An eerie event occurred at a recent meeting of the WDCY2K
(Washington, D.C., Y2K — the largest Y2K group in the world). Senator
Bennett was the speaker. He indicated many foreign countries were
behind in fixing Y2K, and that their failure to finish could have a
severe economic impact here. During the question-and-answer session, a
member of the audience followed up on this point by asking what the
United States could do to make these countries do a better job of
getting ready?
Bennett replied, “Well, of course, there’s nothing we can do to force
another sovereign nation to do what we want.”
A titter ran through the crowd. The chuckles grew when someone asked
jokingly if that included Serbia (at that moment under intense air
attack by NATO forces). In a moment, laughter swept across the audience
and the senator’s face flushed an admirable bright red. (Yes, Alice,
it’s rare, but politicians can blush.) Exhibiting fine political skill,
Bennett adroitly recaptured the moment by adding, “as so clearly
demonstrated by our current lack of success in the Balkans.”
Safely back in the senator’s pocket, the audience roared its
appreciation. To one who does a lot of public speaking, it was a
delicious moment. There is a serious relationship between Y2K and the
recent military conflict in Kosovo, however — one that could have
far-reaching and dramatic effects on our military readiness and the
prospects for peace or war in the near future. First, a few comments
about the conflict and the combatants:
The Eastern Orthodox Christian Serbs and the Moslem Albanians hate
each other with pathological intensity because they’ve been at war for
over 600 years. In 1389, Moslem hordes were poised on the doorstep of
Eastern Europe threatening conquest. The only thing standing in their
way was an army of Serbian Crusaders.
The ensuing battle went badly for the outnumbered Serbs and when
their leader, Prince Lazar, was slain they faced certain annihilation.
In a desperate suicide strike, however, several hundred Serbian knights
broke through to the enemy’s command post where they put the opposing
Turkish leader, Emir Murad I, to the knife. They perished in doing so
but they also broke the spirit of their opponents and saved Europe from
a Moslem conquest.
Seventy-seven thousand Serbian knights died in this greatest act of
Christian martyrdom in history. The site of the battlefield is today
called “The Holy Field” — of Kosovo. The collarbone of Prince Lazar
rests there in the Orthodox Cathedral, Serbia’s most holy shrine. To
this day, the Serbian battle flag is adorned with the number “1389” in
memory of the year of this costly but decisive victory.
Another conflict, centuries later, provides further insight into
these brutal people. As World War II ended, Serbia was still occupied
by Nazi troops. In horrifying retaliation, the Serbs made prisoners of
the entire occupation army and forced them to march back and forth
across Serbia where the populace beat them with sticks and stones until
every man died from starvation and exposure.
This is the place and these are the people Bill Clinton decided to
pick a fight with. It was an unbelievably stupid decision. The Serbs
will never stop fighting because Kosovo is holy ground to them. It is
their Alamo and much, much more.
Don’t be fooled by a cease-fire and the introduction of tens of
thousands of “peacekeeping” troops. The Serbs may go underground and
start a guerrilla war or they may slip back into the weeds and regroup.
Whatever the case, they will not quit. And every one of them now hates
the United States with an awesome, cold-blooded virulence. Bill Clinton
and NATO have accomplished little beyond creating another ten million
terrorists. Where does Y2K fit into this picture? We need to see one
more piece of the jigsaw puzzle.
Corrupting the Warrior Spirit
Bill Clinton hates the armed forces. Immediately after his
inauguration, he began systematically dismantling the most powerful
military in the world. Today, the job is nearly finished.
A once-proud fighting machine is now shot through with lady
gladiators and gay warriors — like dry rot in a fine looking building.
I don’t apologize if this sentiment offends. I’ve been in combat, and
I’ve tended to a son’s family while he was dodging Saddam Hussein’s Scud
missiles.
No amount of “fairness” or “diversity” can compensate for the fact
that these Clinton policies are poisonous. They destroy morale and
break down trust in leadership. It is a brutal fact of life; you can’t
plant petunias and expect to harvest pit bulls. And you better not send
petunias to take on the Saddam Husseins or Serbs of the world.
In this wretched and toxic environment, the senior leadership of the
military services has become severely politicized — by far the worst I
have seen in my lifetime. Only those who support Clinton’s radical,
political correctness agenda can aspire to flag rank — even while they
know this agenda is destroying fundamental military values.
This abandonment of principle in favor of self-promotion is not lost
on junior officers or senior enlisted personnel. A recent Army survey
indicated an astonishing 70 percent of soldiers don’t trust their senior
leadership. No wonder the retention rate, especially among pilots, is
in the toilet.
Tearing down the machine
Under Clinton’s negligence, the physical readiness of the armed
forces has also deteriorated enormously. Col. David Hackworth, retired,
a long-time military critic, wrote in the Oct. 28, 1998 edition of
WorldNetDaily that
- The kids that daily put their lives on the line all over this
messed-up world have tanks without engines, planes without parts, ships
without gear and a military infrastructure — hangars, barracks, ranges
— that looks more like that of a Third World military force.
My military career was spent in electronics maintenance — ten
years as a technician and fourteen as a maintenance officer. My final
shipboard tour was served onboard an aircraft carrier where I managed
the upkeep of 7,000 pieces of electronics equipment. I understand spare
parts. I’ve lived and breathed spare parts. To a maintenance officer,
there are only two important things in the world. Your people and your
spare parts.
Col. Hackworth is right; the United States had a huge spare parts
problem even before the Kosovo conflict. One report, for example,
indicated over one fourth of the Air Force’s airplanes could not be
flown because of a lack of, you guessed it, spare parts. This terrible
material readiness is common across all the services.
Military forces have been slashed since the end of the cold war. At
the same time, a succession of American presidents has exhibited a
reckless passion for throwing them at every problem around the globe.
According to Air Force Times (Aug. 3, 1998) the United States now has
troops stationed in 144 nations — about two-thirds of all the countries
in the world.
Bill Clinton has intensified this trend like no other before him. As
much as he hates the military, he loves using the military and does so
at the slightest whim and for any reason — to fluff up his poll
numbers, even to distract attention from the latest scandal. The
operational tempo of the military today is extremely high. Simply put,
he’s running them ragged, very, very ragged.
And now, Kosovo. This conflict hammered our armed forces, already
stretched rubber-band thin. For example, during the conflict, the Air
Force announced the cancellation of planned departures from active
service (retirement, enlistment completion, etc.) of personnel critical
to the war effort. The action affected about 40 percent of the entire
force. And this kind of step is necessary when we have to take on some
tin pot dictator in some rag-tag Third World nation.
At the moment there is virtually no capability to handle a serious
conflict in any other hot spot. Not long ago the Air Force even called
for a “King’s X” stating they needed a rest before being called into
service again. The equipment is taking a beating. Weapons, and, more
seriously, spare parts, are being consumed at alarming rates.
For the rest of the year we’ll pour materials into the Balkans to
support the peacekeepers there. A massive military effort will be going
on there for most of 1999. And then Y2K will hit.
I believe most of the weapons systems (airplanes, tanks, missiles,
etc.) will work. Intelligence and communications systems will have some
problems but they will probably not be catastrophic. Logistics and
other support systems will be hit even worse because these systems are
always on the bottom of the totem pole.
The greatest Y2K impact, however, will be the lack of compliance of
their civilian suppliers. My research indicates that not enough is
being done to assure the Y2K compliance of the small and medium sized
companies that make many of the spare parts. (There those pesky things
are again.)
The Department of Defense is making the classic Y2K management error
of only taking care of the computers within their own four walls. They
are failing to assess systems on which they have great dependence but
which they do not own or control.
It’s the spare parts, stupid!
For a military force, this has always been the case.
By the middle of next year, I’ll be surprised if the United States
has the capacity to intervene effectively in any conflict in the world.
This gloomy view does not depend on widespread or severe Y2K computer
failures of infrastructure in this country. If such problems occur, the
military’s problem will be much more severe.
If this spare parts crisis materializes, several military conflicts
are likely. These would probably include China-Taiwan, North-South
Korea, India-Pakistan and general conflagrations in the Persian Gulf and
the Balkans. Some might even call that — World War III.
Jim Lord is a veteran Y2K expert and author, and a retired Navy
officer. To send this article to a friend, visit Jim Lord’s
website. First published in the “Journal of
Personal Freedom” newsletter.
