Fence sitting as a war policy
I read somewhere that a compromise is an arrangement whereby people who can’t get what they want make sure nobody else does either. and that’s the way this drizzle is shaking out in Afghanistan.
According to the Associated Press, President Obama is ordering only 30,000 troops for his drizzle over the next 6 months and then he’ll announce he’s pulling them back out in 19 months. So, I’m guessing there won’t be much action for the next 19 months while the Taliban takes sabbatical.
The Washington Times writes that both sides in the US aren’t happy about his decision;
Two liberal Democrats and a moderate Republican lawmaker are set to announce their opposition to the president’s plan Tuesday afternoon, just hours ahead of Mr. Obama’s nationally televised address at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y. And Republican leaders, who support the president’s call for more troops to Afghanistan, have qualified that support by saying that any talk of an exit strategy won’t fly.
That’s what happens when you’re supposed to be a leader you try to please everyone. Everyone expects to be made happy and no one is. Every 20-year-old buck sergeant learned that on the first day of PLDC.
ADDED: In this link from TSO, the American Legion has it’s reservations about the policy, too.
Category: Barack Obama/Joe Biden, Terror War
UpNorth,
Again, I’ve got no crystal ball. Like you, I have been waiting anxiously for this decision, I have scoured all kinds of websites today, read two newspapers, I am watching various news programs as I write this. The opinions are all over the map. Even retired generals, of which there are many in the media, can’t agree – from what I read and watch, some ex-military men think it’s a rational plan, some think we should pull out now, some think it’s too little. I’ve gotta think that ex-generals have the experience and credibility to speak authoritatively, and yet even they can’t agree. Huge stakes, tough, tough decisions. One thing Defense Sect. Gates said that I had not thought of – let the Taliban lay low for a couple of years, that’s great news, it’ll give us open field running for two years for a COIN strategy. I don’t know, I just feel it is a good faith effort on the part of our President, and I will support him until evidence points to a different conclusion. And by the way, here is the verbatim text from his speech, I think IT DOES acknowledge the soldiers who have been fighting for us these last eight years. Best Wishes….
“Today, after extraordinary costs, we are bringing the Iraq war to a responsible end. We will remove our combat brigades from Iraq by the end of next summer, and all of our troops by the end of 2011. That we are doing so is a testament to the character of our men and women in uniform. Thanks to their courage, grit and perseverance, we have given Iraqis a chance to shape their future, and we are successfully leaving Iraq to its people.”
Mmmmmmmmmmm beer. kidding aside: The one thing that has been overlooked by everyone that is championing this decision by our President is this; where did he say anything about victory? Where was the part of the speech where he said we would leave when we achieved victory? He didn’t. Now, before the learned intellectuals show up and start bragging about their PhD’s in military strategery, let me tell you there is such a thing as victory in war. The left and right agree on what constitutes losing, so why is it that many can’t see what victory would be? I’ll tell you what victory is; it’s when you get an un-conditional surrender from your enemy, or you render their warmaking ability ineffective, thereby getting capitulation from them by proxy. Now, look back in time and then think forward and tell me when the last time we had such a thing. Responsible withdrawal is not victory. Setting a timetable for achieving un-specified goals (which the President did) is not victory. Was there a timetable set in WWI? WWII? Korea (although we did not achieve victory there, it was a UN operation)? So why the rush to set timetables now? Why is having a timetable to achieve victory so important? Is war fought around even a rough guess for a timetable? No, because it can’t be. Not if your goal is victory. If your goal is to just get a lot of people killed, then you can break out your PDA, crackberry, whatever, and schedule it up, no problem. One thing you might want to do, if you go that route, is to have a conference call with your enemy and get the details of the timetable worked out ahead of time. That kind of thinking reminds me of the old Star Trek episode (told ya I was old) where these 2 worlds had been fighting a war for 500 years, all by computer, even though the deaths were real, when someone was told they had been killed in an attack, they would merrily go to the death chamber and be killed.… Read more »
Yes, OldTrooper, my dad was part of that “Greatest Generation”, and a great human being as well. He enlisted, fought in WWII, didn’t complain, got the job done, came home and never drew attention to his service. Millions of that generation did the same. The one problem I have with “winning” is that back then there were centralized governments in Japan and Germany to declare surrender, and their people accepted the decision. Now, with the amoeba-like Al Qaeda, there is no single, centralized entity to declare surrender. All along, since the war on terror was declared, I have thought it was a flawed concept. We are not fighting a conventional enemy, we’re fighting and idea, a meme, and memes travel at the speed of sound. The Al Queda leadership might surrender, but all it takes is one guy with some explosives to keep the “war” going. So it’s gonna be hard to convince thousands of bad guys, one at a time, that the best thing for them to do is put down their arms. That’s why the concept of winning in the old sense may not be a good model.