Lounsbury asks "What would Sun Tzu do?"

He's no pacifist, but The Lounsbury is one helluva critic of how things are going. He's in fine form with this link-filled post. Just in case the reader is tempted to skip the "yellow satire" link, I reproduce it here to set the stage.

Mediator: Can we all agree that blowing little girls' faces off is undesirable?
Hizbullah: Of course, but one must look at ripping-off-little-girls’-faces in the context of a legitimate resistance.
Israel (to mediator): Yes, yes, of course it’s undesirable, but we are talking about a war of survival. War is war. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. And you have to rip some little girls’ faces off to make an omelet when you are fighting for survival. And how can you survive without an omelet? Certainly kidnapped soldiers can’t survive without omelets, so little girls may face the risk of having their faces ripped off.
Hizbullah: We don’t want to rip little girls’ faces off, but what alternatives can one possibly imagine when you are a political party with a large budget and huge population base facing a need of a prisoner exchange? What else is even remotely possible but ripping little girls’ faces off?
Israel: The IDF – Israeli Damsel Faceripping – guidelines are designed only to permit collateral little girls’ faces being ripped off. Nothing worse is acceptable. If we have to collaterally rip off some little girls’ faces to remind our opponent that they are barbarians hiding behind little girls' faces, so be it.
Hizbullah: Our little-girls-face-ripping-off missiles answer to God the most merciful, the most compassionate.
Israel: As Golda Meir once said: we do not actually hate them for ripping off our little girls’ faces but for making us rip off their little girls’ faces.
Hizbullah: And let’s not forget the Palestinians, they have lost their land and some of their little girls’ faces.
Israel: Oh that’s from honor killing, if the girls have sex, they rip off the girls’ faces.(Angry shouting, inaudible)
Mediator (pounding gavel): Inadmissible, we are only talking about face-ripping-off-of-girls in war. We are trying to prevent another Mideast Girl Face Ripping Off Free-for-All.
Israel: Millions of Jewish girls have had their faces ripped off out of sheer cruelty and hate; and dozens and dozens of Israeli girls through suicide bombers and terrorists. We will never forget. So we are accidentally ripping off girls’ faces strategically for survival.
Hizbullah: We are compelled to rip off the faces of little girls in order to hasten justice. We will, if necessary, rip off little girls’ faces until justice is complete and the Compassionate One is sovereign and cruelty is banished.
Israel: We are a humane society and we never rip off faces of little girls except by accident. And by the way, they are overcounting their little girls with their faces ripped off.
Hizbullah: They are deliberately ripping off little girls’ faces every day.
Israel: Blood libel! Blood libel!
Mediator: So will you Hizbullah, stop ripping off little girls’ faces then?
Hizbullah: Not until they retract the blood libel charge.
Israel: Give us back our soldiers!
Hizbullah: Give us back our prisoners!(Incoherent yelling; Pause)
Mediator: Can we agree to limit the number of little girls whose faces can be ripped off?
Israel: We cannot control the number because all such events, if they occur, are purely accidents. This is very very complex.
Hizbullah: Look this isn’t rocket science—
Israel: Actually, it is….(Pause)
Mediator: Should we bring in the rocket scientists?
Hizbullah: Um, uh, . . . is there a . . . um . . . Farsi translator here?
Israel: See, the Iranian Ministry of Ripping Off Little Girls’s Faces is supporting them!
HIzbullah: Is not!
Israel: Is too!
Hizbullah: Blood libel! Blood libel!
Mediator: If we can’t reach agreement on limiting the ripping off of little girls’ faces, we can at least agree in principle that it is wrong?
Hizbullah & Israel (together): Of course. But the other guys won’t stop!
Mediator: So we have an agreement. In principle it is wrong to rip the faces off little girls.
Hizbullah: Subject to the context of legitimate resistance…
Israel: Subject to the context of a war of survival…
Mediator: Can we perhaps agree to a Convention to only to rip off little girls’ faces up to the nose?
Israel: Well, their women wear veils . . . .
Hizbullah: Not kids and not over the face, that’s the Saudis.
Mediator: So up to the nose then…..
Israel: Really, we cannot control that.
Hizbullah: When there is justice, we can talk.

This wicked satire and it's sequels present as much criticism as can be mustered against today's warfare. This "Fourth Generation" stuff is sucking the life out of old-fashioned morality and pumping in a replacement, a toxic mixture of post-modern, neo-something substance, an ersatz-principle formula which is neither non-poisonous nor bio-degradable.

The final reference to the Sun Tzu link should be examined and thought about very closely.