Beersheba

The charge of the 4th and 12th Australian Light Horse Regiments (4th Lt Horse Brigade) at Beersheba.

Today is the 90th anniversary of probably one of the defining battles fought by Australian troops. All of our military actions are remembered but although the troops in all of them served with the same courage, tenacity, and discipline, only a few of these battles go into

legend. Beersheba is one of them.

In 1917 the British advance against the Turks was stalled at the Gaza Beersheba line, which was still intact after two major attacks on Gaza, both of which had been repulsed. Beersheba was on the other end about thirty miles inland across waterless terrain.

For this reason it was generally believed by the Turks that it was not possible to take Beersheba as the only available water was the wells in the town itself.

However General Chetwode, the commander of the British 20th Corps believed that the lack of water would be easier to overcome than the Gaza fortifications and devised a plan of attack from a base within range of the objective. However the whole thing depended on the town and water supply being captured swiftly. If the attack was repulsed on the first day, the British would be forced to retire in search of water.

The force to be used was the British 20th Corps and two mounted divisions of the Desert Mounted Corps, which consisted of the Anzac Mounted Division and the Australian Mounted division. These were Light Horse troops who used horses for fast mobility to get within range of the enemy, then dismount and attack as infantry.

The actions during the earlier part of the day, while successful had taken much longer than expected and as result water was running out. Chauvel had planned to make a dismounted attack on Beersheba but he was now out of time. The alternative was to make a cavalry charge.

He had in reserve south-west of the town, two brigades of the Australian Mounted Division; the Australian 4th Light Horse Brigade and the British 5th Mounted Brigade (the 3rd Light Horse had been sent to support the attack on Tel el Saba). The British brigade was a proper cavalry brigade, armed with swords, however the light horse brigade was closer to the town. Both brigades were eager to make the attack but Chauvel, with time running out, chose the 4th Light Horse.

The 4th Light Horse Brigade, commanded by Brigadier William Grant, contained the 4th, 11th and 12th Light Horse Regiments. The 11th was dispersed but the 4th and 12th were quickly ready to make the charge.

The rest is a quote from “Beersheba; The only great Mounted Infantry charge in history”.

'It was the bravest, most awe inspiring sight I've ever witnessed, and they were. . . yelling, swearing and shouting. There were more than 500 Aussie horsemen . . . As they thundered past my hair stood on end. The boys were wild-eyed and yelling their heads off'.
Trooper Eric Elliot.

Trooper Elliot had crept to a hillock within two miles of Beersheba (a city now part of Israel, but then a southern outpost of Turkey's Ottoman Empire) to act as range-finder for artillery. He noticed a cloud of dust behind him. The 4th Light Horse Brigade suddenly was on the move. A thundering line of charging light horsemen soon appeared over a crest in extended order, followed by a second and then a third line.

Directly in their path, Elliot somehow managed to scamper out of the way.

The charging force comprised the 4th (Victorian) and 12th (New South Wales) Light Horse Regiments. They formed the 4th Light Horse Brigade under Brigadier-General William Grant (born Stawell, Victoria). Earlier, Australian General Sir H. G. Chauvel had been ordered 'to capture Beersheba today, in order to secure water and take prisoners'. Chauvel had other units available including British troops, but directed the 4th Brigade forward. 'Put Grant straight at it', he directed.

History's last great mounted charge thus was hastily organised in an atmosphere of urgency. Dwindling supplies of water demanded that the water wells at Beersheba be taken at once. Any delay, while the large British force gradually assembled nearby, would only lead to demolition of the wells by the Turkish defenders. Without water, the whole Sinai-Palestine campaign would be halted perhaps for months, and the Gaza-Beersheba line would remain unbroken. A victory here over the Turkish defenders would help avenge the disasters of Gallipoli.

The 4th Light Horse Brigade had spent a quiet day till then. Widely scattered as a precaution against any surprise aircraft attack, the men and horses rested in small clusters. It took an hour-and-a-half to assemble the brigade behind a ridge overlooking Beersheba. The Victorians were on the left, the 12th Regiment on the right. It was 4.30 pm on 31 October 1917. Without swords (they were not on issue to Lt Horse), the light horsemen drew their long bayonets to flash in the setting sun as swords. . .

The two regiments moved off at the trot, gradually fanning out until there was five yards between each horseman. 'Speed and surprise were their one chance', wrote official historian H. S. Gullett later, 'and almost at once the pace was quickened to a gallop'. Four miles ahead lay Turkish trenches, many cleverly concealed even from aircraft reconnaissance and surrounded on nearby hills by machine gun and artillery positions.

One such battery opened fire with shrapnel ammunition as soon as the brigade was spotted. Soon, after charging over two miles, a hot machine gun fire was directed onto the leading squadrons. A British battery--the Essex Battery--which observed this at once replied and after only a few shells put the machine guns out of action. All this intensifying enemy fire only sped up the gallop.

The Battle of Beersheba has always been presented as a story of almost reckless heroism. But it took sixty years for another point of view to emerge. Historian David Holloway interviewed veteran Trooper Vic Smith who remembered:

Of course we were scared, wishing to hell we weren't there, but out of it. But you couldn't drop out and leave your mates to it; you had to keep going on.

As the Turkish trenches neared, rapid rifle fire began to take its toll. Horses and men in the first line began to drop. Strangely, as the lines got closer to the trenches fewer casualties occurred. This, it was later said, was due to the fact that the Turks, dazed by the sheer audacity and thunder of the charge, failed to alter the sights on their rifles.

Soon they were firing harmlessly over the heads of the approaching charge. While this is a possible, even likely, explanation for the sudden fall in casualties, the light horsemen themselves regarded the Turkish soldier as a well-disciplined and dangerous foe, not likely to make so basic a mistake. The clouds of dust of the charge may have made picking a target near impossible.

About half-a-mile from the town, the Brigade began to overrun fugitive troops and guns. Some surrendered but others elected to fight and Light Horsemen here and there dismounted to capture them by rifle and bayonet. Led by two ground scouts about 80 yards ahead, the charge swept on.

When the trenches before Beersheba were reached, the Brigade mostly bypassed the first and main trenches, but casualties occurred. Some Light Horsemen raced through to the town to capture objectives. Others dismounted at various trenches or had their horses shot from under them and dazed or not 'got to work with the bayonet'. A terrible disorder soon reigned with some Light Horsemen reduced to using their rifles as clubs. Mostly the Turks seemed anxious to surrender, but scattered units exchanged fire with the Light Horsemen, some bitterly refusing to give up until large numbers had been shot or bayoneted.

Three or four incidents took place where surrendered Turks changed their minds. One rolled a grenade at Lieutenant Ben Meredith of C Squadron and 'blew him to bits'. The Turkish soldier was immediately bayoneted.

In one incident, Armourer Staff-Sergeant Arthur Cox of Bendigo saw a machine-gun being hurriedly dismounted from a mule by its crew. 'In a minute it would have been in action at close range'. Cox dashed at the party alone, bluffed them into surrender, and took forty prisoners. Altogether 738 prisoners were taken.

Trooper S. Bolton of Geelong single-handedly captured a gun and its crew including a German officer. A wounded trooper revealed: 'All I could do was ride my horse, wave my bayonet round my head and yell. But we were lucky. No barbed wire and none of those horse pits too wide to jump'.

In the capture of Beersheba, the 4th Light Horse Brigade took 38 officers and 700 other ranks prisoner as well as four field guns. In the two regiments, only 31 men were killed (including two officers) and only 36 men wounded (including eight officers).

This is not my usual type of subject however this one is special, if you get a chance watch “The Lighthorsemen” or a rarer movie “20,000 Horsemen”.

Media Bias and Bastardry.

By Jim Fryar.

Photo Lisa Milat from her website Lisa Milat LDP Senate Candidate.

A couple of paragraphs were 'borrowed' from a press release from David Leyonhjelm our secretary, a tireless worker for the party, (at least I hope he is, there's a lot to be done yet so don't slack off you bastard.)

The media can be educational, informative and generally a force for good, but all too often it tends to go the other way, and becomes a force for prejudice, bias, and destructive negativity.

My first experience of this was when I was very young, and there was a regular radio program from a person whose name I can’t recall but who traveled to all sorts of places and commented on them. From memory I think his first name was Wilfred or Wilbur but the surname just wont come.

He seemed to be very popular, and often the topics were discussed afterwards. After a short time however I found myself getting irritated by the mournful voice and his constant negativity, then he did a program on the USA and I realized that in the whole of the country he wasn’t able to find a single thing that he didn’t dislike. I never bothered with him again.

Next came current affairs. Every reporter was ‘investigative’ and approached any subject with the desire to find something wrong, then somehow someone managed to crossbreed this with the attitude of the British tabloids and get today’s media, or at least the majority of it.

Recently this has come up again in the Australian Federal election. The Liberty and Democracy Party selected Lisa Milat for a senate candidate in the Australian Capital Territory. Part of the press release read: - Note: Lisa Milat is related by marriage to the convicted murderer Ivan Milat. Her husband is one of his brothers. She does not consider that connection is relevant to her candidacy and will not answer questions about it.

Ivan Milat was one of Australia’s worst serial killers.

It was obvious that something would be made of it by the media, and it was probably a very courageous move by Lisa to stand. Being a new Party we lack experience and experienced candidates, and have a fair way to go to get media savvy. We did not expect the sensationalist and deliberate unfairness that followed.

The Daily Telegraph reported it in a not unreasonable manner, although making much of the connection: -
SERIAL killer Ivan Milat's sister-in-law is running on a Senate ticket of relaxing gun laws and claims the psychopath's horrendous crimes were water under the bridge.

Ms Milat who married the jailed serial killer's brother Walter, is one of 35 candidates running for the Liberty and Democracy Party - a party which supports nuclear power, lower taxes and euthanasia, and opposes criminalising victimless crime – in the federal election.

Ms Milat, who lists target shooting as one of her hobbies, told Sydney's The Daily Telegraph newspaper that her brother-in-law's crimes were in the past and she was not concerned that her family associations may harm her chances at a seat in Parliament.

This was followed by some background stuff but at the end of the article was a push poll on “Would you vote for Lisa Milat with the answers framed as;
‘Yes – there’s no reason to believe she’s a psychopath like her brother’

and

‘No – her relation to one of Australia’s most notorious serial killers scares me’.

The question incorrectly suggests that Ivan Milat is Lisa’s brother. They are related only through marriage. There is no basis on which to raise the prospect of being a psychopath or scary.

“Lisa Milat is a law-abiding and upstanding citizen and a proud mother of two. She is making a stand in politics because she believes that people who disagree with the status quo should do more than whinge. Therefore she is having a go at trying to make a difference.

While she was still shocked at this channel Nines “A Current Affair” arrived to do an interview which I missed, but which was described by Tex at Wackingday in his article “Cletus Spuckler, is that you?” as follows: -

The gist of the report was:
1- Lisa looked very nervous and therefore not a real politican.


2- Sudden segue into scary photos of Ivan Milat. Of course, no connection whatsoever was made between Lisa and Ivan Milat's crimes. But hey, scary photos!!!! Guns!!!



3- Some senile old cop saying "Ivan Milat!!!! Guns are evil!!!". Essentially suggesting that Lisa Milat was planning to hand guns out to serial killers so they could shoot children and small puppies. 



4- Lisa forgot the details of the party policy on euthanasia. 


5- Senile old cop returns, doing his Guns-are-evil muttering.

6- Airhead host Tracey Grimshaw closes out by saying "The LDP is contesting this years election...you've been warned". No really, that's what she actually said.

I was half expecting Kent Brockman to show up, backed by the theme music from Dracula.

Some years ago the Australian Broadcasting Commission did a satirical series on current affairs broadcasting under the title of “Frontline” with a vacuous twit called Mike Moore as host. (No not the infamous one)

This is what Wikkapedia has to say about it:

The series follows the fortunes of a fictional current affairs show, Frontline, which airs on a fictional commercial network, much like real networks Channel 7, Channel 9 and Channel 10. In the show, Frontline competes directly with Nine's A Current Affair and Seven's Real Life, which changed its name to Today Tonight from 1995 onwards.

The Frontline office showcases and satirises the machinations of the ruthless producers, the self-obsessed airhead host, and the ambitious, cynical reporters, all of whom resort to any sort of underhanded trick to get ratings and maintain their status - including the use of hidden cameras, foot-in-the-door, bullying interview techniques and chequebook journalism. They ingratiate themselves with the all-powerful network bosses, while the real work is in fact done by their long-suffering production staff.

It was so close to the bone that at least one host was rumored to be considering suing however thought better of it.

“Fuelish Food Policies”.

By Viv Forbes

The Carbon Sense Coalition today claimed that mis-guided government policies on global warming were going to cause a crisis in food.

The Chairman of “Carbon Sense”, Mr Viv Forbes, said that subsidising ethanol, taxing carbon fuels and covering grasslands and farms with trees would cause massive dislocation of rural industries and shortages and runaway prices for food.

“The ethanol swindle has sucked in many people, but the costs will far exceed the benefits. Demand for ethanol feedstock has already caused massive increases in prices for corn in USA and similar things will happen with sorghum and sugar in Australia. If the current foolish policies persist, these problems will also infect the soy industry, palm oils and other grains.

“Australian taxpayers will subsidise a huge ethanol plant being built at Dalby which will gobble 500 tonnes of grains per day – that is a lot of chook feed.

“Rising prices for grains, sugar and soy will feed thru into higher prices for all food produced in farms, feedlots and factories. Beef, lamb, dairy products, chicken, eggs, breakfast cereals, bread and confectionery will all become more expensive, to the detriment of every consumer. The biofuels mania has caused price increases for pasta in Italy, cornflakes in Kansas, tortillas in Mexico and croissants in Paris.

According to a recent EU report: “The current push to expand the use of biofuels is creating unsustainable tensions that will disrupt markets without generating significant environmental benefits”.

“Ethanol contains less energy than is used to produce it. Making alcohol from corn is a good way to make whiskey, but a terrible way to make motor spirit.

“Moreover, to produce one litre of ethanol uses 4 litres of water, so ethanol plants will cause increases in the prices of both food and water.

“Naturally there are vocal beneficiaries of the ethanol boom, but the net cost to the whole community will be negative – it will always be cheaper to produce motor fuel from oil or coal than to use fossil fuels to produce organic fuels via ethanol.

“We should plant our seed corn, not turn it into motor fuel. Burning food for fuel is a very fuelish policy. What do we do as an encore? Pay subsidies to oil companies to produce pizzas from petroleum?

“Even more foolish than subsidising ethanol is the process whereby people are encouraged to evade carbon taxes by planting trees.

“These force fed forests will result in a creeping infestation of woody weeds into land currently producing grass, pastures and crops.

“If some extremists had their way, Australia would become a monoculture of unproductive eucalypts, which are rightly regarded as invasive weeds in other countries. And the rules for carbon credits will probably dictate that they stay there forever, becoming a haven for feral pests and weeds and a magnet for bushfires.

“There is a place for trees in any productive landscape, and previous stupid government policies caused excessive clearing of trees on government controlled leasehold land. But banning all land clearing and subsidising tree planting is just as stupid.

“Farm forestry or wildlife refuges should be allowed to flourish on a fair basis alongside all other land businesses – none should receive discriminatory tax breaks. Well managed grasslands can extract just as much carbon from the air as will tree plantations (unless the trees are harvested and turned into timber houses).

“The final stupid food policy will be carbon taxes, which will push up the already high costs for fuel and power for every farming operation. Soaring prices for diesel, petrol and electricity will escalate the cost of operating tractors, harvesters, trucks, dozers, road trains, water pumps, feedlots, food processing plants and supermarkets. The end result will be seen at every checkout.

“The world has always depended for most of its food on great grasslands of Australia, the savannas of South America, the prairies of North America and the farmlands on the European plain. And the key food resource is the native and domesticated cereals and grasses and the grazing animals that live in harmony with them. Turning these ancient grasslands into forests will have far reaching and costly consequences.

“All of this is justified to calm a world hysteria about the modern era of global warming which started long before man started burning fossil fuels and will continue to rise or fall irrespective of what puny vote-seeking politicians do.

“Despite the recent Ignobel awards to Al Gore, more and more independent scientists are concluding that the facts and the evidence do not support the hysterical claims that the carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere by mankind will cause runaway warming.

“A Judge in Britain got it right recently when he called Gore’s film a biased political document with eleven specific claims not supported by any evidence.

“Politicians are about to inflict huge Greenhouse costs on the whole community, for nothing.”

Disclosure of Interest:
Viv Forbes earns income from three carbon emitting industries - coal, cattle and sheep. He nurtures native grasslands. He hates frosts, droughts and starving stock. He also uses cement, steel and electricity, buys diesel for his tractor, petrol for his car and gas for his barby. He uses trains and occasionally boards an aeroplane. He eats carbon based foods, pays taxes and uses government services funded by taxes on the carbon industries. All of these industries and services will be harmed by carbon taxes, emissions trading or carbon sequestration. He is also a scientist, investment analyst, computer modeller and political analyst. Like the great majority of Australians, he has a big vested interest in the outcome of this historic debate.

Busy

My regular readers will have noticed that I have been a bit slack of late. The reason for this is that Australia is in the throws of a federal election which requires a lot of my time in order to give what help I can to the Liberty and Democracy Party. 

I will get some stuff on as soon as possible.

Regards, Jim.

New Sanctions on Burma

Aung San Suu Kyi.

"Suu Kyi Could make General Petraeus look wimpy."

From News.com.au.

PRESIDENT George W. Bush today announced tighter US sanctions on Burma's military rulers and urged China and India to step up pressure on the junta to end repression of pro-democracy activists.

"Burma's rulers continue to defy the world's just demand to stop their vicious persecution," he said at the White House. "Business as usual is unacceptable."

Mr. Bush was joined by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and, more unusually for a statement of this sort, by First Lady Laura Bush, who has been a leading US voice of criticism of the junta in Rangoon.

"I am proud of Laura for all she has done to awaken the conscience of the world to the plight of the Burmese people," the President said. "We must not turn a deaf ear to their cries."

It is pleasing to see more international action against this regime. Many countries through the world have non-democratic governments, and while democracy probably offers the best chance of human rights it is no guarantee, witness Zimbabwe. No system of government offers a guarantee in the human rights arena as all systems can be abused.

Democracy is only just when backed by a solid constitution guaranteeing the rights of the people and limiting the power of that government to encroach on those rights.

This country however while maintaining power purely by force systematically abuses the rights and indeed the lives of its people. Personally I feel somewhat inadequate when I consider the general ambivalence toward the plight of these people in the past, while seeing Aung San Suu Kyi, apparently a small delicate woman standing in the path of these brutes and suffering for it, but never giving up.

Looks can be deceptive though, Suu Kyi could make General Petraeus look wimpy.

Among the moves this time is a freezing of the assets of a number of junta members, moving to prevent the import of Burmese gemstones from third countries and moves are afoot to force energy giant Chevron to leave. I am not sure that the latter is a good idea as while it may feel good it will probably benefit the regime by picking up a valuable asset at fire sale rates.

All efforts should be made by all countries of goodwill to pressure these people out.

Treachery

Tensions with Turkey are understandably high, (mainly from their point of view) resulting from a deliberate effort by Nancy Pelosi and the Democrat majority in congress to antagonise a key ally in the war against terrorists in Iraq.

Turkish forces have been mobilised in the Iraqi border area ready to attack Kurdish separatists, which to their credit in deference to the need for stability in the area they have refrained from doing despite numerous provocations. The Kurdish north of the nation is one of the more stable areas in the country.

A greater danger to the coalition efforts is the threat by Turkey to deny access to Incirlik air base in southern Turkey, a major supply area for the U.S. military and allied forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Jed Babbin reporting in Human Events.Com had this to say: -

According to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Incirlik Air Base near Adana, Turkey is the transshipment point for about 70% of all air cargo (including 33% of the fuel) going to supply US forces in Iraq.

 Included are about 95% of the new “MRAP” -- mine-resistant, ambush-protected -- vehicles designed to save the lives of American troops. Turkey wasn’t always this helpful. In 2003, the Turks refused permission for the 4th Infantry Division to enter Iraq through Turkey.

On October 11, Pelosi said, “While that may have been a long time ago, genocide is taking place now in Darfur, it did within recent memory in Rwanda, so as long as there is genocide there is need to speak out against it.”

But the resolution is gratuitous and Democrats’ timing suspicious. It’s gratuitous because, in 1981, President Reagan referred to the Armenian massacre as genocide in a proclamation commemorating the Nazi Holocaust.

Why, if Pelosi is so committed to ending genocide, aren’t she and Senate Democrat leaders doing something about the ongoing genocide in Darfur or the massacres of protesters in Burma?

Speaker Pelosi said, “This isn't about the Erdogan government. This is about the Ottoman Empire." Baloney.

Turkey has a great deal of sensitivity over this to this day, and while such acts are reprehensible the fact that they took place nearly a century ago, few Turks alive today would remember it, and probably none could have taken part in it. 

For this reason the motion is totally gratuitous and serves no purpose other than to push the Democrat agenda against the war. Doing this is a purely political act, and one that endangers troops in the field and as such is dangerous to the point of treachery.

Fortunately it appears that it will fail as reported in the Seattle Times: -

Chances for a U.S. resolution calling the mass killings of Armenians that began in 1915 "genocide" eroded dramatically Tuesday as sponsors dropped off in droves and senior Democrats urged House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to abandon her support.

The number of lawmakers supporting the bill slipped below a majority as four more withdrew from the legislation. The White House opposes the resolution, saying it will damage U.S. relations with Turkey.

Legislators cited those objections — along with warnings from the Turkish government and from Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Baghdad, that the resolution would cause Turkey to scale back its assistance in the Iraq war — as reasons for rejecting it.

The House Foreign Affairs Committee passed the nonbinding resolution in a 27-21 bipartisan vote last week, but several of those who voted yes have since switched.

With the resolution's chances of passage apparently doomed, senior Democrats were urging Pelosi, who has a large population of ethnic Armenians in her district, to declare victory with the committee vote and move away from the issue.

Regrettably not before a great deal of damage has been done, and a great deal of comfort has been given to our enemies.

“The Good guys” or “Allied Democracies Group”

Some time ago on the ALS website “Thoughts on Freedom” a debate raged for some time on the possibility of eliminating Mugabe and proposing a number of measures including privately funded options. After some time I came up with: -

“Remember when POL POT was still recognized by the international community as the governing authority in Cambodia, despite having been overthrown and virtually an outlaw in his own country, because the UN didn’t approve of the invasion of that country.

Who wept for this toad and his henchmen apart from the UN and left wing intellectuals?

States tend to support this course, in the name of stability as they fear the consequences if their own legitimacy is called into question.

No international recognition or protection should be afforded to governments which rule by terrorizing their own people no matter how they came to power in the first place, and no manner of throwing them out should be illegal, as long as the rights of the population of those countries are respected afterwards.

Having said this, some rules would have to be established, so it wouldn’t simply be a matter of what Tom Lehrer described as: -
They have to be protected, all their rights respected,

Till someone we like can be elected.”

Recently John Humphries posted an item “Military Foreign Aid Con Work” I had cause to raise it again and suggested the following;

I am as I said skeptical of the ability of the UN, and there were reports of deep psychological scarring among forces from Kosovo as result of inability to carry out their mission owing to the conditions placed on them.

I believe we should have some sort of alliance with like-minded countries to deal with these situations with terms of engagement, command and control residing with those countries, not the UN. It gets back to my good guys argument.

“Before this could be done, a whole new set of principles would have to be set in place, to set the circumstances under which such action could occur, the manner of carrying it out, and ensuring the independence of the subject country after the process.

Mere furtherance of the ‘police’ country’s political, economic, or territorial interests would not be a reason to violate the independence of another.

These principles would never find their way through the convoluted processes of the U.N. and would have to be done as a treaty of sorts by what we shall call for want of a better term, “The Worlds Good Guys”.”

This was taken up by Nicholas Grey with: - “Re: The World’s Good Guys. What we need is someone to start an Allied Democracies group, where membership would not be automatic- applying nations would need to let in inspectors to assure that the people were free to vote for whom they chose, and counting of votes was free and fair and noncorrupt. 


Nations like the US, with their dubious ‘Chads’ might not get in, (Nicholas is a cynic) but they’d only want to dominate it anyway! Allied Democracies would automatically extend most favored trading nation to each other, and hold military exercises together.

All that trading would promote growth, inducing other nations to become true democracies. The UN would then become a talk-shop for tyrannies, and fall out of favor, or could refashion itself. Win-Win all round!”

My reply was, “I can’t fault that idea; I like it, although I would probably opt for constitutional guarantees on a minimum standard of liberty rather than the electoral stuff. The important thing is not so much how the politicians get there, as what they can do to you when they are there.

I accept though that fairness in elections tends to go hand in glove with higher standards of freedom, but is not a guarantee. I think that if elections are free and fair, those politicians in government are more loath to pass draconian legislation, as they have to consider the possibility that the other side may get in and use it on them.”

I believe this could be a viable proposition along the following lines: -

(1) The above organization be of nations with a high standard of liberty and human rights.

(2) An agreed format for the requirement for intervention be declared.

(3) A mutual defense pact be formed among those countries.

(4) The nations within the organization strip tyrant nations of their recognition.

(5) Sanctions by the member nations in combination with (4) above be used in preference to military intervention.

(6) After removal of recognition a “third party” nation that is affected by the subject nation may take unilateral action, however must guarantee that the rights of the population of the subject nation afterwards or face action itself.

(7) The UN would be supported only when they are acting in a proper manner.

This pretty much concludes the points, at least those I can think of at the moment, but I feel there will be others.