Posted on 11/25/2011 12:54:49 AM PST by LeoWindhorse
COMBAT OUTPOST HANSON, Afghanistan — A turkey trot it was not.
The U.S. Marines’ top general, James Amos, sprinted up and down the Helmand River Valley in southern Afghanistan on Thursday, visiting frontline Marines at nine remote outposts to share Thanksgiving and applaud their gains against the Taliban in a region where al-Qaida hatched the 9/11 plot a decade ago. Traveling mostly in an MV-22 Osprey, the hybrid that flies like an airplane and takes off and lands like a helicopter, Amos began shortly after daylight and finished 14 hours later — and, improbably, managed to confront just one turkey dinner.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
How about Tehran and throughout Iran ? You are already on deck in the approx AO . Finish the damn job with decisive long lasting military victory , not another CIV ordered diplomatic pullout . The mullahs in Iran will never cease to be a problem confronting this entire world unless and until we remove them entirely , with prejudice . Just do it and forget what the pussy-in chief and all of his whiner advisers say . Semper Fi! kick ass and take names . Let those whom we have lost not to have died in vain .
IMHO, CIC Cain or Bachmann would be President bound by Constitutional oath, not politican, when provisioning the forces or answering threats or acts of war. When war was required, this would result in true and complete identification of the enemy, legitimate casus belli, proper conduct, no artificial prolongation and victory.
While I like your sentiment, I do not agree. We have wasted too much treasure (young men and women) in the Middle East.
It is time we pulled ALL of our troops from around the world, closed ALL our bases and began strategic nuclear bombing to settle old scores and to avenge the betrayal of our young men and women.
Each and every Islamic country should have their five largest cities vaporized.
North Korea’s capital should be gone and a simple notice to the rest of the world, “Get Your Sh*t Together, Or You Could Be Next!”
I am tired of watching our decline through passive pussy politics and political correctness.
You say that ever so casually to have thought at any length of the consequences of such horror. I served on active duty during the Cold War when we trained in dealing with nuclear combat as a reality of the modern battlefield. The army sent me to Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Warfare School. We spent an enormous amount of time on the nukes and chemicals and very little on the biotoxins, since that was deemed to be the weapon of choice for terrorists and we were still a good thirty years away from Sept 11th 2001. In short, you have NO idea what you're talking about. You act like we're the only folks with a capable nuclear arsenal. What do you think both China and Russia will be doing while we're vaporizing their buddies? You're casually advocating Armageddon and I for one would like to wait on the Lord's timing for this, since I'm pretty sure it's not too far off anyway. But if we do it HIS way, it'll be a lot less uncomfortable for HIS people. Are you one of HIS? RAPTURE READY?
Newbie. Possible troll.
Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!
Now that you’ve done your ad hominem attack duty against exsoldier, please point out where he was incorrect in his statements.
They’re sworn to protect and defend the Constitution, and I’m starting to wonder if the next stop shouldn’t be DC.
"Marine, you'll be going to the next country where we decide to fight a half-assed war under the Care Bears rules of engagement and leave all the Islamists alive so they can take over after you and your buddies spend a decade there nation building. Semper Fi, son."
While I share a sentiment that Iran are dangerous they are probably only the most dangerous at this time, there are others. Shall we take an agenda to invade all of them?
The question I have though is what does “victory” in Afghanistan or Iran look like? We have already demonstrated that it is not possible to “liberate” muslims without occupying them and that we have no taste for occupation nor should we.
It seems to me that the asymmetric warfare we have been engaging in is all wrong and that the only way to “win” is a temporary thing done by special forces who cut off the head, destroy the core war fighting ability, leave nothing but mayhem and fear in their wake and then withdraw. In other words, kick the living crap out of the belligerents, take out their successors, leave a calling card with extreme prejudice and leave with the warning that they will come back as needed. In Afghanistan, there is no core only people who have demonstrated that they will not be led by a central authority. They have demonstrated this for centuries. So what do we do? Couldn’t we monitor for training cells and destroy those as they arise?
I would not seek war but if we are to have war it must have a plan for what victory looks like. Not all parts of the world will embrace our brand of nation building, we have clearly seen that. In fact, I don’t think I like our brand of nation building considering the bloody mess we have now in this country. We need to clean around our own back door before we go telling someone else what their country should look like. Elimination of threats though is another matter but elimination is the operative premise. In many places we will never be a friend no matter how hard we try.
I think you’re on to it.
(Freerepublic is a great sight for conservative news, if you can stomach the cop hating.)
Sight = to see
Site = a location
Just saying.
It is easy to have a lot of bravado when you haven’t had real sacrifice in the effort. I do and if I’m going to do it again it must be unrestrained and well worth the price.
As for cop hating, I detest bad cops and there are a lot of them now days who behave like jack booted thugs. I don’t accept that many who join the profession are noble.
How on earth did THIS get into the thread comments? I made just zero mention of law enforcement. I used to carry a badge for a living myself and god willing, next year I'll be teaching at a public high school that serves as a law enforcement magnet school where besides my usual duties teaching American Government, I'll also be the school firearms coach as well as a specific instructor in Criminal Justice and National Security studies. I'm very pro law enforcement. I just recognize that a great many police today are products of the public schools and that seems to include their lockstep mentality against the 2nd Amendment and the right of law abiding civilians to own and carry (keep and bear) arms. It's not necessarily their fault. It is what it is. They simply need to be gently reminded of the reality of limited government in a Constitutional Republic.
I’m afraid that you lost me entirely as your comments to me have no relation to anything that I wrote on this thread.
Wow what an oversite, oh silly me....I mean what and overSIGHT.
;)
thanks
Seems to be the bigger threat and the almost nonexistent popularity of DC politicians makes them stand out.
Most of this I can agree with but the how to do it is the problem. I would like a whole-hog solution but can’t see how it would be politically or morally acceptable.
One thing I am certain of, until you have a child that you have raised in harm’s way you do not understand the price of war. My own life is less valuable to me.
This is why we say if old men want to rattle sabres and be noisy with bravado let them go first and do what they proclaim. At least the ancients had this right since kings and emperors led their own battles. Now all we get is a bunch of mush mouthed, candy ass politicians telling our sons what to do.
Most young Marines, though strong, skilled and filled with fight, have not had the time or experience to think things through. This is why I pray that the Commandant is a man of both valor and wisdom.
First off, thank you for your service. I too keep in contact with many of my friends, well actually with their kids because most of MY contemporaries have retired from the service by now, but they feel the same in terms of long range objectives and especially the "surrender monkey" ROE.
Ever since Desert Storm we've been operating militarily on the middle-ground. We're conducting a politically-correct "war" that is getting us no where. I don't know what the answer is, but I know it isn't continuing what we're doing now. I know we're not winning $hit at this point. There are still an infinite number of muslim enemies around the world and their numbers aren't shrinking, in fact they're growing exponentially.
Probably true, but saying that we need to initiate nuclear holocaust because there is no middle ground is really cutting off the nose to spite the face, IMHO.
Perhaps M.A.D. isn't the correct answer but we're going to have to do something more than what we are now to actually WIN.
Okay, define for me what you mean by WIN?
Just saying blanketly that we can't go at the problem whole-hog or full-force because there will be conseqences is continuing the style of defense we currently have. We need to eradicate the problem once and for all.
LOL, right.
Our military was able to do it 200 years ago with the muslims there is no reason we can't do it again.
How can that be, since the problem is so obviously still with us! Also, we have been continually struggling with this difficulty ever since the actions you mention. Things never stopped, they just slowed a bit and in that time the problem has grown to such dimensions that I seriously doubt the commanders (including the President's in the past) would have any better idea how to tackle the problem than we have today. You're being incredibly simplistic.
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