All things Middle East related

[JoeRedskin]

While I generally don't agree with That Guy on a lot of politics, I am with him on this one.

Boots on the ground? If history has shown us anything, it has demonstrated that putting troops into a place is always easier than withdrawing them. Once Americans die, there had damn well better be a reason for being there and, if there is, we damn well better win. In the Middle East, barring the economic need for oil, there is no reason for young Americans to die. I bought into that theory once. Not again.

Who is in those boots? Young Americans fighting ... who? Assad? ISIS? For the rebels? For some of the Rebels but against others? With Turkey but not with the Kurds? And when in this mish mash of religious radicalism, rampant ethnic loyalty, and generally undemocratic forces, we end up siding with folks who - it turns out - also commit atrocities, we inevitably make more enemies.

ISIS is bad. Assad is bad. Many of the rebels are bad. Not a lot of folks fighting for "Truth Justice and the American Way."

I don't know what the right answer is. I am convinced, however, "boots on the ground" is the wrong answer unless their is a clear, rock-solid, exit strategy. Because war is messy - particularly the war being fought in the ME, I just don't see a scenario that warrants Americans dying in the dessert.

[Schneed10]

Originally Posted by JoeRedskin

While I generally don't agree with That Guy on a lot of politics, I am with him on this one.

Boots on the ground? If history has shown us anything, it has demonstrated that putting troops into a place is always easier than withdrawing them. Once Americans die, there had damn well better be a reason for being there and, if there is, we damn well better win. In the Middle East, barring the economic need for oil, there is no reason for young Americans to die. I bought into that theory once. Not again.

Who is in those boots? Young Americans fighting ... who? Assad? ISIS? For the rebels? For some of the Rebels but against others? With Turkey but not with the Kurds? And when in this mish mash of religious radicalism, rampant ethnic loyalty, and generally undemocratic forces, we end up siding with folks who - it turns out - also commit atrocities, we inevitably make more enemies.

ISIS is bad. Assad is bad. Many of the rebels are bad. Not a lot of folks fighting for "Truth Justice and the American Way."

I don't know what the right answer is. I am convinced, however, "boots on the ground" is the wrong answer unless their is a clear, rock-solid, exit strategy. Because war is messy - particularly the war being fought in the ME, I just don't see a scenario that warrants Americans dying in the dessert.

Here's the deal, and it's really a lot more simple than people want to make it. ISIS is coming to fight the West, whether you like it or not, no matter what.

They are either going to be permitted to operate in Iraq and Syria where they control lots of revenue-generating assets, and thus enabled to coordinate attacks throughout Europe, or someone is going to fight them on their turf, disrupting their ability to generate the cash necessary to fund their operations. But either way people are going to die, it's just a matter of how many, on whose side, and where that happens.

We are extremely fortunate here in the US that we don't face the same threat to our homeland that Europe does. Belgium demonstrates the severity of Europe's problem. So you could say there's no way we should put American boots on the ground without Europe (and Saudi Arabia and Jordan and Egypt and...) being along for the ride.

Except we were the ones who created the mess in the first place, by toppling Saddam and leaving before the power vacuum was adequately filled. So we, the United States of America, are to blame for creating an environment for ISIS to operate and fund its machine. Build a coalition, fine. But we have to go in. ISIS doesn't exist if we never toppled Saddam, and ISIS doesn't kill hundreds of Parisians and 30+ Belgians if not for our extremely serious mistakes.

Are these nations our NATO allies or not? We belong there, cleaning up our mess properly. Blame it on Bush if you want, that's appropriate. But nevertheless it's the mess we left. We can't just practice sea gull foreign policy - fly in, sqwauk a lot, shit all over the place, and fly away.

We have a responsibility to the world now, like it or not.

[That Guy]

Originally Posted by Schneed10

They are either going to be permitted to operate in Iraq and Syria where they control lots of revenue-generating assets, and thus enabled to coordinate attacks throughout Europe, or someone is going to fight them on their turf, disrupting their ability to generate the cash necessary to fund their operations.

again, we're already doing this and the speed at which we're doing this is being bottle-necked by political concerns between the many groups on the ground, not by military limitations. throwing 30,000+ more americans in the way would, in all likelihood, make the situation even more complicated then it already is.

[Chico23231]

Originally Posted by That Guy

again, we're already doing this and the speed at which we're doing this is being bottle-necked by political concerns between the many groups on the ground, not by military limitations. throwing 30,000+ more americans in the way would, in all likelihood, make the situation even more complicated then it already is.

2 things...essentially we will not at this point because the Iraq troops and Iranian Shia brigades have refused our help on combat troops (you know we are supporting Iranian troops on the ground...insane) You can call it an agreement or not, but right now at this moment, they don't want our help on the ground(but love our air campaign and proudly cheer it).

Now in the Peshmerga and Yadiz controlled areas(large chunk of Northern Iraq), their troops would absolutely welcome us with open arms. They have asked us to come. They have been far and away the most effective group fighting against ISIS...but we will not help them because of an agreement with Turkey. We refuse to even arm them, which is some cowardly-Obama, state department bullshit.

We do have 2 firebases right now near Mosel within the Peshmerga controlled area which will serve as artillery with the coming assault on that city. These are being run by several hundred US Marines *only* with top-line artillery pieces...we also have an airstrip built near by.

We don't need 30k troops...Im not gonna talk the past because Obama fuck it up already but before we certainly coulda handled fuckin ISIS with 5k troops at the time of the break-out...easily too.