Achilles Heel

An Achilles Heel is an idiomatic phrase which means something's biggest weakness. It is named for the legendary Greek hero Achilles, whose biggest weakness was his heel, and indeed was the source of his fabled demise during the Trojan War.

When involved in operations, knowing the Achilles Heel of not only your enemy, but yourself as well, is one of the keys to success on the field.

The Death of Achilles, Alexander Rothaug

The story of the life and death of Achilles varies from account to account (as things from Ancient Greece do) but the core of the story is this:

1. Achilles was dipped in the River Styx as a child by his mother, granting him perfect invulnerability everywhere (except for the one spot on his heel covered by his mother's hand when she dipped him in the river).
2. Despite this weakness, the near-invincible Achilles went to War and killed a LOT of people.
3. Towards the end of the Trojan War, Paris of Troy shoots Achilles in the heel with a poisoned arrow.
4. Achilles dies, and his kill streak ends.

The historical Achilles was likely a skilled Aeolian Greek warrior. This man was likely not supernaturally invulnerable at all, but nevertheless he succeeded in combat for a long time with normal human limitations. Achilles clearly had a reputation, which became the fuel for this legend. The tragedy here is that a violent state-sponsored mystery cult erased this man's already-epic story in favor of a conspiracy involving a haunted river, depriving us of valuable historical field data that could have been used to save lives.

One of the most important things to know about warfare, is that everything has an Achilles Heel, and everyone is always looking for everyone else's Achilles Heel.

This means you will need to keep track of a myriad of Heels for both defensive AND offensive operations.

There are many places around you that a traitorous Achilles Heel can hide itself. To flush out these potential Benedict Arnolds, you should ask yourself important questions, such as:

Are your blades sharpened? Are your batteries charged? Are you still running that one battery that barely holds a charge? Are your radios programmed the ideal way yet? Do you have combat-ready ammo, or do you still only have that low-grain plinking ammo you got for the range? When is the last time you cleaned and oiled your gun? And speaking of oil, when is the last time you changed the oil in your car? How bald are your tires? Did you replace the missing USB charger in your car yet? Have you not been maintaining your things in general? Are you keeping pace with software updates? Did you restock the antiseptic and liquid bandage in the first aid kit? Does your defense strategy involve things that are dependent on unstable supply chains?

Do you have unsustainable habits or addictions? Do you act impulsively? Do you get aggressive and/or dangerous when you get impulsive? Do you unintentionally sabotage friendships and relationships? Do you feel suicidal, or like you want to physically harm yourself or others? Do you find yourself oftentimes swept away by weird nonsensical political theater? Do you constantly feel like you are always pushing a boulder uphill? Do you have a job that you can be fired from? Do you intentionally pick fights with strangers on the internet?

Do the people around you introduce weird, obnoxious or draining liabilities into your life? This is one of the trickiest ones to keep in mind, but one of the most important. Your inner circle has the keys to your physical surroundings and your soul. If you get real deep into certain operations, it is possible that your friends, family & co-workers will be targeted by wingnuts or suicide trollers, and it helps to have an idea of what those people might try to exploit in order to Destroy you.

This does not mean you should obsessively spy on your friends, however, because it is not only creepy and illegal, but creates an even wider security liability than the one they may already present. If you feel you may have to do something like say, lie in court to protect them, then it is better off for both of you if do not dig into that aspect of their life any further. But be honest with yourself about who you let into your life, especially if they are regularly pushing you into conflicts with other people, have serious dependency issues, or are constantly making you feel negative.

Some of you may even be blessed enough to have real friends - genuinely decent people with no weird ulterior motives - who should not ever be dragged into internet drama. These types of friends introduce a whole different type of Achilles Heel. If you have those types of friends, you might want to consider advanced anonymity magick.

Many of the great battles & turning points in history have involved someone's Achilles Heel being exploited to great effect. Some examples of this are:

• Vulnerability to arrows also ended up being the Achilles Heel of the French in 1415 when they lost to the English at the Battle of Agincourt. The French Cavalry could not breach the English perimeter, leaving them to mill around aimlessly while they were picked off by endless flurries of arrows.

• In 627 at the Battle of Nineveh, the Achilles Heel of the Sasanian Persians was their reliance on arrows & archers. The Byzantine Greeks, approaching under the cover of fog, were able to rout the archers. The Byzantine victory would set off a chain of events that would eventually result in the complete collapse of the Sasanian Empire.

• The fragile Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact of 1941 was the Achilles Heel of Imperial Japanese forces in World War 2. The Soviets would later on, quite predictably, enter the war against Japan on the side of China and the US anyways. This breakdown of the pact was the final nail in the coffin for the Empire of Japan.

• The Achilles Heel of former President of the United States Richard Nixon was the deteriorating health of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. Hoover was Nixon's ace in the hole for monitoring and silencing his political enemies, and to keep law enforcement at bay. When Hoover croaked, it created an opening in Nixon's flank, and that was the beginning of the end for his administration.

The large and prominent tendon of the gastrocnemius, soleus, and plantaris muscles of the calf is called the Tendo Achilleus or Achilles Tendon, because is commonly associated with the site of Achilles' death wound.

The oldest-known written record of the Achilles Tendon being named after Achilles is in 1693 by the Flemish/Dutch anatomist Philip Verheyen. In his widely used text Corporis Humani Anatomia he described the tendon's location and said that it was commonly called “the cord of Achilles.”

True to its name, a serious injury to this tendon is all it might take to turn a pleasant hike through enemy territory into a harrowing gauntlet for survival.