The ideological cause of the Benghazi bungles

When Pizarro hit the Incas, they just could not see him unless he got in their faces and started poking swords into them. They could not see him, because they could not believe in him.

The attack on the Benghazi embassy was not a terrorist attack. It was a conventional military operation by the uniformed and well equipped troops of an organization that frequently engages in terrorist attacks. They used truck mounted artillery, not box cutters, and were dressed as Al Qaeda armed forces, not civilians. If you cannot say “War with Dar al-Islam”, or even say “War with Radical Islam”, you cannot see Islamic armed forces.

No one seems able to say “uniformed”. They say that they were wearing “Afghan costumes”. But no one in Libya wears “Afghan” costumes except armed forces affiliated with Al Qaeda, thus the costumes clearly identify them as members of an organized military force, which is the Geneva Convention definition of a military uniform.

So Al Qaeda launched a conventional military attack on the US government, and the US government refused to fight back. That was scandal one. Scandal two was that the US government proceeded to lie about it, to fit it into what they wanted to believe, rather than what actually happened. Hence the cover story that the attack was a demonstration related to a video critical of Mohammed – that it was outraged civilians, or perhaps terrorists hiding amongst outraged civilians and using them as human shields.

This lie was not only intended to cover up the first scandal, but to enable them to continue to believe in a worldview that had been falsified by events. They lied to themselves, as well as to their opponents.

This is akin to the fact crimestop prevents progressives from seeing reactionary propaganda, most famously in “District 9” Reactionaries are taking advantage of progressive crimestop, and Al Qaeda is taking advantage of progressive crimestop.

Shawn Turner, spokesman for Mr Clapper’s office, said that in the immediate aftermath of the attack, US agencies came to the view that the Benghazi attack had begun spontaneously after protests at the US embassy in Cairo against a short film made in California lampooned the Prophet Mohammed.

Mr Turner said that as US intelligence learnt more about the attack, “we revised our initial assessment to reflect new information indicating that it was a deliberate and organised terrorist attack carried out by extremists”.

He said it remained “unclear” if any individual or specific group commanded the attack.

The lie drifts slightly closer to the truth, without any danger of making contact.

Progressives reacted to the 9/11 attack as an opportunity to invade Muslim countries, kill their leaders and convert them to … progressivism

As Moldbug sarcastically tells us, progressivism is a superior revelation of which Christianity and Islam, along with all other religions, is a mere anticipation, a kind of lame-ass John-the-Baptist point-the-way figure. Backward people who refuse to accept this inevitable transition are called “fundamentalists”. If they do accept it, they are “moderates” or some other term of approbation.

There is a fair bit of “moderate Islam” in the US, meaning preachers who preach progressivism to a rapidly emptying mosque while calling themselves Muslims, for in the US the full power of the state can be applied to bend preachers to the will of the state. Progressives believe that there is a fair bit of “moderate Islam” in the middle east, but they are deluded. From time to time Obama (himself a “moderate Muslim”) has embraced some Muslim preacher as prince of moderation, only to later add that preacher to the list of people that assassin drones are to kill on sight. Obama seems to be waking up the fact that “moderate Muslims” are as thin on the ground as shovel ready government projects. This, however, puts Obama well to the right of the Department of State, and indeed well to the right of most neoconservatives.

Because progressives are unaware how much coercion they apply to convert people subject to the rule of the USG to progressivism, they profoundly under estimated how much violence would be required to convert the middle east. Thus they were, and are, in denial about what happened in Benghazi. The new regime in Libya was supposedly progressive, thus unthinkable that some military units of the Libyan spring were in fact Al Qaeda, unthinkable that they were in state of conventional war, declared by both sides, with the USA. Official truth was and is that there was no significant Al Qaeda presence among the rebels against Gaddafi’s regime, hence the inability to recognize “Afghan” clothes for what they were. The failure to respond to a military attack, and the subsequent lies and cover up, are all in an effort to uphold official truth, all in an effort to believe official truth.

12 Responses to “The ideological cause of the Benghazi bungles”

  1. […] Donald on on the Battle of Benghazi: Obama seems to be waking up the fact that “moderate Muslims” are as thin on the ground as […]

  2. SOBL1 says:

    A progressive is likely to turn their eyes away from a violent killing as a random act of crime in their metro area, despite happening daily. Their behavior towards the Libya fiasco is just an international version of it.

    They spent months (instead of days) trying to knock off Ghadafi, create a ramshackle country without him, see violence kill their own and cover up the true problem. Just substitute Southern city political power structure, random city with new, hip black mayor + a murder on the streets and you have described many cities in the American South.

  3. frank says:

    What were the hidden or misunderstood themes of District 9? It was all fairly overt, no?

    • jim says:

      Hidden in plain sight.

      The central message being that the superior have a duty to rule the inferior, and that blacks are inferior.

      The movie makers take out a clue by four and proceed to beat the audience over the head with the analogy between the
      aliens and blacks.

      The movie tells us that the aliens are stupid, violent, and self destructive. Blacks are stupid, violent, and self destructive. Without white leadership blacks will shit in their homes, kill each other, and eat each other.

      And strangely, the politically correct smile and nod approvingly.

      The movie tells us that although without proper leadership, blacks are savage cannibals, with proper leadership they are OK. It shows us that that blacks are stupid violent dirty rapist cannibals, and the politically correct smile and nod approvingly.

      The movie tells us that there are superior kinds, and inferior kinds, and the inferior need to be ruled by the superior for their own good, and the politically correct smile and nod approvingly.

      The movie tells us that without the alien leadership caste, the worker caste of the aliens do not work, and are a danger to themselves and everyone else, and without white leadership, blacks are the same. And the politically correct smile and nod approvingly.

      • Observer says:

        Observe a similar theme in ‘Django Unchained’. Without his German ‘companion’ to restrain and guide him, Django goes on a bloody rampage. And all the Good and Great cheer him on. Kill Whitey! is all they can see. They can not allow themselves to see anything else.

      • Red says:

        The background theme of District 9 is very reactionary while the story is very progressive. A evil white man realizes the value of the worthless aliens though interacting with a magic nergo, err alien. White man then turns on his own kind to help the Aliens gain their rightful dominance over their oppressors.

        I’ve talked to a few progressives about the film and while they realize something is wrong with the film they can’t allow themselves to think what it is. The most they can bring themselves to do, is to whine about the Nigerians.

        • jim says:

          Exactly so: Crimestop. They cannot allow themselves to think what is politically wrong with the film, because to notice those thoughts would be to notice some truth in them.

  4. survivingbabel says:

    “Because progressives are unaware how much coercion they apply to convert people subject to the rule of the USG to progressivism, they profoundly under estimated how much violence would be required to convert the middle east.”

    Superb. As long as the Cathedral refuses to see its own power, and instead pretends that it is working against some other “Man”, things will only get worse.

  5. Thrasymachus says:

    I think chaos serves progressives. They create chaos, with the idea that after all the players are killed and all the cultural infrastructure destroyed, they will be able to impose their will. Egypt looks like it’s on this path.

    • survivingbabel says:

      It’s not that they intend to create chaos, they don’t even see it *as* chaos. To them, it is “deconstruction” of the “existing power structure”. Never do they ask whether or not the power structure was keeping something aloft, or keeping something at bay. No thought of consequence. Just get to smashing the eeeeeeeeeeevil hierarchy. What happens afterward? Heaven on Earth, brother. If we aren’t there yet, we just have to “deconstruct” some more.

      They’ll deconstruct us back into grass huts on the Savannah given the chance.

  6. spandrell says:

    What’s the point of calling Obama muslim at all? I just don’t get it.

    • jim says:

      Obama is no less, and no more, a Muslim, than progressive Christians are Christians.

      He was raised a Muslim, recited the Sahada, and has not repudiated the the Sahada. To repudiate the Sahada, he would have to criticize Mohammed or get baptized and say “Jesus is Lord” – which is strangely not something that is said in the Reverend Wright’s supposedly Christian Church.

      If Obama is not a Muslim, then Bush is not a Christian, and arguably the Pope is not either. I think that is a legitimate point of view, and I tend to subscribe to it, but if we apply it to Obama, need to apply it to the Pope

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