Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Really? Striking heavy civilian areas is just going to push more of the survivors to their side there for creating more extremists and possible terrorist who want revenge for the death of their loved ones.
Yeah. Japan's extremists are roaming the world blowing up concerts, buildings and subways. </SARCASM>
Yes...if the Islamic world made a recognizable move to reconciliation..I think we would respond..America is tired of war..but we just can't see our way out.
It's both impossible and inadvisable to negotiate with the likes of the Manchester suicide bomber.
Probably not. Unless we dissolve the executive order that forbids the CIA from targeted assassinations of leaders. Carter's order. This was typical of fighting in our style and expecting everyone else to conform.
LOL, I hope you don't think the US forbears assassinating hostile leaders when possible. I assure you, we don't. You heard about Osama bin Laden, but don't imagine the hunt for him was unique.
It's not normally done by the CIA, though. I provided intel for five missions similar to the Osama bin Laden attack over my career, and you haven't heard of any of them.
If it had been up to me, you wouldn't have heard officially of Osama bin Laden's death by now, either.
In that it was in my OP....I guess you concede MY point, eh?
But seriously..I really didn't have a 'point'...I just wanted a variety of viewpoints to consider...
In that, you helped me and I thank you. I don't think your options as set forth are viable--and I think the law of unintended consequences would wreak havoc on your solutions.
LOL, I hope you don't think the US forbears assassinating hostile leaders when possible. I assure you, we don't. You heard about Osama bin Laden, but don't imagine the hunt for him was unique.
The reason an executive order was needed to assassinate Osama bin Laden was the earlier Carter order. Otherwise he could have been dispatched in the normal course of business.
In that it was in my OP....I guess you concede MY point, eh?
But seriously..I really didn't have a 'point'...I just wanted a variety of viewpoints to consider...
In that, you helped me and I thank you. I don't think your options as set forth are viable--and I think the law of unintended consequences would wreak havoc on your solutions.
But as always..I could be wrong.
I respect your views. The problem is that no method of dealing with the Muslim world has worked. That includes the Crusades, the battle over the Philippines after U.S. conquest, the perpetual war between the Jews and Islam in the modern Middle East and the more recent struggles. In fact the Jewish-Muslim situation shows that the Muslims will accept nothing less than total victory.
The reason an executive order was needed to assassinate Osama bin Laden was the earlier Carter order. Otherwise he could have been dispatched in the normal course of business.
During the Persian Gulf war, we were doing our darnedest to locate Saddam Hussein, and would have put a Tomahawk on him immediately if we'd been able to locate him.
First: Outside a war acknowledged by Congress, then it certainly should require a specific order from the president to assassinate a national leader. Covert actions of such political impact should not occur without an Executive command. "Regime change" is not the "normal course of business" for any CIA or DoD bureaucrat to determine all on his own.
Second: No succeeding president has been hampered by any Carter Executive Order. Carter's Executive Orders could be and were revoked by any succeeding president...unless that president chose for himself to continue them.
After the passing of the Intelligence Oversight Act, such actions require Executive Office direction. CIA lawyers interpret that as being either the president or the vice-president. I know that during the Reagan administration, the CIA took proposals for covert actions first to Vice-President Bush (who had formerly been the director of the CIA and was greatly admired by them); Bush determined whether Reagan needed to sign off.
"Terror" is itself just a tactic and is not at the core what we are at war with. What we are at war with is the ideology that sometimes employs this tactic, salafism. The propagation of this backward, anti-enlightenment ideology is what we are at war with. Both the impatient jihadists and the more patient types are the problem.
The more cunning patient conservatives who seek to keep muslim communities insular, traditionalist and prevent liberalism from getting a foothold among their flock are the root of the problem. These are also the same elements who push for proto sharia law in various western countries. They are the core of the problem because they craft and maintain the ideological fertile ground from which people are easily "radicalized".
As has already been noted in this thread Saudi Arabia and the other wealthy wahabbi gulf states are the primary place from which salafism spreads across the world. They are surrounded by poor countries who cant resist their money and influence. Recently even Indonesia has been targeted by the Saudis who realize the strategic need to prevent the most populous muslim nation from becoming liberal. There has been an increase in extremism in that country lately because of it. The Saudis also expend lots of money to influence the muslim populations in various western nations, as does the Muslim brotherhood and its affiliated organizations.
What counts as a win?
The only long term solution is liberalism. Liberals and true moderates must win out from within. The prospects dont look promising on that front. Turkey is heading backwards and Saudi Arabia and Qatar are aggressive as ever exporting extremism. Western liberals are doing a poor job of sticking up for their own kind within the muslim community and they seem to lack vision here.
If the muslim liberals cant get a stronger foothold and expand substantially, the gloomier solutions proposed by the illiberal posters here become more likely in the long run.
Good God I think none of you read any history. A good review of the Vietnam War would be in order. The U.S. bombed that country into the stone age for all the good it did.
You've got to have hearts and minds. If you don't have that, you'll never win, no matter how powerful. Without it, you might as well save the expense of fighting.
Good God I think none of you read any history. A good review of the Vietnam War would be in order. The U.S. bombed that country into the stone age for all the good it did.
You've got to have hearts and minds. If you don't have that, you'll never win, no matter how powerful. Without it, you might as well save the expense of fighting.
I think most of us in this forum recognize that there are times that some level of war is necessary.
But then there's another group of people in the forum who relish war. Whether it's lamenting that we didn't "finish the job" in World War II, or the Korean War, or the Vietnam War, and eventually in the Middle East War that they hanker for. They post over and over again about war. I'm not sure whether it's a sort of sport for them, or whether it's a sort of macho-ism. What's especially is concerning is that they aren't the ones who are going to fight these wars. They're the keyboard warriors who seem to like playing the lives of American soldiers as if they are game pieces on a board game. Perhaps what they ought to do is become soldiers of fortune and go blow themselves up, instead of trying to nudge this country into a hot war (because they're not a bit satisfied with a cold war).
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
