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sebster wrote:

Fateweaver wrote:I've always wondered what a Democrat President would have done in response to the 9/11 attack.

I'm going to go with 'not invaded Iraq'.

We dont know that. President Clinton wanted to invade for the exact same reasons with the exact same intel in 1998. I was sitting on a grinder waiting for the order to load up and ship out for a week. The Iraqi Govt. (Saddam) backed down the same way two bit dictators always do. I would put a pay check on any president doing the exact same thing.

He also did start a war in Kosova over what national interest of the US again?

Kilkrazy wrote:

Fateweaver wrote:I just don't see Obama keeping his promise about pulling out in 18 months.

He claimed to have Gitmo shut down by the end of this year and last I heard that won't happen, his HCR Bill won't get passed before the end of the year (not that I want it to pass at all in it's current state).

He has done nothing he's promised in the time he's promised it. I have friends apparently going over there in 2011 (according to their higher ups) so unless things change it will be like Iraq in that the men and women who should be here in the states (the NG for sure) will be sent on another "peace keeping mission" and be stuck in a country that they have no place in.

I've always wondered what a Democrat President would have done in response to the 9/11 attack.

It's impossible to know, of course.

Previous Democrat presidents faced with dangerous international crises include Woodrow Wilson, F D Roosevelt, Harry S Truman, John F Kennedy and Lyndon B Johnson.


MR. Killkrazy is correct and to add onto that believe it or not if you look at history books, and gov't statistics it will show the U.S suffered more terrorist attacks both demestically and abroad under the clinton administration then we did under any other president in our history. I can give examples, but please just google as it is a lot of them.
If that creates any kind of precedent, perhaps a Democrat would have done all right.

Yeah Frazz but the Muslim world really appreciated us going into Kosovo eh?

On a serious note.. i think it was hard to call the whole Kosovo thing, i mean, many of us in the West tend to lean towards a dislike of Islam as it seems to be very misogynistic and intolerant of people from outside the faith, but at the end of the day, innocent people were being killed and i feel that we do have a responisibilty to try and stop needless suffering when we can. I know we cant heal the whole world but... well.. its the bureaucrats make the decisions..

Frazz i think you would get along with my notoriously politically incorrect father who incredulously shouted down the phone at me

"Eight crusades and now we HELP them!?!"

mattyrm wrote:Yeah Frazz but the Muslim world really appreciated us going into Kosovo eh?

On a serious note.. i think it was hard to call the whole Kosovo thing, i mean, many of us in the West tend to lean towards a dislike of Islam as it seems to be very misogynistic and intolerant of people from outside the faith, but at the end of the day, innocent people were being killed and i feel that we do have a responisibilty to try and stop needless suffering when we can. I know we cant heal the whole world but... well.. its the bureaucrats make the decisions..

Frazz i think you would get along with my notoriously politically incorrect father who incredulously shouted down the phone at me

"Eight crusades and now we HELP them!?!"

In fairness though the human rights violations that went on in Kosovo caused the UN not just the US but the UN to go in and liberate kosovo from Slobadon(or however it's spelled). Plus we actually, much like we do now, have muslim nations working with us in muslim countires.

Empchild wrote:

mattyrm wrote:Yeah Frazz but the Muslim world really appreciated us going into Kosovo eh?

On a serious note.. i think it was hard to call the whole Kosovo thing, i mean, many of us in the West tend to lean towards a dislike of Islam as it seems to be very misogynistic and intolerant of people from outside the faith, but at the end of the day, innocent people were being killed and i feel that we do have a responisibilty to try and stop needless suffering when we can. I know we cant heal the whole world but... well.. its the bureaucrats make the decisions..

Frazz i think you would get along with my notoriously politically incorrect father who incredulously shouted down the phone at me

"Eight crusades and now we HELP them!?!"

In fairness though the human rights violations that went on in Kosovo caused the UN not just the US but the UN to go in and liberate kosovo from Slobadon(or however it's spelled). Plus we actually, much like we do now, have muslim nations working with us in muslim countires.

You're right. Ever since the UN sent tank divisions to stop the slaughter in Sudan oh wait... never mind.

Frazzled wrote:

Empchild wrote:

mattyrm wrote:Yeah Frazz but the Muslim world really appreciated us going into Kosovo eh?

On a serious note.. i think it was hard to call the whole Kosovo thing, i mean, many of us in the West tend to lean towards a dislike of Islam as it seems to be very misogynistic and intolerant of people from outside the faith, but at the end of the day, innocent people were being killed and i feel that we do have a responisibilty to try and stop needless suffering when we can. I know we cant heal the whole world but... well.. its the bureaucrats make the decisions..

Frazz i think you would get along with my notoriously politically incorrect father who incredulously shouted down the phone at me

"Eight crusades and now we HELP them!?!"

In fairness though the human rights violations that went on in Kosovo caused the UN not just the US but the UN to go in and liberate kosovo from Slobadon(or however it's spelled). Plus we actually, much like we do now, have muslim nations working with us in muslim countires.

You're right. Ever since the UN sent tank divisions to stop the slaughter in Sudan oh wait... never mind.

Yup why would we save Christian lives when its Muslims killing them. It only matters in the reverse.

Hey Emp have you seen how Dog gak the Muslim soldiers are though? All these hippy types go on about the "elite" Revolutionary guard's and the "tough as nails" mujahideen.

My unit (40 commando) had charge of the AO incorporting the biggest ISAF base in Kabul, the American camp (Phoenix) and the British and Turkish camps too.

A VBIED went off outside Phonenix and my QRF hightailed it up there, we set up a cordon and asked for the other camps to send their QRFs to assist us and we got told by the Turks via the radio "We cannot fight today"

Another time a US convoy got attacked and in such cases you go into the closest ISAF base, it was the Turkish base and they made them sit outside the camp (on the MSR!) for 25 minutes while they "got ready"

Every week we had an intel meeting and every week they would say "we have nothing" there were whispers many of them were actively assisting the Taliban by "letting slip" convoy timings etc to the local nationals that worked on their camp.. i could go on and on.. but perhaps some of it would get me in bother. (although i doubt military intelligence reads dakkadakka)

They were the most unprofessional jackasses ive ever had the misfortune to work alongside. I firmly believe that they are loyal to their Religion first and their country second and somewhere at the arse end of that list the coalition.

If i had my way we would have no Muslims in the coalition simply because the danger of infiltration is there, sure they arent all bad, but plenty are! One of our TA (national guardsman) terps was caught speaking to Iranian intelligence on my tour of duty in 2006.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/nov/05/daniel-james-spy-iran


Anyway, i went off on a tangent, all im saying is, we do have them serving with us now, but i feel its a token effort to appease the locals, and their soldiers truly suck.

mattyrm wrote:Hey Emp have you seen how Dog gak the Muslim soldiers are though? All these hippy types go on about the "elite" Revolutionary guard's and the "tough as nails" mujahideen.

I had no idea that religious affiliation was directly related to soldiering ability. Ya, learn something everyday!

I have a theory about that.. they dont do much phys for one thing. And they seem to be fasting half the bloody time...

Redbeard wrote:However, I do believe that there are plenty of individuals who are suffering just as badly, if not moreso, than individuals did during the great depression.

I know people who are out of work, who have lost their home, who are in thousands of dollars of debt due to medical bills that they'll never pay, and who have lived under bridges at times because of this recession. I'm sure they'll be happy to acknowledge how much worse it was back then.

See, you can't tell someone who has lost their job, their home, and their savings that it was worse in the 30's. To the people actually impacted by current events, their situation is just as dire as a similar individual's was in the 30s. Recessions aren't just about countries and GDPs, they're about people's lives.

While I absolutely see the point about individuals who have been financially ruined and/or made homeless, I have to agree with Gorgon’s point that in discussing the severity of a national event you have to look at numbers. I can’t see us having big tent cities and bread lines again. I don’t see the rate of bank failure multiplying by 50. And as noted, we do have more social programs (like Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, etc.) to help nowadays.

The problem with this plan is we've got 18 months to create an Afghanistan that can stand on its own two feet and defend itself from absolutely zip. The central government is weak and untrusted. People show more loyalty to their local area than the nation. There is nothing to build a functioning military on top of and you've got 18 months to do it. Good luck not having everything so shot full of Taliban and Taliban sympathizers that the country doesn't completely revert to their control the moment we leave. Afghanistan is not Iraq, you're not rebuilding a country that was used to acting like a country before you go there. You're building a country out of a bunch of different factions with no real motivation to act like a country.

Mannahnin wrote:

Redbeard wrote:However, I do believe that there are plenty of individuals who are suffering just as badly, if not moreso, than individuals did during the great depression.

I know people who are out of work, who have lost their home, who are in thousands of dollars of debt due to medical bills that they'll never pay, and who have lived under bridges at times because of this recession. I'm sure they'll be happy to acknowledge how much worse it was back then.

See, you can't tell someone who has lost their job, their home, and their savings that it was worse in the 30's. To the people actually impacted by current events, their situation is just as dire as a similar individual's was in the 30s. Recessions aren't just about countries and GDPs, they're about people's lives.

While I absolutely see the point about individuals who have been financially ruined and/or made homeless, I have to agree with Gorgon’s point that in discussing the severity of a national event you have to look at numbers. I can’t see us having big tent cities and bread lines again. I don’t see the rate of bank failure multiplying by 50. And as noted, we do have more social programs (like Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, etc.) to help nowadays.

Don't use the bank one. Depending on what statistical game you want to play, we exceeded that in spades. Course you can make the same argument for what occurred during the S&Ls.

Tyyr wrote:The problem with this plan is we've got 18 months to create an Afghanistan that can stand on its own two feet and defend itself from absolutely zip. The central government is weak and untrusted. People show more loyalty to their local area than the nation. There is nothing to build a functioning military on top of and you've got 18 months to do it. Good luck not having everything so shot full of Taliban and Taliban sympathizers that the country doesn't completely revert to their control the moment we leave. Afghanistan is not Iraq, you're not rebuilding a country that was used to acting like a country before you go there. You're building a country out of a bunch of different factions with no real motivation to act like a country.

Go listen to the Press Secretary's conference. He addresses this whole thing. Obama was vague on purpose.

Mannahnin wrote:
I can’t see us having big tent cities and bread lines again.

We have big tent cities again.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-05-04-new-homeless_N.htm
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/26/us/26tents.html
http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/wayoflife/03/19/seattle.tent.city/index.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26776283/

Do a quick google search and you'll find a lot of these links. The world is a different place than it was in 1930. In 1918, a flu epidemic wiped out millions. Today, we panicked because swine flu killed 2000 people in Mexico City. In 1930, you're right, we didn't have safeguards on banks, or fallback social programs. And yet, in spite of the last eighty years of progress, our unemployment rate is very comparable to what it was in 1930 (after you account for the differences in data). Companies have shed jobs, and aren't looking to refill them. (There was an article in the WSJ about this today.)

I really don't think our economy, taken as a whole, is in better shape than in the 30s. I think that the safeguards that we have in place to prevent the worst effects have helped. But, I also think that we're in a far worse position in regard to recovery.

Consider this. In 1930, stuff went down, but fundamentally, the country was in a position that, a decade later, we were able to ramp up production to supply the needs of World War 2. Much of the underlying infrastructure was still there. Much of the skilled, and unskilled labor was there. People were unemployed, but were able to be recalled to a productive state fairly rapidly.

Today, we're a consumer society. Our jobs aren't just lost, they're outsourced to 3rd world countries that do it cheaper. Our factories are closing, if not already closed. Our future (read deficit) is already leveraged several times over. We've already got the social programs and safeguards in place, and yet in spite of this, we've still got tent cities. Our idea of helping the economy isn't to fund large-scale infrastructure programs, because our workers are no longer trained to do this work. Instead, as a consumer society, we're told that in order to help the economy, we must spend money, and are given tax rebate checks that we might do this.

In short, I think we're worse off now than we were then. Back then, all it took were a few bright people figuring that the government could create jobs for people. Today, the people who are out of work are marketing executives and retail chain managers. What sort of 'new deal' can they be offered. Social Security helped save people in 30s, today, its been mismanaged so badly that we're left trying to figure out how to save Social Security.

I agree with Red that as an American people, we are worse off, but economically, we are far better off than in the 30's.

"The reports of my demise are premature."
-The United States

Redbeard wrote:Today, the people who are out of work are marketing executives and retail chain managers. What sort of 'new deal' can they be offered.

We can send them to Afghanistan to manage/market the new government.

Kill two birds with one stone!

Frazzled wrote:He also did start a war in Kosova over what national interest of the US again?

Pushing NATO's legitimacy, and therefore expanding its influence and membership.

Also, he didn't start the war. Not unilaterally anyway. The decision to intervene in Kosovo was a collective one, made by NATO. Certainly Clinton backed that decision, but had NATO not come to a consensus its unlikely there would have been any action.

dogma wrote:

Frazzled wrote:He also did start a war in Kosova over what national interest of the US again?

Pushing NATO's legitimacy, and therefore expanding its influence and membership.

Also, he didn't start the war. Not unilaterally anyway. The decision to intervene in Kosovo was a collective one, made by NATO. Certainly Clinton backed that decision, but had NATO not come to a consensus its unlikely there would have been any action.

Yea he started it. It was in response to no action on the part of Serbia. We didn't even have the excuse that they were shooting at US aircraft, unlike Iraq which was bombed during the same period.

NATO wouldn't have done squat had we not pushed it.

Frazzled wrote:
Yea he started it. It was in response to no action on the part of Serbia. We didn't even have the excuse that they were shooting at US aircraft, unlike Iraq which was bombed during the same period.

The excuse was that NATO, of which we are a member, intervened in the conflict. We may have supported the decision to intervene, but had NATO not agreed to do so it wouldn't have happened. Not militarily, anyway.

dogma wrote:

Frazzled wrote:
Yea he started it. It was in response to no action on the part of Serbia. We didn't even have the excuse that they were shooting at US aircraft, unlike Iraq which was bombed during the same period.

The excuse was that NATO, of which we are a member, intervened in the conflict. We may have supported the decision to intervene, but had NATO not agreed to do so it wouldn't have happened. Not militarily, anyway.

You said he didn't start the war. Guess what-he did. It was completely voluntary conflict that had no ecurity interest for the US.

Outside of the UK and Italy, how many NATO planes dropped ordnance over Serbia?

Frazzled wrote:
You said he didn't start the war. Guess what-he did.

No, he didn't. NATO started the war, Clinton pushed for it in NATO, but that's not the same thing as starting a war. You could claim that NATO is an appendage of the US, but then you'd also have to claim that any threat to NATO is a threat to US security.

Frazzled wrote:
It was completely voluntary conflict that had no ecurity interest for the US.

If by security interests you're referring only to incidences of direct threat, then yeah, you're right. But no one talks about security as an isolated concept. Its a thing which has an interdependent relationship with power. Generally, the more powerful you are, the more secure you are. A stronger NATO usually means a stronger United States (though that notion has its limits, and liabilities). It isn't hard to see why this was an easy choice for the US. Minimal risk, for moderate reward is a pretty clear choice; especially given that there existed relatively broad support with the Alliance itself.

Frazzled wrote:
Outside of the UK and Italy, how many NATO planes dropped ordnance over Serbia?

Germany, France, Canada, Spain, Denmark, Turkey, the Netherlands, and Belgium. So, a lot of others.

mstersmith wrote:Being in the military and having fought in Iraq twice I know for a fact the 30k troop numbers is an outright lie. When talking about troop numbers and strength they only include the infantry based units. This makes it more palatable to the people. They conviently forget the cooks, bakers and candle stick makers because for every one infantrymen it takes roughly (service dependant) 5 support personnel to make him combat effective. These support personnel range from aircraft mechanics, truck drivers, APC crews ect ect. These personnel will fill combat roles. Some of the trainers they speak of come from support units (in the Marines any ways) because they have the personal to give up without taking away from their combat effectiveness. It will not be 30k it will be more alone the lines of 150k and no one will notice until we are kicking the crap out of anything dumb enough to shoot at us. Same thing happened in Iraq and all the commentators scratched their heads trying to figure out have an additional 100k troops were sent over. Congress didn’t even figure it out until late 2006 in Iraq. It is a bait and switch that has worked for the past 8 years and will continue.

......No.

You've got it backwards.

Here's a good 2007 CBO publication on Iraq force increases. Pg. 7 indicates that the US military struggles to keep more than 15 combat brigades deployed for long periods.

15 brigades x ~4,000 personnel each =~60,000 troops, which hovers around 1/3 of the 150,000-180,000 total end strength that has been consistently reported for Iraq, the other 100,00 being the support folks that you are claiming never get mentioned or realized in anyone's calculations.

Pgs.9-10 go on to explicitly state:

U.S. forces in the Iraq theater of operation include personnel deployed to both Iraq proper and to neighboring countries (particularly Kuwait). Prior to the announcement of the increase in forces in Iraq, those forces included about 20,000 Air Force personnel, 25,000 Marine Corps personnel (with two regiments deployed), and 120,000 Army personnel (with 13 to 14 brigades deployed).

Not all of those personnel are in ground combat units. An Army combat brigade, depending on its type, will have between 3,400 and 3,800 personnel normally assigned to it (although it is common practice for the Army to assign more personnel to a unit deploying to a combat zone—in that case, personnel fill rates of 105 to 110 percent are normal). The remaining military personnel in-theater are associated with various units that command or support the combat brigades (for example, the corps headquarters, logistics commands, medical evacuation units, engineers, and so forth) The majority of those personnel perform functions that directly support combat brigades, and their number varies in proportion to the number of combat brigades in-theater. Marine Corps regiments are similar in that respect.

Here's a recent article on the upcoming deployment of Marines to Afghanistan. It points out that 2nd MEB's strength is ~10,000, 3,000 of which are in the infantry battalions. There are 9,000 Marines deploying so obviously the support folks are again accounted for.

Long story short, "30,000 troops" does NOT mean 30,000 11B's/0311's, with a "hidden" requirement/deployment for an additional 100,000 pogues and fobbits.

I would use more .gov/.mil publications to prove my point but I no longer have access to AKO, and have yet to get a login for whatever the Marine equivalent is.

JEB_Stuart wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:So he's seen a good idea which worked and now he's copying it.

I assume WGs mockery is directed at the president's own hypocrisy. He bashes a strategy of GWB, but when he gets into office, "Hmm, it wasn't so bad." I approve of his using common sense on this issue, I can understand the frustration with a double standard.

I'm not sure its hypocrisy to be opposed to an idea, see that it works and then start supporting that idea.

"When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"


Automatically Appended Next Post:

mstersmith wrote:We dont know that. President Clinton wanted to invade for the exact same reasons with the exact same intel in 1998. I was sitting on a grinder waiting for the order to load up and ship out for a week. The Iraqi Govt. (Saddam) backed down the same way two bit dictators always do. I would put a pay check on any president doing the exact same thing.

Clinton and his senior advisors talked strong on Iraq and often included phrases about possibly having to invade, but it was always in the context of maintaining sanctions and considering air strikes. There was never any intent to mount a ground war - look at the months of speaches and military preparation that occurred in the build up to Iraq to make invasion politically and militarily viable - Clinton never took the first step along tht path.

He certainly never wanted to invade, I suspect you've falled for a rather disingenuous email that's been floated around that took a number of statements out of context.

There certainly were people arguing for regime change, but this came from people like Trent Lott and Richard Armitage, the hardline of the Republican party, and was never entertained by Clinton's administration or by the Democrats as a whole. When those people came to power, they then set about the invasion. It's not sensible to say a similar policy would have occurred under a Democratic administration.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

mstersmith wrote:Yup why would we save Christian lives when its Muslims killing them. It only matters in the reverse.

Or possibly the political situation is vastly different, with the Balkans and surrounding nations having been open to intervention, while in Africa there is considerable hesitation to have military forces deployed from the former colonial powers (somewhat understandably, and somewhat infuriatingly completely inexplicable). This led a peacekeeping operation from African forces, which was both undermanned and underequipped, and predictably ineffective. There have been efforts since to form a peacekeeping operation since then, but it's a complex political environment.

Or maybe its just about how it totally isn't fair and everyone's picking on the Christians.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

mattyrm wrote:(although i doubt military intelligence reads dakkadakka)

No, but I'm beginning to suspect dogma is actually skynet, so you'd best be careful.

Anyhow, that was an interesting post, thanks for that. I'm not sure I'd be so quick to declare it a result of being Muslim, as much as being from a developing nation and not a first world military. There are lots of developing Christian nations out there with pretty gakky armies as well.

I'm not sure I'd be so quick to declare it a result of being Muslim, as much as being from a developing nation and not a first world military. There are lots of developing Christian nations out there with pretty gakky armies as well.

Fair enough, but he was talking about Turkey - I wouldn't call them a 'developing' nation. They have kebabs, a sure sign of civilisation.

Albatross wrote:

I'm not sure I'd be so quick to declare it a result of being Muslim, as much as being from a developing nation and not a first world military. There are lots of developing Christian nations out there with pretty gakky armies as well.

Fair enough, but he was talking about Turkey - I wouldn't call them a 'developing' nation. They have kebabs, a sure sign of civilisation.

In fact its a sign of High Culture and Sophtistication. Viva la Kabob!

Albatross wrote:

I'm not sure I'd be so quick to declare it a result of being Muslim, as much as being from a developing nation and not a first world military. There are lots of developing Christian nations out there with pretty gakky armies as well.

Fair enough, but he was talking about Turkey - I wouldn't call them a 'developing' nation. They have kebabs, a sure sign of civilisation.

True, true. When we form the Federation, we won't be looking for the development of ftl interstellar travel before we make contact, we'll be finding out if they've progressed enough to have kebabs.

Thing is, being muslim they can't drink alcohol - when the feth do they eat Kebabs? I can't eat one unless I'm absolutely steam-rollered.

Seb excuse that wee bit of nationalism.. i am of course well aware that a Christian and a Muslim are essentially physically identical, but for some reason those chickenshit Turks just dont cut it. I mean, im going to be a bit bias for our guys, but I was talking about this with some mates of mine and we couldnt think of a logical reason they would behave that way other than their culture or Religion.

To be fair, it might be more the culture thing, i used to train with the American guys who were attached to us, and the Canadians and Europeans/commonwealth guys always seemed to be a happy with mainting their skills.

But the Turks? They never ever seemed to exercise, i never once saw any training or running or shooting on the range or stripping and cleaning weapons or anything, all they used to do was pray, drink tea that smelt funny, pray, watch TV and pray.

One of them once wandered into the gym on camp for a look around, and i think he picked up a medicine ball for a few seconds, but he just kinda... sniffed it?

Aye their a funny bunch.