Generals and President divided on use of “boots” in Iraq
In the Washington Post, by way of the Stars & Stripes, they describe the tug-of-war between the White House and the Pentagon over the use of troops in Iraq;
[A] series of military leaders have criticized the president’s approach against the Islamic State militant group.
Retired Marine Gen. James Mattis, who served under Obama until last year, became the latest high-profile skeptic on Thursday, telling the House Intelligence Committee that a blanket prohibition on ground combat was tying the military’s hands. “Half-hearted or tentative efforts, or airstrikes alone, can backfire on us and actually strengthen our foes’ credibility,” he said. “We may not wish to reassure our enemies in advance that they will not see American boots on the ground.”
We’ve all been there before – a White House that doesn’t want to call their employment of troops a path to success, that can’t form the word “Victory” with their crooked mouths. Meanwhile, The Post‘s David Ignatius reports that James Clapper is making excuses that they had underestimated the Islamic State;
“What we didn’t do was predict the will to fight. That’s always a problem. We didn’t do it in Vietnam. We underestimated the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese and overestimated the will of the South Vietnamese. In this case, we underestimated ISIL [the Islamic State] and overestimated the fighting capability of the Iraqi army. .?.?. I didn’t see the collapse of the Iraqi security force in the north coming. I didn’t see that. It boils down to predicting the will to fight, which is an imponderable.”
Well, that’s disingenuous, they saw the Iraqi Army collapse in the battle against ISIS for Fallujah in February and they made empty promises of support for the Iraqi government that were still unfulfilled six months later as the Islamic State lined up at the gates of Baghdad. There were plenty of indications, most of the people who read these pages saw it coming – do you actually mean that no one in the Pentagon, no one at the State Department, no one in the White House saw it when was obvious to the whole rest of the country?
They just didn’t want to make the hard choices – they didn’t have the guts to admit that they’d been wrong and now, in the 11th hour, the troops have to once again pull this administration’s fat from the fire. And even now, they don’t have the guts to make the hard choices.
Category: Terror War
An actual commander-in-chief would say, “Shit. If every one of the generals agrees with me, I don’t need any of them.” But, as I say, that would be an actual leader. With the Golfer in Mom Jeans, it’s quite a different approach. I had hoped that by this late date a general would publicly and loudly resign BECAUSE OF that guy in the White House. Instead, the truth, if it comes at all, arrives only after the career is in the bank.
The CiC is absent, and has absolutely no clue as to how to actually “Lead”. He and his handlers only act out of reaction to poll numbers, and other forms of public opinion. He has no heart for this fight.
No man wants War, but War has been declared on US. He needs to respond with the full force of the US Military, but he cannot because he is too busy crippling it, experimenting with it, and sending thousands off to Africa for a mission they were not trained for.
We do not have a Leader, we have an Emperor with no clothes.
Mind bleach!!!!!
Please – warning next time? I beg you!
That is twice in one weeks time I have done that to someone here… I will put up an Advisory next time.
Underestimated or didn’t see it coming? Both times we hit Iraq, their army faded fast although they did try a little harder the last time. As for ISIS, haven’t we been watching them in Syria for the last two years? We’ve all seen this coming…
How about blew it off as inconsequential?
Isn’t that what Monica Lewinsky said?
sorry, it just begged to be said
Heeheehee!
Recall that it was Clapper who said the Muslim Bro’s were “largely secular”….even though Mussie is part of their name.
This whole administration and the Pentagon are a bunch of left and right hands that never speak or know what the other is doing, thinking or planning until it hits the media. Then the White House press liars go to work to spin away whatever the other agencies say or advocate that does not fit their cowardice. That is Obama in a nutshell. A coward of the worst sort. The kind who always gets far more of his own people killed than need be when often non need die.
You guys are expecting WAY too much of bodaprez. He has to address sexual assualt on college campuses.
http://news.msn.com/us/hamm-other-stars-join-campaign-against-assault
That’s something he can really deal with, isn’t it?
I still have my size 10D steel toe flight boots, and I know exactly where one needs to be planted.
This is an inherent flaw in our constitution that confers complete military authority on a civilian politician may have little to absolutely no knowledge of military strategies and capabilities.
I am well aware of all the arguments that we must maintain civilian control of the military. However, for a nation wielding the destructive power of this one, the idea of a total neophyte ascending to a position of control of all that power through popular election by an uninformed electorate is truly scary.
Well….maybe not complete authority. Still subject to the “two man rule”. The POTUS as commander-in-chief is the ultimate “decider” on use of military force (including nukes), but the SECDEF must concur…since both POTUS & SECDEF comprise the National Command Authority.
What would Pres Greg Stillson (Martin Sheen) do? ;>)
Just who in the hell was “We”, because those of us who have done the all expenses paid by Uncle Sam vacation in the hinterlands saw this one coming years ago.
At least one somebody somewhere has a thick file of all the briefings and reports that were prepared for consumption at 1600. There might even be tracking data available to show when ALL that information was transmitted to them. And we are supposed to believe that that recent developments are shocking to them?
Can’t have it both ways, idiots. If “the man” is truly ignorant of the details it is willful ignorance. Shameful, if true. Otherwise, it’s just a complete package of lies. In other words, more of the same. Either way, y’all are not doing your jobs.
I’d choose ‘denial’ over ‘wilful ignorance’, although they are quite close together on the ‘don’t wanna hear it’ scale. This involves ‘maintain an even strain’, ‘nothing is wrong, everything is JUST FINE’, and other forms of denial of reality. You and I all live in the real world. We react in very real ways to the news we see coming off the internet and electronic media. Anger, horror, anguish, a desire to retaliate are all real and understandable reactions. But we have someone in charge, with no leadership skills or experience, someone who is so blatantly incompetent that he denies real-time reports of a jihadi cell just across the southern US border, and who thinks the ‘right thing to do’ is sending our military people by the truckload to a disease-ridden area that should be quarantined until the disease runs its course. It’s not that we ourselves are doomed by this. We aren’t children, waiting for Mum and Da to tell us what to do to stay alive, are we? No, we’re not. In regard to this conflict in the Oval Office, it will play itself out and some decision will be made. If it favors the troops’ welfare, that’s good. I hate this mission creep, I really do. But if they are sent over there to engage in combat, then they should be sent to decisively win the conflict, hands down. I said elsewhere that warfare is the ultimate competition. There is only one winner, the survivor of the conflict. You’re in it to win it, or you’re dead. This business is about OUR survival, as well as the rest of the world, and they’ll have to kick in, too, if they want to survive. Some of them have already reached that conclusion and are beginning to crack down. The denial of reality has to stop somewhere, you know. When does that happen? When the mall at Cherry Hill, NJ is invaded by jihadi with automatic weapons set on ‘spray’? Do we get to see a grade school in Michigan targeted by truck bombers? Does denial stop when a… Read more »
So when will one of the powdered princes at the pentagon decide that there is just some shit he won’t eat and call the prez out. Write a letter that lays out all that is wrong with the ISIL strategy and give Obama a chance to change it. If ignored he has to retire/resign and tell the american people why. Tell the truth and tell it loud. We know that Obama has no loyalty to his top commanders and he will throw them all under the bus when his non war becomes a real defeat. Or an attack on the homeland by the JV team, B squad.