A Primer on Warfare & Occupation
For Public Schools (and Presidents)

By Daniel D. New

Class, today we will learn about the related subjects of “WARFARE” and “OCCUPATION”. 

It is interesting that one can search various DOD and military websites and find no definition for the simple word, “war”.  Hundreds of terms deal with “war this”, and “war that”, but none define “war” itself.  I therefore turned to Webster’s on line for:

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1) - Cite This Source

war1  Pronunciation noun, verb, warred, war·ring, adjective

–noun

That’ll do for our purposes.  A “war”, Children, is when two nations get into a big fight.  Sometimes they stop before a victory is accomplished, for any number of reasons, such as happened in Korea.  Usually, one side or the other gives up.  Surrenders.  The war is then considered over, and a new phase begins.

The winner dictates terms, saying, “We won.  This is how it’s going to be.”

And now, the War is over.

What happens next will vary from case to case, but in general, when you have two Nations who fight, the winner tends to dominate the loser for a long time, usually by setting up a friendly administration (also known as a “puppet government”) to run the losing Nation. 

When an Empire goes to war, unlike simple Nations, they tend to stick around and dominate the daily life of the losing population.  This is known as the Occupation Period, and the former nation (which is no longer a Nation) is known as the Occupied Territory.

Occupation, Boys and Girls, it different from Warfare, in many ways, in spite of some similarities. 

Class exercise:  List some ways in which Occupation is different from Warfare: 

1.  Under Warfare, there is a Front, and organized resistance.  Under Occupation, there is no battle front, the enemy has given up on organized, formal resistance.

2.  Under Warfare, there is a Central Command of Resistance.  Under Occupation, if there is any resistance, it tends to be disorganized, irregular, and without cohesion.

3.  Under Warfare, the Enemy normally wears identifiable uniforms, fights as a unit, and when captured under the rules of warfare, is treated as a Prisoner of War.  Under Occupation, the Enemy almost never wears a uniform, but blends in with the population.

4.  Under Warfare, the opposing forces may actually communicate, send offers of negotiation, exchange prisoners, discuss terms of surrender, or other subjects.  Under Occupation, both the Occupying Force and its Puppet Government speak the same terms, and the Resistance has no recognizable voice in government, in policy, or in warfare.

5.  Under Warfare, when the Winner prevails, the Enemy surrenders.  Under Occupation, the Enemy waits, to see how the Conqueror is going to behave, and then, once the Enemy begins to resist, he tends to get stronger, emboldened by the inability of the Occupation Forces to identify and neutralize him. 

6.  Under Warfare, the shooting stops when the Enemy surrenders.  Under Occupation, the shooting begins to grow, little by little, until the Resistance is either victorious or is defeated. 

7.  Nations which win wars usually know better than to attempt to occupy, unless the similarities of the two nations are so great that the citizens of the one can hardly be distinguished from the citizen of the other.  This usually includes language, religion, race, culture, etc.  Empires may understand this difference, but don’t care, having the strength, and the will, to occupy and crush any resistance.

8.  Warfare has goals which are achievable, such as, “Destroy the Enemy’s ability to resist.”  Occupation requires one of two things – (a) the ability to crush – as in “kill” – all those who would resist it, or (b) cause the occupied people to desire Occupation over self-rule. 

(You may think of several others.)

Now, Children, take this test:

1.  Before the War, Iraq was ruled by

          __ A cohesive, stable and freely elected government

         __ A Tyrant who kept peace by crushing all resistance

2.  What do we have in Iraq and Afghanistan today?

         __ Warfare

         __ Military Occupation of a defeated nation

3.  Clearly, there WAS a War.  Who won it?

          __ The Allies (USA, Britain, and their lapdogs)

          __ The Iraqi Army under Saddam Hussein

4.  What was the stated Mission of that War?

         __ To defeat Terrorism

         __ To gain oil for the New World order

         __ To lead them all to Jesus

         __ To change their form of government

         __ To change their culture

5.  After the USA won the War, what happened next?

          __ We went home, leaving a puppet government to rule.

          __ We changed the Mission, and decided to institute a “Democracy”

6.  Who is winning in the Occupation?

          __ The USA and its Allies (Ally?)

          __ The Terrorists

          __ The Iraqi People, who are sick of being occupied

          __ Nobody

          __ Democracy

Now, Children, please go home and tell your parents that the War in Iraq has been over for a long time, and the USA won it. 

Then, patiently explain to them that what happened next was an Occupation, in which we attempted to do what only Tyrants have ever succeeded in doing, (such as Saddam Hussein), and that is to “Impose our will upon a population, politely, and with tolerance for their diversity, and with political correctness, in spite of all the guns.”

The VERY FIRST governor we attempted to impose upon Iraq, as head of an interim government, was a woman.  This could only be perceived as a colossal insult deliberately imposed upon a proud and patriarchal people, whom we were telling that we had liberated, (and who well they thought that, at first).  That particular insult backfired before she got to her office, but the American comprehension of how to deal with this “subdued people” never improved.  “Those People” whom we seemed to think would welcome our boot upon their necks, our daily patrols and the daily kicking in of their doors, just seemed to take it personally every time we arrested one of their spiritual leaders and submitted him to interrogation, torture and brutality, and to make it as bad as we could make it, these “interrogations” took place while the often-innocent citizen was naked, and being handled – even taunted – by women! 

The Occupation policies of the USA/British Forces should constitute a textbook on how to anger a nation, how to cultivate resistance, and how to stir up a blood feud that will not go away for a century, if then. 

Saddam Hussein, brutal dictator, had what it takes to keep three (or is it 27?) spiritual and linguistic and cultural factions from slitting each other’s throats and blowing one another up.  Brutality.

America is ill-suited to being able to bring herself to torture her defeated enemies.  When we do it, we are embarrassed about it.  Imagine, if you can, some reporter actually getting a story to Pravda that the Russians were torturing Afghani rebels.  This would earn such a reporter a reward of free meals and job security for life – in Siberia!  Russian leaders would laugh out loud, and in public, not that they were tortured, but at the creativity of the tormentors. 

Living as we do in a post-Christian society, with vestigial values of the Faith of our Fathers, we just can’t bring ourselves to act as brutally as all successful Occupying Forces must act.

Therefore, Children, it’s time to recognize that (a) we won the War, but (b) the Occupation was/is a disaster, and it’s time to give Iraq back to the warring factions, and let them settle things in their own way.  And may God have mercy on the women and the children.