Gee. What A Surprise.
Well, it looks like the current DC cognoscenti are beginning their preparations for departure.
Why do I say that? Because yet another of those “high mucky-mucks” currently in the Federal government now seems free to speak his or her mind – and deviate from the accepted “party line”. Here’s a quote from a current high-level political appointees:
“But there will still be much more to do after that to make sure that, once defeated, ISIL stays defeated. We’ll need to continue to counter foreign fighters trying to escape and ISIL’s attempts to relocate or reinvent itself. To do so, not only the United States but our coalition must endure and remain engaged militarily.
In Iraq in particular, it will be necessary for the coalition to provide sustained assistance and carry on our work to train, equip, and support local police, border guards, and other forces to hold areas cleared from ISIL”.
Yeah, he’s saying we’ll need a US “stay behind force” in Iraq after Daesh is defeated in order to maintain long-term stability. Surprise, surprise.
If that sounds familiar . . . it should. It’s the same thing several others were telling the current Occupant, 1600 Penn Ave, Wash DC and his clueless clown krewe Administration about Iraq during SOFA negotiations in 2011. It’s also what several of them later said publicly about the resulting mess – as well as saying that the rise of Daesh is directly attributable to a lack of any US stay-behind forces.
The person quoted above? That would be the Honorable Ashton Carter – AKA, the current SECDEF.
Hmm. For some reason, the phrase “rats leaving a sinking ship” comes to mind. Oh well.
I will be so glad when something resembling adult leadership having a freaking clue about how the real world works returns to that Open Air Brothel on the Potomac called DC next month. I’m thoroughly sick and tired of being led by clueless ideologues with zero understanding of the real world.
Eight years of Leftist idiocy is far too long.
Category: Foreign Policy, Military issues
Mattis knows Iran is and has been the problem in the middle east since the late 70’s. He fucking hates Iran.
I hear that he is very close to some Beirut veterans. Speculation and rumor of course, but I can confirm his hatred for Iran.
I am surprised the media has not picked up on decades of quotes where he preaches the destruction of Iran.
Slow readers I guess.
I don’t like my leaders making decisions based on hatred. Hatred is great tool to use in close combat, but pretty much useless besides that.
I would be concerned if not because I read GEN Mattis quote: ‘There are some people who think you have to hate them in order to shoot them. I don’t think you do.’ which tells me the dude is right on my page.
I don’t think you have to hate people to kill them…its just an extra warm fuzzy when you do.
Mattis knows we should have dealt with Iran decades ago.
I have learned to embrace my hate, nothing wrong with killing the enemy while you hate them.
I’m with you Dave.
I am so entirely sick and tired of the crap we have put up with since the Bush I administration.
Since that administration the softening and left wing bull shit have taken this country into the latrine ditch they live in.
I am so sick of them, all of them…
You can still see the streak of brown on his nose where it’s been up Obama’s ass for so long, a schoolboy knows you can’t initiate violent regime change and then leave….the whole SOFA argument was very much like the video causing the Benghazi attack argument, it was a bullshit from day one and it’s still bullshit now. Ash Carter is still an asshole, and while his comments are accurate he did nothing to promote that while in office so his current commentary smells like an attempt to make a relevant comment for posterity…fuck that guy.
0bama still leaving office with a No Balls peace prize.
The head of the Nobel committee now regrets. Too late Dumas.
He regrets being political? Or he regrets all the bad press he’s received for giving an “intent” award to someone?
You mean from the same No Balls Foundation that gave the same to Al Gore Junior foe his environment con games?
Yeah, well, some people have integrity and others are just full of hot air and bull shit.
And money. Gotta give the No-Bells Pizza Prize folks that. They got money.
They may give it to blooming idiots for a participation trophy, but it spends.
I’d laugh at their stupidity except that too many fine men and women paid the ultimate price for their fucking idiocy.
There’s nothing funny about it.
And it will take beyond what time I have left just to get back to where we were before the children took over.
Not at all funny.
It sickens me to think of all of the lives lost to take those shitholes and then Odumbo turns around and hands the fuckers the keys to the city! I don’t know how that ass clown can sleep at night knowing what he has done to the vets and their families that lost a loved one for that useless pile of monkress!
Yeah, Israel and Great Britain are pissed off at us for a variety of reasons.
Cuba and Iran have new deals with the US.
Mattis told Congress his perspective because he was briefing them according to what he was required to and was told to retire early for being honest. His becoming SECDEF is just a purely awesome Fuck You! to the current administration.
GTMO has been getting emptied and many former guests went right back into the fight. Obama talked about Constitutional problems and legalities with keeping them at GTMO, yet he’s the same guy who droned a US citizen without a trial or due process and said “oh that was legal” without missing a beat. (I suspect if GW had droned awlaki, the MSM would’ve marched on the white house with torches to lynch him. But Barry did it so its “okay” with them.)
Is Ash related to Jimmy by chance?
Weird, I might’ve done something wrong, I didn’t expect this to pop in as a reply to you. lol.
Politicians are reptiles. It’s as if there’s a gene going back to velociraptors or something.
So here come Ashton Carter with a clever ploy to provide a win-win for the so-called Obama legacy. If ISIS is defeated, the current administration can say all the heavy lifting was already done when a new administration took over. If ISIS is not defeated, the current administration can say victory was handed to the new administration who managed to screw it up.
“Politicians are reptiles.”
Most of them are very soulless ones as well.
Velociraptors had better manners. If you said ‘komodo dragons’, I’d agree completely.
Ashton Carter = Cocksucker.
His only real talent is kissing ass and sucking cock at the same time.
I heard how he does that. There’s a third party involved.
Ashton Carter – PC, SJW COCKSUCKER!
I was part of the team planning the 2010/2011 Iraq force drawdown. We were working with three courses of action; a high, mid, and low US force number. The low number was quite a bit north of zero, and we knew that we were behind the power curve to start moving personnel and equipment out of Iraq even if POTUS opted for the high number.
I can tell you that, when the number zero was announced, we were all shocked. No one in uniform had briefed zero, recommended zero, or even considered zero as an option. Essentially, Obama dismissed all or our military advice and went with some clueless member of the NSC or State Dept., with predictable results.
And then when the CENTOM Commander was briefing Congress and told them the truth, that same CENTCOM Commander was told to retire early.
But, that same CENTCOM Commander is going to be the new SECDEF, so I’m sure he’ll be able to work on correcting some of that bullshit over the last 8 years.
You did not complain about our ability to remain in Iraq when the Bush administration threw us under th bus and hastily agreed to a dangerous and dysfunctional SOFA agreement in 2008.
There was no possible way we could function effectively under that agreement and since Iraqi Shia’s (some of them Iranian agents) that controlled the government did not want us to stay they were unwilling to give the Obama administration the concessions necessary to continue to function.
It does not even matter if Obama wanted to or not. The 2008 agreement effectively made us combat ineffective and exposed us to ridiculous risk at the hands of Iraqi police who had become a major threat to US forces. It also made it near impossible to arrest, hold for any reasonable time, and convict insurgents.
The Shia dominated Iraqi government wanted us out of th way so they could move the Sunni political opposition from power and did exactly that LITERALLY the day after we pulled out.
Obama cannot be given full blame for the pull out. BOTH the US and the Iraqis have to be party to the agreement and Bush killed any negotiating power Obama would have had by hastily giving Iraq almost everything they wanted in the 2008 agreement.
It’s afternoon and Poodle is up and at ’em as Commander 0’s sycophant and apologist in residence at the People’s Dhimmicratic Republic of Berzerkley.
Must of had some of those tofu Grape Nuts and triple soy decaf lattes from the local coffee shop co-op to get himself all fired up and ready to go…
That’s because he got up early yesterday to implant his muddled ideas on us.
Hey, who is ‘we’, puddlepounder? You got a mouse in your pocket?
I remember a lot of folks complaining about the SOFA in 08, so I don’t know what you’re talking about..
Politicians being stupid is rampant in both parties, hence the results of the 2016 election. BUT make no mistake about it, the left works overtime to accomplish its idiocy.
Just more of Lars projecting his own hypocrisy. Pay no attention.
Hey Puddin’ Tame, I and many, many others her presume that you ARE VERY PROUD of your idiocy given how you perpetually parade it here for us!
Didn’t Obama say he ended the war in Iraq?
Yeah, you can tell with how peaceful it’s been since then, just like Syria, Libya, Somilia, ad nauseum. /sarc
But… but… but the Ministry of OOB News has declared that it’s over!
How can anything possibly be going on there?
How? How? My head is going to explode… or something.
I guess its okay because he was saying all that on the campaign trail right?
The Commisar is right. The military did in fact propose higher troop numbers, but the proposed SOFA was unacceptable. We would have had troops subject to Iraqi law for protecting themselves.
Had we kept troops in Iraq under the SOFA they would have been very constrained and largely ineffective, and we would not have been able to sustain it for long. We had a hard time maintaining the surge as it was.
Oh, by the way, ISIS already existed at the time, they just called themselves AQI. They had a number of options to stay alive if we stayed in the country- they could have gone to ground until we did leave, they could have stepped up their game and taken us on, knowing that the SOFA would make it hard for us to fight them the way we wanted, or they could have just concentrated more in Syria.
On another note, I’m not sure why everyone is surprised that Carter supports Obama’s policies. Obama picked him; he serves at the pleasure of the president. Obama would fire Carter on the spot for refusing to follow orders and replace him with someone that would comply. Simple as that.
Interesting read Reddevil.
One comment – seems to me the only time our troops came under Iraqi law was for acts committed off duty time and out of uniform? If so, that sounds very much like the agreement we had with the FRG authorities – I remember a rapist for 3/63d getting turned over to the Polizei back about 1984 or so.
3/63 at Harvey Barracks?
No- this would not have been like forces in Germany or even Korea. soldiers on patrol would have been subject to Iraqi law for actions taken in combat. This would have severely restricted what we were able to do in the country.