Nuts

Symbolic victories, plus a dozen or so other things worth knowing today

In the middle of the Battle of the Bulge, four German soldiers approached American troops, carrying white flags of truce and a letter:

“There is only one possibility to save the encircled U.S.A. troops from total annihilation: that is the honorable surrender of the encircled town.

— The German Commander”

As the story goes, the acting commander of the 101st Airborne, Brig. Gen. McAuliffe, was asleep when the letter reached him. The first word he uttered when he was awakened from his slumber—a G-rated epithet—became the official American response:

"December 22, 1944

To the German Commander,

N U T S !

The American Commander"

Now, the American situation during that battle at that moment was actually quite dire. But McAuliffe’s response took on a life of its own.

You can imagine why I’m writing about this. During the past five days, there has been one “NUTS” moment after another out of Ukraine.

Of course, I have no idea who will win the war ultimately in a kinetic, strategic sense, and the situatio…