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Cliff Hancuff
The World of Journalism Is Flat, Too

http://community.cnhi.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/4871074/m/664107374

Cliff Hancuff
The World of Journalism Is Flat, Too

I can’t say enough good things about what Brooks Jackson did with my original TRUTH FROM AN HONEST MAN pamphlet I loaned him.

My great, great, grandfather, who I am named in honor of, made the supreme sacrific for our country in Lincoln’s Union Army serving Stonewall Jackson his only defeat in the Civil War.

Diana Irey has “cut&run” from her use of this Lincoln quote. Write her “handler” at bill@irey.com and ask him.

Cliff Hancuff
The World of Journalism Is Flat, Too

Lincoln never said this. Ever. This quote is a fabrication of Dr. J. Michael Waller who first wrote it in 2003 shortly before the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth gave it life in 2004. How pathetic has the Republican Party become that it insults the reputation of America’s finest Republican president for their political gain?

Cliff Hancuff
The World of Journalism Is Flat, Too

The problem is, Jack, my strategy was to confront the Soviets in 1945 and 1946 and use force, if necessary, to push them back within their own borders — when our army was mobilized, when we were in the strategic positions necessary, when we had far better technology and tactics, and BEFORE the Soviets had nuclear capability.

That’s hardly “playing with soldiers’ lives”. That’s taking advantage of strength in a timely fashion to PROTECT their lives. Truman made the calculus that stopping millions of people in Eastern Europe from going from one form of despotic oppression to another wasn’t worth the potential that he might not be re-elected or that he might be impeached.

Also, Jack, I hate to say it, but I think you’ve completely misread the point of Eisenhower’s speech. Most liberals see this as a warning to the American people about what excessive military spending can do. But if you read it in its entirety (which most liberals don’t; they usually only see the excerpt you quoted), a couple statements leap out at you:

This way was faithful to the spirit that inspired the United Nations: to prohibit strife, to relieve tensions, to banish fears. This way was to control and to reduce armaments. This way was to allow all nations to devote their energies and resources to the great and good tasks of healing the war’s wounds, of clothing and feeding and housing the needy, of perfecting a just political life, of enjoying the fruits of their own free toil.

It inspired them-and let none doubt this-to attain a unity of purpose and will beyond the power of propaganda or pressure to break, now or ever.

In short, Eisenhower was saying that if the Soviets thought they could cow us or that we wouldn’t fight, they had another thing coming.

The “cross of iron” portion is Eisenhower bluntly laying out to the Soviet Union the continued cost of its choice to stay armed and to the rest of the world what NOT pressuring the Soviets to change costs us.

Then, this part:

So the new Soviet leadership now has a precious opportunity to awaken, with the rest of the world, to the point of peril reached and to help turn the tide of history.

We are only for sincerity of peaceful purpose attested by deeds. The opportunities for such deeds are many. The performance of a great number of them waits upon no complex protocol but upon the simple will to do them. Even a few such clear and specific acts, such as the Soviet Union’s signature upon the Austrian treaty or its release of thousands of prisoners still held from World War II, would be impressive signs of sincere intent. They would carry a power of persuasion not to be matched by any amount of oratory.

This portion is why most liberals and Democrats are not fit to even quote this speech. Democrats and liberals seek rhetoric, not deeds; pandering, not peace. They settle for the Munich Agreement, not for armistice or treaty; oratory, not obedience. They believe Ike’s speech began and ended with the portion they clip to explain why the world “can’t afford war”, while ignoring the portion that makes it clear that the world can’t afford their version of “peace”.

The problem was, Jack…..1945 wasn’t an election year, 1946 was, and even then, it wouldn’t have affected Truman; moreover, there were enough people who distrusted the Russians and would have been appalled by what they were doing in their soon-to-be satellites that public opinion, while it wouldn’t have FAVORED a war, could likely have been swung in that direction.

Really, your last phrase, though, was key; Truman wasn’t willing to risk impeachment or not being elected three years later to stand up to the Soviets, and his failure to do so is part of what forced him to go to war again bare years later in Korea.

And the real tragedy, Jack…..think of the strategic situation in 1945 after Japan had been defeated. We had not one, but TWO massive armies on both sides of Russia; Eisenhower’s European command and MacArthur’s and Nimitz’s Pacific commands, both fully equipped, on war footing, and with technologies the Russians could barely comprehend, much less counter. We had airfields in China (which was still our ally at that point, remember) from which B-29s with CONVENTIONAL bombs could have made hash of every single Russian industrial city and leveled Moscow; remember, Russia’s air defenses against high-altitude attack were virtually nonexistent, since the Nazis never truly developed that capability. Probably biggest of all… we had the nuclear bomb and the capability to use it.

I do not blame FDR as much for the situation as I do Truman. FDR had an unrealistic and frivolous view of Stalin’s truthfulness, yes, but at the time the Yalta agreements were signed, FDR was still looking at an invasion of Japan that would have killed hundreds of thousands of Americans. He was in no real position to be forceful with Stalin. However, at Potsdam, Truman should have known that he held all the cards; Stalin had unquestionably broken the Yalta agreements at that point, and Truman should have made it clear to him that, as much as we were sick of war, we weren’t going to make the mistake of Chamberlain and Deladier less than a decade earlier and appease him. He could either get back to his borders or have his country leveled, because we hadn’t gotten rid of two despotic regimes who had oppressed the people of Eastern Europe and Asia so HE could do it.

That to me is the key point, Jack. The lesson that we tacticians and strategists should take from World War II is that sometimes the greatest weapon of the brutal and underhanded is war-weariness. Hitler would likely be a minor footnote in history had the Allied Powers enforced the Treaty of Versailles; but he was intelligent and devious enough to realize that they would not, and their failure to deal with him immediately cost millions of lives. We’ve seen the same with the postwar Soviet Union, with Korea, with China, with Vietnam, with Kosovo, and with Iraq.

As my dad always puts it, you don’t have to wear gloves if you weed the garden in a timely fashion; it’s only when you dilly-dally and hope the weeds will go away on their own that they grow thorns, spikes, and poisonous leaves Or, as another wise strategist friend of mine puts it…..rule of thumb, never negotiate based on anything but a position of strength with a regime where political dissent is solved by bullets, not ballots.

The Chance for Peace [best know as the "Cross of Iron" speech]
by Dwight D. Eisenhower
April 16, 1953

My favorite excert:

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

This world in arms is not spending money alone.

It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.

The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities.

It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals.

It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement.

We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat.

We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people.

This is, I repeat, the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking.

This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron. These plain and cruel truths define the peril and point the hope that come with this spring of 1953……”

As a footnote, I saw one estimate that the US, for its nuclear deterrent alone, spent 21 TRILLION DOLLARS. Think about the good that could have done, had we been able to spend even half that for peaceful purposes.

Jack

I an not the weak kneed Lib you think I am. Try the FDR Nazi and Jap defeating, NATO building Commie defeating HST kind of Liberal.

One quick question.. Are you saying we should have attacked Russia in the Late 40’s or in the early 50’s to take them out and free Eastern Europe? If so, that denies the political landscape in the US then.. We had just fought WWII, American wanted the troops HOME and the Armed Forces Demobilized. No American politician could have stood against that then, he would have lost the next election or been impeached. Are you saying Esienhower was a pussy? The man who organized D-Day and the defeat of Nazi Germany?? The man who built up SAC with thousands of Nuclear Bombers, many on 24 hr airborne alert? Was critizized by JFK for the supposed missle gap. And there was one.. when we sent up our 1st spy satelites, turned out we had about 65 ICBMS ready to fly, the Soviets only 4… course, JFK never declassified THAT little campaign mistake, did he??

It makes me wonder why you so want to “play” with the lives of American fighting men.. If we had followed your stategy, how many hundreds of thousands would have died in the 50’s if we went against Stalin and his succsesors, or the millions who would have died in 62 if we had invaded Cuba, (as the JCS recommended) and had 70 nuclear tipped frog missles employed against the invasion force? Do you even think you or I would even be alive if George W. Bush had been president in 1962 in charge of the Cuban Missle Crisis? Can you say Armageddon?? (I include civillian loses also.. ). You want this what you suppose is a Reagan like, MUSCULAR policy. But Reagan never directly attacked Russians, he used proxies like the Muhajadein and the Contras.

More later, got to get some sleep..

Happy New Year if I dont post till Sunday..

Jack

u just dont give it a rest at all do u?

it gets annoying after a while.

the worlds not all shite u know.

say somthin nice 1nc in a while.

see how it feels. lates

First, to Kosovo. Have you ever actually analyzed what happened during the Kosovo war? If you read reports like Benjamin Lambeth’s, what it makes clear is that the United States’s unwilllingness to sustain military casualties resulted in more CIVILIAN casualties.

For instance, due to fear of Yugoslav air defenses causing any casualties, bombers were ordered to stay at or above 15,000 feet for the first portion of the campaign. However, what any intelligent military commander with aerial bombardment experience could have told them is that the higher up you are, the more difficult it is to determine what you are bombing or hit it precisely. This is exacerbated when dealing with mountainous and forested terrain and exceptionally rotten weather, visibility-wise, like Yugoslavia’s.

End result — refugee convoys were bombed, civilian houses were bombed, and foreign embassies — like the Chinese — were bombed, all with massive loss of innocent life, all because liberals were paranoically afraid of ANY military casualties.

Furthermore, and perhaps most importantly, the Yugoslav army figured out how to shield themselves effectively from bombing — they accelerated their advances into Kosovar villages. Why? Because they knew the US and NATO wouldn’t bomb those villages for fear of causing civilian casualties.

The only way to stop that tactic is to use ground troops, which CAN differentiate between military and civilian and are able to apply force with much more precision than can aircraft, to push these groups AWAY from civilians and concentrate them into spots where they can be effectively bombed without risk to civilians. But using ground troops means a virtual certainty of casualties, and liberals would not do that.

End result — Yugoslav army groups went into Kosovar villages and committed wholesale slaughter of innocent people on a massive scale while our military might could do little to nothing to stop them, all because liberals were paranoically afraid of ANY military casualties.

This is why the Gulf War was the golden opportunity to get rid of Saddam. The Iraqi armies were out and visible, away from cities and civilians, and could have been easily surrounded and cut off.

Think about that. We would have had ALL of Saddam’s officers, equipment, and ability to wage war, including his WMDs, within our control. Without his armies, Saddam had zero power politically, and a rebellion by the Iraqi people at that point could have easily removed him — or we could have given him 24 hours to get out and quickly reformed a government.

But again, that would have involved casualties, and the paranoical fear of them again raises its ugly head. So liberals like you and Clinton dream up an excuse that you have “sealed Saddam in a straightjacket”, ignoring the fact that you have locked 25+ million people in with him while not disarming or controlling him in the least.

As for your “national interest” for Kosovo versus Iraq leaving a brutal, despotic dictator with one of the largest armies in the world in a spot where he controls a large portion of one of the world’s most vital resources, shares borders with not one, but SEVERAL of our allies whose help we need in securing said resources, has direct access to a location where he could choke off the WORLD SUPPLY of one of those resources, AND has a proven record of laying waste to not only his own, but other countries would seem to carry a far greater imperative than attacking a country that lacks ANYTHING of the sort, but is laying waste to its own people.

That being said, Kosovo was a necessary war, although poorly fought. However, Iraq was even more so, yet liberals like you deny the fact — and using what logic?

We couldnt have contained Saddam for the few years needed to destroy Al Queda, by which time Saddam might have died, or we could have by then rallied NATO and other Allies to fight him, if needed , just as Bush I did in the 91 Gulf War?

You forget that all of those “allies” were being paid by Saddam to do nothing. When that fact was exposed, only because the Bush administration was willing to stand up and deal with it, you suddenly come in like a jackal saying you “hope those people go to jail”. However, had you liberals gotten your way, it never would have been exposed.

And that’s what it all boils down to, Jack. You don’t care how many of anyone anywhere else dies as long as you don’t have to pay for it. You and your fellow liberals would rather ignore blatant human rights abuses, wage ineffective war, or appease brutality than risk your own lives.

That is al-Qaeda’s single greatest weapon.

The Bush administration has already made this country safer by pointing out to terrorists and despotic states that we are no longer the world’s patsy; if you attack us, there will be a price to pay. We will no longer hamstring our armies, we will no longer bind our own might, and we will no longer look the other way as long as you pay us.

Keenan’s basic theorem was based on political and economic containment of the Soviet Union; indeed, his lifelong regret has been that he did not emphasize enough that it had nothing to do with MILITARY containment, and in fact thought military containment would be detrimental. His belief was that, without an obvious enemy, the Soviet Union would slowly collapse as its citizens rebelled against senseless repression.

This theory was sound when one considered what had happened under Lenin and Stalin prior to the German attack; the Soviet Union came close to economic and political collapse during the latter half of the 1930s because Stalin put ideology ahead of common sense and purged the people who grew the majority of the Soviet Union’s food. Stalin in great part signed his non-aggression pact with Hitler because he had no choice; indeed, he was so desperate to avoid provoking Hitler that he had several of his generals who had prepared contingency plans for a war against Germany framed and executed.

However, what it didn’t take into account was that the postwar Soviet Union had been in existence for almost three decades. At that point in time, there were two types of Soviet citizens left — those who had never known anything BUT Communist rule and life, and those whose status depended on maintaining the Communist ideology. Neither side had any incentive to do anything differently. What they DID have in common was the shared experience of an “ally” who had sworn “nonaggression” against them and then attacked without warning, a deep, almost paranoiacal belief that the world was out to “get them”, and almost complete indoctrination into an ideology that equated suffering with holiness, self-sacrifice with heroism, and capitalism with weakness. Stalin had seen Chamberlain and Deladier at Munich, and he had seen FDR say during the same time period that the US would absolutely not intervene in any foreign wars; therefore, he was under the impression that the US would do nothing unless we were attacked directly.

Keenan’s theorem, thus, was flawed on two levels; it made the assumption that the Soviet citizenry were motivated to change by their privation, and it made the key mistake of assuming that the Soviets were scared of us intervening. It worked in Western Europe, as seen in the Marshall Plan, mainly because it was dealing with a fundamentally different group of people from a cultural and experience standpoint. But it was hash when it came to the Soviets, and because of that, the United States basically wasted thirty-plus years while millions of people were murdered.

The reason the Soviet Union unraveled so quickly under Reagan is because Reagan understood the importance of the military option in reinforcing the other portions of Keenan’s doctrine. Reagan poured immense amounts of money into defense spending for two reasons. One, defense spending by law is redistributing tax dollars to US companies, US technology development, and US workers, since foreign component use is extraordinarily limited. That technology is then moved into the civilian market, which is a big part of what touched off the tech boom of the nineties.

However, the second reason is more important; Reagan knew the Soviets would have to match it, and they couldn’t. They had to divert money away from supporting their satellite nations, their missions abroad, and ultimately feeding their own people. Reagan (cynically) deepened their paranoia by making it clear the United States WOULD intervene militarily, even if we weren’t being directly attacked; it ultimately reached the point where the people of the countries, seduced by our media and our culture, started asking “Why? Why do we have to starve for these missiles?”.

In short, Reagan, being an intelligent conservative, applied what liberals wouldn’t — the fact that political and economic pressure is only meaningful if military intervention is a plausible and proven option. Moreover, he and his policies forced the Soviet Union into collapse in less than a third of the time that liberal policies had spent “containing” it.

– Teddy Roosevelt was supporting truthful criticism, not the lies pushed by the Democratic Party comparing Bush to Hitler, insisting that Saddam Hussein was not a brutal dictator, or calling terrorists “freedom fighters”.

– Had Eisenhower meant his words in the fashion they are perverted by Democrats and leftists today, humanity would still be hanging from an iron cross — that of the unanswered, appeased, and still existing Third Reich.

I see you have succeded in aping the “straw man” tactic to try and paint your opponents into a corner. Aint gonna work.

Remember, I said this:

we contained the Soviet Union for nearly 50 years, and it fell apart. We couldnt have contained Saddam for the few years needed to destroy Al Queda, by which time Saddam might have died, or we could have by then rallied NATO and other Allies to fight him, if needed , just as Bush I did in the 91 Gulf War?

Please note, N. Dallas. Thru 50 years, led by Republican and Democatic Presidents and Congresses, we ALLOWED the Soviet Union to continue to exist. We had to allow hundreds of thousands if not millions of people to go to the Gulags and DIE. We allowed the Hungarians to revolt in 56, and the Czechs in 68, and did not lift a finger to intervene.

We didnt like what was going on there, but we decided early on that if we CONTAINED the Soviet Union it would eventually fall apart. That was in the Truman admin, postulated by a very wise Russian Expert, George Kennan.

And even REAGAN followed Containment, even if he rattled the cage more.

And low and behold, the Soviet Union fell apart. What’s left now aint pretty, but it sure is an improvement. And the Poles, Hungarians, Rumanians, Czechs, and Baltic states are thriving democracies.

Why did we just contain? Because the calculus was if we tried to intervene militarily to stop the Soviet Communist power, MILLIONS AND MILLIONS MORE WOULD HAVE DIED IN WWIII. Including millions of Americans. Lord knows, we came within a hairsbreath during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 62, or the Berlin Crisis in 61.

And I sure dont see Bush doing anything AT ALL about FULL SCALE GENOCIDE in Sudan, in Dafur. Just as Clinton did not about Rawanda.

Why? Right now, since Bush is trying to fight the GWOT without mobilizing the American public or industrial base to do so, he dosnt have the means to do anything about Sudan, besides, we are supposedly getting some GREAT intell about Al Queda from the Sudanese. In the Bush/Cheney mindset, whats a few hunded thousand black sudanese against some GREAT intell on the GWOT!!!

And N. Dallas, when do we intervene? When we decide it can be done AND IT IS IN OUR NATIONAL INTEREST, AND THAT WE CAN ACHIEVE OUR GOALS WITHOUT LOSING TOO MANY MEN AND TOO MUCH TREASURE.

The US decided to intervene in the Yugoslavia/ Kosovo mess because we saw it as a threat to European Unity, a threat because of the animosity it stirred up in the Muslim nations, and a constant source of problems if not solved. We also saw it was a problem that could be solved with the forces we had in NATO and with our Nato Allies. IT WAS IN OUR NATIONAL INTEREST TO INTERVENE.

It worked. We did not even lose one combat soldier in the Kosovo intervention, the first time in World history a combatant force has ever done that. (We did lose 4 Apache attack copter crewmen in training accidents, and a F117 and another fighter jet were shot down, but both pilots were extracted).

My question to you, North Dallas, where does our intervention stop? China has a gulag, just shot and killed several hundred villagers protesting their farmland being taken away so some millionaire chinese business man, probably in league with the Peoples Army, could build a new sweatshop factory. Do we invade China? Remove their Commie Govt? If we do, say Bye Bye to the West coast. China got nukes, N. Dallas. Also say goodbye to all those nice cheap prices at Wal Mart. BTW, Dallas, my wife and I havnt shopped at Wal Mart in nearly 4 years, because of their horrible domestic employee policies as well as the thousands and thousands of 3rd world people oppressed in their sweatshop factorys, from Guatemala to China to Bangladesh. Not to mention the US workers it puts out of work, But let’s leave that to another discussion. We be talking about War and Peace and FOREVER WAR here, arent we?

Do we go into Africa, invade, and then nation build an entire continent? How about Belurus.. Still led by a commie leader, with totalitarian control, torture, etc going on. Uzbeckistan, any one? The tyrant there BOILS his opponents to death. Hell, Russia itself is becoming more totalitarian every day under the man that Bush professes to “know his heart”. Yeah, right. Maybe Bush just LOVES the hearts of former KGB officers. The KGB loved to torture, too, didnt they?? No wonder the attraction.

We are the most powerful nation in the world, but we are but 296 million vs at least 3 billion that are under some kind of dictatorial control . As powerful as we are I dont see us fighting a FOREVER WAR for democracy all over the world. Hell, I dont see us even enlisting the numbers needed for the current force level, and the Bush administration ruled out the draft from the beginnning. Got to protect all those lovely, top 1 % and corporation tax cuts, right? Plus, no way are we going to draft the kids of all our millionaire friends to fight a FOREVER WAR. No, we will just overstress our Army and Marine troops and contract out to mercenary companies like Blackwater. So what if they shoot up Iraqi civilians by mistake. (did you see that video? ).

The simple facts are, Bush I did Gulf War I just about right. We could not let the invasion of Kuwait stand, for international good order. Lots of people called for going to Baghdad, BUT.. the wise men like Brent Scowcroft and Colin Powell, and Bush I himself, a man who studied foreign Policy closely, predicted then what has happened now under his ignorant son.. a fragmenting, factionalized Iraq, verging on a civil war. With our troops in the middle of it. So we completed our objective, and retook Kuwait and put Saddam into a straight jacket of the North and South No Fly Zones.

If I could snap my fingers and make the whole world a free democatic one, I would of course do so. But reality intervenes, dosent it, N. Dallas?

And back to your quesiton, I supported going into Afghanistan, because that was were Osama and Al Queda were, and the Taliban was protecting them and refused to hand them over. Geopolitically, we could not ignore fighting and destroying Al Queda and anyone protecting them. We should have made that our objective, along with the stabilization and rebuilding of Afghanistan. Instead, Bush did stupid things like not send enough troops to close the trap at Tora Bora, and actually pulled out the Middle Eastern trained Special Forces troops in Afghanistan to get them ready for the Iraq War, and replaced them with Special Forces trained for Latin America and Eastern Europe. GREAT. No wonder we dont have Osama captured, dead. Not to mention the fact that Afghanistan has gone into a throwback to the old days post Soviets.. Warlords controlling most of the country, back to being # 1 in the world for the illegal heroin trade, and the nominal Karzi Govt controls “10 square blocks” in Kabul. At least, that’s the joke among the aid groups and other NGO’s trying to rebuild Afghanistan.

And you talk about the oil for food.. at least, it did pay for the food. Saddam did that to keep down the discontent at home, so he could loot it for the palaces and slush funds he used to bribe his personal Guard, and the Republican Guard units, with which he kept himself in power. I hope that those UN and Europeans GO TO JAIL who were involved.

Now, will you say the same about the mighty mental midgets who ran the Coalition Provisonal Authority and somehow managed to LOSE NINE BILLION DOLLARS? SIX BILLION BELONGED TO THE IRAQIS, ANOTHER 3 BILLION IS US MONEY, AND GOD KNOWS HOW BAD IT IS WITH ALL THE CONTRACTING FRAUD FROM THE LIKES OF HALIBURTON, KBR, BECHTEL, ETC.

And please, get off your high horse about Saddam and the hundreds of thousands he killed. Did you say anything about it back in the 80’s, when Bob Dole got the Reagan administration to continue the Agricultural loan program for Iraq, even though Carter had suspended it for Saddams torturing human rights violations? Bob JUST HAD TO SELL ALL THAT SURPLUS KANSAS GRAIN FOR HIS CONSTITUENTS. Did you say WORD ONE about Rumsfeld going over to meet with Saddam TWICE, to facilitate giving him intel and material to fight our “worse” enemy at the time, Iran? Some reports even suggest that the Rumsfeld visits cleared the way for Saddam to purchase the precursor chemicals he needed for his chemical weapons. So, RUMSFELD FACILITATED SADDAM GETTING THE VERY WMD WE WOULD GO TO WAR TO DESTROY. My, My, My. Republicans and Democrats seem to have a Nasty record in the tinpot dictators we end up supporting, dont we? Overthrew a democaticly elected govt in Iran in the 50’s to bring in the Shah. Short term, good. Long term, gave us the Ayatollah. Supported Noreiga in Panama,for he supported us in the Contra/ Nicaragua war. Whoops, too bad he turned into a drug dealer whose troops killed an American Officer, beat up another american officer, and sexually assaulted his wife. Had to go in and slap HIM down. Only lost 90 or so KIA, another 150 or so WIA. No big deal, geopolitically Hm? (Lost one of my College classmates in Panama, his chopper shot down.. )

As you can see, containment and playing the REALPOLITIK game aint pretty. You end up in bed with horrible people. But, at least for the Cold War and the Soviets, the outcome was worth it, for WE DID NOT DESTROY THE WORLD IN WWIII.

And Bush I and Clinton made the decision that getting into the Tarbaby of Iraq was not worth the cost.

My main problems with Bush is his bad strategy, and bad tactics, and the thousands of American soldiers he has gotton killed in Iraq for no good purpose, and the 16,000 or so WIA, over half of them maimed for life, and the other 25,000 medivaced from the theatre for illness, physical and mental. BTW, have you seen how the Bush controlled VA hierachy is trying to redefine PTSD so they dont have to pay for all the troops coming back from Iraq mentally broken? So much for supporting the troops, just put that in the column with the other things they have tried to shortchange the troops on, like cutting combat pay in 2003 for the 2004 budget, (got shot down by the out cry in Congress), the constant shortchanging of the VA budget, had to do an Emergency Appropriation this year, they mis judged it by 2 billion.

Yes, N. Dallas, I have coverd topics BEYOND the narrow scope of you questions, but I hope you see that I am not your “lefty bleeding heart” caricature that is fed you by the conservative media. I’m a liberal alright.. the FDR/HST/JFK tough, anti commuist liberals that won WWII, contained the Soviets, and set the strategy in motion that won the Cold War. I was even proud to serve in it, as an LT in a Mech Inf unit in Germany for 44 months.

Back in your court, North Dallas..

A couple of quotes from Republican Presidents…

The President is merely the most important among a large number of
public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the
degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his
efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and
disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is
absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the
truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to
blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any
other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To
announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we
are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only
unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American
public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one
else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or
unpleasant, about him than about any one else.
-Teddy Roosevelt May 7, 1918

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired
signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are
not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not
spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the
genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way
of life at all in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war,
it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.”

Dwight D. Eisenhower, From a speech before the American Society
of Newspaper Editors, April 16, 1963
US general & Republican politician (1890 - 1969)

What you pro torture folks seem to forget is the “ticking time bomb” scenario is almost always only seen on TV, in shows like “24? or “Alias”. The number of real occurances of this in the last 20 years could be counted on the fingers of one hand, if that. To be honest, the West Situation is the only one I can think of. Do YOU know of any more?

Let’s put it this way….I hardly think Lt. Colonel West’s situation was in the least unique. I think his was a situation that numerous commanders of soldiers in Iraq faced every day for the first two years of the war. I think it’s a situation that’s far more common than you care to admit elsewhere.

But, Jack, thanks to you and the moonbats with whom you’ve aligned yourself, who care nothing about torture (given the amount they allowed to take place under Saddam), but only about bashing the Bush administration, any commander who acts with the thought first in mind of protecting his troops’ lives will be court-martialed and forced out of the military.

This is why I don’t believe your “support” of Lt. Colonel West, Jack; you’re a Bush-basher first, regardless of how many soldiers get killed in the process.

But the BUSH/Rumsfeld DOD went insane loosening the laws against torture. EVERY ONE OF THE JAGS FOR THE ARMY, AIRFORCE, AND NAVY DISAPPROVED OF WEAKENING THE UCMJ RESTRAINTS ON TORTURE. (That report was declassified this year, BTW). Why?

PR, plain and simple. They were, like you, more concerned about public relations than they were about soldiers’ lives.

As for the Germans, maybe your brother should explain to them about the billions of dollars their politicians were being paid through “oil-for-food” bribes to keep Saddam in power and how they encouraged anti-Americanism as a means both of doing that and to cover up their economy’s dismal performance, including double-digit unemployment, anemic growth, and companies leaving in droves.

Trust me, I lived in Germany and still travel there regularly; people have suddenly realized that Schroeder, aka Panderboy, took the country for a ride in his attempt to create a new Franco-German axis. This heavy-handed stupidity on his part and Chirac’s is why the rest of the EU gave a big ol “F you very much” to the EU Constitution that these fools wrote.

Finally, Jack, the rest of your post is nothing but wild accusations that can be neatly dealt with by asking you these simple questions:

– If attacking despotic countries encourages terrorism, why did you support attacking Afghanistan, since by your logic, it only created more terrorists?

– Is it necessary to have US troops in Saudi Arabia? Better yet, has al-Qaeda ceased their terrorist activities, as they swore they would do if US troops were removed from Saudi Arabia?

– Are you willing to stand up and admit to the American people that, during the decade he was “contained”, Saddam Hussein imprisoned, tortured, and killed literally MILLIONS of Iraqis, supported international terrorism with money and locations, traded in weapons technology and nuclear technology with states like North Korea, and impoverished his country in order to pay billions of dollars in bribes to UN diplomats and European politicians and bureaucrats?

No, I would NOT have courtmartialed LTC West. I think the Army did the right thing.. the exigisis of an IMMEDIATE theat made LTC West decide to do what he did. The upside, his unit was not ambushed. The personal downside is West was forced to retire. I am in the Alan Dershowitz camp.. if you know to a almost 100% fact, that a terror suspect knows where/when the ticking time bomb is, then you MIGHT use some force. LTC West did what he thought best for his unit, and was willing to take censure for violating the UCMJ.

What you pro torture folks seem to forget is the “ticking time bomb” scenario is almost always only seen on TV, in shows like “24″ or “Alias”. The number of real occurances of this in the last 20 years could be counted on the fingers of one hand, if that. To be honest, the West Situation is the only one I can think of. Do YOU know of any more?

But the BUSH/Rumsfeld DOD went insane loosening the laws against torture. EVERY ONE OF THE JAGS FOR THE ARMY, AIRFORCE, AND NAVY DISAPPROVED OF WEAKENING THE UCMJ RESTRAINTS ON TORTURE. (That report was declassified this year, BTW). Why?

Almost all experts who study torture report that it is almost never productive of current valuable intelligence. In fact, the interogation techniques the Army Manual suggests seems to work the best- Get to know the subject, put subtle pressure, but manily GET THEM TALKING. Sooner or later they reveal info that can be valuable. Torture obtained info is always suspect because, obviously, the subject will tell you WHAT YOU WANT TO HEAR TO MAKE IT STOP. Often, that has no semblance of the facts.

The latest reports /after actions for Abu Ghraib shows that 85-90 % of the suspects tortured were victums of rival clans “dropping a dime” on them to the Americans to get even for some clan/clan disagreements. They WERE NOT insurgents. By letting a very seldom used extreme tactic become widespread, by troops NOT trained like the original expert CIA team who were doing this to the top captured Al Queda suspects, Bush/Rummy caused the debacle we have now:

1)Tremendous downside in the war for hearts and minds.. How many thousands of Arabs did we radicalize and prompt to volunteer for Al Queda? the CIA and independent experts think its HAS been thousands.

2) How many of the innocent we tortured decided to get even with the US and became insurgents? Knowing the capacity of Arabic culture for revenge, I would bet a MAJORITY of them.

3) The rest of the world literally thinks the US has become unhinged. My younger brother, who visits Germany 1-2 times a year to see the rediscovered love of his life (she vists him here 1-2 time /yr also) has seen a huge change in attitudes.. Since he usually goes to a Conversational German 1 or 2 week class each time, he also meets other Europeans.. They supported the US whole heartedly after 9-11 and for the Afghanistan retaliation/Talaban/Al Queda destruction. They think attacking Iraq is equal to the situation that, after Pearl Harbor, we had attacked Mexico. I trust my brothers judgement in this, for he, like myself, is also a US Army veteran and well read in military and international subjects. The fact that it jibs with the majority of reports on World opinion on the US/Iraq situation makes it even better.

Finally, the attack on Iraq benifits who, really?

Iran.. for it weakens Iraq, and gives Iran influence with the 60% majority Shiites.

Al Queda.. it generated literally THOUSANDS OF RECRUITS and metasticized Al Queda wanna bes, like the Moroccans who blew up the synagoge, or the faction that did the Madrid train bombings. Or the various radical bombings in Turkey, none of which seem to be directly connected to Al Queda.

We still have not stabilized Afghanistan. The joke in the international aid comunity about the Karzi govt is “10 square blocks”. ie. they only really control the 10 square blocks of downtown Kabul. Outside, it is a mishmash of warlords, heroin traders (often the same guys, often a nominal member of the govt!). Afghanistan is back to its # 1 status as illegal heroin supplier to the world it had before the Taliban. Outside Kabul, the Burqua and head scarfs for women are STILL the rule, and women treated as no more than chattel.

Al Qeda also achieved one of its strategic aims… the removal of all US military forces from Saudi Arabia.

As Richard Clarke and other counterterrorism experts have stated, Osama must have praised Allah when Bush attacked Iraq. As far as he was concerned it couldnt have gotton much better. (unless he got ahold of some nukes, of course!)

And as a former military professional, I think Bush/Cheney/Rummy violated several of the Nine Principals of War, including Objective, Mass, Economy of Force, and I could probably go on..

Finally, we contained the Soviet Union for nearly 50 years, and it fell apart. We couldnt have contained Saddam for the few years needed to destroy Al Queda, by which time Saddam might have died, or we could have by then rallied NATO and other Allies to fight him, if needed , just as Bush I did in the 91 Gulf War?

Yes, IMHO, when the history is written, Bush will go down as the worst president the US ever had.

I reitterate: If there was any justice in this world, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith, and all those other Neocons should be sentenced to empting bedpans and waiting on wounded soldiers at Walter Reed and Bethesda Naval for the rest of their sorry lives. They should have to live every day with the carnage and tragedy their decisions have caused.

Back at you, N. Dallas..

Jack