Not that I am a Murtha fan, but we never should have been in Somolia or the Balkans in the first place.
F-ing clinton....
Rather an understatement.
You beat me to it. Thanks.
The impeached Clinton has been noticeably quiet, not opening his mouth IN THIS COUNTRY. About the vote.
I'm sure HE remembers Murtha.
You got that right brother! All of it!
Agreed- Somalia was a disaster from inception. OTOH- IF we commit troops to an op, I DAMN WELL want to see they have what they need to COMPLETE THE MISSION.
That is my endless rant...from Nam to this day. We deploy with a P.S. "You must fight in a politically correct manner, meaning you can't really complete the mission we're asking you to..."
end rant.
It's a dilemma at best. Somalia was one in a string of problems that cemented conventional wisdom about use of the military. You begin with these nominally humanitarian-only missions, do some actions to try to improve success of that mission, and get burned. I think there was a wide consensus to just stay out of those situations. It amounted to straying from the more popular and proven strategy of either do nothing or go in with overwhelming force.
I think Osama's perception of this as a "congenital" cut-and-run tendency on our part was faulty. A lesson may be to try to avoid giving even the appearance of being weak. But it is too harsh to say, for example, 9/11 was OUR FAULT for showing weakness.
When he was voted out of office his plan to turn the peacekeeping over to the UN was dropped by BJ Clinton. He then launched on a campaign of "nation building" which was mostly involved in trying to get cuts of any aid deals for his cronies.
Then a warlord rose up, sponsored by Osama. And Clinton sent in the Rangers to take him out. But he also refused to give them back up (shades of his hero JFK).
And that's how we got Black Hawk Down. And then Murtha and friends turned it into Vietnam. And now they're trying to do it again.
Tens, if not hundreds of thousands died following the Somalia debacle brought about by Clinton and Murtha.
Millions died after the dims abandoned the people of Southeast asia and millions more lost their freedom.
Somalia I could sort of understand just given the human disaster involved but in no way under the command of the UN