Posted on 12/07/2009 2:13:29 PM PST by rabscuttle385
If anyone still doubted that this administration’s foreign policy would bring any kind of change, this week’s debate on Afghanistan should remove all doubt. The President’s stated justifications for sending more troops to Afghanistan and escalating war amount to little more than recycling all the false reasons we began the conflict. It is so discouraging to see this coming from our new leadership, when the people were hoping for peace. New polls show that 49 percent of the people favor minding our own business on the world stage, up from 30 percent in 2002. Perpetual war is not solving anything. Indeed continually seeking out monsters to destroy abroad only threatens our security here at home as international resentment against us builds. The people understand this and are becoming increasingly frustrated at not being heard by the decision-makers. The leaders say some things the people want to hear, but change never comes.
One has to ask, if the people who elected these leaders so obviously do not want these wars, who does? Eisenhower warned of the increasing power and influence of the military industrial complex and it seems his worst fears have come true. He believed in a strong national defense, as do I, but warned that the building up of permanent military and weapons industries could prove dangerous if their influence got out of hand. After all, if you make your money on war, peace does you no good. With trillions of dollars at stake, there is tremendous incentive to keep the decision makers fearful of every threat in the world, real or imagined, present or future, no matter how ridiculous and far-fetched. The Bush Doctrine demonstrates how very successful the war lobby was philosophically with the last administration. And they are succeeding just as well with this one, in spite of having the so-called “peace candidate” in office.
We now find ourselves in another foreign policy quagmire with little hope of victory, and not even a definition of victory. Eisenhower said that only an alert and informed electorate could keep these war racketeering pressures at bay. He was right, and the key is for the people to ensure that their elected leaders follow the Constitution. The Constitution requires a declaration of war by Congress in order to legitimately go to war. Bypassing this critical step makes it far too easy to waste resources on nebulous and never-ending conflicts. Without clear goals, the conflicts last forever and drain the country of blood and treasure. The drafters of the Constitution gave Congress the power to declare war precisely because they feared allowing the executive unfettered discretion in military affairs. They understood that making it easy for leaders to wage foreign wars would threaten domestic liberties.
Responses to attacks on our soil should be swift and brief. Wars we fight should always be defensive, clearly defined and Constitutional. The Bush Doctrine of targeting potential enemies before they do anything to us is dangerously vague and easily abused. There is nothing left to win in Afghanistan and everything to lose. Today’s military actions are yet another futile exercise in nation building and have nothing to do with our nation’s security, or with 9/11. Most experts agree that Bin Laden and anyone remotely connected to 9/11 left Afghanistan long ago, but our troops remain. The pressures of the war racketeers need to be put in check before we are brought to our knees by them. Unfortunately, it will require a mighty effort by the people to get the leadership to finally listen.
Hey Ron, you are right, perpetual war will not solve anything. So I suggest you beltway idiots listen to your experienced commanders and go in there 150% and kick those fascist asses to death.
This guy is such a maggot. I can’t wait ‘till we fire his looney butt.
We went to Afghanistan for a reason and it wasn’t “cuzz the durty Jooos tricked us!”
“....all the false reasons we began the conflict
So Paul seems to be ok with the Towers being brought down and the Pentagon attacked. As well as 3000 dead one might quibble over Iraq but the reasons for going into Afghanistan is pretty cut and dried. Unless you maybe think it was a set up, like going to the moon!
Yes I would like to see RINOS gone, but Paul utters this tripe I will take any RINO over him. This is spitting on the dead & wounded of that day. Someone needs to challenge Paul and boot him! Kentucky FREEPERs is his son a loon also. Someone should ask his son if he supports this?
RP’s goofy supporters here were all shouting that RP SUPPORTED troops in Afghanistan. Where are they now?
The way to win wars is established.
1] Congress declares war against all enemies - to unite the nation.
2] An exit strategy is set - unconditional surrender.
3] Overwhelming force is provided - draft sufficient military to fight on all fronts.
4] Rationing and financing as necessary.
Roosevelt was the last President who won a war.
When do you all think we’ll leave Afghanistan?
And under what circumstances?
I think we will go broke and have to come home.
It will be the same old same old over there. No gain for us - except for those who got rich off of it all.
How much more longer do you think our troops should stay?
I don't agree with Paul's aspect of foreign policy that Islam is a peaceful ideology and we should trade with them and our policies are to blame. No, I believe in his other aspect, whereas the enemy should be annihilated and reduced to rubble.
If Ron were president he would face the same problem as anyone else.
Having promised to bring the boys home, do you pull out precipitously, and leave a bloodbath in your wake, as the baddies slaughter everyone who ever had anything to do with you and you just figure its the breaks of the game;
Or do you try and train up a force that can hold the ground as you depart, and give people a fighting chance.
Given the stark choice of a Vietnam/Cambodia genocide or hang in a couple of years while your trainers train, I think even Ron would take the choice he didn’t want to take.
Afghanistan is never going to be Iowa. But it doesn’t have to be Iowa to be a successful mission. All you need is Zawahiri’s head in a duffel bag, and gendarmerie that can keep the Talibs out of the cities. Thats pretty modest, but considering what happened the last couple of times we’ve just walked away, its probably worth it. Its not what Ron would want to do, but its different when its your watch and your conscience.
True statement. He is referring to the concept of “perpetual war for perpetual peace,” which is the purpose of the UNO—to keep a conflict going somewhere on earth at all times to justify its own existence.
” . . . if you make your money on war, peace does you no good.”
Good statement.
“Responses to attacks on our soil should be swift and brief.”
We have the capability to do this, too-—to use just a fraction of what we’ve spent in Iraq and Iran for the purpose of superior intelligence, and use air power, sophisticated weaponry, and special forces units to utterly destroy them, and if necessary to make on-going raids to “prevent the fungus from accumulating under the rim.” (And never tell the news media about it until 7 to 10 days after the operations are certified to have been successful and effective.)
Our leaders are afraid to do this because of UNO and other globalist garbage.
Yes Paul’s son is another leach of society.
Ron Paul is an apologist of the IslamOfascists.
He has ranted and pulls out his diversionary tactics
away from the enemy who can take us out in seconds
and who killed more in one day in September 01 than
on 7 Dec ‘41.
The people who follow this demagogue of the neo left,
Ron Paul are no better than those who are sucked into
the Obama type of propaganda.
Those who won’t support or defend the fight against the
people and ideas of those who attacked American soil
and killed over 3,000 and who declared war against America
are usually the college kids who theory is all they know, not the real world.
Or many who whose roots are not of America and don’t understand the sacrifices of people who built this country
and fought for it.
Several of my 9th great grandparents lived in in the same area of the World Tradw Center in the 1600s.
My great great grandfather grew up just blocks from the WTC in the 1800s.
Today, the descendants of these ancestors of mine are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan and they know and understaand why they are there.
Great post.
So I take it you’re in full support of the current administration’s foreign policy?
RP supported going after the people who attacked the Towers and the Pentagon. Not nation building. We still haven’t got the ones who attacked the towers and we’re nation building, just like Clinton did.
When will at the Paul-haters realize that all this foreign nation building is a construct of the the hard left (i.e Woodrow Wilson), not the right? The left has consistently used this to build up the power of the federal gov’t and the right keeps buying into it.
The terrorists who flew into the Pentagon lived around 6 miles from me here in San Diego.
Some think if they don’t think about the enemy, they will go away. That worked well in the 1930s.
‘Or do you try and train up a force that can hold the ground as you depart, and give people a fighting chance.’
Well we have given Afghanistan a 8 years to build up a defense force capable of doing basic tenants; self defense, a simple start.
Now, that there is a ‘time line’, that should motivate them. Nothing motivates someone like Death.
The amount of blood lost by our own people and treasury is staggering, America has sacrificed enough for Afghanistan. Their survival is in their own hands.
Go away Ron Paul. We don't need the likes of you to surrender for us! No way am I gonna wear a burqua!
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