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We’ve already heard chatter for a week about General Stanley McChrystal’s leaked report which recommends a substantial increase in troops to Afghanistan at the risk losing the Afghan mission — whatever that mission may be, since conquering the unconquerable nation/state seems to be something no one really wants to put in black and white.
The buzz included crazy talk/pipe dream/wishful thinking along the lines of deploying 500,000 troops.
Crack-induced imaginings of a half a million troops aside, it looks as if McChrystal ignored chain of command, pissing on President Obama’s shoes and decided his report should be made public rather than submit it to his Commander in Chief and await the CiC’s decision on next steps.
GOP legislators have also been clamoring for McChrystal and other military leaders report to Congress rather than the Commander in Chief as to their plans for Afghanistan (which as markfromireland pointed out, could be seen as little more than incitement to mutiny).
But we may be well past either incitement of mutiny or informing Congress.
First, a new position on the Joint Chiefs of Staff was filled:
Maj. Gen. Kelly K. McKeague, chief of staff, National Guard Bureau, Arlington, Va., to assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for National Guard matters, Joint Staff, Pentagon, Washington, D.C.
This brand-spanking new role might oversee a ramp up of National Guard and other military personnel — in essence, a back door draft of IRR and stop-lossed already on active duty.
Do you recall seeing anything in the media indicating we needed more Guardsman, or that recruitment numbers were down? I certainly didn’t.
But that’s not all; there’s an apparent expansion of command as well:
Col. Stephen R. Lyons, special assistant to the commanding general, U.S. Army Materiel Command, Fort Belvoir, Va., to deputy chief of staff, logistics, C/J-4, International Security Assistance Force, Operation Enduring Freedom, Afghanistan.
Brig. Gen. Michael S. Linnington, commandant of cadets, U.S. Military Academy, West Point, N.Y., to chief, C/J-5, Headquarters International Security Assistance Force Joint Command, Operation Enduring Freedom, Afghanistan.
Both of them have ONE thing in common as you can see by the emphasis I’ve added.
So what’s going on here? Is the military already doing whatever it damned well wants, without a formal order from their Commander in Chief and funding from Congress?
Or is the Obama Administration quietly setting everything in motion, allowing a kabuki show to play out front for the benefit of the public and politicos?
The kicker here is that a "spy surge" has reportedly begun; if CIA is boosting its personnel on the ground already, who’s really calling the shots?
Or is this a left-behind action from the previous administration and its National Security Council?
Whatever the origin of these efforts, after eight years more troops are not the solution, particularly in a country with a long history of insurgency. There can be no safety and security in Afghanistan until their people are ready to demand these for themselves, and until both the poppy crop has sustainable replacements which are culturally acceptable and the culture itself wants the change. Expending more resources on a ramp-up of troops are a drain, without a larger Islamic-centered, tribally-engaged effort to address the underlying root causes of insecurity in the country. The real challenge is Pakistan and we aren’t focusing enough resources in that direction.
Would be nice if I could read similar assumptions from the military’s head shuffling, whether originated by the military or by the White House.
Or by another White House, come and gone…
So what’s your take?
71 Comments
It will only be when Obama publicly announces his decision about where he is going in Afghanistan that we will know how much of this is real and how much has been kabuki.
McChrystal may still be putting his team together or he may be ramping up. The 60 Minutes piece was interesting in that it never once considered if we have any substantive policy reason for even being in Afghanistan. Instead it was all about what a tough, can-do kind of guy McChrystal is and how set he is on “winning” this war.
BTW the first and third names on your list are the same.
Thanks for pointing that out, I’ll have to go and snag the original while I can still edit. More in a sec.
Edit: okay, fixed, must have misread announcements because I thought I had three on first pass.
Didn’t see the 60 Minutes piece, will have to catch it on line. Do you remember who did the coverage? There’s a couple guys I trust, but only on specific topics. There’s a couple guys who do “beat sweetners” — those saccharine puff pieces which seem to have little purpose to the public’s eye.
But reporters often have another reason for a beat sweetener; they know they will have to do a LOT of reporting on this person/topic, and they want to make sure they have acces. Perhaps this piece may even have been authorized by Rendon Group while Rendon still had the media monitoring beat.
Which begs the question, why do they need more and better access?
And then there’s another even uglier question: is this an OSI piece run on the American public in advance of some other activity which needs lubrication?
Pour on the spooks after eight long years of their failure and their torture in particular.
Yeah.. that’s the ticket.
Would be beyond pathetic if it weren’t so deadly.
Gee McChrystal and Patraus did great things in Iraq, yets let them mess up an other war. Wars are meant to be won, and if they are won, there would be no insurgency. Only when You mess things up so bad that even a couple rag heads can make the worlds most powerful military, setting ducks.
We didn’t get Osama, and were told we beat the Taliban. The northern Alliance let the Taliban go home with their guns, and Osama has made fools out of us.
If I hear one more time we need to listen to the Generals on the Ground I’m going to puke. We should be sringing these Generals up, but instead we pin medals on them, and ask them to mess up somemore stuff, and get more of our brave solders killed so the can do their mission. That mission which no-one seems to know what the hell it is. Making a Country from poppies and rocks, sure isn’t much of a mission.
You know, this is eight years too late. The spooks should have been the first thing in back in September 2001.
Should have been earlier, of course, given all the warnings we had, but after 9/11, we should have ramped up the spooks. First.
And we should have allowed them to do their work by pre-9/11 standards, demanded a thorough job, and only after they did all the clandestine stuff they could do to pinpoint targets, send in covert military ops while ratcheting up our law enforcement operations here at home to address the lapses revealed post-9/11.
I don’t know that this isn’t what we should do anyhow, operating in a wide swath along the AfPak border, and reduce the rest of the operations in country save for key locations like Kabul to Bagram. We should concentrate efforts to influence culture in urban spaces, focusing on winning hearts and minds and on economic development rather than the drone-based crap we’ve been doing. But how do you sell that to the GOP?
Is this a back door approach to sneaking up on this without tipping off the GOP that we’re not going to do all-out warfare a la Soviets? Is this insubordination, mustering resources without orders from CiC? Is this an SAP set in motion by the last admin but still in operation for another 18 or so months?
So opaque, all of it.
Well, was this a couple of cards played in such a way that McChrystal finds himself feeling compelled to demand a yes/no decision, leaving Obama no choice but to cashier McCrystal? Oh, and Mullen, too?
And what happens if these two guys end up on the outside of the military while an investigation happens to trip on and dig up stuff about Copper Green?
Lots and lots of questions, huh?
Sounds a little like hopeful 11 dimension chess to me. I don’t follow this in great detail but I do think the signs are all bad so far. From Odierno in Iraq to Petraeus to McCrystal these are not folks one would keep at the top if they were going to really turn things around in the chess move you mention, imo.
And not only are the GOP a problem.. Obama seems to be, considering the leadership point I made above. Also sounds like Hillary and Cohen are too… among dog knows how many other neolibs.
I just think our forces from top to bottom are fried and have spent to many years under an insane Bush Cheney regime to remotely be able to turn themselves around and conduct themselves in some sort of sane manner. I seriously doubt I would be able to do so after several such deployments under their commands. You don’t go from ordering, conducting, condoning torture to playing the three cups of tea routine with the same leaders and no clear plan. Soldiers don’t shake off years of Fallugah or Sadr City to suddenly being nice to the tribal villagers. And you don’t do three cups of tea well if you are trying to convince everyone else you are really out to fuck people up.
These spooks will end up counting goats in some tribal language on an opium high… if we are lucky. Otherwise they will spend their time arming and pitting Afghans against each other in one continuous fools errand.
We will never be welcome there (Afghanistan or Pakistan), nor should we be. Though their rich will play us for $$$ fools as long as we let them.
If we leave tomorrow all we need to do is watch our ports and airports well. Is that so hard to remember or do?
We have got to get out.. and do a full reboot. Even the potential pipelines can’t be worth this much anymore… not to most citizens.
The Shadow Government likely calls the shots.(PDF)
*******
“So secretive are Bush administration plans that Peter DeFazio (D-OR), a member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, was denied access in 2007 to the classified version of the COG plans contained in top secret Presidential Decision Directive annexes. This too, is unprecedented.
While the Bush administration admitted that COG was activated in 2001, their disclosure came only after The Washington Post broke the story based on confidential administration sources troubled by the scope of the program and its secretive implementation. “
*******
“Ten months before the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld approved an updated version of the U.S. Army’s secret operational Continuity of Government (COG) plans.
“A draft document published by the whistleblowing website Wikileaks entitled, “Army Regulation 500-3, Emergency Employment of Army and Other Resources. Army Continuity of Operations (COOP) Program,” dated 19 January 2001, spells out changes in Army doctrine.
Issued by Headquarters, Department of the Army and signed off by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and the Secretary of the Army, the document is affixed with a warning: “Destruction Notice: Destroy by any method that will prevent disclosure of contents or reconstruction of the document.” The restricted document as published by Wikileaks states: “
http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Rums…..efore_9/11
The First Report of the Continuity of Government Commission. Brought to you by the American Enterprise Institute and the Brookings Institute. (May 2003)(PDF)
*******
http://www.continuityofgovernm…..Report.pdf
This is where elections matter — and on a continuing basis. There must be more change in the Senate as well as the House, and they must be solid candidates who are on the left end of the political spectrum.
Because the only way to stop this crap is to defund it, and ensure that good law enforcement is tracking any illegal attempts to fund it off the books.
Steve Croft…big focus on how Gen. starts his day, etc.
Is any of this ordinary rotation. There is a law on the books, CONAS, that requires rotation of officers every four years.
ah yes…sadlyyes!
RevBet — oh damn, that’s bad, means it’s a beat sweetener intended to gain access because something’s coming.
foothillsmike — no. These are NEW slots, not transitions to old ones.
Steve used to be a good journalist. Guess he drank too much Kool-Aid. Left ya one at swim.
On edit I see your answer. Never mind.
Rayne,
Great quote.
I agree with your interpretation on the 60 minutes piece @13. Our country cannot afford this build-up.
Sounds “backdoor” for Iran.
So, the U.S. has a presence in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan (after a hiatus), Tajikistan, and other neighboring stans*, along with Pakistan and Afghanistan.
That covers the eastern side of Iran. Iraq borders the west side of Iran.
On the southern side, the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, but with U.S. flotillas.
To the west, Iraq, occupied by American forces.
To the northwest, Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia. Also there’s Russia and China. And of course amid all this, the Caspian Sea. Gas and oil.
Here’s an excerpt of an English language comment posted on New Central Asia last January:
I’ve asked this since I first heard about the McCrystal report, what exactly would “winning” look like?
Or turn it around and describe exactly what losing would look like. I suspect if you do that, you’ll realize we’ve already lost.
Is this how Viet Nam got so big?
So this General either wants to be fired and then he will claim that he had a *cough* plan to win the war. Or he hopes Obama will roll over for him and give him 25,000 more troops classic Bush play when dealing with Congress ask for twice what you want and then act all bipartisan when he got half of what he asked for. This is Lucy with the football.
Any expansion of the war should be paid for in this years budget either the GOP produces 90% of their House and Senate votes for a tax increase to pay for the war and all the war debt Bush hid or well whats in it for us?
Why should we support more deficit spending on a war Bush couldn’t win in what 8 + years? If Bush listening to his Commanders on the ground could not win after all this time why should we listen to the generals now?
What does Shinseki think?
klynn — you know, if this was a backdoor for Iran, we could do it by simply scaling back and creating a corridor from Kandahar to Herat, making this a “Green Zone” of sorts. And if we were trying to eliminate the permeable nature of the AfPak border, why not make the Kabul-Kandahar another “Green Zone” and leave the rest of the country to its own devices? I just don’t see us winning hearts and minds by inserting more troops into the rest of the country, and I’m hearing very little about cultural/memetic interventions. So much of this is old school, and we know from history what happened to other old school attempts to master Afghanistan.
alank — interesting, but the piece you excerpted begins with a quote from Rice. I’m sure Albright must have thought the Bush administration would continue the same tack as the Clinton administration back in Dec2000/Jan2001. (p.s. typically three graf excerpts are considered fair use; more than that should point to a link, in order to avoid copyright problems.)
And yes, ultimately, it has been all about gas and oil; Turkmenistan and Iran sit on the largest reserves of natural gas in the world, if memory serves. That’s why Russia has been so “nice” to Iran for more than a decade, providing assistance with nuclear technology in exchange for access to gas. But this is Cheney’s global war on petrochemicals; it should not be the war we are fighting.
There will not be a half million men and women in Afghanistan unless there is a draft, and there will be no draft. Obama put himself in this spot during his electoral campaign. He thought (and was probably correct in so thinking) that unless he supported at least one of our wars, he would be seen as another McGovernite, and be smeared as weak on defense. He is trapped only by his own rhetoric. The Thugs are divided on this issue, because their opportunism pulls them in two directions. On the one hand, the obvious and inevitable defeat gives them an opening on the side of ‘bring the troops home,’ and an attack on Obama’s competence. On the other hand, if Obama decides to scale down the enterprise in recognition of our defeat, they go the other way. It is their modus operandi. He may be trying to thread themiddle and draw them into a corner they can’t escape. He’s too smart not to know that we are defeated there. The brass know it, too.
You note:
The consideration of HRC as a problem would indicate an answer for why (out of all the people deserving of indictments) all those indictments of Clinton fundraiser guys lately. He views her as a potential 2012 challenger, regardless of whether she wants to go forward. Already, we’re seeing the Big Dog get asked if she intends to run, usually couched in terms of 2016. Obama wants to forestall a 2012 primary challenge (rising in potential given the unpopularity with the Dem base of a lot of the bitchslapping he’s given the base so far) and cutting off the money that would fund such a challenge by putting under a cloud or in jail the people proven able to raise money would be the simplest way of strangling that baby in its crib.
All of which tells me there is significant dissension within the Dem party over the direction Obama is going, he’s hearing about it, and isn’t about to change it.
Juan Cole’s read on Afghanistan today is pretty ominous. I hadn’t focused on the fact that the attack on Ismail Khan came in Herat where there are no Taliban.
Like VN, there is no govt in Af for the U.S. to support. What a rathole.
Is the GOP insane do they want to lose the military vote again? Military families talk news like this will spread like wild fire. And you know that if it does pass McCain and Sarah will blame Obama for why their kids are not home for Christmas.
I’m sure, AS USUAL, Obama will cave to the military and the right.
This is nation building. We need to get OUT of the nation building business. We have our own nation to rebuild.
This isn’t the change I voted for, that’s for sure.
http://www.juancole.com/2009/0…..ttack.html
Great Iran is probably showing they can cause us trouble in Afghanistan if they want to we can’t even shut the Afghan/ Pakistan border if Iran decides to aid their friends can we say 2 front war?
Well, as far as Iran goes, China doesn’t like the idea of sanctions which could limit it’s oil gluttony, and what China wants these days, China gets. So, I figure, look for alot of breast beating/mouth breathing about Iran and a trade off war escalating in Afghanistan.
From my point of view the McCrystal “interveiws” were absolutely sickening; & put upon the premise that we were willing to risk our kids for the “higher purpose” of making sure the Afghans were “comfortable with UNOCAL’s pipeline ( which, Of course was never mentioned). It was a load of propagandististic crap.
As for the military, I never thought they were very comfortable with who’s president right now and if Gates hadn’t been retained, probably would have mutinied already.
McCrystal seems to like to get his hands wet.
The backdoor draft is easy in this climate of the economic takedown of America where 50% of the young people in this country have no jobs and the “social services” seem more and more to just be in place to get the kids old enough to go to war.
McCrystal was on a couple of times last night and I thought “uh-oh”
I did put a link to the article quoted in the sentence before it.
When I looked at your map, the first thing that leapt to mind was Iran surrounded. The war in Afganistan is a sideshow to the main event which apparently requires positioning forces all the way round Iran on unrelated pretexts.
Where will Obama get the money is my question if we don’t all get healthcare now at prices France pays and drug prices like Canada and Mexico have a bunch of people will be asking how come we can always afford more money for never ending war.
I think the Generals know the war is over but they want to set the stage to blame Obama. Lets ask the General if he will resign no benefits or cushy Corporate job after he retires if he can’t win the war under an acceptable time table a year should be good.
Worlds biggest Super power fighting its longest war? against a third world nation me I would be firing no benefits or corporate jobs every general who worked on these wars.
Obama brought this on when he failed to replace Robert Gates with a patriot.
Yesterday, Juan Cole had an interesting take on sanctions against Iran, namely that the Iraqi govt would breach them. For example, if gasoline is embargoed, Iraq would smuggle it across the border.
Not sure I agree; after all, how much excess gasoline does Iraq have? Nonetheless, it’s a factor that I haven’t seen mentioned elsewhere.
That’s dark stuff you’re describing.
Except that Iraq supports Iran. See the Juan Cole link in my 32.
Okay–I’m really confused. Obama is so effed up. What happened to his reviewing of strategy in Afghanistan? What happened to Biden reviewing information and HIS strategy? This is so typical of this administration. Obama AGAIN has not set a clear path to where he is going on this. Just like his stance on healthcare. You have no fricken idea where he stands on anything. Bush had a clear goal and made it VERY obvious. What ever happened to Bin Laden? WTF? I want a new president. I’ve given up on this clown. Someone needs to talk to Hillary. At least she would know what the path was and would be able to convey and implement it coherently.
Dark Days, my friend. we’ve been had again. This time by “hope” with lies right after “fear” with lies.
With the Sunni out of power and the Shia in power, Iran has a true ally, thanks to the U.S. war on Iraq. It must not be that important to the U.S. and only underscores the motives are elsewhere, viz., natural resources, such as gas and oil.
See my post @37. It’s true, but America has a significant forces still present in Iraq, and is building out garrisons around the country.
Obama seems to take his marching orders from Bush’s erstwhile lapdog, Rahm; and who knows what Rahm is thinking? He’s the conduit of the shadow government into Obama’s admin.
the twin towers fell more slowly than this country is right now. Obama sure SOUNDED like a leader, didn’t he? but he’s not at all. We have a few heroes in Congress, but they’ll prolly be voted out next year. I don’t think anything we can say can accurately describe the direness of the mess the USA really is in
Just one more operation Anaconda Oil for Daddy Bush’s CIA boys. Why the
profits from the heroin sales will pay for the war itself! The US didn’t
learn after the Spanish-American Cuba war, or the rest of the 20th Century
capitalist-criminal-selfish, mismanagement.
RRRRAAAAWWWW!!!111 Snarkly!!1111
Here’s another excerpt from the same article cited above, of possible interest here:
Well, I don’t know what to make of it all, other than I put a lot of credence in Col Pat Lang and the McClatchy crew. They certainly seem to be raising the red flags about potential military ‘insubordination’. And it should not be a secret that some in the GOP appear to want to run Petraeus in 2012, which is more cause for skepticism.
Meanwhile today: the Guardian.uk reports much more missile testing activity by Iran (surprise, surprise…).
Financial Times is highlighting what appears to be a 12-year shift in German political power via a big win by Merkel; good for German power companies (after the knuckleheaded freeze on natural gas flows in the dead of winter last year by the Russians, this German vote is not surprising). Merkel’s win may be bad for Turkey’s hopes of becoming a member of the EU. If so, there’s more source of discord, which is an even bigger deal given the recent pipelines around the Black Sea that transit across Turkish territory.
The problems with respect to American support for McChyrstal:
— there’s been so much dishonesty related to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars that this suggestion of insubordination is ominous,
— there’s been so much ‘crossing moral boundaries’ by means of torture and OLC-Addington legal fandangling that our moral authority seems to have eroded to an extent that endangers our troops; yet we’ve not remedied that mess to date,
— there’s a problem logistically operating a war in Afghanistan: if we’re down to negotiating with Russia in order to get supplies to our troops, then how certain are we that Russia will continue to allow that route to remain open?
— there’s still been no real action on the Xe (Blackwater) and Dynacorps contractor abuses — look at those photos out of Kabul a few weeks back, with contractors acting like depraved hyenas, yet still no legal charges…
— there’s been no real action from DoJ on issues related to black ops, black budgets, and Cheney’s Secret Government, which means that those of us already skeptical simply have more reason to remain so…
With all that in the background, military insubordination would be the road to ruin.
In addition, the GOP Senators bleating about ‘regime change’ in Iran and fuming that the military should bypass the CIC suggests that this has relatively little to do with Afghanistan, and is a power play by forces that some of us don’t clearly understand.
If the SCOTUS approves their notions that corporations can outright lobby the American public in political campaigns, how long will it be before we are treated to ExxonMobil’s remonstrances that we support Af-Pak in order for them to gain a more perfect
unionfoothold into pipelines out of the Caspian…?The GOP in the Senate appear to be inciting the US military commanders to commit insubordination, and that requires deft, powerful response by Dems in the Senate and House leadership. Today. No if’s, and’s, or but’s.
Does Sen Jim Webb (D-VA) agree that these military commanders should circumvent the CIC by speaking directly to Congress? Does former Admiral, D-PA Joe Sestak have thoughts on this potential insubordination? What are Eric Massa’s views?
Now that the Dems have actual ex-military leaders in the House and Senate, it would be worth asking what they think of the GOP’s requests that Petraeus and McCrystal ‘bypass’ the CIC to whom, under the Constitution, they are supposed to report.
As Col. Patrick Lang says, ‘Americans play checker; Iranians play chess.’ IIRC, chess was invented in what is now Iran.
The GOP needs to stop playing checkers.
The Dems need to start playing chess. The sooner, the better.
al Maliki spent years in Iran while Hussein was in power, IIRC.
Surprise, surprise, eh?
alank (29) – please read up on Fair Use. The rule of thumb is that a maximum of three paragraphs from a copyrighted work are a less than substantial amount of work one should use for an excerpt. More than that may constitute a breach of copyright. A link to the original and three graphs is accepted practice and does not jeopardize you or the site on which you post the excerpt.
rOTL — did you note in particular that one of the NEW DOD assignments was a logistics position?
Ahem.
And as for the insubordination: I’ve been told there are key personnel in the military who are very disturbed by the attempt to ramp up troops. We may see major changes in personnel because of this. What I don’t know now is whether we will see good guys win out.
I’d like to see less bitching about Obama, and more constructive, analytical discussion about the possible scenarios which may unfold before us.
– If Obama cashiers McChrystal, what happens to McChrystal? does he end up at Blackwater/Xe (and hell no, I’m not calling it Xe only as this merely enables it to escape its deadly baggage);
– If Obama caves to McChrystal, how does McChrystal’s plan as leaked actually do anything except continue to ratchet up the insurgency?
– If Clinton is on board with McChrystal’s report, why is her spouse advocating a longer period of time for analysis and decision making? (interviewed on NPR this past week)
– If Obama has actually set this all in motion, how will he be forced to deal with admitting to his supporters that he has breached the trust he’s been given?
– If Obama is behind this and doing it on an immaculate basis, how is the GOP encouraged to put a stop to the funding, in spite of their bloodthirst?
Thanks for stating the obvious.
I agree I would like to get an idea on how all this will play out thats why I would like to know what Hillary has to say. Sorry about my b*tching about Obama. When do the Progressives start dissing this guy?
Rayne – I believe the reference to 500,000 includes the Afghani security forces, which they want to be 400,000 or so. Not all US forces.
I am pretty sure the special asst. position to the Chairman for NG matters is not new. May have increased the rank from one to two-stars, but more because the NG Bureau made a stink about not being loved enough and they wanted more influence on the JCS. Seat at the Tank, etc etc.
The term “Opn Enduring Freedom” has always been used for operations in Afghanistan and for homeland security missions. Not a new thing. Until the Obama administration makes up its mind about what it wants to do – and yes, they’ve taken way too much time by now – then the military has to fly on existing terms and strategy. Not too hard. No conspiracy here.
There’s a difference between dissing — which only provides fuel for people who we already know are our enemies among the right — and pressuring him for both transparency and better performance. We should be saving the full onslaught for the right, which put us in this untenable situation to begin with, and insanely believes that doing more of the same only harder will bring different results.
In the land that kicked Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, the British and the Soviets to the curb, no less…learning from history, doomed to repeat, yada yada…
Think about what happens if with enough angry, uncontrolled hostility we find ourselves with another John McCain. Or cheese-on-a-stick, Petraeus in 2012.
Do you think we’ll get something less than McChrystal’s plan from them?
So how do we encourage a Dem president to scale it back successfully, while protecting our known interests, while preventing the arrival of a warmongering rightist in 2012?
I swear the timing of so many things we see in the media is designed to taunt Obama into doing something rash. Should we be adding fuel to that same pressure?
Figure out how to thread that needle and we’ll be headed in the right direction.
I’d believe that if the changes hadn’t been pointed out to me by sources with strong ties to the military.
[ThingsComeUndone (25): military families are already talking.]
Sen. Levin’s recommendation is closer to what you’ve described, not what McChrystal’s plan described.
As for flying under existing terms and conditions: how is maintaining status quo an authorization to scale up command?
We’ll have to agree to disagree.
Right. Fair use means no criticism of Obama. Got it.
[modnote: fair use applies regardless of person criticized or praised.]
McChrystalpalooza rolls on
“an appealing earnestness and openness” doncha know
I did give you a link to the term “Fair Use” at Wikipedia above, correct? And I take it you couldn’t be bothered with reading the content at that link, which concerns the use/misuse of others intellectual property?
Violating copyrights of other site’s material poses a liability to YOU and the site on which you post appropriated material. The polite response would have been to appreciate the cautionary note which was intended to protect YOU and Firedoglake.
Agh. “[a]n appealing backstabbery and bully” would be more like it. He’s the master of passive aggressive behavior, based on Newsweek’s description.
Thanks for the link. Oy.
Insurgents in or out of uniform never ask permission, and only sometimes ask forgiveness; then, it’s usually kabuki for the mob, to cement the illegitimacy of their moves.
I confess that I’m an aging Peacenik from the Vietnam era, also that I have carried with me an anti-military bias since at least the day before I became eligible for the draft in the fall of 1960.
Today, as I recount and recall America’s miserable failure in Vietnam and more recently in Iraq and in Afghanistan, I continually have to wonder but one thing: what is the undercurrent in this country that never lets up in its demands for war? Is it insufferable ego? Is it insufferable ignorance? Is it corporate greed on the part of the M.I.C.? I suspect the triad operates collectively.
Consequently, there is, today, only a single albeit multi-faceted solution: pull out of Iraq. Now. Pull out of Afghanistan. Now. Cut military expenditures by no less than fifty percent. Now. Get out of the war business. Now. Demilitarize. Defense is the ONLY legitimate military expense.
I remember thinking much the same thoughts in 1968. And I was not alone. Even LBJ, the primary Vietnam ‘escalator’ read the handwriting on the wall as the ‘insurgent’ Tet Offensive predicted American failure in Vietnam within weeks of its inception, and Johnson wisely decided not to run for a second term. Gene McCarthy or Bobby Kennedy — who would it be that would bring the Peace Movement finally to power?
Neither. RFK was on course in the early morning minutes of June 5 following the California Primary, and then, moments later, the dream died with him; the 1963 coup d’etat was finalized, completed. The warmongers were victorious, and over the ensuing four decades have prospered continuously. And now, today, this day, it’s obviously time to once again demonstrate America’s greatness. It’s time to bring troop levels in Afghanistan up to, what, to the half-million that were “winning the war” for us in Vietnam, circa 1968? Sure, why not. Spread freedom. At the point of a gun. Right?
Yeah, right. We will kick ass, we will kick ass. America is great, America is good. We will kick ass.
Nearly two decades ago while I was working on my undergrad in business, my Econ 101 professor explained to us that war was good.
It drove up consumption of raw materials and finished goods, we shipped the stuff overseas and never saw it again, and we didn’t have to worry about the stuff hurting demand levels here in the U.S because the final products were “consumed” overseas and not here. It spurred long economic expansion like that of the 1960’s.
So war is good.
Of course near the same time frame there was the movie Wall Street, in which Gordon Gecko (famously played by Michael Douglas) intoned, “Greed is good.” Sure, the good guys played by Charlie and Martin Sheen win out in the end, but our culture rewards Gecko; can you remember anybody else’s line from that movie?
This is the dark heart of the beast. Our business schools treat war as a profit center, a means by which to boost our economy, and our culture reinforces it. Eisenhower’s fear has been realized. We are the Shock Doctrine.
There is no precise measurement of fair use. Only freerepublic was ever sued and that is because they were copying full articles to their site and making money from doing so when their subscribers did not have to pay to use other sites. Fair use pops up here about once a month. You get used to it after awhile. Of approx. 118 sentences and paragraphs, you copied 7; I think you’re safe. As to your information, Zbigniew Brzezinski and Carter have much to answer for. Perhaps that is why Carter tries so hard now to do good for people around the world. The Mujahedin was a bloody nightmare unleashed upon the world to proxy fight Russia in Afghanistan. I’m sure Carter regrets doing so; just as sure Brzezinski does not.
Rule of thumb is three grafs. Many outlets have threatened suits, AP most frequent. And I believe the rule of thumb is derived from the many threats AP has generated. Need to keep in mind that copyright law is not globally uniform; I have not heard of any entity threatened for using three grafs or less within or outside the U.S.
I’ve worked for a site which has received a threat about fair use. I’ve also had to threaten sites for blatantly ripping off content without attribution. I hate having to pay lawyers to defend against this kind of crap. Intellectual property is no joke.
I don’t think the political leadership should ever let themselves be led by the nose that way. They have to set the plan idea, the goals and so on.
What are our goals in PakAf now?
I think it’s still to deal with Al Qaeda and to the extent the Taliban interferes with them. After that we only have to consider whether a long-term presence might be needed in order to prevent a resurgent Al Qaeda and/or terrorist training camps.
The Iran situation is really not one the public is ready for. It’s not understood. It’s problematic because of the size of that country and it’s military. It’s a nightmare only NeoCons would want to jump onto at a moment’s notice.
They love to shock us with scary crap and then say, “Now what?” to try and force our hand out of fear. That isn’t good in any world.
We bought the situation in Iran. We spent millions of dollars on covert and clandestine ops over the course of many years, and what we see on the ground in Iran is part of that purchase. The leaders of Iran, both legitimate and illegitimate, know it.
We’re the only ones who have no clue. And now we don’t know what to do about it, especially now that Ahmadinejad has decided to ratchet up his obnoxious attitude (media may be deliberately distorting his words, but his attitude says everything we need to know).
The goals we should have in AfPak versus the ones we can realistically have are entirely different things. We can no longer do much to change women’s lot in that country, or at least conditions will not improve in any way if there are weapons involved. We could only monitor/track Taliban and potential terrorists, and we’re doing a poor job of that with our excessive use of drones combined with technology on the ground.
The most critical goal we have in AfPak is preventing proliferation of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal; we must ensure that it is in stable hands and that it is safeguarded from use by any party, including the Taliban.
Does it take 500,000 troops or any combination there of to do this? Or simply a well-trained and resourced joint task force or two?
Rayne, I can’t tell what’s going on.
I was able to listen to Jim Webb on MTP today, and he makes more sense to me than anyone else. You may want to google it; beware, Kyl was on to give the GOP perspective.
Which to my mind is kind of like putting a gnat [Kyl] up against Godzilla, but perhaps that’s only MVHO.
Webb, as he has in the past, gave a more nuanced, analytical explanation than anyone — other than perhaps Bacevitch — that I’ve heard yet.
I’m not saying that Webb and Bacevitch agree!
But Bacevitch, an historian, points out that military power has its limits. (Doh, too bad Bush couldn’t fathom that sober fact.)
Webb gave a better sense of the spectrum of options, and conveyed a sense of the complexity — coming back around to the basic premise that until you know what you want to achieve, your chances of success are approximately nil.
Someone needs to put Col. Pat Lang on the teevee, as well as Bacevitch. Like Webb, they’re Big Picture thinkers.
End of thread: i doubt anyone will stumble here.
I looked up ‘Qom’ + earthquake, and what a bizarre mix of links turned up in a google of that search.
Near Qom, the city of Bam suffered earthquake damage in 2003; over 23,000 people lost their lives and more were injured. I recall being horrified by the photos of that city leveled.
At any rate, Qom is on an earthquake zone (so am I, which is why I consider these things). So it could simply be faultlines shifting that cause these earthquakes. But at the same time, I remember wondering whether there was some kind of subterranean project going on in that region that may have created shifting subsurface earth large enough to trigger an event like that earthquake.
I’m not saying that the nuke site had anything to do with the earthquake, but the timing: late 2003, is rather strange. Also note that if this was under construction in 2003, or even in the early planning phase, someone would have wanted the CIA’s person in charge of watching Iranian WMD ‘outed’.
Which sure makes that whole Plame business even weirder.
I’m still watching the thread, never know what might turn up at the end.
You say you can’t tell what’s going on. Apparently nobody else can, either. I’ve got sources who are clamming up, who are very worried. If it didn’t sound like crazy yammering, I’d say we are watching an attempted coup of sorts, a silent one in which the authority of the president is completely undermined by the military, and everybody who has any hint that this is going on is trying to make it look like things are normal so as not to cause a cataclysm. But what am I saying…we had a coup in 2000 and we just carried on…
I don’t know that I’d make much of the Qom earthquake (although I’m sorry if it sounds cavalier); as mountainous as the entire area is, the kind formed by upheaval and not volcanic activity, there are likely to be a lot of earthquakes. Afghanistan has had two in the 4.0-plus range within the last 30 days (Pakistan has also had two). But ruling out underground uh, activity, isn’t entirely possible, either.
Will make a point of trying to watch Webb and Bacevitch; any reasoned figure deserves more air time right now, considering the size and length of commitment being demanded of the American public.
See, I cannot tell if it is a military coup or a hostage/coup by a larger entity which has taken hold of very conservative military in the process. During the Clinton admin, there was talk of a mole very high up and suddenly the whole case was “disappeared”. Almost like there was a threat and there should be no more talk about “the mole” or something BAD will happen.
Democracy in Afghanistan..or not.
*******
“Mrs Clinton told Rangin Dadfar Spanta, the Afghan Foreign Minister, that she and her Nato colleagues — including David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary — had reached a consensus that Mr Karzai would remain President even if investigations now under way cut his share of the first-round vote to below 50 per cent. The meeting took place last Friday but details emerged yesterday. “
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/t…..853123.ece
klynn — Need only look at the Larry Franklin case and how it was handled to see there has been a problem (deliberate understatement).
bluebutterfly — Karzai and his family have us over a barrel, at least that’s how I’m reading it; they’ll funnel more drug money to the “good guys” if we play with them, or they’ll funnel more drug money to the “bad guys” if we don’t.
Now I’m no advocate for violence, don’t take this the wrong way. But if Karzai and family have been such known entities, why wasn’t there a covert op to clean house and remove them, like other covert ops have done elsewhere over the last 7 years?
Or is this a replay like the Reagan years with Saddam Hussein, setting up a corrupt strong man in order to keep a country in line?
The internal inconsistencies of the Bush regimes drive me batty, but then I can’t think that corruptly.
rOTL — watched the MTP vid with Webb. God, is that Kyl nothing more than a bagman for the Bushista/Cheneyite hawks? Webb did a good job, but you can see he is struggling with “losing” Afghanistan even though scaling down and out is the right thing even in a shift towards a counterinsurgency (our over military presence only increases counterinsurgency).
Need more stuff like Jeff Huber’s analysis.
Seriously, LOL at your understatement!
Yeah, I thought you’d like that.
Have been playing out a thought experiment in my head for some time, here’s the gist of it: what would happen if a genetically engineered virus slowly disrupted poppy plant’s growth? Let’s say one which takes out 8-10% of the crop each year by suppressing blooms…what are all the repercussions?
Have wondered why there’s been all kinds of money thrown at GMO food but no money, especially gov’t money, thrown at methods to scale down crops of illicit products?