Posted on 05/06/2011 12:59:04 PM PDT by Pinetop
Thanks for that calculation on the comparison with WWII.
The Obama/Osama duality is pretty evil. Hopefully, we will be rid of Obama next year.
Charge it to Bill Clinton, for not taking Bin Laden when the Sudanese government offered to hand him over.
nuclear weapons are cost effective.
There is so many loopholes in this post, I will wait till Monday to start adding them all up.
Suffice it to say, terrorism is always cheap, if you are the terrorists, and, many times over, extremely damaging and expensive if you are it’s victims. But, doing nothing is not a choice for the victims. That’s just the way it is. Putting a” price tag” on it does not change the dynamics and the disparity in the costs, when terrorism is a global outreach enterprise and not simply domestic wackos.
What about the Opportunity Cost? The OC of another terror attack or the OC of the Trillions spent on other problems or the loss of freedoms for the faux security of an ever expanding Police State. There are a lot folks that need to accept the blame for a lot of bad decisions from this ‘Terror’ enemy.
I would have no problem with this statement if most of the terrorist issue was settled, but it has not been, at least from the information we have on our side of the line, outside of the intelligence community. While we killed bin Laden, we did take 10 years post-9/11 to find him. There is a whole lot more terrorism than just him. If we put a good stopping point to terrorism, then yes, the money and resources were worth it, but seeing as how we haven’t scratched the hotbeds in Yemen, or the growing disorder in Europe, our victory is not so certain, and not neccessarily going to last all that long.
if I was Bill Clinton and forced us to spend $3 billion by letting Osama get away in the 90’s, I’d want all the evidence in Sandy Berger’s pants too
Bin Laden just may get his last laugh if we don’t do anything about our incoming debt crisis. Remember he helped to bankrupt the Soviets.
You're welcome.
“Suffice it to say, terrorism is always cheap, if you are the terrorists, and, many times over, extremely damaging and expensive if you are its victims. But, doing nothing is not a choice for the victims. Thats just the way it is. Putting a price tag on it does not change the dynamics and the disparity in the costs, when terrorism is a global outreach enterprise and not simply domestic wackos.”
That sums it up nicely. Soft targets in large numbers hit with low-tech weapons - very cheap. Intelligence-gathering and high-tech security - not cheap.
Not the most logical allocation of resources to be combating terrorism through the financing of troops and nation building in the Mideast while our southern border security is deliberately lax, particularly when the enemy is part of a “global outreach” with a seemingly endless supply of crazed foot soldiers.
Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
John F. Kennedy
You mean we put three trillion into the pockets of those who invented Bin Laden... more inventions of evil will follow you can be sure.
We could have paid the Chi Coms back three times.
Wuli-—excellent point.
It may be that the only form of “concentrated” effort that we should be making in Afghanistan, and around its borders is the special ops, the increase of our own humint, the drone operations and all like manner of efforts - smaller “foot print” but, if concentrated as a bigger % of the effort, maybe more effective. Who knows? I sure don’t have a crystal ball.
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