Posted on 01/05/2019 11:13:19 AM PST by Navy Patriot
Bolton is as neocon as they come. Possibly more of a nationalist neocon, which might contribute to his not quite fitting in with his type, but he’s your usual chickenhawk who never met a possible war he didn’t like.
If you are going to pretend that the “chemical weapons” in Syria haven’t mostly been our own false flags.
Not at all - I think that may have contributed to the decision to pull out. Of course I believe that the false flag part was in the wrong folks being blamed and when that fell apart, trump decided that was the last straw...not that our people (Trump Admin) were waving them flags.
This bogus scheme has been used several times in Syria. Announce there could be a “chemical attack by Assad”, then stage it.
Do you really believe the Trump Administration has been doing this? If it was us doing it, you can bet he wasn’t put in the loop....I noticed that after the other “incidents”, he got quiet on the topic for a while and then announced the intent to pull out - I’d wager he finally got enough good info to know it was the Assad opposition that was doing it....any bets if any behind the scenes conversation went on and are going on today?
As I stated earlier, I thought the troops were already out. Which was the way to do it. Announce it when it's a done deal.
I think Trump has some leverage in mind by announcing it w/o a hard timeline and letting Bolton out to talk about "conditions"...he's always looking for a crack to exploit in our favor.
Personally, I do not like that use of "neocon" because it stems from the Left's appropriation of a term from the Reagan era for use as an epithet with anti-Jewish overtones. In the Left's view, anyone who was on the Left but then supported the Iraq War is a traitor to them.
The term "chicken hawk" is even worse because it was originally a term for older gays who cruise the streets looking for young gay prostitutes. Refashioned into a political insult, chicken hawk refers to someone who is pro-war but shirked personal risk of military service or combat. I have no reason to think that was the case with Bolton.
To Bolton's credit, as a Fox New commentator and recognized conservative figure, he was pro-Trump during the 2016 campaign when many in the GOP were reflexively hostile to Trump. In return, Trump identified Bolton as a potential Secretary of State. And since Bolton is now Trump's National Security Adviser, he has had a role in crafting Trump's withdrawal of troops from the conflicts in Syria and Afghanistan.
If you have a substantive point against Bolton, please explain with facts. I am in earnest. I am not trying to bait you.
Sure, lots of neocons are Jewish, but it should not be used as a euphemism for that.
Forget the Jewish bit—first you try to define it by that and then say it is therefor not a good term.
Those who claim to be of the right but really are interested in at least certain, if not all, foreign wars. Likely funded by the armament funders, manufacturers and traders. Likely not actually appreciative of the right’s classical liberal and libertarian background, because that is not why they have clustered to our side.
Chickenhawk also has multiple meanings. Used to also refer to men going exclusively for young girls, though in that sense it is now used exclusively for gays.
But I obviously used it in the military sense and Bolton has admitted to avoiding danger in the Vietnam War:
“During the 1969 Vietnam War draft lottery, Bolton drew number 185. (Draft numbers corresponded to birth dates.)[38] As a result of the Johnson and Nixon administrations’ decisions to rely largely on the draft rather than on the reserve forces, joining a Guard or Reserve unit became a way to avoid service in the Vietnam War, although 42 Army Reserve units were called up with 35 of them deployed to Vietnam shortly after the Tet offensive in 196869.[39][40] Before graduating from Yale in 1970, Bolton enlisted in the Maryland Army National Guard rather than wait to find out if his draft number would be called.[41][42] (The highest number called to military service was 195.)[43] He saw active duty for 18 weeks of training at Fort Polk, Louisiana, from July to November 1970.[42] After serving in the National Guard for four years, he served in the United States Army Reserve until the end of his enlistment two years later.[5]
He wrote in his Yale 25th reunion book “I confess I had no desire to die in a Southeast Asian rice paddy. I considered the war in Vietnam already lost.”[44] In an interview, Bolton discussed his comment in the reunion book, explaining that he decided to avoid service in Vietnam because “by the time I was about to graduate in 1970, it was clear to me that opponents of the Vietnam War had made it certain we could not prevail, and that I had no great interest in going there to have Teddy Kennedy give it back to the people I might die to take it away from.”[45][46][47]”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_R._Bolton#US_National_Guard_and_Army_Reserve_service
Bolton has pushed war over and over. He is beyond hawkish. (A term you could tolerate, perhaps?)
Good for him in supporting Trump, but he is a risk where our military’s lives are concerned. Trump seems so far to have used him well, let’s hope that continues.
As for Bolton's limited military service, it is more than most of the population has done. And if Bolton is a chicken hawk because he did not want to fight in Vietnam's rice paddies, is my father also one because he activated his Naval Reserve officer's commission and thereby avoided getting sent to Korea as an Army draftee?
I note that my father, a Kings Point graduate and a merchant marine officer at the time, requested sea duty in the war zone but the Navy instead sent him to Panama to pilot warships and war cargoes through the canal. Does the Navy's administrative decision against sea duty in the war zone mark my father as chicken hawk in that he has hawkish views?
As for Bolton, if we live long enough, we may get to read the national security strategy he helped develop for Trump, but we know enough already to see that it is similar to Reagan's strategy of victory without war by directing American economic, political, and cultural power against our adversaries.
When Trump was elected, the US was on a path towards war with North Korea. Trump -- with help from Bolton -- is instead trying to draw North Korea out of its isolation while using pressure from its neighbors to facilitate the process. Similarly, Trump (and Bolton) have organized Sunni Muslin states against Iran and are putting it under severe economic pressure that may prompt runaway inflation and a regime crisis this year or next.
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