FOXNews reports on the invasion of
Liechtenstein.
ZURICH, Switzerland — What began as a routine training exercise almost ended in an embarrassing diplomatic incident after a company of Swiss soldiers got lost at night and marched into neighboring Liechtenstein.
According to Swiss daily Blick, the 170 infantry soldiers from the neutral country wandered more than a mile across an unmarked border into the tiny principality early Thursday before realizing their mistake and turning back.
A spokesman for the Swiss army confirmed the story, but said that there were unlikely to be any serious repercussions for the mistaken invasion.
"We've spoken to the authorities in Liechtenstein and it's not a problem," Daniel Reist told The Associated Press on Friday.
Officials in Liechtenstein also played down the incident.
Interior Ministry spokesman Markus Amman said nobody in Liechtenstein had even noticed the soldiers, who were carrying assault rifles but no ammunition. "It's not like they stormed over here with attack helicopters or something," he said.
Liechtenstein, which has about 34,000 inhabitants and is slightly smaller than Washington, D.C., does not have an army.
Read this carefully. Liechtenstein doesn't have an army. The border wasn't marked. The Swiss soldiers had assault rifles but no ammunition. Only in Europe .... that's what a lack of religion leads to.
FOXNews reports on the invasion of Liechtenstein.
13 comments :
Great story, Larry.
Your comment is spot on. Thanks.
Oh yeah, it's either paradise or we (Europeans) are all naive. Which reminds me about what my staff sergant used to say: "god save Austria, because we can't".
Btw. Andrea Townsend says "hi". She's my thesis supervisor here.
We who live in civilized countries like the US- or, for example, Iran- can only shake our heads at such barbarism. Perhaps someday you heathen Europeans and Canadians will rediscover the powerful civilizing influence of religion and once again become as advanced as we are. It's not only our military might but other aspects of our advanced civilization that you can only envy: for example, did you know that out of 173 countries in a recent survey, only the US, Lesotho, Swaziland, Liberia, and Papua New Guinea fail to provide for paid maternal leave? That's because our beloved Christian religion teaches us the importance of families! How can you ever hope to compete with such powerful logic?
Reminds me of the time the UK accidentally invaded Spain five years ago.
Mike says,
Btw. Andrea Townsend says "hi". She's my thesis supervisor here.
Oops. I hope she's not telling stories about me. I really wasn't that bad as a project supervisor. You have to keep in mind that it was a long time ago and she's probably confusing me with someone else!
Email me if you want to hear some stories about her ... :-)
Hi Andrea!
I'm reading this carefully. "Liechtenstein, [which] has about 34,000 inhabitants and is slightly smaller than Washington, D.C."
My hometown has 3 times that many inhabitants and, surprisingly, we don't have an army either. So I don't think the inhabitants of Liechtenstein need to feel peculiar. ;-)
Btw, IIRC they are members of Nato, which independent Switzerland isn't. So I'm not sure which was the ant and which was the elephant in this case. :-)
That aside, yes, Europe is rather tired of wars and the woe that follows for generations after. Hopefully US will do too someday.
Liechtenstein a NATO member? Doesn't make much sense without an army.
"Btw, IIRC they are members of Nato, which independent Switzerland isn't."
In other words, a NATO member has been attacked by an outside power! An attack on one NATO member is an attack on all. Clearly we need to invoke article V of the NATO treaty.
Send in the US marine corps now!...Oh wait a minute, Switzerland is land-locked.
"Liechtenstein a NATO member? Doesn't make much sense without an army."
I'm not sure if that is required to be associated. Anyway, I stand corrected. I was probably thinking of Luxembourg. ( http://www.nato.int/structur/countries.htm )
"Luxembourg's contribution to its defence and to NATO consists of a small army. As a landlocked country, it has no navy, and it has no air force, except for the fact that the eighteen NATO AWACS airplanes were registered as aircraft of Luxembourg for convenience.[4]" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luxembourg )
There's an old story, which may be true, was that the last time Lichtenstein went to war (in 1866), its entire army of 80 men marched off to battle and 81 came back. Apparently they'd made a friend on the way.
Does anybody remember a gentle 1950’s cold-war satire movie called “the mouse that roared”? The plot revolves around a Liechtenstein-style European statelet called ‘the Duchy of Grand Fenwick’ whose scheming Prime Minister (Peter Sellers) persuades the dotty Grand Duchess of Grand Fenwick (Peter Sellers) to declare war on the United States. They expect to loose and thereby reap massive Marshall Plan aid.
Things start to go wrong when the token Grand Fenwick army and its commander (Peter Sellers again), lands in New York and er....wins the war.
A bit dated, and no ‘Dr Strangelove’, but still funny.
....“the mouse that roared”...
Read the book (and the sequel Mouse on the Moon); I'll definitely have to see the movie if I ever get the chance.
I have seen a bit once, and IIRC even that small piece was hilarious.
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