Second Chances

[DanaC]

Out of interest Yesman: what do you consider 'mainstream' media? which outlets have been disturbingly quiet? Do you have an example of a non-mainstream media?

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

That's why I haven't voted for a Democratic candidate since sometime-I-can't-remember in the last century: no visible interest in [s]the Republic's[/s] my interests, which is a hell of a goddam note during a shooting war.

Well I guess that is logical.

[yesman065]

Originally Posted by DanaC

Out of interest Yesman: what do you consider 'mainstream' media? which outlets have been disturbingly quiet? Do you have an example of a non-mainstream media?

The media that reaches the vast majority of the population - the big three TV networks and the largest newspapers like those owned by the Gannett Company, Inc.

Smaller independent outlets - cable news, independent internet outlets and the like.

I'm sure they will all report the helicopter crash that happened yesterday though which killed 14 servicemen, and they should, but they seem more focused on the negativities of the situation to drive ratings and revenues.

[tw]

From ABC News of 22 Aug 2007:

http://The President's Surprisin...q War: Vietnam
Bush avoided comparison with Vietnam for two reasons, said Thomas Biersteker, a professor of international relations at Brown University and a Vietnam War expert.

"He chose to distance himself from Vietnam because of his own lack of involvement and because Vietnam is generally not considered a resounding success in popular memory. It is striking that he has begun to rely on arguments strikingly similar to those of Richard Nixon," Biersteker told ABCNEWS.com...

"I think it's really regrettable to me that the president really has learned nothing from Vietnam," said Bernie Reilly, a West Point graduate, Vietnam vet and father of a son who has served tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"It is perfectly right to compare Iraq with Vietnam," said Barry Romo of Vietnam Veterans Against the War. "We got into Vietnam with a lie about the Gulf of Tonkin incident and we got into Iraq with a lie about WMD."

An AP(?) report details the irony in George Jr's latest speech.

Over the past year, Bush has tempered his endorsement of al-Maliki. When they met in Jordan last November, the president called al-Maliki "the right guy for Iraq." Now, he continually prods al-Maliki to do more to forge political reconciliation before the temporary military buildup ends.

"I think there's a certain level of frustration with the leadership in general, inability to work _ come together to get, for example, an oil revenue law passed or provincial elections," Bush said.

While the Iraqi parliament has recessed for the month of August, the president said lawmakers already had passed 60 pieces of legislation and have a budget process that distributes money from the central government to provinces.

He stressed U.S. commitment in Iraq, yet laid the political problems at Baghdad's doorstep.

"The fundamental question is, Will the government respond to the demands of the people? And, if the government doesn't demand _ or respond to the demands of the people, they will replace the government. That's up to the Iraqis to make that decision, not American politicians."

The Kansas City speech was a change in George Jr's rhetoric. Previously, he complained that Iraq had not even passed legislation to share oil wealth with the provinces. That the government had met almost none of the objectives demanded by the American government. Suddenly George Jr is claiming that the oil wealth is being shared despite no legislation. That they have made all these accomplishments. Whereas George Jr seriously tempered his support for Maliki while in Canada, the speech next day in Kansas City included an endorsement of Maliki.

Why the conflicting message? Implied is infighting or indecision within a White House that is usually careful to restrict all access to thoughts inside that administration. When asked about what appeared to be diminished support for Maliki (from that article), "National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe told reporters that Bush continued to have confidence in the prime minister and that his level of support had not changed."

The fact that George Jr is now trying to compare Iraq to Vietnam is, well, how many here so often denied that relationship: Deja vue Nam. Both wars were created by lies, fought without a strategic objective, and had no exit strategy defined by that strategic objective.

Just another example of seeing the school bus OR worrying about all school buses (which was the point in that post). Whereas Yesman065 sees accomplishment in skirmishes, the strategic objective is clearly not being achieved as more participation in the Maliki government is withdrawing, as the conflict moves into new provinces, and as refugees are now leaving the country in same numbers - something estimated to exceed 50,000 every month - not including an increasing number of refugees in other parts of Iraq.

Reporters note the surprise, contradiction, and political dangers of comparing an American defeat in Vietnam with Iraq.

[yesman065]

Have you answered the questions
put to YOU?
Unlike an ASSHOLE
who only claims, TW, to have not insulted, yet when shown he has, still ignores the reality of that which has been proven repeatedly.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

That's why I haven't voted for a Democratic candidate since sometime-I-can't-remember in the last century: no visible interest in the Republic's interest, which is a hell of a goddam note during a shooting war.

This is a really weird thing for a supporter of Caesar to say. Yes, the Democrats lied about pulling us out of this nightmare, but to imply that Caesar supports the Republic is just nuts.

[piercehawkeye45]

"It is perfectly right to compare Iraq with Vietnam," said Barry Romo of Vietnam Veterans Against the War. "We got into Vietnam with a lie about the Gulf of Tonkin incident and we got into Iraq with a lie about WMD."

Ugh, this is why I hate both sides.

"It is perfectly right to treat Timothy McVeigh with Martin Luther King" said piercehawkeye45 of the cellar. "They both have been to jail."

[tw]

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

"It is perfectly right to treat Timothy McVeigh with Martin Luther King" said piercehawkeye45 of the cellar. "They both have been to jail."

Both did not go to jail due to a heinous crime. To go to war, the 'crime' must be so heinous as to justify war. Whereas WWII, Korea, Afghanistan, and Desert Storm did qualify as heinous, neither Nam nor "Mission Accomplished" did. Whereas WWII, et al created war without lies, both Nam and "Mission Accomplished" were both justified by outright and contemptuous lies.

As even noted by Sze Tsu 500 years before Christ, war first must be justified by something so contemptuous - the smoking gun. Going to jail means nothing without including underlying reasons why. Going to war must be justified by the same underlying facts – the reasons ‘whys’. Niether Nam nor “Mission Accomplished” comes even close to being justified by a smoking gun. The first reason why those wars could not be won is found in no smoking gun.

The first reasons why King was not sentenced to death is also found in the same reasons why he was jailed. There was no heinous crime. There was not even a felony.

[piercehawkeye45]

Yes, but to pull out because of that reason alone is very foolish. Yet, I guess it is where your priorities lie.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Yon, on Anbar, talks perspectives.

For a time, Fallujah garnered nearly 100% of the media battle-stage. A speck of a city in a dysfunctional country standing toe-to-toe with a Super Power whose guns were hot and loaded. In the eyes of many, Fallujah was the frog strangling the stork, the defiant mouse giving the finger to the eagle, or more nobly, the Tankman of Tiananmen Square. The fact that Fallujah’s “defiance,” like the attacks on 9/11, was delivered in the form of celebratory murder was carefully omitted from the publicity campaign. (Hollywood press agents have nothing on al Qaeda’s media squad.)
~snip~
Many Vietnam veterans fear that our leaders never learned the lessons they paid dearly for. And mostly they are right. However, some of our officers—like James Mattis and David Petraeus—have studied the lessons of Vietnam in great detail. But for a long time, although these two officers realized we were in the middle of an insurgency, it was tantamount to “un-American” to call insurgents insurgents. They were “dead-enders,” and since there was no insurgency, there was scant need for counterinsurgency warfare. Had these two officers been running this war from the beginning, it probably would be finished by now.

It took enormous guts to take the job at this stage of the war, when it’s like an airplane with one of the wings blown off, and there is this pilot in the back of the airplane who easily could have parachuted out the back—where some of the others already have gone—but instead he says, “I can still fly this thing!” Had David Petraeus jumped and landed safely, he’d still have been one of the few who could land with a sterling reputation after his previous commands here. If this jet crashes while Petraeus is flying it, we will always know that the best of the best did not jump out the back; he ran to the cockpit.

Despite that Petraeus has the cockpit as under control as it can be, the jet is still nosing down. The only way this is going to work is if the majority of the subordinate commanders, and our troops, are applying the difficult lessons of counterinsurgency. Lessons that we failed to apply for most of the first few years of this war. Lessons our Vietnam veterans paid for in full. Lessons lost on others from wars here long ago and seldom mentioned these days. Lessons whispered by the Ghosts of Anbar.(The ghosts of Anbar he's refering to are pictures of Aussie and Brit grave markers from WW I & WW II era)

~snip~

The sheiks of Anbar turned against al Qaeda because the sheiks are businessmen, and al Qaeda is bad for business. But they didn’t suddenly trust Americans just because they no longer trusted al Qaeda. They are not suddenly blood allies. This is business, and that’s fine, because if there is one thing America is good at, it’s business.

But in Anbar a perspective less lofty but infinitely more practical has evolved which acknowledges that, first and foremost, peace is better for business and self-interest is a more reliable motive for cooperation than is self-sacrifice.

Winning the hearts and minds of businessmen with greed, is probably a better bet than preaching democracy.

[piercehawkeye45]

More realistic eitherway.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

Well I guess that is logical.

I seek to understand and adopt the Republic's interest, so only in that sense is it "my" interest. It's in the Republic's interest to win her wars, especially with Gap-nation nondemocracies (an essential reason they are in the listing of Barnettian Gap nations), and particularly in the interest of spreading any possible shades of democracy throughout the globe. Instantaneous conversion from bad government to good government isn't at all likely, so opening wedges and the salami method must be employed, and planned for.

This is a really weird thing for a supporter of Caesar to say. Yes, the Democrats lied about pulling us out of this nightmare, but to imply that Caesar supports the Republic is just nuts.

Calling GWB a Caesar does violence to an accurate understanding of both, Griff. Kindly do not indulge in unbalanced partisan hysterics if you want me to take you seriously as a thinker. He thinks more as a libertarian than you're willing to give him credit for, so remove the blinkers. I mean, visibly do so, don't just claim you did and continue as blindly as before: to endeavor by all means to shrink the world's trouble spots -- the countries and regions in the Gap -- is not unlibertarian at its root, however busy this may be in intervention in affairs outside our borders. Call it anti-isolationism if you like. You know I regard isolationism as a nonstarter and you know why I say so. The worldwide economic and cultural connectivity of globalism make this course of action inevitable and its advance inescapable. A question for this America, this quintessential global economic Core nation, is whether we ride this advance to greater success and general worldwide wealth creation, or whether we screw up and cede this position to somebody of greater ambition or hunger, in the New Core -- mostly Russia, China, and India.

[Griff]

Your mistake is in believing that militarism supports our being an economic core nation. One example is the erosion of our lock on international students in our university system. Students who come to America become business partners with Americans when they return to their home country. Our position in the world has deteriorated to the point that international students are looking elsewhere, because we now approach the world paradoxically, our minds are isolated but our weapons are everywhere.

[DanaC]

we now approach the world paradoxically, our minds are isolated but our weapons are everywhere.

That is a great line.

[tw]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

It took enormous guts to take the job at this stage of the war, when it’s like an airplane with one of the wings blown off, and there is this pilot in the back of the airplane who easily could have parachuted out the back—where some of the others already have gone—but instead he says, “I can still fly this thing!” Had David Petraeus jumped and landed safely, he’d still have been one of the few who could land with a sterling reputation after his previous commands here.

Yon forgot one important fact. Had Petraeus not taken command, then his military career was done. IOW he repeatedly made the point. He cannot win this war. He can only achieve tactical victories and only in limited locations. Petraeus had a choice. End his carrer. Or declare up front that he could not win this war so that he only accomplished every limited objective.

Wars are not won on the battlefield as the 'big dic' types believe. Wars are settled politically. This war cannot be won when those who must do the poltiical settlement are not able or do not want to.

Petraeus said this up front before he took command. Those who see the bigger picture understood this. Those who see in terms of tactical objectives - the mistake of Nam - associate security around Baghdad as strategic victory. You can see here many who cannot see the bigger picture. They proclaim the surge is working when even everyone knows the strategic objective is being lost. Some here did not grasp what Petraeus was warning long ago. Iraq is slowly being lost as Petraeus cautioned. Sen Warner - a long time military man - accurate said the same thing. We are not winning - while achieving every tactical objective.

Petraeus had no choice. Take command or terminate his military carrer. That's how it works when one is a general. Yon forgot to mention that part.