So does the Chief of our military have any idea what he is doing?
I am really starting to question if he does... Thoughts?
CNN Iraqi Will to Fight
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The middle east is a region of the world where there are only bad choices. Almost by definition, to make any choice at all is to make a mistake. For us in the middle east, any decision about how to intervene is just a decision about in what way we are going to make things worse.
--Hiram
There are two schools of thought. One, that Obama is deliberately trying to destroy the United States as a world power, or two, that he is simply grossly incompetent. I remember how the Clintons, faced with the choice of criminality or incompetence to explain their behavior, chose incompetence every time but were not believed. I think Obama has a far better chance of selling that explanation. Of course, gross ideology-driven stupidity would also work.
I think if you want an example of how an American president goes about destroying the country, you don't have to look much further than the Bush administration, which combined both foreign and domestic disasters in an unprecedented way. We are living with the consequences of those disastrous policies today, and will be for the foreseeable future. In foreign policy terms, we simply cannot fight all the wars Republicans want us to fight. And as we are learning, there is no one to fight them for, as our nominal allies who never liked us melt away in the face of enemies who hate us.
The Jihadist view of the world, one that's shared by Fox News and many Republicans, is that we are engaged in a war between Islam and the west. Our enemies call us "crusaders". It is perhaps useful to remind ourselves of the lessons our enemies take from the crusadea. The crusaders lasted in the holy land for a long time, but they didn't last forever, ultimately because they didn't have local support. They learned the lesson then, that Republicans and Fox refuse to learn now, that you do not make friends with people by waging war against them.
As for competence, that's only valuable when it's used as a tool for sound policy. The really terrifying thing about the Bush administration is that it pursued it's disastrous middle east policy with immense competence. They were so good at causing catastrophe. It was a positive talent for them.
There aren't any good options here. We need to do what we can to limit the damage to our interests, and I frankly have no idea what the path forward should be, but Republican calls to put thousands more troops on the ground don't feel like the answer to me. If you're serious about fighting ISIS, you have to do so in Iraq and Syria. And the Iraqi government has proven it's not up to the challenge, while in Syria, there's no faction who is ready to take over there. My sense is that once you start opening the spigot for more troops there, it's going to be real easy to get us back to having 100,000 troops on the ground, engaged in full combat.
Let's assume, using our marvelous imaginations, that what you say about Bush's Mideast policy is true. That is the past. How does that even BEGIN to excuse Obama's utter incompetence (another assumption) at "losing" both Iraq and Afghanistan, plus Syria and Libya?
I have never been too eager to engage in the argument over whether George Bush lied us into the war in Iraq. Considered broadly, it's just too difficult a question to answer. But one subset of statements, that I find very difficult to regard anything other than lies, were the ones that said we would be greeted as liberators. The idea that waging war on a people is a way of befriending people is just too contrary to everything I know about people and history to be capable of belief. Let there be no doubt, that in prioritizing the war in the middle east the way we do, the tradeoff is that we are making enemies forever.
"How does that even BEGIN to excuse Obama's utter incompetence (another assumption) at "losing" both Iraq and Afghanistan, plus Syria and Libya?"
You can't lose what you have never had. Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Libya were never ours to begin with, so it simply wasn't possible for us to "lose" them.
--Hiram
It could be worse.
For those people critical of Obama what do you think should have been done differently? What would you do now?
I'd rather have Obama or Hillary as commander and chief rather than any of the GOP candidates.
The real problems with Obama’s ISIS strategy, in one paragraph
I hope Obama resists the calls to send in combat troops.
Laurie,
How could it be worse?
The world has a very vocal group who is growing in power that violently executes anyone who believes differently than themselves. Their visibility, marketing and success is encouraging our country's children to join them in committing violent acts over there and here. This will likely result in some significant domestic terrorism result at sometime that makes the Boston bombing seem small.
And this is mostly because Obama and crew decided to remove the stabilizing forces from the area while encouraging people to over throw their dictators. I agree that Bush and crew also own some of the responsibility, but remember that this started way back when Saddam invaded Kuwait.
ISIS Map
Let's not forget how the Iraqi pullout occurred. President Bush negotiated an agreement with the Iraqi government to pull out U.S. troops at the end of 2011. President Obama tried to negotiate a new status of forces agreement with the Iraqi government, but the Iraqis insisted on having the ability to prosecute American soldiers for collateral damage that occurred during combat situations. (Based on the makeup of the Iraqi legislative body, there was very little possibility of them supporting a new SOFA that didn't include that provision.)
That, obviously, is unacceptable. If we had continued to stay in Iraq without a new SOFA, we would have lost the legal basis for being there, and we would have been viewed as invaders. The right thing to do was to accept the Iraqis sovereign decision (even if it was stupid on their part).
The question is what do we do now? We can help Iraqi troops call in airstrikes, but if you want "victory" instead of merely "containment", you're going to need to insert tens of thousands of American troops again or perform mass backbone transplants on the Iraqi military. So what is it?
I am pretty sure the USA could have solved the SOFA issue if we would have wanted to, however Obama had promised to exit and he chose to exit.
What to do now? Obama needs to decide if this is containment or elimination? Then let the Generals do what Generals do and fund the choice. But saying it is elimination and doing little is pointless and costing the USA credibility.
"I am pretty sure the USA could have solved the SOFA issue if we would have wanted to"
Let's look back at the reporting at the time, shall we?
But ending the U.S. troop presence in Iraq was an overwhelmingly popular demand among Iraqis, and Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki appears to have been unwilling to take the political risk of extending it. While he was inclined to see a small number of American soldiers stay behind to continue mentoring Iraqi forces, the likes of Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, on whose support Maliki’s ruling coalition depends, were having none of it. Even the Obama Administration’s plan to keep some 3,000 trainers behind failed because the Iraqis were unwilling to grant them the legal immunity from local prosecution that is common to SOF agreements in most countries where U.S. forces are based.
Time Magazine, 10/21/11
But talks ran aground over Iraqi opposition to giving American troops legal immunity that would shield them from Iraqi prosecution. Legal protection for U.S. troops has always angered everyday Iraqis who saw it as simply a way for the Americans to run roughshod over the country. Many Iraqi lawmakers were hesitant to grant immunity for fear of a backlash from constituents.
When the Americans asked for immunity, the Iraqi side answered that it was not possible," al-Maliki told a news conference Saturday. "The discussions over the number of trainers and the place of training stopped. Now that the issue of immunity was decided and that no immunity to be given, the withdrawal has started.
AP via HuffPo, 10/22/11
This month, American officials pressed the Iraqi leadership to meet again at President Talabani's compound to discuss the issue. This time the Americans asked them to take a stand on the question of immunity for troops, hoping to remove what had always been the most difficult hurdle. But they misread Iraqi politics and the Iraqi public. Still burdened by the traumas of this and previous wars, and having watched the revolutions sweeping their region, the Iraqis were unwilling to accept anything that infringed on their sovereignty.
NYT, 10/22/11
"What to do now? Obama needs to decide if this is containment or elimination? Then let the Generals do what Generals do and fund the choice. But saying it is elimination and doing little is pointless and costing the USA credibility."
So, your plan is to continue to Monday-morning quarterback. You're willing to be definitive on how Obama mucked up the situation, but unwilling to commit to what we should do instead?
Regarding SOFA, it was a negotiation. Not sure how hard we tried, however we have bought these before.
After decades of listening to Liberals blame the Bushes for the messes, maybe I adopted a bad habit.
As for what to do... I am of 2 minds.
My empathetic side says to go in and blow up all the "bad guys" to save all the "good guys, women, children".
My pragmatic cold side says contain the mess, ship as many combatants as possible to the region and let them kill each other as they have been doing for millenia.
Now the questions are what will the Commander in Chief say? And what will he do? And are they aligned?
How could it be worse? You have no imagination, John. We could still be fighting a war in Iraq or elsewhere, that involves tens of thousands of soldiers (or more) and hundreds of billions of dollars. We could have suffered another terrorist attack.
I don't believe you have mentioned what you think Obama should be doing differently. Do you think it is time to redeploy troops?
Millions of peaceful family people like yourself are dying, going hungry, being enslaved, being executed, being raped and/or being displaced, and all you can say is "WE" this, "WE" that, etc.
Where is that caring, giving, heart on her sleeve Liberal who thinks it is terrible that people are made to work to pay for their own food, housing and health insurance?
If Iraq is willing, I am happy to have our "all volunteer" military back in Iraq. Just make sure the Commander in Chief gives them clear goals. Personally I think we could draw down a whole bunch of them from Korea...
I know things are always more complicated than they appear from 5000 miles away, but it has never been clear to me why we don't just drop a missile down the new Caliph's pants and end their self-made legend of invincibility real quick. One reason I can think of is that Obama still thinks that if we're just nice to them they will turn all goody-two-shoes. From 500 miles away, that looks like an idiot to me.
One would think most of the good guys have exited the area and that your proposal would make sense. Unfortunately I think there are a whole bunch of those slaves I mentioned trapped where the bombs would drop. That would be bad...
I was thinking about Laurie's question.
If 5 guys are walking down a road and they see 2 guys beating and raping a woman in the alley, what should they do?
I mean involving themselves would put their health and future well being at risk. The 2 guys may have a gun, they could die. Maybe they should just go home, kiss their wives and deny what they saw...
We were at war in Iraq for 8 years and spent a trillion dollars and couldn't win a stable, lasting peace. How much longer do you think we should fight over there? Maybe the people who live in Iraq and the middle east need to fight their own wars. I think our tax dollars are better spent here. btw, when I joined the large anti war protests back in 2003 we were right, it was a dumb war.
If we want to be more humanitarian I favor additional funding for food programs to reduce the millions of hunger related deaths each year.
"If 5 guys are walking down a road and they see 2 guys beating and raping a woman in the alley, what should they do?"
Should the U.S. be committing thousands of troops to stop genocide in Africa? Where do you draw the line?
Based on history there are 2 criteria.
1. People need help
2. Security of America or her allies are threatened
I think the Middle East Terrorist / Oil situation meets both criteria, where as we will need to just keep feeding the folks in Africa.
I think the place to start is to acknowledge that there is evil and there are evil-doers in the world, and that WE are supposedly the good guys. Obama does not grasp that very simple reality, I am convinced. Now, what you do about that is to first, separate out those cases where there are US interests-- economic, political, humanitarian, all of them count-- and then further winnow them down to where there is something we can realistically do about it. Iraq was a clear case of a very bad guy running wild-- gassing his own citizens, sons raping willy-nilly, taking over a nearby country, threatening international trade, etc.. We had the means-- massive military might backed by a coalition of 21 nations-- to do something about this evil. We created a stable government (some think we should not have engaged in "nation-building" but I think it was a case of "you broke it, you bought it" and to do otherwise would have put the same crazies that we now see back in charge) but not one able to defend itself. Many things we could have done along the way, but we haven't done them because, well, you can decide whether Obama is criminally complicit, hopelessly naive or grossly incompetent. "We" won't solve the bigger problem until "we" do something about that one.
Applying that to your hypothetical, you (or 5 guys, doesn't matter), first challenge the evil-doers. Tell them to stop. If they pull a gun, run until you can pull yours or, lacking that, until you can call a cop, or find someone who can call a cop. That's what I did. If they don't have a gun, you make the call whether a physical confrontation might or might not work out for you. Criminals generally don't like interference and prefer to find easier victims, in which case you chase until you find a cop. Whip ISIS convincingly a few times and they will slither away. And if not, they'll all die and that's OK, too.
"it was a dumb war"
I don't think there are any smart wars, just necessary ones that are consistent with American values.
I am a pragmatic person, people die in the world every day due to violent power hungry people, starvation, disease, etc. Many bring it upon themselves by having too many children.
What to do about it is a very complicated issue. However I don't think closing our eyes to it and focusing efforts on giving / promoting America's poor is the right answer.
I just read in an article that 42% of children born in MN were born to Mom's who were on medicare. I am not feeling too sorry for those Mom's.
The problem is that all the problems that we unleashed by our invasion of Iraq were foreseeable (and some people who were marginalized out of the go-to-war conversation did foresee them). The general who said that we would need 300,000 troops to occupy the country for a period of many years was given the bum's rush. Plenty of others pointed out that the Iranian-tied Shia majority would be likely to seek revenge against the Sunnis, or that folks wouldn't feel bound by any sort of Iraqi nationalism because until the West drew lines on a map, it never existed as a concept. But we deluded ourselves into believing that we could break it and fix it and we'd have a functioning, America-friendly democracy that we could use as our gas pump.
We're not going to be able to make good decisions about what we can/should do until we accept the limits of our power. Just because we're America doesn't mean that we can force change on the rest of the world.
about "I don't think there are any smart wars, just necessary ones that are consistent with American values."
so knowing what we know now do you think going to war with Iraq in 2003 was the right decision? Jeb and some of the other GOP candidates have been having a hard time with this question.
"so knowing what we know now do you think going to war with Iraq in 2003 was the right decision?"
This the wrong question, though. All the potential downsides of the invasion were known before the invasion. The real question is how do we ensure a better process the next time we have to make such a decision, so we don't get groupthunk into another disastrous war?
So since you have ignored my question about was the Iraq war a mistake I will answer it with an opinion poll.
"Going to war with Iraq was the wrong thing to do, American voters say 59 - 32 percent. Republicans support the 2003 decision 62 - 28 percent, while opposition is 78 - 16 percent among Democrats and 65 - 26 percent among independent voters.
Considering how partisan people are it must have been a really dumb war if 26 percent of republicans think it was a mistake.
Hi Laurie,
I am sorry, I must have dazed off. What people think today is somewhat pointless, as Sean says it is easy to be a Monday morning quarterback.
Please note what people thought in 2002.
Would I have supported invading Iraq knowing what I know now? Yes
Would I have done things differently? Yes
Now a question for you. What would you have done in 2002?
Please remember where we were:
- No Fly Zones were being maintained.
- Saddam was killing Iraqi citizens.
- After ~10 years, Saudi Arabia wanted the foreign militaries out of their country.
In essence, we had a killer tiger in an expensive time consuming politically unstable cage. If we relax the cage, the tiger would eat the Kurds and Southern Shiites.
Options:
- Maintain cage indefinitely and hope. Kind of like Iran / North Korea but worse.
- Walk away and let the Tiger eat our in country allies.
- Kill the tiger and have faith that the Iraqi people wanted peace and prosperity.
- Other?
Seems to me we're asking the wrong question. "Knowing what you know now, would you have gone to war in Iraq?" Should be, "knowing what you knew THEN, would you ...?"
"Was going to war with Iraq the wrong thing to do?" Has to be tempered with "compared to what, going to Disney World?" A better question would be, "Given the options available, was a war with Saddam Hussein the best one?" I would say it was the only one. Like John says, what we did after that decision might have affected the current situation, but I then think you have to ask another question: "Knowing what you know now, would you have voted for Barack Obama as President?"
""Given the options available, was a war with Saddam Hussein the best one?" I would say it was the only one."
No, there were plenty of other options. For instance, we could have allowed the inspections to work (the UN -- not us -- turned out to be correct about Saddam's WMD capabilities), while tightening the no-fly zone (it only covered parts of the country), and used airstrikes to enforce Iraqi noncompliance Clinton's 1998 airstrikes were very effective in destroying what was left of the WMD programs, and in setting the stage to allow the inspectors back in).
Sean,
Your recommendations don't address the reality of that point in time. Our local allies were losing patience with maintaining the no fly zone cage. It had been 10 years with little change.
The only other realistic option would have been discontinue the no fly zone and maintain sanctions. (ie Iran, N Korea, Cuba, etc) Saddam would have killed / punished the Kurds / Shiites, however Iraq would have been a stable and relatively peaceful Dictatorship again.
Based on the past and current behaviors of people in that area of the world, maybe brutal Dictators are what they need. Assad, Hussein, Mubarak, Saudi Royalty, Gadafi, Iran's Religious Leader, etc seem(ed) to keep the peace very well.
Certainly the no-fly zones were an issue for the Saudis, but Saudi cooperation was not essential for maintaining them. We supported our troops in Iraq beginning in late 2003 from bases in Turkey, Kuwait, Qatar, and the UAE.
Now I'm confused. At the beginning of the thread, you were defending the invasion of Iraq. Now you're saying that people in that area of the world need dictators?
I said "maybe"...
Eric has to be one of the farthest Left "Journalists" have ever read. MinnPost Why USA Does Not Win Wars Anymore
And in this case... The glass half empty guy...
"I think everyone would agree that the USA / S VietNam lost in VietNam.
I think the 51 million people enjoying peace, prosperity and freedom in South Korea would say that they won.
The Yugoslavian conflicts seemed to have ended successfully for those who live there.
Afghanistan and Iraq pose an interesting question. The USA's involvement was successful it that it gave them a chance at peace, prosperity, freedom, women's rights, etc. Now can they seize it like South Korea, Japan, Germany, Yugoslivia, the Eastern BLOC countries, etc, or will they waste the opportunity." G2A
Eric is very moderate compared to most of the journalists I read. In this case I think your disagreement is with Mark Kukis, whose analysis of modern war and the difficulty in winning sounds about right to me.
MP Comment:
Steve posed and interesting question. "Who has benefited from these wars?" Of course, he said the military industry. Of course, I had a different view.
"Korea - All citizens in South Korea. All people who like Samsung, LG, Hyundai, Kia, etc products. Since I have 2 Samsung TVs, Thank you.
Viet Nam - No one except those we brought to the USA. We lost that one.
Balkans - All the people who are now living there in peace and have not been ethnically cleansed.
Afghanistan - All the girls who are now attending school, and not being made slave to their husbands. All the people who want to fight against the Taliban. The people of the USA who no longer have to worry about terrorist being openly trained there.
Iran - The Kerds and Shiites who were being killed and tortured by Saddam and the Sunnis. Anyone who did want free speech. All Americans, for better or worse the Terrorist have focused their efforts there and not here.
If you look for failure, I am sure you will find it. If you look for people who's lives are better because of US efforts, you will find those also." G2A
I think all the money wa have spent on the various wars you have mentioned could have had greater psoitvie impact if spent another way. We have spent over a trillion dollars on Iraq alone, that sounds like alot of $ to me.
How much was keeping the terrorists busy for 13+ years worth?
CNN 9/11 Fast Facts
Is preventing another 9/11 worth $2 Trillion? More? Less?
about - Is preventing another 9/11 worth $2 Trillion? More? Less?
I will go with less. Maybe we would have also been free from terrorism if the money was spent in other ways. The wars did result in the deaths of 5,000 soldiers which is about 2,000 more than were killed in 911.
I personally spend zero time worrying about a terrorism atack. It is a very small risk compared to dying in a car crash (30,000 people a yr). Another 30,000 a year are killed by gun violence in the US (which feels extremely unlikely to me but statiscally a greater risk than terrorism. I do venture into North Mpls a few times a year which probably raises my risk an iota) I guess my point is that in the modern world terrorism is just one more risk. Do people who lose a family member to tornado, flood, car crash or gunshot grieve any less that a family who has lost someone to terrorism?
"We have spent over a trillion dollars on Iraq alone, that sounds like alot of $ to me." -- Laurie
You know what sounds like a lot of money? $18 Trillion in National Debt, OVER HALF of it incurred by Obama. $60 Trillion on the "War on Poverty," another war that we lost because "the poor" are no better off than when we started.
And I'm still suspicious of that accounting. We were paying and training the military anyway, buying them gas and ammo for their exercises. Yes, 5000 dead and countless more seriously wounded is a terrible price for victory, but it is an unacceptable price for the defeat being sought by our feckless CIC.
I am glad you can spend "zero time worrying about a terrorist attack" because I cannot. I am concerned about more people than just you, or me. I worry about the Christians being burned, executed, raped, enslaved, beheaded or killed in tortuous ways by ISIS. I worry about the innocent Shia Muslims caught up in the violence and treated the same. I worry about those Somali and other refugees safely on US soil, who are then corrupted into fighting and dying in this "holy war." I know we're not the world's policeman, but at what point do we stop this barbarity?
"Do people who lose a family member to tornado, flood, car crash or gunshot grieve any less that a family who has lost someone to terrorism?" They do if you want to distinguish between natural disasters and criminal acts, aka "man-caused disasters." Natural disasters are not preventable. Acts of terror largely are, if they are recognized for the evil they are. I don't think our current CIC, unfortunately, has any such mental construct.
My guess is doing what he can to prevent another terrorism attack is at the top of Obama's list.
I'm sure you are guessing, because the evidence is absent. How else to explain failure to close the Southern border, orders to ignore expired visas for those from terrorist-sponsoring countries, pushing hard to guarantee that Iran gets a nuclear weapon and relieved of sanctions, and "ending" the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan too soon?
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