Ding Dong The Witch is Dead: Part 1 of a long upcoming series

[Bill Sornson]

Jeff Starr wrote:
> On Wed, 02 Nov 2005 00:34:59 GMT, "Bill Sornson"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>
>>
>> I'll sum it up this way, Neil. You're a bleeding-heart, liberal
>> ideologue. Perfectly fine. You're also a smug, arrogant
>> "intellectual bully" who
>> thinks he's the smartest person in the room (and wants everyone to
>> know it).
>
>> Guess what -- other people have valid opinions and feelings, too.
>
> Oh c'mon Bill, stop being so funny. I can't stop laughing. What other
> people? I'll bet I know, it's the ones you agree with.

I'm talking REAL life Jeff, but thanks for butting in.

>> Your holier-than-thou, righteous indignation doesn't mean you're
>> always holy OR right, just judgmental and indignant.
>>
>>> This notion of my new signature is really tearing you up inside,
>>> isn't it? Feel the need to scream out loud about my Moots, my
>>> touring bike, my mountain bike, my laptop computer, and my GPS?
>>
>> Gee, I hadn't even thought of all that! Let's see... Throw in two
>> cars
>> even though only one person works outside the home, satellite (or is
>> it cable?) TV, swimming pool, shag carpet, shaving cream... Yes,
>> "Live simply that others may simply live" -- LOL -- it IS a bit of a
>> load, isn't it!
>>
>>> I never understand where you're going when you head off in this
>>> direction--unless it's still that tactic of discrediting to avoid
>>> discussing the assertions at hand--but--if you feel so
>>> compelled--the podium is all yours.
>>
>> I guess I liked it better when you were ignoring me; you take this
>> Usenet
>> **** WAY too seriously.
>
> But you, never take any of this "Usenet ****" too seriously?

I separate online from real life. (And yes, I'm polite to waiters -- but
sincerely so, not because I "should" be.)

> I've been reading this ungoing disagreement between you and Neil.
> Without a doubt, it is you Bill, who comes across as bitter, petty,
> and a total jerk. Between you and Hickey, you have become the self
> appointed defenders of Bush and all things right wing. This blind
> allegiance to Bush, just baffles me.

First of all, who asked you? Second of all, you do NOT know all the facts.
And lastly, your opinion of my political views obviously influence your
uninvited "observations" (or you wouldn't have mentioned it here), so who's
truly biased?

> It's funny, when I started reading these bicycle newsgroups, you were
> one of the people that I took a liking to, but over the last few
> months, man you have changed.

You know what changed? I made the fatal mistake of not going overboard when
Katrina hit. I saw (almost entirely) left-wing people using a natural
disaster to further their political pet peeves -- whether Bush bashing,
global warming, race cards, you name it. I mean, literally within hours.
So I argued with some people, including someone I considered a friend, who
then repeatedly misrepresented what I said and then /sanctimoniously/
attacked those strawmen. I got angry -- but purely in a "Usnetty" sense --
with no idea that the other person was taking things so seriously. (I
expect my "friends" to tell me face to face or man to man when I've ******
them off so we can try to work things out; I'm not used to someone just
suddenly freezing me out and not replying to calls or e-mails.) I even
kidded around -- using the phrase "even you're not THAT dumb" or something
like that (didn't think a smiley face was required), which is when I was
accused of attacking personally and using "invectives".

Then this same "friend" spewed a littany of my "shortcomings" on Usenet for
all to see, also taking the side of some racist dude who'd just showed up
(the guy who talked about CondaLEEEZA) when I /returned/ a flame, and I'd
seen enough.

I wish I knew what it was like to have so many "friends" that I'd lose one
over a "silly Usenet argument", but I don't. So if I come across as
resentful and bitter, it's probably because I am.

Glad I could amuse you some more.

 

[Bill Sornson]

Jeff Starr wrote:
> On Wed, 02 Nov 2005 00:34:59 GMT, "Bill Sornson"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>
>>
>> I'll sum it up this way, Neil. You're a bleeding-heart, liberal
>> ideologue. Perfectly fine. You're also a smug, arrogant
>> "intellectual bully" who
>> thinks he's the smartest person in the room (and wants everyone to
>> know it).
>
>> Guess what -- other people have valid opinions and feelings, too.
>
> Oh c'mon Bill, stop being so funny. I can't stop laughing. What other
> people? I'll bet I know, it's the ones you agree with.

I'm talking REAL life Jeff, but thanks for butting in.

>> Your holier-than-thou, righteous indignation doesn't mean you're
>> always holy OR right, just judgmental and indignant.
>>
>>> This notion of my new signature is really tearing you up inside,
>>> isn't it? Feel the need to scream out loud about my Moots, my
>>> touring bike, my mountain bike, my laptop computer, and my GPS?
>>
>> Gee, I hadn't even thought of all that! Let's see... Throw in two
>> cars
>> even though only one person works outside the home, satellite (or is
>> it cable?) TV, swimming pool, shag carpet, shaving cream... Yes,
>> "Live simply that others may simply live" -- LOL -- it IS a bit of a
>> load, isn't it!
>>
>>> I never understand where you're going when you head off in this
>>> direction--unless it's still that tactic of discrediting to avoid
>>> discussing the assertions at hand--but--if you feel so
>>> compelled--the podium is all yours.
>>
>> I guess I liked it better when you were ignoring me; you take this
>> Usenet
>> **** WAY too seriously.
>
> But you, never take any of this "Usenet ****" too seriously?

I separate online from real life. (And yes, I'm polite to waiters -- but
sincerely so, not because I "should" be.)

> I've been reading this ungoing disagreement between you and Neil.
> Without a doubt, it is you Bill, who comes across as bitter, petty,
> and a total jerk. Between you and Hickey, you have become the self
> appointed defenders of Bush and all things right wing. This blind
> allegiance to Bush, just baffles me.

First of all, who asked you? Second of all, you do NOT know all the facts.
And lastly, your opinion of my political views obviously influence your
uninvited "observations" (or you wouldn't have mentioned it here), so who's
truly biased?

> It's funny, when I started reading these bicycle newsgroups, you were
> one of the people that I took a liking to, but over the last few
> months, man you have changed.

You know what changed? I made the fatal mistake of not going overboard when
Katrina hit. I saw (almost entirely) left-wing people using a natural
disaster to further their political pet peeves -- whether Bush bashing,
global warming, race cards, you name it. I mean, literally within hours.
So I argued with some people, including someone I considered a friend, who
then repeatedly misrepresented what I said and then /sanctimoniously/
attacked those strawmen. I got angry -- but purely in a "Usnetty" sense --
with no idea that the other person was taking things so seriously. (I
expect my "friends" to tell me face to face or man to man when I've ******
them off so we can try to work things out; I'm not used to someone just
suddenly freezing me out and not replying to calls or e-mails.) I even
kidded around -- using the phrase "even you're not THAT dumb" or something
like that (didn't think a smiley face was required), which is when I was
accused of attacking personally and using "invectives".

Then this same "friend" spewed a littany of my "shortcomings" on Usenet for
all to see, also taking the side of some racist dude who'd just showed up
(the guy who talked about CondaLEEEZA) when I /returned/ a flame, and I'd
seen enough.

I wish I knew what it was like to have so many "friends" that I'd lose one
over a "silly Usenet argument", but I don't. So if I come across as
resentful and bitter, it's probably because I am.

Glad I could amuse you some more.

 

[Mark Hickey]

Jeff Starr <[email protected]> wrote:

>Between you and Hickey, you have become the self
>appointed defenders of Bush and all things right wing. This blind
>allegiance to Bush, just baffles me.

If you'll read over the posts, you'll find very little "defending of
Bush" and a LOT of "correction of errors". As I've said over and over
and over, it's difficult to have a meaningful discussion when most
insist on avoiding the historical facts.

Mark Hickey
Habanero Cycles
http://www.habcycles.com
Home of the $795 ti frame

 

[Mark Hickey]

Jeff Starr <[email protected]> wrote:

>Between you and Hickey, you have become the self
>appointed defenders of Bush and all things right wing. This blind
>allegiance to Bush, just baffles me.

If you'll read over the posts, you'll find very little "defending of
Bush" and a LOT of "correction of errors". As I've said over and over
and over, it's difficult to have a meaningful discussion when most
insist on avoiding the historical facts.

Mark Hickey
Habanero Cycles
http://www.habcycles.com
Home of the $795 ti frame

 

[[email protected]]

Mark Hickey wrote:
> "Qui si parla Campagnolo" <[email protected]> wrote:

> >Iraq is a mess by any measure. NEW ideas are needed. 'stay the course'
> >when the guy at the helm is clueless, is NOT the answer. Either go in
> >with more and finish it or leave now.

Unfortunately, we don't have more now. We have frittered away the
strength of our military to the point that we don't have enough troops
available to do the job that needed to be done immediately after our
invasion of Iraq, and I doubt that even that number (300,000-400,000)
would be enough now. After we overthrew Hussein, there were a lot of
people in Iraq who felt friendlier toward us, or at least feared us
more, than they do now.

I've noticed an effect in these asymmetrical wars that the US has been
involved in going back to at least Somalia. When the US invades and
takes control, the populace with the potential to become insurgents is
fairly intimidated at first. If we are able to maintain that level of
intimidation until we reach the outcome we want, we have a chance to
succeed, but immediately the potential insurgents begin testing our
occupation. I remember how the early tactics in Somalia did not include
disarmament of the warlords when they were still intimidated and then
they gradually discovered that their pickups and automatic weapons were
pretty effective against our Light Infantry.

Similarly, the insurgency has been picking up steam in Iraq from the
early days of the occupation. It started with demonstrations, became
riots, and finally turned into armed resistance that has become more
deadly with every passing month. What we needed immediately after the
invasion was about a half million US and Coalition troops to completely
clamp down on civil unrest and prevent looting and destruction of
infrastructure. To get that many troops we needed better international
support, which was not going to happen after ignoring the UN. Now it is
too late, at least for Bush who burned his bridges in that regard. It
is _maybe_ possible that someone not connected with the Bush
administration could come in with a new administration and get
international support for a much larger peacekeeping force, which,
along with a _new_ constitutional convention that the Sunnis could buy
into, _might_ be able to do something to fix the situation. But for the
US, under Bush, with the current Iraqi constitution, there is no number
of troops available to the US that can go back and fix what was broken
two and a half years ago.

> Iraq has ALWAYS been a mess by any measure. The death rate now is
> lower than during Saddam's rule,

Whose death rate? The one that matters most to me, the death rate of
American troops, is at its very highest point right now. Solve that,
and then we'll argue about the death rate of Iraqis, which I'm
regardless not convinced is lower now than it was before we invaded
Iraq.

> and should decline dramatically once
> the terrorists figure out that a) they aren't going to influence the
> outcome of the democratization process

What democratization process? A constitutional Shiite Islamic republic
that deprives women and Sunnis of rights that they had even under
Hussein? The New Iraq is better described as the New Iran. The moderate
Sunnis know now that they have no stake in the government shoved down
their throats and will fight it FOREVER.

Call it revenge, if you want, and say the Sunnis had it coming after
their repression of the Kurds and Shi'ia under Hussein, but don't call
it democracy. That's nothing but a sick joke.

> and b) are pissing off the
> other Islamic cultures (not all of 'em though).

They're pissing off Iran, and that's pretty much it. The insurgents
have the sympathy of most of the rest of the Moslem world, which is
mostly Sunni.

Hickey, is this an example of how you do "correction"? You pretty much
don't know what you are talking about, probably because you get your
news from sources that have a stake in hiding the truth from you.

 

[[email protected]]

[email protected] wrote in part:

> I remember how the early tactics in Somalia did not include
> disarmament of the warlords when they were still intimidated and then
> they gradually discovered that their pickups and automatic weapons were
> pretty effective against our Light Infantry.

Actually what they discovered was (a) the American military
seemed willing to rather indiscriminately kill shitloads of
civilians, which they did in a few key incidents (virtually
unreported by US media) leading up to the final confrontation,
thus turning the entire population of Mogadishu against the
US soldiers, and (b) the militias' cheap RPGs were effective against
American helicopters. Imagine if they had had IEDs.

American civilian leadership doesn't understand the
far-reaching negative implications of the use of military
power, even when that power is used effectively. When
that power is wielded ineptly, look out.

Robert

 

[Jasper Janssen]

On Tue, 01 Nov 2005 18:45:57 -0700, Mark Hickey <[email protected]>
wrote:

>The thing that seems to always (try to...) slip out of these
>discussions is Iraq's admission of having large stockpiles of WMDs,
>and their inability to account for where they went. As of the date
>they admitted having the WMD, the burden of proof shifted to them to
>prove that they had destroyed the WMD, not onto the UNMOVIC guys to
>turn over rocks until they find them or not (in an area the size of
>California, at that, and after years of potential consideration as to
>where to hide them).

Why do you suddenly trust the Iraqi government when they say they have
WMDs and not when they say anything else? AFAIC that was pure propaganda
for internal consumption and almost certainly false.

Jasper

 

[[email protected]]

[email protected] wrote:
> [email protected] wrote in part:
>
> > I remember how the early tactics in Somalia did not include
> > disarmament of the warlords when they were still intimidated and then
> > they gradually discovered that their pickups and automatic weapons were
> > pretty effective against our Light Infantry.
>
> Actually what they discovered was (a) the American military
> seemed willing to rather indiscriminately kill shitloads of
> civilians, which they did in a few key incidents (virtually
> unreported by US media) leading up to the final confrontation,
> thus turning the entire population of Mogadishu against the
> US soldiers, and (b) the militias' cheap RPGs were effective against
> American helicopters. Imagine if they had had IEDs.

They didn't need IEDs. US troops were almost completely in unarmored
Hummers and presented big, soft targets. The effectiveness of RPGs
against helicopters was a function of US tactical mistakes in the way
they employed helicopters. Generally speaking, helicopters are sitting
ducks if they are used to disembark troops, especially by rapelling, in
a place where they can come under fire while doing so.

I would still contend that those incidents you refer to came after the
US had passed the critical point where our troops could have controlled
the situation. The initial occupation of Somalia was almost unopposed,
and if US/UN troops had moved quickly to disarm the warlords I think
the outcome might have been different, but who knows? The US troops
were not much "heavier" than the warlords' irregulars, and that could
have been a problem in trying to disarm them. (For that I blame the US
Army which had this infatuation with Light Infantry that could be
deployed quickly but did not even have the firepower to be decisive
against the most lightly armed irregulars.) George I, though,
explicitly stated that the US role there was not to get involved in the
middle of the civil war/ anarchy, but then they did anyway, and by then
they had lost the shock advantage that existed immediately after the
occupation.

You can document similar incidents in Iraq, particularly in Falluja
early in the occupation. The US made mistakes in how they reacted to
civil unrest, but by then the situation was already in a death spiral
that continues to this day.

> American civilian leadership doesn't understand the
> far-reaching negative implications of the use of military
> power, even when that power is used effectively. When
> that power is wielded ineptly, look out.

TrainWreck's First Rule of Asymmetric Warfare: you have to kill or
convert the enemy to your side faster than you make new enemies as a
result of the way you are fighting the war.

I think my second rule might be: try not to give them a chance to start
an asymmetric war.

 

[[email protected]]

[email protected] wrote:

> They didn't need IEDs. US troops were almost completely in unarmored
> Hummers and presented big, soft targets. The effectiveness of RPGs
> against helicopters was a function of US tactical mistakes in the way
> they employed helicopters. Generally speaking, helicopters are sitting
> ducks if they are used to disembark troops, especially by rapelling, in
> a place where they can come under fire while doing so.

Blackhawks are sitting ducks no matter what they're doing, especially
if they're hovering at low altitude and flying the same patterns and
using the same tactics day after day. But ya live and learn. No they
didn't need IEDs. They didn't need Stinger missiles either. Imagine
if they had those. Just with RPGs they managed to take down like
five helicopters.

> I would still contend that those incidents you refer to came after the
> US had passed the critical point where our troops could have controlled
> the situation. The initial occupation of Somalia was almost unopposed,
> and if US/UN troops had moved quickly to disarm the warlords I think
> the outcome might have been different, but who knows?

It was the US forces' apparent disregard for
any Somali, exemplified by a few grisly incidents--machine
gunning a crowd of civilians from the air, firing 15 tow missiles into
a clan meeting attended by kids and very old men--that led the entire
city to pick up a rifle against US forces as soon as they saw their
chance to do so. We somehow united this stew of rivaling
clans into a single anti-US mob. And we went
there, in the first place, to FEED THEM. It was a clinic in how to
use military force to go one step forward and twelve steps back.
Mogadishu was a giant mistake caused by the completely
wacky and unfounded belief that military force can be wielded
bluntly to solve complex problems. Oops.

> The US troops
> were not much "heavier" than the warlords' irregulars, and that could
> have been a problem in trying to disarm them. (For that I blame the US
> Army which had this infatuation with Light Infantry that could be
> deployed quickly but did not even have the firepower to be decisive
> against the most lightly armed irregulars.)

It wasn't lack of firepower that was the problem. (Marines, Rangers,
10th Mountain Division). It was too much firepower used at the
wrong times for the wrong reasons.

> George I, though,
> explicitly stated that the US role there was not to get involved in the
> middle of the civil war/ anarchy, but then they did anyway, and by then
> they had lost the shock advantage that existed immediately after the
> occupation.

This was Clinton's, specifically Madelaine Albright's deal, not Bush's.
Albright is the one who decided we could solve the problems of
Somalia simply by killing the right people.

> TrainWreck's First Rule of Asymmetric Warfare: you have to kill or
> convert the enemy to your side faster than you make new enemies as a
> result of the way you are fighting the war.

I believe the current leadership subscribes to this First Rule as well.
It is a recipe for massacre on all sides. Because it is impossible to
kill all the right people and end up with nobody left to kill. The
killing
itself is an engine which creates hatred and resentment of the
highest order, which creates new enemies and hardens old ones,
and ensures that the killing will go on. Violence breeds violence,
even if that violence is directed with pinpoint accuracy, which is
virtually impossible. Pretty soon you are involved in a frenzy of
killing just trying to keep up with the enemies and hatred you
created with the killing you've already done.

> I think my second rule might be: try not to give them a chance to start
> an asymmetric war.

Or, if you start one yourself, have some sort of plan? Jesus,
what a colossal nightmare.

Robert

 

[Mark Hickey]

Jasper Janssen <[email protected]> wrote:

>On Tue, 01 Nov 2005 18:45:57 -0700, Mark Hickey <[email protected]>
>wrote:
>
>>The thing that seems to always (try to...) slip out of these
>>discussions is Iraq's admission of having large stockpiles of WMDs,
>>and their inability to account for where they went. As of the date
>>they admitted having the WMD, the burden of proof shifted to them to
>>prove that they had destroyed the WMD, not onto the UNMOVIC guys to
>>turn over rocks until they find them or not (in an area the size of
>>California, at that, and after years of potential consideration as to
>>where to hide them).
>
>Why do you suddenly trust the Iraqi government when they say they have
>WMDs and not when they say anything else? AFAIC that was pure propaganda
>for internal consumption and almost certainly false.

If during a search, a criminal admits he has a gun, I suspect that the
police tend to believe him too (since he's probably got no reason to
lie about it).

Either way - Saddam said he DID have WMDs (and in fact used a bunch of
'em, in case you forgot), then said he did NOT have WMDs... so he was
lying at least half of the time. Maybe there was an element of bluff
and bluster to his claims, but there were known stores of WMDs that
have never been accounted for, and he's never produced any evidence of
their destruction.

Mark Hickey
Habanero Cycles
http://www.habcycles.com
Home of the $795 ti frame

 

[Bill Sornson]

Mark Hickey wrote:

> Either way - Saddam said he DID have WMDs (and in fact used a bunch of
> 'em, in case you forgot), then said he did NOT have WMDs... so he was
> lying at least half of the time. Maybe there was an element of bluff
> and bluster to his claims, but there were known stores of WMDs that
> have never been accounted for, and he's never produced any evidence of
> their destruction.

That sounds like the quote of a "BBII Democrat"! (Before Bush Second Term.)

Bill "but...but...it can't be /that/ simple" S.

 

[Jasper Janssen]

On Wed, 02 Nov 2005 20:39:43 -0700, Mark Hickey <[email protected]>
wrote:
>Jasper Janssen <[email protected]> wrote:

>>Why do you suddenly trust the Iraqi government when they say they have
>>WMDs and not when they say anything else? AFAIC that was pure propaganda
>>for internal consumption and almost certainly false.
>
>If during a search, a criminal admits he has a gun, I suspect that the
>police tend to believe him too (since he's probably got no reason to
>lie about it).

As compared to Saddam, who had a country's worth of reasons to lie about
it.

>Either way - Saddam said he DID have WMDs (and in fact used a bunch of
>'em, in case you forgot), then said he did NOT have WMDs... so he was
>lying at least half of the time.

You know, these things can go away. Especially when *someone*'s military
is dropping bombs all over the place on a regular basis.

>Maybe there was an element of bluff
>and bluster to his claims, but there were known stores of WMDs that
>have never been accounted for, and he's never produced any evidence of
>their destruction.

It's kind of hard to provide evidence of the destruction of things that
were bombed.

Jasper

 

[Gary]

take your "long upcoming series" to a politcal group and leave this one
alone," okay?

Jasper Janssen wrote:

> On Wed, 02 Nov 2005 20:39:43 -0700, Mark Hickey <[email protected]>
> wrote:
>
>>Jasper Janssen <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>>>Why do you suddenly trust the Iraqi government when they say they have
>>>WMDs and not when they say anything else? AFAIC that was pure propaganda
>>>for internal consumption and almost certainly false.
>>
>>If during a search, a criminal admits he has a gun, I suspect that the
>>police tend to believe him too (since he's probably got no reason to
>>lie about it).
>
>
> As compared to Saddam, who had a country's worth of reasons to lie about
> it.
>
>
>>Either way - Saddam said he DID have WMDs (and in fact used a bunch of
>>'em, in case you forgot), then said he did NOT have WMDs... so he was
>>lying at least half of the time.
>
>
> You know, these things can go away. Especially when *someone*'s military
> is dropping bombs all over the place on a regular basis.
>
>
>>Maybe there was an element of bluff
>>and bluster to his claims, but there were known stores of WMDs that
>>have never been accounted for, and he's never produced any evidence of
>>their destruction.
>
>
> It's kind of hard to provide evidence of the destruction of things that
> were bombed.
>
> Jasper

 

[D'ohBoy]

Hi, Gary -

I'm thinking that your repeated suggestions are being ignored. Perhaps
instead, you could ignore this thread?

It might be more effective in the long run.

Just an idea,

D'ohBoy

 

[Gary]

But I just hate seeing the group become a dumping ground for politicos
when they could easily take their rants where they belong. But they are
too afraid of those groups. Anyone finding this group for the first time
would be thinking, "What a bunch of idiots!"

D'ohBoy wrote:
> Hi, Gary -
>
> I'm thinking that your repeated suggestions are being ignored. Perhaps
> instead, you could ignore this thread?
>
> It might be more effective in the long run.
>
> Just an idea,
>
> D'ohBoy
>

 

[[email protected]]

[email protected] wrote:
> [email protected] wrote:
> > The US troops
> > were not much "heavier" than the warlords' irregulars, and that could
> > have been a problem in trying to disarm them. (For that I blame the US
> > Army which had this infatuation with Light Infantry that could be
> > deployed quickly but did not even have the firepower to be decisive
> > against the most lightly armed irregulars.)
>
> It wasn't lack of firepower that was the problem. (Marines, Rangers,
> 10th Mountain Division). It was too much firepower used at the
> wrong times for the wrong reasons.

Marines, Rangers and the 10th were not much more heavily armed than the
Somali irregulars, and they were not really any more heavily armored.
(I believe the Marines had some light armor.) Lack of discipline is a
problem among US troops that probably has its roots in the perception
that they will not be held accountable for their actions and is a big
part of the difficulty the US has in winning these types of wars.
Nevertheless, I still maintain a mistake was made in not disarming the
warlords early on.

> > George I, though,
> > explicitly stated that the US role there was not to get involved in the
> > middle of the civil war/ anarchy, but then they did anyway, and by then
> > they had lost the shock advantage that existed immediately after the
> > occupation.
>
> This was Clinton's, specifically Madelaine Albright's deal, not Bush's.
> Albright is the one who decided we could solve the problems of
> Somalia simply by killing the right people.

No. It was already open war between the US and the Somali warlords
before Clinton took office. Clinton decided to go after whathisname in
an effort to control the mess he had inherited.

> > TrainWreck's First Rule of Asymmetric Warfare: you have to kill or
> > convert the enemy to your side faster than you make new enemies as a
> > result of the way you are fighting the war.
>
> I believe the current leadership subscribes to this First Rule as well.

Then they are incompetent beyond belief in their application.

> It is a recipe for massacre on all sides. Because it is impossible to
> kill all the right people and end up with nobody left to kill. The
> killing
> itself is an engine which creates hatred and resentment of the
> highest order, which creates new enemies and hardens old ones,
> and ensures that the killing will go on. Violence breeds violence,
> even if that violence is directed with pinpoint accuracy, which is
> virtually impossible. Pretty soon you are involved in a frenzy of
> killing just trying to keep up with the enemies and hatred you
> created with the killing you've already done.

Immediately after the invasion there was a period whn probably even
most Sunnis were willing to accept a fair amount of violence directed
at the Baathist insurgents. The occupation was botched in many ways-
undisciplined rules of engagement, insufficient troops to protect
infrastructure, dissolution of the Iraqi army, barring of all Baath
Party members from almost any type of official work, Abu Ghraib (which
was creating huge amounts of anger among the Iraqis before we back in
the US had ever heard of it), relatively sloppy over-reliance on the
use of airpower (again traceable back to the lack of occupation
troops)- dovetailed with Arab traditions of vengeance to raise the
level of resentment and create ever-growing numbers of Sunnis dedicated
to killing Americans.

So, I disagree that violence with pinpoing accuracy could not have
achieved the results that Bush was seeking in Iraq; remember, I said
kill OR convert to your side. There were a lot of Iraqis that were on
the fence and at least glad to be rid of Hussein. If we had gone about
finishing off the Baathist insurgents in a more professional manner,
before they morphed into an orgranized insurgency, it could have gone
the other way. Too late, now, though.

> > I think my second rule might be: try not to give them a chance to start
> > an asymmetric war.
>
> Or, if you start one yourself, have some sort of plan? Jesus,
> what a colossal nightmare.

Bush and Rumsfeld didn't have the imagination to see past the
conventional war to defeat the Republican Guard; the professionals who
understand this stuff (but were not willing to be lackeys for Rumsfeld)
may not have anticipated the Baathist insurgents, but they did know how
many troops were needed to control the country after the defeat of the
conventional forces. Unfortunately, they were ignored.

 

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per [email protected]:
>And we went
>there, in the first place, to FEED THEM. It was a clinic in how to
>use military force to go one step forward and twelve steps back.
>Mogadishu was a giant mistake caused by the completely
>wacky and unfounded belief that military force can be wielded
>bluntly to solve complex problems. Oops.

Once I heard a bird colonel responding to the concept of "surgical strikes".

He said something like "Sure, a military strike can be 'surgical' - if you think
of surgery using a chainsaw."
--
PeteCresswell

 

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per [email protected]:
>the professionals who
>understand this stuff (but were not willing to be lackeys for Rumsfeld)
>may not have anticipated the Baathist insurgents, but they did know how
>many troops were needed to control the country after the defeat of the
>conventional forces. Unfortunately, they were ignored.

And Shinseki was more than just ignored....
--
PeteCresswell

 

[Mark Hickey]

Gary <[email protected]> wrote:

>But I just hate seeing the group become a dumping ground for politicos
>when they could easily take their rants where they belong. But they are
>too afraid of those groups. Anyone finding this group for the first time
>would be thinking, "What a bunch of idiots!"

Good to get it out in the open though, right?

Mark Hickey
Habanero Cycles
http://www.habcycles.com
Home of the $795 ti frame

 

[Jasper Janssen]

On Thu, 03 Nov 2005 11:03:18 -0600, Gary <[email protected]>
wrote:

>But I just hate seeing the group become a dumping ground for politicos
>when they could easily take their rants where they belong. But they are
>too afraid of those groups. Anyone finding this group for the first time
>would be thinking, "What a bunch of idiots!"

Feel free not to let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

Jasper