Posted on 09/28/2024 5:45:15 AM PDT by MtnClimber
Yamamoto, Ribaul. Squadron of P-38’s. We used to know how to fight a war.
Does the US really want to ‘win’ a war? Or do they want to eternally support the US arms industry instead?
Words are cheap - watch actions and choices - - there you’ll find the truth.
America (the people who rule it) don’t want to WIN wars.
They just want them to last forever. Not much profit in winning; The real money is in fighting them constantly.
The history of terrorist organizations shows it ain’t that simple. It’s never been done in the Mid East. Best case scenario you kick them out of one small area for a few year. But in the process of doing that you make a whole bunch of people angry and spawn the next wave of terrorist. The nature of terrorists makes them harder to wipe out than cockroaches, the process of getting rid of them makes more. Someway somehow you’ve got to stop making the source angry. That’s how England finally ended “the troubles”. But how? That’s the hard the question.
Chicago
Narrallah? Legitimate?
Hezbollah has the blood of Americans on its hands. Therefore the proper US response would be to celebrate Israel’s recent successes.
That is a legend which does not bear up under examination.
It is mostly a rationalization for "negotiating" with terrorists and making various concessions to them. That can work if the terrorists have limited goals which do not include extermination of their opponents.
See the story of the Tamil Tigers for a worked example of how terrorist warfare is actually defeated. It has been done many times in many places. Not good stories if you are squeamish.
As for the Irish Troubles - the IRA was not actually trying to exterminate the British in England. An "ending" was possible without extermination of either side and the British simply tired of the expense required to subjugate Ireland. They were ruthless enough, and skilled enough. It was not worth the cost.
The original Assassins from Persia were exterminated, along with many of the cities that supported them. Their Eagles Nests were laid waste, and they never recovered. So, I cannot say "It's never been done in the Middle East". But you have a valid point that it has not been done in living memory.
The Israelis might be the first to succeed in a long time. How ironic that their success will probably feature Jews implementing a "Final Solution" to the Palestinian problem.
Victory does not last forever. Defeat often does.
I only WISH the US still had the “fight to win” mentality that Israel has...
The world would be a much better place right now. None of this “changing hearts and minds”/”Nation building” BS that has never in the history of the World actually worked.
Agreed.
It very much bears up under examination. All you have to do is look at how many terrorist groups there are. There’s over a dozen operating in the Mid East right now, you know what happens if we wipe out one? Nothing.
I didn’t say we should negotiate with them. I said killing them has a 70+ year track record of not ending them. It’s complicated. And it’s situation by situation.
Our military once knew how to win wars. Not so much today.
The Democrats have poured absolute rot into the military for 12 of the last 16 years. And regardless of which political party controls the government, the natural tendency of military forces is to deteriorate over time unless we pay careful attention to them. They must be small, all-volunteer forces, well paid, and trained hard in the practice of warfighting.
That is not what we have now.
Rebuilding the skills we once had will take a lot of work and a lot of time. We are running very short on time.
You must kill them all. And you must kill their sponsors too.
It is a big job. Maybe too big. Certainly, way too ugly for current liberal sensitivities. The Arabs have all that oil. Let's just make deals with the Arabs and let their terrorist groups exterminate the Jews, in exchange for keeping the oil flowing.
Or not.
Without oil, the Arab countries would be impoverished backwaters of no importance to anyone in the West, and their terrorist warfare would be confined to their own countries.
The "root cause" of Arab terrorism is Islam and it keeps regenerating because of oil revenue. The forcible subjugation of infidel nations and enslavement of their populations is a core tenant of Islam. You are not going to fix that by making lesser concessions. You are not going to fix that by "education".
True believers act on their thoughts with a dedication, consistency, and force of will that non-believers refuse to understand. It is to the peril of the non-believers.
Terrorism is cheap, compared to regular military forces, and it is extremely effective if regular military forces are not available to suppress terrorists. It fails very consistently when countered by regular military forces under competent political direction.
The West no longer has competent political direction.
But you CAN’T kill them all. And their sponsors. It’s just not possible. It’s not a big job it’s a logistical impossibility.
It’s way way more complicated than you’re willing to comprehend. Suffice to say, every single sentence you said is wrong. It isn’t Islam and it isn’t oil. A lot of it is the Cold War. Both sides used the Mid East for proxy conflicts, and we supported a lot of serious scumbags just to keep their country from going commie. We basically spent 5 decades doing everything possible to make sure people there hate us.
We’ve NEVER had competent political direction. We’ve always been short sited and addicted to expedience.
That is a valid criticism. Thus, terrorist activities will continue until the oil runs out.
Or until widespread conversion to nuclear power (thorium-based reactors) makes oil less important.
It’s way way more complicated than you’re willing to comprehend.
Not so. It is way more complicated than can be solved by simple measures. I like "kill them all", but you are correct, the West can never summon the will to do that.
The replacement of oil with nuclear power is the best path I can see towards defunding terrorists. No money, no sponsors, no terrorists. Well, at least not so many terrorists, and easier to put them down with civil police methods rather than military force.
A lot of it [Why They Hate Us] is the Cold War. Both sides used the Mid East for proxy conflicts, and we supported a lot of serious scumbags just to keep their country from going commie.
They don't hate us because we did terrible things to them during the Cold War. They have been doing terrible things to each other for millennia.
They hate us because it is a convenient distraction for their rulers to keep their angry populations directed towards external enemies rather than the rulers and uber-minions who keep abusing them. Some things never change and work the same way everywhere. Even in the USA.
They hate us because their populations are well past the agricultural carrying capacity of their countries and are dependent on successful Western economies which they cannot duplicate, within their political and cultural restrictions.
They hate us because their dominant religion commands them to hate us as infidels. True believers act on those thoughts, and influence everyone around them. We ignore spiritual influences at our peril.
"Being nice to the Arabs" (and the Turks, and the Iranians, and the Russians and the Chinese) is not going to get out of this mess.
War is a solution to all of these problems. Not necessarily the best solution, and not necessarily in our favor either. But we continue to betray allies and provoke enemies until war may be the only remaining path for us.
And it won't be a matter of our choices then.
And we’ve been doing terrible things to them for a millennia. They hate us because frankly we’ve earned it. The west has treated the Mid East like a playground for all of our most homicidal entertainments for a thousand year. The miracle is that there are actually some of them that don’t hate us.
War isn’t a solution to ANY of these problems. War is what got them started, the Crusades. I don’t know what the answer is, but it definitely is not continue to be homicidal idiots that treat the Mid East like a murder sandbox.
This is an intractable point of disagreement between us.
I do not expect to convince you otherwise. You will not expect me to be convinced otherwise.
That will lead to completely different perspectives and proposals for solutions.
I am willing to read what you propose as solutions and give it attentive consideration. I might even agree with some points and not others.
Do carry on.
As I said, I have no idea what the solution is. What I do know is that going back to Rome the west has been nothing but crappy to the Mid East. Lots of conquest, lots of killing, lots of holding our wars in their area (WWI and WWII), forcing them to be in countries that make no cultural sense, using them against each other, propping up dictators. It predates Islam and it predates knowing what to do with oil. I also know that when we compare European history to the Mid East they aren’t any worse to each other than we’ve been to ourselves. We calmed down a little bit after WWII, but not much.
And the biggest thing I know is what I first posted on this thread, anybody that thinks killing Nasrallah is going to win the war is just ignoring how these things go. And I’m not saying killing him was wrong. But we do know from having cut the head off many terrorist organizations in the past is the absolute best case Hezbollah gets beat up enough that survivors all go join other terrorist organizations. Ones that already exist, or maybe make new ones. It’s whack-a-mole. If there’s an answer out there it starts with a fundamental change to our entire relationship to the Mid East.
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