Maybe Trump will stop bombing our ally (Pakistan). What he did announce is a stronger diplomatic effort to get Pakistan to be more proactive.
Trump when elected empowered his generals to wage war as they saw fit.....they started losing serious ground in Afghanistan since....now Kelly says to Trump...we need to send in more troops to stop the embarrassment....Trump says....Where's Afghanistan?
“I commend President Trump for taking a big step in the right direction with the new strategy for Afghanistan,” the Senate Armed Services chairman said in a statement. “The unfortunate truth is that this strategy is long overdue, and in the interim, the Taliban have made dangerous inroads. Nevertheless, I believe the President is now moving us well beyond the prior administration’s failed strategy of merely postponing defeat.” – (John McCain) The Hill
Watched the address last night. I is hard to tell if he is selling out to the establishment swamp monsters, or giving the Generals the latitude to prosecute the war as needed. His speech seemed disjointed, almost Jekyll/Hyde. The one thing that I came away with was that he did not make the mistake of past administrations by telegraphing every move.
What I like about you is your sensitive soul and your cries for civility. Also, you still didn't address your non-point about how a six-month drawdown "emboldens the enemy" because they just have to wait it out, but announcing that the troops are already gone somehow doesn't, even though that means they don't have to wait at all.
https://www.thenation.com/article/secret-nation-building-boom-obama-years/ The Secret Nation-Building Boom of the Obama Years As the infrastructure of many U.S. cities crumbles, the Pentagon continues to pump over a billion dollars into military bases throughout the Middle East. The Pentagon awarded $667.2 million in contracts in 2012 and more than $1 billion during Barack Obama’s first term in office for construction projects in largely autocratic Middle Eastern nations, according to figures provided to TomDispatch by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Middle East District (USACE-MED). More than $178 million in similar funding is already anticipated for 2013. These contracts represent a mix of projects, including expanding and upgrading military bases used by U.S. troops in the region, building facilities for indigenous security forces and launching infrastructure projects meant to improve the lives of local populations. The figures are telling, but far from complete. They do not, for example, cover any of the billions spent on work at the more than 1,000 U.S. and coalition bases, outposts and other facilities in Afghanistan or the thousands more manned by local forces. They also leave out construction projects undertaken in the region by other military services like the U.S. Air Force, as well as money spent at an unspecified number of bases in the Middle East that the Corps of Engineers “has no involvement with,” according to Joan Kibler, chief of the Middle East District’s public affairs office.
I criticized your post. It is moronic. This one is slightly better, but devoid of Reason. Leaving now doesn't put our troops in harm's way any longer. Leaving at any time might mean the enemy might strengthen (though they're getting stronger as is, and lots of troops or minimal numbers of troops hasn't won this thing in 17 years). We can still bomb the shit out of the bad guys with drones and from aircraft carriers, should they regroup. I don't want to leave behind a stash of weapons that the Taliban will end up using. THAT would be repeating a mistake of the prior administration.
I'm dubious about the prospect that Trump has stopped bombing all the places Obama did. At least he isn't expanding the war into several additional states as the Nobel Peace Prize (LOL) winner did.
I want the troops to come home. Screw Afghanistan! But... that is where the our opposition chooses to center. One day probably not so far off, it will be another on the EBF list. We have never won this conflict and we have been in it since the Days of Jefferson and the creation of the US Marine corp to go with our brand new Navy. Then it was North Africa, we never won, but the conflict moved on. Then the French took over for a while, the British in another place. So called World Wars disrupted the conflict or at least distracted our attention, but it never ended. We got a taste of it again between the world wars in the Philippians, then again some after WWII, but no winners. Afghanistan is just the current place and we will not win. But the place in the center of attention will move. I am pleased to see President Trump, understand Nation building is not the goal and it is not our job. Damn! That is a major step forward. All we have to do it battle those that would do us in. Forget about making piece with them, you can't make peace with another morality set. I am pleased to see this step forward in understanding. I wish there was a way, I would like to see the young war fighter come home, but the only way I see that come to be, is with a new leader, like the last, that has no idea what is happening.
I'm not saying you broke any rules, I'm just saying that you whine a lot about your feelings being hurt for a person who tosses around words like "moronic." It's exactly the same point as before, which is why I said "you still haven't addressed it." But that's not the basis for which you criticized Obama's "incompetent fucked up strategy." If you've already forgotten, this was your argument: "announcing an end date so the bad guys can sit tight and wait it out" If the bad guys knowing that in 6 months, they have free reign is your basis for a strategy being "incompetent and fucked up," then the bad guys knowing that immediately they have free reign is also incompetent and fucked up. Basically, your basis for attacking Obama's strategy made no sense.
Reading is fun-da-mental "building facilities for indigenous security forces and launching infrastructure projects meant to improve the lives of local populations."
You simply point out the folly of pretending announcing an end date has any merit. Again, your logic is painfully strained.
Yeah, it mentioned that, but it seems the focus is on military bases. Even the headline disagrees with itself: So, I don't think the article is terribly helpful. Besides, my point was that Obama said pretty much exactly the same thing Trump did about nation building. And most likely, Trump will actually do pretty much the same as Obama in terms of nation building, because he's following Obama's Afghanistan policy pretty much completely, despite pretending to change direction. The only real change is that he's sending 4000 more troops over. barfo
It "seems" hundreds of $millions or $billions are spent on things we'd leave behind when we do leave, as well as outright nation building. Obama bombed Pakistan. Trump said we'll be asking Pakistan to take a much bigger role. That's a really big difference. Obama's policy extended the war by 8 years and expanded the war by about 6 countries (I didn't count, but it may be a couple more even). EDIT: looks like 5 countries we have been bombing that we weren't when Obama took office.
I wasn't saying announcing an end date has merit or doesn't. I'm saying that whenever you actually recall the troops, the enemy is going to know they're unopposed by those troops, so the "emboldening the enemy" thing you keep trotting has never made any sense unless you believe the troops should be there forever.
Maybe the troops should be there forever, like they've been in S. Korea. That's a very different question. We're not dropping bombs in S. Korea and killing civilians. No matter when you leave, any enemy might regroup and gain strength. Thus announcing some timetable months or years in the future is utterly stupid and indefensible. Indefensible, but you will.
