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America and military criticism
#1
America and military criticism


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#2
RE: America and military criticism
It must be terribly painful for him to face the reality that his buddies died because of a series of clusterfucks...not the least of which was sending troops to Afghanistan in the first place. At some point though Americans will have to realize that we cannot send a company of marines to every 3d world shithole. They have far more shitholes than we have marines.
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#3
RE: America and military criticism
Talk to Obama about it.
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#4
RE: America and military criticism
Uh, well number one...

We went to Afghanistan in the first place, Min, because 3000 Americans died screaming on American soil and the bastards that did it were being harbored in Afghanistan. What would you have us do, wag our finger at them and call them naughty? I really don't understand when people say, "We should never have gone there in the first place!" or "Why are we in Afghanistan?"

What the living fuck?

Anyway.

Yeah, some military guys get defensive when it turns out the country shouldn't have sacrificed their buddies for a less than stellar reason. But the logic behind it is this.

The military isn't a democracy. There are no debate teams. When you sign up for the military you swear to obey lawful orders from your superiors. Not to question them.

That's a privilege that civilians have. Military members voluntarily give up those rights so that you can continue to keep them.

Now, as an example, Vietnam. Major clusterfuck, we lost tons of people, they lost tons of people, and in the end the same result happened if we hadn't even tried at all. So, yeah, you could say it was all a waste.

But for the individual soldier, that's above their paygrade. If a soldier did his duty, and his job, and died doing it then that deserves some respect I would imagine.

I just wish the politicians would act a hell of a lot more wisely.

Robert A. Heinlein, the late science fiction writer, advocated that only veterans should have the full rights as we all do now as citizens. For the most part everything would still be the same all around. But only veterans would be able to vote or hold public office.

Maybe if Congress was comprised of nothing but battle scarred veterans they'd spend American lives more frugally.
Everything I needed to know about life I learned on Dagobah.
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#5
RE: America and military criticism
Quote:Now, as an example, Vietnam. Major clusterfuck, we lost tons of people, they lost tons of people, and in the end the same result happened if we hadn't even tried at all. So, yeah, you could say it was all a waste.


Can you seriously look at Afghanistan and think that the ultimate outcome is going to be any different than Vietnam.


Yes, I know that the leaders were in Afghanistan. So what? If a bank robber runs into a school will the cops burn the school down just to get him? Okay - bad example. These days they might. Ultimately we got bin Laden with a small group - not an army. We had an administration which thought that any problem could be solved by dropping bombs on it. They conned themselves into thinking that we'd be greeted as "liberators." As a result we have taken a further 20,000 casualties on top of the original 3,000 and that's not including Iraq which was an even bigger clusterfuck than Afghanistan. And, for what? To prop up sleazy bastards like Karzai and Maliki?

We cannot police the whole world.

I certainly understand why any soldier would not want to think too deeply about the sacrifices they made.

I'm not so sure about the veterans idea though. As the saying goes "old soldiers never die because young soldiers do all the fighting."
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#6
RE: America and military criticism
So your big plan would have been for us to ignore 9/11, Min? Just shrug and say it's ok, we'll just clean up the mess and forget about the whole thing?

Bin Laden blew up the USS Cole to draw us into war and it didn't happen. So he ramped it up and implemented the 9/11 event. If we had ignored that he would have continued and done something else. Over and over and over.

Were we just going to sit here and take hit after hit? Bullshit.

I'd rather our soldiers die over there than our civilians die over here.

Oh, we took causalities in Afghanistan. Wow, no one saw that coming. What the fuck.

Invading Afghanistan was the only correct choice.

The only time an American soldier feels like their buddies died in Afghanistan for nothing is when they talk to an ungrateful idiot like you that has their head stuck up their ass.
Everything I needed to know about life I learned on Dagobah.
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#7
RE: America and military criticism
(January 16, 2014 at 11:33 pm)Rahul Wrote: Uh, well number one...

We went to Afghanistan in the first place, Min, because 3000 Americans died screaming on American soil and the bastards that did it were being harbored in Afghanistan. What would you have us do, wag our finger at them and call them naughty? I really don't understand when people say, "We should never have gone there in the first place!" or "Why are we in Afghanistan?"

What the living fuck?

Anyway.

Yeah, some military guys get defensive when it turns out the country shouldn't have sacrificed their buddies for a less than stellar reason. But the logic behind it is this.

The military isn't a democracy. There are no debate teams. When you sign up for the military you swear to obey lawful orders from your superiors. Not to question them.

That's a privilege that civilians have. Military members voluntarily give up those rights so that you can continue to keep them.

Now, as an example, Vietnam. Major clusterfuck, we lost tons of people, they lost tons of people, and in the end the same result happened if we hadn't even tried at all. So, yeah, you could say it was all a waste.

But for the individual soldier, that's above their paygrade. If a soldier did his duty, and his job, and died doing it then that deserves some respect I would imagine.

I just wish the politicians would act a hell of a lot more wisely.

Robert A. Heinlein, the late science fiction writer, advocated that only veterans should have the full rights as we all do now as citizens. For the most part everything would still be the same all around. But only veterans would be able to vote or hold public office.

Maybe if Congress was comprised of nothing but battle scarred veterans they'd spend American lives more frugally.
Stupidity deserves respect?... what a world.
[Image: thfrog.gif]



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#8
RE: America and military criticism
It is a false dichotomy to think that we can only be brash and reckless or do nothing, and I really wish people would stop using it to defend highly flawed, short-sighted military campaigns.
Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cozy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own - Bertrand Russell
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#9
RE: America and military criticism
Vietnam was a huge mistake & horrible war. But invading Afghanistan was the correct choice. Iraq also needed to be liberated from the dictatorship of Ba'ath, although I don't like the way Bush Jr. handled it. If he had taken the same route as his father none of our men would have died. The Gulf War was a huge success & much to the credit of Bush Sr., who owned Saddam without even injuring a single serviceman.
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