We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
|
The seizure of eight British sailors and their small patrol boats by Iranian forces means it is time for the British government to show that unless a swift accommodation is reached, the consequences will be severe for the Iranian state. If the UK forces did indeed stray into Iranian waters, nothing more than a curt apology is due the Iranian state, and only that if they return the British sailors and their equipment without delay. The Iranian state is a vile tyranny and the sooner they are put under real pressure the better.
Of course I would like to see as much instability as possible within Iran regardless of the incident with the sailors. There is no shortage of people in Iran who would love to see the end of theocratic Islamic rule and now would be a good time to start taking advantage of the fact UK and US forces control the Iraqi side of the border. Surely there must be some fairly large stockpiles of weapons from Saddam’s army that have not been blown up and are just sitting around in Iraq…
But if the Iranians want to turn this into a hostage crisis however, the only response should be to use whatever force is required to resolve the situation, not just via anti-regime dissidents but directly by Britain against the Iranian state, and as soon as it is practical. If the theocrats want to engage in brinkmanship, I hope the UK and US will be prepared to not just go to the brink but to step straight over it very forcefully indeed. A nice opening move to the ‘negotiations’ would be to redeploy a division right up to the Iranian border.
Update: Hopefully this will all be over by tomorrow (Thursday). Perhaps the Iranian state decided it was unwise to push things too far. It will be interesting to see if there is any long term fall out from this incident.
We noted that Our Man in Basra, spurred to action by some less than informed commenter(s), to put it mildly, in the comments section of our post expressing outrage that the government has not greatly reinforced UK forces in Iraq. As he has so courageously by-passed his ‘handler’ and put much interesting information in a comment, I shall give you the full juicy goodness of Our Man in Basra (perhaps I should take this opportunity to rename him to Our Man in British Army), herewith:
As I notice I am being referred to, under my pseudonym “Our Man In Basra” (not I am no longer working, I should say) I thought I would throw my two-pence worth in.
Do UK troops need more equipment? Absolutely, enough personal radios, body armour, working Land Rovers – I could go on for hours. (In fairness, where I was the food was excellent). Some more helicopters would be hugely useful, but beyond fantasy as a hope.
However, more troops – abso-bloody-lutely. I cannot comment in detail for reasons that I take to be obvious, but to give generic examples of why more troops would be useful in a counter-insurgency
- More patrols, at more frequent intervals, so you can dominate the ground, throw uncertainty into your enemy, and essentially take the initiative. As all the military experts commenting above must know, having the initiative is the key to winning any kind of military confrontation. And if all your troops are tied up guarding your bases and vulnerable points, you cannot do anything to get the initiative. You cannot reduce the number of bases (much) or vulnerable points, so you need extra troops. QED.
- More (reliable) troops to guard the vital infrastructure, i.e. the electricity and oil lines. Not necessarily by sitting on them, but by frequent unpredictable patrols.
- Troops to act as dedicated QRF (Quick Reaction Forces), so that you can react rapidly to any enemy action- so that eventually he learns that any attack by him gets a very rapid response, thereby reducing the scale and effectiveness of what he can try.
- More guards for your own installations – not necessarily to boost the number on guard, but so you can rotate them more regularly, and keep them fresher/more alert.
- Crowd control. One man with a machine-gun can shoot a loot of people. But if you need to control a large angry crowd with sticks and stones, and you do not want to shoot – well then you need a lot of hard men with batons. Crowd in Iraq are in the 100s and up. That means you need a lot of troops – crowd control is labour-intensive. Unless you want to take the capital-intensive solution, and start shooting.
I am sure readers can think of plenty of other tactical uses for extra troops. At the higher level, the more troops you have, the better you can rotate them and manage their morale, thereby avoiding the kind of cynicism and depression. Soldiers thinking I hate this hole, I’ve been here 9 months, I’m exhausted and I’m not leaving for another 6 months. Who gives a shit what happens to the Iraqis? undermines the basis of counter-insurgency, hearts and minds. The British rotate our troops far more frequently than the Americans (average 4 months versus over a year), which IMHO is one reason for our relative success at hearts and minds.
The idea is not to carpet the country with troops, Boer War-style – although it may be worth noting that such an approach would actually work if we had enough troops. No, the idea is to have enough troops to do what we are doing now effectively.
To address some ‘issues’ raised by a particular commenter that goes by name Charlie who says: But if there were more soldiers, that would mean more opportunities for opportunistic attacks and therefore more casualties.
So, if there were no troops, there would be no opportunity for opportunistic attacks? True, but the point is not just to minimise casualties, or else why go there? The mission (should) come first, followed very closely by what our American cousins call “Force Protection”. And that means you need enough troops to do the job.
In this case, the job is not protecting our troops, it is protecting the poor average Iraqi from all those who seek to prey on them, from ex-Saddamites to gangsters to religious fanatics (or at least those who claim religious backing for their own grab for power).
There is an amount required to do the job. At present it might be thought that a great deal of what we are doing is being driven by a desire to minimise our troops numbers and expense, rather than to actually do what is best for Iraqis (and in the long term for us).
Of course, one way to make do with fewer troops is to use what are known as “force-multipliers”, anything that increases the effectiveness of your troop numbers. A good example is the helicopter, because it enables you to dominate larger areas of ground with fewer troops. But the UK has nowhere near the helicopter numbers of the US, because of far smaller funding. Another potential force multiplier would be reliable British Arabic translators. But to have lots of those ready to go would require more funding for Defence languages. You get the idea.
Also, in this type of operation in particular, the distinction between “combat” and “non-combat” troops is spurious. The RMP [ed. Royal Military Police] took a lot of casualties, I do not think they would appreciate being told they are not needed to fight. They, and many other supporting troops, are in great demand to, for example, run PW camps, which I would suggest is better than giving the job to reservists, as well as all kinds of other tasks – from advising the infantry on how to effect arrests while on patrol, to helping to train the Iraqi Police Forces.
That said, more infantry would be good as it would avoid the need to use other troops, such as RMP or Artillery, to perform patrolling functions, in which the Infantry are the specialists. As another commenter, Jacob, actually correctly points out, you can always use more soldiers in any kind of fighting situation. This point was made quite simply by Field Marshal Slim, one of the greatest military minds in history. I highly recommend his book “Defeat into Victory”, I think mentioned on Samizdata before. The more you use, the fewer you lose.
Unfortunately, having said all the above, there simply are not that many soldiers left in the Army [ed. British Army], and there are still many commitments elsewhere – from Northern Ireland to the Balkans, not to mention Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, etc etc. The “Harmony Guidelines” which said that for the sake of their families soldiers should get at least 18 months at their home base between operations are already a poor joke. We might need to send more soldiers, but unless we cancel everyone’s leave, we haven’t got them.
Sorry, rather longer than I planned, but I thought it was worth saying.
It has been reported that the 700 strong 1st battalion of the Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment has been in contact with the enemy every day for the past six weeks, racking up 250 seperate combat incidents.
Capt Justin Barry, a military spokesman, is quoted in the Daily Telegraph:
The fighters engaged were basically terrorists and gangsters – people who are out to destabilise the area, drive out the Coalition and suck as much out of Iraq as they can. But at the end of the day, we got the better of them. The Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment were engaged in very heavy hand-to-hand fighting and bayonets were fixed. There’s a great sense of satisfaction among the men with the way this turned out.
Indeed, but no thanks to Tony Blair. The fact the government has not greatly reinforced UK forces is nothing short of a national scandal.
“Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops. My decision to attack at this time and place was based upon the best information available. The troops, the Air and the Navy did all that bravery and devotion could do. If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone.”
– Memo composed by General Eisenhower, 5 June 1944.
Today, we commemorate one the most glorious chapters of German arms: the lightning-fast response of 21 Panzer Division to Eisenhower’s overconfident thrust, a response that rolled up the British left flank and culminated in the annihilation of the British and American invaders.
How appropriate it is that, lacking the the confidence in race-destiny that comes so naturally to the Germanic peoples, the Allied commander had actually composed his memo taking responsibility for failure beforehand!
Despite the somewhat tense international situation, the commemorative ceremonies have proceeded with our customary German precision. It is certainly a sign of how the bitter memories associated with the dawning of the atomic age over Hamburg, Smolensk and Manchester all those years ago have faded that for the first time we have welcomed to our remembrance the President of France, speaking from Vichy by audio-visual link, and the General Secretary of the British Communist party speaking from London. Many have seen in this technical and political triumph a sign of a possible convergence between the two great systems, National Socialism and Communism, that currently dominate our world.
The storm over the revelations of prisoners’ abuse in Iraq may have subsided a bit, however, the events have prompted Our Man in Basra to come out and offer his personal comments. His perspective comes from working and talking to people who deal with Amnesty International (AI) and International Red Cross Commitee (ICRC) in Iraq and elsewhere and from knowing their reputation in the Army.
I actually support the concept of an independent civilian organisation that moderates us [ed. armed forces]. There are often unconscious pressures to slip into “abuse”, and they are most effective because of “socialisation”, the process by which you take your cue for acceptable behaviour from those around you – that is why it is easy when standards slip for all to gradually slide down. Armed forces are designed to reinforce this process, and if the standard is not set from the top (as military hierarchy is designed to ensure it is) then they can slip down quickly.
That is exactly what happened in Abu Ghraib. There is therefore a need for an independent organisations such as Amnesty International or ICRC monitoring Army (and civilian) activity. They are a separate group, not subject to same socialisation, and so can act as a brake and ensure standards are maintained even if military’s own system fails.
This relates to a more general point about Anglosphere intuitions being less corrupt in general and more effective. This is not because of better people, but better systems. This is why the United States as a country works so well with so many non-Anglo-Saxon people. In this context, one could think of Amnesty International checks as a sort of moral separation of powers.
However, Amnesty International and International Committee of the Red Cross have completely lost perspective, which in the long run is a pity for all of us. These organisations rely upon their moral authority, and in the past their most important and influential supporters have been people in the west with a strong moral sense and anti-despotic beliefs – whose faith in the ICRC and AI will be undermined once details of some current claims come out. As an anecdotal example that know of from a man working on the reports AI compile on us: They complained that Iraqis in Umm Qasr (British/US administered detention facility in the South) where being degraded because their food was handed out in plastic bags rather than delivered on some kind of trolley or plate. The Iraqis were not bothered, the food was perfectly good, but this was thought to be “degrading”. This is an important point – when one of these reports comes out and accuses anyone of “degrading” or “humiliating” behaviour, etc, it is essential to dig deeper and see exactly what they mean.
The interesting question is why has this happened? I think there are a whole host of reasons feeding off each other:
- Ignorance. The AI and ICRC are not monolithic, they have different people reporting in different places. It is a fair bet that the overwhelming majority people reporting on Iraq were not there before the war, because Saddam sure as hell would not let them. The same applies to every other Arab country. The investigators are therefore every bit as ignorant as the average journalist reporting on the country, with whom they share a lot in common, such as probably the same general meta-context and the same belief (with rather more justification) that they are there to uphold their view of civilisation. Not the local one.
- The investigators are civilians (as they must be) but therefore often poorly equipped to put things in to relevant tactical perspective. These are not weasel words – to give a concrete example, suppose an Iraqi man has been “beaten up” by British troops; a clear case of abuse? This depends upon the circumstances. There is a world of difference between beating up a helpless prisoner once back in camp (this is clearly abuse), and, for example, using physical force to subdue a struggling looter, or an armed rioter. The whole purpose of Armies is to use violence, which cannot be defined as abuse every time they do without rendering the term pointless. It is moral infantilism to say that the context does not affect the morality of the act, and it is not clear that all of the reports or accusations take this in to account.
- The above is essential to the most important point – Iraqis lie. This is not at all a criticism of Iraqis in a racial sense – being born Iraqi does not make you a liar. But lying reflexively to strangers is an entirely rational, indeed inevitable, response to living your entire life under a brutal and intrusive police state, in which the only efficient institution were the secret police forces. Therefore Iraqis have a neutral attitude to truth at best – they feel no automatic inclination to tell it the way westerners do.
In addition most Iraqis have a strong sense of pride that prevents them from admitting ignorance. They will consistently claim knowledge they do not have, rather than admit that they do not know something. It is a matter of face, especially for the more important Iraqis. This was and is a constant source of frustration for anyone trying to gather information from them. They have lived their whole lives by exploiting any small opportunities the state bureaucracy may have given them.
Most importantly, there is no punishment for lying to an investigator – what are we going to do, sue them for libel? Bear in mind as well that the vast majority of detainees were either looters, rioters, criminals of some kind (as the military, against its wishes, was stuck with running basic law and order) or actual ex-Ba’athists or terrorists. This does not give the slightest justification for abusing them, but it does suggest that they are not the most objective or reliable of witnesses.
Now consider the following scenario:
AI (or ICRC) investigator: We are investigating claims of brutality by British soldiers. We are deeply ashamed of such things, and want to assure you that we are not like the last regime; we will investigate any complaints, and we will compensate anyone who was unjustly harmed; do you know of any such incidents?
Iraqi ex-prisoner (or even not): Why, yes I do I was beaten up, and so was my brother, and my cousin, and my father was shot, and all my family, and how much did you say the compensation was?
It is an entirely rational economic act if you feel no obligation to the truth, a no-brainer gamble – money if you are believed, no cost if you are not.
- All this is not helped by the seeming automatic tendency of the AI and ICRC to disbelieve anything the soldiers or military tell them but to believe anything an Iraqi tells them. I do not really object to their scepticism towards the military, wearying as it is – after all, in a sense that is their job. But to do a good job they should apply the same standards of proof and scepticism to both sides, not just one. If anything, the benefit of the doubt should belong to the military, who have a better record of honesty. Abu Ghraib, in the US military response actually demonstrates this. It was an entirely US military internal investigation that uncovered and closed down the Abu Ghraib abuses, not an AI or ICRC one.
- Abu Ghraib has not helped, as it enables the AI, ICRC and everyone else to say “Look, these abuses have happened here, they could happen elsewhere, and the possibility must be investigated”. Although it is fair to say that most of the reports currently in the press were prepared before Abu Ghraib became public knowledge. I have no problem with that conclusion – we are all appalled by Abu Ghraib, the military probably more than most.
However, that is not the same as assuming that these things did happen elsewhere. Let’s see proof, or at least strong evidence, before accusations are taken as smearing the whole military. Note to the media: Could we please distinguish between reservists, often great people but basically civilians with minimal training in uniform and who seem to have been almost solely responsible for Abu Ghraib, and the professional regular military? And if, as I suspect, poorly trained reservists are found to be involved in any other cases of abuse, can we consider how that reflects on the moral responsibility of politicians who try to cut corners on the armed forces by sending out civilians to do their job?
- In conclusion, accusations must be investigated, but they are not proper evidence, let alone proof in themselves. They should be investigated by people with some understanding of the relevant factors, i.e. culture, situation at time of event, tactical realities, medical knowledge, etc; and with at least some parity of scepticism between the locals and the military.
Finally, I do not presume ill-will on the part of AI and ICRC per se. I am sure that the vast majority of AI and ICRC workers are genuinely trying to do the right thing. But I suspect them of making a moral equivalent of the old “equality of outcomes” fallacy, that equal treatment must mean everyone has equal wealth.
In this case, they are so keen to be, and to be seen to be, impartial between different governments and people, and between Arabs and the ‘West’ that they seem to feel they must give equal reports of abuses by both sides, when in fact there is no remote comparison of treatment. Such reports are a disservice to objective truth by giving the false impression of a broad comparability of moral standing. Shades of the Cold War anyone?
I said at the start of this post, the current state of affairs is regrettable, because in the long run it will undermine the most important resource of both AI and ICRC, their credibility. And there may be times when we will still need them.
Mark Steyn describes an incident that confirms my impression that the politicians are botching up Iraq.
During the Falklands War, a bayonet charge on enemy positions would have been publicly applauded by the Prime Minister, honours and medals would have been discussed and the British public would have been in doubt that the government and the military knew exactly what they were doing. We could agree or disagree with the objective or the means, but not the operational competence or the political will.
Where Iraq is going wrong is not that the military are incapable (unless they run out of ammunition, boots, flak-jackets etc). It is that military action will be undermined by political ‘arse-covering’. The resolution shown by troops is frittered away by Colin Powell and his cronies in the US, and by the Labour government in the UK. Powell looks more and more like his caricature in the Tim Burton movie Mars Attacks! played by Paul Winfield.
My view on Vietnam is that it would have been better if the US had not got involved after the French pull-out, given that they were going to do so eventually anyway, or that the US should have fought to win. I take a Barry Goldwater position rather than a Eugene McCarthy one.
It used to be Colin Powell’s position too.
I took some rather hot flak when I opposed international gun control as an excuse for invading Iraq (if Iraq’s nukes are “bad”, are France’s and China’s nukes “good”?). I have also taken some sharp criticism for saying that invading a country in order to make friends is an odd strategy (worthy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau “We will force you to be free!”).
From Wires blog:
As we were leaving Baghdad, taking a ‘short cut’ through Fallujah and Ramadi, we passed a US Tank involved in ‘Stop and Search’. It had ASSAULT AND BATTERY written on it’s barrel.
Nice Peace – Keeping.
Now I do not take everything fiona says as Gospel, although her first act in Iraq was to try out an AK-47 so she can’t be all bad!
It is clear however that there is no abatement of the resistance to foreign occupation of Iraq. It does not really matter whether the fault is that the occupying forces are too forceful, or failing to keep the peace because of politcally correct instructions, or a row between the US State Department and the Department of Defense. Either way it has all the potential for Vietnam II.
The only worthwhile achievement of invasion was the removal of Saddam Hussein. He has gone, it is time to leave also.
The only worthwhile debate now is whether to recognise an independent Kurdistan or not before the troops pull out and allow Iraqis to sort out their civil affairs.
I ran across this little item from ten days ago while catching up with postings on a network admin group:
Ordnance Find Closes Baltimore Tunnel
BALTIMORE (AP) — The Baltimore Harbor Tunnel has been closed indefinitely after a worker at a nearby construction site discovered military ordnance.
Nine munitions, ranging in size from 500 to 4,000 pounds, had been found since early Wednesday. The construction site, less than a half-mile from the tunnel, was once used by the Navy to assemble and disassemble ships.
Disposal teams were working to determine the status of the munitions, said Col. Tim Madere, of the Aberdeen Proving Ground.
Military investigators are trying to determine exactly where the ordnance came from, said Cpl. Greg Prioleau, a spokesman for the Maryland Transportation Authority.
The closing was ordered by Gov. Robert Ehrlich on the recommendations of ordnance disposal teams from the U.S. Army, Baltimore City, the FBI and the Maryland State Fire Marshal. Adjacent portions of I-895 also were closed.
On March 19 1995, the Aum Shinrikyo cult released the nerve gas Sarin on five trains of the Tokyo underground. Until 2001, I rated this the most frightening news story of the previous ten years. Why? Because until then the most severe weapons that had been used by terrorists had been conventional explosives. The expression “Weapon of Mass Destruction” is overused, but as the word is usually definted, this fit the bill. As it happened, due to a combination of inexperience in deployment and concern for the safety of the people actually deploying the weapons – the concentration of sarin in the containers was apparently substantially lower than Aum Shinrikyo had considered using – the Tokyo attack only killed 12 people, although a great many more were injured or otherwise affected by the attack.
But it was extremely close. Had a few fairly minor details been different, thousands would have died. As it happened, Aum Shinrikyo had one chance only to cause carnage of this kind. They were the kind of organisation that it was relatively easy for the Japanese authorities to round up and eliminate, and the Japanese authorities did indeed do this. But what they demonstrated is that a few skilled chemists with the sorts of resources that can be moderately easily bought on the open market in a developed country can produce extremely deadly chemical weapons.
It is now 2004, and such weapons have not been used again by terrorists. (In fact, I don’t think they have been used in warfare since then either. To be truthful, they are not terribly useful in achieving military objectives unless your military objectives include killing large numbers of civilians. Saddam Hussein in the 1980s seems to be the last person who was into using them in a big way. While on that, I hope Mr Hussein is enjoying his cell in Qatar or wherever it is). Since then, we have had far too many terrorist attacks using conventional explosives, and one attack in which terrorists attempted to see if the sorts of fantasies that exist in Tom Clancy novels and James Bond movies will work in real life. (The answer was clearly yes, once. I can’t imagine that September 11 type attack will work again, however). What we have learned since then is that there are terrorists out there who wish to kill westerners in large numbers, and who have operatives who are willing (or even eager) to die while delivering the weapons. Given that, an attack such as the one in Tokyo seems a fairly obvious way to achieve such objectives. So why hasn’t it happened? I find it impossible to believe that Al Qaeda would not attempt such an attack if it could. The only explanation must be that they do not have such weapons?
Why not? Demonstrations that something is possible are usually followed by somebody else trying it. So why not here?
→ Continue reading: The puzzle of why terrorists do not have weapons of mass destruction
An interesting question for those concerned about creating a more free society is how such a society, be it a model of constitutional, limited, minimal government, or even an anarchist one, would actually defend itself from attack. What sort of practical ways would such societies employ, and would such societies require armies, navies, air forces and the like?
It seems pretty fair to me to assume that outside some sort of pacifist utopia, any such model requires defence and people with the skills and willpower to serve as soldiers, pilots and the like. That is why in the absence of the draft, which libertarians rightly abhor, we need people who can volunteer to serve in the armed forces, giving up the comforts of home. That is not sentimental military-speak, but hard reality.
Hard reality is something of a stranger to the author of this diatribe, full of twisted logic, presumptiousness and lies against the late American soldier and former NFL star, Pat Tillman.
I will not bother to fisk the piece. The illogicality of it is so glaring, its vile intent so obvious, that a line by line response would merely insult the intelligence of this blog’s readership. Suffice to say that a man gave up the promise of a fat paycheck and the comforts of a loving family to go and join the army, knowing that in so doing he might be called upon to fight in situations those moral perfectionists in our academic world would find abhorrent.
Whether one agrees with the war against Saddam and the Taliban or not, on a broader point, it seems obvious to me that we will need people willing, like Pat Tillman, to defend us. This is a point that about which a “chickenhawk” like me who is too old to serve in the forces any more is only too painfully aware.
Remember the name of the woman who wrote this shabby article. As the years go by no doubt she will continue to enjoy the benefits of a world made rich by a model of free enterprise she hates, and defended by “macho” men she despises. But I will not forget. This sorry excuse for a human being has not just traduced the memory of a very brave and good man; she has done so against all those who believed they were fighting to defend the freedoms we enjoy.
(Please post comments on the Daily Collegiate website I linked to. They deserve to hear what you think).
I have only just noticed this. But I agree with it, and I think the point is good enough to last way longer than a fortnight. It is from our own Natalie Solent on what to do about hostage taking:
Iraqi gunmen of the Mujahideen Brigades, a previously unknown group, have taken three Japanese citizens captive and say that Japan must pull out its troops or the prisoners will be burned alive.
Well, it worked in Spain. It worked in Somalia. The question is, do we keep it working?
I say, no. Kill the Muhajideen brigades. God willing the hostages might be saved, but if they are killed too, better a bullet than being burned alive and better a world where they die thus than one where the tactic of threatening hostages with death by torture works. As I said in January when Israel more-than-foolishly released many terrorists in exchange for an Israeli hostage, “Yes, of course I’d feel and speak very differently if it was my relative held hostage. Do you think I’m made of stone? But what is that to the purpose?” Think not only of the hostage we see now but of the next, and the next, and the next – because unless war is waged and won on this tactic, that is what there will be.
Whenever I line up next to, or myself say, things like this, I recall Saki’s phrase about the reckless courage of the non-combatant. As Natalie asks, what if a relative of hers were a hostage? What if she was? What if I was?
Nevertheless, I truly believe that she is right, and there is no future in giving in to these people, and not too abysmal a hope of a present for any hostages if the captors and their fortress are stormed rather than negotiated with.
There are times when the newsies reach depths which even I find difficult to fathom. There has been an ongoing debate with the DOD by the lowest of the breed about access to Dover Air Force Base where our war dead make their first stop on home soil.
The DOD says it is being sensitive to the needs of the families; that most do not want the return of their loved ones turned into a ratings carnival for the Evening News.
Personally, if I were a family member and a loved one of mine were being returned, I would expect quiet and dignity. If the DOD ever changes the policy in favour of the paparazzi, family members should consider applying their weapon of choice against the nearest, most expensive cameras.
Kicking a cameraman in the balls could be equally educational to the receiver, even if she doesn’t have them.
|
Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
|
