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Pompus windbag

Ross, When would have been a good time to take Saddam down?

As for not "having a dog in the fight"... Sue, you're mistaking my belief that we shouldn't have gone in with believing that I'm not behind the guys on the ground.
Okay, My bad. Bad weasel and no biscuits for me. I do know that you are very supportive of the guys on the ground. For which alot of us are very grateful and appreciative.
As far as invading other countries not right now unless there is a damn good reason like it was for us to go into Iraq.
Glad you heard from your guy in Afghanistan.
 
MrsWildweasel said:
Ross, When would have been a good time to take Saddam down?
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When he posed a direct threat to US interests. If he had had a hand in 9/11, or the Cole, sure. If he pulled something like the Tehran Marine Barracks crap, go for it.

If your criteria is that he was committing genocide on his own people, again I have to ask why didn't we go into Rwanda? (just as an example) I'm looking for the criteria that lets us go after one dictator and not another. There has to be a difference there somewhere, right?
 
dwarven1 said:
When he posed a direct threat to US interests. If he had had a hand in 9/11, or the Cole, sure.
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They were reportedly indirectly involved in the 9/11 attacks, I thought that was common knowledge.

Here's an interesting piece of info, from what can clearly be said is NOT a Pro-Conservative source, PBS:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/gunning/interviews/khodada.html

I don't necessarily know what kind of training they do, but they were trained exactly at the same locations, and they were trained by the same teachers who were training ... [the fighters for] Saddam. Training includes hijacking and kidnapping of airplanes, trains, public buses, and planting explosives in cities, sabotaging villages, sabotaging houses, assassinations.

And the training also included how to prepare for suicidal operations. For example, they will train them how to belt themselves around with explosives, and jump in a place and explode themselves out as part of the suicidal training. I think the trainings of the Arabs was much harsher, and much stricter, than the training of the Iraqis.

Why?

Because we know that Arabs, non-Iraqis who come to train in these kind of camps, are going to be sent to very dangerous and important operations outside Iraq; not inside Iraq. And they will be conducting very specific operations and dangerous operations in their own cities, or in their own countries, or other countries all over the world. Those Arabs are real volunteers. They come in small numbers, and they come with the intention to do some real suicidal operations. ...
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dwarven1 said:
If your criteria is that he was committing genocide on his own people, again I have to ask why didn't we go into Rwanda? (just as an example) I'm looking for the criteria that lets us go after one dictator and not another. There has to be a difference there somewhere, right?
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The difference is Rwanda is a shit hole in the desert with no bearing on our National Security.
 
Geography lesson

"The difference is Rwanda is a shit hole in the desert with no bearing on our National Security."

Anyone familiar with Rwanda - or who looked at a map - knows that Rwanda is lush jungle and farmland with rivers; hardly a "shit hole in the desert."

And if we'd eliminated Saddam the FIRST time, he would not have been a "National Security" issue.
 
"Eliminating Hussein the first time" was not an option. Unless, of course, you wouldn't have minded starting WW III against all Arab nations and their sympathizers (some with nukes).

A mission objective was stated in the beginning and was the basis for the coalition which, for the first time in history, had Arabs sided with us against other Arabs.

As for now, our presence in Iraq is a necessary evil, if you will. Iraq created enough 'reasons' to justify our actions. As Mark mentioned there is a difference between tactics and strategy. I, too, have spoke with many guys involved in this operation from LtCol. to L/Cpl and from SF units to intel weenies to the grunt. I've met no one who believes we are doing the wrong thing or that we are losing in any facet.

Some here, and others places, have stated the obvious fact that other Countries in the region pose a greater threat. This is true and this is where that pesky little creature called "strategy" comes into play. As much as Mark is apparently 'in the loop' I'd have thought he would realize the bigger picture for being there.
 
TonyD said:
Some here, and others places, have stated the obvious fact that other Countries in the region pose a greater threat. This is true and this is where that pesky little creature called "strategy" comes into play.
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And a clue:

Going after Iraq was easier to do, and easier to justify than going after Iran or Syria. Saddam didn't have many friends in the region.

Lybia? Not much of a threat anymore, harder to justify than the rest.
 
Nickle said:
[quote="TonyDSome here, and others places, have stated the obvious fact that other Countries in the region pose a greater threat. This is true and this is where that pesky little creature called "strategy" comes into play.
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And a clue:

Going after Iraq was easier to do, and easier to justify than going after Iran or Syria. Saddam didn't have many friends in the region.

Lybia? Not much of a threat anymore, harder to justify than the rest.[/quote]

Bingo.
 
"Going after Iraq was easier to do, and easier to justify than going after Iran or Syria."

Why is easier the second time than the first - when we had a COALITION and the smoke was still rising/oil still gushing from the ruined wells and tank farms?

"Saddam didn't have many friends in the region."

Yet another reason for removing him the first time.

"Lybia? [sic] Not much of a threat anymore, harder to justify than the rest"

And taking Saddam down would have likely brought Khaddafi to heel that much sooner.
 
Scrivener said:
"Going after Iraq was easier to do, and easier to justify than going after Iran or Syria."

Why is easier the second time than the first - when we had a COALITION and the smoke was still rising/oil still gushing from the ruined wells and tank farms?

"Saddam didn't have many friends in the region."

Yet another reason for removing him the first time.

"Lybia? [sic] Not much of a threat anymore, harder to justify than the rest"

And taking Saddam down would have likely brought Khaddafi to heel that much sooner.
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This really isn't very difficult to understand. Read my first post and ask yourself if you really think the coalition Countries gave us carte blanc over their troops to do as we pleased.

Again, the coalition was formed on the specific mission objective. It was contingent on many factors including, but not limited to, NOT invading Iraq. There would have been a little hipocrisy there don't you think? Go to war because one Country invaded another and then perpetrate the same action?
 
Scrivener said:
"Going after Iraq was easier to do, and easier to justify than going after Iran or Syria."

Why is easier the second time than the first - when we had a COALITION and the smoke was still rising/oil still gushing from the ruined wells and tank farms?
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That same "Coalition" had numerous Arabic members. They wouldn't stand for a full blown invasion of Iraq.

Scrivener said:
"Saddam didn't have many friends in the region."

Yet another reason for removing him the first time.
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He did have some friends left in 1990/1991. He some made sure he had none, based on his actions post Gulf War. He did go way out of his way to PO a lot of countries in the region after the GW.

Scrivener said:
"Lybia? [sic] Not much of a threat anymore, harder to justify than the rest"

And taking Saddam down would have likely brought Khaddafi to heel that much sooner.
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Qaddafi (or any of the other spellings of it) was brought to heel by Reagan in the early to mid 1980's. The Pan Am bombing didn't help him, either. He was "to heel" before 1991, and long before 2003.
 
I really want to thank the folks who took the time to write some thoughtful replies to some of my posts.

First, I am not a conservative, but a moderate to liberal, I know most of you are probably more conservative than myself when it comes to issues other than gun control. So, if I sound like a liberal sometimes, well if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is probably a duck. No offense taken...because everyone has his or her own opinion and because I firmly believe that an "armed society is a polite society" we shooters are normally pretty civil people.

Now I think the best post on why we should be in Iraq, was that if we show resolve there, our potential enemies are going to respect us a lot more. That has been generally true througout our history.

There is no such thing as a "just war" in my opinion. In WWII Hitler had to be stopped and we were attacked pre-emptively by the Japanese. That doesn't mean we got results that were just or noble, it merely means that we eliminated two threats to our nation. It all depends on one's perspective, I think. If one was a kid growing up in the 50's in the US, like I was, it was a very good time, but if I was a kid growing up in Poland, East Germany, Hungary and the rest of the Warsaw Pact it wasn't. Now that is fact, not even debatable.

Now as far as being "in the loop", I don't claim to be in the loop, like I said I was a very small frog in a very big pond, and truthfully while there were indicators that Saddam was working on WMDs, wanted WMDs, there was never any 100 percent concrete proof (in the time frame I am referring to) that he had them, or very many of them. I really think it was a lot more bluff and postering than reality....but maybe they are in Syria...one thing is for sure, they are not in Iraq now.

Now there are those who see the United States as the savior of the world. I really wish that it was. But it is not. The point is that we have allowed countries and leaders far more sinister than Saddam Hussein to continue. If we were the great moral power, we would have intervened in Rwanda, or Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, or Hungary in 1956, but we didn't because as another poster pointed out it was not in our own self-interest.

Now here is the thing that bothers me about this war, folks....and that is the toll it is taking on the American military, the astounding deficit that is being generated. It is the next war and the war after next that I am concerned about. The Global War on Terrorism is going to take years to fight, and frankly if we are not careful we will run out of the resources to fight. Hindsight is 20/20...it easy to say that we should have done this or that, but let's look at a few facts:

North Korea is a nuclear power. Kim Jong Il is a whacko who has exploited his people since he has been in power and his father before that. Now back in the day, when I was a little frog in US Forces Korea, there were usually about 19 active indicators that North Korea was going to war any minute. If we had used the same criteria in evaluating the Soviets and the Group of Soviet Forces Germany, we would have preemptively struck first, and it would have been American tanks hurling eastward into the Fulda Gap. Over the years I have talked to some of our top North Korean experts, and even they are uncertain. True, the Republic of Korea Army is pretty decent (alhtough it took the US many decades to develop it into a high level of independence and combat readiness,) We still have our strategic weapons and weapons systems. But do we really want to use them ?

Now there is China. China, the oldest continuing civilization in the world. Time is on its side. Until recent times xenophobic and a land power. Now China wants to build a blue water navy, I'm told (still the optimal power projection platform even in the 21st Century). China, the economic powerhouse and on the world stage today our only potential rival. The Chinese want the same oil we do, and they are willing to pay for it.

Then there is Iran. A disappointment in many ways, because for a while it looked like things might change over there with such a young population. It doesn't seem likely now, and they do have WMDs.

Of course, there are the countless Jihadists out there that simply hate our guts. An assymetric threat. Are they going away ? I would encourage you, if you have not done so already, to read Samuel P. Hundington's Clash of Civilizations. Huntington has greater insight into the whole problem, than I could ever even attempt to have.

Let me close (if you have gotten through this tome, I applaud your patience. If you find yourself in Central Mass near Devems, PM me and I'll buy you a coffee, you deserve something...whew !!) Ask yourself this question: What condition will the US Military be in 2008 or 2010 ? Will an all volunteer, professional force have the personnel and equipment to carry out multi-theater operations against diverse threats ? That's really what it boils down to. A professional military is a finite resource and thus we must pick and choose our battles carefully, very carefully.

Regards,

Mark
 
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