Manila to Withdraw from Iraq 'As Soon as Possible' (“In response to your request…”)

Reuters via Yahoo! ^ | 7/12/04

[dead]

DUBAI (Reuters) - The Philippines will withdraw its forces from Iraq (news - web sites) "as soon as possible," Philippine Deputy Foreign Minister Rafael Seguis said on Monday in a statement he read out on al Jazeera television.

"In response to your request, the Philippines ... will withdraw its humanitarian forces as soon as possible," Seguis said according to al Jazeera's Arabic translation of his remarks. His statement was addressed to the group which is holding a Filipino driver hostage.

[Zhangliqun]

"Well here is the problem as I see it - The Bush admin has mismanaged the coalition. Now I agree with you thatthe USA is big enough not to need or be hobbled by coalitions as Kerry and the Dems would envision it but if the Bush admin talks up the fact that we do have a viable coalition then a better job was and is needed in maintaining such an alliance via diplomacy. I want to add before the flames come my way that this is hardly a mortal blow but it is a failure in diplomacy and so I hang this failure around the State Dept's neck."

***

How do you mismanage going door to door and telling people the obvious -- that their neighbor's house is on fire and their house could be next?

Something like this does not and SHOULD not require shrewdness or subtlety or any other diplomatic legerdemain. If Europe & Co. don't get it, no amount of talking and begging and pleading will make them see the light. Diplomacy at that point will only, say again only, one more time for the visually impaired -- ONLY -- compromise, delay, dilute or otherwise screw up our mission.

And another thing -- why do THEY have no complicity in this diplomatic breakdown? I say it's THEIR failure, not ours. If they're so in the right (and I'm not saying that's your point of view), then wasn't it up to THEM to show us the error of our ways and that they didn't means THEY failed to "manage the coalition"?

From DAY ONE, all we EVER got from these "masters of diplomacy" was arrogance, condescension, ridicule and dismissiveness. This is diplomacy???? The ONLY way they EVER would have gone along with us is if we accepted a strategy -- with them in charge of course -- that would guarantee our failure.

Watch the movie "High Noon". Guess which country is represented by Gary Cooper...

[cake_crumb]

Instead of screaming "COWARDS!", we OUGHT to concentrate on the fact that they were due to PULL OUT ANYWAY, FOLKS. What SHOULD their response have been..."Go ahead, kill him...we're staying in for an extra year"?

That wasn't in the cards, and they don't have the funds for it. This is as long as they could say.

Nothing like our side pulling defeat from the jaws of agreed operational procedure. Just like the terrorist left wants.

[Zhangliqun]

“It is the full responsibility of the puppet Arroyo government whatever happens to Angelo de la Cruz. The moment his head is severed, we will do everything to ensure that the Arroyo government will be overthrown. The revolutionary movement promises to do everything to hasten the downfall of [Mrs.] Arroyo if de la Cruz is beheaded,” Rosal added.

***

What a load of crap! As if they would abandon their "revolution" if the guy ISN'T beheaded...

[dead]

First of all, I didn’t call anybody “cowards” or anything else, so you can stop yelling at me.

Second of all, if you can’t see the appeasement in the statement by the Phillipine Deputy Foreign Minister to the group holding a Filipino hostage:

"In response to your request, the Philippines will withdraw its humanitarian forces as soon as possible."

I can’t do anything for you. You’re too far gone.

[ApesForEvolution]

Talk about more freaking encouragement for these mutants. I wonder sometimes if half the world maybe should just be isolated from the rest.

[ThermoNuclearWarrior]

I know what happened in Spain. A Majority of Spaniards cowered in the face of a terrorist attack and elected an ignorant appeasing socialist who they knew would retreat.

[Coffee_drinker]

Very good post Zhangliqun. I like the saying
"the best defense is a good offense" it really truly applies to fighting terrorism.

btw, what does your screen name mean?

[ItsTheMediaStupid]

They have agreed to pull out their troops, all 51 of them. Sounds like a smart thing to do to me. Then if they release the hostage, send in 5100 troups to find the terrorists.

[Zhangliqun]

"btw, what does your screen name mean?"

It is a name given to me by a Chinese friend years ago. Zhang is a common Chinese surname (don't know what it means).

But Li means "strength" and Qun means "ability, or has much of".

So the name literally means Mr. Zhang Who Has Much Strength.

[Napoleon Solo]

I must have not written my original post incorrectly.

What and who I ragged about has nothing to do with our today's military. They are really the greatest since they have one hand tied behind their backs due to weak leadership in high ranking positions as well as the BullS called Political Correctness. Let our guys and gals do the job they were trained to do and it should be over much quicker and safer than by letting them go down the primrose UN/Euornazi path we seem to be on.

My complaint is about today's youth who are not a part of the military and have no clue whatsoever about the realities of life escept for getting all that they want from Mom and Dad whenever they wish and then taking the car keys to boot!!

Sorry if you all saw this as a rag on our today soldier!!

NS

[Napoleon Solo]

Please see my post #111. I think it clears up what I meant.

NS

[Napoleon Solo]

See my post #111 to clear this up

[Billthedrill]

With that I agree entirely, and I think I know where you're coming from. It gets pretty depressing putting up with the constant defeatist drumbeat, and some of the folks beating the drums appear to actually believe the garbage they're spouting.

But most of 'em never served. ;-)

[Iberian]

Actually in your case I'll keep it simple. Aznar was to win in Spain by 8 percent and retire Zapatero back to housekeeping for Jacke.

As far as I know Spain was a test bed for using murder to influence elections with such timing and precission.

I am sure you have a much better answer and I am open to listening. I'll pass it on to the Bulgarians, Philipinos and whoever is next.

Do share, because time is critical, our elections are in November.

Simple enough for you?

[Zhangliqun]

"Actually in your case I'll keep it simple. Aznar was to win in Spain by 8 percent and retire Zapatero back to housekeeping for Jacke.

As far as I know Spain was a test bed for using murder to influence elections with such timing and precission.

I am sure you have a much better answer and I am open to listening. I'll pass it on to the Bulgarians, Philipinos and whoever is next.

Do share, because time is critical, our elections are in November.

Simple enough for you?"

***

Your take on the whole thing is identical to mine. The Spanish electorate is hoping Churchill's crocodile will eat them last. The Islamo-fascists got their way, their test was a success.

I somehow got the impression that you were saying the opposite, that the situation in Spain was full of all those vague and contrived "complications" that leftists usually come up with when the obvious is to horrifying for them to face.

My mistake. Do cc this to Bulgaria and the Philippines though...

[NJ_gent]

"I'd be with you if that were possible but it's not. At least 10,000 miles of border and coastline and god knows how many cubic miles of air space. Impossible to defend."

We have approx 7,477 miles(1) of borders between Mexico and Canada, including Alaska's border with Canada. If we add the 50,000 Border Patrol agents that I've suggested in the past we add, we'd have roughly 2.3 agents per square mile of border. If we wall and/or fence off the border and put up surveillance equipment to keep unauthorized crossings from going unnoticed, we'll have extremely effective border controls. Another option besides hiring new BP agents would be to use National Guard troops, marines, army soldiers, etc to guard the border.

We have approx 12,380 miles(1) of coastline, also including Alaska's coastline. With the US Navy no longer spread all over the world, working in conjunction with existing Coast Guard, we can easily patrol our coastline. As for airspace, we have lots and lots of aircraft carriers, Aegis cruises, land-based aircraft, and other means to secure air superiority against any foe. Providing air security is the easiest of the three. Nothing can make a trans-atlantic or trans-pacific flight and go unnoticed by US satellites and radar. Unless, of course, Osama is developing stealth fighter-bombers. :-)

"The best defense is a good offense, which we have, and which is working with or without the Philippines."

And without Spain, Germany, France, China, North Korea, Syria, Lebanon, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Somalia, Saudi Arabia, and a whole lot of the rest of the world. If we had the power to successfully conquer the world, then I'd agree with you. As it stands, we cannot possibly chase down our enemies if we lack the support of allies, and most of the world. If there were only a handfull of countries caving to terrorists and supporting or hiding them, then I'd still agree with you, as we could isolate those few countries. With the sheer number of countries not helping us, or actively working against us, perhaps it's time we hop out of Iraq, beat the hell out of North Korea, and then lock ourselves behind our newly secured borders.

Let the animals wipe each other out while we work on profecting ourselves as a civilized people.

[NJ_gent]

Pardon me for the double reply, but I missed a couple things while rushing out my last comment. First of all, the unreferenced (1) in the last comment was intended to show that the figures were obtained from the CIA 2003 World Handbook. I also forgot to make one other comment regarding something else you'd said.

"50 years from now they will tell their grandchildren: "It wasn't 'the world' that helped us -- it was the Americans."

Just like the French, right? We helped save their butts in WWII from the Germans who they're now allied with against us. Or how about the South Koreans? They love us over there - those anti-American protests they have all the time demanding that their government expel our troops are no big deal. Or the biggest ones of all, the Mujahadeen we supported against the Soviets. Those are the same bastards who trained the murderers who flew planes into our buildings, killing 3,000 of our citizens. Somali people who we went in to help see that UN food reached them instead of being stolen? They came after us with thousands of armed people, trying to murder our soldiers.

I find it far easier to see the new Iraqi government siding with Al Qaeda than with us within 10 years. In 50 years, we'll probably be more hated there then we are now.

The motto of people around the world seems to be, "help me today, Americans, so I'll be around to try to kill you tomorrow".

[NJ_gent]

"And watch our own economy collapse in the process?"

Part of the beauty of a free market economy is that it can adjust far more rapidly than a socialist, government-controlled economy. Within 5 years, we'd be as well off, if not more well off, than we are now. Would it be easy? Certainly not at first, but it would get increasingly better over time. The rest of the world would have problems. I don't particularly care, to be honest. So long as we're in good shape, I'm happy.

[Iberian]

I agree with you. First paragraph only.

I's all good! :)