed, and that murder rampage has no connection at all to Islam. Dylann Roof murders nine African Americans in an effort to start a race war, and Obama believes that this is a direct result of American history. Roof: “drew on the long history of bombs and arson and shots fired at churches — not random, but as a means to control. A way to terrorize and oppress.”
To the Left — and Obama is very much an ideological Leftist — the enemy is always America and the freedom it represents.
Emery

August 23, 2015

You seem to pretend that nothing has happened over the last fifteen years that has caused you to question the neoconservative worldview.
kel

August 23, 2015

Emery;
You seem to pretend that nothing has happened over the last fifteen years that has caused you to question the progressive worldview.

there I fixed it for you.
Prussian Blue

August 23, 2015

What is the “neoconservative worldview”, Emery, and how do you know what the “neoconservative worldview” is? And what does it have to do with Mitch’s post or the comments? You are the only person that has mentioned “nation building.”
I have given a link to the Leftist view of Islamist terror (the Dissent article and discussion). Walzer and March are very highly regarded on the Left. When I write about the Leftist view of Islamic terrorism, I know what I am talking about and can provide references. Most people who use the word “neoconservative” don’t have the faintest idea what neoconservatism is, other than a really bad thing that they learned about by reading the Huffpo or or an editorial in the Times.
Emery

August 23, 2015

These comments remind me I haven’t watched Idiocracy for a while.

Idiocracy – President Camacho Speech
https://vimeo.com/82074066
Night Writer

August 23, 2015

Blue, by God, man – when you get back on the mainland I am buying you a steak!
kel

August 23, 2015

“These comments remind me I haven’t watched Idiocracy for a while.” – keep working that bathos Emery its your best feature.
Emery Incognito

August 23, 2015

It seems to me that the heart of the problem is that since the end of the Second World War we suffer from an acute inability in our conflicts to settle on a war aim. We want to force our way to a destination but we don’t know where that destination is, what it looks like or what distance we must travel to get there.

All the complaints about not having a coherent strategy are really null and void in that one cannot construct a proper strategy unless one has a realistically achievable political war aim that exists in the realm of reality and not merely in our hubris driven fantasies.

We select war aims that are not amenable to war as a tool. We use the army to advance democracy. Or to stabilize a hated and unstable regime. Or to build a nation that doesn’t want to be built.

The Napoleons and the Bismarks were usually wiser in choosing to fight for things that could be achieved by force of arms.
Prussian Blue

August 23, 2015

By an odd coincidence, when I read Emery’s comment re: Idiocracy, I was watching this vid on Youtube:
https://www.facebook.com/david.johnson.9883/videos/10206999508610890/
I got to the vid from a link on this thread, http://accordingtohoyt.com/2015/08/23/burning-down-the-field-in-order-to-save-it/#comment-298522 about the fiasco that was the Hugo awards ceremony this year. Long story short, the SJW’s have invaded the world of science fiction and are meeting some resistance. Resistance, of course, will be futile.
Prussian Blue

August 23, 2015

Emery, nation building as a US foreign policy goal was repudiated by Bush before the 2000 election. It was seen, at the time, as a Clinton policy (Balkan interventions). The story goes that after 9/11 Bush needed a way to deal with the emerging and increasing threat to world peace posed by terrorism, and the neocons had a plan. No one else did. I will remind you that the Afghanistan War had broad popular support and bipartisan support in congress. The Iraq War had less support, but the Iraq War resolution still had the support of both parties.
The alternative policy, as practiced by Obama, has been to create failed states (Libya), to engage in targeted, extra-legal assassinations via unmanned drones, and to bribe terror-supporting states (Iran).
What is your plan?
Mitch Berg

August 23, 2015

We want to force our way to a destination but we don’t know where that destination is, what it looks like or what distance we must travel to get there.

This was the subject of Edwin Luttwak’s The Pentagon and the Art of War, one of the better books…of 1987.

Goldwater/Nichols addressed a lot of the problems Luttwak wrote about – but in the intervening generation, the problem has re-sprouted.

The book needs a new edition.
Joe Doakes

August 24, 2015

Emery, you sound as if you agree with Vox Day’s Time to Civilization Hypothesis as well as my Three Generations to Peace Plan. That’s good: recognition that societal change takes centuries is the first step in embracing the Classical Liberal concept of Non-Intervention (which Intervention fetishists call Isolationism). Trade with all countries, entangling alliances with few, social engineering inside none.

Bush thought Iraq seeking yellow cake uranium to make nuclear weapons posed a threat to the security of the United States so we launched a pre-emptive attack and set up the machinery to convert Iraq into another Germany or Japan. Obama abandoned that machinery while overthrowing stable neighboring governments, leaving all of North Africa in civil war bleeding refugees (while simultaneously losing a war against the same goat herders who threw Russia out of Afghanistan).
Joe Doakes

August 24, 2015

Dang, pushed “Post” too quickly.

The tie-in to Mitch’s post is that Islamic fundamentalists who were suppressed under Bush are now liberated under Obama.
Prussian Blue

August 24, 2015

“Non-Intervention (which Intervention fetishists call Isolationism). Trade with all countries, entangling alliances with few, social engineering inside none.”
What do you do when China says it will only allow other countries to trade with pacific nations if they pay China a tribute? Or a $10/bbl trade tax on every barrel of oil that is not destined for Chinese ports? Free trade is not free.
Joe Doakes

August 24, 2015

No. it’s not free, but I didn’t call for free trade. I was thinking of Jefferson’s inaugural address.
Emery Incognito

August 24, 2015

PB wrote: “What is your plan?”
It’s been discussed and written about for years our political and military failures and fallout in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Most open-minded people probably have a pretty good take on the key reasons behind those failures. The more important question that arises now in the postmortem is if we can incorporate those hard lessons into future actions?

Largely because our defeat in these two wars was more in the political realm rather than the military (much like Viet Nam) and owing to the vast asymmetrical nature of the American war machine versus its opponents it is easy for the military to say ‘nothing wrong here lets continue business as usual’.

In other words we conspicuously fail in the larger mission but lacking evidence of an actual military defeat we continue to assume the posture of victors. And as history frequently demonstrates victors learn lessons less well than the losers who must reflect upon their errors and omissions.

Having become somewhat jaded about how we use our military I don’t think it is too far wrong to expect that the United States continues to make its usual false assumptions and proceeds to run the same old plays even though they fail to gain sufficient yardage yet alone score.

To sum, since there is no longer a meaningful political or military cost to mission failure what incentive is there to change anything?
Joe Doakes

August 24, 2015

We won’t have long to wait to find out, Emery. Iran should have The Bomb within three years and the means to deliver it within five, thanks to Obama’s genius deal with them. After that, we won’t need to worry about international relations, we’ll be dead or starving. So we’ve got that going for us.
Emery Incognito

August 24, 2015

I’ve always been confident that the US and Iran would reach a deal. I have also been confident that in the long run Iran will have a modest nuclear weapons capability. The deal will slow it down a bit. But we will learn to live with a nuclear Iran. We have survived a nuclear Pakistan for a couple of decades which is much scarier.
Prussian Blue

August 24, 2015

“I have also been confident that in the long run Iran will have a modest nuclear weapons capability.”
What is modest? Enough to destroy a hundred of the world’s largest cities? Iran has IRBM’s with MIRV capability. A single atomic bomb can inflict more damage than one of World War Two’s thousand-plane raids, and there is no way to defend against it. A single atomic bomb with a delivery system allows a state to engage in nuclear blackmail. Pakistan is reported to have between one and two hundred nukes. They used the same tech that Iran is using. Are you comfortable with Iran possessing 100-200 nuclear weapons, Emery?
Prussian Blue

August 24, 2015

Emery wrote-
PB wrote: “What is your plan?”
It’s been discussed and written about for years our political and military failures and fallout in both Afghanistan and Iraq.
These were political failures, not military failures, as you imply later in your comment.
I supported the Afghanistan and Iraq wars because the options seemed to be worse — either a US withdrawal from the world stage, or further attacks like 9/11.
The problem is one of stability. The world has been been very stable since the UNSC began to keep the peace in ’46. A world map from 1946 shows nearly the same national boundaries as a modern world map (the dissolution of the USSR notwithstanding). The problem faced by the nations of the world is keeping those borders stable (or meaningful) in the future. It is very easy for things to get out of hand, that is, for events to cascade into a world altering event like the global wars of the 20th century.
If nation building doesn’t work, the alternatives aren’t pretty. I don’t like the idea of the US dropping drones on people on the authority of the chief executive, or the intelligence agencies of the chief executive having the power to investigate Americans without judicial review. The office of chief executive of the United States is not particularly subject to democratic oversight, and whoever holds it is incentivised to make it less subject to democratic oversight.
I guess I am annoyed at people who seem to be gleeful because the neocons dreams of nation-building failed. Neocons aren’t the only would-be colonizers on the planet, and if not nation building, what? Endless war against undefeatable enemies?
Without the ability to rebuild failed states to our liking, quo vadimus?
Emery Incognito

August 25, 2015

PB wrote: “Are you comfortable with Iran possessing 100-200 nuclear weapons, Emery?”
About as comfortable as I am with the 200 nuclear weapons Pakistan, India and Israel process. Do you truly believe the mullahs are crazy enough to want to see Iran experience a massive nuclear retaliatory strike? MAD is a principle that has worked thus far. The idea that every nations motives are more suspect other than our own is the common script of all countries and used in all narratives much like a disclaimer is used in a contact.
Joe Doakes

August 25, 2015

Strawman, Emery. Iran could launch a nuclear attack on New York today confident that Barack Obama would not launch to retaliate but would instead apologize for offending them. And Mutually Assured Destruction only deters people who want to live, not people willing to die for their faith.

Politically moderate Americans today do not understand martyrs. We know they existed back in ancient history but people aren’t like that nowadays, at least nobody we know in the faculty lounge. We’re all thoughtful, reasonable people, surely those folks over there are the same?
Emery Incognito

August 25, 2015

“I supported the Afghanistan and Iraq wars because the options seemed to be worse — either a US withdrawal from the world stage, or further attacks like 9/11.”

While being sympathetic towards the general thrust of your comment I don’t believe that this current flavor of the month strategic approach carries within itself any greater propensity for success than our other previous approaches. Attacking ISIS is fine by me but I expect little from the effort except dead Islamic extremists which are easily replaceable.

The risks of ISIS in my humble view are being dramatically over blown by domestic political forces thus forcing Obama to respond less to the ISIS threat than to a domestic political impulse requiring attention.

ISIS contains the seeds of its own eventual destruction. It is an alliance of unstable self-interested tribal groupings. That condition in the Middle East has always led to eventual fratricide as factions seek advantage of one over the other.

Iran’s interests are limited and calculated to insuring that the ascendency of their brethren Shiites in eastern Iraq. They also want to keep their investment in Assad propped up and if the Americans are willing to do their bidding by bombing the desert that’s fine with them. The Iranian’s play a very long game. We on the other hand play a game defined by the two-year election cycle.
kel

August 25, 2015

“The risks of ISIS in my humble view are being dramatically over blown by domestic political forces thus forcing Obama to respond less to the ISIS threat than to a domestic political impulse requiring attention. “

On the contrary, if we had a conservative president you would not be able to turn on ABCCBSNBCCNNNPR without being inundated 24/7 with every bit of violent imagery that ISIS produces as a means of proving how weak and ineffectual our leadership was. As it is our media elite soft pedal, deflect and recast the narrative as much as possible in order to allow Dear Leader to work on securing his legacy with occasional breaks to show up in the sit-room to play live action Call Of Duty: Black Ops.
Want proof? What is Hillary’s comprehensive plan for neutralizing ISIS and restoring stability in the ME? Go ahead look for it, take your time.
Emery Incognito

August 25, 2015

I’m neither a fan nor a supporter of Mrs. Clinton. Despite his very long odds, I like John Kasich. If Bush is the eventual nominee, he would be wise to choose Kasich as his running partner and increase the odds of winning Ohio.
Prussian Blue

August 25, 2015

A Bush-Kasich ticket would be an affirmation of the idea that the GOP has become the tax collector for the welfare state. Also, you’ve got the problem of a pasty-white male ticket. Not that there is anything wrong with that . . .
Emery Incognito

August 25, 2015

Certain Republicans go for idiots with an anti-establishment attitude.
Certain Democrats go for starry-eyed idealists with an anti-establishment attitude.

The establishment almost always wins.
Prussian Blue

August 25, 2015

In 2008, the candidate of the Democrat establishment was Hillary Clinton.
Trump won’t lose because the establishment will crush him, he will lose because he is not a serious candidate. Other than immigration, he doesn’t really have any policies (“being the best president ever” is not a policy). Trump’s signature issue is immigration. If he was serious about immigration, he would spend a few million countering the money the US Chamber of Congress spends supporting candidates in GOP congressional primaries. Trump has no ground game. Has he even contacted a state or county level GOP organization?
Trump is setting himself up to be a spoiler, not a winner.
Emery Incognito

August 25, 2015

Clinton better have something to offer, policy-wise, or she could easily lose to a centrist who can out-centrist her, like Bush.
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