lets-retire
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Failing to stay the course makes all the lives lost in Afganistan and Iraq wasted lives.
Did Bubba Blow It?
- Thread starter haha
- Start date
Shredder,
I have one daughter who is a junior in HS. She's seen a lot of military life through 20+ years as a USAF "brat", and she's in a very good position to make up her own mind about military service. I'll give her all the information I can, then support her 100% if she makes the decision to seek a commission or enlist. I know that would likely put her into the present fight, and I'd worry about her every day--and be proud of her beyond words.
By the way, you can forget about the "sons" stuff. While there are no female Rangers yet, there are plenty of women in the fight. Carbombs do not discriminate by gender.
I've served in Afghanistan, and have many friends now there and in Iraq.
I'm not one for blindly pursuing a policy or war that can't be won, regardless of what has been invested to that point. I believe we've produced good results in both Iraq and Afghanistan and they'll be longstanding results if we don't quit prematurely.
I'm with Nords's nephew--what I hear from guys firsthand does not match what I see on the news. I'm especially struck by the fixation on suicide bombing casualties as a metric of how we're "losing in Iraq." Stupid. It's as dumb as the US use of the VC bodycount as a gauge of our progress in the Vietnam war--we (and the ARVN) inflicted far more casualties than we took, we won every major battle-but we still lost the war, and the VC body count was irrelevant. In Iraq, there is big political and social progress, the police forces are getting trained (too slowly, but it is working), AND we are cleaning the clock of a lot of bad actors. All the important stuff is going in the right direction for us, but what makes the news is that 10 people died when a car blew up yesterday.
I have one daughter who is a junior in HS. She's seen a lot of military life through 20+ years as a USAF "brat", and she's in a very good position to make up her own mind about military service. I'll give her all the information I can, then support her 100% if she makes the decision to seek a commission or enlist. I know that would likely put her into the present fight, and I'd worry about her every day--and be proud of her beyond words.
By the way, you can forget about the "sons" stuff. While there are no female Rangers yet, there are plenty of women in the fight. Carbombs do not discriminate by gender.
I've served in Afghanistan, and have many friends now there and in Iraq.
I'm not one for blindly pursuing a policy or war that can't be won, regardless of what has been invested to that point. I believe we've produced good results in both Iraq and Afghanistan and they'll be longstanding results if we don't quit prematurely.
I'm with Nords's nephew--what I hear from guys firsthand does not match what I see on the news. I'm especially struck by the fixation on suicide bombing casualties as a metric of how we're "losing in Iraq." Stupid. It's as dumb as the US use of the VC bodycount as a gauge of our progress in the Vietnam war--we (and the ARVN) inflicted far more casualties than we took, we won every major battle-but we still lost the war, and the VC body count was irrelevant. In Iraq, there is big political and social progress, the police forces are getting trained (too slowly, but it is working), AND we are cleaning the clock of a lot of bad actors. All the important stuff is going in the right direction for us, but what makes the news is that 10 people died when a car blew up yesterday.
C
Cut-Throat
Guest
lets-retire said:
History will show that no matter what course we will follow, this will be a total waste
brewer12345
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
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Cut-Throat said:
Oh, c'mon CT, you know that certain segments of the political spectrum will never admit that it was anything but another wild success. Of course, the rest of us who live in the real world don't have to agree with them.
lazygood4nothinbum
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Nords said:
it's been years and my heinlein is quite rusty, but does a recruited conscientious objector exemplify his flirtation with social darwinism or transnational security? as he didn't seem to care much for government in any form outside of peacekeeper, i'm not sure how much he valued our vote.
"be wary of strong drink. it can make you shoot at tax collectors, and miss."~~robert a. heinlein
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