Posted on 06/23/2014 1:50:59 PM PDT by mojito
ISIS is bigger, badder, richer, and better organized than any jihadi threat the United States has faced thus far. Its rise represents a foreign policy disaster of the first order.
A group more radical than al-Qaeda, better organized, better financed, commanding the loyalty of thousands of dedicated fanatics including many with Western and even U.S. passports? And this group now controls some of the most strategic territory at the heart of the Middle East?
Welcome to President Obama’s brave new world.
[....]
One wishes we had a Republican President right now if only because when a Republican is in the White House, the media and the chattering classes believe they have a solemn moral duty to categorize and analyze the failures of American strategy and policy. Today that is far from the case; few in the mainstream press seem interested in tracing the full and ugly course of the six years of continual failure that dog the footsteps of the hapless Obama team in a region the White House claimed to understand. Nothing important has gone right for the small and tightly knit team that runs American Middle East policy.....
Rarely has an administration so trumpeted its superior wisdom and strategic smarts; rarely has any American administration experienced so much ignominious failure, or had its ignorance and miscalculation so brutally exposed.
(Excerpt) Read more at the-american-interest.com ...
The way they’re going not long. Their star is rising and they’re becoming more than just a ragtag bunch of towelheads shooting AK’s into the air and are quickly evolving into a serious threat. Since we helped hatch this egg that worries me even more that it will come back to bite us.
To glom on to what you said...
The Nazi’s were a stronger foe for us militarily, but we were still up to the challenge.
The problem with these ISIL guys, is, yes they are incredibly cruel, fanatical and vicious, yet they are not more formidable than the Nazis of old, but WE (the West) are wussies who don’t understand that war with ISIL is a no holds bar, fight to the death. They can fight that way; we cannot.
Rules of engagement, fear of war crimes and court-martials, bad optics to “only cares about winning and staying in power” politicians, a press Hell bent on “proving” US troops are a weird combination of Storm Troopers and Racist Rednecks, and especially the pussification of the American Male by feminists and nanny-staters means ISIL is more dangerous to us than the Nazis.
A don’t even get me started on the war in the Pacific with the Japanese. Our grandfathers fought that one against an even harder and more determined foe than the Nazis. We had to be crueler just to beat ‘em. In many cases, we had to kill all of ‘em because they refused to surrender! Do you think we could fight that way now?
No.
We’d apologize to the Japanese after Pearl Harbor just to show the world we’re not racists.
The Jihadi Menace made itself known with the FIRST bombing of The World Trade Center in NYC.
Rarely has an administration so trumpeted its superior wisdom and strategic smarts;
leads directly to Part 2:
rarely has any American administration experienced so much ignominious failure, or had its ignorance and miscalculation so brutally exposed.
Those with any wisdom / experience (learned from) did not even need to know what the policies would be, to know the outcome.
The article asks some good questions:
How could the U.S. government have been caught napping by the rise of a new and hostile power in a region of vital concern? What warning signs were missed, what opportunities were lost—and why?
Indeed. 13 years after 911, this is a security failure so monumental that it is hard to comprehend. Ok, granted, we know Obama was off playing golf or, er, "whatever", instead of attending National Security meetings, but where the H. E. double L was everyone, or anyone, else? A bigger, badder, richer, and VERY effective "A.Q. Heavy" just came out of nowhere? No way.
Granted, some will say this is a part of an Obama agenda to wreck America, but, I don't think so. Obambi can't feign ignorance on this one: The responsibility here is just too direct, and too politically damaging, to be intentionally self-inflicted. "The One" can't afford to be totally discredited over 2 years before the end of his term. Sheer incompetence is a much more likely explanation.
(Ok, I would accept the possibility that ISIS / ISIL was planned / allowed, and simply "blew up" like a pulse thunderstorm MUCH faster than expected, but even that implies incompetence of the highest order...)
If Obama had any honor, or even a desire to rescue his own party from disaster, he would
A) Somehow dump Biden.
B) Name as VP some Lib / Dem who would actually demand to have competent people fighting the War on Terror. (Joe Lieberman?)
C) Then resign, himself.
Unfortunately, unlike, say, Napoleon after Waterloo, Obama likes being ruler too much...
I’m not so sure.
Between the sense of entitlement and materialism that dominates our present culture, and the lack of regard for life (as demonstrated by the average opinion of “under 40’s” regarding abortion), once ISIL begins cutting hard into our lifestyle*, I think they will be dealt with harshly. However, that likely won’t happen until ISIL has the strength to cause us many more combat (and other?) deaths than should have ever happened.
*If, indeed, they choose to do so, by disrupting oil supplies and the world economy. They might just be smart enough to at some point consolidate what they have won, offering cease fires and so on, and then make incremental moves so as to not trigger heavy duty Western or other**responses. However, judging by the radicalism displayed so far, I count this as “not probable” (but still possible).
**I would also note the VERY substantial military buildup of the Saudis in recent years. (#4 in the world in military spending in 2013.) If Saudi judges ISIL an existential threat, ISIL will have an existential threat to themselves to worry about.
Well... We were pretty lucky early on to not be signing some sort of truce / armistice. It's not just that our carriers were not @ Pearl Harbor when the Japanese attacked: Not too long after, even most of our carriers were sunk or out of action / being repaired. If the Japanese had not made tactical & strategic errors (basically, they should have been more agressive) we might have been in a world of trouble in the Pacific.
I'm not so sure about this, Mark.
My understanding is that ISIL is funded by Saudi Arabia, at least the Syrian branch, but the Saudis claim they are not funding ISIL's Iraqi operations; talk about splitting hairs! So this support is maybe one of the reasons they are spending so much... ISIL recruitment and payoffs costs them a lot and they apply this to their defense budget.
BTTT!
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