In the first place, please don’t tell me to calm down. Tell my daughter’s best friend, whose father is running all over Iraq in an unarmored humvee providing psychological counseling to our boys (among whom, according to his reports home, are an appalling number of basket cases), to calm down. She’s a little upset these days.
And that justifies just giving up? Our Beloved Leader says he doesn’t even care that much about bin Laden anymore, and that’s okay? I know there were logistical problems, but come on! The world’s most technically advanced army, with the will of the entire American populace behind it, with only an isolated, universally despised regime opposing it–we couldn’t have found some way to sweep in with as many troops as it might’ve taken to do the job? So much for that famous “Can do” military mentality, I guess. Better to invade pushover countries to distract people from the awful truth.
Whose reasoning? The administration’s? Sure ain’t the way they sold it to the American public! Last I heard, Cheney was STILL pimping the nonexistent connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda.
And if you’re promoting the virtues of realpolitik, then getting rid of Saddam was the worst thing we could’ve done – loathsome as he was, he was one of the few secular bulwarks against Islamic fundamentalism in the ME. During the Cold War, we certainly had no qualms about supporting Batista, Somoza, Trujillo and other slimeballs in Saddam’s league because of their anti-commie creds – but, of course, I’d be a bed-wetting liberal conspiracy theorist if I pointed out THEY didn’t sit on the second largest reserves of oil in the world.
Get a life. I have two close cousins IN Iraq (one is in Faluja atm in fact) and a son in the Marine Corps who will be deployed to Iraq sometime next year. In addition, I’ve made 2 trips to Iraq in the last year and will have to make another one sometime early next year. I’m still telling you…calm down.
No, it explains WHY we did what we did in Afghanistan. If you want magic solutions or think someone can just wave a magic wand and troops will spring up with full logistics support, or we’ll be able to home in on Bin Laden by pressing butting X, but that the government was too lazy to do so, then you need to get a grip. I tried to explain WHY reality is…well, real. You can only do what you can do…and our military is not some magical super wonder weapon that can do the impossible. If you don’t want to accept that, thats fine by me.
Hey, you’ll get no arguement from ME as to the fucked up way the administration sold the war. However, thats WHY we went into Iraq, whether or not its what the administration SAID were their reasons. Bottom line is…we went in because SH and Iraq gave us the excuse we needed to occupy a strategic position in the ME…where the majority of the Islamic terrorists happen to be last time I checked. So, its not a head exploding leap of logic to understand the why, whether you agree or not. Don’t agree we should have gone into Iraq? I’m right there with you…I dont agree either. However, UNDERSTANDING that it wasn’t either a whim, nor was to steal oil, nor for revenge about 9/11 or to avenge his daddy’s honor (or whatever other fantasy reason is currently popular) is important for rational discussion. Otherwise I guess rational discussion about Iraq just isn’t possible (actually, I don’t think it is on this board).
Dude…I’m all for realpolitik. Its how the work works. However, I already said that taking out Saddam and invading Iraq was stupid…I don’t think the strategic benifits (i.e. basing rights, having a forward deployed military in a troubled area, etc) outweight the problems (like the cost, the insurgency thats tied down said military for the indefinite future, etc). Why are you trying to put me on the side of defending the administrations decision?
Wait - so you don’t remember the whole thread we had awhile back where you were bashing Clinton for not doing anything about terrorism, and several of us bombarded you with information to the contrary? You really don’t remember that?
The first was a joke-- my friends in Calgary continually bitch about road quality being so pathetic they need a 4x4 in order to get to the other side of the potholes.
The second is an attempt at defeating the ‘Western conceit’ shared by Alberta and British Columbia that provincial taxes are far lower than in the East. The reality is that apples get compared to oranges, and when you include provincial health care premiums (which are included everywhere else – Oh I see that Ontario is now instituting Health premiums) the actual percentage of taxes paid is pretty close.
One thing I don’t get, and maybe I’m just not reading this right, but are you saying that the US couldn’t have sent more troops into Afghanistan and rooted out OBL and his crew a bit easier? I understand the terrain difficulties involved in the area in question, but I’m just trying to figure out what you mean. It seems to me that the entirety of the Iraq war effort could have been better used making Afghanistan into a real country and not the anarchic wasteland it has been for 30 years or more. So couldn’t the US have sent the troops that are in Iraq into Afghanistan, not had to use “freedom fighters” who are really little different from the Taliban other than their ultimate loyalties, and secured the borders and hemmed AQ in? Or was there some reason why that couldn’t be done in the first place? Honest question.
We could not have sent a large force easily into Afghanistan…certainly not one heavily supported by armor and air. Where would we stage such a force out of. How would we resupply it in that terrain? After the fact, we certainly could (and probably should) have more heavily re-inforced Afghanistan (instead of heading off into our Iraq adventure) by sending in our lighter mountain divisions and perhaps even some of our heavier formations in the more hospitable areas. But this would have been after ObL bolted already anyway.
You have to remember that by the time Iraq kicked off Afghanistan was pretty well over, that our ‘freedom fighters’ coupled with air support (something you CAN do in such terrain) and our SF formations there had pretty much defeated the Taliban.
But STAGING massive amounts of troops and supplying them in that time frame just isn’t reasonable. Again, recall that we built up in Kuait and Saudi for our Iraq adventure for months, stockpiling supplies, bringing in troops, weapons, etc…and even training in those conditions. All that as a prelude to attacking. Where could we have done this to invade Afghanistan? Not being condescending, but here is a map of the immediate region…take a look and see if it answers your question in light of what I just said. Particularly, look at the surrounding countries (and the terrain) and think about where the US could have staged up to move in a large force…and how the US would have supplied said force once it was there.
Ok, fair enough XT, but what about Pakistan? I know the people don’t really care for the US, but the government there is on your side. Or one of the former Soviet republics to the north. I’m sure there might have been some possibilities there. It just strikes me as foolish to send a small force to do a big job. You can say that the Taliban has been routed but let’s be honest, Afghanistan - even with the recent election - is far from becoming any sort of functioning nation. Much of the area outside of Kabul is in warlord hands, Taliban terrorists are still making attacks here and there, and things aren’t looking great.
Maybe I just don’t know enough about the logistics of military interventions, coming from a country that hasn’t been at war for 50 years or so. It seems to me, however, that if you’re going to do something, it should be done right the first time, especially when lives are at stake. What if a new madman arose in Afghanistan that required serious intervention (actual threat to world peace or some such)? Would the US just say "Sorry, nowhere to layout the troops and equipment?
Couple of things with Pakistan. First off, look at the boarder between the two countries. Most of it is pretty mountainous. Secondly, I have serious doubts if Pakistan was (or would) let us stage up a huge army in their nation…or, even if their GOVERNMENT allowed it if it would be a wise decision in any case. Certainly not at THAT time…hell, I don’t even think it would be smart today.
The Taliban WERE routed. Doesn’t mean they aren’t still hanging about, just that the majority of their teeth were pulled. And we did that using mostly local support along with our special forces. I think it was a brilliant plan myself, and probably the best we could have done there unless we were willing to out and out attempt to conquere the country. You might recall that didn’t go so well for the USSR (in spite of the fact that they COULD stage up in the area, as they controlled much of the northern border at the time). Our mistake in Afghanistan was in not following up (IMO)…I don’t think taking Bin Laden was ever in the cards except through luck (i.e. nailing him in a cave, or a chance meeting as he attempted to escape)…reguardless of how many forces we could put in the field. Again, this was a meme (again, IMO) that the Dems used because people really didn’t understand the logistical situation, nor really comprehended exactly what that region looks like.
As to the present situation, you are probably fairly accurate in saying that its by no means secure, especially outside of the cities. The only thing I’ll say is its not nearly as bad as it was for the Soviets when THEY invaded as far as a country side up in arms…and a lot of that has to do (again, IMO) with the fact that the US didn’t massively invade, but allowed those local mercenaries to do most of the heavy lifting. If only we had of been as wise in Iraq…
I suppose we MIGHT try something desparate like a forced entry attack with light forces to go in and secure an area, then try and build up and stage out of there. It would take a long time though and would probably be pretty costly…a lot more costly than even Iraq was. Or we could just sit back and pound them with air and missile attacks…but they really don’t have all that much to attack, and such attacks, even with the best intentions, tend to cause civilian casualties and draw things out. Or, if it happened today, we MIGHT be willing to risk pressuring Pakistan into letting us stage up there, though we’d be likely to have our legs cut off if we did, if the happy people of Pakistan took it into their heads to attack our supplies and rear area.
Or, I suppose we could always invade and conquere Iran and then stage out of there for an attack into Afghanistan. :smack:
Thanks for the replies XT. I can’t honestly see Pakistan as an option either, since it seems like much of the border region between Afghanistan and Pakistan is only nominally controlled. Seems almost like a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation.
Afghanistan is simply a very nasty place. One has only to ask the British and the Soviets how nasty it is to try and fight there. Hell, even Alexander had a bad time of it in that region if I’m remembering correctly.
Lets hope we never have to find out. I know people go on and on about Iraq, and I’m not too keen either…but Iran would be an order (or several orders) of magnitude worse IMO. Ugly would be an understatement.
