John Sheehan, (Gen., US Army, Rtd) told a House committee yesterday that Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell must remain the policy of the United States military because having open gays turned the Dutch into such wussies they couldn’t prevent the genocide of Srebrenica:
The battalion was understrength, poorly led, and the Serbs came into town, handcuffed the soldiers to the telephone poles, marched the Muslims off, and executed them.
First of all, the 400-odd member Dutch unit in question was facing a Corps-sized element of the Republika Srpska. The attacking unit was probably nowhere near full strength, but we’re talking about a large ratio — about 8 to 1 at the very least.
Second, Srebrenica was what commanders call an “enclave” — completely surrounded — for long enough before the assault that locals were already starving to death. The Dutch couldn’t have been much better-off.
Third, the fact that a NATO unit surrendered when that treaty organization had hundreds of aircraft available to annihilate any attacker speaks volumes about the conduct of that war. Western allies were powerless because they shirked from using power.
And what was it that prevented Bill Clinton from risking American might against the mighty Serbs? Why, yes — it was a wave of isolationism in a Republican-controlled Congress.
Sheehan knows all of this. He’s just being disingenuous lying his ass off.
