Surrender

[prog]

I just heard this exchange on an NPR program:

Speaker A (a think-tanker): You want to surrender to every country in the region.
Speaker B (a general): It's not a surrender, it's a strategic withdrawal.
Speaker A: [Derisive laughter.] Oh, I apologize then.

Who just lost the argument? I'm not sure.

In reality I'm peeved at A for callously dismissing the distinction between the two terms, which have a world of difference to a military man like B.

But if B had said what he said in, say, a movie, it would definitely be used to show how foolish he is, willing to niggle semantically around the plain fact of his army's defeat, and A's laughter would have echoed the audience's.

I suppose that you could say "Well, jmac, this isn't a movie." And I would say, "Isn't it?" Then there'd be a beat where we looked at each other in silence, and then you'd slap me. And I'd go Ooooh! like Curly and start crying.

Comments

[prog.livejournal.com]

This was the point in the program when I lost all respect for the think-tanker's argument (he's a leading voice in the movement for a "surge"). If he dismisses the difference between these two things, I don't think he has any right to talk about military deployment strategy. OTOH I did wonder if he did in fact get cinematic victory points by manipulating the general to say what he said and then laughing at him.

[xymotik.livejournal.com]

Praytell, is this "surge" the guy wants going to be led by think-tankers applying their debating skills to IEDs?

RAGE.

[kahuna-burger.livejournal.com]

I got in a similar argument with a dork on a messageboard (who actually claimed to be military himself) who kept saying anyone who wasn't gung ho for Iraq wanted to "surrender and retreat". I got pendantic on his ass, both asking who we were going to go and negotiate the terms of our surrender with (and what we would give them for the right to lose) and pointing out that retreating and surrendering were actually mutually exclusive options for when you are losing.

[prog.livejournal.com]

The difference between the messageboard dork and the think-tanker radio guest is that one of them isn't writing articles that influence presidential policy.