Petraeus: The Surge is Working, Premature Pull-Out Would Be Devastating

Nicely put rhester, but you are a troop hating traitor to your country.

 

It hurts me to be honest to see us this far into this... we almost have to finish the course at this point- all because of political motivations.

A conservative aligns with the US Constitution as the law of the land.
By the Constitution we should have followed these steps instead of a political agenda-

1. Bring a Declaration of War before Congress to determine if Iraq was an aggressor against the US and presented a current threat of military aggression to our people and assets.
2. If the Congress determined Iraq acted in agression against the US and Congress determined they would continue military agression then they would vote on the Declaration of War.

Then we could act constitutionally and we never would be in this mess.

If terrorism was the primary issue then we should have handled that through the CIA and military intel where it is best confronted and defeated (mainly the CIA).

There is no military war to fight against terrorism, that is a function of intelligence warfare. Armies, navies and airforce do not have a means of fighting cells of terrorists.

 

It might not even take 10 years, but even if we could "win", what would it gain us?

A prolonged commitment to support the Iraqi Shia and Kurds against the Sunnis and Persians? That's still going after 54 years in Korea.

A majority, elected government that will oppress the minorities and use our support to pursue their own objectives, which will eventually be against our objectives? That's happened to us more times than I care to count.

I'll say it again. It's time to bring home the troops from all over the world. Tell NATO and the UN to fight their own battles. Tell our buddies in Europe and Asia that we aren't their protectors anymore. And tell the businessmen to do business in malevolent areas at their own risk, we're not going to stabilize it for them. We've tried this interventionist crap for 90 years now, and for every problem we correct, we create another two. Let's try it the way the Founders intended for a couple of decades. Just to see what happens.

 

Not because Bush Said so, Chris. Because the president there has made an outright threat to our country and Israel. Have you ever heard Hussein DIRECTLY threaten us? Maybe. But I don't remember.

And STILL, threats and all, Iran has its own problems because tons of kids there are damn near revolting against their own government. So attacking them makes no sense anyways.

Look, these people have issues they need to resolve on their own by the most part. They are still living in the 13th century. They have to make the decision to change on their own. We can influence them in other ways. Our military should of been used to annihilate Bin Laden or annihilate any country that dares provoke or attack us. This propping up government bullsh!t has never been or should ever be part of our nations policy.

Even General Patraeus when asked does the war makes us safer, he said he has never thought about it in that way!!!!!! What the hell? He says they are trying to win in Iraq. Great. But they asked him if this war would make us safer and he says HE DOESN'T KNOW!!!!

This is so stupid.

 

The overall report doesnt seem to me a strong statement that concludes the operation is working. The low violence level could very well be temporary. Long term wise, is it working? Are we exterminating extremist and jahadist for good in the region? How competent is the local Iraqi force? Is next year a good time to pull out if this year is not?

I dont think I get satisfactory answers from the report.

 

Yes, you are.

Living in L.A., I am truly worried for my safty while Laden is still out there in the mountains.

2nd world war mentality. Lots of people in DC would lose their jobs if they had to think differently.

 

I was nodding my head until the point that I bolded. Hey, you were close!

I'm more of a JFK Democrat. An internationalist, if you will. I don't think we can "do a turtle," and pull our head back in it's shell. We are invested around the world, in a myriad of ways, and we have a military presence that is in some ways left over from the Cold War, in others, left over from WWII. Shift our forces to where they do the most good, as needed, but withdraw? I don't think it wise. And neither does a great part of the world, whether they say so or not, in my opinion.

I'll give an example. Does Asia really want us gone from Japan, where we still have a large presence? Almost 35,000 military personnel, plus thousands of civilian support people from the States. Yes, they help maintain US security, but they also help prevent major Japanese rearmament, by providing them a measure of security.

We need better leadership, not withdrawing from the world to Fortress America.



D&D. Impeach the Living Embodiment of the Peter Principal.

 

Depends on who are you asking.

China and Russia? Dude!

Japan itself? Not sure. I think the country is devided on this issue.

So is South Korea.

Smaller parts of Asia, like Taiwan, certainly they want US to stay.

Europe is probably the same.

The attempt to establish US presence in middle east will not fly IMHO, and I think that's the ultimate goal Bush and republicans want to achieve when they talk about long term goals.

When America's fortresses reach as far Hawaii and Alaska, that is pretty far reaching, if the country's safty is the concern.

 

this war is depressing. but if the soldiers on the ground are willing to grind it out then fine.

any military out there? has anyone done tour(s) in iraq? are you willing to grind it out for 5, 10, 20 years?

if we are going to continue our presence in iraq, its time to bring the draft back. and to be fair, there should be no exemptions for college students so that rich and poor alike will bear the burden of iraq.

 

we have a volunteer army, and i'm sorry they were sent their in the first place. but they were, and we're stuck trying to find an end to this without leaving the country as another afganistan.

but it's not up to the soldiers. certainly it woudl be wise to set an example to future enlistees and keep our guys fresh for other conflicts, but we need to do what's overall in the best interests of the u.s. long term goals.

of course, what that actually is highly debateable.

 

Get ready to do this all over again in 10-15 years.

 

I posted this in another thread. I thought it was worth reposting since it deals with the issue at hand, was written well before the speech, and I don't think you can slander the people at millitary.com as pinko liberal America-haters, in league with the terrorists. It also very accurately predicts the direction of the spin and the dynamic of the "debate".

Source

[rquoter]
The Cult of Petraeus
Jeff Huber | August 07, 2007

Secretary of State Robert Gates seemed sober and subdued on Meet the Press last Sunday. He was candid about the negative effect of Iraq's Parliament taking August off while American troops continue to fight in support of it, and of the Sunni ministers who resigned from Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's cabinet.

Gates kept things matter-of-fact as he admitted that a troop drawdown might take place by the end of this year, and he even managed to deftly deflect the issue of one of his subordinates accusing Hillary Clinton of assisting enemy propaganda efforts by allowing as how a lot of people are "on edge."

Gates did, however, say a thing or two that set off my warning system. He's starting to echo a memo that wraps the future of our Iraq adventure firmly around the personality of General David H. Petraeus, United States Army.

Supporters of Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, hail him as our best and brightest military officer and one who knows how to conduct counter-insurgency warfare. His detractors seem of the opinion that the thing Petraeus knows how to do best is make himself look good.

While some praise Petraeus for his administration of Mosul and Ninevah after major hostilities ceased, others blame him for allowing the insurgency to establish itself in those areas. His tenure as the officer in charge of training Iraqi troops and police clearly did not go well, despite his praise in a 2004 Washington Post article titled "Battling for Iraq" of the progress being made by the fledgling Iraqi security forces under his tutelage. Of the article, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman wrote "General Petraeus, without saying anything falsifiable, conveyed the totally misleading impression, highly convenient for his political masters, that victory was just around the corner." It also appears that Petraeus is at least partly responsible for arming of Iraq's insurgent groups. According to a recently released Government Accountability Office report, the Pentagon has lost track of roughly 190,000 AK-47 assault rifles and pistols that were issued to Iraqi forces while Petraeus was in charge of their training. More than 200,000 pieces of body armor and helmets distributed to Iraqis during that period are also unaccounted for.

As the U.S. four-star in charge of Iraq, Petraeus has shown a definite penchant for public relations, having staged a record setting Fourth of July reenlistment ceremony and a congressional shopping spree through an outdoor market in Baghdad, and treating journalists to an aerial tour of the city's soccer games. Pentagon correspondent Thomas E. Ricks, a Petraeus fan, refers to the general as a "force of nature," and often cites Petraeus's fondness for challenging soldiers half his age to one-arm pushup contests. Like Ricks, I'm impressed that a general in his mid-fifties can outdo fit men half his age in tests of physical fitness, but all the one-arm pushups in the world won't fix what's broken in Iraq.

It's not my purpose to run Petraeus down for the fun of it. Let's face it, nobody makes it to level he has reached in the military without making a few enemies or mistakes, or without a certain flair for flash and self promotion. My point is that General Petraeus may be able to walk on his hands, but he can't walk on water--as Mr. Bush seems to want us to think.

As Ricks noted in July, "Almost every time President Bush has defended his new strategy in Iraq this year, he has invoked the name of the top commander, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus." Mr. Bush calls Petraeus his "main man," and managed to fend off a revolt of congressional Republicans over the war by telling them "to wait to see what David has to say. I trust David Petraeus, his judgment."

That Mr. Bush trusts Petraeus's judgment should give us pause. Mr. Bush has an established track record of trusting the judgment of people who tell him what he wants to hear. This is not to imply that Petraeus is a spineless yes man. He probably does believe in the escalation strategy and in his own ability to pull it off. But beliefs and reality aren't always the same things. Believing to the depths of one's soul that the moon is made of green cheese doesn't make it so.

And so it is with our situation in Iraq. We've listened to four and a half years of "last throes" and "dead enders" and of criticism of the war described as "Henny Penny sky is falling" talk from the likes of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld (who could both be described as "forces of nature" themselves).

Nobody in their right mind or otherwise expects that come mid-September, General Petraeus will tell Congress, "Sorry folks, I gave this surge thing my best shot, but it's time to yank the rug out from under it." No, Petraeus will walk in loaded with a full magazine of talking points about "signs of success" and the need for the legislature to give him more time to "get the job done."

The administration and its liegemen will point to Petraeus's testimony as "proof" that Congress needs to continue funding and supporting Mr. Bush's "Son of Stay the Course" strategy. They'll harangue the Democrats with the argument that says, "Hey, you confirmed him, now you have to do whatever he tells you to," and given what we've seen since January, the Democrats are likely to cave in.

The shame is that the Democrats will likely go wobbly because they can't understand or explain that decisions of whether or not to persist in conducting a war are not matters of strategy, they're matters of foreign policy, and in the United States, generals are not supposed to dictate policy, foreign, domestic or otherwise. And despite what Bush supporters would have you believe, the Constitution does not make foreign policy the exclusive privilege of the executive branch. It does quite the opposite.

Article II makes the president commander in chief of the military and allows him to receive foreign ambassadors and ministers. He appoints U.S. ambassadors to other nations, but they must be consented to by the Senate, as do "other officers of the United States" like David Petraeus. A president can make treaties, but those treaties must be approved by two-thirds supermajority of the Senate.

Article I gives the legislature authority, among other things, to punish "offenses against the law of nations," to declare war, to issue letters of marque and reprisal, to provide and regulate the military, and to call out the militia to repel invasions.

Nowhere does the Constitution dictate or allow Congress to cede its authority in matters of war and peace to the president's "main man." I hope the Democrats keep that in mind come September.

[/rquoter]

 

Because it is a volunteer army their trust in leadership and it only sending them into war in circumstances that would protect the U.S. is more sacred. The trust has been broken and keeping them in the instance of that broken trust is more of disservice to the volunteer army.

 

The thing is Patraeus can't even say that the policy in Iraq is making the U.S. safer. He's the general in charge. He said that what they are doing is the best, but the general in charge can't even say that it is making the U.S. safer.

He's leading people to die for something that he can't say is making the U.S. safer. It is ridiculous.

 

Just curious... how old are you? If you don't mind me asking.




D&D. Impeach the Living Embodiment of the Peter Principal.

 

If you put 160k strong army in a country of stone age, there ought to be some level of reduction of violence there. Do we know for sure we could pull out next year and Iraq wont be another Vietnam. I was hoping to get an answer from the report, but disappointed. Can we still say it is working?

 

As Fred Kaplan noted over on Slate today - this was a damning indictment of President Bush's ridiculous claim to the contrary. Really it makes Bush look terrible.

Fortunately for Bush, most of America tuned his lame duck self out a long time ago.

 

The guy is in charge of military operations of all of Iraq but can't say if those operations make the U.S. safer or not?

Is that really what you think makes a good commander?