The Jedi-haiting John Podhoretz shouldn't be allowed to review movies, but he's still sharp on politics and he speaks some inconvenient truths which will be old news to regular Dirkworld® readers, namely, you can't win a kinder, gentler war. (Duh.) Some clips:
[W]e relented on several occasions when we had a chance to score a major victory over the bad guys. Because politics was more important than military victory, because playing the game was more important than killing the enemy, we chose to lose.Again, duh. The problem is that seeing as Dubya doesn't seem interested in shutting down a Treason Media addicted to aiding and abetting our enemies and revealing our secrets, he's unlikely to suddenly grow a pair and fight the war we've never had.
After the beheading of Americans in Fallujah, we had the city surrounded - but, because it seemed an attack on Fallujah would be problematic for Iraqi politics, we pulled back. We had the Shiite monster Moqtada al-Sadr in our sights as well, but let him go as well for fear Iraq's leading Shiite cleric would turn on us.
Each of these decisions seemed prudent at the time. In retrospect, they seem disastrous. Our failure to take Fallujah after the deaths of Americans gave the enemy the sense that we were weak. Our failure to kill Sadr has led to a situation in which he has excessive power over the elected government.
[snip]
So we need a new plan. But the Baker-Hamilton advice isn't a new plan. The Democrats don't have a new plan. The only plan that will work is a plan to face the tripartite enemy - the Saddamists, the foreign terrorists and the Shiite sectarians - and bring them to heel.
Kill as many bad guys as we can, with as many troops as we can muster.
If this is unrealistic, then Iraq is lost.
If we can't win, then we lose.
Political change doesn't win wars. That's what we've learned, painfully and horribly. Only winning wars wins wars.
President Bush needs to decide, as soon as possible, that he is going to win this war - that the bad guys are going to die, that we are going to kill them and that we will achieve our objectives in Iraq. That is the only way forward for him if he doesn't want to end up in ignominy.
The clock is ticking. He has only a week, maybe two, to change course dramatically. To choose to win, and to direct the military to do so.
Or we are sunk, and so is he.
Ladies, better start your bhurka shopping.
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5 comments:
Podhoretz is ignorant. And I'm sorry to say, so are you. A couple of keyboard commandos who have not taken the time to understand what is really happening in Iraq. You think we can "win the war" by brute force. You are wrong.
http://noquarter.typepad.com/my_weblog/2006/12/a_soldiers_stor.html#more
"I am an American soldier in the Army Special Forces. I have just returned from a one-year tour of duty in Iraq, where I lived, shared meals, slept and fought beside my Iraqi counterpart as we battled insurgents in the center of a thousand-year-old city. ....
I have slowly come to understand that if we are to succeed in Iraq, we must either change the way we perceive and treat those we want to help or we must disengage the great percentage of our military from the population."
Gee, a soldier who happens to agree with your "America is bad and that's why they hate us" view of the world. What of the soldiers who have re-upped for more tours and wonder why the Treason Media refuses to report the victories that they have had? Oh, that's right, only poor, stupid, ignorant fools who were brainwashed by the hypnotic flag bug on Fox News are going to war, poor bastards. Dying for a lie.
The war has gone poorly because White Guilt and the Treason Media cowed Team Dubya into this half-assed "kinder, gentler" war. Dubya was supposed to be aware of Daddy's blunders and committed to not repeating them, but he ended up doing the same and has no brought in Daddy's Wise Men to put a surrender cherry on this effed-up sh*t sundae.
IF we had leveled Fallujah in April 2004; IF we had whacked al Sadr; IF we'd charged into Syria; IF, IF, IF we had real men and not quisling punks, perhaps things would be far better, but as long as Dubya is incapable of a response to the Treason Media other than "Stay the course," he's gonna keep getting creamed.
It's ironic that the site you linked requests that readers at least consider what they write when you are obviously incapable of accepting an idea other than America is bad and it's defeat before Islam must happen. Take your dhimmitude elsewhere. Thank you.
Dirk, my man, you're playing with the big boys. I bet you won't print this post, but I'll educate you anyway.
>IF we had leveled Fallujah in April 2004
I guess you didn't know that we DID level Fallujah during Operation Phantom Fury a/k/a the Second Battle of Fallujah in November of 2004. Did Podhoretz forget to tell you that? LOL Yep, we destroyed the city and killed a couple thousand insurgents. I guess that plan worked real good since now Iraq is so peaceful. Nothing like destroying a city if you want to bring democracy to a country. Nice going, Dirk!
Playing by Hama rules can work to subjugate a population. Of course that would mean the whole thing would fall apart the minute that the US leaves Iraq, unless we left
another dictator like Saddam in charge who would be willing to do mass killings of the population to enforce order. Is that your preferred end game? I guess so.But what happens when the U.S. supported dictator is overthrown by the extremists?
>"IF we had whacked al Sadr"
Yes, we should have whacked Al Sadr, but it's probably too late now. But it wouldn't have changed anything. There are countless militias that you don't know about to fill the vacuum. Or maybe we should have leveled Sadr City, that would have worked great just like in Fallujah. If only we had leveled every city in Iraq, now there would be peace! And anyway, shouldn't SCIRI be your bogeyman when it comes to evil militias? Sheesh, you never even heard of SCIRI.
What really makes me laugh about you right wingers is that now all you talk about is Al Sadr, a Shiite. First you thought you could kill all the "bad" Sunni's and that would solve the problem. Now you think you can kill all the "bad" Shiites and this will solve the problem. What about the Sunni's? I thought they were the bad guys. LOL
Vanity Fair just published the whole Neo Culpa article. Even they know it's over.
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/01/neocons200701
>IF we'd charged into Syria
Failed war in Iraq? Let's invade Syria! That'll do the trick.
Let's face it, Dirk. You think you can smear me by calling me an America hater. But your knowledge of Iraq is as thin as the editorials you read. No substance. You think we can impose democracy on tribes that have been killing each other for thousands of years. Maybe if we put in 1 million troops for 30-50 years, but I doubt it. It's over, Johnny.
Where are these "big boys" that you're referring to? Surely, you can't be referring to your pitiful mewlings. (Can you?) It'd be interesting to see what someone who's not so constipated could come up with.
I said we should've flattened Fallujah in April; coming back 7 months later is like George Costanza thinking of the "stupid store" retort the next day on "Seinfeld". Throughout this war, we've played by insane ROEs that have tied the hands of our soldiers and done absolutely nothing to keep them from hating us and trying to kill us. If we're going to be a hated occupier, we should be at least doing something to earn this enmity.
The big mistake that Dubya made was to believe that Muslims are capable of democratic governance. Of course, he considers Islam to be a "religion of peace", despite all the evidence to the contrary. Heck, I thought that these mooks would appreciate the freedom from Sadaam's thugocracy, but when it all comes down to it, these are tribal peoples with a binding ideology of death. After they kill the Jews and the infidels, they'll just turn to destroying each other. That the West is committing societal suicide doesn’t help.
Re: Vanity Fair – Sorry, Bub, but the Vanity Fair piece has been repudiated by many of those quoted as being twisted out of context and the release of misleading quotes before the Election a cheap political hit job. The price of candor with the Treason Media is a knife in the back. That they were surprised to be betrayed indicates that they forgot who they were dealing with.
Re: Syria – No, moron, we should've hit Syria the day after we stormed Baghdad. No failure then, but to "America BAD!" people like you, all victory is to be avoided.
One thing that occurred to me while reading your tortured and distorted diaper-fillings is how for all your condescension and ad hominem, what you have yet to suggest is how things SHOULD be done or how a yellow-bellied appeaser like you would've done things post-9/11. Just like your fellow travelers, you're full of name-calling and "you're doing it wrong" criticisms, but you offer no plan other than defeat and retreat. DO YOU ACTUALLY HAVE A BETTER IDEA?!? IF SO, LET'S HEAR IT, MR. ANONYMOUS PUSSY!!!!
At least I have ideas and are willing to argue them. What have you got, bitch? Let's hear what the laughably ironic "reality-based" plan for victory is.
Well, after five days, I guess Mr. Anonymous Pussy could come up with an idea of his own or even borrow one. Any idea at all.
This is so typical of the violent sophistry of the facist Left. They attack, ad hominem, distort, lie, take out of context and assume that everyone is as stupid as they need them to be to get away with it. But when you put them on the spot and ask them, "What would you do, since you're so smart?" they take the powder.
Lesson learned: When confronted by these antaganistic asstacklers, simply ask them what bright ideas they have and watch them run away screaming like the little girlie-men they are.
This topic is closed for further comment. (Better luck next time, chump.)
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