Posted by Bonn1997:

there is nothing to be gained from either bombing innocent civilians or putting putting our troops in harms way and still bombing innocent civilians.

You really hit the nail on the head there. I couldn't believe it when his answer to the question of what would be gained by bombing was to say that nothing has been gained by invading with troops! The two are not exhaustive options.

Posted by OasisBU:

Has anyone on here watched the first part of the Frontline special on PBS called Bush's War? It is pretty eye opening and goes into detail how Cheney and Rumsfeld ran their own agenda even though it was not in the countries best interest and was totally unethical.

As far as what I think about the war 5 years later - at the time I was for it and I cant even think of a good reason why, probably just bloodlust after 9/11 (which Cheney and Rumsfeld took advantage of in this country). Now I think it is a war that will probably go down as one of the greatest mistakes in United States foreign policy history. I just dont see what good can come of it.

This is not the war on terror, it was a hit on Hussein guided by personal agendas not aligned with this countries best interests and we are all paying the price for it.

Posted by Cosmic:

So let me get this correct now.

Bonn, 4949, and Bitty.


You guys are operate with the belief that:

(A): Waging a 6 year (heading towards 8) campaign, which cost us 4,000 US troops (heading to 5,000), wounded 23,000 (heading towards 27,000), cost 600B (heading towards 1 Trillion), putting 160,000 troops at any given time in harms way both mentally and physically and forcing their families to fend for themselves at home, and accomplishing virtually nothing in the process.

Is a much more appealing situation over:

(B): Waging a 2-8 week precision bombing campaign against known targets of military installations, missile sites, and weapon development, definitely his republican guard (which we daisy-cuttered on the opening night of war mind you), costing at a maximum of 10-20B dollars, costing maybe half a dozen planes and their pilots.

??????????????????

OKAY, Gotcha, now my puny know-nothing brain is going to leave you guys and your infinite wisdom be.



Oh, and, I love how the three of you assume I mean to blindly carpet bomb the entire country when I brought up "bombing campaign". Well, whatever.....makes you guys feel like you've got the right idea there I suppose.

I would like to see the three of you try to spin your assumption that option A is a clear cut winner over option B to the families of the US servicemen dead or wounded. Yeah, you'd get far. Oh, and those who are struggling in our economy today to keep their families afloat because GW is too busy pumping billions into a pointless and un-winnable war. Yeah, you'd get far with that, too.

To each their own I suppose.....

[Edited by - cosmic on 03-28-2008 07:12 AM]

Posted by martin:

Posted by 4949:

Posted by izybx:

I support the war, I support the troops.

Wars are sort of a natural extermination mechanism when you really think about it. We all live on a planet of 6.something billion people. When the planet starts to become over populated, especially with life forms that pollute, then eventually, a lot of people have to die. Either by natual-natural cuases or a natural cause like going to war. It's human nature and un-avoidable. It's sad, but it's something that has to be done. We are some of the fortunate few who aren't directly affected by the tragedy's on a world level. At least not yet, so count your blessings and pray for those who don't make it.

That's what I think of war. Who voted for it or who didn't vote for it doesn't really matter, when you think of it in these terms.

tell don't tell that to our service people who are over there or have been over there.

Posted by izybx:

Posted by martin:

Posted by 4949:

Posted by izybx:

I support the war, I support the troops.

Wars are sort of a natural extermination mechanism when you really think about it. We all live on a planet of 6.something billion people. When the planet starts to become over populated, especially with life forms that pollute, then eventually, a lot of people have to die. Either by natual-natural cuases or a natural cause like going to war. It's human nature and un-avoidable. It's sad, but it's something that has to be done. We are some of the fortunate few who aren't directly affected by the tragedy's on a world level. At least not yet, so count your blessings and pray for those who don't make it.

That's what I think of war. Who voted for it or who didn't vote for it doesn't really matter, when you think of it in these terms.

tell don't tell that to our service people who are over there or have been over there.

Soldiers go to war. Thats the nature of the job. I spent 7 years in the army as an infantryman and I know that almost every man that I served with accepts the possibility of deployments. I feel that when people are against a war they shouldnt use the excuse of "defending our servicemen" as an excuse. Thats the job of a soldier, to fight. Thats the way it is, and thats the way it always be.

Was this war run to perfection? Absolutely not. There should have been a much larger amount of combat troops deployed in the first place. Some thing that many people dont know, for every 5 soldiers deployed, only one of those is an actual combat MOS who is trained to fight. The rest fill out a wide range of support roles, from cooks and supply to air support and comunications. So our initial combat force was actually only 20,000-30,000 boots on the ground. The only way to win a non-conventional war such as this is by having large of amounts of soldiers in the streets. That was the mistake that was made once the war was began.

If your against the war, thats fine. Please dont pity the troops. In my heart Ill always be a soldier, and I can say that we knew could happen when we signed a contract.

Posted by martin:

Posted by izybx:

Posted by martin:

Posted by 4949:

Posted by izybx:

I support the war, I support the troops.

Wars are sort of a natural extermination mechanism when you really think about it. We all live on a planet of 6.something billion people. When the planet starts to become over populated, especially with life forms that pollute, then eventually, a lot of people have to die. Either by natual-natural cuases or a natural cause like going to war. It's human nature and un-avoidable. It's sad, but it's something that has to be done. We are some of the fortunate few who aren't directly affected by the tragedy's on a world level. At least not yet, so count your blessings and pray for those who don't make it.

That's what I think of war. Who voted for it or who didn't vote for it doesn't really matter, when you think of it in these terms.

tell don't tell that to our service people who are over there or have been over there.

Soldiers go to war. Thats the nature of the job. I spent 7 years in the army as an infantryman and I know that almost every man that I served with accepts the possibility of deployments. I feel that when people are against a war they shouldnt use the excuse of "defending our servicemen" as an excuse. Thats the job of a soldier, to fight. Thats the way it is, and thats the way it always be.

Was this war run to perfection? Absolutely not. There should have been a much larger amount of combat troops deployed in the first place. Some thing that many people dont know, for every 5 soldiers deployed, only one of those is an actual combat MOS who is trained to fight. The rest fill out a wide range of support roles, from cooks and supply to air support and comunications. So our initial combat force was actually only 20,000-30,000 boots on the ground. The only way to win a non-conventional war such as this is by having large of amounts of soldiers in the streets. That was the mistake that was made once the war was began.

If your against the war, thats fine. Please dont pity the troops. In my heart Ill always be a soldier, and I can say that we knew could happen when we signed a contract.

Fair enough, but how about going to war (and the reprocussions of it) under false pretenses or in a way that was severly mismanaged? It means that our infatry men and women are dying and/or getting injured, maimed, whatever for no reason.

What about the National Guard? Don't know their exact role quite frankly, but because of poor planning I think the expectations of those people were stretched.

Posted by Cosmic:

So let me get this correct now.

Bonn, 4949, and Bitty.


You guys are operate with the belief that:

(A): Waging a 6 year (heading towards 8) campaign, which cost us 4,000 US troops (heading to 5,000), wounded 23,000 (heading towards 27,000), cost 600B (heading towards 1 Trillion), putting 160,000 troops at any given time in harms way both mentally and physically and forcing their families to fend for themselves at home, and accomplishing virtually nothing in the process.

Is a much more appealing situation over:

(B): Waging a 2-8 week precision bombing campaign against known targets of military installations, missile sites, and weapon development, definitely his republican guard (which we daisy-cuttered on the opening night of war mind you), costing at a maximum of 10-20B dollars, costing maybe half a dozen planes and their pilots.

??????????????????