What? Overreaction Did The French Have To 9/11?

Tonight on my local 10 'o clock news there was a "Terrorism Expert" who said we should not overreact to tonight's terror attack in Paris, the way we overreacted to 9/11.  He claimed that is exactly what the terrorists want us to do and it would be a mistake.  Because if we overreact, the way we did after 9/11 we will only make matters worse by alienating more Muslims and creating more terrorists.

I take it "the mistake" he was referring to was code for Operation Iraqi Freedom.  Because all right thinking people know that Operation Iraqi Freedom was a disaster and why Muslim extremists are now on the offensive in France.

But wait a second Mr. Expert, France wanted and played no part in Operation Iraqi Freedom.  How did our overreaction in Iraq lead to France being attacked so viciously?  I can see how "Operation Iraq We Gone" contributed to the mayhem we are seeing right now, but Operation Iraqi Freedom, not so much.  It seems to me when President Bush left office Iraq was stable, on the right path, and Muslim extremism was being rolled back.  Beating one's enemy on the battle field has a way of sapping them of their vigor.

Then we elected a new President who was going to correct the mistakes of our "Cowboy President."   Operation Iraqi Freedom was ended in favor of Operation Iraq We Gone.  The whole region has been going backward ever since.  Allowing our enemy space and time to regroup is an under-reaction that is only going to get more people killed.

"Overreaction"! (smh)  

Iraq War: The Inconvenient Facts

Tonight in the Democratic Party Presidential debate, they were all in agreement that the Iraq War was the worst foreign policy mistake in American History.

Really???

The facts:
In 2009, when GWB left the White House the nation of Iraq was stable, Al Qaeda in Iraq if not totally defeated was badly beaten and on their way to defeat, and the nation of Iraq was heading in the right direction.

What happened?  Obama failed to negotiate a Status Of Forces agreement allowing US troops to stay in country to insure the progress would continue in the right direction.  The US troops in country were the one honest broker that would be able to see that the Shia, Sunni, and Kurds all got along.

Obama and Clinton then neglected Iraq and dropped the ball during the Arab Spring allowing Iran to extend it's influence in Iraq leading to the neglect of the Sunni and Kurdish area's of the country, which in time led to the rise of ISIS and a new civil war in Iraq starting in 2013.

If Iraq War is the worst foreign policy mistake in American History, it's because of failure, neglect, and negligence directly attributable to the foreign policy of Obama and the Democratic Party.  

Iraq War Reporter Dexter Filkins On the Worst Mistake Of the Iraq War

Bill Clinton, Had He Done the Right Thing Back Then...

...how would history be different now?

What got me thinking about this question again and ole' Slick Willy was the way former Texas Ranger Ron Washington handled his infidelity the past couple of weeks.  And also how my Governor Mark Dayton reacted to the Adrian Peterson situation with these remarks:

"It is an awful situation. Yes, Mr. Peterson is entitled to due process and should be 'innocent until proven guilty.' However, he is a public figure, and his actions, as described, are a public embarrassment to the Vikings organization and the State of Minnesota,"

Back in 1998, I was adamant that the only proper thing for Bill Clinton to do in light of the whole Monica Lewinsky scandal was for him to resign his office in disgrace.  That was clearly the right thing for him to do.  Yet for reasons that may forever be beyond me Bill wouldn't do it and the Democrats wouldn't make him do it.  It's not like the Democrats wouldn't still hold the Presidency and I believe it's the only reason why GWB even had a shot at beating Al Gore in 2000.

Would 9/11 have happened? I think probably so and the War in Afghanistan would have gone pretty much as it has.

Would the Iraq War have happened?  I think the chances are better than 50/50 that it would have.  A little later than 2003 probably, but I believe Al Gore wanted Saddam gone.

Would Gore have gotten a 2nd term? I'm 98% positive he would have.

Would the financial collapse of 2008 happened?  Pretty much 100% sure nothing would have happened to stop that.  But I believe the nation would have been in better financial shape thanks to no Bush tax cuts for the top 2%.  Yes, I believe the Bush tax cuts were clearly a mistake.

Who wins the 2008 election?  In light of that, a Republican obviously.  I don't even know if we would know Barak Obama's name right now had Bill Clinton resigned.

Would we have gotten Osama at the exact same time we eventually did?  Pretty much.

Who wins in 2012? No idea, but what I'm sure of is we would be in a lot better shape in the "Long War" than we are now.

Why didn't that SOB Bill resign?

"If it's important enough to fight;..."

...It's important enough to win."
Rep. Jack Kingston

I am in total agreement with this statement.  I don't believe President Obama subscribes to it in wars our soldiers are fighting over sea's.  But I believe he subscribes to it 100% at it would pertain to winning against his political opponents here at home.

Obama's Iraq Policy

Disaster by Peter Beinert of The Atlantic

Candidate Obama On Iraq, "I Will Do Stupid Shit!"

Op-ed from the New York Times
In this campaign, there are honest differences over Iraq, and we should discuss them with the thoroughness they deserve. Unlike Senator McCain, I would make it absolutely clear that we seek no presence in Iraq similar to our permanent bases in South Korea, and would redeploy our troops out of Iraq and focus on the broader security challenges that we face. But for far too long, those responsible for the greatest strategic blunder in the recent history of American foreign policy have ignored useful debate in favor of making false charges about flip-flops and surrender.

I thought Barak's foreign policy motto was "Don't Do Stupid Shit". Can we all be honest and admit that Barak's policy in Iraq was some pretty stupid shit. This Nation would have been served far better had we done what McCain said we should do in Iraq back in 2008.

My Congressman Rick Nolan

In his most recent add Rick Nolan starts off by talking about how "so called nation building" is a waste of money.  I guess this is what polls well with all the folks up here in the sticks.  If he had his way we would pull our troops out of Afghanistan as we did in Iraq and were forced to do with all our people from Obama's War in Libya. Were you even aware that there are no American's left in Libya in any capacity.  Yep, not doing any nation building in Libya and giving up on it nearly cold turkey in Iraq has worked out swell.  In Afghanistan I'm sure things will turn out swell as well.  Just remember Syria had Chemical weapons, Pakistan has the ultimate Islamist prize, Nuclear Weapon's.  

He is also all for shrinking our military.  Yep sticking our head in the sand, while the world spins out of control is just the kind of leadership we need more of in Washington. smh

I'm Not Happy, So I'm Back

I haven't blogged my thoughts here for the last couple of years for a couple of reasons.

1. I had a stroke in December of 2011 that has negatively effected my intellectual capabilities.  For instance  I don't have the same level of short and long term memory recall as I did before.  My deficits in intellectual capabilities makes blogging thoughtful posts much more difficult than it was before.
(Writing this one took me several hours, yes hours! And I wouldn't describe it as very thoughtful)

2. The country electing Barak Obama for a second term was totally discouraging to me.  How could people be that foolish?  Fool them once shame on him, fool them twice shame on this country.  I was left to just shake my head and pretty much checked out on the serious war on terror issues that this blog mostly focused around.

So why am I back now?  I'm pissed off with Obama's "smart diplomacy" that has blown up in our faces.  This is especially true for things are turning out in Iraq.  What a major fuck up?  Completely conceding our influence there to Iran when we pulled all our troops out was just asking for trouble.  And please don't give me that flimsy excuse that getting the hell out wasn't up to him.  He couldn't get our troops out fast enough to claim how he "responsibly ended the war."  What a crock of shit!  Now thousands and thousands of innocent Iraqi's that shouldn't have had to pay more for our invasion in 2003 than they originally already had to are getting stuck with an even higher bill.  That just plain sucks!!!

If you don't believe what I'm saying I encourage everyone to read:

Behold What Is Possible Without America by The Dignified Rant Blog
(I have pretty much always been in 100% agreement with The Dignified Rant on Iraq Policy)

What We Left Behind by Dexter Filkins The New Yorker

and last but not least my own
9/11 Has America Forgotten? written on 9/11/2010

and

Are Terrorists Wiser Than You? Written back in 2004.  We hadn't forgotten 9/11 in 2004.  Four years later  we as a nation just buried our head in the sand and gave what our soldiers fought so hard for away and for What?

About those Non-existant Iraq Weapons of Mass Destruction

Did We Lose in Iraq? No, and Here’s Why.
Michael J. Totten

This article is an essay published in the The New Republic that I think is worth a read. As that The New Republic is liberal leaning you would expect the comments on the article to be all hostile towards the thesis of the article. Amazingly not all of the comments are hostile and I think as a whole they make for an interesting read.

Most commenter's believe the war was wrong mostly because Saddam didn't have the Weapons of Mass Destruction upon which much of the justification for the war was made. Saddam didn't have the weapons, therefore there was no threat, and so the whole thing was nothing but a huge mistake.

I have one question:
How do we know Saddam didn't have the weapons?

Answer: We know he didn't have the weapons, because we went to war and so the question was once and for all definitively answered. I think it is clear in the aftermath of the war that before the war we didn't have much of a clue as to the status of Iraq Weapons of Mass Destruction and WMD programs. I think we were pretty certain Saddam was cheating, and there is no doubt at this point that he was in fact cheating on his obligations; We had no clue how much or how little.

One of the lessons of 9/11 that seems to have been forgotten at this point is that what we don't know can suddenly result in the death of a lot of people and do untold billions of dollars in damage. The burden of proof to show Saddam did not have WMD's was on Saddam and Saddam only. He most certainly did not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he in fact didn't have WMD's. Saddam played games as if he was guilty of hiding things and we know he was hiding things but they just happened to be minor rather than major. In 20/20 hindsight critics claim Bush acted rashly and recklessly, but I see just the opposite. He erred on the side of caution because the risk of erring on the side of catastrophe was just to great as the lesson of 9/11 so violently showed

Review: The Strongest Tribe: War, Politics, and the Endgame in Iraq by Bing West.

The Strongest Tribe is a book I bought around this time last year got about a quarter read and then stopped. Within the last week I picked it up again and finished the rest.

The book is essentially about the progression of the Iraq War from the end of major combat operations in 2003 through the success at the end of "The Surge" in the Summer of 2008. I suspect the book went to publisher in Sept. of 2008 and so it does not have details or analysis of the Status of Force Agreement that was put into place between Iraq and the United States later that Fall into Winter.

The books strong suit is Bing West's connection with the US military and his ability to tell their side of the story about what was going on both good and bad. The book is weaker in it's reporting and analysis of the political realms of both the US and Iraq. Mr. West does not seem to be particularly fond of politicians and bureaucrats and makes little to no attempt to explain or give their side of the story.

I think the book is certainly worth reading to find out how the military fought the Iraq war and prevailed when so many had written the war off as a "fiasco,"disaster, terrible mistake, etc.

One of the books biggest surprises comes at the end in the 25th Chapter "The Stongest Tribe" as Mr. West gives his analysis about certain aspects of the war. The surprise comes in a paragraph entitled: Myth About the Lack of U.S. Troops. West argues that had there been more troops at the beginning doing the same things that the troops in country were doing than that would have made matters worse not better. West doesn't say but obviously hints that had the troops that were there been used in a smarter more efficient way than the numbers of US troops in Iraq would have been sufficient.

Iraq War: Zero

It looks like 2009 closes out with the lowest possible number there can be for US soldier hostile-fire fatalities in a month: The big ZERO!

There were 4 non-hostile fire US soldier fatalities in Iraq this December, so December 2009 will go down as the new record low for US soldier fatalities in a month.

The last Iraq War US soldier hostile-fire fatality came on November 22nd, which is obviously a record span of time between incidents. The last Iraq War US soldier non-hostile fire fatality came on December 11th and this also sets a new record span of time in the Iraq War without a US soldier fatality.

For the year there were 75 US soldier hostile-fire fatalities and 75 US soldier non-hostile fire fatalities making this the least deadly year of the conflict.

Update: It turns out there were 74 US soldier hostile-fire fatalities, not 75.

31 Straight Days

Today marks the 31st day in a row without a hostile fire US soldier fatality in Iraq.

Double Awesomes

False Memory Syndrome by The Dignified Rant. Just another example of Obama's selective history. Money Quote:
The consensus of the world? The "world" did indeed decide to confront Saddam over Kuwait, as expressed with a Security Council resolution approving war.

But somebody forgot to tell the president that his party shouted "stop the world, we want to get off!"

Follow the link for the real history.

No new troops: Germany admits, it wasn’t Bush, we just don’t do hard stuff by Free Frank Warner on Germany/Europes shameful wankerishness.

Money Quote:
"Help US"? This battle is to help Afghanistan

Two Important War Questions

How lethal can your enemy get?

How long can your enemy sustain it's highest levels of lethality?

I think these two questions are important to consider when thinking about the wars which we are waging. To be successful in waging a war you have to be able to take the best shot your enemy can give for as long as they can give it without a collapse of will on your sides part. When asking these these questions you are trying to figure out just how much sacrifice in "blood" a conflict will require. It is the most cold calculation of war and I think trying to answer it objectively is an important moral dimension if one is to support a war effort. Obviously during the various stages of the conflict seeking the answers is conjecture and only in retrospect can you know the awful truth.

In the Iraq War it now seems pretty clear that our enemies maximum level of lethality was to kill about 1000 US soldiers in a 12 month period and for 5 years they could sustain a level of lethality towards US soldiers that would take a toll of around 700 soldiers per year. In the 6th and 7th year of the Iraq conflict US soldier fatalities have plumeted and for our part it would appear that a military victory has been achieved at a very modest to low cost when the historty and scope of modern conflicts are considered. The damage done to Iraqi patriots and civilians has been much more considerable, but the blame for this lies squarely at the feet of insurgents who's strategy for victory was to cause as much murder and mayhem as they possibly could in order to sour US politicians in the hope that the politicians would call for retreat.

In regards to the War in Afghanistan it does not appear that we have yet seen how lethal the Taliban can be. Since 2005 the Taliban have progressively been showing more lethality each year with a significant jump in Coalition fatalities this year. With the additional escalation of Coalition forces planned for 2010 it would seem we will get a indication sooner rather than later about just how lethal the Taliban can be. Right now the conventional wisdom says that Coalition fatalities will continue to spike in 2010 with the "surge" and on the surface that makes sense as more boots on the ground means more targets of opportunity.

However, I have my doubts about just how strong the Taliban is and can be. The insurgents in Iraq proved they could bring a consistant level of resistance 24/7/365. The Taliban has no such capability with the Afghan terrain and weather being what they are. Also I think a big reason the Taliban has been able to show increasing lethality over the last few years is because the baselines have been kind of low to begin with each year until now.

I do think the Taliban may be able to maintain current to slightly higher levels of lethality for at least the next couple of years but I'm hoping that won't be enough to convince us to bug out.

Update: Now that the January 2010 Coalition fatality numbers are in. I have to admit I am on the surprised side on just how many casualties the Taliban were able to inflict this past month. However, I did hear a report that it has been a rather mild winter and that along with the increased troop pressence now in country explain the hike in fatalities in Jan..

Rush to War

In the song I Am Not At War Luka Bloom sings "This rush to war was wrong" about the Iraq War. I think many who were and are against that war suffer under a delusion that there was a "rush to war" in Iraq. I think the actual history in the run up to the invasion tells a different story.

This from the blog The Dignified Rant:
And two, there was no "rush to war" in Iraq as the argument deployed by the White House asserts. The national debate lasted about a year from after the fall of Kabul to the invasion of Iraq, and included a Congressional debate and declaration of war and long efforts at the UN that got us a resolution reaffirming post-Desert Storm UN resolutions insisting Iraq prove it no longer had WMD or else. We had a long debate on starting that war, and the so-called "rush to war" was quite possibly the most telegraphed war in history.

And another thing.

People might not think about this or like to hear it, but in my mind it was pretty much inexcuseable for the nations of the UN Security Council to back Resolution 1441, but when the time came to put their money where their mouth was they backed out and would not approve a resolution making it clear it was time for Saddam Hussien to go or face war. I think had a resolution like that been approved than the war probably would have been avoided altogether.

? Didn't write this but wish I did.

I don't agree with the idea of easing up in Afghanistan. This asymmetrical war is not about crushing the enemy and signing a peace treaty. It's about eroding the enemy's support among the populace and his will to fight.

These comments were made by Original MikeS at JustOneMinute Blog

It may seem counter intuitive to many that we should basically engage in a war of attrition with the Taliban; After all isn't that pretty much the Taliban strategy to beat us? War is expensive and blood is certainly not cheap but the same pretty much holds true for both sides relatively speaking (although to be honest blood is a lot cheaper to them than it is to us.) I may be wrong on this, but I do believe a big part of winning the the Iraq war was about attrition through a collapse of insurgent leadership and finance. Although it will be a bit more difficult I think the same basic path to victory can work in Afghanistan provided that this countries leadership commits itself to the task.

Unfortunately I am not sure Obama is up to this.

Here is a bit more from the same JustOneMinute blog comment section:

So - given the character of our leadership I would follow Tom Friedman, focus on transforming Iraq, and let Afghanistan slide.

TM

Your lack of confidence in Obama is totally justified but with the greatest respect what reason is there to think that al Qaeda and the Taliban will stop at Afghanistan with Pakistan and its nukes next door? John Bolton doesn't think they will settle for Afghanistan and I agree with him.

It sucks when your enemy is prepared to fight for a hundred years.

Afghanistan is going to be extremely difficult to pacify but IMHO the choice here is between bad and infinitely worse


I third the notion that the fight in Afghanistan isn't so much about Afghanistan as it is about Pakistan and their nukes at this point. Pressure on the Taliban in Afghanistan is pressure on the Taliban in Pakistan who are waging a war in that country as well. At this point I firmly believe that keeping the Taliban occupied in Afghanistan keeps the most dedicated anti-western Sunni Jihadists focused on defending that Muslim land instead of on doing terrorism in the West or going for WMD's in Pakistan. Thankfully I think a debilitating weakness in the Jihadist worldview is that defending Muslim territory from the infidel seems to take precedence over pretty much everything else. I feel like the Jihadists are suckers for our military hard target and they just screw themselves when they take out their frustrations of not being able to expel the infidel out on fellow Muslims.

On the Iraq Suicide Bombing of 10/25/09

Comment left at The Long War Journal
I don't think the doom and gloomers are very good analysts. This was not an attack on Shia, or Sunni, or Kurd, but a direct attack on the unified State of Iraq. I would say chances are pretty good in a blast this big that all three segments of Iraqi society were represented. If you want to re-kindle the civil war, I don't think this is the way to go about it.

I don't think the attack delegitimizes the state in the least. It does, however, serve to delegitimize the insurgency and provides for a propaganda bonanza for the state to demonise whoever they want to blame.