FLASHBACK: Obama (2007): The War We Need to Win (Steele is right)

BarackObama.com ^ | Aug 1, 2007 | Barack Obama

[SmartInsight]

We did not finish the job against al Qaeda in Afghanistan. We did not develop new capabilities to defeat a new enemy, or launch a comprehensive strategy to dry up the terrorists' base of support. We did not reaffirm our basic values, or secure our homeland.

And so, a little more than a year after that bright September day, I was in the streets of Chicago again, this time speaking at a rally in opposition to war in Iraq. I did not oppose all wars, I said. I was a strong supporter of the war in Afghanistan. But I said I could not support "a dumb war, a rash war" in Iraq. I worried about a " U.S. occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences" in the heart of the Muslim world. I pleaded that we "finish the fight with bin Ladin and al Qaeda."

When I am President, we will wage the war that has to be won, with a comprehensive strategy with five elements: getting out of Iraq and on to the right battlefield in Afghanistan and Pakistan; developing the capabilities and partnerships we need to take out the terrorists and the world's most deadly weapons; engaging the world to dry up support for terror and extremism; restoring our values; and securing a more resilient homeland.

The first step must be getting off the wrong battlefield in Iraq, and taking the fight to the terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

[Cold Heat]

The RNC has been involved in every primary, some more than others. In one way or another. That is what they do. That is there mission and purpose as it is a fundraising and logistical organization.

We won most of them, and they spent millions if not half of their money for Scott Brown, and in Pennsylvania, Illinois, and many others. I don't think they helped all of them financially, but if not they do in other ways with signs or tranport....yadda yadda. They are still a bit gun shy from the debacle on the East Coast with that near Commie republican woman....LOL.

[csmusaret]

I have commented here in the past that Obama owns this war. Shortly after being sworn in he fired General McKiernan. He hand picked McChrystal to take over and bought into his COIN strategy. He immediately sent an additional 21000 troops then approved another 30,000 (that surge won’t be complete till Sep). The wizard of smart then fired McChrystal and chose Petraeus, the author of McChrystal’s COIN strategy, to replace him. After 18 months in office Obama is on his third commander in Afghanistan. Despite what Steele may or may not have meant, this is Obama’s war lock, stock, and casualty list.

[TribalPrincess2U]

Thanks

[Cold Heat]

Despite what Steele may or may not have meant, this is Obama’s war lock, stock, and casualty list.

This is such a serious issue, and I don't want to make light of it, but Steele has so much in common with Tony Haywood of BP.

Both are but Chairmen in their organizational structure and as such their big power is that they sit at the head of a big table with a board that really runs the company. They break tie votes occasionally and they are the face of the board, but they don't run crap! Tony is no more responsible for the oil spill then Steele is responsible for a Republican loss or win. But they both know that they hold a partisan political job with many snakes in the audience and neither one has a friggin clue that everything they say will be dissected and used by the opposition to destroy them personally.

I thought I would point this out for clarity on just what a Chairman does. They are a figurehead and expendable, and they have a term of service which I believe both of them will be exiting the stage when their terms are up. In Steele's case and Tony of BP are both in early January of 2011 at the end of the corporate quarter..

[csmusaret]

When the chairman of the RNC says, “The war in Afghanistan is a war of Obama’s choosing. This was not something that the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in.”, sane people rightfully ask “What the hell is this guy smoking?” and “Where has he been since 2001?”

It should be painfully clear by now that the RNC is in serious need of a new figurehead, and if he is in fact expendable, he should be expended at once.

[Cold Heat]

No problem TP. I have not commented on Steele and Afghanistan much on this forum because it's not anything I can fix. I am just a watcher like everyone else, but I can't let people demand someone like Steele who really is meaningless in the big picture, but to do so and upset the RNC so close to November is politically stupid.

As to Obama, he does own this war and the war in Iraq and neither are really wars in the real sense, they are both nation building operations. No different then past CIA operations but on a bigger scale.

Our history is full of failures in this regard. The successes were done differently. The enemy was soundly defeated and demoralized and we don't do that anymore and as a consequence of not defeating the enemy totally and without question, we have lost every attempt since WWII. The jury is still out in Iraq, and Afghanistan is a 7 going on eighth year mess that has become much worse since zero took the reigns. Iraq is at a turning point and we are in the middle of a withdrawal.

I don't have any hope at the present time for the success of any of this, but if I picked one that was worth the price, especially now with Iran's meddling in the world and the Soviet Bear's return to the world stage, I would put all our eggs in Iraq and make it ours.

[Cold Heat]

This was not something that the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in.”, sane people rightfully ask “What the hell is this guy smoking?” and “Where has he been since 2001?”

I know history is not supposed to change, but the truth is that we never really invaded Afghanistan under Bush. We used special forces, Marines and not that many of them. We made a alliance with the tribes in the North called the Northern Alliance with just a few Americans and we kept a purposely low profile for a very good reason and Obama changed all of that.

The fact is, these people don't want us there and the more we send, the more targets the insurgency which is based in Pakistan, a ally that we can't attack or stop, simply moves back across the border to regroup and rearm then comes at us every spring. They co-opt everything we did and do on the ground and turn the local against us and they melt away in the fall to winter.

The one comparison I can make with this is the Viet Cong and Cambodia. We could not follow them! They did a similar insurgent war plan and they defeated us by killing a few here and few there until our political support broke down. We were pulled out even though we had won every major military battle that we fought. We could not deal with the people who's allegiances switched with the day to shifts of power and fear. We used power and they used fear. Fear won and won handily, just as it did in N. Korea when we crossed the DMZ.

We have the technology to contain. Clinton failed to use it when we had the Intel to act and 9/11 was the result yet we blame Steele for pointing out the futility of this invasion into a territory where history tells us multiple times that we will eventually withdraw after suffering too many casualties for the political support to deal with.

I would support a return to the strategy that Bush employed and beef it up with more UAVs, and gunships. I would put two or three more operating bases at the pass between Pakistan and Afghanistan and I would continue to support Karzi and free elections.

In time, I would go to the UN and begin the process of breaking this mess up when elections and any attempts to form a countrywide governing body failed which they will because it's ungovernable in the same way Pakistan has never been able to govern it's border regions with Afghanistan.

[Cold Heat]

He will be gone shortly after the November elections and not before. It’s not sensible to upset the board at the RNC before and so close to the November battle. As I said, it would do far more harm then good and I doubt you will see much of Steele between then and now. Just written statements.

[csmusaret]

If I worked at the DNC all my commercials leading up to the mid terms would star Michael Steele. I think Kristol got this one right:http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/07/calls_for_steeles_resignation.html

[Cold Heat]

If he does, then the resignation and why becomes the story.

The Dems will gleefully frame it are a pro-life attack on a black man. They will use it to great effect as they have in the past and scare the hell out of the independents who have left Obama. They will make it a emotional issue and say that "if you elect these human rights grabbin republicans that they will take all your rights away just as they have tried to do in the past. Protect the working man, the black man and especially the poor and downtrodden women who we fight for everyday."

Just let this die, and He will likely shutup and not be seen again except for written missives cleared by the board. Then he will be gone after November.

It's too early to be positioning for 2012, and that is what Rove, Cheney and I suspect some others will be doing. I would not be surprised if more of the old guard come out of the woodwork and attack Steele. But remember that Krystol, who I heard referred to as a conservative today on FOX, is not a conservative. His entire sch-tick, like his fathers, is all foreign policy as it affects Israel, and nothing more or less. When he occasionally leaves his area of expertise, he is a progressive. Steele is more of a Conservative then he will ever be, but Steele can't defend himself right now and this forum is certainly not a place that would listen anyway. He has been on the black list since his Eastern views on social issues made the papers in 2009.

I can tolerate him because we are more in agreement then not, but there is not any one Republican on either coast that I would say agrees with me on everything.

In fact, there is maybe six in my state. Maybe less.

But, he is a Reagan type, and I know it hurts conservatives to accept it, but Reagan was not nearly as conservative as they make him out to be on this forum. In fact if he were alive today they would call him a RINO.

[csmusaret]

Bedtime. Enjoy the Holiday.

[Cold Heat]

You too....

[PaleoBob]

Steele has been running the RNC since after the 2008 elections. Republicans Christie (NJ), Brown (Mass) and McDonnel of Va have all won elections while Steele has been in charge of RNC.

[ballplayer]

I dont care if he is right about about this or not, He should be Bashing the Marxist every minute of every day on the Economy and Jobs. Why are we having an Election in November since everything we should be basing our decisions on will be Announced AFTER the elections? Dont you think you should Know which direction the people you are going to vote for are going to take to try and Fix the Diastrous mess this Marxist is foisting upon the Country? Why Is Steele not DEMANDING the Democrats answer questions now about the MASSIVE tax increases that are coming when Bushs Tax cuts Expire Jan.1st, Now these are separate from all the Nice Goodies that Obamas Deficit reduction Commission will be Dropping on us and to which Obama ALREADY Knows about judging by his remark that he will be Calling all those Whining about Deficits,BLUFF,next year ,so WHY is That Buffoon Steele Not Demanding the Democrats explain BEFORE The Election so we can Cast an Informed Vote .
I will tell you Because the Republicans Dont have a Clue and Steele is an Incompetent Buffoon.

[PaleoBob]

The RNC has become pretty much irrelevant over the past 10 years. The hard money donations dried up and it’s all soft money now and there are many avenues for it to be put to work. Money is flowing unabated to aid Repubs, and if the RNC was disbanded tomorrow, it would not make a tinkers damn worth of difference.
As to Steele, he is a true Reagan repub. People attacking him today are simply mistaken as to his politics. Reagan never would have mounted a surge in a worthless country. I don’t think he would have gone into Iraq. he would have used B-52s! The policy of the GOP until 9/11 and since 1951 was “No Nation Building! Ever Again!”

You see we tried it twice since 51 and got our asses handed to us politically! This country may well have the good intentions and the good will but it does not have the political will to nation build in a foreign land while loosing blood and treasure for very long and we have far exceeded that time limitation. We are just not good at it and the GOP right up to the day of 9/11 had a policy of not doing it. We even made Bush pledge he would never attempt it on our watch. Both Bush’s.

Now we have done a major investment in Iraq, one that I think may well be worth it in the long term, but do we have the political will to reengage in Iraq to protect that investment?

I think not...... and if not we lose it all again.....

So it follows, after two failed attempts in Korea and S. Vietnam, a third may well fail and a fourth is underway, that the Republicans like myself who have been around for a while would be just a little bit reluctant to continue what appears to be political madness and do our best to try to lay this fourth failure at a democrat’s feet rather than accept the blame for it politically again for the fourth time! Not that it matters who began it because we always have to take the heat for ending it

But hey! That is exactly what I heard Carl Rove do this morning on FOX. Steele tried to lay it on Obama and Rove attacked Steele a layed it back on Bush and the Republican Party.

This is bizzaroville. You don’t win elections this way. But hey, I said the same thing in 2006.

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I think Steele has done the two things he needs to do: raise money and win elections. Generally, I would agree with him on many issues (I’m a Marylander) though I adamantly disagree we should just cavalierly pull out of Afghanistan. I do agree with him that the Dems politicked their way into a deeper commitment there with their stupid Iraq comparison.

I respect your viewpoint and I hope you felt the same way in Dec 2001 when we were going IN to Afghanistan. All I’m asking for in my dispute with people here at FR is that we have the intellectual honesty and pragmatic stones to see things through and face reality as it is.

If we leave Afghnaistan the reason we leave WILL NOT MATTER to al Qaeda and the Taliban. They will have a victory. We will have surrendered. Granted, there won’t be any more shortage of clever explanations for our leaving Afghanistan now than there was when we left Vietnam—in that case, a million people were murdered in the immediate aftermath and millions more enslaved and NOT ONE OF THEM was saved or spared by even the most clever reason anyone offered for our “withdrawal.”

I don’t think we WILL leave, so to me it’s moot. Politics is such that even an Obama is more easily encouraged to expand than withdraw forces, anything to avoid “another Vietnam.” It’s easy enough for political advisers to argue that when we stay we win—Europe, Japan, Korean peninsula.

The odds are strong that we will NEVER leave any of these places. The thing to contemplate is how we remain in place permanently most effectively and with the best security for our forces. That’s the discussion people ought to be having, not one that imagines the US will do something it won’t do.

[Cold Heat]

I don't think leaving is a option either, but the tactics employed since Obama took over are wrong in my opinion and will fail in the long run, leaving us with a situation politically where withdrawal would occur much in the same way we left Vietnam.

That is what I fear.

Pulling back a bit, and using special ops, Marine short term deployments and fire bases with mucho air support as there is no counter to it but small arms, would achieve a large measure of control and containment and we can do that for a long time.

While that goes on, you can try to work something out with the UN and the bordering countries to eliminate the failed state of Afghanistan and give it's territory to the various border states who have indigenous people already there. Pakistan would get the Pashtun areas and the bulk of the valley which is very valuable for agriculture and they need it.

This is why Pakistan and India are constantly fighting over the lush lowlands that they share. It's a matter of need and if all this could be mitigated, it would go a long way toward a lasting stability.

[PaleoBob]

While that goes on, you can try to work something out with the UN and the bordering countries to eliminate the failed state of Afghanistan and give it’s territory to the various border states who have indigenous people already there. Pakistan would get the Pashtun areas and the bulk of the valley which is very valuable for agriculture and they need it.

This is why Pakistan and India are constantly fighting over the lush lowlands that they share. It’s a matter of need and if all this could be mitigated, it would go a long way toward a lasting stability.

---

I agree with you that Obama is the LAST person in the nation I’d want dealing with Afghanistan. What a nightmare he and his crew are. The idea that any good will come from what the likes of Richard Holbrooke or Hilary Clinton add to the mix...

Well, it’s god awful.

That said, maybe Petraeus can come up with something that makes sense and gets us through with as few casualties as possible to 2013, when Palin or someone else invested in victory (mil and pol) takes over.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks SmartInsight.

"Present!"

I did not oppose all wars, I said. I was a strong supporter of the war in Afghanistan. But I said I could not support "a dumb war, a rash war" in Iraq. I worried about a " U.S. occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences" in the heart of the Muslim world. I pleaded that we "finish the fight with bin Ladin and al Qaeda." When I am President, we will wage the war that has to be won, with a comprehensive strategy with five elements: getting out of Iraq and on to the right battlefield in Afghanistan and Pakistan; developing the capabilities and partnerships we need to take out the terrorists and the world's most deadly weapons; engaging the world to dry up support for terror and extremism; restoring our values; and securing a more resilient homeland. The first step must be getting off the wrong battlefield in Iraq, and taking the fight to the terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan.