Pirate's Cove

And not just anyone a the NY Times, but, a retired Army Brigadier General, Steven M. Anderson, who says we need to Do Something, but, doesn’t really get around to say what we Should Do, just, Do Something

Save Energy, Save Our Troops

Well, who could disagree with that? Which is why I personally like the usual climate alarmists, barking out their insanity. It’s those that are quietly rational who are the most dangerous.

A NATO oil tanker truck was blown up by insurgents at the Pakistan-Afghanistan border last week, and while no one was injured, the incident temporarily closed the Khyber Pass, the main supply artery for Western troops in the Afghan theater. This has become an all-too-routine occurrence; in the last nine years some 1,000 Americans have been killed on fuel-related missions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Until the Defense Department develops battlefield policies recognizing that energy efficiency contributes to military effectiveness, more blood will be shed, billions of dollars will be wasted, our enemies will have thousands of vulnerable fuel trucks for targets and our commanders will continue to be distracted by the task of overseeing fuel convoys.

There is nothing wrong with energy efficiency, and the more we can do, the better, especially since so many military vehicles do not measure miles per gallon, but gallon per mile, as their standard. But, I’m sorry to say, I’m going to have to take General Anderson to task for this line of climate alarmist though.

First, the only energy efficiency he mentions is spraying foam insulation on buildings near the battlefield. That’s his sole recommendation. Which still means……trucks will have to transport the foam to those buildings, making themselves easy targets.

Second, “As the military’s senior logistician in Iraq for 15 months in 2006 and 2007”, he should know better that convoys are not solely about fuel. They include food, parts, ammunition, men, and other materials, and all have big bulls-eyes on them.

Of course, he wants us to get off “foreign oil.” That would be great, if the alarmists would allow us to use our own oil. And, I have a feeling that he wouldn’t allow us to use our own oil, either.

Why has the Defense Department dragged its feet on energy efficiency? Chalk it up to the impediments to change found in any large organization: passive leadership, lack of accountability, competing priorities. In this case, add skepticism over the data, calls for additional studies and unfounded environmental concerns.

Skepticism could be read more than one way, yet, I suspect that it is exactly what you thought the first time you read it, namely, not believing in globull warming, or climate change, or whatever-the-heck they are calling it today to fit their deranged cult’s beliefs.

You know, if the Usual Wimps on the Left would just let us beat the ever-loving-crap out of the enemy in an efficient way, we wouldn’t have to even have discussions about the use of fuel and the dangers of transporting it. The enemy would just be dead. And there would be less people on Planet Earth, using resources, exhaling CO2, which you’d think would make the unhinged alarmists happy, since they want population reduction.

BTW, you liberals/climate alarmists can save your “you must hate the military, Teach” idiocy.