Imagine an Occupied America

[AZhitman]

Wow. Kind of a tough one to swallow...

http://antiwar.com/paul/

[s0m3th1ngAZ]

Well...and not to sound trite...DUH
Why this isn't common knowledge goes to show how rigid our thinking as a nation is.

[mattblancarte]

1.6 MILLION casualties in Iraq. How many of those are seriously injured and wounded civilians, you ask? 1.5 MILLION.

How many dead from our campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq? Damn near 1 million.

This is definitely a hot-button issue for me, and the way in which Bush's War on Terror played out makes me sick.

Obama is just as bad in my opinion. He's failed to bring the troops home in a timely manner (last time I checked, it was 2011), and he shouldn't be forgiven for that. He will not receive my vote in the coming election. End of story.

The US should not be involved in foreign nation building, lest we want to embrace the blow-back as a result.

[Cold_Zero]

After looking at the title, I have one thing to say, "WOLVERINES!"
I believe the remake is coming out soon.

I agree with a lot (not all) of what Representative Paul has to say. Which really pisses my father off (having taken part in two occupations, or liberations.) It would be interesting to ask Rep. Ron Paul what his view on World War II would is, related to ‘empire building.’
But I am glad, Greg you posted this up because it gives me a segue to my hot button issue.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/ger ... 10,00.html

Now look, I am not going to imply that because we have bases in Ktown or Baumholder, that this prompted the attack. NO, rewind 13 years to the Clinton Administration where, in their short sidedness they should have been bombing the KLA instead of ripping Kosovo out of Serbia. Kosovo had been a part of Serbia since the 1300’s. Now why do you ask does this pertain to the link above? Well the shooter was a Kosovar (Albanian) who apparently had ties to radical Islamists. Now, please note that the vast majority of Albanians in Kosovo like the Bosniacs are typically Muslim in heritage only (non practicing). They are like the Americans that think their default religion is Christianity. But it was more important to establish a base in the Balkans and subsequently display 1 million people from Kosovo, so we supported the KLA to overthrow local government in Kosovo. We should have been fighting the terrorlst group the KLA.
Now this is not the sole reason why this area is so messed up. The Ottoman Empire had a lot to do with why the Balkans are the way they are. And please don’t jump my case by confusing the Bosnian civil war with the NATO action in Kosovo or imply that Serbians are all evil. I would remind everyone that it was the Croatians that joined the Nazis in setting the Balkans and Eastern Europe ablaze. Not the Serbians.

[audtatious]

This is definitely a hot-button issue for me, and the way in which Bush's War on Terror played out makes me sick.

That's the past now that Obama has stopped it....

[IBCoupe]

Last July, everybody's two favorite senators (including the guy you're linking to) joined forces.

[audtatious]

Cut military spending

Increase bank financing to those who can't afford to pay the loans back

Sounds like a Frank plan to me.

[szh]

Wow. Kind of a tough one to swallow...

http://antiwar.com/paul/

It is, indeed, a good way to bring the facts home ... we need to look in mirrors more often.

Z

[AZhitman]

...was hoping you'd chime in, Z.

[szh]

...was hoping you'd chime in, Z.

There are no real clear-cut answers, unfortunately!

I am opposed to war (see below for why), but I recognize reality and can see the other viewpoints. Because of the serious consequences - and these are obvious - of going into battle, I want powers-that-be to think very, very hard about making such decisions. Going to war should never be easy or done in haste or emotionally undertaken!

And, I also believe that each such situation has to be dealt with independently ... with the appropriate amount of clean (non-emotional) thinking-through.

(People need to read Churchill's full six volume history of the Second World War - a tough read because of the length, but an amazing chronicle of war and its effect on people.)

Yeah, some wars are perhaps easier than others to justify, of course. For example, I am a complete believer in a strong self-defense. Never be the aggressor, but always be way strong enough to prevent aggressors from ever considering anything stupid - or at least, make them think hard before they move.

Inre the article at the link, yes, I understand why the Afghans defended themselves against the Russians as best as they could, and are being hurtful to the Americans in their country - inspite of the fact that Afghans are one of the most hospitable peoples in the world! I don't agree with them doing what they do, of course, but I understand them. And, it has hit home close - good friends of mine have their sons and daughters in the US forces over there, and I worry for them! One of them was almost killed a few years ago - his friend took the brunt of the bomb that went off.

And, friends of relatives have been killed ... you all will remember my post about the US Soldier who was killed while working on providing clean water to people in Afghanistan. Frankly, soldiers have the toughest job in the world - they are called upon to potentially sacrifice everything for their country in the line of duty.

Long sidebar ... albeit sorta related to the original post ... explains my stance on war:

I remember the big hoopla when Maya Lin was chosen as the architect of the Vietnam War Memorial. The opponents said that she was a woman, and could not possibly understand the history of those events, etc., etc., etc. Veterans castigated her design as a travesty compared to other, far more grandiose, monuments and memorials in the city.

Yet, I also remember that the critics were almost instantly silenced when The Wall was completed and unveiled. I wondered what could cause that change of heart?

So, in the summer of 1985, my sister and I were in Washington and we went to see The Wall and the Three Soldiers Statue.

We were absolutely and totally stunned by the beauty, simplicity, power and majesty of what we encountered. Yet, it was also one of the most peaceful places I have ever been in. Quite literally, my sister and I walked around there for an entire afternoon without speaking a word to each other.

We sat on the grass and watched the families and friends, including other veterans, of the fallen soldiers find the names of their lost loved ones, leave notes and flowers, rub the names onto paper with pencils and charcoal, and cry. And we grieved with them. We watched as young and old alike became instantly part of the amazing aura of the place when they walked in there.

That very day a major change occurred in me: watching the the lasting effects of war on soldiers and their friends and families, let alone the damage to others in the war zone fray, made me come to the personal belief that wars should never be fought.

However, reality is what it is. So, certain war scenarios are possibly described as necessary evils perhaps. But these must be carefully examined at all times, IMHO.

I believe that all Presidents and Senators and Congresspersons (and the Generals too!) should be required to spend a few hours walking at The Wall before they cast their vote to go, or not to go, to war against any another nation or people or region. Regardless of the provocation. And, regardless of the circumstances. This may help clear their minds of any fuzzy thinking!

Pardon the long ramble ... but explains why I stand where I stand on the issue!

Z

[IBCoupe]

That was a nice piece you wrote there, Z. My sincere thanks for you sharing it with us.

I will always support calls for a draft and for war taxes; only when we all have skin in the game will we be willing to stand up and say whether we think the war is justified or not. Could we be lied into a war? Sure. Could we be wrong? You bet. But we'd most assuredly be a lot slower to accede ourselves to the unfortunate aspects of war, and we'd be a lot quicker to put an end to a war we decided was improperly conducted.

[mattblancarte]

I believe that all Presidents and Senators and Congresspersons (and the Generals too!) should be required to spend a few hours walking at The Wall before they cast their vote to go, or not to go, to war against any another nation or people or region. Regardless of the provocation. And, regardless of the circumstances. This may help clear their minds of any fuzzy thinking!

Love this type of thinking.

While I don't support a draft of any kind, I do support the idea of war taxes.

Drafting our soldiers should be withheld for just-wars, such as WWII. As in, the USA will face impending doom if we don't engage a major superpower rival with everything we've got.

My logic behind that is that we already have a huge war-fighting force and spend insane amounts of money on our military groups.

We'd either have to:

1. Spend more money overall.
2. Decrease pay/quality/etc. for each soldier.

Each sound like bad news to me.

I totally get what you're saying, IB, and I think the ideals are in the right place. Just not sure if a draft would slow down the process much. Also not sure if it would allow the average Joe non-soldier citizen to soak in more of the horrors brought on by war to any greater extent. If anything, it could be argued that we are much more aware of the day-to-day madness nowadays.

[stebo0728]

IB, not knowing it, you've touched a bit on my tax theory. Although I tend to favor consumption based tax, regardless of the form of tax, taxes should be more specific in nature. Your idea of a war tax, I agree with completely, because then we as Americans can absolutely know what we are spending on any engagement, and can more easily determine when this is or isnt an appropriate action.

As far as the draft, Im with matt, I think a professional, career military fairs much better than a forced participation. If we were to have a war come to our shores, and we were fighting for our very survival, then of course, everyone would have to fight, even citizens (if they havent been neutered by gun law).

[IBCoupe]

Drafting our soldiers should be withheld for just-wars, such as WWII.

I think you got my point, but it deserves reiteration: the hope is that in having a draft, we'd have far fewer unjust wars.

I want war to be as unpleasant as possible for as many people as possible. I want it to be that we are never again eager to go to war; always reluctant. How do you think March 30th, 2003 would be remembered if every able-bodied man had it in their heads that they're the next to ship out?

[stebo0728]

I dont know that I would argue that we have conducted any "unjust" wars. Certainly we've put our nose where we didnt need to, from a self preservation standpoint, but I dont know that any of the things we've done weren't actually a just endeavor, for the right reasons. Now you can certainly say we shouldnt have done alot of the things we've done, or that we should have done them differently, but not because our actions were unjust, just because they weren't entirely smart, or the best actions for our own interests.

[IBCoupe]

I think that sticking our noses where we oughtn't is unjust. We have killed people, Stebo, and for really crappy reasons. We lied ourselves into a war, and then, when we admitted the lies, we justified it to ourselves in a way that would have never gotten us into the war in the first place. And there were doubts about the WMD's in the beginning - I know because I and others were expressing them. I asked, "If the inspectors can't find anything, but we maintain that the WMD's are there, why don't we tell them where to look?" Nobody answered, and a few months later, we invaded Iraq.

I think that's pretty much the definition of "unjust." Maybe Afghanistan was better justified (though we need to ask ourselves: where does self-defense end and revenge begin?), but I don't think an honest person can really call Iraq a "just war."

[Cold_Zero]

Wouldnt we just see more 'operations' like the Global War on terror, which is fought prodiminately from Djibouti (Northern and Horn of Africa) to the Phillipines, and less official wars to avoid the taxation and drafts?
The tax doesnt so much provide more 'skin in the game' as much as it draws direct attention to what is being paid for(providing more information). And thus makin it 'unpleasant as possible.' It is very similar to a tactic that the Fair Tax uses, keep taxes low by not allowing Politicians to embed taxes.

[stebo0728]

I dont know, I dont want to start the whole "Bush lied" debate back up and all that. My point is, the end result, the removal of Suddam I think was a necassary step. I do think we did it out of turn, and let Iran dangle too long while screwing with Iraq, but I still think at some point, dealing with Saddam was going to be necassary. Regardless of all the reasons we did it, whether we were lied to, whether we believed the wrong people, I still think we would have ended up the same place. The WMD was there, WAS there, where it went we've yet to discover, or if it was destroyed, no proof of that has been found either. We telegraphed WAY too much on that ordeal so any idiot could have cleaned house before we got there.

So perhaps we acted upon some sort of "unjust" reasons, I still use the term "unjust" sparingly, but I do believe the end result to have been a just one, and a necessary one, even if we did handle it out of order from other things.

[IBCoupe]

The WMD's don't exist until we show that they did. You don't get to wage a war because opponents haven't yet proved a negative. Whether we were lied to is actually immaterial - we didn't give a good reason. There are despots all over the place. Think if "Saddam's a bad guy" had been offered from the get go that anywhere near a majority of Americans would have supported sending young Americans there to die?

[IBCoupe]

Cold, that doesn't really seem like an argument against either a draft or a war tax. Yeah, the government can go around things. So? Vote better. And impose a war tax and a draft.

[Cold_Zero]

I am not trying to undermind your argument. Trying to parse through the issue.

[mattblancarte]

I think you got my point, but it deserves reiteration: the hope is that in having a draft, we'd have far fewer unjust wars.

I want war to be as unpleasant as possible for as many people as possible. I want it to be that we are never again eager to go to war; always reluctant. How do you think March 30th, 2003 would be remembered if every able-bodied man had it in their heads that they're the next to ship out?

Totally understand your point, and I think it's a good thought with all the right intentions. However, when I put it into historical perspective I can't find a reason to think it would work.

Considering the last 100 years in particular, you can contrast the times in which the draft was lawful vs. the post-Vietnam Conflict era. The draft didn't stop the government from lying our way into Vietnam, or dragging it out until millions of innocents were dead.

The public is becoming less and less tolerant of each conflict that can be exposed as flawed and unjust.

Information regarding pretty much anything is so free and easily obtained nowadays... Perhaps forcing the government to show billboards of gore-shots or something would be as effective, without all the unwanted dying/maiming of drafted soldiers.

I dont know, I dont want to start the whole "Bush lied" debate back up and all that. My point is, the end result, the removal of Suddam I think was a necassary step. I do think we did it out of turn, and let Iran dangle too long while screwing with Iraq, but I still think at some point, dealing with Saddam was going to be necassary.

Looking at the current state of the middle east, if we had left Iraq alone they may have fixed the problem themselves it may have played out much more in their favor.

If they were already trying to overthrow Saddam and we aided militarily, it wouldn't look 1/10th as bad as how we went through with it.

[IBCoupe]

Certainly you're right about that, Matt. Even as I give those measures my full-throated support, Vietnam is bouncing around in my skull. I still think it's the right thing to do. At the very least, it might make us conduct wars better: armor plating for humvees, anyone?

[Cold_Zero]

I seem to remember during the begining of the War in Iraq 2003, they had a hard time supplying body armor and they were running low on BGM-109 TLAM's.

[IBCoupe]

I thought I remembered the body armor issue, but I wasn't sure. I was sure about the humvee plating, so that's what I used for an example.

Think if each Congressman had a few more kids from their district involved that they'd be a little bit more concerned with getting that stuff to the front?

[mattblancarte]

I believe the strategists at the Pentagon were to blame. The modern Interceptor armor was deemed combat-worthy in 2000, and they were slow to move it out to each soldier.

What's odd is that it should have been easy to predict the type of weaponry they'd face. AK-47 rounds and RPG's.

In hindsight, the mismanagement of the conflict was apparent from the get-go.

The Humvee plating wasn't really even on the map because they couldn't predict the ridiculous number of IED's they'd face in day to day patrolling. They were decently quick to fix that, IMHO.

[IBCoupe]

Heh, so it seems of all the possible examples I could have offered, I picked the worst one.

So, let me rephrase:
"At the very least, it might make us conduct wars better: body armor, anyone?"

I wonder if the reason I remember the humvee plating so well is because there was a pretty large outcry about it when it came to light. I wonder, if that's the case, that it's the same reason it was resolved so quickly.

[Cold_Zero]

IBCoupe, there have been quite a few Congressmen with their children in harms way. Funny, when Michael Moore was sticking a microphone in their faces to blast the war in Iraq, he never seemed to find the ones that had their children deployed. *shrug*

[IBCoupe]

Okay.