The Problem with Barack Obama... to me...

[Yurt]

this crap is really boring and tired....

I agree.

Now why don't you be a man and drop it?

why even respond you idiot

you're the one continuing it by jumping into it and declaring who is truthful or not....

you simply don't need to respond any further

got it, good

 

[MaggieMae]

If any of you guys READ McChystal's request - he made it emphatically clear that request was FIRST and FOREMOST a request for a review of strategy and tactics and that additional forces were NOT the crux of his request.

The 40,000 figure was based on a specific strategy for what he actually wanted to DO WITH 40,000 additional troops.

Obama obliged and made a very careful review of strategy and tactics and opted for a modified course of action that could be accomplished with 30,000 troops. McChrytal agreed.

I STILL disagree with the decision - but for crying out loud, I do wish people could stop falling all over themselves trying to gin-up something to whine about.

LMAO.....so I am curious....did you get the clearance and the tag to enter the room with no cell phone, no camera, no one with you...oh yeah...and of course.....proof you are a member of congress...to read the unredacted report from the general?

Wow...I am impressed!

Did you? Got proof? Oops, you don't provide proof; just your word.

 

[MaggieMae]

Patreus [sic] ?
LMAO....you surely know what you are talking about.

McChrystal asked for the troops... Petraeus, as his boss, supported and endorsed his request. Now..Petraeus is fully supportive of the plan that resulted from the Obama team thoroughly examining all the various strategy/force strength options.

And you know this how exactly?

Patraeus appeared on several morning news programs yesterday confirming just that. In fact he revealed that small, clandestine special forces operations will be deployed to eliminate pockets of terrorists in the most inaccessable places. Obama didn't talk about such details, yet everyone expected him to, and as I said earlier, if he had he'd still be talking. But the public shouldn't be privy to classified strategic movements, so don't expect much more to be made public until after an operation has ended, if then.

 

[MaggieMae]

Huh? Did I say there were not enough workers for the project?
A PM devises a plan BASED ON THE AMOUNT OF WORKERS AVAILABLE and the budget.
Whats the use....you are wasting my time.

I give up...you win

That was an excellent analogy and directly relates to the situation in Afghanistan

You should be proud

The words in bold.....
Sadly, words us Americans will need to get used to.
Words I have seen you use one too many times.
Grow some balls you spinleless freak.

Make up your mind, sir.

 

[geauxtohell]

That may be the problem. You want to see your information from a link. I like to get my information from the source. A General will not ask for 40,000 troops if there were not 40,000 troops to take. A general would not ask for 40,000 troops if those troops were war weary and not 100% capable of performing in a life and death situation.

You see...I have a choice of listening to Hannity, or Matthews, or blogs or commentators........or, instead, the ones that are really in the know. I have learned my lesson educating myself with info from links...Instead, I know apply basic logic and listen to those in the know.

So, no, I do not have a link. I have the word of a general who knows a heck of a lot more than any link will ever know.

Translation: I have NOTHING to back up a thing I say, but you should trust it more than documented sources because I said so.

The thing is, they probably could scrape together enough conventional units like infantry brigades, but they are not as effective in a terrain such as Afghanistan, so special operations forces are preferred which take more training and are more scarce in number.

Tactics, not terrain, drive that.

SF units have a distinct mission that is different then the Infantry.

The Infantry's mission is to be able to handle any terrain. That is why we have a mountain units, jungle units, airborne units, artic units, etc. Any standard infantry unit can deal with the terrain in Afghanistan.

 

[MaggieMae]

i can't believe this board has a creepy grammar nazi stalker.....

some people really need a life, stalking others is really perverted

and as anyone can tell...i really spend time checking my spelling, punctuation and capitalization.....

at least i haven't been banned from 3 boards (multiple times) for personally threatening someone, his family and his job....

Retired military, regardless of ideology, shoiuld never be compared to a nazi.

oh please, grammar nazi and spelling nazi are simple slang for obsessive assholes on the internet who go around message boards constantly correcting grammar and spelling as if message boards are theses

I agree with you on this one Yurt. My system crashed a week ago and when I got it back up, I had mysteriously "lost" the spell check on my toolbar. I didn't realize how much I used it until it wasn't there. Now I just wing it and hope I don't fall victim to the nit-pickers.

 

[geauxtohell]

Petraeus NEVER asked for the troops. McChrystal was the "project manager" who did the research work necessary for the request and the he was also the Author of the request.
Obama is Petraeus' boss...so was it Obama's request? You see my point.

And Petraeus is McChrystal's boss..........

 

[geauxtohell]

why even respond you idiot

you're the one continuing it by jumping into it and declaring who is truthful or not....

you simply don't need to respond any further

got it, good

It's pathological with you, isn't it?

 

[Coyote]

That may be the problem. You want to see your information from a link. I like to get my information from the source. A General will not ask for 40,000 troops if there were not 40,000 troops to take. A general would not ask for 40,000 troops if those troops were war weary and not 100% capable of performing in a life and death situation.

You see...I have a choice of listening to Hannity, or Matthews, or blogs or commentators........or, instead, the ones that are really in the know. I have learned my lesson educating myself with info from links...Instead, I know apply basic logic and listen to those in the know.

So, no, I do not have a link. I have the word of a general who knows a heck of a lot more than any link will ever know.

It seems to me that a general asks for what he "needs" to complete what he sees as the mission and that does not mean he is knowledgable on availability or on war weariness. But it's up to the Commander in Chief, a civilian as mandated constitutionally - to determine the scope of the mission and that mission has been thrashed out and considered very carefully over the past three months...I don't think that the job of the CinC is to give his generals whatever they ask for but to consider the big picture and define the mission. I think that lack of definition has been a problem from the beginning. But I'm just guessing - I'll admit. This debate kind of reminds me a little of McArthur/Truman....my grandfather was a general and he never forgave Truman.

 

[mudwhistle]

Oh please.

Other than the fact that McChrystal publically asked for more troops, you think Petraeus isn't on board with that?

That's not how the Chain of Command works.

This is what happens when people try to politicize the motives of professional officers. The conservatives were all hunky dory on Petraeus when Bush was in Office (and some liberals were calling him Betrayus) now that Obama is in charge, the tables are turned.

Thank God we have a professional officer corps (and NCO corps) that is above this political backbiting.

Petraeus is CENTCOM commander, that means any plan in CENTCOM has his signature on it. Especially plans at the strategic and operational level.

I'm aware of who Patraeus is, and who McChrystal is, and I know that what they say in public is not necesarily what they think.

I have more respect for professoinal officers than I do for any politician. Patreus is a great officer, as is McChrystal.

My point - unless you are within a very limited chain around either, then you are unlikely to know what either of them really thinks about Obama's strategy.

You don't have much respect for GEN Petraeus' integrity if you think he would be pressured into a plan that he didn't agree with.

Considering Petraeus advocated for the "surge", you don't think he'd try a similar template in Afghanistan?

For the record, I don't think it's the right approach there, but I know that Petraeus is much smarter about this than I am. That gives me some confidence.

Officers follow orders. That's all they can do or resign.

Strange how Obama wants to surge but never admitted that the surge in Iraq ever worked. This new policy is an open admission that he thinks it did.

If you wait long enough liars [Democrats] evenually expose themselves.

Problem being that most people aren't smart enough to figure out that it happened. In most cases you have to point it out to them.

I have zero confidence that this surge will work in Afghanistan. It's basically a cheap imitation of the Bush surge.....with cut & run date being included to assure failure.

 

[rightwinger]

Love how a ten year engagement in Afghanistan is "cut and run"

 

[geauxtohell]

Strange how Obama wants to surge but never admitted that the surge in Iraq ever worked. This new policy is an open admission that he thinks it did.

Except that he did.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Udt92OwPOgs[/ame]

After that, is there any point in addressing the rest of your points?

If you wait long enough liars [Democrats] evenually expose themselves.

Problem being that most people aren't smart enough to figure out that it happened. In most cases you have to point it out to them.

I have zero confidence that this surge will work in Afghanistan. It's basically a cheap imitation of the Bush surge.....with cut & run date being included to assure failure.

 

[geauxtohell]

Love how a ten year engagement in Afghanistan is "cut and run"

Oh the phrase "cut and run", how I hate the so.......

 

[mudwhistle]

Love how a ten year engagement in Afghanistan is "cut and run"

It's simple....first of all it isn't 10 years....try 9...secondly Obama wasn't President during most of it but no sooner do things get tough for him he wants to quit.

First he proclaimed it was the good war...then he said he would not rest until it was won.....now he wants to bail out on a fixed date regardless of whether we have a victory or not. He's gonna take a full year to build up our forces and within 6 months he's gonna start pulling them out.

That's called Cutting and Running.

 

[geauxtohell]

Love how a ten year engagement in Afghanistan is "cut and run"

It's simple....first of all it isn't 10 years....try 9...secondly Obama wasn't President during most of it but no sooner do things get tough for him he wants to quit.

First he proclaimed it was the good war...then he said he would not rest until it was won.....now he wants to bail out on a fixed date regardless of whether we have a victory or not. He's gonna take a full year to build up our forces and within 6 months he's gonna start pulling them out.

That's called Cutting and Running.

I applaud him for not giving the Afghan government the luxury of an open ended commitment.

Secondly, it's irrelevant how long Obama has been running the show. What is relevant, is the perception on the Afghan street, which is that we have overstayed our welcome. When the public stops seeing us as liberators and occupiers, the insurgency is strengthened. I suspect that is a large part of the Taliban resurgence.

 

[rightwinger]

Love how a ten year engagement in Afghanistan is "cut and run"

It's simple....first of all it isn't 10 years....try 9...secondly Obama wasn't President during most of it but no sooner do things get tough for him he wants to quit.

First he proclaimed it was the good war...then he said he would not rest until it was won.....now he wants to bail out on a fixed date regardless of whether we have a victory or not. He's gonna take a full year to build up our forces and within 6 months he's gonna start pulling them out.

That's called Cutting and Running.

We have at least two more years before we start to withdraw troops. He never said anything close to he would not rest until it was won.....you are making that up

Victory is defined as Afhanistan defending itself. If they cannot build the capability to control their own country after more than ten years they never will

When Bush pulled troops to attack Iraq...was that "cut and run"??

 

[mudwhistle]

Strange how Obama wants to surge but never admitted that the surge in Iraq ever worked. This new policy is an open admission that he thinks it did.

Except that he did.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Udt92OwPOgs[/ame]

After that, is there any point in addressing the rest of your points?

If you wait long enough liars [Democrats] evenually expose themselves.

Problem being that most people aren't smart enough to figure out that it happened. In most cases you have to point it out to them.

I have zero confidence that this surge will work in Afghanistan. It's basically a cheap imitation of the Bush surge.....with cut & run date being included to assure failure.

Funny...what I heard was him refusing to give credit where credit is due.

He said the surge worked in ways even Bush didn't think it would.

Which is the same thing as saying Bush succeeded by accident but not saying the word "succeeded".

He never wants to show any class and admit Bush was right about anything.

So in effect he says the troops succeeded but Bush wasn't responsible for anything at all...which means he still says Bush failed.

This is a very small man this Obama guy.

 

[mudwhistle]

Love how a ten year engagement in Afghanistan is "cut and run"

It's simple....first of all it isn't 10 years....try 9...secondly Obama wasn't President during most of it but no sooner do things get tough for him he wants to quit.

First he proclaimed it was the good war...then he said he would not rest until it was won.....now he wants to bail out on a fixed date regardless of whether we have a victory or not. He's gonna take a full year to build up our forces and within 6 months he's gonna start pulling them out.

That's called Cutting and Running.

I applaud him for not giving the Afghan government the luxury of an open ended commitment.

Secondly, it's irrelevant how long Obama has been running the show. What is relevant, is the perception on the Afghan street, which is that we have overstayed our welcome. When the public stops seeing us as liberators and occupiers, the insurgency is strengthened. I suspect that is a large part of the Taliban resurgence.

Who's fault is that perception?

Obama doesn't know what he's doing.

We won over the locals in Iraq and the surge started working.

Obama puts our guys out in the middle of nowhere so they can be better targets and imposes ROEs on them that handcuffs them. Then he drags his ass on making any decisions that might help them.

The troops are demoralized because they feel they don't have the support of the President....and the locals feel it's better to not get involved with the effort because of Obama's cut & run strategy.

It's doomed to failure.

 

[rightwinger]

You can't get credit for a surge when it was your own inept strategy to invade Iraq with minimal troops and declare "Mission Accomplished" that allowed the insurgents to take hold

If Bush had ignored Rumsfeld and listened to Shinseki we would have been out of Iraq by 2007

 

[maineman]

I'm aware of who Patraeus is, and who McChrystal is, and I know that what they say in public is not necesarily what they think.

I have more respect for professoinal officers than I do for any politician. Patreus is a great officer, as is McChrystal.

My point - unless you are within a very limited chain around either, then you are unlikely to know what either of them really thinks about Obama's strategy.

and if you had ever served in the military, you would know that there are countless situations arising every single day where senior military officers disagree with their more senior superiors... and they voice that disagreement in private and then, after their opinions have been voiced, and the senior makes a decision, the subordinates all walk away and implement the decision as if it were their own.

True...but you and I both know exactly who the CIC is and how he is perceived as it pertains to military strategy. We are not talking aboiut DDE or even JFK

We are not talking about a Col and a Lt. Col with military training and experience debating tactical operations a mile off the front.

We are talking about an experienced Genral with direct exposure to the front and the CIC with absolutely no military training.

There...I said it.....I will put stock in an NCO over our CIC any day of the year when it comes to military strategy...and yes...I am exagerrating but to make a valid point.

I understand your point... but would that point have held true under Wilson, who had NO military training, or FDR, who had NO military training, or LBJ, who had precious little military training? The CinC is the CinC because the people of this country, not merely the people in uniform, want HIM to be the CinC.

If you don't like the decisions he makes as CinC, you can either run against him or vote for the other person who runs against him in the next election.

As for me, I will support - even begrudgingly - the decisions of my CinC.