Mike the Usurper wrote:
ibenez wrote:
I see how they are somewhat related, but "in response"? Your a lib - are you sure you support the military - most libs dislike the good guys ( the good guys = US Military ).
Nope, I'm all for the, as you put it, "good guys." I like them well trained, well armed and well armored. I find it insulting that the civilian guys in chargesort of half ass their way around all of this crap. 500 Ospreys at 40 mil a pop? Great, now we can get our guys into places faster, less safely (that was part of the Osprey study where because of the conversion time, the thing is actually more vulnarable than a conventional helicopter), without the armor. That's a bad combo.
I had always thought Iraq was a screw up. Afghanistan was a problem, as the Soviets found out in the 80's, but what we wanted to do there was go in, nail the guys we wanted, and essentially be a peacekeeping force while getting the Afghani population organized on their own terms. We didn't get the guys, Bin Laden is still out there, didn't go in with enough force to provide a realistic peacekeeping force, and now the place is like the Balkans right after Tito died. The only thing really holding it together is that the warlords feel safer with a figurehead government to cover for them.
Iraq wasn't even that good. The mission there needed way more troops than we sent in. What I find insulting about it, is not only did they go in light on numbers, they've also gone light on the hardware, and now we're looking at privately bought armor on the troops that they were supposed to be paid back for, and haven't been, and hillbilly armor on the humvees finally getting refitted with what they should have had in the first damn place.
On top of that, the guys with the stars and birds on their shoulders are smooching up to the White House when they know what the deficiencies are. Those deficiencies are, the equipment is still coming in, the manpower is short, and the planning from the civilian side is absent.
Will the current plan work? My guess is, it will work about as well as Vietnamization worked in Vietnam. In May of 2003, at "Mission Accomplished" the insurgency was guessed to be under 5,000. It is now estimated over two years later at over 20,000. That's called losing the war.
The way I see it, there are four options. We can continue just the way we have been going and watch the whole damn thing come apart until Bagdahd looks like the American Stalingrad. We can get the hell out and try to pick up the pieces after the Sunni's, Shi'a and Kurds blast the crap out of each other. We can pull down from every other location in the world and triple the troop numbers in Iraq, and come down with enough force to pound the insurgency numbers down. We can turn the Sunni triangle into a plain of fused glass (except that might be considered genocide).
Personally, I'm in favor of option 2, getting the hell out and picking up the pieces after they blow each other to hell. I would be for option 3, but I don't think we've got the troop numbers to pull it off, and I have no faith whatsoever in Bush, Rummy and co. to have any idea how to make that work.
They've demonstrated time and time again that they are perfectly happy to fuck over anyone for no reason, whether it's our own troops, our former global allies, our own population, up and down the line. The only thing they've done is push an agenda with all the finesse of Imelda Marcos in Macy's shoe department.
#2? I respect your opinion but think the choice is a poor one.
I favor a combination of #1 and #3 - add more power, keep it there longer.
