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Posted: Tue Dec 01, 2009 1:08 pm
by Mister Tee
Well, Greg, I (and, presumably, Obama) don't see the choice as binary the way you do. I think it's possible some good can come with a temporary escalation. If it doesn't work, fine; then get out. But I think cavalierly leaving right now carries dangers, most especially, as taki points out, those that might arise in Pakistan, another place Bush neglect has made a more hazardous place than it was previously.
As far as the rest of what you wrote, the only thing with which I would violently disagree is your glib contention that the major al Qaeda planning came in FL flight schools. I don't think there's much doubt al Qaeda command was operating with impunity in Afghanistan, and whatever orders set those guys off on September 11th came directly from there. Richard Clarke is one person I grant great credibility on the whole issue of terrorism, and he said the Afghan camps should have been attacked long before they were.
Posted: Mon Nov 30, 2009 6:58 pm
by Greg
Mister Tee wrote:Any reaction to the NY Times article today, which says Obama's speech tomorrow is going to be framed around the exit strategy from Afghanistan, even while it ups the troop level for a temporary period? That seems to me to put the lie to "we're going into a quagmire", but most people don't even appear to be reacting to it.
The point I would make is that there may be only two options available in Afghanistan.
1: Pull out and allow the Taliban and even some of Al-Qaeda to set up shop in some rural areas of the country; and
2: Have the U.S. military permanently run Afghanistan.
I saw Matthew Hoh, the marine captain in Afghanistan who recently resigned, on TV and he said that historically there has been no national governing body over rural Afghanistan, that the whole region is just a collection of autonomous villages. That would mean that any group that wanted to march into an uninhabited place in rural Afghanistan would be free to set up shop and do whatever it wanted.
There is a high probability that the U.S. will never find any indigenous body to effectively govern rural Afghanistan. So, if the U.S. military then did ever leave, whoever else wanted to could march back in.
I support scenario 1 of the choices because even when Al-Qaeda was in Afghanistan, that nation was not the big training ground for the 9-11 terrorists, it was flight schools in Florida. Al-Qaeda can not do anything in Afghanistan that it could do anywhere else in the world; so, beefed-up domestic law enforcement would be the best method to protect against another 9-11, not military intervention abroad.
Also, it would be better for the U.S. and the world if the Taliban forces that marched into Pakistan when the U.S. invaded Afghanistan would march back into Afghanistan when the U.S. leaves, as Afghanistan has no nuclear weapons. Finally, the best way to help provide a decent life for those who would be oppressed by the Taliban/Al-Qaeda would be for many of the nations of the developed world to open immigration for those who would flee Afghanistan.
Regardless of what Obama might say about an "exit strategy" or only upping the troop level for a "temporary period," adding the 30,000+ troops signals to me that Obama will not choose scenario 1 over scenario 2 and that Afghanistan will "turn into a quagmire," will turn into another Viet Nam with many more than 30,000 more troops added.
Edited By Greg on 1259625774
Posted: Mon Nov 30, 2009 4:55 pm
by taki15
I'll add my two cents as an outsider who might see things with a more cool head.
Landmines are insidious weapons. The problem isn't with those used by the countries and their regular armies to guard their borders, we do along our border with Turkey and there are significant casualties every year among illegal immigrants trying to enter and nobody seems to bother.
The problem is when they are used indiscrimanately(sp?) by guerilla groups in war-torn countries of the third world. Unfortunately their low cost/high efficiency has made them a very popular weapon in such cases with the horrific results we all see among the general and largely unsuspecting populace.
Obama made it very clear from the beginning of his campaign, in 2007, that he would send more troops and pursue more vigorously the war in Afghanistan. John McCain, and many other of the people who criticise him for dithering now, were saying back then that the US could "muddle through" without any additional resources. Liberals are right to worry about a potential quagmire but there are no good options for this mess, especially as long as Pakistan remains unstable and unreliable.
Not only Clinton but Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon were in such a tough spot at this point of their presidencies. That's the price Obama pays for trying to push through perhaps the biggest piece of legislation since the Civil Rights Acts of the '60s.
I read the other day Chuck Todd marveling how this behemoth has'nt derailed yet.
I would also like to provide this article for some perspective:
Obama's Brilliant First Year
Posted: Mon Nov 30, 2009 2:17 pm
by Mister Tee
Sonic Youth wrote:I suppose I could read into the matter further - beyond Unicef and Human Rights Watch -
Which was rather my point. That was where all my initial information came from, and why it was easy for me to buy into "This is evil and must be stopped immediately" -- I'd never heard any positive rationale for it. But there are military justifications for it -- among other things, they're often used as security/border blockers (and are well-labelled, meaning many of the people injured by them are breaking laws by entering the area), sparing danger to military personnel who would otherwise be posted there and could suffer injury or death from people trying to illegally cross borders.
As I said, you may read through all the available literature and still come down in opposition -- in fact, I lean that way myself. I'm simply saying most people's understanding of the issue is based on a sound bite that leads to an obvious, knee-jerk reaction -- much the way people will moan about the woman who got $10 million dollars for spilling McDonald's coffee on herself, unaware it's a far different story when you know the dozens of details that make the woman's case more compelling.
To rebut your family's position would require my knowing their reasons for positions held. I just I'd start by asking, did they also believe in early September 2008 that Sarah Palin had fundamentally changed the elction calculus, and that Obama was running scared? Because an awful lot of people I knew did, egged on by a press corps that repeated it as gospel. This same press corps is pushing "Obama Failure" 24 hours a day now, and I don't doubt emotional contagion has persuaded many people of it. The same ambience existed at about this point in Clinton's first term; Democrats always seem ready to abandon their leaders if things don't change overnight. I see a guy headed in the right direction, who will be judged a success when the actual evaluation period comes up. To me, too many seem to be taking a "Fix it today or fuck you" approach, which I think is silly.
For the record, Firedoglake is a web site run by Jane Hamsher, a sometime movie producer, who seems to take everything Obama does as personal betrayal. I believe she, like many who are the msot hysterical these days, was a heavy Hillary supporter, and has persuaded herself that everything would be different and better if her candidate had won.
That Michael Moore letter is pure garbage, capped off by the disgraceful invocation of Obama's mother. It'd be nice if he managed to at least work in some mention of the fact that Obama said during the campaign things needed to be done in Afghanistan. If Moore thought he was voting for Dennis Kucinich, that's a knock on him, not on Obama.
Any reaction to the NY Times article today, which says Obama's speech tomorrow is going to be framed around the exit strategy from Afghanistan, even while it ups the troop level for a temporary period? That seems to me to put the lie to "we're going into a quagmire", but most people don't even appear to be reacting to it.
Posted: Mon Nov 30, 2009 1:51 pm
by Greg
An Open Letter to President Obama from Michael Moore
Dear President Obama,
Do you really want to be the new "war president"? If you go to West Point tomorrow night (Tuesday, 8pm) and announce that you are increasing, rather than withdrawing, the troops in Afghanistan, you are the new war president. Pure and simple. And with that you will do the worst possible thing you could do -- destroy the hopes and dreams so many millions have placed in you. With just one speech tomorrow night you will turn a multitude of young people who were the backbone of your campaign into disillusioned cynics. You will teach them what they've always heard is true -- that all politicians are alike. I simply can't believe you're about to do what they say you are going to do. Please say it isn't so.
It is not your job to do what the generals tell you to do. We are a civilian-run government. WE tell the Joint Chiefs what to do, not the other way around. That's the way General Washington insisted it must be. That's what President Truman told General MacArthur when MacArthur wanted to invade China. "You're fired!," said Truman, and that was that. And you should have fired Gen. McChrystal when he went to the press to preempt you, telling the press what YOU had to do. Let me be blunt: We love our kids in the armed services, but we f*#&in' hate these generals, from Westmoreland in Vietnam to, yes, even Colin Powell for lying to the UN with his made-up drawings of WMD (he has since sought redemption).
So now you feel backed into a corner. 30 years ago this past Thursday (Thanksgiving) the Soviet generals had a cool idea -- "Let's invade Afghanistan!" Well, that turned out to be the final nail in the USSR coffin.
There's a reason they don't call Afghanistan the "Garden State" (though they probably should, seeing how the corrupt President Karzai, whom we back, has his brother in the heroin trade raising poppies). Afghanistan's nickname is the "Graveyard of Empires." If you don't believe it, give the British a call. I'd have you call Genghis Khan but I lost his number. I do have Gorbachev's number though. It's + 41 22 789 1662. I'm sure he could give you an earful about the historic blunder you're about to commit.
With our economic collapse still in full swing and our precious young men and women being sacrificed on the altar of arrogance and greed, the breakdown of this great civilization we call America will head, full throttle, into oblivion if you become the "war president." Empires never think the end is near, until the end is here. Empires think that more evil will force the heathens to toe the line -- and yet it never works. The heathens usually tear them to shreds.
Choose carefully, President Obama. You of all people know that it doesn't have to be this way. You still have a few hours to listen to your heart, and your own clear thinking. You know that nothing good can come from sending more troops halfway around the world to a place neither you nor they understand, to achieve an objective that neither you nor they understand, in a country that does not want us there. You can feel it in your bones.
I know you know that there are LESS than a hundred al-Qaeda left in Afghanistan! A hundred thousand troops trying to crush a hundred guys living in caves? Are you serious? Have you drunk Bush's Kool-Aid? I refuse to believe it.
Your potential decision to expand the war (while saying that you're doing it so you can "end the war") will do more to set your legacy in stone than any of the great things you've said and done in your first year. One more throwing a bone from you to the Republicans and the coalition of the hopeful and the hopeless may be gone -- and this nation will be back in the hands of the haters quicker than you can shout "tea bag!"
Choose carefully, Mr. President. Your corporate backers are going to abandon you as soon as it is clear you are a one-term president and that the nation will be safely back in the hands of the usual idiots who do their bidding. That could be Wednesday morning.
We the people still love you. We the people still have a sliver of hope. But we the people can't take it anymore. We can't take your caving in, over and over, when we elected you by a big, wide margin of millions to get in there and get the job done. What part of "landslide victory" don't you understand?
Don't be deceived into thinking that sending a few more troops into Afghanistan will make a difference, or earn you the respect of the haters. They will not stop until this country is torn asunder and every last dollar is extracted from the poor and soon-to-be poor. You could send a million troops over there and the crazy Right still wouldn't be happy. You would still be the victim of their incessant venom on hate radio and television because no matter what you do, you can't change the one thing about yourself that sends them over the edge.
The haters were not the ones who elected you, and they can't be won over by abandoning the rest of us.
President Obama, it's time to come home. Ask your neighbors in Chicago and the parents of the young men and women doing the fighting and dying if they want more billions and more troops sent to Afghanistan. Do you think they will say, "No, we don't need health care, we don't need jobs, we don't need homes. You go on ahead, Mr. President, and send our wealth and our sons and daughters overseas, 'cause we don't need them, either."
What would Martin Luther King, Jr. do? What would your grandmother do? Not send more poor people to kill other poor people who pose no threat to them, that's what they'd do. Not spend billions and trillions to wage war while American children are sleeping on the streets and standing in bread lines.
All of us that voted and prayed for you and cried the night of your victory have endured an Orwellian hell of eight years of crimes committed in our name: torture, rendition, suspension of the bill of rights, invading nations who had not attacked us, blowing up neighborhoods that Saddam "might" be in (but never was), slaughtering wedding parties in Afghanistan. We watched as hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians were slaughtered and tens of thousands of our brave young men and women were killed, maimed, or endured mental anguish -- the full terror of which we scarcely know.
When we elected you we didn't expect miracles. We didn't even expect much change. But we expected some. We thought you would stop the madness. Stop the killing. Stop the insane idea that men with guns can reorganize a nation that doesn't even function as a nation and never, ever has.
Stop, stop, stop! For the sake of the lives of young Americans and Afghan civilians, stop. For the sake of your presidency, hope, and the future of our nation, stop. For God's sake, stop.
Tonight we still have hope.
Tomorrow, we shall see. The ball is in your court. You DON'T have to do this. You can be a profile in courage. You can be your mother's son.
We're counting on you.
Yours,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com
P.S. There's still time to have your voice heard. Call the White House at 202-456-1111 or email the President.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words....l-moore
Posted: Sun Nov 29, 2009 10:53 pm
by Sonic Youth
Mister Tee wrote:Like, I assume, most, when I first heard years ago about the landmines controversy, I thought it was a no-brainer to be opposed to them. But I heard Bill Clinton explain that, in many cases where they're used, they're an alternative to committing military defensive resources who might suffer life-casualties. I suggest people read into the matter further. You may still well come down on the anti- side, but it shouldn't any longer seem as cut-and-dried as "an innocent child will lose a limb, so ban them".
How about 3,500 innocent children per year, which constitutes half of the deaths and casualties inflicted by landmines? I can't say I'm surprised at the curt, personal jabs throughout your post since I believe you've made some of the same comments before. (I don't know what FiredogLake is.) But I'm very surprised at the callous dismissiveness above.
I suppose I could read into the matter further - beyond Unicef and Human Rights Watch - but is it not safe to assume that the 158 other countries who signed the treaty have done the necessary reading on our behalf, or are they misguided?
I admit I'm not entirely sure what "military defensive resources who might suffer life-casualties" are, but I'm guessing you mean troops. Well, troops sent overseas aren't the only ones who suffer life-casualties. Does this argument extend to other tools of war, like uranium-tipped bunker busters? At least there's little danger of an American troop getting blown up after he's sent home, but landmines are the gifts that keep on giving.
Happily, one person who understands how the system works and is confident about waiting for the end result is Obama. There's not a day goes by I'm not thankful he's the president.
Speaking of thankful, you would have been a minority of one at the family Thanksgiving dinner. What a change from last year that was, when everyone (except me) had stars in their eyes with the prospects of a President Obama. Otherwise, this year, everyone to a one (okay, there were only six of us), agreed what a disappointment this new president is proving to be. And these are all intelligent, well-read, politically decent people, half of them (okay, three of them) in their fifties and sixties and more likely to read the New York Times than firedoglake, or any blog at all for that matter.
Posted: Sun Nov 29, 2009 1:16 pm
by Mister Tee
I'm late weighing in here, but, Jesus Christ...
Comparing Afghanistan to Vietnam at this point is beyond silly, and tends to reinforce the media stereotype that left-wing foreign policy amounts to War is Not Heathy for Children and Other Living Things. The horror of Vietnam wasn't the initial troop commitment; it was that LBJ and Co. kept doubling and tripling down on the bet when it went bad. I think it's clear from Obama's initial resistance and pushback to the generals' proposals that he's got a very wary eye on this, and everything's on a short leash. And, as Heksagon says, the options in Afghanistan thanks to 7 years of Bush mismanagement only range from the dreaful to the not-so-dreadful.
Like, I assume, most, when I first heard years ago about the landmines controversy, I thought it was a no-brainer to be opposed to them. But I heard Bill Clinton explain that, in many cases where they're used, they're an alternative to committing military defensive resources who might suffer life-casualties. I suggest people read into the matter further. You may still well come down on the anti- side, but it shouldn't any longer seem as cut-and-dried as "an innocent child will lose a limb, so ban them".
On the whole, I think the FiredogLake lefties are behaving like spoiled children at this point in Obama's presidency -- ignoring the many positive things he's done and concentrating on any tiny disappointment, some of which are not even denied, simply deferred. Health care is now officially further along than it ever has been in American history, and lefties are whining that Barack isn't publicly flogging Joe Lieberman into submission (because we all know nothing changes a Senator's vote like open humiliation). Let's wait till we get to the end before we render a verdict, ok? I read a few months ago in the Times about the many stages the '64 Civil Rights Bill went through -- the many deals and concessions offered -- before it became law. This is the NORMAL way legislation is produced. What we have now, unfortuantely, is the first major piece of legislation attempted during the era of the 24-hour news cycle and the political blogs, and a bunch of amateurs and know-nothings are making declarations on a daily basis when they should be showing patience.
Happily, one person who understands how the system works and is confident about waiting for the end result is Obama. There's not a day goes by I'm not thankful he's the president.
Posted: Thu Nov 26, 2009 9:04 am
by Sonic Youth
Heksagon wrote:Well, it didn't last too long for people on this board to become disappointed with Obama.
Don't look at me. I didn't vote for him.
Edited By Sonic Youth on 1259244337
Posted: Thu Nov 26, 2009 7:36 am
by Heksagon
Well, it didn't last too long for people on this board to become disappointed with Obama.
What were you expecting, really? Concerning Afghanistan, it was always a choice between several bad alternatives. The mess in Afghanistan is not his fault, and there is nothing really genial to be done there.
But he did get/is getting the health care reform done? Isn't that something? Certainly it's more than just "nice while it lasted"?
And concering his massive efforts to revive the economy - well I am probably the only one on this board who has really criticized them, and even I think that the current administration's economic policy is an improvement over the previous one.
Posted: Wed Nov 25, 2009 11:58 am
by Greg
Eric wrote:Not to be Italiano about it, but were you all sleepwalking to the fact that you live in America?
Actually, the polls I've seen show the American people split down the middle as to whether more troops should be sent to Afghanistan.
Posted: Wed Nov 25, 2009 11:55 am
by Eric
Not to be Italiano about it, but were you all sleepwalking to the fact that you live in America?
Posted: Wed Nov 25, 2009 11:46 am
by Sabin
Ooh. Yeaaaaaaah. This is bad. Until the post-apocalypse, no war is going to come down to landmines.
Posted: Wed Nov 25, 2009 12:27 am
by Damien
Add me to Disillusioned. It Was Nice While It Lasted. Damn, it was so much nicer being in favor of the President than not, but -- quel surprise! -- here I am forced into negative territory.
Edited By Damien on 1259132117
Posted: Wed Nov 25, 2009 12:05 am
by OscarGuy
The troops thing doesn't really bother me since we're still trying to clean up Bush's fuck ups...and by sending needed troops in, we can hope things will go more like Iraq when it finally got the troops it needed.
But the Landmines thing is bull shit. Obama should know better than that. Who gives a fuck if our security needs them? A five year old wandering accidentally into a mind field sure doesn't feel secure when blown up by one.
Posted: Tue Nov 24, 2009 10:30 pm
by Sonic Youth