***Rumsfield Stepping Down***

[ted]

Ted, The first I heard tha Al Qaeda was streaming in in numbers, I thought the say thing. I said, "Brilliant! Draw them all in ON SOMEONE ELSE'S SOIL, and then close the net around them."

I no longer hold that theory, however, because we did not seem at all prepared to draw the net. In fact, they have not even seemed to be able to kill the kingpins without a considerable amount of time. Iraq is, at least, keeping Al Qaeda occupied off of our soil, but so much for closing the net and killing them all. In the long run, it could be much worse for us because there are so many we can't seem to kill for whom this was their recruiting ground and training ground and is now a new place of covert operations, which it was not before.

Part of me thinks that was part of the plan, but another part of me feels that it was simply another by-product of the war- one which we were not prepared to deal with, as you say.

Had we made that an active part of the plan, we would have prepared a little better for it, I think.

Then again, who knows?

I think the plan was basically to take out Saddam, help the country install some kind of representative government, and then maintain some bases there for a while until things settled in.

I don't think they planned for such a well-planned out resistance funded and led by Iran among the Shia, though.

I also think that the plan to take Afghanistan, and then Iraq, was part of a larger plan to deal with Iran, as well. Check the map and see who we now surround by taking the two countries.

I think the plan was to eventually hit Iran from all sides with the help of the entire UN, Nato, and the EU. Things started to fall apart when most of those organizations punked out. lol

They didn't hold up their end of the deal.

But of course now, we have thousands more terrorists than we did before. Yes, it is a direct result of the war on terror, and was probably planned for. We knew we couldn't stir up the nest without the bees coming out. I just think that there are more bees than what we first thought. But, one reason we are having so much trouble with their numbers is because we thought that many other nations would be helping, too. I'm sure Bush got promises from many before he went in, but then they buckled, leaving us to hold the bag. If I didn't know any better, I'd say that we were set up and that them punking out was all part of a plan to make us humbled.....

Bush's vision of freedom didn't quite sell to people's who have been wiping each other out for thousands of years, either. I don't think we looked hard enough at the "Macho" factor of middle-eatern manliness.

People talk about losing momentum in this war, and I think it's true. Because we were left to do everything (with the help of a dear few), we are now overwhelmed- not because we lost credibility among the nations of the world. I think we have been a target for many years now, and it's natural that the world would want to take us out. It's the nature of the beast (not in any Biblical meaning of the Beast...).

But, what to do now? Simply pack up and go home? Run to Okinawa like Murtha wants to do?

No, I think we have to finish the job before we leave. If that means one final push with triple the numbers, then so be it. It's time to get it done and come home.

We still have Iran and North Korea to deal with, anyway. Plus, that little boy in Venezuela needs a spanking, too.

It's going to be an interesting next two years.....

t.

[ted]

I thought you would be interested in this David. Here's more proof that AlQaeda has been in Iraq

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,228636,00.html

Al Qaeda Claims to Have 12,000 Fighters in Iraq

Friday, November 10, 2006

Abu Hamza al-Muhajir, also known as Abu Ayyub al-Masri.

CAIRO, Egypt

[David H.]

I also think that the plan to take Afghanistan, and then Iraq, was part of a larger plan to deal with Iran, as well. Check the map and see who we now surround by taking the two countries.

Could be. I've wondered the same. It's a good overall strategy as strategies go, but these guys are convincing me less and less that they have any smarts in the strategy department. They appear to all the world to be operating without an effective game plan and with a lot of false assumptions from the get-go. The only thing that keeps me wondering if they had such a strategy is that it's the only thing I can think of that would explain why they tried to justify a war they clearly wanted to have.

I just think that there are more bees than what we first thought.

I think we're breeding bees by building hives.

But, one reason we are having so much trouble with their numbers is because we thought that many other nations would be helping, too.

If that's what Bush thought, it was certainly naive. You can't go ignoring what other nations are clearly telling you, wacking them over the head as "Old France" then expect they're going to line up behind you. Sovereign nations don't take that kinda elephant pucky. You have to work WITH them, allowing them the time and trouble with Saddam they need to come around. Bush gave some time, but it was clear his agenda was already in full swing, even as he claimed to be waiting. I think most of the nations in the U.N. felt Bush was only giving other nations time because it served his own interest to ready his forces anyway. I don't think they took his bullheaded diplomacy seriously

I'm sure Bush got promises from many before he went in, but then they buckled.

Buckled? Or got publicly bushwacked and said, "Fight it on your own, Pal."

I'd say that we were set up and that them punking out was all part of a plan to make us humbled.

Well, there is no doubt that Bush's cowboy diplomacy needed a little humbling. So, I'm sure that was a part of it. But that's what I'm saying. If you're going to ride herd on the rest of the nations, then you have to expect that people of very high power are not going to take your pushing and cajoling. I think Bush made the United States look like everything the EU feared it was. Bush gave anti-Americanism a real big target.

Bush's vision of freedom didn't quite sell to people's who have been wiping each other out for thousands of years, either. I don't think we looked hard enough at the "Macho" factor.

I certainly agree. I think Bush naively thought that people crave democracy. Remember how Israel craved a king when it had judges, which were much closer to being a democracy. Countries in the Middle East crave strong-man leadership. I also think it is a foolish notion to think democracy will make things any better over there. Alexander de Toqueville said, after he visited and analyzed our democracy for France, "America is good because it's people are good. When America's people cease to be good, America will cease to be good." In saying that, he recognized the true goodness in America at that time came from its people and was not guaranteed by its form of government. He recognized an undeniable truth that a "government by the people" cannot be any better than the people. So, in the Middle East, how is a government by people who hate us going to be good for us?

But, what to do now? Simply pack up and go home?

I agree again. We're stuck now, and we have to fight it out to the best possible outcome. But I don't think you're going to see the Democrats cut and run. They're sick of that reputation. Instead, you'll see them make better diplomatic efforts than our chief diplomat and try to recover some world support so other troops can slowly replace ours ... so this is not seen as an American occupation. Whether they can build any bridges so quickly after Bush lit so many on fires, I don't know; but it may be that some nations will now step in just to boost the present change in our government. Maybe.

I won't hold my breath.

It's going to be an interesting next two years.....

It surely is. That's why I'm so happy about the change. It is, at least, change, which is going to force accountability into the Bush Administration for its many oversights and gross failures (like Tora Bora).

--David

Edited November 11, 2006 by David Haggith

[ted]

Apparently, not much. Before we went into Iraq, the Democrats strongly warned that this would be another "quagmire" like Vietnam. Bush, like Kennedy, thought it would be a cakewalk because the people of the country would be so happy to be occupied by their saviors. Hardly. It is now becoming the quagmire that it was predicted to become based on our experience as an occupying force in Vietnam.

In that sense, you are correct.

I was more talking in terms of the increase in Special Warfare Operations, training, and doctrine since then. We learned that we have to make friends out of whichever locals will have us, train them to do their own fighting, and to increase our own Special Operations folks.

In that regard, we learned well.

Kennedy's mistake was to not deal with the influence of China and Russia and what it meant to North Vietnam.

Bush's was to not deal with the influence that Iran has on the Shiite followers in Iraq. In retrospect, we really should have increased our numbers to about 4 million and taken both countries at once.

It's not a now-what. It was an INCREDIBLY stupid mistake! I mean, if I started howling the second I heard that's what we were doing and start ranting that we'll lose him for sure, then it had to be pretty stupid for me to realize it so quickly, right?

(I'm givin' ya a wide-open shot here.)

And because it was SOOO stupid, we need the Donkeys to kick some Elephant posterior. (Gee, who'da thunk that multi-millionaire bin Laden would be able to pay off the greedy warlord that apprehended him on the way outa town??? Who coulda guessed that call?)

lol!

Again, it was a mistake. Bin Laden was cornered and had nowhere (so we thought) to go. We thought we had him pinned. So, the decision was made to hold up for a minute, let the Afghans go up front. and take him out.

Oh what grand news it would have made later on in the papers! "Afghan fighters capture Bin Laden!"

Trouble is, we forgot to check and see if the back door was locked......

Hey, we do it with the French all the time in Afghanistan. When I was there, we would set up simple little missions for them to complete so we could hail the cooperation of the French!

Still going on today, I might add.

Gotta love our allies and their resolve to help us!

It was a simple mistake, one that we have to deal with. It was all but done in Tora Bora.

So close.......

With a new administration that doesn't make such blatantly stupid errors. For the price we pay, we have every right to expect the very highest quality leadership. So dumb mistakes at that level cannot be tolerated. Regular mistakes, yes. Dumb mistakes, no. There has to be accountability, and that's what this election was all about. We're gonna hold some feet to the fire.

Somehow, I just don't see it happening with a Democratic Congress or President. I thought a shake-up was needed, but even I wouldn't have let it get this far...Speaker of the House Pelosi??

Who know's, though. Stranger things have happened.

t.

[David H.]

we really should have increased our numbers to about 4 million and taken both countries at once.

Probably. But, in that case, we should have stated our true reasons for going to war in Iraq: "We're doing this so we can gang up on Iran from all sides."

Now, that would have made Iran sweat.

Just kidding. I know it's probably not practical because it may have made Iran and Iraq strange-bedfellow friends -- drive our enemies to seek each other's protection.

A better plan, I think, would have been to pour all these resources into Afghanistan and transform it into the gem of Middle East, while we carried out real diplomacy with other nations over Iraq, giving Saddam more time and more ways to flaunt his arrogance. That would have given other nations more time and more reasons to despise him while buying us all the time we needed to make Afghanistan a huge success in every way. (To stay with the cowboy motif, we should have cut him enough rope to hang himself.) Then, Saddam's Suny followers, seeing that the U.S. actually did transform Afghanistan AND LEAVE, would be a lot more willing to say, "Hmm, maybe they're not just the aggressive oil occupiers that we thought they were." Instead, Bush seemed intent upon proving the world's fears right.

That strategy would have taken more than one administration to play out, but Bush said he was a patient man; so, I think it's the strategy that would have kept from turning the Middle East into the greater hot bed that it is today. It would have proven, prior to any conflict in Iraq, that we are not there to occupy and that this kind of change is good. We'd have a LOT more grass-roots support in those countries. And we'd have a lot more support from the rest of the world after scoring a MAJOR success. We also would have learned a lot in Afghanistan about fighting in that area and would have built a lot more local contacts first.

But the arrogant overreach and try to do too much at once, thinking they're too big and too smart to fail.

Edited November 11, 2006 by David Haggith

[ted]

All of this is going so fast!

It's hard keeping up with your posts, but interesting none the less.

Thanks again to you, and tmrfiles and Hypatia, as well. Civil discussion about such matters certainly is more enjoyable than "You're stupid, just shut up!" lol

Onward.....

Well, there is no doubt that Bush's cowboy diplomacy needed a little humbling. So, I'm sure that was a part of it. But that's what I'm saying. If you're going to ride herd on the rest of the nations, then you have to expect that people of very high power are not going to take your pushing and cajoling. I think Bush made the United States look like everything the EU feared it was. Bush gave anti-Americanism a real big target.

I see Bush's plan for the war on terror a litle differently than "Cowboy Diplomacy". It's a catchy little phrase- good for the papers- but I don't think it describes his policy correctly. I think it's more like he knew to hurry up with such things, rather than to use the worn out old waiting game.

Considering Iraq only now, how long did we put up with him sticking thorns in the world's eyes before we did anything about it? For over ten years, they guy had been jabbing at us in flagrant disregard to the surrender agreements which he, in fact, signed.

We had, in effect, already waited and used diplomacy with him for some eleven years already. What good did it do? We went throught the UN throughout this entire period, and had little to show for it except a few blown up milk and asprin factories and radar sites.

In the mean time, he was rebuilding his military, seeking out better WMD's and rallying support against us and the UN throughout the middle east.

How much longer should we have waited?

He never stopped his antagonizing ways against the resolutions against his country. He did, rather, build sympathy to his causes.

People always forget that little part: The waiting and diplomacy game had been going on for 12 years. He had chance after chance to stop, but only grew worse as time went on.

Bush, in what little wisdom he actually has, knew that the time was now. Waiting much longer would only serve to help Saddam. He was already getting help through kick-backs in an illegal UN scam and able to work his way around the rules placed on him. For 12 years, he harrassed UN inspectors and led them on wild goose chases into the desert. He held them up, moved stuff around, and only let them in when Clinton got "angry" enough to ask the UN to follow through with their own resolutions.

Anyone, even Bush, could tell that the situation with Saddam would only get worse.

Bravo to him for not waiting any longer!

Of course, by not playing the game, he gave almost everyone else in the world the ammo they needed to make us look stupid.

I really don't blame him for "going it alone" (actually, a massive misnomer). I just wished he would have waited until we had a better hold on Afghanistan and gave us a chance to rest first.

War is tiring.

t.

[David H.]

All of this is going so fast!

I gotta pull in the reins, myself. It's time to go out and make a livin' for the day.

End of cowboy talk.

--David

[ted]

Probably. But, in that case, we should have stated our true reasons for going to war in Iraq: "We're doing this so we can gang up on Iran from all sides."

Well, I'm not sure if I would have given Iran the courtesy of such early warning.

Besides, I think was part of a bigger plan, but not the true reason (as in only reason) for going into Iraq. I think that it's more like the final chapter in the Middle-East portion of the war on terror. Once you take out Iraq and Iran, there's not much else to do besides sweep little Syria out the door.

After that, all you have left is little pockets left. But, oh how those pockets can sneak up on you when you're not paying attention....

A better plan, I think, would have been to pour all these resources into Afghanistan and transform it into the gem of Middle East, while we carried out real diplomacy with other nations over Iraq, giving Saddam more time and more ways to flaunt his arrogance. That would have given other nations more time and more reasons to despise him while buying us all the time we needed to make Afghanistan a huge success in every way. (To stay with the cowboy motif, we should have cut him enough rope to hang himself.) Then, Saddam's Suny followers, seeing that the U.S. actually did transform Afghanistan AND LEAVE, would be a lot more willing to say, "Hmm, maybe they're not just the aggressive oil occupiers that we thought they were." Instead, Bush seemed intent upon proving the world's fears right.

Sounds reasonable, but for two important things:

1. Afghanistan will never again become a "jewel" in the area because they have ceased to be important in world affairs ever since the airplane was invented. The one thing they had going for them was their geographical position. It was the crossroad between east and west.

Now, we can simply fly over it and the world has left it in their dust. They have no natural resources other than poppies to make opium with.

In fact, we offered to help them out of the 17th century after we invaded, but they can't come together on the project, which brings me to reason number two...

2. Afghanistan never have been, and never will be united under an outside influence. Yes, they have been invaded countless other times, but it never lasts for long. Bush addressed this with them, and told them that we would not be there forever, much to his credit.

One reason that explains why they will never come together under a united flag is that there are simply way too many seperate groups in the country. If I remember correctly, there are some 50+ totally seperate tribes and peoples in the country, all of them looking out for "number 1".

Some tribes date back to Alexander the Great- with blonde hair and blues eyes to boot, and others are as arab as they get. Some are Asian, and some are more European. It's a huge mix of people.

Some are friendly, and some have been warring for centuries. Some trade with each other, and others continue in raids which have their roots thousands of years ago.

Some like the idea of modernization, and others are content to live as the Taliban did. Some are beduins who roam the range, and others have had control of the same villiage for generations

It's a strange hodge-podge of peoples which only historically unite for one reason only- to drive out foreign invaders. Other than that, there is little hope for a united, representative government to last very long. Think of the American Militia groups on steroids.

That's what there is over there.

Offering most of these groups money is like offering you and I a Barbie Make-up set complete with glitter lipstick. They simply do not have the same value of money that most of the world does. It means nothing to them. It does nothing for their villiage, so it means nothing to them.

That's one of the biggest reasons why rewards mean nothing to those who live in the western mountains of Pakistan, as well. The notion of giving money to them for handing Osama over is laughable to them.

So, we have to think of something else.

For those reasons, it's going to be hard to hold Afghanistan together under an elected representative government, and thus, hard to make anything out of them, not to mention some kind of "jewel". I mean, who do we pick to lead it in the first place? If it's not someone from "their" villiage, you can expect little help from "them" (individual villiages, that is).

In fact, it's not even technically part of the "middle-east". They don't think so, anyway. Some in the Kandahar region think they are part of the middle east, but those from the north don't seem to think so. Heck, many of them aren't eve arab, and could care less about the arab's plight.

They do, however, have a common bond through various sects of islam. That, of course, is not very encouraging......

In Iraq, in contrast, you have basically three groups- neither of whom care about us much. The Sunnis and the Shiites are two distinct tribes of islamists. The Kurds in the North only care about breaking away and moving on. If we can help them with that, then they are for us. If not, they'll dismiss us soon enough and carry on. If we do help them in this, then we make Turkey mad, because the Kurds take up much of the south-eastern portion of Turkey.

Making Turkey mad doesn't make much sense to us because they are one of the few muslim nations to actually like us any more.

Iran pulls the strings for the Shiites, and the Sunniis are mad at us for taking out Saddam. Once we took him out, the Sunnis were left exposed to the revenge of the Shiites for years of torment by the hand of Saddam.

The more I write, the more it sounds like something out of The Lord of the Rings......

Anyway, having much influenc in Afghanistan is next to impossible. They won't remain united long enough without us having to stroke every little tribe. Some, of course, ahve more influence than others, and as long as we control the major cities, we should be ok.

Whew....gotta break for a while.

Thanks,

t.

[JustinM]

I just hate how the rest of the world gets a free pass for their corrupt and unethical behavior, while the President of the US shoulders all the blame.

What kind've lesson did America need to learn? We've helped and freed millions upon millions of people. We've set up trade policies that have made so many countries wealthy beyond comprehension. How has America used its military to bully Europe or the rest of the world? Last I checked bullies intentions aren't very noble. They push people around for personal gain and only their personal gain, whether it be fluffing up their egos or increasing their wealth.

At least we stand up for the weak, while we aren't saints, we do a lot of good. So, could someone please tell me why America needs to be humbled and by Europe of all places, the very people that were undermining us (their allies) and receiving bribes from Saddam Hussein and by creating the most corrupt organization the world has ever seen (UN).

If anyone needs to be humbled, it's our so-called friends that knifed us in the back.

[David H.]

So, could someone please tell me why America needs to be humbled and by Europe of all places, the very people that were undermining us (their allies) and receiving bribes from Saddam Hussein and by creating the most corrupt organization the world has ever seen (UN).

If anyone needs to be humbled, it's our so-called friends that knifed us in the back.

Because George Bush is arrogant. He thumbed his nose at Europe when the U.N. voted his war down and started the war he always intended to start anyway. He did it on false pretenses that even he does not make any more effort to defend. No one invited us to be the great helpers you say we are to the Iraqi people. We invited outselves where WE WERE NOT WANTED. Aside from our false pretenses, we also said it was because Saddam was defying U.N. resolutions. He certainly was BUT it is up the U.N. to decide how it wants to enforce U.N. resolutions. The resolutions were not created just for our use. Once we put the terms of surrender from the first Gulf war to be negotiated in the U.N., then we put enforcement of those terms under U.N. authority and supervision.

We need to be humbled because we presume we can decide for ourselves how U.N. mandates will be enforced and because we start wars by giving untrue reasons or hugely exagerating the significance of any facts.

Afghanistan, on the other hand, was not a war fought over U.N. sanctions or based on false pretenses or on behalf of the U.N. It is a war fought solely on behalf of the U.S. for its own legitimate reasons with the help of those allies who were willing to join us.

--David

Edited November 13, 2006 by David Haggith