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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (271585)	11/18/2009 1:21:22 PM
From: Selectric II	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

I missed it, but sounds like a typical 60 Minutes advocacy piece. While those guys' job is to keep the road clear of mines, there are others whose job it is to get the bad guys, and still others who help train Afghans to take responsibility and otherwise help the country get its act together. Analogy: If 60 Minutes did a story purportedly about state government, but only followed the routine of the crews who keep the sewage lines clear, and whose idea of "winning" is to keep the sht flowing to the treatment plant without getting an e-coli infection, you might get the impression that the state's only job is to keep sht flowing with no other goal. War is hell, no doubt about it. Did 60 Minutes show any of the good things we're doing over there? Doubt it.

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (271585)	11/18/2009 3:03:10 PM
From: Hawkmoon	1 Recommendation Respond to of 281500

When the guys doing the dying think winning means coming home alive then you better find a new strategy or bring them home, don't you agree? Ed Yes.. I agree.. I saw that 60 minutes program. And that Colonel was being politically correct in his comments on mission success. Again, that's why I posted that McClatchy article (did you bother to read it?).. I suggest you starting reading Michael Yon's reports out Afghanistan. He's a former Green Beret and he understands the nature of this fight, as well as its challenges. Btw, it's not the first time we've seen setbacks in a war and had to resort to new strategies. Hell.. we were daylight bombing Germany and suffering 10-20% losses in men and planes, until the advent of long range fighter escorts like the P-51. We did the same over Japan, but the high winds prevented accurate bombing, so we switched over to the British tactic of incendiary raids, flown low level at night, which killed hundreds of thousands of people indiscriminately. What I saw in that 60 minutes story is that the commander doesn't have "eyes on" the road he's supposed to be controlling, either with UAVs, motion sensors, or LP/OPs with sniper rifles. Could be he's under-resourced, but that's what McChrystal is trying to resolve with Obama. It's possible that this particular piece of Afghanistan might need to be "pacified" later on when we have a fairly reliable Afghan Army and police force. Once you control a population center, you consolidate those gains and don't let the enemy have access to that population again. That's the foundation of counter-insurgency. Btw, it's always been cheaper to break something that is it to build it. Always been the case where a single $1000 shell (price as of now), or $80K anti-tank rocket, can destroy a multi-million dollar tank. Also, "coming home alive" is ALWAYS what a soldier prays for. They did it in WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Desert Storm, and OIF, and now in Afghanistan. However, they still do their jobs. Hawk