I am very curious to hear you clarify your comments as to what is "politically correct"? How many innocents need to be killed in this massive offensive you are envisioning? What EXACTLY are you talking about here?

Indiscriminate killing of civilians is "politically incorrect"?

I don’t think Vermillion was asking you to leave the board. Fortunately, the only two people who can do this are Mike and Jaime. I think their tolerance level is greater than that of some members. If members could ban each other, membership might spiral downward rather quickly.

What I think Vermillion was trying to tell you is that if you don’t start getting your ducks lined up before you post – corroborating facts with something more than you heard it from “Uncle Joe,” - then your life here will become miserable. This is a debate board – a civil debate board, but still a debate board. We demand from each other, push each other – hopefully growth comes from that yin and yang – but one has to be a little bit open for that to happen.



No, you’ve got it backwards. This is a public debate board. Post almost anything. You can expect someone to tear into it.



Ok, consider this article by Michael E. O'Hanlon, Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies at the highly regarded Brookings Institute.



http://www.brookings.edu/views/op-ed/ohanlon/20041013.htm

Note: The need for a draft created by the 2nd Bush Administration might not materialize for an administration or two down the road. Unfortunately we'll be paying for the Bush Administration long after Bush Jr. is hiding at his ranch or his SMU Presidential Library.



A debate board by nature is competitive. There’s competition regarding content, style and credibility. You are lolsing your “cool” net2007. To reverse Martha Stewart, ”it’s a bad thing.”

Now, net2007, I’ll give you half an example of how things should work. The other half will have to wait on lederuvdapac’s response.

I disagree with leder on this point, as I will illustrate. Do I expect him to come back and say, “BoF, I’ve seen the light.” No! Do I think he will get bent out of shape because I’ve challenged him? No! I expect he will defend his position and that he will provide information to support that position. That’s how it works.



I don’t think we need the Patton mentality in the modern Army. Although Dwight Eisenhower and Patton were friends, Patton caused the Supreme Commander, much grief.

Since I am typing this from a book, I will contain my example to one incident.

In his book, Eisenhower: Soldier and President, presidential historian Steven E. Ambrose writes these words:



A Patton like abuse of soldiers report is about the last thing we need coming out of Iraq.

Ok, net2007, since you like Wiki links, I will provide one for Stephen Ambrose, the highly regarded historian who penned the words about Patton and Eisenhower.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Ambrose

Ambrose is what we mean by credibility, if you don’t mind an example.

Now, I am going to offer an interpretation or an opinion. Our view of General George F. Patton is a mixture of reality and myth - the myth being supersized by the George C. Scott Hollywood portrayal. This happens frequently. There was Kennedy and Camelot. Patton is part of the he-man solution to problems. It’s a syndrome that includes, John Wayne, Douglas MacArthur, Patton, Ronald Reagan and others – the get tough solution for everything. Is Fred Thompson the next link in this chain?

************************************

Edited after net2007 replied to DTOM:



Let me get this straight. You support the war in Iraq, but did not enlist because "I decided to get into computer game design." Priorities?

Somehow this sounds remarkably like what Dick Cheney did during Vietnam. He kept getting deferments because he had other things to do. You didn't enlist in a cause you believe in because you have other important things - designing computer games - to do. Why get shot at, when you can create on-screen cartoon figures for kids to shoot? War games are much more fun, and certainly safer than war itself.



http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/01/politics...artner=USERLAND

Lol, I would have enlisted to tell you the truth, much of my family has served for our country and my little cousin is in Iraq right now, He was on leave recently though and I had a chance to talk to him, the reason I didn't enlist is because I decided to get into computer game design instead. That is something I could have seen myself doing. Me and James, my cousin, have a lot in common we were best friends growing up.

I meant recognized offline research, like Stephen Ambrose's book - Eisenhower: Soldier and President, Simon & Schuster, 1990.

How did you miss that?

For real, net2007 you have so botched your response above, that one has to work to find out what you are adding to the thread.

**********

QUOTE(net2007)

if you don't like what I have to say then don't read it, its as simple as that.

QUOTE

No, you’ve got it backwards. This is a public debate board. Post almost anything. You can expect someone to tear into it.

QUOTE(net2007)

if you don't like what I have to say then don't read it, its as simple as that.

QUOTE

No, you’ve got it backwards. This is a public debate board. Post almost anything. You can expect someone to tear into it.

**********

Why oh why did you post these lines twice?

You didn't even bother to correct the misprinted characters. Here's how it was originally written.



If anyone wants to read my previous post, please click below instead of trying to follow net2007's butchered version.

http://www.americasdebate.com/forums/index...st&p=216830

Its getting even sillier. You are now spending far more time pretending to be a martyr (a total invention) and explaining WHY you choose NOT to substantiate any of your points, than you do actually debating. Your arguments are getting increasingly desperate, and I still have not seen ANY evidence backing up ANY of your assertions. Why is it so hard for you?

Instead you spend your whole post making things up, such as the 'horrible nasty attacks by big bad Vermillion against poor little martyred Net2007. Except the attacks you claim are all just innovative fiction, nothing more.




Firstly, this is the PERFECT example of you making up 'insults' and trying to play the martyr card. I didn't tell you to leave, I told you that on this board you have three choices: learn to substantiate your points, learnd to deal with people ridiculing your unsubstantiated arguments, or leave. Those are plain and simple your three choices, nothing but. That is an absolute statement of fact, please don't make some schoolyard attempt to turn it into an 'insult' of poor you, as nobody reading this would ever believe such deliberate misrepresentation of my points. If you put as much effort into substantiating your arguments as you do into obvious deliberate misrepresentation of other's comments, this thread would go so much easier.

Secondly: Of COURSE you should have to post links. Yes, you have right to your views, I've said that many times. And if your view are completely contrary to ALL available evidence, and you refuse or are completely unable to substantiate or evidence your view, I have a right to tear them apart, and so does everyone else on this board.

You have accused me of being bogoted, predjudiced, insulting, arrogant, cruel, and half a dozen othet things, when my only 'crime' is to ask that you back up your increasingly absurd comments: that you answer the mountains of evidence proving your opinion to be 100% factually false. You can't do that of course, so you resort to these schoolyard tactics: 'he's being mean!"; "I have evidence but I don't WANT to post it!" and so on.



That, as you well know is not what I said. I said present links, or get used to having people tear up your unsubstantiated assertions[/bb] or leave. Simple facts, there are no other choices here really. You are correct, I DON'T have to believe a word you say. In fact, you leave me NO CHOISE but to disbelieve it. After all, there have been presented great piles of evience from a dozen expert sources demonstrating you wrong, and you INSIST on rfusing to provide ANYTHING to back up your obviously counter-factual points. Of COURSE, given that situation, nobody believes what you have to say. What would you expect? How could it be any different?

QUOTE

I'm not pretending to be victimized in any way, you have been doing nothing but questioning my credibility and playing as if you set the stage for proper forum behavior, and the more you've done it the less im compelled to waste my time giving you links to anything, if you don't like what I have to say then don't read it, its as simple as that.

Yes, you are pretending to be victimised, in fact that was the vast majority of your last post: you complaining about how the big mean posters are abusung you: all completely made-up of course.

And reality time: You choose to post on a respected public debate board, a board in which in the very RULES it asks you to substantiate your points. So don't pretend that I'm doing anything wrong by asking you to provide ANYTHING AT ALL, ANYTHING to demonstrate your wild, unevidenced assertions, which fly in the face of all available evidence, are anything but made-up.

No, you are not 'compelled' to post links or evidence, but you are 'compelled' to accept what your REFUSAL to post links or evidence does to your credibility.

QUOTE(net2007)

Ohh so your saying we have no troops stationed anywhere, in other words we pulled them all? I find it hard to believe that the 43 of 44 brigade figure is a full representation of all our forces both in the states and abroad. Do you have a link stating the over all percentage of troops pulled from abraud, Seriously im interested in seeing something like that, I'm talking an over all figure of American troops across the globe and of those how many have been deployed. Including the Army National Guard, or Army Reserve, the Navy Reserve, the Marine Corps Reserve, the Air National Guard, the air force reserve, and the coast guard reserve. I had no such luck finding an over all figure.

Actually no, that was Colonel Charles Hardy of the Army Forces Command saying there are no active COMBAT troops stationed anywhere, in other words you have pulled them all in. Why do you ignore factual evidence like that every time it is posted?

However, you ask for evidence that the entire COMBAT strength of the US military (44 brigades) has been committed to Iraq, I am happy to provide. (see how easy it is?)
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/blogs/news_bl..._only_one_h.htm
"According to a report released this afternoon by the Center for American Progress, of all of the U.S. Army's 44 brigade combat teams, just one has not been deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan. The majority--31--have had two or more tours in Iraq or Afghanistan (9 brigades have had three tours, and two have had four)."

And here is the evidence which SHOULD seal it for anyone, a report on the US military by the House Armed services Committe: I recommend you read it, it demonstrates just how wrong you are.
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/200..._not_ready.html

QUOTE

Ohh right your not rude at all, I'm playing victim. Wasn't that your argument before? You refer to either me or the person in a blog that doesn't support your viewpoint as being ""some nobody"", earlier you tell me to meet your requirements or go elsewhere, so I'm pretending right? You also tell me I don't read the links I do present , as if you would know, so you got a lot of nerve to say your not on a non stop rant here, I mean its the same thing over and over with you.

Firstly, the right wing blog [b]is by 'some nobody', he is nobody who is in any position of power, or authority, or in Iraq, why on earth should we take his opinion as fact? Would YOU accept the ramblings of some unknown left-wing blogger as 'fact'? You don't even accept the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the pentagon, the CIA or the secretary of defence as fact!... that is a rant from a right wing blogger, thats all. Oh yeah, Great source. Oh, and that ognoring the point that his blog rant DOESN'T even sdiscuss or support your assertion, at ALL!!

Secondly, I think my question of weither or not you read the links you post is not an unreasonable one, since as I pointed out (and you dodged) neither of the links you provided are even remotely relevant to your point. I mean seriously, neither of them even tries to argue for your assertions, not at ALL. Given that baffling disparity, I don't think my question was unreasonable at all. Don't you? You didn't even TRY and defend this in your post, just whined about how I was 'attacking' you again.

Look, playing the martyr is, as I said, weak at the best of times (especially when it is entirely made-up) , but when you use it as a substitute for responding to arguments, then its very telling.



I WOULD LOVE TO VIEW BOTH SIDES OF THE STORY!!! Thats why I have been BEGGING you to provide some, ANY evidence at ALL to back up your wild assertions, and yet in post after post you are repeatedly unwilling or unable, coming up with ALL KINDS of reasons why you won't evidence your wild, counter factual assertions.

All anyone reading is left with is: One opinion supported by hard facts, by specific actions taken by the US military, and supported by dozens of quotes from every major ranking officer in the US military, the CIA, the Pentagon, the Secretary of Defence, the Secretary of State, the House Intelligence Committee, the House Armed services committee, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff and more...... and on the other side another opinion completely in contradiction to the facts with NO evidence or support whtsoever. None.

And now you come out and tell me we need to see both sides of the story? There IS NO Other side of this story! None you have provided anyways....

I ask you, who should people believe: the facts and unanimous opinions of ALL those people above, supported by specific actions and reports of the US military on the ground in Iraq... or the unsubstantiated, unevidenced wild assertions of mr net2007? You tell me, and try and do it without complaining you are being attacked again.




Again you utterly miss the point. OK, I accept what you say 100%, it wasn't a typo. I NEVER CLAIMED IT WAS. I'm not interested in your initial error, I'm curious about the 'research' and 'offline sources' you used to come up with your REVISED figure of 16 million US dead in WWII. I'm curious, and have asked you several times, if we should put as much faith in ALL your arguments as we put into the 'research' you did to come up with the revised figure. It's a simple question really. You corrected yourself, did 'research', or 'recognised your error', or whatever you want to call it.... then produced the figure of 16 million US dead in WWII. I want to know if that revised figure is an example of how good your research and 'other sources' and general knowledge is.

Yes, (as I said before) there IS a big joke and only you don't seem to know the punchline: that's not an insult, its a fact. I'm presuming you will get the joke eventually... you haven't thoughout your last 5 posts mind you, which makes it all the funnier.




Please. More poor martyr net2007. Except its complete fiction, I haven't attacked you, just your arguments, I have made no personal attacks. You did and took a mod warning for it. I'm perfectly relaxed thank you. Now wil you please stop trying to pretend you are poor insulted victim under attack, and put some effort into substantiating your wild assertions?




More fiction. I didn't tell you to 'post links or get out', as you well know. Stop making things up, and stop trying to justify your own misdeeds by making up misdeeds of others.





You just completely contradicted yourself yet again.

First it was "we are not stretched, no ifs and or buts about it" THEN it was for about the 5th time I never said we were not stretched. NOW in THIS post, it is "I continue my stance that we are not stretched to the limit.

Really? I though you told me 5 times that you NEVER said the US was not stretched. You have changed your mind on this issue four times now. Don't just ignore the issue and pretend 'it's out of context' and then move on. It is perfectly in context: these are all YOUR WORDS. All of them, in direct contradiction again and again. Why can you not take a stance on this issue?



Firstly, I was under the impression you were 19 because I though you self-identified as such in another thread. If that is not the case it is my bad: it was a statement of fact (I thought) not an attack. So you are 24.

Secondly: wow, apparently I'm immature, and I'm targeted attacking you, and I'm not interested in civilised conversation... You sure are playing that card pretty hard. Complete fiction of course. I have asked you again to substantiate your position. You have shown yourself FAR more interested in whining about 'attacks' that don't exist than actually defending your positions. I don't care about your martyr card, and neither does anybody else: it is as transparent as it is ineffective. Debate the issue, support your arguments. That's all I have EVER asked, and all I CONTINUE to ask. But you can't, or won't. Thats YOUR problem, not mine.

You can call me all the names you want, they don't alter reality one bit.



yes, lets. Lets put this silly "oh no! Big bad Vermillion is beating poor little me up!" absurdity to bed once and for all, shall we?


-"learn to support your arguments, or go elsewhere."

Complete and deliberate misinterpretation, you even left out half my comment. Obvious invention by you, clear to everyone.

-"its like there is a big joke going on here and the only person who doesn’t know the punchline is you.

There is though, regarding the 'research' you put into your 16 million US dead revision, and you still haven't figured it out, which is kindof funny. Shall I tell you what the joke is, or do you wish to try and figure it out for yourself?

-"Remember when we were talking a few posts ago about you not posting about the second World war, because you don't seem to know anything about it?"

Statement of fact, your knowledge about WWII, a subject you KEEP trying to source, is appauling. I'm sorry, but it's true. See 'the big joke' above.

-"Firstly, did you even read over the sources you cited, or did you just post the first two that came up from a google search, unread?"

You posted two sources which had NO RELEVANCE to your argument, a perfectly reasonable question (and one you didn't answer). And even if that were not the case, this is me attacking your arguments. To try and pretend that is a 'personal attack' is just sad.

-"I don’t know or care if your initial comment about 60 million US dead in WWII was an error, a typo, a lack of knowledge or demons taking over your screen. You were already made fun of for that gross error back a page ago."

Statement of fact. Your initial number was incredibly wrong, several people here pointed it out, you aknowledged it and then 'researched' a revised figure. I have told you repeatedly that I don't CARE where or why that mistake occurred, its done and irrelevant now. And how on EARTH is that statement a 'personal attack'?

So that's it? Thats the 'big list' of personal attacks I have made on you which make you feel so bullied and martyred? Seriously? That's pitiful, there is not a personal insult in the list., except possibly the 'big joke' comment, but when you finally GET the joke you will see how justified it is.

This is the basis for your martyr complex, for you spending HALF your post whining and hardly ANY actually debating the issue or defending/ justifying your wild assertions? I wonder if I did the reverse, posted all the times you have called me immature, arrogant, foolish, uncivilised, 'a goof' and so on... I wonder how that would compare based on YOUR actions? I won't do that though, I'd much rather debate than play the 'poor little me' card.




Boy... look at all that bile. Good thing I don't care to play the 'personal attack' card as you so frequently do, as my case would have actual standing, not be all made-up as yours is. Quite the little attack-rant you made there. Irrelevant and entirely made-up, but very vitriolic.





Firstly (back to that knowledge about the Second world war thing) I THINK that you will find, if you 'research' it, that the Second World war was LONG over by the 1950s.

Secondly, stop trying to compare this counter-insurgency to the Second World War. There are few to NO similarities. Compare it to Vietnam or Soviet Afghanistan, the parallels there are frighteningly exact, down to the failure of the local government and the tactics of the insurgents.

Thirdly, that is some powerful rhetoric, and some finely crafted patriotic phrases. It remains however, irrelevant. You can 'believe in the country' all you want, in fact I admire you for it. But that alters NOTHING regarding hard facts. The military is overstretched and there are no more troops coming. Recruitment is barely able to cope with casualties, and despite your assertions, you have not been able to dispute the simple facts.
-All but one of the US militaries combat brigades are already on Iraq rotation.
-Tours have been extended from 12 to 15 months to curb the shortfall of troops.
-Training time has ben shortenbed, and new troops have been thrown into battle early to try and make this surge happen.
-Recruitment is barely meeting quotas (and NOT meeting quotas in nat. Guard and reserves) becaue of a drmatic lowering of standards and massive bonuses.
-The US military in the field is facing a growing equipment shortfall they cannot match.

Every one of those facts I have sourced and evidenced, and then provided further evidence with quotes from the absolute TOP MEN in political, civilian and military circles. You have provided NOTHING WHATSOEVER to oppose them, nothing at all. Your 'phantom sources' have no credibility concidering your refusal to cite or back up any of your assertions.


Now, you can spend another lengthy post casting insults and complaining about how you are constantly attacked (which is a complete fiction), or you can do some more 'research' and try and defend your wild assertions. Your call.

It is unfortunate that this debate has turned into a "if you're not there, how can you be in favor of what's happening, you don't know" kind of debate. That's a disingenious argument to be quite frank. Actually, more than just disingenious, but biased as well. One could just as easily make the argument that "if you're not there, how can you be against what's happening, you don't know?" So, we're left with a real problem here. Not too many people on this message board are in Iraq right now, and vice-versa. My nephew happens to be there in a combat unit attached to the 1st Cav out of FOB Warhorse, but he doesn't have the time to use the Internet. So, I don't think he'll be posting here anytime soon. But, that gets us to the actual question posed here for debate... Anyone remember that?

1. Can a politically correct military prevail in future engagements?


The term "politically correct" connotates some sort of social issue kind of thing, but I think if we concentrate on the political aspect of this question instead it might be more productive. The fact of the matter is that civilians, specifically politicians run our military and make the policy decisions. This is always how it has been, and hopefully how it always will be. I don't like the idea of some general deciding they know what's best and making "Seven Days in May" a reality. So, we're left with a debate on what to do conducted primarily by people who "aren't there". Certainly people who aren't there are making the policy decisions, and they are empowered to make those decisions by the votes of the American people. Like it or not, that's how it works and that's called "politics".

Times have changed since WWII and anyone who looks at the casualty figures in that war would wonder how in the world such a war would play out today. Just a sample from this website for the Pacific battles fought by the Navy and Marines. I left out Army stuff like D-Day because I wasn't there..... But my dad was...



Look at those numbers, and consider them in light of what happens nowdays. It seems to me that the face of war has changed from pure military engagements into political battles. The battles for the "hearts and minds" and I think that is what the initial question for this thread really addressed. We are no longer fighting purely military conflicts, but political ones as well. North Vietnamese General Giap understood this and launched the Tet offensive to win the political battle even though he knew he would lose the military one. From this website.......



Well, by military standards, Tet was a disaster for the North, but by political standards, it was a rousing success. Later on from the same article........



Sound familar? It should because that is the blueprint Al Qaeda and other extremist organizations hostile to the US are following now in Iraq and elsewhere. It's a war of political attrition, and somehow we better figure out how to fight such a war. I don't know if that means "politically correct" or not, but I do know that if we don't figure it out, we're not going to prevail at the end of the day and that wouldn't be a good thing.

Aquilla

Firstly, best of luck to your nephew.

Secondly, if I may be so bold, I don't think thats IS what the debate turned into. One poster once made the comment that I 'can't know' because I'm not on the ground in Iraq a page or so ago, but then wisely abandoned that and never mentioned it again.


I think the issue more recently is a slightly different one: You have a poster who has declared his willngness to kill many thousands of US soldiers if 'thats what it takes' and seem to feel the deaths of all these American soldiers is worth the price: yet despite his willingness to kill OTHER Americans for his opinions, he isn't willing to put himself in harm's way because he would rather desgne computer games.

I think given that situation, it is more than valid to ask how one can be so willing to kill other Americans, but not feel strongly enough to actually serve. If a poster makes a statement like: "if that means deploying more troops and ending up losing 10,000 Americans or more when all is said and done we have to accept that as a sacrifice of war.", then I think it is very valid to ask why the poster is only willing to have OTHERS killed for his principles, and not himself.

Thank you.



I don't know that anyone has argued here that more American soldiers should be killed in order to win this war, but I haven't read all of the things written in this thread. I have seen the argument made concerning "tactics" and that goes back to the original question posed concerning "political correctness". Vermillion, you yourself have raised the spectre of Vietnam in relation to the war in Iraq and while many here are probably too young to remember that time, I'm not. Live and living color and that was a very strange war when one compares it to conflicts like WWII (my dad's war). This one had some really strange rules attached to it. Stuff like the DMZ where you could get shot at and not return fire. Kinda like a Mosque in Sadr City. It was like a deadly game of hide and seek where the enemy could shoot you then run across some political line and yell "Ollie Ollie Oxen Free". Very strange way to fight a war if you ask me, but nobody asked me. Lots of good people got killed in Vietnam that way and I don't think anyone asked them either.

But, back to the point of my post in this thread in response to the question asked. Our enemy has learned lessons from our experience in Vietnam, they are following Giap's blueprint. Have we learned as well? Do we know how to fight and win a political war? There is no question we could win one the way we did back in the days of "wooden ships and iron men" meaning a massive airstrike that would wipe Iraq off the face of the map, or at least the trouble areas, and we wouldn't suffer a single casuality. But that's not the way wars are fought anymore. Perhaps a subject for a different thread, but I sometimes wonder if that's such a good thing. Sometimes I wonder if we've made a mistake by making war too "civilized", or in the words of the initial question "politically correct". Perhaps if wars were fought the way they used to be there might be a whole lot fewer of them.


Aquilla

Vermillion is correct Aquilla.

Here are the words from the horse's mouth.

Aquilla- I ask again- what are you saying when you say " politically correct"- so you are saying that tactics are NOT being used because they might not work- but because of "political correctness"- I would ask you to define how these "politically incorrect" means would actually help the war- because I haven' heard a good one yet.

Let me throw some degrees of "poltically incorret"- and you tell me how far you are talkng about in the debate-

1) Be as brutal as Saddam and keep the population in line- do you think it would take something less than Saddam to keep the factions in line?

2) Kill more innocent Iraqis in order to "get to the bad guys"?- Do you think we can install some kind of stable goverment when before we leave? Or would that goverment we install be accepted by the poeple of Iraq WITHOUT the brutality of Saddam? How long before there is another civil war?

3) Give me a better example of what you are talking about?

Aquilla- the conservative posters have been drawing a very, very vague idea as to what tactics would be employed that are not "politically correct" and yet won't enrage the population and causing need for more brutality on our part?

If I knew how to win this war, militarily and politically, it would be a done deal and I'd be eating dinner in the White House Dining room. I wish I knew, I want our people home yesterday and a stable Iraq. Brutality isn't going to do it, but neither is surrender which is the option many liberals have advanced - regardless of what they call it. I think there must be some way though and I think that is what we should be seeking, both on the left and on the right. I think the surge might have a chance of working by stabilizing Baghdad long enough for the Iraqi security forces to gain a foothold on things and most importantly gain the confidence of the people there. It's a two-headed dragon, military/security and political (confidence of the people). I would evaluate the effectiveness of the surge not on number of deaths or bombs, but rather on the volume and quality of intelligence gained from the populace. I think that's the key to winning this war.

In some ways I liken the situation in Iraq to the situation faced by the City of Los Angeles and the violence from the various gangs. Iraq is obviously on a much larger scale, but the analogy still holds. The only way the LAPD is able to go after the violent gangs is through help from the community. People standing up and saying "I'm sick and tired of this crap and I'm not going to put up with it anymore" and having the confidence in the LAPD to do something about it if they're told. That's happening in LA, slowly, but it's happening and I think it's going to get done. I think if we can have the patience it can happen in Baghdad as well. I don't know how long that's going to take, but I think it's important that it happen. Perhaps we might take a page from the LAPD strategy book. They have never set a deadline on when they're going to just give up.


Aquilla

I wish I had your optimism, Aquilla. Gang warfare, while horrible and unlawful, is still ultimately a civil problem; it compares only to an insurgency/civil/sectarian war in that people are being killed. I want to ask you this straight-up, Aquilla, and hope you give me an honest answer. What happens if this surge/escalation doesn't work? Will you want to continue the fight in Iraq? Will you call for more troops? At what point do you consider the "plan" to be a failure?

What saddens me about the hawks is that they have never provided an answer to what happens if/when there's a failure -- it's always "okay, let's try this now". Should we keep upping the charge on the ECG well after we know the patient is brain dead?

But most importantly, it saddens me that the hawks seem not to learn from history. The failures of Vietnam, of the French Indochinese war, of any number of wars of nation building have always ended badly for everyone involved. There are no winners or losers. There are the soldiers who fought: living, dead and wounded. There are the billions of dollars spent for no gain. There are the civilians (you know the ones we're building the nation for) who, perhaps, love the idea of a liberal democracy but after enough hardship and death will take peace no matter who provides it.

Not quite sure what you mean here by "civil", but it does seem to me that people getting killed is pretty much the main problem people in this country have with what's going on in Iraq right now. I'm not there, but I'm pretty sure that's probably a big concern of the Iraqis as well.



Lots of complex questions here that I'll try to answer, but the simple one is whether or not I would want to continue the fight in Iraq. The answer to that is yes. I don't think losing there is an option, because I don't think it will stop there. Whether or not Iraq was a part of the war against terror when we went in is the subject for other debates. It is now, and it is a war that we have to win. If the surge strategy doesn't work, then we need to come up with something else that will work. I don't know what that might be and if I did I would be advocating it. I'm not a military planner, and I don't even play one on TV. (not being flip, just lightening the mood here for a bit before I go back to the original question).......

Ok, bottom line. As phrased in the original question (somewhat modified by me), Iraq has now turned into a prodominately political war. We defeated Saddam and his government militarily in a very short time. Now, we can argue whether or not at that time he was a threat the US, or harbored terrorists, but that's not the question at hand now. Terrorists dedicated to causing harm to the US now reside in Iraq. I'm not talking about "shop-keepers by day, insurgents at night" kinds of people. I'm talking about hard-core terrorists that have called for the destruction of western clivilization. If we leave Iraq does anyone here think they;ll just say, "Cool! Let's go home and raise goats". Anyone here think that's going to happen? Or, are they going to say something along the lines of "Dang! No Americans to kill here anymore, let's head off to Los Angeles and blow up some of them there." Anyone here think that could happen? I do.

Ok, so where do you want to fight them? There or here?

Aquilla

I mean "civil" in the sense that gang warfare exists within the context of the larger civil society. There is no functioning larger civil society in Iraq.


Maybe, I wasn't asking the question too well. What if there is no military solution for Iraq? Are you willing to consider this option? Or what if the only military solution is genocide? Are you willing to employ this option? I think that's what we're left with.


Terrorists dedicated to causing harm to the US now reside in the US too.


I'd rather fight them over here, actually. It's our fight and not Iraq's fight. However, this is a straw-man question. We will be fighting them here and in Iraq and many other places in the world. Terrorism is a tactic and not a nationality.

logophage:

You left out Japan and Germany, both of which entailed us destroying an established regime and its military and then reforming/remaking the government[s] along lines acceptable to us. So it has not always been a case of failure. Oh, the distinction between success and failure is simply, well, look at the level of opposition from the folks at home to the efforts you mentioned versus the two that I just did, as that's the explanation for the difference between success and failure. Lastly, I wouldn't exactly call the French-Vietnamese War one of "nation building" on the part of the French.

Japan and Germany were wars of nation destruction and not nation building. It was only after the complete destruction of their society and their infrastructure were things like the Marshall Plan put in place. So, yes, if Iraq were utterly and completely destroyed by the US, then it's probable that the equivalent could be done in Iraq. A few small, teeny, tiny issues though: Iraq neither attacked nor declared war on the US; the US vs. Iraq military power ratio is vastly diffrent from the US vs. German military power ratio; the government of Saddam no longer exists; oh and we're supposed to be helping the civilian populace to build their nation not to destroy it while fighting the insurgency. Thus, there is no moral or political justification for bringing about the utter destruction of Iraq (unlike Germany and Japan). These WWII examples are far from salient and are actually counter-factual to your thesis. Next...


I see. So, the act of disagreeing with a war means that the war will fail. Seems to me that you're insulting the US military by deeming it so feeble that it can't deal with opposition to its mission. I'm no hawk and I certainly don't think this. Oh and..um... we're a democracy, right? So if there's a large segment of society or golly a majority of society who disagree with a war, don't you think that this popular opinion should have an effect on our foreign policy decisions?

Sadly, losing is always an option. It may not be an option anybody likes, but it's an option. I'm sure at some point members of the losing side in ANY way have said 'losing isn't an option'... that didn't alter the situation they faced.

Here is the thing: You say you don't know what the 'something else' is because you are not a military planner. Fair enough. But the United States military has lots of military planners. It hads for the past four years, it had lots of military planners for the 8 years of Vietnam. The USSR had lots of military planners for the 10 years of Afghanistan. So it's not just you, or me, or anyone else on this board: nobody seems to know what the 'something else' is.

Thats because nobody has figured out how to win a counter-insurgency struggle, as an unpopular occupying force, against an intrenched insurgency. People have been working at this for years, and the best they could do was come up with a list of suggestions to maximise your chances, thgose suggestions were all ignored by Bush Jr in 2003-2004, resulting in the situation that exists today. So how do you defeat the insurgencies in Iraq? I don't know. Nor do you, nor it seems, does anyone else. There seem to some people, like one mentioned before on this thread, who are willing to keep killing Americans indefinately, just so long as more American dead means not having to admit that the US can't win... That seems unimaginably heartless.

Because that's the clincher here: the debate of 'how to win in Iraq' is NOT an academic excersis, its not a bunch of men sitting around a table arguing, or posting options on an internet debate board. It is a brutal ongoing struggle costing hundreds of lives per month, thousands of wounded per month and billions of dollars per month.


And ALL of that comes down to one simple, indesputable fact. NO STRATEGY can exist without the Iraqi government coming in and taking over: starting to actually govern. And that is not happening. That, in a single sentence was the cause of defeat in Vietnam and Soviet Afghanistan, its that the local government the foreign power was artificially propping up had no capacity to govern the state, and as such could not stand on its own. There can be as many 'troop surges' and piles of American dead as one likes, yet because of the situation in the Iraqi halls of power, the situation is worse now (significantly) than it was a year ago, and worse than a year before that. The US military, for four years of effort, not only is incapable of improving things, theycan't even prevent things from deteriorating.




Firstly, I agree with you on the first point: Bush Jr will face the judgement of history for his reckless stupidity in this war, not just its inception, but more importantly its execution. That is however, essentially irrelevant to 'what happens next'.

Yes, there are hard core terrorists in Iraq, but they are the minority, the vast majority of the insurgency ARE the 'shopkeeper by day' types. And interestingly, the large local militias loathe the foreign jihadists as much as they hate the United States. The fear that they will 'come to the US to kill Americans' is a bit unrealistic as an excuse for maintaining a US presence in Iraq:

Firstly, if they were going to come over to the US, why didn't they until now? Both before and during the war, people could easily have hopped on a flight and come over, the idea that the fiasco in Iraq is somehow 'prevening them' or even 'dissuading them' from flying to the US makes no logical sense.

Secondly, the vast majority of these insurgents have no interest whatsoever in attacking the US or killing Americans elsewhere: they just want their country back. They are fighting for Iraq, and for the desire to see Iraq under their preferred form of government, whatever that may be. The foreign fighter component of the insurgency is now and always has been tiny. Did you know that in four years of war, a grand total of only 312 foreign fighters have been captures? Thats fewer than 80 a year. And do you know what countries most of them come from? Egypt, Syria, Sudan and Saudi Arabia.

Thirdly, the presence of the United States as an occupying force in Iraq is the motivation for almost all of the foreign fighters captured. These people were not just magically created in 2003, if they wanted to attack the US they could have. But they came to Iraq BECAUSE of the US presence there occupying a state in the Middle East. There is quite simply no reason to believe that if the US leaves, all the insurgents will get on the next flight to Tulsa. And if the terrorists DO decide to get on the next flight to Tulsa, the presence of the entire US mobile projectable military force bogged down in Iraq will not deter or even inconvenience them.

Lastly, EVEN IF this were true, the argument is essentially that "we should keep killing hundreds of Americans and wounding thousands more every month, not to mention pouring billions of dollars down a hole and destabilising the Middle east, because if we DON'T, some Americans MIGHT die."


This is why the vast majority of Americans want the US to pull out of Iraq. So do the vast majority of US troops in Iraq. So do the vast majority of Iraqis.

I think that its a shame that this thread deteriorated into another debate over whether Iraq was winnable instead of the overacrhing question of whether a politically correct military can actually win a war...or perhaps the better question if a politically correct military can win the hearts and minds of a populace. The answer I put forth earlier in this thread ( post #21 for those who missed it), was that the truth is that you cannot. As Sun Tzu wrote in The Art of War, The good fighters of old first put themselves beyond the possibility of defeat, and then waited for an opportunity of defeating the enemy. To secure ourselves against defeat lies in our own hands, but the opportunity of defeating the enemy is provided by the enemy himself. This the good fighter is able to secure himself against defeat, but cannot make certain of defeating the enemy. Hence the saying: One may know how to conquer without being able to do it. Security against defeat implies defensive tactics; ability to defeat the enemy means taking the offensive.

Using Iraq as an example, our tactics from the very beginning made it so we would have a difficult time with not just the political victory but the military one. After a highly successful offensive campaign, we went on the defensive and that has led us to the point we are currently at. We have given the enemy the opportunity to decide where and when the battles would be fought. If we stayed on the constant offensive, even at the expense of political correctness, we may have been able to secure the country. And this is the most important breakdown that hasn't been considered. We can do one of two things: 1) We could, in an attempt to win the hearts and minds, run a politically correct campaign not venturing into culturally sensitive areas or engaging in highly populated areas....-or- 2) We could engage the enemy wherever they are and whenever it is opportune to do so. You see to me, the first option looks like it needs an extended campaign os tit for tat because you do not want to completely wipe out the enemy with fear of backlash. The second option has the outset goal of security and defeating the insurgency outright even at the expense of being PC. While this option may have more feverish backlash in the early going due to obvious levels of violence, the long run is much brighter because people can forget about the past if there country is currently secure. This war of attrition (which goes back even further than Vietnam, these tactics were used by the South during the Civil War and even before that) which is prolonged makes it impossible to win either a military or political victory.

Okay- you are another to use this comment of "politically correct"- without details about what you mean- are you saying we go in and indiscriminately kill anybody that is around what we THINK is the enemy?

I am curious as to how leveling a mosque is going to pacify the local population, or carpet bombing an area, or, like with Fallujah- sending hundreds of thousands out of thier city as refugees are going to pacify the region- because it certainly hasn't helped- in fact, it has upped recruitment for the the folks that like to kill US soldiers.

Or are YOU talking reverting to Saddam like brutality? Do you think it would take LESS than the tactics Saddam used?

If the situation was reversed- do you think that destroying all the washington DC based monuments to our forefathers would pacify the population or would we use it as a rally-cry against the oppressors?

The rules of engagement state that you can shoot when shot at. If the enemy is shooting from a mosque, than we should be able to fire back. If an entire platoon is shooting from a mosque, we should be able to level it. By not fighting back, we are allowing them to leave, regroup, and fight another day which in the long run does more harm than the good that was done by NOT firing on the mosque.


It has only hurt because th tactics were not implemented from the outset of the engagement. If we kept on the offensive even after the fall of Baghdad, then perhaps we would not be dealing with this insurgency currently. Fighting a war in order to win the hearts and minds is quite an oxymoron. The problem with our tactics was that we tried to win the political victory at the expense of a military victory when it is ONLY through the military victory that a political one can succeed.



All I am saying is that we should have pacified Fallujah from the very start. We should have taken out Sadr when his militia first arose. And we should have had the troops to do it. What I am saying is that we tried to work the political angle in many of our military situations only to have a short cease fire and then a prolonged insurgency campaign. If we took care of this early on, we wouldnt be dealing with it now. Yes, there would have been heavy backlash, but if it made the country secure and made it possible for political action to take place, then it would not have been seen as a bad thing. What IS bad is this conflict which has no end in sight.



That is too simplistic for me even to answer. We are talking about allowing militias and insurgents that were allowed to gather and plan attacks because we attempted to find a political solution to a military problem. IF (and this is the important word here) a country is going to invade another one with the prospects of exporting democracy...then security has to be the numebr one priority. It has to be, Nothing else can be achieved until the security situation is apt. We tried to move the political process along with the securing of the country and it proved to be a failure. We didnt have enough troops and we were not allowed to exercise the tactics necessary to win. To use a baseball analogy, we scored 8 runs in the top of the first and jumped out to an early lead. Well guess what. If the other team scores one run every inning without us scoring any more, we lose.

I'm no military strategist but it seems to me first off that the term "politically correct"