Internet Special Bulletin, 1-Oct-02

To Help You Understand The War

Recommended Reading

Odds are high that we will be in a war economy for at least a decade, and maybe the rest of our lives. Homeland security chief Tom Ridge refers to the war as a "permanent condition."

If you do not know a lot about war, you will be operating with a major handicap, you could make costly mistakes, and pass up major opportunities for profit.

(For an explanation of the war economy, see the May 2000 Early Warning Report, p.4 to 8; November 2000 EWR, p.2 to 5; , January 2001 EWR, p.2 & 3; May 2002 EWR, p.4 to 8; June 2002 EWR, p.5 to 8; and July 2002 EWR, p.2 to 5. Back issues of EWR are $10 each.)

Should you believe what the government and mainstream press tell you about the war?

Senator Hiram Johnson warned in 1917, "The first casualty when war comes is truth."

Here is a recommended reading list about war. I suggest you go through the books in the order listed. To save you from plowing through stacks of tech manuals, all have been selected for easy reading.

Book List

I have never been accused of being excessively humble so, not surprisingly, the first books I recommend are my own. To help you become more savvy about war, especially the present war, in 1999 I wrote the book that predicted it:

1. THE THOUSAND YEAR WAR IN THE MIDEAST, AND HOW IT AFFECTS YOU TODAY, by Richard Maybury.

The second millennium began in 1000 AD with Christians and Moslems using swords and spears on each other near Baghdad. It ended with jet pilots from the Christian world using laser-guided bombs on Moslems near Baghdad.

The "war on terrorism" is the third world war. It did not begin on September 11, 2001, it began a thousand years ago.

This is the book that predicted America's plunge into the war. It gives you the so-called Big Picture, the full story of the ten century battle between the Islamic World and Christian West.

TYW includes 34 maps which help you understand how America blundered into this terrible conflict between Moslems and the rulers of Christian Europe.

This year I wrote:

2. WORLD WAR I, THE REST OF THE STORY AND HOW IT AFFECTS YOU TODAY, by Richard Maybury, and its sequel:

3. WORLD WAR II, THE REST OF THE STORY AND HOW IT AFFECTS YOU TODAY, by Richard Maybury.

The explosion of the battleship Maine in Havana Harbor in 1898 was the beginning of a chain reaction that eventually destroyed the World Trade Center in 2001.

An unbroken line leads directly from the Spanish-American War through World War I, World War II, the Korean and Vietnam Wars, the Iraq-Kuwait War, and now to the present war. Anywhere along this line, the federal government could have ended the chain reaction, but never chose to do it.

The first book of this two-book set covers events from 1870-1935, focusing on the First World War and the ten deadly ideas that lead to war.

The next book covers 1935 to the present, with emphasis on the Second World War and how our misunderstanding of this war led to America's subsequent wars in Vietnam and many other places, including the present "war on terrorism."

Unlike other books about war, these focus on ideas and effects, not combat and carnage.

These two books explain that the reason we are in the third world war is we were lied to about the first and second world wars. The federal government's foreign policy today is still based on 1940s propaganda.

All three books are written to be very easy, clear reading. They are in the form of a series of letters from an economist to his niece or nephew, who has asked for a non-government explanation of the wars, especially the present war.

Caution: few Americans have much interest in World War I, so after reading THOUSAND YEAR WAR, they want to go straight to my World War II book. Please, read about World War I first. The second world war was chapter two of the first world war, and the second world war is nearly impossible to understand unless you know about the ideas and events that led to the first world war. These ideas are still very much alive and still guiding US foreign policy.

For instance, in the late 1800s, US officials adopted the policy of "Anglo-Saxonism," which said that America is a superior country, and Americans have the right and duty to clean up the world and rule it, like the ancient Romans did. Anglo-Saxonism produced the Spanish-American war of 1898, then led to US involvement in the first world war.

In 1998, President Clinton's Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, renamed Anglo-Saxonism, she called it "the indispensable nation." Said Albright, "If we have to use force, it is because we are America. We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall. We see farther into the future."

Clinton's bombing of Afghanistan under the doctrine of "indispensable nation" then led to the destruction of the World Trade Center in 2001.

One of the insights you will gain from these books is that perhaps the most amazing two things about military forces is their effectiveness, and their ineffectiveness. When it comes to killing, their abilities are astounding, but when it comes to killing the people who really do need killing, they are nearly impotent.

It is probably fair to say these are anti-war books written by an extreme militarist.

After you finish these three books, which give you the history and geopolitics behind the present war, it will be time to develop an understanding of weapons and strategies.

4. DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS - MILITARY INFORMATION YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO KNOW by James F. Dunnigan and Albert A. Nofi. Published in 1990, this book is somewhat out of date, but nevertheless packed with fascinating tidbits about weapons, strategy and geopolitics. Lots of insights here that the government does not want you to have.

5. SUPPLYING WAR by Martin van Creveld. An old saying among generals and admirals is that amateurs talk about strategy while experts talk about logistics. Logistics is the ability to get bullets and beans to the troops. Creveld believes logistics is 90% of warfare, and I think that may be an understatement. Understand logistics and you understand a great deal about how war affects the economy and the investment markets, too.

Nearly all wars today are guerrilla wars, and the "war on terrorism," is no exception. Special operations, which mostly means anti-guerrilla warfare, is the point of the spear. The next two books give you a look at the weapons, tactics, and a bit of strategy.

6. SHADOW WARRIORS - INSIDE THE SPECIAL FORCES by Tom Clancy.

7. THE COMPLETE IDIOT'S GUIDE TO U.S. SPECIAL OPS FORCES by Marc Cerasini.

8. TARGET SWITZERLAND by Stephen P. Halbrook. It's not that America should not have military forces, it's that we have the wrong kind. Our Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines are mostly expeditionary forces scattered all over the world to cram the federal government's policies down other people's throats. We should have the kind of military described in the second amendment to the Constitution, one designed for defense, not for encroaching on other nations - a porcupine not a shark. In World War I and World War II, the Swiss used this porcupine defense - a well-equipped militia trained to fight as guerrillas - to protect against the mighty Third Reich, and it worked. This book explains how the Swiss did it, a sterling example for every nation to follow.

Tom Clancy is famously knowledgeable about military affairs, and his series about the various parts of the U.S. armed forces will give you more than you will ever need to know:

9. ARMORED CAV - A GUIDED TOUR OF AN ARMORED CAVALRY REGIMENT by Tom Clancy.

10. CARRIER - A GUIDED TOUR OF AN AIRCRAFT CARRIER by Tom Clancy.

11. SUBMARINE - A GUIDED TOUR INSIDE A NUCLEAR WARSHIP by Tom Clancy.

12. FIGHTER WING - A GUIDED TOUR OF AN AIR FORCE COMBAT WING by Tom Clancy.

13. MARINE - A GUIDED TOUR OF A MARINE EXPEDITIONARY UNIT by Tom Clancy.

14. AIRBORNE - A GUIDED TOUR OF AN AIRBORNE TASK FORCE by Tom Clancy.

The war has triggered new interest in weapons, so a well-stocked bookstore will contain a plethora of illustrated books about weapons. Two handy series are:

15. JANE'S RECOGNITION GUIDES. Jane's publishes a tank guide, a warship guide, etc. Photos plus data.

16. Another series similar to the Jane's recognition guides is published by Friedman-Fairfax Publishers.

17. VIETNAM, A HISTORY, THE FIRST COMPLETE ACCOUNT OF THE VIETNAM WAR by Stanley Karnow, gives the whole awful story, and therefore a lot of insight about why the Pentagon is so afraid of guerrilla war.

18. BLOWBACK by Chalmers Johnson. Invented by the CIA, the term "blowback" refers to the revenge foreigners exact for the federal government's (usually secret) meddling in their countries. I hope you will make this highly useful term part of your vocabulary. An early example of blowback was the German navy sinking the liner Lusitania in 1915. Germans had discovered that Washington was secretly using the ship to supply ammunition to Britain. The 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor was blowback for President Roosevelt cutting off Japan's oil supply. My book, THE THOUSAND YEAR WAR, covers the Mideast; Johnson's is mostly about the Far East, but he writes about bin Laden and sounds the same warning THE THOUSAND YEAR WAR does. Ignore Johnson's leftist economics, his geopolitics is perfectly on target.

19. JOSHUA'S HAMMER by David Hagberg. If you prefer techno-thrillers, this book published prior to September 11, 2001 gives a revealing picture of guerrilla operations in Afghanistan, and a likely way the guerrillas will hit the US. The book has the usual weaknesses of such novels, it sees everything in the simplistic terms of a Hollywood movie, good guys against bad guys, and paints government officials as honorable, stalwart defenders of liberty. But, it is an entertaining way to get insights about events that affect our investments.

20. THE ENEMY WITHIN by Larry Bond. I first recommended this in July 1997, and I recommend it now more than ever. Bond offers a stunning insight. Until the 1990s, Washington's Islamic enemies had trouble infiltrating America. Most of these warriors had Middle Eastern appearances, making it difficult for them to blend into American society.

In the 1990s, Clinton's arms embargo against Moslems in the Balkans got a lot of innocent Moslem men, women and children killed by the better-armed Christians. Thus the embargo created for America a lot more "terrorist" enemies.

Bond's point is that Balkan Moslems are European slavs, not Middle Easterners. Many have blond hair and blue eyes, and would have no trouble blending into American society. They may be duping American malcontents such as Timothy McVeigh (Oklahoma City) into doing their dirty work for them.

In short, the real main force of so-called terrorists already inside the US may look like Germans or Swedes.

In 1997 I wrote, "THE ENEMY WITHIN contains too much Rambo for my tastes, and the ending is a chapter from POLLYANNA compared to the big war that's likely, but these are my only serious criticisms." So far, that forecast is right on track. Combine Bond's book with the 11/01 EWR article about Hasan-i Sabah's group, and you will know a lot that does not appear in the mainstream press.

21. A HISTORY OF WARFARE by John Keegan. An encyclopedic look at the evolution of warfare since ancient times, including hardware, strategy and tactics. Many insights about how war affects the psychology of a leader to the point that the leader does not steer the war, the war steers the leader.

22. THE OXFORD BOOK OF MILITARY ANECDOTES edited by Max Hastings. Persons who have not served in the armed forces sometimes have misleading notions about what military life and warfare are really like. This collection of short anecdotes from the experiences of troops and officers will dispel any notions about glory, precision, heroism or effectiveness. War is, more than anything else, chaos.

23. PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE by Gore Vidal. Vidal is a leftist, which makes his economics difficult to stomach, but this book's thoughts on US foreign policy are right on. The book is worth the price just for the list of Washington's 201 foreign military adventures since 1945. Washington makes the Romans look like peaceniks.

Each time Washington's armed forces kill someone, America becomes the enemy of that individual's friends and relatives. These people can number in the dozens or hundreds. You don't need to be a math wizard to see an exponential growth rate in the hatred of America.

In other words, the US armed forces have been used to create the enemies they are supposed to be protecting us against.

24. THE PRINCE by Niccolo Machiavelli. When using his power, a politician experiences a high much like that produced by cocaine. He is an addict, he does not own his power, his power owns him, he dances to its tune.

"I have thought it proper to represent things as they are in real truth, rather than as they are imagined. ... I know everyone will agree that it would be most laudable if a prince possessed all the qualities deemed to be good among those I have enumerated. But, because of conditions in the world, princes cannot have these qualities."

So wrote Machiavelli in THE PRINCE, published in 1532. This short book remains the world's most revealing explanation of how governments really work, and no government on earth wants you to read it. It is packed with insight that will keep you from jumping to high-risk conclusions about how government will affect your investments. As you read, substitute the word president for prince. You will find this especially helpful in understanding foreign and military policies.

THE PRINCE is so savvy about political power that it was a favorite book of Mussolini.

I recommend the Penguin Classics edition translated by George Bull, the introduction is not to be missed.

If you want to be streetwise about what governments really are and how they really behave, order THE PRINCE from any bookstore.

   Editor, Early Warning Report
   October 1, 2002

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