Only teach rich students

[Syn7]

And who will remove the man? I don't think the US has much interest in wars for the time being. We're a bit tired, if you hadn't noticed.

You mean beaten. it's the opposite of winning. I realize it has never traditionally been a part of American military vocabulary but it's something yall should've learned in the 50's when you lost that one. Or the 70's when you lost THOSE ones. Or the the proxies in the 80's when your funding went for nothing or in the 2000-2010 era when yall lost 2, count em, TWO wars simultaneously.

[Drake]

You mean beaten. it's the opposite of winning. I realize it has never traditionally been a part of American military vocabulary but it's something yall should've learned in the 50's when you lost that one. Or the 70's when you lost THOSE ones. Or the the proxies in the 80's when your funding went for nothing or in the 2000-2010 era when yall lost 2, count em, TWO wars simultaneously.

How did we "lose" Iraq? Especially when the government that asked us to go was the one we set up? SH is gone, and the country is staying above water? Loss? I don't think so.

How did we "lose" Afghanistan? The TB have no power base in AFG, and must conduct virtually all planning from either Pakistan, or way out in rural areas. Last I checked, Mullah Omar is afraid to cross the border, and Karzai calls the shots. How is that losing?

And specify which other wars we lost. Last I checked, Vietnam was the only one I would consider a loss.

[Syn7]

Destabilizing a region is not equal to victory. The gov. you set up is a joke and won't last if you left. The only way you guys will have the gov you want is if you are prepared to keep soldiers there forever. When you guys "pull out" rarely is there mention of who is left behind and what their jobs are. You re-classify the theater, call it a new name and pretend like you have left to the American public but really there will be soldiers there indefinitely. Just not as many. But there none the less.

You have not achieved a reasonable amount of objectives given the time money and bodies you've thrown at it. The US hasn't won a war since WW2 and they take way too much credit for that. According to a good percentage of Americans the US saved the world.

But whatever. I don't want to argue bout that. Yall haven't won anything since the 40's. OK. Better?

What I really want to know is why the US military and foreign affairs depts. feel they have some sort of moral authority to tell ANYONE ANYWHERE what to do outside of the US? I don't get that. How come American morals are the best morals? Why is crony capitalism the great blueprint for economic success? Why are you forcing others to act the way you want them to act? Just answer me that and I'll be happy.

Oh and one more question. Why do you fight for a nation that puts it's own economic interests ahead of the lives of people from trouble spots? All that rhetoric about how the US is the great torchbearer of freedom and democracy yet the US has consistently sided with dictators over popular democratic movements.


OH OH OH one last question. How come the masses have not risen in outrage over the killing of a citizen without DUE PROCESS? Due process IS judicial process. I don't dispute that the citizen in question deserved to be treated like a combatant aggressive to the US. But why couldn't they just present evidence to high up justice in secret and get the paperwork right? This is a CRAZY precedent that due process isn't judicial process. That means that ones right to a fair trail is no longer a guarantee under that interpretation of the US constitutions 14th amendment. Specifically the Due Process Clause(I think there is a clause in the 5th amend. as well). Why are Americans not enraged? I don't get that. The only answer I can come up with is that the majority of Americans simply don't understand what the due process clause even is. In fact I bet majority aren't even knowledgeable about what the 14th contains. I'll go even further and suggest that the majority don't even fully understand the rights and freedoms they demand as natural entitlements. Canadians are a bit better. I find the average Canadian knows more about their own Gov than the average American. But the difference isn't very much at all. I find northern Europeans to be the most knowledgeable, on average, about their own governments. By a HUGE margin. I would mos def move there if I had a reason to. Denmark is fresh. Their legal, education and health systems are way above par and the average life expectancy is higher. The average income is higher(the real numbers, not the juked stats you see over here). The rate of mental health and depression is significantly lower than here.

D@mn socialistas!!!

lol

[Drake]

So, in other words, you have no answer. Thanks.

[Syn7]

What? You're gonna criticize me for not answering your question when you never even addressed most of my questions? In fact you didn't answer any of them.

That's kind of like when you accuse somebody of generalizing then do it yourself over and over.

Don't be an defensive wimp. You shouldn't even be capable of being offended by my words. And don't go and act like you haven't been. An IQ of 85 does that kind of sh1t. Like when a child insists they didn't eat the chocolate when it's all over their hands and face. lol. Don't be a child. Mmmmkaaay squirt

kisses

[Drake]

Are you drunk posting? The rules go as follows. The first person who asks the questions gets theirs answered.

Unfortunately now you are just being sarcastic and rude, so I think it's appropriate to let others see how you are behaving while I exit this futile discussion in subjectivity.

[Syn7]

Are you drunk posting? The rules go as follows. The first person who asks the questions gets theirs answered.

Unfortunately now you are just being sarcastic and rude, so I think it's appropriate to let others see how you are behaving while I exit this futile discussion in subjectivity.

Rules?

I did ask the first questions. A handful of them and you didn't answer any of them. You asked me a question and fronted like you got in first? Or maybe you are that slow and you really believe you got in first.

Just answer the questions then we will move on to yours. As per YOUR rules, I did get in first. Do I really need to prove it? It's all in this thread.

Ok for the slow, here we go.

you wrote

Clearly you haven't been keeping up, then. We're in the midst of a massive drawdown in forces. A LOT of soldiers are on the chopping block for involuntary separation. Tens of thousands, actually.

It's over.

then I wrote

What gives the US the right to tell anything to anyone outside its own borders? It's laughable that there is a presumption of moral superiority

which wasn't actually my first question but it was the most important which is why I repeated it twice afterwords.

It's all one page back, why did I need to spell all this out for you?

According to you

The rules go as follows. The first person who asks the questions gets theirs answered.

OK so I have now proven my case. Now either answer my questions or back off, but don't come back at me with more rhetoric bullsh1t that steers you away from answering my question. You don't have to answer me. You can back off if you like. Just stop with the misdirection. I'm not some average civi that you can manipulate with absolute bullsh1t.

Your rules, now follow them. I might, if I feel like it. They aren't my rules. And they certainly aren't the rules in the US political sphere. For now I will conform. If only to get an answer to my questions. If you do actually put some real thought into answering them and don't come back with more trash, I will gladly partake in an exchange of Q n A. I would like nothing more, from you that is.

Mkay... Shoot......

[Drake]

You didn't ask me a god**** thing. I simply questioned your idea of what "losing" meant, because as far as I know, we've accomplished our objectives. Whether or not General Syn from the Internet thinks any of it was worth it is utterly irrelevant, because you played no part in any of the planning or defining of objectives. We knew people were going to die, and we actually lost much less than we thought we would.

And no, making up objectives or their inherent value just so you can therefore label it a failure is inherently flawed on all levels of thinking, and does not qualify as discussion.

Saddam Hussein is removed. Any threat of a WMD program, real, fabricated, or grossly overblown, is gone. Bin Laden is dead. The taliban have to either live in the boonies or Pakistan, because they are arrested or killed when they come here.

You didn't ask the first question, considering my second POST WAS QUESTIONING YOUR DEFINITION OF DEFEAT.

[rett]

You mean beaten. it's the opposite of winning. I realize it has never traditionally been a part of American military vocabulary but it's something yall should've learned in the 50's when you lost that one. Or the 70's when you lost THOSE ones. Or the the proxies in the 80's when your funding went for nothing or in the 2000-2010 era when yall lost 2, count em, TWO wars simultaneously.

This is a pretty foggy-headed comment.

We all agree that the USA and its allies won WWII. Armistice day, ticker tape parade, the defeated countries laid down their arms and cooperated with the occupier.

Yet even then, the USA was war-weary. Ask anyone from that time what the mood of the nation was. Being war-weary doesn't equate to having lost.

Insurgencies are more like fighting crime; they may never have a clear closing date. It's always a compromise. This has to do with the ruthlessness and inhumanity of the insurgents (terrorizing the population, using human shields etc).

Using standards of the big wars between nations of the past and applying them to insurgencies in the 2000s is muddle-headed and really adds up to nothing more than you wanting to tease and provoke an active service member.

[Syn7]

You didn't ask me a god**** thing. I simply questioned your idea of what "losing" meant, because as far as I know, we've accomplished our objectives. Whether or not General Syn from the Internet thinks any of it was worth it is utterly irrelevant, because you played no part in any of the planning or defining of objectives. We knew people were going to die, and we actually lost much less than we thought we would.

And no, making up objectives or their inherent value just so you can therefore label it a failure is inherently flawed on all levels of thinking, and does not qualify as discussion.

Saddam Hussein is removed. Any threat of a WMD program, real, fabricated, or grossly overblown, is gone. Bin Laden is dead. The taliban have to either live in the boonies or Pakistan, because they are arrested or killed when they come here.

You didn't ask the first question, considering my second POST WAS QUESTIONING YOUR DEFINITION OF DEFEAT.

I even reposted my question for you. How can you say "what question"? And that was just one of the many I asked. I posted it all out for you. Don't get all over emotional over it. Relax.

OK now on to the war. Ok let's do this then. We can start with Afghanistan.

The US military has not completed the majority of the objectives originally stated when they first went in. The US drove the Afghan Taliban leadership into Pakistan. These exiles allied with tribes in Pakistan and through that process of receiving aid from the Pakistani side the Pakistani Taliban gained power and influence with goals aimed at their own Pakistani gov. The Pakistani gov. deals with the Afghan Taliban, even giving aid and weapons in documented cases, but they do not officially talk with the Pakistani Taliban. India also has a large role here, but we don't have to talk about that and I'm trying to keep this very simple. OK so the U.S. went in with all these promises about rebuilding, creating a real democracy and most importantly it promised to create an indigenous economy. Then took a ton of those promised resources and flew into Iraq with most of the cash and aid to support your clusterfukc over there.

Obama's surge was like 3 years too late. There have not been enough civilian programs. All these people that are working for this war in one capacity or another will be unemployed after the pull-out. The whole economy is based on Opium and whichever army is occupying at the moment. After you leave do you really think they will continue to grow your soybeans? Of course not. they will go back to the best cash crop they have where they can be free of foreign control and subsidy.

After crop season the money goes to Afghan Taliban and then is sent to the Pakistan Taliban for weapons and supplies and goes back to the Afghan Taliban for a new season of fighting. When you leave everything you did will crumble within a few crop seasons. The Afghan Taliban will subvert and destroy with relative ease. The Gov left behind cannot hold on it's own, military or politically. The simple truth is that Afghanistan isn't ready for what you want to create there. They need to do this on their own. They aren't like Egypt. They need more peacetime on their own to create any sort of real democracy with a lasting chance. You lost before you even started. You did kill bin laden, but you'll leave 1000 bin ladens behind you when you pull out. The tribes will fall into old style alliances and the Taliban will weasel it's way in like it always does. With gifts for those who support and violence to those that hold out. Like in Vietnam, you guys can only hold real estate by keeping heavily armed resources there. As soon as they leave the vacuum is filled right away with enemy combatants.

the bottom line is that if you want to prevent this scenario then the US will have to strike deal with the Taliban before leaving. And recently the US has ****ed it's friendship with Pakistan. The US needs them to get anything out of the last decade and however many billions of dollars that was spent. Without a handful of treaties and agreements and compromises I don't think the US is willing to make, the last decade will be for naught. Not to mention the THOUSANDS of innocent CIVILIANS that were killed over the last decade by allied weapons. Do you really call that winning? The average Afghan, you know, the guy who wants nothing to do with you, he doesn't agree with you. I have never spoken to an Afghan that considered your war a success. Not one. Those dudes that always hang around and are more than willing to talk to anything remotely American are a massive minority. Most of them are there for the work and can't wait to get away from y'all. They smile and bow their heads to your face and talk behind your back. "Yes sir, OK sir." but as soon as you leave it's "they are such motherfukcers!"


You don't need to be a general to compare a promise list to a completion list. I see more failure than achievement.

The US military clearly approves of collateral damage in such magnitudes otherwise they wouldn't keep repeating it. And we all saw the wikileaks videos, you would be lying to say that wasn't more normal than the officials are willing to admit.

I believe that there is a massive set of flaws in the military culture and attitude of the USA and there is lots of evidence to support that theory. I bet that if I had free access to all military recordings I would find some atrocious sh1t.

[Syn7]

This is a pretty foggy-headed comment.

We all agree that the USA and its allies won WWII. Armistice day, ticker tape parade, the defeated countries laid down their arms and cooperated with the occupier.

Yet even then, the USA was war-weary. Ask anyone from that time what the mood of the nation was. Being war-weary doesn't equate to having lost.

Insurgencies are more like fighting crime; they may never have a clear closing date. It's always a compromise. This has to do with the ruthlessness and inhumanity of the insurgents (terrorizing the population, using human shields etc).

Using standards of the big wars between nations of the past and applying them to insurgencies in the 2000s is muddle-headed and really adds up to nothing more than you wanting to tease and provoke an active service member.

I'm not criticizing them because it's hard to fight an indigenous insurgency in occupied land. I'm not even criticizing them for largely failing in dealing with that. I'm criticizing them for coming in with gold plated promises and falling short on almost every one of them. Yeah sure they achieved some American objectives but they failed miserably with the Afghan objectives. All those civilian bodies for Bin Laden? That is some seriously selfish sh1t right there. If the US had delivered on their promises it would have been a decent trade. But they didn't. The economy is fragile and reliant on the occupiers. If the U.S. army can't even clear the borderlands then what chance does the Afghan army have? The Taliban will creep back in. You know it, I know it and they know it.

[Syn7]

So Drake, what gives the US the moral authority to tell anyone anything at any time outside of their own borders?

If you can't even achieve any sort of moral consensus within your own culture what makes you think you not only have the right, but have the ability to tell anyone else how to act?

That question goes for any country telling anyone else how to act. Britain does it a ton. Canada not so much, traditionally we've been more peacekeeper than peacemaker, but we have our moments too.

[Syn7]

You don't feel like taking on any of that huh? Are you playing the "I couldn't be bothered" card or the "you aren't on my level therefor I won't even dignify you with a response" card?

Whenever you're ready then
You know where to find me.

[Syn7]

Ok then what do I have to do to get you to answer a question in full? Seriously. I wrote all that out cause you whined about who asked first and you still punk out? WTF???

[Syn7]

still being a pu$sy about it then?

i guess you are just a ticket punching robot.

quelle surprise!