Spiegel: Bush can barely string a sentence together, and more

[Anonymous]

WTF, you are basically validating my primary points. The war was poorly planned, poorly executed and poorly managed.

There were not enough troops to get the job done. We had no coalition, which compounded the troop problem. And more fundamentally, our military is not designed for this type of occupation. The shift to a lighter, leaner high tech military has been ongoing for many years. In fact this was one of Rummy’s primary goals as secdef.

You can’t blame Clinton on our smaller active duty as this has been the trend for a long time and is continuing under Bush. More fundamentally, the Adminstration has no direct impact on military size. The President is in charge of the miltary but he does not make the budget, that is congress job.

So bottom line, whether you agree on the reasons to go to war or not, there is no debate that the planning and execution of the war has been a total failure. And the President is Commander in Chief, the number one leader of the military. As a result, he bears 100% responsibility for its successes and failures. Many of the Bush apologists refuse to admit that.

[Anonymous]

“We normalized relations with China in 1971 and pulled out of Vietnam in 1972. Something similar will happen in Iraq. Perhaps we’ll normalize relations with Iran and Syria”

The timing coincides but thats pretty much it. And it doesn’t mean it was the right thing to do in either case.
Comparing that past scenario to our current dilemma is apples to oranges at best. If we did repeat vietnam withdrawal in Iraq the results would be the same wholesale slaughter while power is solidified then the re-education purges. Read some history on what happened after we left Vietnam and the surrounding areas. But then maybe you have a Pol-Pot tshirt to go with your Che Guevera one.

Give up the neo-con gambled for world dominance crap. I think you are way too smart to actually buy into that, at least I assume so. That mentality sounds like “the vast right wing conspiracy” mantra. I hear those and see the tinfoil sales going up.

[blahblahblah]

bgates wrote: “CONCHO, you’re wrong. According to your own link, the French sent ‘4500 including 3500 for the Marine Nationale’, or navy. given that Afghanistan is 500+ miles from any body of water, I’d consider that 3500 less than significant”

I’m sure our US sailors reading this blog will appreciate your comment that Navy troops are insignificant in ground wars like Afghanistan and Iraq.

And yes, we did fund, train, and equip the Taliban as well as Osama and his goons during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. The article I referenced didn’t “blame” the US for the 9/11 attacks, it merely pointed out that one of our useful monsters had come back to bite us. Saddam was another of those useful monsters.

[Anonymous]

Coalition? Come on bgates, the % of casualties suffered by our coalition partners is on the order of 5% (US 95%). Do you consider that a significant coalition? What are the UK and Australia doing, giving us “emotional support”?

And yes, the gap is shrinking. For one thing, the US definitely doesn’t want to mess with China. The Chinese Army is on the order of 1.5 million troops compared to the US less than 500K. They also have significant technology including missiles and nukes.

[bgates]

CONCHO, I’m pretty sure any sailor reading this little exchange is going to take my side over yours. Saddam wasn’t a US creation, anymore than Osama. They chose anti-Americanism of their own free will. There was never any American funding of Osama, and your link doesn’t say anything to the contrary. Your French friends say that 9/11 would never have happened without American support of Osama. That’s blaming us.

[bgates]

Deadzone, what are the Chinese doing in this discussion? You were making a poor argument that the US didn’t have enough coalition support to win a war; if you’re now claiming that the US can’t win a war without a Chinese alliance, you’ve gone from poor to laughable.

Your disparagement of dozens of other nations who support the US during time of war would be laughable if it weren’t near-treasonous. Yes, I’m questioning your patriotism. Gratuituous insults of allies serve no purpose beyond weakening those alliances, and that’s not the action of a patriot.

Why are you so excited by the size of the Chinese army?

[Anonymous]

However you try to demean it, it is a coalition. While I agree it would’ve been nice to see more support in the way of troops; it didn’t happen and useless at this time to complain. In today’s world though it does mean something to have someone take our side publically – they take a risk just by doing so.

The size of the chinese army is of little consequence unless we wind up in a ground war there…. or here (logistical nightmare so unlikely). The technological gap is closing but, we are still a good ten+ years ahead and a significant part of their progress was stolen or purchased from (surprise! us!, thank you Billy C. but you got a swell library and maybe you can be the first first husband).

Which brings up another point… diplomacy…. If you can follow the news – regardless of where you get it from, it’s utilized in todays world as a mere stalling tactic. The intent from most of the nations in this world is to try to hamstring and keep us preoccupied with false promises and agenda until the time comes that they can slap us and get away with it. We keep coming to the tables and we get nowhere, then we get criticized for obstucting the process as we fail to capitulate fully to the other sides requests.

[blahblahblah]

I wrote something here but I have deleted it. This is all so silly. Let’s all grow up and stop posting to these stupid threads.

[Anonymous]

I am not claiming that the Chinese military is superior to the US, it is just an example that the gap is closing.

Are you guys happy with a coalition that only supported 5% of casualties?

[startingout]

I really don’t feel that this is a “silly” thread. Some people may have resorted to name calling, but overall the discussion has been insightful. Debate is useful, and it’s nice to see people actually thinking about the issues at hand, rather than taking the typical American “La la la, I can’t hear you, I’ll pretend that nothing is wrong and I’ll just keep buying and increasing my debt to make myself feel superior to my neighbors!” stance, complete with fingers in ears.

By the way Concho, you aren’t obligated to read every thread on the website. The title obviously let’s potential readers know that the thread has nothing to do with housing, and if you’d prefer to limit your reading experience to housing threads, then I suggest that you do just that. If you feel this thread is silly, then don’t read it.

[Anonymous]

like I said it would be nice if we had more support. To sum it up, it’s someones sons or daughters, moms or dads etc. that are gone and that saddens me regardless.

Concho, I concur as far as; as interesting of a discussion this is, it’s not why we are here (at Piggingtons). But it’s not silly or useless, mental exercise never is. Even for the challenged such as myself.

I just had an epithany! Powayseller isn’t from Poway and not a she, it’s really Ahmadinejad keeping us distracted and not seeing the true agenda.

[Anonymous]

lk, I'm a day late (literally) on this, but here's more recent evidence of using emotion, instead of logic, to direct medical research dollars:

http://tinyurl.com/ylmkzm

$400MM for prostate cancer research in '05, which has an annual incidence (new cases) of 234K.

$700MM for breast cancer research in '05, which has an annual incidence of 213K.

More spending on a disease that's less common; difficult to understand.

We guys don't want more money spent on us, especially if it's going to be taken away from our wives, daughters, and mothers.  But, we sure hope to be acknowledged for maintaining our stiff upper lip!

And, JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) proved my earlier point that it's politically-correct organ; it's dedicated its ENTIRE current issue to men's health:

http://jama.ama-assn.org/

Look at that cover; I'm embarrassed for us men.

[L_Thek_onomics]

“Are you guys happy with a coalition that only supported 5% of casualties?”

Well, a good number of American leftists are aiding the terrorists, the
“coalition” of their side (the terrorists) suffered 100% casualties. The
left must be very happy… They just found the really helping coalition.

L Thek

[bgates]

Deadzone isn’t claiming the Chinese military is superior to the US, just saying that we “wouldn’t want to mess with” them, pointing out they have a 3x manpower advantage, and some technology besides.

Deadzone, remind me how China fits into your argument that the US didn’t have enough coalition support? I was under the impression that the vast majority of coalition casualties were being suffered by the Iraqi state. So, you consider the United Kingdom, Australia, Poland, and Iraq to be not significant, at least from a military standpoint. Would you like to add to your list of countries you consider insignificant, or go back to criticizing my arrogance?

[Anonymous]

bg, read the posts and you’ll see why I mention China. Just an example that we are not the only powerful military in the world, and coalition support is a good thing to have.

Those “coalition” countries are insignificant to the Iraq war effort. They account for less than 10% of the troops and less than 10% of the casualties. In case you flunked math, that means the USA has the burden of over 90% of troops and casualties.

Not sure why you are counting Iraq casualties as coalition, since Iraq is the country we invaded and are occupying.

[Author]

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