December 12, 1941

WASHINGTON DC (Routers) Despite yesterday’s declaration of war against the US by the German government, some in Congress are concerned about becoming embroiled in a war in Europe, when we are apparently so ill prepared to defeat the duplicitous Japanese, who only five days ago attacked and decimated our Pacific fleet in Hawaii without warning.

Many fear that the US, still mired in the deep economic depression of the past decade, lacks the resources to take on separate foes on three separate continents and two oceans, particularly when it seems so unnecessary, and a diversion from our true enemy.

A former State Department analyst put it in perspective. “It was Japan that attacked Pearl Harbor on Sunday, not Germany. We don’t have positive knowledge that the Germans deliberately attacked the Greer last September, and if they did, is that sufficient to risk our Pacific war effort with our more immediate enemy, the Japanese? After all, they didn’t sink her. And if it’s cause for war now, why not on September 4th?”

Many independent military analysts agree that America is ill prepared to fight a war against Japan, let alone one on multiple fronts. The nation’s aircraft are outdated by those of the enemy, our navy was inadequate to the task even before the loss of so many ships and brave sailors in the Pacific fleet on Sunday, and the armed forces are severely understaffed. Just to gear up to wage war on Japan will require massive rearmament and recruiting of personnel.

Roosevelt Administration officials, however, scoffed at the notion.

A high-ranking undersecretary at the Department of War said that, “America is quite capable of fighting all of our enemies as needed. The factories are already gearing up, and the American people have our full support. Enlistment has never been higher.”

“It’s ludicrous to think that we could ignore a government that has declared us our enemy, and simply wait until he’s become even more powerful to take him on, as we’ll have to do inevitably. This talk of ‘containment’ of Hitler by the Russians is whistling past the graveyard. We must engage him now, and force him into a multiple-front war. We can afford it–he cannot.”

But one high-ranking Senator who oversees the War Department, who wished to remain nameless, pointed out that “…yes, they’re allies of Japan, but Germany is no real threat to us. They have their hands full with the Soviet army right now, and this declaration is simply bluster on their part. Indeed, the President’s precipitate action in declaring open fire on all German and Italian vessels yesterday has unnecessarily widened this war, perhaps far beyond our present capabilities to wage it.”

Off the record, a former War Department analyst put it best:

“Until we’ve got Tojo’s head on a platter, this war won’t be over. Anything that distracts us from that is a victory for the attackers of December 7th.”

(Copyright 2002 by Rand Simberg)

Robert Forward has died.

He was a brilliant man, a titan in science, technology and science fiction. Probably no single man came up with and fleshed out more concepts that may ultimately result in our visiting other solar systems.

He was the king of anti-matter propulsion, but he also developed concepts for star travel via light sail. In addition, in more mundane matters (relating only to travel in our own solar system), he was a leading light on the care and use of tethers.

I have many (literally) vivid memories of him, particularly of his sartorial oddness. He was a man quite comfortable in a rainbow hued vest amidst a group of gray suits and ties. His ideas stood out in much the same way. I deeply regret that he didn’t have the opportunity to see many of his ideas come to fruition.

Richard Poe says that the big-government-loving media ignored one of the biggest stories of September 11–the spontaneous, non-governmental evacuation of lower Manhattan, in which up to a million people were removed from danger under fire, in just a few hours.

Boy, I take a little one-week vacation, and Instantman takes over my space column at Fox News.

I just noticed that my page is screwed up. I’m hoping that adding this post will fix it.

We had a good flight into Maui, and are renting a cottage in the upcountry, on the lower slopes of Haleakala. We drove up to see the crater this morning, and took lots of pictures, but don’t expect to see any before I get back (if then) because the bandwidth sucks here–I’m on a bad phone connection. We’ll probably go back up tomorrow morning, but this time early enough to see the sunrise. We could see the big island, but no signs of the most recent eruption at Kilauwea.

I had a great time up in Hollywood last night. I met Martin Devon, Moxie, Brian Linse, and Ann Salisbury, and talked to Emmanuelle Richard, Eugene Volokh, Mickey Kaus, Ken Layne, Laura Crane, and (too briefly) Matt Welch sans the now-immortal-in-more-ways-than-one cowboy hat (as always). And thanks to Matt for the mention of my site in his devastating critique of the latest lame LA Times attempt to be relevant. Brian Doherty and Sara Rimensnyder of Reason were there, too. As usual anyone who didn’t have a good time, probably didn’t deserve to.

Patricia is trying on her new wet suit and fins, and getting everything packed. We’ve rented a house on Maui for the next nine days, and will be leaving in the morning. There were too many odds and ends today to post much, but look for my column on Fox this weekend (it’s a repeat of the Buzz assault hoax) and I might check in from Hawaii, but don’t bet on it. Back a week from Monday.

[Update at 6:30 PM PDT]

The Fox column is up now.

Mindles Dreck has uncovered another internal Al Qaeda memo.

Howard Fienberg says that Cynthia McKinney may run for president on the Green Party ticket.

I hope she does.

Bart Sibrel, a man who claims that man never set foot on the Moon, also claims that famous Apollo astronaut Buzz Aldrin punched him in the jaw on Tuesday in Beverly Hills.

There’s a small cottage industry of people who, like people who still believe that the earth is flat, or alternatively, that it’s round but hollow, live in an alternate reality–one in which NASA was not capable of sending men to our sister orb in the 1960s. Unfortunately, it’s not small enough. While just a few percent believe this, according to most polling, that still constitutes millions of people deluding themselves about what many consider the greatest achievement of the twentieth century, and perhaps in history to date.

Anyway, for most of them, it doesn’t matter to their everyday lives, but for a few, like Mr. Sibrel, it becomes an obsession.

The arguments made for his position are seductive, to the scientifically illiterate and innumerate, but they are equally fallacious. They usually hinge on lack of knowledge about the behavior of light, lenses and film, and a misunderstanding of orbital mechanics and the physics of particles in vacuum. But in addition they are always interlarded with conspiracy theories and suspicion about NASA’s veracity, necessary to sustain the belief. I don’t have time or page space to debunk them here, but they have been amply debunked.

Of course, the hardest part of the theory to buy is that NASA and its contractors, an organization of thousands of people in a position to know, all were paid off, or threatened to practice “omerta” and not talk about how the lunar landings were staged. If NASA could actually pull that off, it would be a greater achievement than landing people on the Moon. This would be one of the biggest stories of the century, but we’re asked to believe that in a government that leaks to the press like a shotgunned sieve, not only is no one talking, but also that all of the astronauts are lying as well–none of them will break ranks.

Which brings us to Tuesday’s reported incident.

Because Mr. Sibrel makes a living at promulgating this nonsense by filming one-sided “documentaries” about it, it’s not clear whether he actually believes it, or is just saying he does to get publicity and notoriety. What is clear is that he makes of himself a nuisance to the men who he should instead be honoring. Tuesday’s incident wasn’t the first time that he’s interacted with a former moon walker. According to Rob Pearlman at Collect Space, he was thrown out of the ceremony for induction of astronauts into the Astronaut Hall of Fame last year for similarly harassing John Young, Bill Anders, and Al Worden.

On Tuesday, in Sibrel’s own words, referring to Buzz, “I approached him and asked him again to swear on a Bible that he went to the moon, and told him he was a thief for taking money to give an interview for something he didn’t do…”

So, by his own admission, he walked up to a man who risked his life to help us win the Cold War, and called him a liar and a thief to his face. Is this sufficient provocation for an assault? I don’t know what the legal situation is in Beverly Hills, and I’m not generally in favor of fisticuffs, but next time I see Buzz, his beer will be on me.

Anyway, while socking Bart Sibrel in the jaw would be a magnificent accomplishment, worthy of recording in the historical annals of comeuppance, and the story of ?one small punch for a man, one giant blow for intelligent mankind? is truly inspiring, I just don’t believe it really happened.

Think about it. Buzz is no Ralph Kramden, capable of sending his wife to the Moon with a single blow (or so at least he perennially threatened).

By all reports, Mr. Sibrel is much larger than Buzz. Astronauts were always shorter than average in stature, because they had to fit first into fighter cockpits, and later into small cramped spacecraft. He’s also much younger. Buzz is into his eighth decade, while Sibrel is thirty seven, a little over half Buzz’s age. Yet we’re supposed to believe that Buzz, a PhD from MIT, would risk a fight with a younger, stronger man? It defies physics and common sense.

Sibrel has a sore, bruised jaw?

How hard is that to fake? He probably went home and hit himself in the face with a monkey wrench.

There were witnesses? It was reported on all the news services?

It doesn’t say what the lighting conditions were, but it’s possible that it could play tricks to make it look as though Buzz’s fist was propelled into Bart’s face. Or maybe Bart attacked Buzz’s helpless knuckles with his chin.

Or maybe nothing happened at all. We’re supposed to believe that Sibrel’s not capable of bribing people? All those Beverly Hills types on Rodeo Drive don’t think about anything except money. It would be easy to just pay them all off to lie for him, and to relay the story to Reuters and AP. After all, if NASA could get thousands of people to keep their mouths shut, it would be a piece of cake for him to get a few dozen to keep their story straight.

You say he has videotape?

What a shocker. A man who makes his living creating documentaries has a videotape. He also probably has an expensive production studio, or knows people who do. How hard is it these days, with fancy computer-generated imagery, to fake up a video showing the impossible–a seventy-two-year-old fist reaching up to strike a thirty-seven-year-old jaw?

This is clearly just an elaborate and diabolical hoax to gain sympathy, and to make us believe that he “won the moral high ground.” It’s ludicrous to believe that Buzz Aldrin actually punched Bart Sibrel in the jaw on Tuesday. Why, you might as well believe that he walked on the Moon…

Some of you perhaps noticed that I took yesterday off. As I said, I had little substantive to say on the occasion that I hadn’t been saying all along for the past year, and I figured I’d let you focus on all the folks who did. Some bloggers used it as an opportunity to take their best shots, and hope that the hyperfrenetic Instantman would offer them a cherished link. I chose to honor the day by doing nothing. Well, except paying work.

I’ve not warned anyone about this previously, because I feared that, amidst the general emotional environment of this week’s anniversary, the news might set off panic in the streets, and send the Dow plunging once again, but I’m going to Maui next week, and will be posting lightly, or not at all. So yesterday was just a taste of transterrestrial withdrawal, as a way of easing my loyal readers into it.

Fortunately, there are many better sites out there, many of them listed to the left, so you won’t be bereft of commentary. And I’ll be back on the 23rd. I’ll be posting some for the next couple days, but I didn’t want to shock anyone with the news on Friday night.