If you support the war, is it being fought well?

G

Glenn E. Meyer

New member
There is a thread on whether you support the war. This is a separate issue. I have a hard time separating supporting the war from what I think is a piss poor strategy for the war.

I have seen both Dems and GOP say if we are going to fight it, let's fight it - go all out. More troops, etc. For some reason, GWB is blind to need to really exert ourselves as a national effort. It was the same 'let's support our noble allies and let them fight' that was in VietNam and caused Bin Ladden to get away. All the after the fact crap from the administration and Tommy Franks was to cover their stupidity for Tora Bora. Why are countries still allowing foreign fighters in?

So do you think, we are fighting it well? I agree with one protester - fight the war or get out.
 
Iraq was an attempt to destroy the center of gravity of militant islam. We will have to wait to see if it is successful.

The real war against islamofascist terrormongers can't be seen. It is being fought in a thousand locations where there are no TV cameras and those doing the fighting are not talking. It is a war being fought with assassination, bribery, and intimidation. It is a war plan that changes day to day. There are no cities to be assaulted, no countries to be invaded, no economies to be destroyed. The objective in this war is to kill specific people.

There is a state level component to the war plan. Iraq put the US right square in the middle of islamist instability. Iraq was a player in state sponsored terror. The real player is Iran. We are now surrounding Iran just like we surrounded the soviet union. We will not leave Iraq completely. As we speak we are building something like 20 installations throughout the country mainly of the intelligence variety. All this is to give us a great big ear in the middle east.

Are we fighting all parts of the war correctly? Not in my opinion. Syria and its president is one of the major players in terror in the ME. The joker is still breathing. We continue to lose Marines in west Iraq because of terrorists coming out of Syria and infiltrating Iraq. Reminds me the Vietnam and Cambodia. You can't give the bad guys a safe haven yet we seem to have done just that.

Yea, we've done a decent job of the overt military thingy but in some areas I fear we've gone mushy.
 
Bush has lost me

I've turned on Bush based on his stance on the war and immigration. This war looks like Vietnam in one important aspect. Bush is allowing these murderous thugs to come across borders, kill and then retreat to the safety of Syria. He is allowing support to come from Iran without apparent consequences. I don't believe that we would need to overthrow the regime in Syria in order to get them more compliant. Reagan put an F-111 on a tent in Libya. Special forces can be used to put the fear of the big guy in the Syrian politicians. I can only hope that we are secretly doing these things. If so, I stand down. The fact that we are not stopping these activities indicates to me that we will wait for a constitution, train a few police and then we will declare victory and get out. I originally supported this war on the basis of geography. I thought that we would use Iraq as a staging area to put pressure on Iran and possible Saudi Arabia, but I was just dreaming. We now have a country that will form a theocratic "democracy". Continued civil war is likely. If the killing stops, the Iraqi people can maintain an agreeable lifestyle and the government doesn't export terrorism, then it will have be worth the effort, but I would not have gone in to accomplish the first two goals. Next stop, Iranian nukes. I no longer have faith that Bush has the nerve to do what needs to be done. Don't get me started on immigration.

Waitone: Great minds think alike. You are 100% right to the point.
 
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I have lost one friend/ co-worker, Maj. Rick Crocker, USMCR in may of this year in Haditha, to an RPG attack and still have two more friends co-workers in country, 1st LT Rob D'Andera 1-184th Infantry CNG and Capt. Doug Woodhams, 4th LAR, USMCR. I get regular emails from Rob about day to day stuff that happens. He seems to be getting fed up with the politics of it, i.e. too touchy feely, afraid of hurting/killing the wrong people, etc. That is what pissies me off the most. If your gonna put our guys in a meat grinder, then let them kick ass ALL THE TIME. The gov't gets its panties in a wad because they suspect some of these units "roughed up some prisoners"? You have got to be Shi**ing me. The bad guys cutt off heads, and we prosecute our own for humiliating prisoners? That, if anything will loose this for us. God bless Rob, though, he has smoked more than a few bad guys.

ON THE OTHER HAND, looking back at history (WWII) there were so many wasted campaigns (Hurtgen forest comes to mind) battles that didn't need to be fought, etc. Hell, conservative estimates on friendly fire losses alone were at 40,000. There was a lot of corruption and every theatre of war had political problems. So it's tough to really see things in a clear perspective until after the fact sometimes.
 
I had to assist in the case of one soldier and my fellow worker who is retired now had to escort the body home. He was killed in an unarmored vehicle in Sep 2004 in Iraq. Over a year since the war started..... I still have a picture of him to remind me everday what the cost of this war is....

How many other folks would have lived if Rumsfeld had escalated the priority higher for body armor and armored vehicles. A recent Marine Corps report was issued saying most of the equipment they have is going to bite the dust in the coming months. The current vehicles were never designed for the armor being added and is wearing out. New vehicles are being sent over but will it be too late? The logistical planning for this war was nonexistant. I had one friend I know who was in 4th ID during the War with Iraq. They had some Iraqi freedom fighters they had trained to help them, soon as victory is declared the freedom fighters were disbanded....this left a lot of soldiers scratching thier heads.

There was no real plan for after the Iraqi army was beaten in Mar 2003.

We see that by Cheney's remarks about the red carpet being rolled out. Well there is red carpet out but its not red from dye. It's red from the blood of American's, coalition members and Iraqis.

We are approaching the third aniversary of the Iraq war in march 2006. All we hear is stay the course and the current plan is working.

Now we have 56% of the American people who say Bush isnt handling the war right. The Republicans called thier 52% victory a mandate from the people.

well if 52% is a mandate what is 56%......

The terrorists have stole Ho Che Mihn's playbook and are using every part of it to turn the citizenry against the war.

While Bush and Company stand around singing " dont worry, be happy"

Kissinger is even sending them a wake up call.......

what do you think?

I say fire Rummy get on your knees and beg for some of the ones youve pissed off to come back to run this war.

What Ham above says also.....

Look case of marine LT Pantano who was left out to hang in the wind by the administration and the Marine Corps Brass. However, he was ultimately aquitted because of the evidence and the response of the people to such bull pookey

The administration wants our soldiers to fight the war....and will sacrifice them for the name of political correctness........

stop the madness dont be a Bush and Rumsfeld Sheeple.
 
I think the media is concentrating solely on losses in the war and not reporting the successes. They are firmly in cahoots with the marxist left and will stop at nothing to make Bush look bad.

The war in Iraq is more successful than the war on drugs and illegal immigration if you ask me.
 
I have read commentaries by very conservative scholars and experts who are not in the slightest PC or liberal, argue that the Bush strategy is flawed.
 
I have no basis to judge the military competency of those fighting and directing the fight.

I think another valid question is, "Is the Iraq problem being dealt with effectively from economic, social, political, infrastructure, religious and military point of view."


Iraq is no longer just a war. Our successful handling of that country comes from how we do everything, not just fight. You can win every battle, and lose a war.
 
Handy, to ask that question - you have to ask the metaquestion of the purpose of the war.

I was concerned more with the actually war fighting measures as the other thread covers the more general ones.

Assuming we have a military problem that our forces are in combat with armed opponents, are we doing enough?

One can postulate that perhaps many infrastructure projects, etc. might turn the Iraq populace into one that would suppress our armed opponents - that might happen. However, right now we are fighting and such long term efforts will come very slowly into fruition. I think they are being mishandeld also but that's wasn't what I was asking.
 
Glenn,

I won't divert the thread farther than to just make this comparison:

Was Vietnam being "fought better" in 1962, when Special Forces was making major inroads in convincing locals to fight for the ARVN.

Or were we fighting better in 1969, when we had some of the greatest number of troops, the Top Gun school was founded, SEALS were terrorizing the VC and we dropped more bombs per year than in any other previous total war?

Both are ways of fighting a war, but had different impacts on the likelihood of winning. The first might have worked, the second did not.


So when you ask about "effectiveness", I have to ask if you mean in killing the maximum number of insurgents, or in creating an atmosphere that is less likely to produce any more of them?
 
Being a former ASA member

We have had "Big Ears" listening in on the Middle East for decades. We don't need Iraq for electronic surveillance. Human intell is a different matter and only an idiot would plant a permanent base in the middle of hostile territory and still expect any degree of secrecy and security.
 
I understand what you are saying Handy and I think that killing the maximum number of insurgents is not a sufficient goal for war fighting. It is but a component of a grand strategy. It may the case that the grand strategy was flawed.

However, given the armed opposition we are facing, it seems to me and others, on all side of the spectrum that we are not doing what we need to do to faced the armed opposition. Perhaps, suppressing the armed opposition and providing security would let the political and social side flower.

I think that both in Iraq and Afghanistan we have let the opponents off and let them recover strength in an armed fashion. We have done that because of some failed strategy by Rumsfield and crew (with Cheney) that thought we could do this on the cheap and that 'allies' would pick up the burden.

Thus, as I said before - if we are going to be in a use of force situation - I don't think we are doing enough because the administration has folks who are not capable of admitting mistakes and Bush cannot see through their crappola.

Fight hard or get out. It may be the case that the culture and populace of Iraq will never respond to their initial proposition and become a peace loving democracy in the Jeffersonian mold. That could have been a complete misunderstanding of the area - as many scholars have written. There may be no effect on Islamic terrorist attacks and no more increased stability. Then GWB and crew will go down as complete failures.
 
Going simply on losses, compared to any other war, yes it is being fought well.

But I do agree that fighting a PC war is not the right way. They are still going to find small things to bust you on (oh, the prisoners had to see uncloaked women, Big Whoop), no matter how ahrd you try to please them anyway.
 
One of the greatest military superpowers in the world fighting a bunch of irregulars who freely roam Iraq bombing at will. I dont think body count is a good definition of victory..... We tried the body count stuff in Vietnam.

This is not a war that can be won by technology and a superior body count.

Has to have a military, social and economic solution.
 
As long as we care about what others might think of us, we cannot wage a successful war.

Anyone out there old enough to remember WWII? I love history, going to museums, and collecting antiques. Of all the artifacts I've seen, I have never come across a newspaper or newsreel of people protesting during WWII.

Imagine looking up in the sky, and there are bombers as far as the eye can see. Not long after that, some French or German city was virtually blown off the map. Did anyone in this country complain? HECK NO!! THEY WERE THE ENEMY!!

Now, we can't even take a few pictures of prisoners. Imagine what they might say if we bombed Baghdad off the map!
 
Of course its being fought well! What sort of a question is that?

Look at the American Civil War. There were still skirmishes being fought after Appomattox! WWII? We were still fighting diehards in both European and Asian theaters of combat for over a decade. But the war that beats them all is the War of 1812 where the major deciding battle was fought after the peace treaty and then we had to fight an entire second war (the so called Seminole War) against Spain, Britain and the Seminole nation, to stop the enemy from paying tribes to continue to raid our borders.
 
I don't support the war, but if I may answer anyway?

I don't see how, tactically, we could improve very much on what we are doing now. Maybe put more patrols along the inflitration routes, but that would probably be about as effective as the US Border Patrol is here in Texas, so not much hope there.

One thing that might help, is to purchase intelligence from the citizenry. It would work something like this - put up posters that say

Five Million Dollar reward AND secret relocation of you and your extended family to the country of your choice, for information leading to the neutralization of terrorist cells containing 10 or more terrorists.

Greed has historically been a pretty good tool.
 
I support our troops however i do not see our role as nation builders being
a good thing for this country, we cannot and should not police the world,
we should protect our borders and defend ourselves in anyway possible,
if necessary go in win and get out for no matter who we put in place as leaders in iraq within 10 years odds are they will turn on us.
 
If you support the war, is it being fought well? Initially, Yes. But with protracted exposure, No. Then again, with the Fog of War, what war is?

It may be that we'll need decades to sit back and see if the sacrifice was worth the cost. Post WWII Europe and Japan took years to rebuild and spun off the Marshall Plan, Berlin Airlift, Iron Curtain Cold War, Greece, Korea and Vietnam... Hitler and Tojo were gone and those two nations have done well... but at what a price!

Gulf War I leads to Gulf War II via 9-11, multiple UN Resolutions and Bush II's perceived mandate (post 9-11) to do something to stop terror backed regimes around the world.

Saddam is out. (+)
No WMD (-) (or is that a +?)
Initial Election has occurred. (+)
Constitutional draft forcing various factions to work together. (+)
Taking too long for Constitutional draft (-) (how do you force consensus agreeable to all parties on what contitutes the correct version of freedom in written form?)
Training of Iraqi police and military forces continues w/ lots of OTJ training (+)
Porous borders bringing unwanted outsiders (-)
American (and others) lives given as price of bringing our version of freedom to natives. (--)
Iran is back doing the nuclear thing. Russia says we MUST let them continue. (--)
Extraction plans? Certainly before the next general election.

Everything bad is still happening over there, w/ some minimized positives so far. London and Madrid excepted. As it has always been, once it's all over, those who have trained by fighting on both sides of this war will lead new young men to fight the next war. Perchance they'll choose to bring the next war to our shores.

Even tho' the price in American lives stands at 1800 (4 more today), the cost in Iraqi lives is probably 10 - 20 fold (26,000+/-?).

Is it worth The Tree of Liberty being fed the blood of free and innocent men and women once again?

I'm sure the same questions were asked in 1782/83 with much the same answers. Gotta Wait and see.
 
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