Afghanistan

[Spexxvet]

It's all partisan politics. I'd laugh, if I weren't so disgusted

Republicans on Clinton and Kosovo

"President Clinton is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be
away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy."

-Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA)

"No goal, no objective, not until we have those things and a compelling case is made, then I say, back out of it, because innocent people are going to die for nothing. That's why I'm against it."

-Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/5/99

"American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy."

-Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)

"If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy."

-Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of presidential candidate George W. Bush

I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning...I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area."

-Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)


"You think Vietnam was bad? Vietnam is nothing next to Kosovo."

-Tony Snow, Fox News 3/24/99


"Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years"

-Joe Scarborough (R-FL)


"I'm on the Senate Intelligence Committee, so you can trust me and believe me when I say we're running out of cruise missles. I can't tell you exactly how many we have left, for security reasons, but we're almost out of cruise missles."

-Senator Inhofe (R-OK )

"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarifiedrules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our overextended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today"

-Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)

"I don't know that Milosevic will ever raise a white flag"

-Senator Don Nickles (R-OK)

"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"

-Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."

-Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)


"This is President Clinton's war, and when he falls flat on his face, that's his problem."

-Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN)

"The two powers that have ICBMs that can reach the United States are Russia and China. Here we go in. We're taking on not just Milosevic. We can't just say, 'that little guy, we can whip him.' We have these two other powers that have missiles that can reach us, and we have zero defense thanks to this president."

-Senator James Inhofe (R-OK)


"You can support the troops but not the president"

-Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)


"My job as majority leader is be supportive of our troops, try to have input as decisions are made and to look at those decisions after they're made ... not to march in lock step with everything the president decides to do."

-Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)


For us to call this a victory and to commend the President of the United States as the Commander in Chief showing great leadership in Operation Allied Force is a farce"
-Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)

Bombing a sovereign nation for ill-defined reasons with vague objectives undermines the American stature in the world. The international respect and trust for America has diminished every time we casually let the bombs fly."

-Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)


"Once the bombing commenced, I think then Milosevic unleashed his forces, and then that's when the slaughtering and the massive ethnic cleansing really started"

-Senator Don Nickles (R-OK)

"
Clinton's bombing campaign has caused all of these problems to explode"

-Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)


"America has no vital interest in whose flag flies over Kosovo's capital, and no right to attack and kill Serb soldiers fighting on their own soil to preserve the territorial integrity of their own country"

-Pat Buchanan (R)


"These international war criminals were led by Gen. Wesley Clark ...who clicked his shiny heels for the commander-in-grief, Bill Clinton."

-Michael Savage


"This has been an unmitigated disaster ... Ask the Chinese embassy. Ask all the people in Belgrade that we've killed. Ask the refugees that we've killed. Ask the people in nursing homes. Ask the people in hospitals."

-Representative Joe Scarborough (R-FL)


"It is a remarkable spectacle to see the Clinton Administration and NATO taking over from the Soviet Union the role of sponsoring "wars of national liberation."

-Representative Helen Chenoweth (R-ID)


"America has no vital interest in whose flag flies over Kosovo's capital, and no right to attack and kill Serb soldiers fighting on their own soil to preserve the territorial integrity of their own country"

-Pat Buchanan (R )


"By the order to launch air strikes against Serbia, NATO and President Clinton have entered uncharted territory in mankind's history. Not even Hitler's grab of the Sudetenland in the 1930s, which eventually led to WW II, ranks as a comparable travesty. For, there are no American interests whatsoever that the NATO bombing will
either help, or protect; only needless risks to which it exposes the American soldiers and assets, not to mention the victims on the ground in Serbia."

-Bob Djurdjevic, founder of Truth in Media

[Elspode]

It doesn't matter where the war is, what the war is about, or who is in power when it happens. The other side will do nothing but stand there and throw stones. American politics knows no other way to function. It is simply not possible for us to function any other way. Shit, at this point, if the Democrats stood up and said "You know, maybe universal health care isn't such a good idea after all", the Republicans would immediately stand up and shout how the Dems didn't care about people.

One side takes a position, the other side shoots it down. The topic is irrelevant.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Spexxvet

It's all partisan politics. I'd laugh, if I weren't so disgusted

Damm! that sounds just like the Demoncrats during Bush.

[Spexxvet]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Damm! that sounds just like the Demoncrats during Bush.

Yup.

[classicman]

Never before has a speech by President Barack Obama felt as false as his Tuesday address announcing America's new strategy for Afghanistan. It seemed like a campaign speech combined with Bush rhetoric -- and left both dreamers and realists feeling distraught.

One can hardly blame the West Point leadership. The academy commanders did their best to ensure that Commander-in-Chief Barack Obama's speech would be well-received.

Just minutes before the president took the stage inside Eisenhower Hall, the gathered cadets were asked to respond "enthusiastically" to the speech. But it didn't help: The soldiers' reception was cool.

One didn't have to be a cadet on Tuesday to feel a bit of nausea upon hearing Obama's speech. It was the least truthful address that he has ever held. He spoke of responsibility, but almost every sentence smelled of party tactics. He demanded sacrifice, but he was unable to say what it was for exactly.

An additional 30,000 US soldiers are to march into Afghanistan -- and then they will march right back out again. America is going to war -- and from there it will continue ahead to peace. It was the speech of a Nobel War Prize laureate.

Just in Time for the Campaign

For each troop movement, Obama had a number to match. US strength in Afghanistan will be tripled relative to the Bush years, a fact that is sure to impress hawks in America. But just 18 months later, just in time for Obama's re-election campaign, the horror of war is to end and the draw down will begin. The doves of peace will be let free.

The speech continued in that vein. It was as though Obama had taken one of his old campaign speeches and merged it with a text from the library of ex-President George W. Bush. Extremists kill in the name of Islam, he said, before adding that it is one of the "world's great religions." He promised that responsibility for the country's security would soon be transferred to the government of President Hamid Karzai -- a government which he said was "corrupt." The Taliban is dangerous and growing stronger. But "America will have to show our strength in the way that we end wars," he added.

It was a dizzying combination of surge and withdrawal, of marching to and fro. The fast pace was reminiscent of plays about the French revolution: Troops enter from the right to loud cannon fire and then they exit to the left. And at the end, the dead are left on stage.

Link

I found this an interesting take on the address. Not that I agree with it as I didn't get that feeling from it, but as I think more on it.... hmm.

The timeline does seem awfully convenient.

[xoxoxoBruce]

McChrystal promised if he got troops he'd achieve x goals, in y timeline.
Obama said OK, here's your troops, now do what you promised.
From that point, whether McCrystal succeeds or fails, the focus on fighting militants will change, and the plan is to make Pakistan put up or shut up.
We want Bin Lauden and his 2nd in command. We want to cripple Al-Qaeda. But I don't think the Taliban is a threat to us, except when we're fucking around on their turf. They may be a threat to Pakistan, which would make them an indirect threat to us, but that's a big leap from where they are now.

[ZenGum]

As Obama was pondering his decision, I was also trying to think what the heck to do there.

"Victory" as I see it is when all the foreign troops have gone home AND a couple of other conditions are met.

The only really important thing we want from Afghanistan is that they not allow terrorist organisations to use it as a base. It would also be good if they could cut down heroin production. As a preference, I do want that Afghan civilians have the basic set of human rights respected, but I'm not willing to bleed indefinitely to secure that. Democracy would be nice but it would take generational change and we just aren't interested in that kind of investment, and there are better things to use those resources on.

The best I could think of was to let Karzai run the show as he likes, pull out, and make sure they know we aren't returning. We should do this slowly and with notice so the Kabul government (for want of a better word) can prepare to take full responsibility. After that it is up to them.

Basically, we shout "Hey, Karzai! Catch!" and throw him the ball. I think this is the only thing that has much chance of achieving victory as I set it.

I also expect that before we even leave Karzai will be showing (more) signs of corruption, brutality, political repression etc. While I expect to dislike this, I am not willing to invade or keep occupying Afghanistan to prevent it.

...but, as Bruce points out ... right next door to Pakistan. Hmmm.

[xoxoxoBruce]

I read in the paper, theres no danger of the taliban taking control of Kabul, at the moment. I couldn't help but think, to the average Afghani, the effect would be the same, as it would to me if the Republicans took control of Seattle. Interesting, but so what.
The Central government has never ruled the country, and I doubt if they ever can... well at least not for another hundred years, and that's if they work real hard at it.

[ZenGum]

[thinking along] Which means that we can't reasonably rely on the central government to prevent terrorist organisations from basing themselves in the country. Hmmm.

[Griff]

which means a forever commitment to occasional intervention... I wonder if Pakistan's border regions are any different.

[ZenGum]

Much the same; there are places in Pakistan where the central government officially "does not guarantee your security".

I have wondered if maybe it would help to excise the tribal regions from both Afghanistan and Pakistan, thus letting the more orderly areas of those countries stabilise, and lumping all the trouble together in a new third country, Fubaristan, in which whacko extremists can do whatever they like but should be aware that western powers will bomb them if we don't like the look of what they are up to.

Dunno about that idea, though. Sounds like it could go wrong.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

I have wondered if maybe it would help to excise the tribal regions from both Afghanistan and Pakistan, thus letting the more orderly areas of those countries stabilise, and lumping all the trouble together in a new third country, Fubaristan, in which whacko extremists can do whatever they like but should be aware that western powers will bomb them if we don't like the look of what they are up to.

Dunno about that idea, though. Sounds like it could go wrong.

What could possibly go wrong??? That sounds like a great idea!

[ZenGum]

Originally Posted by classicman

What could possibly go wrong??? That sounds like a great idea!

I think that was what they said in the 1980s about using that Bin Laden guy to fight the soviets in ... where was it again?


How about Trashcanistan?

[regular.joe]

I'm thinking Asscrackistan is a better name then Fubaristan. though Asscrackistan could end up being a district inside of Fubaristan, along with Eatadikestan and Nutsackistan.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

"Ashcanistan" puns have already been made in US political cartoons. Less potent were "East Abunny" and "The Fun Republic of Chuckles." All in the same cartoon yet, something about a UN council -- might have been on civil rights.