Afghan Thoughts

It’s a great article but Joe, I’m not trying to be shrill by always bringing this up: what does any of this have to do with the original Afghanistan mission? We went to kill or capture bin Laden.

If bin Laden is still alive and free then this new plan does nothing to accomplish the original mission.

If capturing or killing bin Laden is no longer important then why not just leave?

Maybe I’m being too short sighted but I think you have to recognize how this war was sold to the American people in 2001. Nobody ever came and changed the sales pitch or asked for new approval, at least not from the population at large.

But I’ll tell you this, if back in 2001 Bush had said: “I’d like to invade Afghanistan, get involved in inter-tribal politics and impose some sort of non-democratic stability at a cost of $1 trillion over a decade” we would not have said “go for it.”

Joe: as I understand Mr Sanger’s piece it is about process and inside the Situation Room positioning. It may be more helpful to hear from the ground in Afghanistan: what gains are being made at the local level? what are the over 100,000 contracters doing? With 200,000 Americans, NATO and contractor types why are things so uncertain? Did the Russians have such large numbers during their “liberation effort”?

Inside the WH debates appear to be more about parties positioning themselves domestically for 2010 abd 2012.

If capturing or killing bin Laden is no longer important then why not just leave?

One of the unmentioned (and unmentional) desired end states is to have reliable assets distributed throughout the country, particularly in the areas that we don’t and can’t directly control. The secret to the success of that Predator program is having people who are willing and able to give us targeting information in exchange for a realiable expectation that we can keep them safe afterwords. But you can’t expect to have the President get on National TeeVee and discuss such details, can you?

That makes a ton of sense. I just wonder whether or not the American people would support that if the costs and benefits were laid out honestly. And seriously, they might well support it. But it’s not the choice we’ve been given.

We read reports of action in Somalia and Yemen from time to time by Special Forces and CIA teams. They were particularly effective in the first couple of months when the attack on AlQaeda took place in Afghanistan. Such action can continue after the US and NATO troops leave, with the contractors in tow.

Currently we are providing the targets given the way ground and air operations are conducted from established bases..

Joe, you realize that our Afghan policy makes no sense. We’re going to kill the Taliban until they reconcile. Good luck with that. Why should they reconcile with an invading force or with their own illegitimate government?
.
So then the policy hinges on “mild hope that we will enable the Afghans to build security from the bottom up, via tribal militias.” Once again, Petraeus gong to bribe local warlords not to kill anyone.
.
This is the Iraq playbook. And there still is no reconciliation between Sunni and Shia, we’re still surging, we’re still making bribes for them not to kill each other (and us, and Maliki’s forces), and the argument is that if we leave, they will start killing one another. Therefore, we can never leave.
.
Terrorists will plot and train somewhere else. It is Homeland Security’s job to protect us from terrorist attack. Afghani security is not our concern. There is nothing to be gained in Afghanistan beside military permanence in order to police the region- exactly what the PNAC crew have desired since the Clinton admin. This is about oil, not national security. We have learned nothing from the pre-Iraq invasion snow job.

(T)he U.S. military is spending billions of dollars on construction projects to ensure (Afghanistan’s) infrastructure can support American and coalition personnel in 2010 and years beyond.
.
The military has already spent roughly $2.7 billion on construction over the past three fiscal years. Now, if its request is approved as part of the fiscal 2010 defense appropriations bill, it would spend another $1.3 billion on more than 100 projects at 40 sites across the country, according to a Senate report on the legislation.
.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/17/AR2009101701695.html

“We have learned nothing from the pre-Iraq invasion snow job.”

.
One thing is very certain at this time. It is no longer George W Bush’s “War”. It is squarely and firmly, Barack Obama’s War now.
.
Isn’t that right Joe?

This says more than Joe Klein will ever know.
.

President Obama strongly opposed President George W. Bush’s surge in Iraq during his presidential campaign, and even now he has never publicly acknowledged that it was largely successful.

.
But it also says a whole lot about the lack of real experience Obama has in general. He is simply taking the same playbook from Iraq and attempting to use it as his Afghan strategy.
.
How sad.
.
Obama has made a major mistake. He is betting that a surge will give him the same results that the surge in Iraq gave to Bush, despite his earlier rants and raves on how bad of a policy decision that was at the time. This tells us all that Obama doesn’t have the slightest clue.
.
When you elect a former “Community Organizer” to be the Commander in Cheif, what should you expect? Face it people, you have simply elected the most incompetent President to ever hold the office of President. Obama even makes Jimmy Carter look like the greatest sage the world has ever known.
.
If Obama would only read the history books, he would know that any effort in Afghanistan is futile. History is repleat with examples of how Afghanistan is never going to be conquerred or even put on par with the rest of the developing nations, ever. It is a 12th century country that will remain in the 12th century for a long long time. Warlords and local sheiks are all that you will find for Afghanistan’s future. Nothing more.
.
While our country slides further and further into economic despair. While jobs are being lost left and right, and Americans are starving, Obama plays nation builder. What a joke.
.
Obama should have pulled out the troops, and saved the treasury alot of money. He should have listened to Biden and droned the place to smitherines. He would have been re-elected in 2012 on that decision alone. Now, there is no hope of re-election. No hope. NOBama 2012.

This is indeed undeniable. GWB cut and run.
.
I always wonder how much Obama is hemmed in by the people around him. He kept Gates on. He didn’t roll any heads at the CIA to speak of. He’s supported BushCo policy on sweeping torture and contracter abuse under the rug. Everything he’s done since arriving has been designed to reassure the Pentagon and Intelliogence services that he isn’t going to rock the boat.
.
Those of us with eyes open have realized this from the midst of the Primary season. Anyone who thought Obama was a peacenik (from either the Left OR Right) was doing so only due to their tendency to project their prejudices.

“the troop suge is not intended to defeat the taliban…”
.
“the goal is stability, not victory, since victory is not attainable.”
.
Now there’s a real moral booster for our troops.

Not exactly Rusty.
First, the Iraq Surge is not a surge and didn’t work. It was a troop increase and it has not lead to political reconciliation- its stated goal. The lessening of violence is attributable to many other factors, including an Iranian brokered truce betw Shia factions, ethnic cleansing of major cities, extensive networks of 20 ft blast walls to separate rival groups, US payoffs to the Sunnis, 4.5 mil refugees. But that’s not the point, Obama has given decision making power over to the Pentagon, as Bush did, and they are sticking to their agenda: increased spending, permanent bases, police the region, protect the oil flow. The defense people are not concerned with reconciliation and marginally concerned with National Security. It’s more about keeping the US on top of the economic food chain.
.
.
.
Per the surge and how it’s effect in Iraq v Afghanistan, Nir Rosen elaborates:

COIN helped to control violence in Iraq because sectarian bloodshed—which changed the conflict from an anti-occupation struggle to a civil war, displaced millions, and resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands—was already exhausting itself when the Surge started in 2007. The Sunnis were willing to cooperate with the Americans because the Sunnis knew they had been defeated by the time the “Sunni Awakening” began in Anbar Province in September 2006; the victorious Shias were divided, and militias degenerated into gangsterism. In comparison with al Qaeda in Iraq and Shia gangs, the Americans looked good. They could step into the void without escalating the conflict, even as casualties rose temporarily. Moreover, with more than two-thirds of Iraqis in cities, the U.S. efforts could focus on large urban centers, especially Baghdad, the epicenter of the civil war.

In Afghanistan, there is no comparable exhaustion of the population, more than two-thirds of which lives in hard-to-reach rural areas. In addition, population protection—the core of COIN—is more complicated in Afghanistan. The Taliban only attack Afghan civilians who collaborate with the Americans and their puppet government or who are suspected of violating the extremely harsh interpretation of Islamic law that many Afghans accept. And unlike in Iraq, where innocent civilians were targeted only by predatory militias, civilians in Afghanistan are as likely to be targeted by their “own” government as by paramilitary groups. Afghanistan has not fallen into civil war—although tension between Pashtuns and Tajiks is increasing—so the United States cannot be its savior. You can’t build walls around thousands of remote Afghan villages; you can’t punish the entire Pashtun population, the largest group in the country, the way the minority Sunnis of Iraq were punished.

I actually agree too. And had Bush had the sense Obama has, we would have already caught Osama Bin Laden.
.
Instead, we got “Mission Accomplished”!

However, I completely agree with this part:
.
.
If Obama would only read the history books, he would know that any effort in Afghanistan is futile. History is repleat with examples of how Afghanistan is never going to be conquerred or even put on par with the rest of the developing nations, ever. It is a 12th century country that will remain in the 12th century for a long long time. Warlords and local sheiks are all that you will find for Afghanistan’s future. Nothing more.
.
While our country slides further and further into economic despair. While jobs are being lost left and right, and Americans are starving, Obama plays nation builder. What a joke.
.
Obama should have pulled out the troops, and saved the treasury alot of money.

And BTW rusty, your comment that I pasted above (7.2) makes you sound down-right liberal. I guess you agree that the Pres should dramatically slash the mil budget and give some of that money to the States so they can hire people to work on infrastructure projects and create jobs. How about some wind turbines?
.
Also, pls know that if Bush could have had a third term, or if McCain won, or just about any major candidate, they would be taking about the same course as Obama. The difference being, McCain (Bush prob) would have dragged Iran into this mess too.

” .. We went to kill or capture bin Laden. .. this new plan does nothing to accomplish the original mission. ..”

The question then becomes: Do we know what the original mission was?

You’d be led to believe that we who condemn, moan and grieve the deaths of our innocent ~4,000 on 9/11 wouldn’t march around the would wreaking gratuitous death and grief upon millions of innocent kids, mothers, fathers …

We invaded Iraq, destroyed a civilization and slaughtered many while in search of Saddam’s WMDs, so the naive world was told.
Yet once in Iraq, the world became aware that we made only token efforts in search of the dreaded WMDs. Why?
Within months, we offered that there were no WMDs in Iraq – a technical fact that was well known to our many experts and imperial policy strategists like Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld well before our wanton, blood-lusting adventurism.

We are still in Iraq – with rationalizations galore for the on-going social disruption, torture, rape, slaughter …

And we are priming new killing fields in Pakistan, Iran, Palestine, Nigeria, ..

[Indeed, "Manifest Destiny" was the duplicitous rallying cry and the pious face of Europe's dastardly invasion of fabulously wealthy Africa, N America, S America ...]

” .. The goal is stability, not “victory” since victory is not attainable. ..”

And, of course, “stability” is attained when we say it is. And efterwards, it has to be ensured/maintained with a residual (colonial) force.

Quite convenient.
[Do you wonder why Saddam wasn't as successful in Kuwait?]

It’s interesting to see someone flatly assert that delusion is a desirable state of affairs. Can’t say that I’m surprised however.

Not quite there with you pinto.
.

“I guess you agree that the Pres should dramatically slash the mil budget and give some of that money to the States so they can hire people to work on infrastructure projects and create jobs.”

.
Liberals believe that the Governments responsiblity is to provide sustance and assistance to the citizens. I fully disagree. This is a socialists remedy for a problem that will never go away unless we give the citizen the tools and education necessary for them to take care of their own needs. Individual responsibility is the task of the individual, not the government.
.
Slash the military budget? Perhaps, but not to add on more wasteful big government projects as you propose. No. What you do with the money is pay off our national debt, and get out from under the thumb of the chinese. That will be when we can see our economy recover and jobs return to those who are now unemployed.
.
No more bailouts, government giveaways or anything of the like. Once the debt is paid, and programs like medicare and social security (the only entitlement programs I agree with) are secured, THEN give the tired and over taxed, taxpayers a break. Give them their money to invest as they see fit for themselves and their families. Elect Congressional Representatives who will work for the people, and not take from the people to line their own pockets with golden bribes. Enough is enough. Hopefully in 2010 we shall see the beginning of the new revolution. The time when we can tell our children and grand children how we took out country back from the corrupt politicians in Washington.
.
Obama’s “spread the wealth” mentality will only take us down a road that will simply risk everything that we have worked so hard for over the years. What our parents, grand parents and great great and greats have toiled and worked so hard for their entire lives. The next year will be interesting, hopefully the Obama bus towards socialism will be hijacked and put back where it belongs, in a footnote in history of another failed President.

” .. I just wonder whether or not the American people would support that if the costs and benefits were laid out honestly. And seriously, they might well support it. ..”

Which makes it difficult for us to hold a grudge against the insurance companies when they make similar cost-benefit, life-death decisions on whether to extend health care coverage to some Americans or not.
[What was that about coming home to roost?]

Did the fiercely independent people of Afghanistan have a say in that? If it is such a noble idea, then why are we – of the world’s mightiest human-killing machine – meeting with such resistance?
Don’t we – the proponents of freedom, liberty and democracy .. the works – hold it as a universal self-evident truth about the people having a say?
(Or is that proclamation part of words-just-words duplicity? Or does that hold only for Americans? And the British and French and Chinese and Russians…)

Yeah because the troops are getting Joe Klein blog posts piped directly into their helmets.

The secret to the success of that Predator program is having people who are willing and able to give us targeting information in exchange for a realiable expectation that we can keep them safe afterwords.
.
This explains a lot, but it’s also incredibly stupid.
.
This is a culture that is endemically corrupt. Karzai’s brother is a drug lord, for crying out loud.
.
But we wonder how it is that we keep bombing villages and weddings with the Predators?

Hey Rust, I almost completely agree with 7.4. The only difference is that I believe that the govt has more of a role in the economy than you, especially in times of economic turmoil. The Fed should make sure that the States can meet their budgets and avoid the cancellation of projects which hire taxpayers (the States should be held accountable). It’s more of an oversight role.
.
Note I said *some* of that money. We have to get out from under our debt. Our need to borrow from other nations in order to keep the government functioning is a national shame. I, however, think we’ve gotten to this point because of run-away military spending, not due to spending on citizens.
.
(and it’s pint or two, not pinto)

Liberals believe that the Governments responsiblity is to provide sustance and assistance to the citizens. I fully disagree.

This liberal disagrees. The Governments responsibility is to see to it that commerce operates in a manner that is free from blatant exploitation and that all citizens are afforded similar opportunities independent of factors beyond their control such as complexion, gender or sexual orientation.
.
Plugging holes in the social safety net may seem like rewarding unproductive behavior but the fact is, that we all benefit as a result. If nothing else it prevents us from having to step over the corpses of those who were unfortunate enough to be unable to care for themselves.

And what about Mr. Koh? Is he more or less demoralizing than Klein? Where does he fall on your Scale of Troop Hating?

I should note, there is no “Obama bus towards socialism”. He’s a centrist Democrat, true-to-form. Which means that he’s to the right of most Americans.
.
(and what PD said @ #11)

I wonder also how they felt when Boosh admonished our enemies with this nugget:
.
“Bring it on!”

I think, to cut to the chase on the whole thing is this:
.
Obviously, Obama has read his history, otherwise he would have claimed that victory is possible. He also pointed out that such a venture could very easily become an open ended proposition* and our economy is more important.
.
He may not have given us immediate withdrawal, as some want (and I understand why, too), but at least he is the first POTUS to provide an exit strategy.
.
I think that instead of sales pitches and fear mongering, Obama has refreshingly provided a prioritized, integrated strategy that weighs all factors affecting the country together instead of just weighing military goals separately from domestic goals.
.
*Remember McCain’s “100 year war?”? At least he was honest about it.

There is actually much to be said for that.
.
People, particularly those on the far right, keep forgetting that rural subsidies are the single biggest example of this.
.
I’m not trying to belabor a point I’ve made many times before, but it is the single most important action ever undertaken by government in this respect. It is a process so deeply integrated into American politics and society that it is under the radar in most discussions.
.
Had FDR not instituted the progenitor programs that have lead to the current set of rural subsidy programs, we would be one of many countries with a rural underclass.
.
It might be of interest to point out that the advertising in support of a program to supply high speed internet infrastructure is motivated by the money that is to be made on it, but impacts will last far beyond the lifespan of the project.
.
The idea that our country was founded to serve the market in it’s natural state, or the idea that health care is not a right, (or otherwise) are simply reflections of an ideology, nothing more, and are not enshrined anywhere in our founding documents.

53, I don’t see it that way (I hope you have better insight than me). Saying that we will start withdrawing troops in 19 mths based on conditions is not an exit strategy. What happens when the Pentagoners say that the conditions are not right for withdrawal (when, not if)? And the Media Celebs chime in -with their (on-the-take and rehearsed) experts? Also, $4 billion in infrastructure construction for American and coalition personnel in 2010 and years beyond (see #5) suggests we’re not going anywhere anytime soon. And Afghanistan will never have a strong central government.
.
I just don’t see the point to any involvement in Afghanistan (aside from attacking specific training camps or terrorists themselves, best done in-and-out-quick) if not for permanent policing outposts.

*per “on-the-take and rehearsed” experts:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/military/2009-11-17-military-mentors_N.htm

” .. at least he is the first POTUS to provide an exit strategy. ..”
Well. The worthwhile exit strategy must address attainable – and indeed quantifiable – goals, milestones, feedback and time limits to the hostilities.

Fuzzy, fungible yardsticks about achieving “stability” and (Bushite) “victory” will not do. Indeed one can propose, in the same breath, that Iraq and Afghanistan (and Pakistan) were stable before our invasion.

There were sort of exit strategies in previous war administrations. During the Vietnam era, we were told that “we shall bomb them back to stone age” – and of course once they are in the stone age they will not resist our mighty modern war machine any more. Victory!
And “there is a light at the end of the tunnel”. Yes, there was: It lit our exit from Vietnam.

[And talking about exit strategies - What was that about about gleefully inflicting gratuitous carnage on a defeated enemy at the hitherto-spared cities of Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki?]

GG brought up the inconsistency coming from the Administration and suggested (uncomplementarily) that this represents yet another attempt by Obama to be all things to all people based on their expectations.
.
I agree with the characterizartion but disagree with the value judgement he attaches.
.
His audience not only includes American Hawks and American Doves but also includes the Afhan Government and The Afghan Insurgency. Do we have any reason to doubt that the Afghan government may be afraid to hear that we’re leaving and the Taliban may be afraid to hear that we’re staying and both of them are going to adjust their strategies in ways that benefit us as a result?
.
The complaints coming from American’s might be utterly predictable but I suspect that Obama’s actually thinking about the reaction over there where it counts.

Indeed one can propose, in the same breath, that Iraq and Afghanistan (and Pakistan) were stable before our invasion.
.
I seem to remember that when we entered Afghanistan we were joining a Civil War already in progress.
When was the last time you heard the phrase “Northern Alliance”?

Liberals believe that the Governments responsiblity is to provide sustance and assistance to the citizens.
.
That’s not true at all. We think it’s government’s responsibility to balance powerful economic forces that exploit people’s desperation and comparative vulnerability.

Whoops!
.
You beat me to answering that, Dirks!
.
Well said.

The operational phrase is “in the same breath” – which is attached to JK’s “the Tals will always be a part of the picture in Afghanistan.”

Do we really expect the Shiite-Sunni strife in Iraq to end? Or the tribal alignments in Afghanistan to become a thing of the past? [How is the 'kumbaya' really working in Bosnia/Kosovo/Serbia? Or in Greece? Or in Ireland? ... ]

[It has been suggested that part of a colonial/imperial startegy in occupied "sovereign" lands is to fan/fund/maintain a certain amount on internal (political/ethnic) strife that pre-occupies and destabilizes the lands; and enables our continued plunder of resources and prosperity (in arms sales to both sides) ..]

The idea that any war can be fought on specific time lines is inherently defective.
.
What always seems to happen is that if you have well defined goals, the exit date becomes fuzzy, or, you can have fuzzy goals and a well defined exit date. I”ve never heard of any war in history ever being fought ‘on schedule’, but I suppose, it is possible. I doubt it though.
.
That’s why you have so many instances in which the agressor declares “victory” and withdraws. Israel did in in 2006, and in the Gaza war as the two latest examples of fudging goals to keep a definite* date.
.
Republicans provide the best example of the other strategy. Most of their approaches involve goals that are clear, but may or may not be attainable, hence the tendency for them to drag us into open ended conflicts – at least until someone comes along to “redefine” the goal (like changing what is meant by “victory”) and pulls us out, as we did in Vietnam.
.
I really don’t think that the corporate boardroom approach to war fighting is even reasonable, as the opposition is just begging to muck up the works.
.
The reverse can happen too, which is what I think happened with the Iraq “surge”. In that case, Maliki and others were pretty sure that the groundswell pressure inside the US was enough to change the relationship between Iraq and the US in Iraq’s favor. Most of the opposition to US occupation decided to hold fire as there was no real need to fight. Some of the surge’s success is owed to that process rather than all of the credit going to the US military alone.
.
*The actual “date” can be defined by political pressure, necessity, etc etc

On the issue of Nagasake, Hiroshima, Dresden and Tokyo, that is a clear case of a war where there was a clear cut goal (unconditional surrender) and a clear cut date (win now!).
.
I hadn’t thought about it when I finished my previous commentary, but this is a case of one war fought with clear goals and clear time line. There are some really big caveats, though:
.
The “time line” was not set until late in the war.
.
We used WMD to achieve our goal (unconditional surrender). The incendiary devices used for Dresden and Tokyo were indeed WMD. They were designed to cause firestorms in tightly packed densely populated areas. The nuclear weapons need no explanation.
.
So what we had at as the end of WWII was both a will and a way to get around the fact that the opposition will always muck up timetables.
.
Unfortunately, for the people of those cities, the solution to the problems opposition would present was to result to what is essentially “total war”.
.
To test this idea out, just try this thought experiment:
.
What would happen if we just simply nuked the opposition in Iraq and/or Afghanistan? Would that succeed in achiving clear goals on a clear timetable?
.
I think it would…

“If capturing or killing bin Laden is no longer important then why not just leave?”

“The momentum of Asia’s economic development is already generating massive pressures for the exploration and exploitation of new sources of energy and the Central Asian region and the Caspian Sea basin are known to contain reserves of natural gas and oil that dwarf those of Kuwait, the Gulf of Mexico, or the North Sea.”

- Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard, 1997

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2009/05/11/the-gas-must-flow/

“what does any of this have to do with the original Afghanistan mission? We went to kill or capture bin Laden.”

“Never before has a populist democracy attained international supremacy. But the pursuit of power is not a goal that commands popular passion, except in conditions of a sudden threat or challenge to the public’s sense of domestic well-being. The economic self-denial (that is, defense spending) and the human sacrifice (casualties, even among professional soldiers) required in the effort are uncongenial to democratic instincts. Democracy is inimical to imperial mobilization.”

- Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard, 1997

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2008/10/30/the-ones-who-attacked-us/

Which brings us back to the scene of the crime:

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2009/04/11/the-rest-is-silence/

“War”?
Our genial JK – of the USA’s “free and fair” MSM – is unaware of the possibility that the U.S. is not waging a war anywhere:

“There was not a war declaration, either in connection with Al Qaida or in Iraq. It was an authorization to use military force.” – Alberto Gonzales, U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing on Wartime Executive Power and the National Security Agency’s Surveillance Authority, February 6, 2006.

pintortwo:
.
I agree with police action as the proper mode of operations to fight terrorism, in the manner you describe. Your other point about fudging the conditions is well taken, too.
.
I agree that is Obama’s hole card as well, and it might well get used, but I’m hoping he won’t use that strategy unless it is clear things are really going south.
.
Even given the stuff I wrote above, which seems to be a pretty good description of how politics influences military activities and vice versa, I would like to see a full withdrawal from both countries with a simultaneous gearing up toward being able to defend our own territory adequately and being able to do those “in and out” raids as needed.
.
We need the power and ability to project anywhere in the world with capability to at least be able to secure a large city temporarily on short notice as well as police actions from anything between that and single operative activities*.
.
*no, I’m not talking assassinating heads of state, but taking out a terrorist or two on his home ground is ok with me.

http://www.theinternationalonline.com/articles/105-a-new-way-forward-for-afghanistan

” .. We need the power and ability to project anywhere in the world ..”

My! Behold the euphoria of the imperial Roman emperors and their citizens who revelled in it!

Does the Al-Queda need the wherewithal – unconventional power and ability – to project anywhere in the world? If not, then why not?
.
” .. taking out a terrorist or two on his home ground is ok with me. ..”
You wouldn’t quibble too much if now and then a ‘suspected terrorist’ – including one under 5 years old – is “taken out” too.
[And we are not calling that "taking out" murder or slaughter or crimes against humanity. Those tags apply only when the other guy inflicts the "taking out" on our own.]
Of course the civilized “innocent until proven guilty” or “habeas corpus” are by now just funny phrases
.. and offense (by invading and killing an innocent man in his home ) is good, internationally-acceptable defence – but only if we are the aggressor NOT the victims.

Yet even as we wreak social dislocation, terror and death on cave dwellers and their nations the world over, we give soaring speeches about universal human rights and respect for sovereignty, justice and “law and order” – and now and then we talk about our cherished judeo-christian morals and ethics.
.

Will these good times ever end?

—-coming home to roost
Orlando, FL – Police officers fired 110 times at (a suspect) …. One bullet was fired at close range. “That’s all the bullets we had, or we would have shot him more,” a sheriff said.
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-152154162.html

” .. We used WMD to achieve our goal ..”

And others can use WMD to achive their goals.
Which renders the soaring speeches of a belligernet POTUS about constraining others through non-proliferation edicts somewhat vacuous, duplicitous.

Dresden is said to have been a center for the arts – with no military installations. The bombs caused mass casualties and the targets were not purely military ones.

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB162/index.htm#_ednref10

“And others can use WMD to achive their goals.”
.
Except, if you notice, that the US has refrained from attacking nations that have the capability to do so. Some, like Al Queda, have attempted to “up the ante” supposedly acting on behalf of the Muslim world by using planes as WMD.
.
Reagan assiduously avoided any semblance of engaging an opposition strong enough to even threaten a small contingent of our military. And so has everyone else since Vietnam. So did Clinton, and Bush after him. Reagan knew the downside of the conflict between goals and timelines in prolonged military engagements.
.
The only president who took much risk was Bush I, when concerns about Iraq, with the 4th largest army in the world at the time (and a legitimate fear of WMD) was considered a threat. He set the table very carefully, and prosecuted a popular war successfully.
.
“Which renders the soaring speeches of a belligernet POTUS about constraining others through non-proliferation edicts somewhat vacuous, duplicitous.”
.
I agree, because North Korea and Iran are not going to give up their nukes. I look at Obama relatively:
.
At least, he has said that he has an exit strategy in Afghanistan. The only other POTUS in my memory that has as much of my trust as Obama is Carter or Bush I.
.
Setting aside Bush I, as his war was popular and fits my definition of a “just” war, none of the others, (except Carter, whom I respect for being the only one with enough guts to use the military in a judicious manner), had a bad habit of dragging us into wars that could potentially be open ended.

Obama might not follow through, given the history in that region. If there is historically one region likely to be a quagmire, Afghanistan is it.

“Dresden is said to have been a center for the arts – with no military installations. The bombs caused mass casualties and the targets were not purely military ones.”
.
At that point in time, the political atmosphere in our country was that “total war” was justified, and the top brass tended to look at things in terms made simpler by leaving out the humanity of the decisions they made. The Dresden and Tokyo bombing campaigns were deemed “successful” because of that evaluation, and of course, using the same equation, the Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombings were deemed a viable course of action when they weighed the cost of an invasion against it.
.
I agree with you that, truth be told, the firebombings were actually wholesale terrorism, and intended as such as the aim was to get the populace of both Germany and Japan to force their governments to sue for peace – saving us from the need for invasion.
.
Note that I had already said that the incendiary devices used in these firebombings can be classed as WMD. FYI, there were a lot of priceless paleontological treasures collected from Tendaguru, in Tanzania in the 1920s lost in the Dresden bombings, too.
.
So yeah, I recognize that Obama is a politician when it comes to wars, and he is also a centrist, as one commenter pointed out. I don’t count on Obama to go too far left on military matters.
.
My disappointment in Obama is his failure to push the public option in health care reform.

53-3, I didn’t mean to advocate perminate bases in SE Asia for the purposes of policing the region. I do feel that any specific terrorist threat can be eradicated by a quick-strike operation. I realize this may seem contradictory, so I’ll elaborate.
.
A special ops unit or two, stationed in Turkey, Pak, Agf or Iraq should (in my non-expert opinion), be adequate to attack any terrorist outpost. 400,000 US, NATO and Afghani troops and another 100,000+ contractors (mercenaries) in Afghanistan (plus our troops in Iraq), and $4 billion worth of infrastructure (and a proposed $3/4 billion embassy in Pak) is certainly overkill.
.
It is my opinion, therefore, that our involvement in Afghanistan is not in response to any direct terrorist threat nor will it benefit national security. I believe that the troops, bases, etc are being put in place so that we can “fight and decisively win multiple, simultaneous major theater wars; perform the ‘constabulary’ duties associated with shaping the security environment in critical regions” (directly from the PNAC’s “core missions” as described in Rebuilding America’s Defenses). *note it is for security in “critical regions”, not in the US; these regions are critical to oil-production. It is clear to me that this is neoconservative theory at work, ie. protect the oil status quo so that the US stays the sole superpower. It is an economic policy. Neocons in the Pentagon and media have pressured this president into furthering their agenda.

“53-3, I didn’t mean to advocate perminate bases in SE Asia for the purposes of policing the region. …It is my opinion, therefore, that our involvement in Afghanistan is not in response to any direct terrorist threat nor will it benefit national security.”
.
I agree with this, pintortwo. Afghanistan could go completely Taliban for all I care. A police action could capture Bin Laden, if we are patient enough. What is important is to to be able to respond anywhere in the world with the range of force i described. I didn’t myself mean to imply I’m in favor of maintaining ourselves on their soil.
.
“I believe that the troops, bases, etc.. …US stays the sole superpower. It is an economic policy. Neocons in the Pentagon and media have pressured this president into furthering their agenda.”
.
I think that we need extreme caution when dealing with Iran and North Korea, and should be able to protect our interests, but I don’t think we are doing enough in the direction of settling long standing conflicts, whose resolution would promote peace and security in the region without a need for us to stand by with a big club.
.
I think Obama is remiss here because he didn’t put enough pressure on Israel. I think that the entire ME strategy needs to be reevaluated from the ground up. HIs foreign policy speeches hinted at that, but when it came time to make changes and implement those things in reality, he fell short.

cfukara:
.
You’ve extrapolated my comments to imply that I believe in something I really don’t.
.
I do not believe in accepting “collateral damage” in any police action, but we do have to be able somehow to defend ourselves. And I’m not talking this point of view the way an Israeli means it. If we know something, we can act on it, if we have someone on the ground to properly evaluate any given situation, be it a platoon, or just a spotter.
.
I have been very much critical of the clinical “remote control” aspect of fighting wars as I know that remote sensing is fraught with difficulties and that hearsay from someone who may or may not have an axe to grind can be mistaken for “intelligence information”.
.
As for police actions, maybe the idea of capturing someone instead of just blowing them up is a better idea. We do do things the hard way in order to maintain due process, so your argument may be valid. It would not be impossible to do, it would just be more difficult, is all.
.
Keep in mind that if we do that, we may need to defend ourselves in the process of making the effort to capture someone like Bin Laden. I seriously doubt Bin Laden would respond to a court summons…
.
See my comments to pintortwo about how I think our military capability should be used.

This is interesting, if brief, article about the problems with trying to impose a “top-down” gov’t in a country with a strong history of local autonomy. I recommend reading it.

@ 53_3:
What is important is to to be able to respond anywhere in the world with the range of force i described.
.
.
Fine. But let’s all keep in mind (not that I think you disagree) that 9/11 was not the result of an inability to project sufficient military force. It was the failure of Homeland Security and local police to stop it. And it is up to them to protect us from future attacks.
.
Al Qaeda is a Saudi group, they (or other terrorists) don’t need Afghanistan. Atta was educated in Germany and trained in the US. The Taliban are not al Qaeda. The Taliban are unsophisticated and not interested in international politics. To think that we can (or should) build the Karzai govt up to the point where they can continue the counterinsurgency is laughable. US troops and US-built infrastructure in Afghanistan will not make Homeland Security’s job any easier.