Deadly blast targets Marriott Hotel in Islamabad

[LogansPapa]

As a general rule, the only people who find our very limited and careful selection of targets to be "murder" are the liberals, especially of the Cindy Sheehan variety. If the Birkenstock fits...

I remember reading about the way that nuclear weapons were going to make infantry obsolete after WWII. Didn't happen. Wars were supposed to be won solely by air power. Didn't happen. Now, drones, technology and financial ruin are going to make us either more lethal or impotent, depending on which way the wind is blowing. Give me a break.

Without implementing a draft - two war fronts the size of the Iraq / March / 2003 commitment will not happen again, without a formal declaration of war. If you look at the technology leap of the last decade and the direction Pentagon purchases are taking - you'll recognize that "boots on the ground" (unless of course you're securing some other country's natural resource) may be a phrase headed for the anachronism file. Under the guise of "humanitarian relief", scores of troops may be delivered to certain theaters, but if you actually believe our country is going to go through the shit it has in the last eight years - you're just plain silly.

Well, What do you call the bombing raids on Germany and Japan. Bombing is meant to kill. That's what happens in war. If you try to play by politically correct rules of engagement, the other side has no reason to call it quits. They just run to the safe base and wait it out. just like Germany in WWII, the populance of an enemy must learn war effects them, maybe they will help end it. You can't play by rules in war, you cheat, do what ever winning requires.

People of Europe and maybe those in Eastern Asia understand exactly what can happen to them from the air, as they've seen it - more than once. The fine people that we're up against now are stuck in the 9th Century. The have a 'one bullet theory' that can cause 3-4 tons of ordnance to be expended upon their location for a single round shot from a sniper's rifle. I personally require no special piece of paper to kill these folks - treaties, coalitions, etc. Kill them all. Kill their fathers. Kill their sons. Kill their uncles. Spend money on DNA programmed missiles for all I care, but don't be stupid enough to try and tell me these latest follies haven't torn the fiber of my country and weakened its leadership as much as it was in the time of Richard Nixon.

[ironhorsedriver]

Well, for one, I don't consider myself stupid. I'm actually quite educated. Secondly, I feel that we went into Iraq at the wrong time, should have completed our job in Afghanistan. However, I will support my country, since it is in Iraq, with my whole heart. The US is not in an Illegal war, and war is ugly by nature.

[Odysseus]

Without implementing a draft - two war fronts the size of the Iraq / March / 2003 commitment will not happen again, without a formal declaration of war. If you look at the technology leap of the last decade and the direction Pentagon purchases are taking - you'll recognize that "boots on the ground" (unless of course you're securing some other country's natural resource) may be a phrase headed for the anachronism file. Under the guise of "humanitarian relief", scores of troops may be delivered to certain theaters, but if you actually believe our country is going to go through the shit it has in the last eight years - you're just plain silly.

Army procurement has been primarily in the area of mine-resistant vehicles in order to protect the boots on the ground, as well as enhanced body armor. There's absolutely no basis for the assumption that we are planning remote controlled wars. The Air Force and Navy continue to buy longer range systems, but that's the nature of their operations.

And just what has our country gone through? The vast majority of Americans have been unaffected by the war. Less than 0.5% of Americans are under arms, and the expenditures have been minimal compared to previous wars. In fact, if it weren't for the headlines and the occasional protestors, the average American would have no idea that there was a war going on, and the headlines disappear whenever things are going well. In fact, the one event that did have an effect on everyone, temporarily, was 9/11, and the media has done everything within its power to sanitize our memories of that.

People of Europe and maybe those in Eastern Asia understand exactly what can happen to them from the air, as they've seen it - more than once. The fine people that we're up against now are stuck in the 9th Century. The have a 'one bullet theory' that can cause 3-4 tons of ordnance to be expended upon their location for a single round shot from a sniper's rifle. I personally require no special piece of paper to kill these folks - treaties, coalitions, etc. Kill them all. Kill their fathers. Kill their sons. Kill their uncles. Spend money on DNA programmed missiles for all I care, but don't be stupid enough to try and tell me these latest follies haven't torn the fiber of my country and weakened its leadership as much as it was in the time of Richard Nixon.

The only thing that has torn the fiber or this country and undermined its leadership has been the relentlessly negative and dishonest coverage of the war by our media. Americans have no problem fighting and winning a war, even a long one, but we hate to lose one, and if you tell us that we're losing often enough, while attacking the basis for the war and the conduct of the troops fighting it, then most people will lose heart. This is exactly what our media learned from Tet, and they've applied the lessons to this war in order to ensure the victories of their political allies rather than of their nation.

[LogansPapa]

You, as with many, haven’t yet realized that this is a war of cultures.

If you gave all Iraqis a $100,000 house a new car and a new hospital in every neighborhood - you’d still be an alien being in their Muslim body. Nothing will appease their deep seeded hate. They've seen all this before, in the beginning of the last century - with a different set of foreigners and they eventually just left.

They will never embrace us as true heroes in their land and simply tolerate our presence their as long as they’re getting paid to do so. People that once used our soldiers as target practice are now manning check-points for $300 per month each.

That’s not peace through Democracy - it’s a truce through prostitution. Nothing more.

Once we’ve moved fully into the massive outlying bases and started to wind this ridiculous venture down they’ll go off on each other. We’ll make speed runs out with Ospreys and Apaches to hose down neighborhoods that go at each other like mad dogs.

All the ethnic separations have run their course and who could leave (professionals and the like), have. You don’t have even providential elections yet - and that’s for a very specific reason: No need to - they’re making too much money off the Americans, and bank-rolling their petro-dollars while they’re at it, and their leadership is laughing at us all the while.

This is why we won’t put boots on the ground in Pakistan, eh?

It may be a hard lesson learned. Airborne strikes and UAV’s hits - anywhere we feel like on their real estate, and all they can do is piss and moan about our incursions. Putting masses of personnel onto other people’s territory, say like North Korea, would be a waste of resource. Just let the Navy handle it - setting off both coasts of the peninsula.

Time for the Army to take a break.

[Odysseus]

You, as with many, haven’t yet realized that this is a war of cultures.

Funny, but I seem to be the one who keeps pointing out that this is a war of cultures. It's you and Gator who keep claiming that it's a war to keep Israel safe.

If you gave all Iraqis a $100,000 house a new car and a new hospital in every neighborhood - you’d still be an alien being in their Muslim body. Nothing will appease their deep seeded hate. They've seen all this before, in the beginning of the last century - with a different set of foreigners and they eventually just left.

They will never embrace us as true heroes in their land and simply tolerate our presence their as long as they’re getting paid to do so. People that once used our soldiers as target practice are now manning check-points for $300 per month each.

That’s not peace through Democracy - it’s a truce through prostitution. Nothing more.

What you don't seem to grasp is that they wouldn't have taken money to side with us two years ago. The reason that we're winning, something that you refuse to accept, is that we have become an honest broker in Iraq, the only truly objective arbitrator between Shia, Sunni and Kurd. At the same time, Al Qaeda alienated Iraqis by imposing their crazed version of Sharia law, which included the segregation of vegetables (women were not permitted to buy cucumbers, seriously), murderous rampages and destruction on a massive scale. People got tired of trying to expel the guys who were providing medical care, infrastructure repairs and stability in favor of the thugs who were walking into crowds of children with bombs strapped to their bodies.

Once we’ve moved fully into the massive outlying bases and started to wind this ridiculous venture down they’ll go off on each other. We’ll make speed runs out with Ospreys and Apaches to hose down neighborhoods that go at each other like mad dogs.

All the ethnic separations have run their course and who could leave (professionals and the like), have. You don’t have even providential elections yet - and that’s for a very specific reason: No need to - they’re making too much money off the Americans, and bank-rolling their petro-dollars while they’re at it, and their leadership is laughing at us all the while.

Do you mean provincial elections?
Once again, you speak without any knowledge of the situation on the ground. You simply assume the worst of the people of Iraq, without recognizing the incredible strides that they have made.

This is why we won’t put boots on the ground in Pakistan, eh?

We won't put boots on the ground in Pakistan so long as their government supports us in the war against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. It's generally not considered a good idea to invade an allied nation, although Obama didn't get that, and you don't seem to, either.

It may be a hard lesson learned. Airborne strikes and UAV’s hits - anywhere we feel like on their real estate, and all they can do is piss and moan about our incursions. Putting masses of personnel onto other people’s territory, say like North Korea, would be a waste of resource. Just let the Navy handle it - setting off both coasts of the peninsula.

Time for the Army to take a break.

It's not often that someone says something that's so incoherent that I consider any response to be all but pointless, but you've managed to do it. I'm not sure if you're advocating nuking North Korea, or simply hitting them with conventional munitions from a distance, but either way, I don't see your point. I can only assume that you'll be able to write a more cogent explanation when the buzz wears off.

[LogansPapa]

Funny, but I seem to be the one who keeps pointing out that this is a war of cultures. It's you and Gator who keep claiming that it's a war to keep Israel safe.

I’ve always said that America has no idea what is involved in a ‘tribal society’ (reference American Indian reservations for a historical education on how that’s worked out for us - via our military jurisdiction) and the Israeli coddling is mainly due to our post-WWII guilt trip.

What you don't seem to grasp is that they wouldn't have taken money to side with us two years ago. The reason that we're winning, something that you refuse to accept, is that we have become an honest broker in Iraq, the only truly objective arbitrator between Shia, Sunni and Kurd. At the same time, Al Qaeda alienated Iraqis by imposing their crazed version of Sharia law, which included the segregation of vegetables (women were not permitted to buy cucumbers, seriously), murderous rampages and destruction on a massive scale. People got tired of trying to expel the guys who were providing medical care, infrastructure repairs and stability in favor of the thugs who were walking into crowds of children with bombs strapped to their bodies.

I sincerely hope you’re right - but I think the people that have harbored (willingly and unwillingly) the thugs are still doing so and now that we’ve set a time-line (something we said we’d never do) via Iraq’s "leadership", the bad guys are just keeping their powder dry. People in this part of the world have ALWAYS taken power via murder. It’s a right of passage in their culture and blood feuds are the hallmark of their society. History is nothing if not cyclonic and one needs to look no further than T.E. Lawrence’s "7 Pillars of Wisdom" to see that it’s repeating itself some 90 years later.

Do you mean provincial elections? Once again, you speak without any knowledge of the situation on the ground. You simply assume the worst of the people of Iraq, without recognizing the incredible strides that they have made.

Come on - do you actually believe the Kurds in the North are just going to quietly hand over their natural resource assets and play nice, after not expending their ammo over the last five years, biding their time and reinforcing their proclaimed territory? If you do - that’s astoundingly naïve.

We won't put boots on the ground in Pakistan so long as their government supports us in the war against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. It's generally not considered a good idea to invade an allied nation, although Obama didn't get that, and you don't seem to, either.

Utter B/S: the Pakistani government (equivalent to the police force in Tijuana: same look - same uniform supplier) has given us lip service. Told us exactly what we wanted to hear - to keep the money spigot wide open. Tell me another country that wouldn't be in the United Nations making a giant shit storm in 15 minutes about people in their air space with manned and unmanned missions. What would India’s reaction be to us doing that along their border with Pakistan? That country is our of control: reference a certain female candidate being assassinated and the country’s Supreme Court being eviscerated. We don’t go there because of the painful lessons learned in Iraq - simple as that.

It's not often that someone says something that's so incoherent that I consider any response to be all but pointless, but you've managed to do it. I'm not sure if you're advocating nuking North Korea, or simply hitting them with conventional munitions from a distance, but either way, I don't see your point. I can only assume that you'll be able to write a more cogent explanation when the buzz wears off.

I have to take a veteran of that war’s word for it. A family member’s 78 now and wants to see that war finally won - conventionally. He seems to think that the only reason it doesn’t happen is that South Korea’s too dependent on our presence there - even half a century later, and, the fact that we’re really all Wal-Mart whores in the States, not wanting to risk offending the mainland Chinese. I wouldn’t know - I’ll have to take his word for it. He was stuck up near the border near some reservoir, when I was still in diapers.

;)