What Closing American Diplomatic Facilities Means

[Geee]

American Thinker:

The U.S. closed its embassies and consulates in 21 Muslim countries on Saturday and Sunday, August 3rd and 4th. There are four lessons in this decision.

First, it says something about the countries in which these facilities are located. A nation's embassy and consular offices are considered part of that country's sovereign territory. Ambassadors and other official diplomatic personnel are supposed to be sacrosanct. A host nation is obligated to protect the property and officials attached to an embassy and/or consulate.

As we learned last year, in Cairo and especially in Benghazi, Middle-Eastern governments cannot, or will not, insure American territory's and personnel's safety. There have been other occasions -- Tehran, 1989 comes to mind -- when governments hostile to the U.S. permitted, and perhaps encouraged, mobs to assault U.S. facilities and officials.

[righteousmomma]

To sum up my thoughts on all this:

Obama told us there is no war on terror. He said we have al qaeda "on the run" and that they were just a small insignificant group because HE got Ben Laden.

Well, who is on the run now?

[Valin]

On Closed Embassies, the Worldwide Travel Alert, and Wimpitude

Daniel Pipes

August 3, 2013

 

In April, the city of Boston was effectively under military curfew because two terrorists were on the loose. Now, fears of al-Qaeda attacking has led the U.S. government temporarily to close 21 U.S. embassies in Muslim-majority countries and then issue a worldwide travel alert announcing that "Terrorists may elect to use a variety of means and weapons and target both official and private interests. U.S. citizens are reminded of the potential for terrorists to attack public transportation systems and other tourist infrastructure."

 

(Snip)

 

Comments: (1) Dont know about you, but I find this pre-emptive cringing unworthy of a great country, even humiliating. Why do we allow a bunch of extremist thugs to close us down, rather than the reverse? For what purpose to we pay for the worlds best military and largest intelligence services if not to protect ourselves from this sort of threat?

 

(2) This timidity fits into a larger pattern that I have long found reprehensible. Heres a comment of mine from 1998 I should like to resurrect, that responded to the double bombings of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania almost exactly fifteen years ago, on Aug. 7, 1998:

 

Itll be a happy day when American embassies are again built in busy downtown intersections out of normal materials and not, as they are now, bunkers located in distant lots surrounded by high fences. Such a change will only be possible when the safety of Americans depends not on walls, metal detectors and Marine guards, but on the deterrence established by years of terrible retribution against anyone who so much as harms a single American citizen.

 

(Snip)

[Valin]

To sum up my thoughts on all this:

Obama told us there is no war on terror. He said we have al qaeda "on the run" and that they were just a small insignificant group because HE got Ben Laden.

Well, who is on the run now?

3 quick points

1. Those of us who really follow this war knew 37 seconds after he said it, that this was...well BS. What should concern people is it appears America is pulling back. And No I am not just talking about the administration, there is also our friends in the Libertarian/Paleo-Con wing of the GOP.

2. We as a nation have short memories, 10 years for many is a long time. For our enemies 100 years is last week. In addition Western Liberal Democracies don't like long wars, we like to go in kick ass, get out. Because we have better more important things to do with our time...hug the kids play with the wife.

3. This leads people to believe the President when he says like this, because its an appealing message. Then this happens and its big news.

 

 

News Flash we can probably look forward to (at least) the next couple of decades of this war. Think Cold War and its 1952. Because at a minimum that is the time frame we are looking at.

[Valin]

Manipulating the U.S. Intelligence Community Shouldn’t Be This Easy

Angelo M. Codevilla

8/4/13

 

(Snip)The shutdown and warnings, then, proceed from the assumption either that the terrorists “chatter” amongst themselves blissfully ignorant of what anyone who cares to look knows about NSA’s reach, or that they willfully warn us. That assumption flies in the face of experience. The terrorists who have bitten us have not chattered, while those who chatter do not bite. The terrorists who brought mortars and grenade launchers to destroy US facilities in Benghazi and kill our people did not chatter. The US government is up against serious people. Unfortunately, it gives proof of unseriousness.

 

The US government’s assertion that the “threats” emanating from this “chatter” were somehow “specific” belies itself because it is contrary to common sense. Any specificity would focus attention on specific people and places rather than eliciting meaningless general measures and warnings. That attention’s effectiveness would depend on secret preparations for counter strokes, not on public displays of fear.

 

This leads reasonable persons to conclude that some enemies of the United States, well knowing that NSA is listening, decided to give it an earful, with a few names and places thrown in by way of example, but not enough to remove the impression they sought to give of general mayhem. And so they ‘chattered.” They had sound reason to believe that US intelligence executives would trigger equally incompetent policy makers, fearful of being blamed for an attack on their watch preceded by such “chatter.”

(Snip)