Steve Gilliard, 1964-2007
It is with tremendous sadness that we must convey
the news that Steve Gilliard, editor and publisher of The News Blog,
passed away June 2, 2007. He was 42.
To those who have come to trust
The News Blog and its insightful, brash and unapologetic editorial
tone, we have Steve to thank from the bottom of our hearts. Steve helped
lead many discussions that mattered to all of us, and he tackled subjects
and interest categories where others feared to tread.
Please keep Steve's friends and family in your
thoughts and prayers.
Steve meant so much to us.
We will miss him terribly.
photo by lindsay beyerstein
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Watson: "War Nerd on Hezbollah"

He's tough
Thanks to Watson for this grab from War Nerd - thanks Watson!
War Nerd is the nomme-de-blog of foggy Fresno's Gary Brecher. His work appears in the eXile, Moscow's alternative newspaper.
Like Steve, he's a military history buff, and he regularly offers an alternative critique to the strategery of our neocon Napoleons.
I'm a bit hesitant to recommend him because his cold-blooded, shock-the-bourgeois writing style is insensitive, to mankind in general and to ethnicity in particular. His advice to those offended would probably be 'Don't study war'.
The excerpt below contains an IDF/Wehrmacht comparison. I think it's benign, but I refer readers to Wes Cheek's 3/18/07 News Blog guest-post 'The Problem with the Problem with Nazi Analogies', and the comments thereto.
Here's War Nerd in July 2006 on the IDF-Hezbollah dustup in Lebanon:
'The IDF doesn't deserve its rep. It did once, back in 1948 and during Suez, when it was manned by double-tough survivors of the European Jews who were determined to show up the book-nerd stereotype by kicking ass from Haifa to Damascus. Those dudes were truly tough. But we're talking demographics again, dude. Passage of time, plus difference in birthrate, means that by now the IDF has a thin, real thin, crust of Ashkenazi brains'n'brawn on top and a bunch of flabby mama's boys under them. ...
'The IDF was safe in its F-16s and Merkavas, facing Pal[estian]s with nothing but rifles and old RPGs. It's easy to look tough rolling through refugee camps in the world's most heavily armored tank. But as you may recall, those tanks got a real different reception when they chased Hezbollah's raiding party back into Lebanon after the Hezzies killed three IDF soldiers and kidnapped another two. ...
'It was a good plot twist: one minute the IDF is stomping around Gaza blasting amateurs, when something taps it on the shoulder, and there's Hezbollah, looking like Godzilla in a headscarf. Pretty funny moment, something almost Abbot & Costello about it. No army enjoys getting invited to a second front just when it was starting to enjoy itself on the first one. Even the Wehrmacht rank and file was bummed when they heard they were getting shipped from the beaches of the Mediterranean to Russia. ...
'Nasrullah may look like a fat social studies teacher who needs a shave, but you don't claw your way to the top of a bloody world like that one without brains. The men who run Hezbollah attacked because they finally figured out that they literally cannot lose. The IDF can never expel Hezbollah from South Lebanon, because it's a genuine mass movement, ashttp://www2.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif committed and crazy at the roots as at the top. ... If Israel retaliates by blasting every target of value in Lebanon, every TV tower and shopping mall and freeway...well, that's the beauty of the plan: the Shia are the poorest of the poor. They don't own any of that shit anyway. They sit back and laugh watching their neighbors' stuff that they've envied all their lives get blown away -- and it's the Israelis who get the blame. So call'em crazy if it makes you feel better, but don't call'em stupid. Better yet, get used to calling'em "Sir."
Link
- posted by WatsonLabels: hezbollah, IDF, lebanon
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