I respect President Obama being photographed honoring our troops, our killed-in-action troops arriving home in flag-draped coffins. George W. Bush banned the press from photographing troops arriving home in such a fashion; and he would not be seen next to a coffin as the fallen would have hurt the image of the great decider disrespecting our armed forces. Bush wanted his wars clean, neat, off-the-books, no sacrifice from the citizenry, just a composite of images and impressions of a swaggering, fakeo tough-guy president that Karl Rove could present to the electorate. And veterans, piss on them, especially those Vietnam War guys.I'm glad Bush is gone, but Obama needs to repudiate both in rhetoric and policy—that promise that real change is possible is why many of us elected Obama one year ago. Specifically, leave Afghanistan and Iraq now.
Bush never would have dirtied himself with the realities of war; Obama's change is welcome.
When were you in the Armed Forces? I've been active duty Army for almost 15 years and never felt disrespected by President Bush. I've had the opportunity as a blogger to sit next to him in the oval office and speak directly about our fallen. So, I speak out of experience when I say you're ignorant. Bush would never have used our fallen for a photo op. Obama needs to because he's losing military support by neglecting his responsibilities as Commander in Chief and sending us more troops so we can complete the mission in Afghanistan once and for all!
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you say that you helped elect President Obama. It's a rare day when people are willing to admit their mistakes!
What "mission" is that again? How about 500,000 more troops and a $trillion more dollars? That ought to complete the "mission" that you apparently equate with civilian-made foreign policy, though I am not quite sure that Afghans in all their tribes can endure any more freedom. Seriously, one wonders if all Republicans can be this dumb. You kiss ass very well; you will make a fine contemporary Republican.
ReplyDeleteFor a blogger that was chosen a best blog and endorsed by "Veterans Today" (a blatantly biased site), I would think that you'd know what the mission is. I'm not sure if you're old enough to remember what happened eight years ago in New York City, but nearly 3000 people were murdered by terrorists who were trained, equipped and funded in Afghanistan. Do I really need to explain why we're in Afghanistan, or was that just an ignorantly rhetorical question?
ReplyDeleteHey CJ,
ReplyDeleteThink, and don't believe everything spoon-fed to you.
Robert Perry is a good start:
... ‘Central Front’ Myth
To sell the Iraq War to the American people, Bush and the neocons called it “the central front in the war on terror,” a claim that was buttressed by false information fed to the Bush administration by captured al-Qaeda operatives in the face of torture or threatened torture.
Those lies told about an Iraqi-Qaeda alliance -- whether coerced or intentionally misleading -- reflected a symbiotic relationship that had grown between the neocons and al-Qaeda, at least over their mutual desire to kill Saddam Hussein, a secular Muslim who brutally repressed Islamic extremists and also was an enemy of Israel.
By invading Iraq, Bush and the neocons gave three key gifts to al-Qaeda: they shifted U.S. military focus away from the Af-Pac border region where Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders were hiding; eliminated al-Qaeda’s rival Saddam Hussein; and intensified anti-Americanism, which helped al-Qaeda recruit more suicide bombers.
Beyond that, Bush and the neocons upgraded the prospects for Islamic extremists to destabilize the Pakistani government, whose collapse could deliver nuclear weapons into the hands of al-Qaeda terrorists, exactly the nightmare scenario that Bush and neocons cited to justify the invasion of Iraq.
How misguided the Bush-neocon Iraq strategy was comes into focus in a recently released letter by a U.S. Foreign Service officer and ex-Marine captain, Matthew Hoh, who resigned his reconstruction post in Afghanistan because he concluded that the drawn-out U.S. occupation no longer made any sense, nor offered reasonable hope of success.
“I have doubts and reservations about our current strategy and planned future strategy,” Hoh wrote in a Sept. 10 resignation letter to a State Department superior, “but my resignation is based not upon how we are pursuing this war, but why and to what end.
"To put simply: I fail to see the value or the worth in continued U.S. casualties or expenditures of resources in support of the Afghan government in what is truly a 35-year-old civil war.”
Hoh described the Afghan conflict as “a tragedy that not only pits tribes, valleys, clans, villages and families against one another, but … has violently and savagely pitted the urban, secular, educated and modern of Afghanistan against the rural, religious, illiterate and traditional.”
This latter group, Hoh said, is at the heart of “the Pashtun insurgency, which is composed of multiple, seemingly infinite, local groups [and] is fed by what is perceived by the Pashtun people as a continued and sustained assault, going back centuries, on Pashtun land, culture, traditions and religion by internal and external enemies.
“The U.S. and NATO presence and operations in Pashtun valleys and villages, as well as Afghan army and police units that are led and composed of non-Pashtun soldiers and police, provide an occupation force against which the insurgency is justified. …
'The United States military presence in Afghanistan greatly contributes to the legitimacy and strategic message of the Pashtun insurgency. In a like manner our backing of the Afghan government in its current form continues to distance the government from the people.'