War is peace?

Alright, now ask yourself why they want to cut American heads off.

Daniel Pearl was beheaded after the Bush torture program began and it was common knowledge in the middle east but not in the US. What does that indicate?

The point you fail to understand is that it will NEVER END even if you pull out troops. This hate will go on for generations thanks to people like you who support its perpetuation. And tell me how you exit honorably after this? I know there is danger in this world but you sound downright paranoid. Were you this gung ho while Bush was pushing this war for the same reason you are now? Again, when are you signing up to go?

Are you accepting of the fact that the US is conducting offensive military operations (with hired mercenaries, but that is yet another topic) in a sovereign state (Pakistan) with out the state's approval?

Under international conventions and US law, this act(s) defines war crimes.

@sleep

Actually i am glad we are involved in Pakistan too. Pakistan is a military dictatorship which is infiltrated with terrorist sympathizers to its highest branches of Government AND it is a nuclear power. I dont think youd be so self righteous if say one of those nukes goes missing and winds up vaporizing an American city would you?

Precisely.

We all wish we lived in a perfect world where defense is not required, but we don't.

Simplistic opposition to all war should not be justification for throwing the President under the bus: in doing so, these poor dupes do the GOP's dirty work for it.

So the answer is 'yeah, war crimes are OK when we do it'

Is that accurate?

Actually, I am not a pacifist since there are scenarios in which I would take up arms. WWII for instance. My position is that there are steps that could be taken to halt the eventuality of war becoming necessary. It is true that the Allies are in part responsible for the environment in which Nazi Germany came into being. There are of course people who will try to say that I want to reward wrong-doers by failing to mete out every bit of punishment that could be given, including isolation and insecurity, but that is exactly the kind of thinking that leads to the perpetuation of the environment which fosters conflict and the sanguine capitulation to there always being war in the world.

I am obviously not talking about throwing our hands up to the world and saying "We aren't going to fight anymore!" and then failing to defend ourselves by letting whoever do whatever to us in the hope that people will see the futility of war. My opposition to war is not simplistic. I do not think it will be overnight or easy. It takes a long time to build trust. Especially with a history like ours. Which means we would have to not only become trustworthy but remain so over generations.

You people who have given in to, or, I daresay have perhaps never even questioned the simplistic notion that there is war in the world and that is just the way it is, do nothing but fail to see that if both war and (at least my version of) peace require sacrifice of some kind, and you choose the sacrifice of war, you are doing so for the base reason that you don't want to feel like you let someone get over on you. This is a typically short-sighted human view. Life is now much more complex than it was when we developed that impulse. It no longer means certain death to sacrifice violent retaliation. To sacrifice the image of being one with whom no one fucks, as it were. To sacrifice real things lost in the name of making an effort to change the global environment into one that fosters foremost an honest effort to understand is a next logical step in our development as a species.

Things are much more dynamic than any one will ever see so long as that one remains locked mentally within the span of his life.

Edit: I guess I clicked "reply" though I meant to make this a standalone post.

War is never good. War is obsolete. We are fighting for a territory in the information age when an enemy can control their forces from anywhere in the world with a freakin cell phone. We take over Afghanistan and then what? They move to Iran or 15 other countries. This is war for oil profit bullshit at an unaffordable cost to our country languishing in foreclosure and joblessness.

"War is obsolete" HAHAHAHAHAHA! Do you have ANY idea how many wars are being fought around the globe right now that have nothing to do with U.S. troops? Holy Ned, what are you SMOKING?!!!

As to fighting myself, nice try, Jan. I am 48. They wouldn't take me if I volunteered. Would I want my son to go? Nope. We have a volunteer military in this country, Jan. They join, presumably, because they are prepared to sacrifice their lives in an often violent world (whether WE like it or not) to protect this country's interests. That is what they are doing. I want them to get the job done and come home safely as quickly as possible.

Yes, there are going to be casualties. That is the terrible choice a President must make. If we lose several hundred or even several thousand good, honorable American soldiers, will that protect tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands who would be exposed if Afghanistan became a terrorist state? Those are the facts Obama spent so much time trying to marshall. He would not likely say so at this time, but he REALLY wants to be reelected. He does not want a bloodbath in Afghanistan. But he does not want Americans to feel insecure in their own country...the way most of us felt in the days and weeks after 9/11.

What a line of crap.

Many of the people who do join the armed forces don't do it out of sense of honor and respect for history, they do it because its the only job they can do, or some do it for the inducements of education benefits, or to have a license to kill. Not all soldiers are doing their jobs out of loyalty as much as they are out of necessity.

I am opposed to wars fought for the sake of profits.

Your point is extremely well taken as to resentment and anger toward the U.S. We had won the war in Afghanistan and could have prevented the resurgence of terrorists there had Bush not conducted his illegal and immoral invasion of Iraq, which has caused more anger and resentment toward the U.S. than any other action by our country in my lifetime. Bushco took their eye off the ball, and we now face the possibility of the Terrorist State of Afghanistan.

I just don't think many people understand what that could mean. Perhaps they think that Afghanistan is, like, the size of Delaware and is therefore no big deal. That is, of course, incorrect. Perhaps they think that Afghanistan is too poor to export terrorism if the terrorists seize the government. Wrong again. Not only is money pouring in from sympathizers in other Middle Eastern and African "interests" (primarily), but the drug trade out of Afghanstan if it were not being suppressed as it is now would dwarf the current revenues flowing into that country and would fund those organizations to the point that they could export their violent ideology in an every more sophisticated and deadly way.

Great chess players think ten moves ahead. You simply MUST think about the consequences for the world if we don't drop those bastards right now...

I often resort to profanity by default and so I say fuckin' A, peterzylstramoore.

P,

Your comment starts out by saying that OBAMA has the largest military budget in history. I didn't even bother reading the rest, frankly, because that observation is absurd. Under what possible governmental framework did you decide that the U.S. military budget was OBAMA's? So you are saying that the Pentagon had nothing to do with the budget, right? And Congress had nothing to do with the budget? And the Bush Adminstration that started the wars we have to pay for had nothing to do with the budget? Nor did the Congresses during that Administration? Uh huh.

Had you started the argument by saying that the military budget was the largest in history, it would have at least been worth proceeding to the second point. But when you engage in that kind of distortion from the outset, your credibility -- at least on this issue -- was shot as far as I am concerned.

CZtheDay,
It may be easy for you to write me off b/c I call it Obama's military budget, but it is not as if we don't have a democratic majority, and it is not as if Obama is pushing for troop surges, extending military bases in Columbia, supporting a coup that was immediately condemned by the OAS and the UN. This is an Obama supported military budget, and it is the same Obama that is talking about needing to be careful with our budget when it comes to a second stimulus.

If it makes you feel justified in your views to right me off for characterizing something as his that he supported (and as I am sure you did in suggesting the Iraq war is Bushes though it also went through congress) then feel justified. If your interested in asking the same kind of questions you would ask a republican president, then we can have a discussion.

P, when did the current military budget become approved. Did it include the additional troops the Pentagon requested and Obama reduced by roughly 10,000? Is it your opinion that the Pentagon is primarily a Republican-leaning or Democrat-leaning set of organizations? I simply do not believe that it is Obama's budget...nor do I believe that the size of that budget is even relevant. How did we get there in the first place? Why wasn't this war won and over with years before Obama even took office. Why does he even have to deal with this shit? THOSE are the relevant questions, P.

CZtheDay,
I know you don't like to criticize Obama, despite the fact that he has the highest military budget in US history, despite the fact that he did not keep the banks from handing out even larger bonusses then before the banking collapse but we have to offer the same level of critical thinking that we do to Bush to Obama.
Intelligence experts (not generals from the military) have always recognized the you don't solve terrorism through war. The economy is thoroughly screwed in Afganistan, and the US and Obama are showing very little willingness to spend anything on real reconstruction. They are arming warlords and druglords and anyone who is willing to stand up against todays terrorist, which is exactly how these terrorists and organizations that were currently fighting were originally formed. I recognize that their is a lot of anger and hatred towards America in the middle east, but we have sewn that through a history of interventions after resources and through a history of incredible bias towards Israel.
Recently under Obama we supported a coup in Honduras, as the US did in Haiti, and Venezuela before it, just this last century, and if you look back three decades the history is even uglier.
If Obama would stand up to Israel and make any aid military or otherwise dependent first on stopping increases in settlements, and then a plan for slowly handing back the occupied territories... If we want real peace we have to recognize that we can't act unilaterally, and it means that "international institutions" aren't in the words of a former president "weapons of the weak" but the way forward. If the US recognized that as a declining hegemon it has the choice of eventually becoming China's bitch as it has a much higher population, and therefor higher economic peak, and rather than playing a game of allies and enemies, I suggest that the only legitimate force is a democratic UN, which could be fully democratized, which individual nations could slowly handover their nuclear weapons, and for which the US could play a real part in generating international norms and rules for engagement. The US as current hegemon has that choice.
It has the same choice for the World Bank, The WTO, and other institutions. It is the real force. But Obama is a PR campaign for US empire.
I am incredibly sorry about your Grandpa. I don't deny that their is just wars, the second world war, after Germany went on the offensive was one of them. However their are many unjust wars where the civilian anger of 90% plus civilian casualties, the destruction of economies, the long term effects of the types of weapons we are using are not adequately measured. These types of wars just lead to the continuation of war.

cztheday - How do you define a WIN in this war?

Lovelander, please see my later post on this thread. We have to disrupt the ability of the terrorist groups operating out of Afghanistan and just across the border in Pakistan to the point where they cease to pose a realistically significant threat to the U.S. and its allies. At that point we exit honorably, cleaning up the damage we did to the innocent Afghanistan public to the very best of our abilities and then hopefully establish a small and truly multinational force (i.e., not one that is incredibly dominated by U.S. forces) to continue to monitor the situation so that any sign of a resurgence can be quickly addressed. Obama should NOT be having to do this. But he was handed a steaming platter and not accepting that responsibility would have been the height of dishonor.

BTW: as to the notion that I don't like to criticize Obama, that is simply untrue. I have stated at least a half dozen times on this site that he was not even among my top three candidates during the Demoractic PRIMARIES. And when the field was narrowed to two, I made clear my position that I thought Ms. Clinton was the better choice.

But Obama/Biden was so clearly superior to McCain/Palin that the choice there was rather easy (and this is from a man who considers himself an Independent and has voted for Republican candidates over the years where they were clearly the superior choice). The notion that McCain could have handled this war better is so laughable that it is not even worth the debate. I applaud his survival skills and his bravery, but he was a West Point fuck up, a fuck up pilot who was shot down while deviating from formation and an armchair warrior for the rest of his career. Give. Me. A. Break.

@RFID

Let me start out by saying I do NOT support what we did in Iraq. Not only was the war unjustified by any means, we had NO plan of action for what to do when we got there. However, Obama is just cleaning up the mess Bush left behind. As nice as it would be to just up and leave now its not reasonable. If weve already spent this much time in Iraq and Afghanistan then we sure as hell better make sure we didnt just waste all those lives and money for no reason.

And yes i agree that the insurgency is largely caused by having a foreign power on home soil. Hell i dont blame them for wanting us out. However, nation building takes time. You cant just come in and overthrow a government and leave the next day. Iraq is just beginning to be able to stand up on its own and as they do US military personnel are shipping out. Afghanistan on the other hand is in NO position to be allowed to self-govern again. They still need a few years of assistance before their government will be ready to function properly. If we leave now the whole country will become a breeding ground for terrorism and extremism again. The only thing that can be worse than 5 more years in Afghanistan is leaving and having to come back again and stay for another 10 years.

Damn CZTHEDAY, when you let it all out you sure dont hold back do ya?

I dont think I have ever heard you talk like that before.

Political disclaimers aside -

If the goal in Afgan is as you state: "the point where they cease to pose a realistically significant threat to the U.S. and its allies."

Then we already lost. That will never happen. They do not pose a realistic threat even though many would have you believe that. They do not have a military, navy etc - logistically how would they invade us or attack us??

Terrorism is a criminal act not WAR and the US Supreme Court has confirmed it. The WTC building owners were indemnified for their property loss - if by definition terrorism was an act of WAR those property insurance policies would have excluded coverage.

If you want to identify realistic threats first start looking at Countries with military and financial capabilities.

fun_size

I am sure 'failure is not an option' but what if it is the eventual outcome?
Then the death toll triples, the casualties quintuple, the terrorists multiply, the attacks on America interests increase and the US taxpayer is out 10 to 20 trillion dollars. For what?
Military commanders and experts quietly acknowledge this will take 10 to 20 years, barring failure.

they should go back to calling it the war dept......

Indeed. The US military has never been deployed in defense of the nation in history that I am aware of.

@sleep

What about the War of 1812? Or maybe World War 2? We were attacked in both of these wars and fought on home soil.

"What about the War of 1812? Or maybe World War 2? We were attacked in both of these wars and fought on home soil."

On January 27, 1941, Joseph C. Grew, the U.S. ambassador to Japan, wired Washington that he'd learned of the surprise attack Japan was preparing for Pearl Harbour. On September 24, a dispatch from Japanese naval intelligence to Japan's consul general in Honolulu was deciphered. The transmission was a request for a grid of exact locations of ships in Pearl Harbour. Surprisingly, Washington chose not to share this information with the officers at Pearl Harbour. Then, on November 26, the main body of the Japanese strike force (consisting of six aircraft carriers, two battleships, three cruisers, nine destroyers, eight tankers, 23 fleet submarines, and five midget submarines) departed Japan for Hawaii.
Despite the myth that the strike force maintained strict radio silence, US Naval intelligence intercepted and translated many dispatches. And, there was no shortage of dispatches: Tokyo sent over 1000 transmissions to the attack fleet before it reached Hawaii. Some of these dispatches, in particular this message from Admiral Yamamoto, left no doubt that Pearl Harbour was the target of a Japanese attack: "The task force, keeping its movement strictly secret and maintaining close guard against submarines and aircraft, shall advance into Hawaiian waters, and upon the very opening of hostilities shall attack the main force of the United States fleet and deal it a mortal blow. The first air raid is planned for the dawn of x-day. Exact date to be given by later order."
Even on the night before the attack, US intelligence decoded a message pointing to Sunday morning as a deadline for some kind of Japanese action. The message was delivered to the Washington high command more than four hours before the attack on Pearl Harbour. But, as many messages before, it was withheld from the Pearl Harbour commanders.Although many ships were damaged at Pearl Harbour, they were all old and slow. The main targets of the Japanese attack fleet were the Pacific Fleet's aircraft carriers, but Roosevelt made sure these were safe from the attack: in November, at about the same time as the Japanese attack fleet left Japan, Roosevelt sent the Lexington and Enterprise out to sea. Meanwhile, the Saratoga was in San Diego.

Cont.

Part 2
Why did Pearl Harbour happen? Roosevelt wanted a piece of the war pie. Having failed to bait Hitler by giving $50.1 billion in war supplies to Britain, the Soviet Union, France and China as part of the Lend Lease program, Roosevelt switched focus to Japan. Because Japan had signed a mutual defence pact with Germany and Italy, Roosevelt knew war with Japan was a legitimate back door to joining the war in Europe. On October 7, 1940, one of Roosevelt's military advisors, Lieutenant Commander Arthur McCollum, wrote a memo detailing an 8-step plan that would provoke Japan into attacking the United States. Over the next year, Roosevelt implemented all eight of the recommended actions. In the summer of 1941, the US joined England in an oil embargo against Japan. Japan needed oil for its war with China, and had no remaining option but to invade the East Indies and Southeast Asia to get new resources. And that required getting rid of the US Pacific Fleet first.
Although Roosevelt may have got more than he bargained for, he clearly let the attack on Pearl Harbour happen, and even helped Japan by making sure their attack was a surprise. He did this by withholding information from Pearl Harbour's commanders and even by ensuring the attack force wasn't accidentally discovered by commercial shipping traffic. As Rear Admiral Richmond K. Turner stated in 1941: "We were prepared to divert traffic when we believed war was imminent. We sent the traffic down via the Torres Strait, so that the track of the Japanese task force would be clear of any traffic."

I can't speak to the war in 1812 but, it was in 1812. Quite a while ago, no?

Kill ALL Humans to prevent WAR!

I would say the most self-destructive force in the solar system is the sun.

Thanks. I did and you are correct, it was excellent.