War with Iran

[EasternTiger]

Occupy Israel

 

[RIOLIUSTAR]

So whens it gonna kick off?

Russians hey...well that'll be worth sitting up all night for.

This should be well worth watching. I must say Afganistan has been very disappointing, not like Iraq, that was great coverage for the most part.

Hopefully Iran will provide the entertainment...fingers crossed




Foxtel and war is a match made in heaven

 

[EasternTiger]

Make sure you're watching it unfold live rioli

 

[rayven]

Has a major ally of a small middle eastern country ever been known to invade such a country and install a regime of it's own preference before?

Afganistan in the 80's....

 

[blackcat]

more than playstation in Nevada.

Hersh brings it my lai style
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2012/04/mek.html

JSOC, ask Jeremy Scahill 'bout the socks. Be blacksocks methink. Ask Stanley McChrystal, one said of his blacksox in Afpak, "we have killed a tonne of people".

Is David Kilcullen resonsible for those night raids 2? He the founding intellect, no, its not an oxymoron, of the Clear Hold Build strategy, thrown in a liberal sprinkling of Hearts and Minds talking points

[YOUTUBE]0LPRwMDD47k[/YOUTUBE]

 

[rayven]

My fellow anti war mungers, i read this s**t today. this paper once had amighty rep and they even apoligised a few years ago when they were outed for doing what they did yesterday and spreading properganda about the Iraq war and not investigating as journo's take an oath to do...

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/14/w...g-of-the-ayatollahs-utterances.html?ref=world

The history of Iran’s nuclear program offers evidence that can be used for several interpretations of Ayatollah Khamenei’s statements and behavior. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the Iranian revolution that overthrew the pro-Western Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi in 1979, originally believed that it was anti-Islamic to build nuclear weapons, and he ended the secret nuclear weapons program that the shah had begun.

Now they leave out the important bit here, the Shah was put in power by America, to serve American interests. It was no reveloution, it was an American insurgency to do with oil security and Isreal.

But the brutal Iran-Iraq war that lasted from 1980 to 1988 changed the Iranian thinking about nuclear weapons. Iraqi forces under Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons against ill-prepared Iranian troops, and there was no outcry from the United States, which supported Iraq at the time.

They leave out another important bit, They pushed Saddam and they supplied him with the chemical and bioligical weapons to use against the goveremnt that overthrew the one there insurgency put in power...

In 2003, probably in response to the American invasion of Iraq, which was originally justified by the Bush administration on the grounds that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, Ayatollah Khamenei ordered a suspension of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, although he has allowed uranium enrichment efforts to continue.

Jospeh Goebbells would be so proud, Now they insinuate that the 2003 invasion of iraq that killed a million and dispalced 6 or so million more and will kill from uranium posioning at least 5 times that for decades stopped Irans nuclear program....

They leave out the juicy bits of American war crimes and how people may be pissed at that...or how they say the afghan war was lost cause they abandoned it to invade iraq based on lies.

And these quotes are what they use to add substance to how they are the good guys and the ayatolla a liar and untrustworthy and how a nuclear program no one can prove, exists....

 

[blackcat]

Iran had the opportunity to retaliate with chemical weapons when Iraq brought to bear, but they remitted

 

[Si Botak]

Russia Is Massing Troops On Iran’s Northern Border And Waiting For A Western Attack

The Russian military anticipates that an attack will occur on Iran by the summer and has developed an action plan to move Russian troops through neighboring Georgia to stage in Armenia, which borders on the Islamic republic, according to informed Russian sources.

Russian Security Council head Viktor Ozerov said that Russian General Military Headquarters has prepared an action plan in the event of an attack on Iran.

http://www.pakalertpress.com/2012/0...hern-border-and-waiting-for-a-western-attack/

Here we go.

Strategic shift of forces to enable the implementation of contigency plans does not an imminent shooting war make.

Do you know how many different response plans involving direct confrontation each NATO country, the US, and the Warsaw Pact had for each other during the cold war, broken down by theatre, aligned to existing strategic and training deployments active at any one time, revised at least annually for the 40 or so years the cold war went for?

An approximate Metric ****ton (note, not an Imperial ****ton, a Metric ****ton)

How many of them actually got implemented? Zero.

Talk about a mountain out of a molehill, guys.

 

[Si Botak]

Is David Kilcullen resonsible for those night raids 2? He the founding intellect, no, its not an oxymoron, of the Clear Hold Build strategy, thrown in a liberal sprinkling of Hearts and Minds talking points

[youtube]0LPRwMDD47k[/youtube]

If you knew half of what you claim to know about military matters, you'd know Kilcullen's doctrinal work on COIN actually put a stop to the midnight door kicking BS that a US Army completely focussed on conventional warfighting was doing way too much of in in the first part of the Iraq and Afghan wars.

Just because you hold a particular bias doesn't mean you have carte blanche to make bullsh!t claims about someone who was actually trying to do some good.

But I guess he deserves it coz he's just another babykiller right?

 

[blackcat]

If you knew half of what you claim to know about military matters, you'd know Kilcullen's doctrinal work on COIN actually put a stop to the midnight door kicking BS that a US Army completely focussed on conventional warfighting was doing way too much of in in the first part of the Iraq and Afghan wars.

Just because you hold a particular bias doesn't mean you have carte blanche to make bullsh!t claims about someone who was actually trying to do some good.

But I guess he deserves it coz he's just another babykiller right?

well, what was the Aus forces throwing grenades, at night. You know the SBS Dateline stuff up, where they got a fake source, that just did not look right, and undermined their legitimacy. So the Aus forces were doing night raids.

and Karzai has this as a major stumbling block, trying to stop the night raids. This is a major issue in these last months. I dont know how serious Karzai is, is he for Afghan domestic consumption, and do we have any good Afghan journalist who has cut thru in our media, or are we taking some ambiguous translators reports, about the major conflict between Obama and his diplomats, and Karzai on night raids. The night raids still exist. So dont know what Kill n Culling solved eh

It was Stanley McChrystal who talked about killing a whole load of civilians.

I got no professional knowledge of counter insurgency. I do know a little history, and the Talibs are not necessarily the one bloc, they are in reality, a diffuse resistance. Like in France, we called them a resistance. Kilkullen would not be part of the good guys, and trying to do good. The US and USSR have used central asia as a geopolitical strategy toy. The place with nascent civil institutions, became eviscerated when the Russkies went in, and the US are just finishing off that work.

I have no need to defend religious gov'ts that use some flimsy koran doctrine to cut folks heads off. But I dont have to like Russia going in, just like the US and the willing coalition. Fools errand tis indeed.

 

[blackcat]

got me two sources for you Si B.


Afghanistan working to stop divisive NATO night raids: Karzai
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/22/us-afghanistan-agreement-idUSBRE82L0HS20120322


Tony Eastley on abc mornings radio, or mourning rayjo

Night raids can radicalise Afghans

http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2011/s3320411.htm
plus, we hear that our special forces were going with the yanks to do assassinations in Waziristan cross Afpak border


seems Killkullen failed to stop that, and yes, he is now at Lowy I assume. And he has been out of theatre for nigh what, half dozen years. But the surge, that was PR for Petraeus looking at a tilte for the POTUS nomination in 2016, he was involved in all of that strategy.

This comes from out resident climater, where is Upton to weigh in on these FoPo debates

When a man's paycheck depends on his not understanding something, you can depend upon his not understanding it.

Now, when the Iraq and Afghan wars were wrong to begin with, and killed over a million by Pew estimates, then there IS NO good. You think you can do some good, or mitigate damage, when in fact you are prolonging it. This was the criticism of John Birmingham had, of Assange's Wikileak Manning dump. Now, if Assange had caused some precipitous withdrawals, yes a manifest ignorance (hubris) indeed, but if he had, when the public opened its eyes, he saves lives. And any Afghans who were collaborating, and got it in the neck from the Talibs, would be wrong and evil, but Assange might have caused untold lives and fatalities prevented no?

As if the west could solve the problems of Afghanistan, but they can be a problem, and just perhaps, there was an alternative, to halting Al Qaeda's free operations.

And Geoffrey Hypothetical Robertson, also got it a little wrong on Iran. they have been after weapons for 20 years now G Rob, if we believe the broadsheets. And lesser technological states has ascended to nuclear powers in that time. FAIL!

 

[blackcat]

cogent words from Gaghan

longer version on the u tubes

[YOUTUBE]lthLeWJPqOU[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Old Skool]

http://theindependentlifeboat.wordpress.com/2012/02/25/iran-fun-facts/

 

[Si Botak]

got me two sources for you Si B.


Afghanistan working to stop divisive NATO night raids: Karzai
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/22/us-afghanistan-agreement-idUSBRE82L0HS20120322


Tony Eastley on abc mornings radio, or mourning rayjo

http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2011/s3320411.htm
plus, we hear that our special forces were going with the yanks to do assassinations in Waziristan cross Afpak border


seems Killkullen failed to stop that, and yes, he is now at Lowy I assume. And he has been out of theatre for nigh what, half dozen years. But the surge, that was PR for Petraeus looking at a tilte for the POTUS nomination in 2016, he was involved in all of that strategy.

This comes from out resident climater, where is Upton to weigh in on these FoPo debates

Now, when the Iraq and Afghan wars were wrong to begin with, and killed over a million by Pew estimates, then there IS NO good. You think you can do some good, or mitigate damage, when in fact you are prolonging it. This was the criticism of John Birmingham had, of Assange's Wikileak Manning dump. Now, if Assange had caused some precipitous withdrawals, yes a manifest ignorance (hubris) indeed, but if he had, when the public opened its eyes, he saves lives. And any Afghans who were collaborating, and got it in the neck from the Talibs, would be wrong and evil, but Assange might have caused untold lives and fatalities prevented no?

As if the west could solve the problems of Afghanistan, but they can be a problem, and just perhaps, there was an alternative, to halting Al Qaeda's free operations.

And Geoffrey Hypothetical Robertson, also got it a little wrong on Iran. they have been after weapons for 20 years now G Rob, if we believe the broadsheets. And lesser technological states has ascended to nuclear powers in that time. FAIL!

BlackCat you misunderstand my point.

I'm not saying Night Raids in Afghanistan aren't used. We all know they are. What I'm saying is they're preferable to the kinds of raiding done by conventional units before Kilcullen did his work on COIN.

A book that details a lot of US military failings pre-COIN in Iraq is 'Fiasco'... most pundits with an interest in what's gone on in the MEAO in the last few years have read it. It details wholesale indiscriminate door-kicking and general heavy-handed blundering that 3ID and 4ID especially were involved in. Kilcullen's COIN work helped put a stop to that. Your argument that that's not a good thing is quite simply put, ridiculous. I suppose you'd rather have just let them continue on their merry indiscriminate way? That would've had AWESOME results.

The COIN doctrine that Kilcullen came up with, of which specific isolated raids against confirmed targets is a part, he came up with during his service in Iraq (i.e. he had far less to do with Afghanistan, indeed by the time Patreus took over there, Kilcullen was I believe retired from the ADF) and is one of the primary success factors there in regards to a comparative lack of impact upon the population, and resultant lack of support for groups like Al Qaeda in Iraq who folded pretty quickly once they realised they wouldn't get sustained public support, and their main players would get more out of a political deal.

I'm not saying the war in Iraq was justified, in fact I'm of the opinion it probably wasn't. As for Afghanistan, you're not going to get a western-standard "clean" election in a country made up of little tribal fiefdoms. You just won't. That's reality. Also reality is that Karzai's government is the closest thing to a democractically elected and legitimate representative government. You cite him, so you either recognise his legitimacy or you're a hypocrit. And it's that government, HIS government which invited ISAF forces into Afghanistan in accordance with US Security Council resolutions and International Law. Make whatever moral judgements you have to, but the ISAF presence in Afghanistan is NOT illegal according to international law.

Furthermore to take a man who's tried to make a shitty situation better in Iraq (remembering of course that Kilcullen was a soldier, not a politician, he didn't make the decision to be there) and basically paint him in a light that suggests he's Hitler for things done by others in Afghanistan after he'd done the vast majority of his work in Iraq and Africa is a below the belt. Maybe you'd like to accuse him of bayonetting some babies while you're at it?

His doctrine supported targetted raids against confirmed targets at a specific time of day as opposed to the wholesale door-kicking 24-7 the likes of which went on during the first years of the Iraq war at the hands of US units like 3 and 4 ID who had no idea on how COIN worked. If they didn't do it his way, they would've used some other considerably more heavy-handed method. I'm sorry, but I do classify the fact that they adopted his methods as A GOOD THING.

That's what I meant when I said he actually reduced the amount of home-invasion-style raids. Your generalisations are unfair at best, disingenuous bile at worst and are based on half-facts/half-truths to support your own preconceived bias. The only argument which "FAILS" here is yours.

 

[blackcat]

sorry Si, I lost a long post.

I might get back to it in the next days.

But Gordon's CobraII and Ricks were on my reading list. Were.

Had somthing to say on Junger, his film is showing on Sunday Best this Sunday on ABC2. He had Assanges video.

Post was longer, but I admit a bias, and went into the meta qestion we fail to ask.

Cancat: " Our humanity determines which questions we even ask"
Upton Sinclair's LAw: "When a man's paycheck depends on his not understanding something, you can depend upon his not understanding it."

http://original.antiwar.com/engelhardt/2012/04/15/what-the-laws-of-war-allow/


I might be able to reply later in depth to your position and criticism of me, which I might recognise may well be valid.

/damn computer ether

 

[blackcat]

I quickly wish to respond to the cofirmed targets qualifier.

You know that is what the NSW dep Commish used to :find: Harrir's"killer" in the Lebanon bomb, the phone trees model. This is what has caused the drone targeting of weddings in afghanistan. Using phone signals to towers, and the phone trees model, they can use a Kevin Bacon degree of seperation, and blow the place sky high with a drone if one of their separation degrees, is at the wedding.

And it is clear that the informers and other tips and sources, will use the occupying forces, for their own advantage.

You obviously are interested in this sphere, so you will know this. So you will know the terminology of "confirmed targets" is just a weasel word of the highest order, and their intelligence is in no way accurate when taking the entire book. One may be. But would we appreciate it is someone kicks out door down at 2am on the basis of flawed intelligence.

 

[Si Botak]

sorry Si, I lost a long post.

I might get back to it in the next days.

But Gordon's CobraII and Ricks were on my reading list. Were.

Had somthing to say on Junger, his film is showing on Sunday Best this Sunday on ABC2. He had Assanges video.

Post was longer, but I admit a bias, and went into the meta qestion we fail to ask.

Cancat: " Our humanity determines which questions we even ask"
Upton Sinclair's LAw: "When a man's paycheck depends on his not understanding something, you can depend upon his not understanding it."

http://original.antiwar.com/engelhardt/2012/04/15/what-the-laws-of-war-allow/


I might be able to reply later in depth to your position and criticism of me, which I might recognise may well be valid.

/damn computer ether

Mate, I'm not critical of you, I'm critical of one argument you made. Certainly don't intend any disrespect

 

[Si Botak]

I quickly wish to respond to the cofirmed targets qualifier.

You know that is what the NSW dep Commish used to :find: Harrir's"killer" in the Lebanon bomb, the phone trees model. This is what has caused the drone targeting of weddings in afghanistan. Using phone signals to towers, and the phone trees model, they can use a Kevin Bacon degree of seperation, and blow the place sky high with a drone if one of their separation degrees, is at the wedding.

And it is clear that the informers and other tips and sources, will use the occupying forces, for their own advantage.

You obviously are interested in this sphere, so you will know this. So you will know the terminology of "confirmed targets" is just a weasel word of the highest order, and their intelligence is in no way accurate when taking the entire book. One may be. But would we appreciate it is someone kicks out door down at 2am on the basis of flawed intelligence.

I'd certainly acknowledge your wider point about Intelligence sometimes being wrong, but I'd disagree that it always is, or even that it is most of the time.

I agree that when it is it leads to some poor bugger having their door kicked in, being interrogated, having the stress of that experience etc when they haven't gotten any ties to the Taliban. The other side to that coin is that people caught in that situation are generally pretty well compensated... I'm not saying that excuses that situation.

But I'm not sure I'd agree that "Confirmed targets" is just a weasal word. No-one's ever argued that Intelligence gathering is ever perfect, but I think we in society have an unfair expectation that it should be, probably because we don't realise how complex it is. I think where society should have higher expectations from their military is the planning that is based on that Intelligence - in Australia's and the ADF's case I can tell you that it's actually pretty good. I can't comment on the US.

The point I was making is that raids (if they must be done) that have some sort of planning, intel and consideration given to them will a) be more effective from a military point of view, b) impact less people unfairly, c) p!ss off the entire community less, than just ripping a door off it's hinges at random at all hours of the day like the yanks were in Iraq... so which would you prefer?

Like I said, read up about the way 3ID and 4ID were going about it in their areas of responsibility. Even other US units not operating to COIN doctrine either (like the 101AA and 82AB) were shaking their heads at these guys wondering just wtf they thought they were trying to achieve.

The point I've always tried making here is that Kilcullen is rightly credited with taking that really bad equation and, as a complete outsider from a country which sometimes isn't taken seriously, convinced the most influential field commanders in the world's most powerful military to change that really bad equation into one that is by comparison considerably less onerous on the population caught in the middle.

I don't believe he deserves to be vilified for that. If anything he should have our thanks for teaching a heavy handed military ally that there is a less aggressive gung-ho and hamfisted way to do things.

 

[blackcat]

But Petraeus was trying to bring in some intellectual chops to his operations.

McCHrystal confirms two things, the formula that one innocent (collareral?) = potentially 10 new enemies. I could use the terms the occupiers use, insurgents or terrorists, could, but wont. But will just extemporise on those terms

The other thing (2), is about the civilian innocents, or victims. We have killed a truckload of people, or something equivalent to that phrasing.

The question the guys like John Birmingham fail to ask in his op-ed pieces on Assange's intelligence wires dump, was just how many victims there are as is, and this dump, may well cause sources or US intelligence cooperators to be necked, but in consequentialist measures, could this realise of information into a public sphere cauced the precipated withdrawal, and saving of lives. Not saving the US collaborators, no, they cop it. I dont agree with anyone copping it. But as McChrystal says, we have been responsible for a $hitload of innocent victims. No doubt, that whatever remains of a centrali Talib command, have also been the bearers of innocent blood on their mullah dress.

So, can one do good. That was the question I was posing in the reply that went AWOL. Google Chrome ahhh. Is Kilkullen and his model and the surge in IRaq, really doing good. Can you mitigate or ameliorate bad circumstance by being their and inside the tent. Or should you not be there. To just assume one is helpless wrt political decisions made in DC and pentagon and the state dept and office of special plans, subscribes to a futility and defers all power to those who take a state to war for some nebulous concept of loyalty or military integrity.

Instructive question is, "how many resignations have their been in Iraq and Afghanistan?" in the higher echelons of the military?

The integrity has been atomised, and if everyone has one one-thousandth responsibility for Abu Ghraib it is easy to get a bottle of Dettol disenfectant and wash ones hands of the responsibility. But this ignores the military structure and chain of command. Bush Cheney Rumsfeld Yoo Addington Wollfowitz Feith, then the military staff. Who is gonna be accountable.

I still did not get into my question of "the question" post, but I think you can discern my position with the references to the mader and engelhardt article, and the other turgid prolix points I "attempted" to make. cheers

 

[Si Botak]

But Petraeus was trying to bring in some intellectual chops to his operations.

McCHrystal confirms two things, the formula that one innocent (collareral?) = potentially 10 new enemies. I could use the terms the occupiers use, insurgents or terrorists, could, but wont. But will just extemporise on those terms

The other thing (2), is about the civilian innocents, or victims. We have killed a truckload of people, or something equivalent to that phrasing.

The question the guys like John Birmingham fail to ask in his op-ed pieces on Assange's intelligence wires dump, was just how many victims there are as is, and this dump, may well cause sources or US intelligence cooperators to be necked, but in consequentialist measures, could this realise of information into a public sphere cauced the precipated withdrawal, and saving of lives. Not saving the US collaborators, no, they cop it. I dont agree with anyone copping it. But as McChrystal says, we have been responsible for a $hitload of innocent victims. No doubt, that whatever remains of a centrali Talib command, have also been the bearers of innocent blood on their mullah dress.

So, can one do good. That was the question I was posing in the reply that went AWOL. Google Chrome ahhh. Is Kilkullen and his model and the surge in IRaq, really doing good. Can you mitigate or ameliorate bad circumstance by being their and inside the tent. Or should you not be there. To just assume one is helpless wrt political decisions made in DC and pentagon and the state dept and office of special plans, subscribes to a futility and defers all power to those who take a state to war for some nebulous concept of loyalty or military integrity.

Instructive question is, "how many resignations have their been in Iraq and Afghanistan?" in the higher echelons of the military?

The integrity has been atomised, and if everyone has one one-thousandth responsibility for Abu Ghraib it is easy to get a bottle of Dettol disenfectant and wash ones hands of the responsibility. But this ignores the military structure and chain of command. Bush Cheney Rumsfeld Yoo Addington Wollfowitz Feith, then the military staff. Who is gonna be accountable.

I still did not get into my question of "the question" post, but I think you can discern my position with the references to the mader and engelhardt article, and the other turgid prolix points I "attempted" to make. cheers

Wars have a habit of killing a truckload of people no matter how you fight them.

I was never really debating any of the other points you mentioned, just your assessment on Kilcullen. Has his work on COIN actually done any real good in Iraq? Yes. Demonstrably so, and according to both his supporters and detractors (of which there are quite a few of both).

Who's going to be held accountable for Iraq? Good question. It behoves you to ensure you have the right head on the chopping block before you swing the axe, but I think your list of all stars from the Bush administration is pretty close to the truth.

As convenient as it is to bind Afghanistan in with Iraq, they're not the same war. They're just not. One was a unilateral invasion, whereas the current ISAF mission in Afghanistan is a UN Security Council backed operation conducted at the specific behest of what passes for the Afghani government. As much as people may have moral, or even political or militarily strategic objections to Afghanistan, it's legal status is not under question by anyone who actually knows their international law.

That doesn't mean I'm advocating blindly supporting the ISAF mission to Afghanistan. It does mean I'm saying you can't class the two wars in the same way. They've run concurrently and were launched/sponsored by the same US administration, that's about all they have in common.

 

[blackcat]

As convenient as it is to bind Afghanistan in with Iraq, they're not the same war. They're just not. One was a unilateral invasion, whereas the current ISAF mission in Afghanistan is a UN Security Council backed operation conducted at the specific behest of what passes for the Afghani government. As much as people may have moral, or even political or militarily strategic objections to Afghanistan, it's legal status is not under question by anyone who actually knows their international law.

That doesn't mean I'm advocating blindly supporting the ISAF mission to Afghanistan. It does mean I'm saying you can't class the two wars in the same way. They've run concurrently and were launched/sponsored by the same US administration, that's about all they have in common.

We are told the surge worked, but it just bought off. And great home spun PR.

1) Sadr ordered his men to stand down, apparently sickened by the recent violence between his followers, and other Shi’ites and the government.
2) The Awakening (Sahwa) councils, Sunni groups who were revolting against al-Qaeda-in-Iraq’s senseless slaughters, began receiving large sums of money from the US to only fight AQI, and not US troops as well, as they had been doing. The verdict is yet out on what happens when the money stops and Maliki, or whoever is in power, decides to turn on this now-well-trained movement.
3) This is the big one: the ethnic cleansing of Baghdad was essentially complete. No more violence was necessary for many partisan sectarians. Juan Cole did some extra parsing of this in 2008.

(source: antiwar.com)

Re: Afghanistan. Why was DC negotiating with the Taliban "government" for the pipelines in 2001. Was a military intervention the one and only solution to dealing with terrorist training camps? No one with a brain can believe this. The intervention/war, was a conflict waged for retribution and retaliation and vengeance. Sate the homeland.

Otherwise, take out the House of Saud, as the militant salafists were from that state.

"if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail."

 

[OldBlueFan]

I'm not saying the war in Iraq was justified, in fact I'm of the opinion it probably wasn't.

Over 1,000,000 dead and way more than that displaced. A country in ruins, many places still without electricity for huge chunks of the day ... etc etc ... all simply to remove a man that was in the way of some oil barons ... but it was only "probably" not justified???

Are you taking your cues from Madeleine Albright?

An entire post of many many words made devoid of any credibility with the inclusion of one tiny word ...

How can you possibly claim to be making an honest assessment of the situation when you clearly have no respect for human life?

 

[OldBlueFan]

The question the guys like John Birmingham fail to ask in his op-ed pieces on Assange's intelligence wires dump, was just how many victims there are as is, and this dump, may well cause sources or US intelligence cooperators to be necked, but in consequentialist measures, could this realise of information into a public sphere cauced the precipated withdrawal, and saving of lives. Not saving the US collaborators, no, they cop it. I dont agree with anyone copping it. But as McChrystal says, we have been responsible for a $hitload of innocent victims. No doubt, that whatever remains of a centrali Talib command, have also been the bearers of innocent blood on their mullah dress.

You realise that there hasn't been a single confirmed death of anyone from the wikileaks dump, don't you BC?

The whole argument is a red herring, designed to distract from the fact that there have been, as you say, truckloads of civilian deaths from the other side of the fence. In many many instances, unjustifiable deaths, that on too few occasions wikileaks has exposed.

The argument about good intelligence vs bad intelligence is another red herring when we have no right be in these countries slaughtering people in the first place!

 

[blackcat]

You realise that there hasn't been a single confirmed death of anyone from the wikileaks dump, don't you BC?

The whole argument is a red herring, designed to distract from the fact that there have been, as you say, truckloads of civilian deaths from the other side of the fence. In many many instances, unjustifiable deaths, that on too few occasions wikileaks has exposed.

The argument about good intelligence vs bad intelligence is another red herring when we have no right be in these countries slaughtering people in the first place!

you were more pithy that my response. The paraphrasing is what I should have put forward.

I know there is no confirmed death.

I doubt the Talibs have a central command scouring the dump. But I also know that with such diverse and diffuse regions in Afghanistan, some folks could cop it in the neck, without us knowing. But, one assumes, there are a few key sources and collaborators in those leaks, and the US forces have not had to stick them in witness protection, nor seen individuals disappear off the radar with no explanation other than WL.

You know the saying about once a CIA agent, always an agent. Well, seems John Birmingham in his time in Canberra in Defence Dep't think he was in procurement, never really left the Defence Dep't eh Falafels getting a little stale in the share house


alternative voice on the surge sham http://www.antiwar.com/ips/fadhily.php?articleid=12408

 

[Si Botak]

We are told the surge worked, but it just bought off. And great home spun PR.

The surge's effectiveness or lack thereof is not up for discussion and has nothing to do with the subject of the paragraph you quoted. Whether or not the surge was effective or ineffective, or how it was or wasn't spun by PR does not change or alter the legal status of the ISAF mission in Afghanistan. Not sure what point you're trying to make here.

Re: Afghanistan. Why was DC negotiating with the Taliban "government" for the pipelines in 2001. Was a military intervention the one and only solution to dealing with terrorist training camps? No one with a brain can believe this. The intervention/war, was a conflict waged for retribution and retaliation and vengeance. Sate the homeland.

ROFL

Really?

I mean REALLY?

No Offence Blackcat, but that's the most batshit ridiculous thing I think I've ever heard. Take one of the most fragmented tribal-society based country in the world (even before the Sovs invaded this was the case) and build an Oil or NG pipeline through it? Alternatively then go to war over it? Especially when there are a ton of much more reliable pipelines further north? When if that was their objective they could've done it back in 2002/3 after the Northern Alliance kicked the Taliban back across the border, then committed resources to protecting it (instead of comparatively ignoring Afghanistan as a theatre between 2002/3 and 2006/7?)

I'm not even going to bother discussing that one with you BC, sorry mate. I'm more than open to reasonable discussions... I need some pretty solid convincing before I take any view other than that's just pure fantasy; no a weblink to a group with a pre-confirmed agenda does not count.

OldBlueFan - Over 1,000,000 dead and way more than that displaced. A country in ruins, many places still without electricity for huge chunks of the day ... etc etc ... all simply to remove a man that was in the way of some oil barons ... but it was only "probably" not justified???

Are you taking your cues from Madeleine Albright?

An entire post of many many words made devoid of any credibility with the inclusion of one tiny word ...

How can you possibly claim to be making an honest assessment of the situation when you clearly have no respect for human life?

a) The word "probably" was used simply because I don't have access to Colin Powell's filofax, and the guy was Secretary of State at the time... and contrary to popular opinion, he's actually not a complete a-hole. The 2003 invasion is inextricably linked to the US decision for better or worse to stick to the UN mandate in 1991 and not act arbitrarily then. It's a complex issue that I don't have all the information for. Thus, "probably" is the best I can do for you.

b) Only when I want to piss off a Carlton supporter. No, that's not a serious answer, but really, wtf did you expect?

c) See 'a'. I'd actually like to believe that being occasionally open to being convinced by other points of view lends credibility, not detracts from it.

d) Wow. Only one post and you've already identified me as a heartless monster who has no regard for humanity... I'm impressed! I have to hand it to you champ, most people here usually take two or even three posts to make the connection. But not you, you're good.

Seriously though, and granted this is a tangent, but can you tell me how you apportion blame so readily using human loss as a sole qualifier? If I was to say that the invasion of Europe to defeat Nazi Germany was justified and necessary, would I be a monster? Would I have no regards for human life? Germany lost more than 8.5 million people dead in that war. Are they worth more or less than the 23.5 million the Soviet Union lost? What about the Japanese? Was unleashing six different types of hell on the Japanese people worth it? Are the 3 million Japanese dead worth more or less than say, the ten to twenty million Chinese dead?

In any case, your assumption that life (yes, even yours) means nothing to me based upon your disproportionate and to be honest unreasonable interpretation of a single word is drawing a bit of a long bow don't you think? Take a bex.

Oh and by the by I've done plenty in the last ten years of my existence to preserve human life. You may or may not believe that... It's none of my business whether you do or don't, and no offence but I won't lose sleep if you don't. I originally posted a statement that was a bit rude and implied somewhat of a challenge... I've removed it since doing so was childish on my part, and beneath both of us.