Only that between right and wrong.Originally Posted by Drang
Only that between right and wrong.
Right and wrong isn’t simple in the real world.
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Please trust me when I say that all of that planning and research has been done, and continues to get done, by leadership that is politically agnostic and is 100% focused on getting this job done *effectively*.
The only time politics come into play is when that knowledge and planning is handed to political leadership, and the choice they make of those options based on politics.
Currently they're taking the effective options instead of the 'but what if' sorts of options and I'm immensely grateful for that, after years of playing smiling slappy-dick with shitty people that happily alternate between exploiting us and killing us as they see fit, because they do not fear us at all.
Make absolutely no mistake - our adversaries out here see ALL of our attempts at being civilized, reasonable, measured, careful about our use of force as only one thing; a lack of spine and a lack resolve because we are infidels and it's Allah's will that we lack the resolve to effectively strike at God's people, despite our overwhelming means to do so.
They see it this way because *they* know what they'd do with the means we have available - and they'd sleep happily after dropping ordnance on every one of our soft civilian targets they could reach. They have no concept of combatants or noncombatants it's just infidels and more dangerous infidels. Culturally they have no understanding or fucks to give toward understanding why we'd try to be careful and measured and peaceful when overwhelming population-clearing violence is an option we have.
There is no reasoning with that mindset or culture; we can only instill fear and hesitation by making sure they *KNOW* they have skin in the game by routinely putting their leadership's heads on very visible spikes.
Now, many of the common folks out here that remember how ugly shit was under a totalitarian dictatorship appreciate the difference between us and the 'old ways' and want us to succeed, but by and large they're not the ones in leadership positions. All of this sucks for those people the most, regardless of which country they're in right now.
He's a done-nothing never-was that feels entitled to sharpshoot every action from his position of confirmation bias and smarmy, willful ignorance that he drops in drive-by opened ended shit-talking like that post.
He'll acknowledge that you'd know more about what you're talking about and then disagree with you anyway in the next sentence.
Don't bother.
Who gives a pink-painted, purple-feathered fuck?
When you're in a fistfight you're an idiot to be thinking about who started it, you should be thinking about landing the fight-ending punch. Figuring out the how and why it started is best figured out after you win the fucking fight. Sure, if we ended up in that fight for dumb reasons we should absolutely learn from that and try to avoid it in the future.
But since we're in a fight, what'd you have us do now? Try to tap out and hope that they let us tap out? If they're being honest, they won't. If they're being the evil self-righteous fucks that we *know* them to be, they'll act like they accept our tap, and play nice until we expose our throats again. That's how these fucking people work and they cannot be compelled to act honestly or in good faith unless they *believe* it'll be their heads on a spike for crossing us.
There's no reasoning with these adversaries. Force is truly the only option, and fear of force is the only thing that will stay their hand. I'm hoping that we can show decisive and effective enough force in the coming weeks that they overwhelmingly feel the need to simmer the fuck down and go back to waving their fists and talking shit like usual.
Truly, the only way this ends well is if we hammer a whole bunch of shit flat and show that we're not scared to do so, and won't ever be scared to do so in the future.
Hey, it’s @JRB laying down some more truths!
On another note. Details from Reuters on some Iranian actions during the run up to this.
Inside the plot by Iran’s Soleimani to attack U.S. forces in Iraq
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-....-idUSKBN1Z301Z
It is one thing to come to your buddy's defense and enter the fight if some stranger walks up and suddenly breaks his nose. It is another to stay in the fight after you learn your buddy raped that stranger's daughter.
You might rightly say "well I'm not friends with any rapists and if I learned someone was, I wouldn't associate with them." If so, great. But you're currently associating with your Uncle Sam who has a long history of sticking his nose in other people's business and lying about the threats presented to further his own interests.
Can you name 1 time "they" attacked the US with absolutely no justification? And even if you think they did, just how many pounds of flesh do you require? 9/11 killed < 3,000. The War on Terror has killed 500,000 just in Iraq, Afghanistan, & Pakistan. Will you not be satisfied until going full Goebbels?
How many dead & maimed Americans does it take before we should act? Since we are talking numbers, what number merits DoD involvement? 1 ? 50? 10,000?
The Minority Marksman.
"When you meet a swordsman, draw your sword: Do not recite poetry to one who is not a poet."
-a Ch'an Buddhist axiom.
First - take a step back and stop deliberately misunderstanding the example I gave. My point is that nothing is to be gained from playing devil's advocate in the middle of a fight. Win that fight first, and then worry about the ethics involved. That's the best policy here and that's the best policy in general. Ideally, avoid fights. Life isn't ideal.
Second - Are you suggesting that the US Gov't is the only Gov't that has engaged in that kind of behavior? Every government or power system on the planet has a history of lying about shit as they see fit to further their own interests.
Our government, for all the warts it has, is among the more transparent and candid versions established by humanity thus far. I daresay that so long as humans are involved at all, perfection is impossible and governments are not immune to that reality.
Yes, it is important to maintain our moral compass. We should seek to only intervene when truly necessary and we should try for nonviolent approaches whenever possible. As I'd think would be self-evident on a board such as P-F, bad guys have a vote in what happens to us, and we don't always have the luxury of avoiding violence.
There's a hell of a lot of people that are straight up evil or culturally so incompatible as to be evil in our eyes (e.g. engage in slavery, genocide, sex trafficking, routinely sexually assault family members or subordinates as they see fit, etc) that peacefully solving their problems with us or our way of life simply isn't an option. Those who would take control of or lead those sorts of people will milk that for all it's worth to make us the boogeyman and secure their own power. Those same people will use the transparency and our 1st Amendment rights to openly and harshly criticize our leadership and paint themselves as the victims to gain emotional support and sew dissent among us.
They'll also invent other happy coincidences and bona fide propaganda to malign and undermine our efforts and use our openness against us there, too.
The US is the only world power with news anchors openly interviewing representatives of hostile nations and giving weight to what they're saying. Journalists in Iran that want to interview US members of state would be expected to be part of a hostage or assassination plot, so it doesn't happen. Seeing how other major powers handle news and media has been a very real eye-opener for me personally. The US MSM situation is worse than it's ever been, to be sure, but it's not NEARLY as bad as a single state-owned media outlet that plays 'everything is awesome' on repeat to support those in power.
Back to the use of violence for securing peace when politics fail: the fundamental question is do you wait to get shot before you shoot back, or will you shoot once he's pointed a gun at you and promised to use it? Does it make a difference if he's shot other people after threatening them, or if you KNOW he's shot other people you care about? Applying that principle to international politics is a necessity, unfortunately, and that means that decisions made with need-to-know info will easily be spun to whatever negative perspective a journalist can dream up.
The asshole that just got blown the fuck up is directly responsible for planning, distribution, training, and implementation of EFP's and other weapon systems that directly killed guys wearing the same uniform I am. He had it fuckin' coming.
People who want to espouse similar value systems need to fear death if they act on it. Since we cannot wage war on an entire culture, no matter how depraved and vile, without crossing some very unacceptable lines. So all we can do is present a swift, precise, and overwhelmingly effective deterrent to those who would act on it by bringing violence to us or our citizens.
That's the only way to ensure that this grand experiment of governance we call the United States of America can survive or thrive on its own accord.
Having seen how Gov't works in this part of the world, and in other parts of the world, I'll happily take our current lefty/righty political clusterfuck. Yes, we're spending too much money on dumb shit, yes, too much of that dumb shit is overseas instead of within the US, yes, a lot of the programs within the US are doing a bunch of dumb shit and there's a lot of Gov't bloat and waste that doesn't need to exist.
All of it is vastly preferable to the outright corruption and fucked up shit that comes with the other options on the menu. There's a reason so many of these people all over the world dream of living in America and not the other way around.
Meanwhile, I guess there's always going to be people like you that expect world politics to be a perfectly solve-able algebra problem where both sides come out equal, and peace to be something that can just be won by crossing a certain finish line.
If there's one thing I've learned the hard way through 12 years in uniform, it's that peace requires constant conflict by political and frequently military means to achieve. Pretending that peace remains and endures after we cease those efforts is just the sophomoric celebration that comes before worse comes to us.
The Marines went to the shores of Tripoli for a reason.
Last edited by JRB; 01-04-2020 at 03:27 AM.
Continuing to trade retaliatory punches indefinitely is insanity.
18 years in - overtly (50+ years covertly) - and you're hoping we're in the middle of the fight? Would you have ever pulled us out of Vietnam?
Costs have been sunk, when do we stop throwing good money (and men!) after bad?
I agree.
If we were truly in the freedom-spreading business we certainly would not be propping up the Saudis nor overlooking the 18 million enslaved in India today. Enduring Freedom was just a slogan. That region has been a clusterfuck for thousands of years and will remain a clusterfuck long after we pull out.
And what about our fighting men & women who have shot or bombed people he cared about? Are they not deserving to be green lit under your ROE? Where does the retaliatory tit for tat end?Back to the use of violence for securing peace when politics fail: the fundamental question is do you wait to get shot before you shoot back, or will you shoot once he's pointed a gun at you and promised to use it? Does it make a difference if he's shot other people after threatening them, or if you KNOW he's shot other people you care about?
Are our military & political actions today truly making us safer on a 50 or 100 year time horizon? Or are we trading our long term security for short term face saving pyrrhic victories?
Again that part of the world has been a political clusterfuck for thousands of years and it'll still be a clusterfuck long after we leave.Having seen how Gov't works in this part of the world, and in other parts of the world, I'll happily take our current lefty/righty political clusterfuck.
You misunderstand me. I do not think Iran, or North Korea, or China, or Russia is an existential threat to the US. I think American fear & vengence is the existential threat to the US. We're like a spooked horse that is barreling toward a cliff because we were stung by a bee.Meanwhile, I guess there's always going to be people like you that expect world politics to be a perfectly solve-able algebra problem where both sides come out equal, and peace to be something that can just be won by crossing a certain finish line.
We can't take back being stung, but we don't have to destroy ourselves & half the world because a handful of guys hijacked a couple planes 2 decades ago. We will be stung again, no matter what you or anyone else does. And it'll hurt. But we'll survive as long as we don't make stomping beehives an obsession.
Last edited by 0ddl0t; 01-04-2020 at 04:13 AM.
While your hatred of American foreign policy is one thing, accusing a man who is part of a fighting force opposing a regime bent on wiping out the Jews as going “full Goebbels” is beyond absurd.
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Trading punches indefinitely is the price we pay for freedom. “Peace” as defined by pundits and academia does not exist. Global commercial and social influence means creating global enemies. This is not a uniquely American problem- it is an inevitable consequence of international relationships of any economically powerful country.
I mention this to ensure we aren’t indulging in myths. Today it’s an Iranian General . Tomorrow it’ll perhaps be a Sudanese commander. But the bottom line is we are at war, somewhere on this globe, 24/7 365. Pulling back from a fight will not change this fact of life . But it can easily make it worse.
The Minority Marksman.
"When you meet a swordsman, draw your sword: Do not recite poetry to one who is not a poet."
-a Ch'an Buddhist axiom.
