TROOP FATALITIES....whose to blame?

[imagine2frolic]

It's this kind of thing that makes my blood boil. Give the troops the best of everything available, or don't send them. The frikking accountants are the troops second worst enemy, and possibly #1.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/200...rcTQtGKyTMWM0F

[Roscoe]

I strongly believe that more casualties are caused by our PC rules of engagement than armoured Humvees. Time to play "no more Mr. Nice Guy"

If we fought wars today like we fought them in 1944 the whole thing would have been over already.

Roscoe

[Ron61]

Don't forget some crooked supply sergeants. Some of them got wealthy from Korea while we had to get replacement parts from Japan because they sold them on the black market. At least two that I knew were sent to Leavenworth and I hope they are still there.

Ron

[VRM]

Originally Posted by Roscoe

I strongly believe that more casualties are caused by our PC rules of engagement than armoured Humvees. Time to play "no more Mr. Nice Guy"

If we fought wars today like we fought them in 1944 the whole thing would have been over already.

Roscoe

Actually, Roscoe - thats the problem. We ARE fighting wars like we fought them in 1944. Our enemy is not. Unlike WW2, this war is as much psychological as it is physical. We have the means to win on the physical front, but we are losing on the psychological front. If we continue to lose on the psychological front then we will eventually lose on the physical one as well.

Steve

[Roscoe]

Steve,

Wrong! We have made it a psychological war, it does not have to be. In 1944 we just beat them into submission. Collateral damage? Sorry.

Curious though....we haven't had many problems from Germany or Japan recently.....Hmmmmmm.

Plus, the Dems are strengthening our enemy with their 'surrender' oops sorry 're-deploy' strategy. In 1944 they would have been arrested as traitors.

Roscoe

[VRM]

Roscoe,

In the 1940s how did most people become German or Japanese?

Now, how do most people become members of Al Quaida?

[Jamo]

Probably no single answer. Been watching the Snake Skin BS going on (since the stuff is made here in Fresno) and it appears Eisenhower's warnings still hold true today. Between politicians (both parties), the military and the favored few who sell stuff to our forces, who knows whether our folks are getting the bestest stuff? Been going on for years.

Steve, you're not wrong, but I agree with Roscoe...we are being too "smart." I'm thinking our smart bombs are working against us...folks expect there not to be any collateral damage when we take out a safe house in their neighborhood even though they knew damn well who was in there. We're so good, we raise their expectations and make war clean. The basturds who take out our folks while they drive down the highway don't have to be as careful...our folks wear uniforms and drive in identifiable vehicles.

I think we need to dumb down our smart stuff in a controlled manner. A city block here and there will make it unacceptable to harbor the bad guys in the neighborhood. Note that some groups that don't even like us are fighting the really bad guys lately to get them out of their towns.

[trularin]

The word 'war' should inspire thoughts of devistation and sorrow. That way it would be avoided at all cost.

Just a thought.

[Roscoe]

At all costs? Is there no circumstance where war is necessary?

Roscoe

[4RE KLR]

I believe we have a war going on in this country right now.

It is just not being fought well.

The war on Immigration!

We should capture the illegals and send the to Iraq and let them EARN thier citizenship.

[VRM]

Jamo,
You make a good point about the smart stuff. Even if a 2.5K lb smart bomb hits the bad guy right between the eyes, it is still going to leave a really big hole.

We have been using your (and Roscoes) method in Iraq, though probably not to the extent you want. The end result is that we are fighting about 5-7% Al Quaida (according to an NIE), and the rest are Iraqis either trying to gain power in the vacuum we left, or they are pissed off at us for: A. killing their family, B. occupying their country, C. Blowing up their business, D. All of the above and then some.
What do you think is going to happen if we blow up a few neighbourhoods deliberately? We then become the bad guy to ALL Iraqis. And that is counterproductive to what we need to do.

Al Quiada is supporting some of these people, and I think it is pretty safe to say that some of them will fall prey to Al Quaida indoctrination - and that leaves us with more bad guys.

Bush Sr and Scowcroft predicted a lot of this. Somebody besides me should have listened to them.

Steve

[Roscoe]

Look what we did to Munich, Dresden, Berlin, Tokyo, Nagasaki, Hiroshima. The Jerries and Japs don't hate us.

Where's Curtis LeMay when we need him?

Roscoe

[VRM]

Originally Posted by Roscoe

Look what we did to Munich, Dresden, Berlin, Tokyo, Nagasaki, Hiroshima. The Jerries and Japs don't hate us.

Where's Curtis LeMay when we need him?

Roscoe

Roscoe,
Those cultures do not have the high level of revenge built into them that those in the ME do. It's one reason that the ME is such a screwed up place in the first place!

Steve

[Jamo]

He!!, where's Slim Pickens when we need him!

[imagine2frolic]

To he!! with the politics on this thread. It is what we are supplying our troops with. Why can't we give them everything that is needed, and quit cutting corners? My personal feeling is that a huge corner was sliced off with the small amount of troops sent. We were led to believe it would be low cost, and high return. None of this happened at all. I believe Cheney's words were "6 MONTHS AT THE MOST!"

If you are going to fight. It has to be to win, or get the he!! out of there. In WWII we went into win, and had no less intentions, but to win. There were sacrifices on the war front as well as the home front. Rationing of many items, the women fulfilling the missing workforce. We bought into the war by buying war bonds.

My personal thought is that you knock the enemy down, put your foot on thier windpipe, give them one last breath to surrender, or step down with force. I do not believe we should have went to Iraq, but now that we are there we need to finish the job, and leave no doubt who is superior in strength. We opened Pandora's box, and we need to get it closed with what ever tool it takes.

[Jamo]

"Screw them pollytishons...this here's WAR!!!!"

[trularin]

Ah yes, we need Peter Sellers and his crew.

CPO I think was the recall code. Or was it CPE, hmmmmm.... no wonder the planes haven't returned.

[LoBelly]

I know that I'm seeing this from a long way away and dont have the same perspective as the countrymen of those doing the heavy lifting but I thought that Thomas Friedman raised a few good points in his opinion piece on resolving the Iraqi occupation.

Some selected quotes:

(on the Iraqi parliament closing because its too hot)...So let’s get this straight: Iraqi parliamentarians, at least those not already boycotting the Parliament, will be on vacation in August so they can be cool, while young American men and women, and Iraqi Army soldiers, will be fighting in the heat in order to create a proper security environment in which Iraqi politicians can come back in September and continue squabbling while their country burns...

(on the quality of the diplomatic effort to date)...When you read stories in the newspapers every day about Americans who are going to Iraq for their third or even fourth tours and you think that this administration has never sent its best diplomats for even one tour yet — never made one, not one, single serious, big-time, big-tent diplomatic push to resolve this conflict, but instead has put everything on the military, it makes you sick...

...I’d draft the country’s best negotiators — Henry Kissinger, Jim Baker, George Shultz, George Mitchell, Dennis Ross or Richard Holbrooke — and ask one or all of them to go to Baghdad, under a U.N. mandate, with the following orders:

“I want you to move to the Green Zone, meet with the Iraqi factions and do not come home until you’ve reached one of three conclusions: 1) You have resolved the power- and oil-sharing issues holding up political reconciliation; 2) you have concluded that those obstacles are insurmountable and have sold the Iraqis on a partition plan that could be presented to the U.N. and supervised by an international force; 3) you have concluded that Iraqis are incapable of agreeing on either political reconciliation or a partition plan and told them that, as a result, the U.S. has no choice but to re-deploy its troops to the border and let Iraqis sort this out on their own.”

The last point is crucial. Any lawyer will tell you, if you’re negotiating a contract and the other side thinks you’ll never walk away, you’ve got no leverage. And in Iraq, we’ve never had any leverage. The Iraqis believe that Mr. Bush will never walk away, so they have no incentive to make painful compromises...

?

LoBelly

[Ron61]

Good points. And there is also the issue of the Iraq Police refusing to move in and secure zones where the troops have ran the bad guys out. So in a day they are back and all the fighting was for nothing.

Ron

[imagine2frolic]

LoBelly, I believe you are correct with the incentive to negotiate. They have none, and while they keep us in this situation. Our money just flows into the corrupt hands that are in Iraq. Not just the corrupt hands of an Iraqi, but all hands.