posted on May, 18 2007 @ 09:45 AM
This definitely caught my attention.
This is a paper written by Lieutenant Colonel Charles J. Dunlap, Jr., USAF, is the Deputy Staff Judge Advocate, US Central Command, at MacDill AFB,
Florida. Now, to clarify the position, the writer makes clear at the beginning that this is a work of speculative fiction in the form of a "letter"
from an Air Force colonel who is detained for sedition following a military coup of the U.S. government in 2012.
Quite creative, if you think about it.
The paper though, written in 1992, talks about trends and events that led to this coup.
While this is fiction, Dunlap makes some startling accurate predictions.
Among his observations:
- Americans became exasperated with democracy. We were disillusioned with the apparent inability of elected government to solve the nation's
dilemmas. We were looking for someone or something that could produce workable answers.
- The country suffered from a "deep pessimism about politicians and government after years of broken promises."
- Congress initiated the use of "national defense" as a rationale to boost military participation in an activity historically the exclusive domain
of civilian government: law enforcement.
- Concern about crime was a major reason why General Brutus's actions were approved in the Referendum. Although voter participation by the general
public was low, older Americans voted at a much higher rate.[32] Furthermore, with the aging of the baby boom generation, the block of American voters
over 45 grew to almost 53 percent of the voters by 2010.
- As more commercial airlines went bankrupt and unprofitable air routes dropped, the military was called upon to provide "essential" air transport
to the affected regions.
- In the name of national defense, the military next found itself in the sealift business. Ships purchased by the military for contingencies were
leased, complete with military crews, at low rates to US exporters to help solve the trade deficit.
- What made this all the more disheartening was the wretched performance of our forces in the Second Gulf War.[73] Consumed with ancillary and
nontraditional missions, the military neglected its fundamental raison d'etre. As the Supreme Court succinctly put it more than a half century ago,
the "primary business of armies and navies [is] to fight or be ready to fight wars should the occasion arise." When Iranian armies started pouring
into the lower Gulf states in 2010, the US armed forces were ready to do anything but fight.
- People in the military no longer considered themselves warriors. Instead, they perceived themselves as policemen, relief workers, educators,
builders, health care providers, politicians--everything but warfighters. When these philanthropists met the Iranian 10th Armored Corps near Daharan
during the Second Gulf War, they were brutally slaughtered by a military which had not forgotten what militaries were supposed to do or what war is
really all about.
While some of the methods that led to the coup in the paper are a little far fetched today, the nut of his thesis remains. The military is too
divested with pointless policing missions (Iraq?) and rebuilding programs (again, Iraq?) to be effective and the military, along with a growing U.S.
public support, will swell into the White House to fix things....