Posted on 03/23/2011 8:39:35 PM PDT by kristinn
In the last few days, Obama administration officials have frequently faced the question: Is the fighting in Libya a war? From military officers to White House spokesmen up to the president himself, the answer is no. But that leaves the question: What is it?
In a briefing on board Air Force One Wednesday, deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes took a crack at an answer. "I think what we are doing is enforcing a resolution that has a very clear set of goals, which is protecting the Libyan people, averting a humanitarian crisis, and setting up a no-fly zone," Rhodes said. "Obviously that involves kinetic military action, particularly on the front end."
Rhodes' words echoed a description by national security adviser Tom Donilon in a briefing with reporters two weeks ago as the administration contemplated action in Libya. "Military steps -- and they can be kinetic and non-kinetic, obviously the full range -- are not the only method by which we and the international community are pressuring Gadhafi," Donilon said.
Rhodes and Donilon are by no means alone. "Kinetic" is heard in a lot of descriptions of what's going on in Libya. "As we are successful in suppressing the [Libyan] air defenses, the level of kinetic activity should decline," Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in a meeting with reporters in Moscow Tuesday. In a briefing with reporters the same day from on board the USS Mount Whitney, Admiral Samuel Locklear, commander of Joint Task Force Odyssey Dawn, said, "The coalition brings together a wide array of capabilities that allow us to minimize the collateral damage when we have to take kinetic operations." On Monday, General Carter Ham, head of U.S. Africa Command, said of the coalition forces, "We possess certainly a very significant kinetic capability." And unnamed sources use it too. "In terms of the heavy kinetic portion of this military action, the president envisions it as lasting days, not weeks," an unnamed senior official told CNN Saturday.
SNIP
So, Obama did not tell us what the goals were until the UN clarified them for him.
KMA, LOL.
LOL. I need lots of help defining kinetic military action.
I mean, aside from your brillant definition.
Similar to the choice of WTF.
Obama better be careful. The teleprompter is getting jealous.
Usurper why don’t you kinetic yourself on out of here.
In all seriousness, bullets are fired, bombs are dropped, missiles are launched and people die. Not to debate the rights or wrongs of this action but IT IS WAR!
What’s 0zero’s defintion of WTF? I know the common one.
No, it’s not war. War has an objective. This doesn’t ... or does it?
Winning The Future, of course.
Onion? WTF it’s real?
This bunch gets nuttier by the day!
Well on the ass end where this pissant spokes-hole is operating, heads are so far up intestinal tracts that there are no signs of action.
SO sayeth the Chickenhawk in Chief. And now we will have to change the VFW to the VKMA.
Like calling rape "Kinetic Penis Action." Just absurd beyond belief.
The verbiage sounds alot like McNamara.
Of course it does. Obama helps expand the future Caliphate.
That’s pathetic. I think he’s just messing with us. “I want you cabinet members to come up with something that is abbreviated SHTF next week, so I can use it at my next State of The Fantastic Union (STFU) speech.”
Now, y'all figure out what "kinetic military action" means militarily in Obama's Libyan War of Aggression. I have to go iron my hair.
Leni
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