Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
Matt
Trad climber
never ever pissing into the wind
|
|
|
Topic Author's Original Post - Sep 13, 2007 - 11:50am PT
|
Well, that apparently is what his boss called him after he signed on to promote the surge and become the face of bushco's continued failure of a war, despite the fact that he had never been in combat or 'led' a f*#king thing.
(see for yourself woody/TGT/chaz et al)
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39235
Hilarious.
Bunch of f*#king well paid salesmen...
|
|
nature
climber
Flagstaff, AZ
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 11:51am PT
|
Hey Matt!
Did you get my emails? Talk to me oh treehugger!
|
|
Anastasia
Trad climber
California
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 12:07pm PT
|
"Audacity, audacity, always audacity."
(General Patton's favorite saying.)
|
|
Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 12:21pm PT
|
admiral fallon for president....dont know why this does not get more press..
|
|
Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 12:28pm PT
|
"Il faut de l'audace, encore de l'audace, toujours de l'audace" (You must dare, dare, and dare again)
 Georges Danton, French revolutionary (guillotined 1794)
Sometimes also ascribed to Frederick the Great (mid 18th century).
|
|
Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 12:32pm PT
|
while you have a point dingus, a REAL miltitary commander will be free and must be free to express his opinion when he sees something wrong. otherwise he is a useless piece of crapola...
|
|
Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 12:43pm PT
|
exactly my point dmt.
line of command.
then why the hell is petraeus reporting directly and responding directly to orders from the prez instead of his senior officers? that is exactly what i found wrong with what was in that article.
btw, i spent my time, i get it. i also work as a dod civilian so i get that.
|
|
Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 12:50pm PT
|
you proabably got that right. hard to blame them really. seems like dubya found the right yes man....
|
|
WoodySt
Trad climber
Riverside
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 12:57pm PT
|
Well, I'm on my way to JT; but, before I go, what the general said is in harmony with what numerous reports out of Iraq are saying. Does this mean everything is positive or that success is around the corner? No.
Matt, you and a few others must get up each morning, rush to info sources and hope that you can find lots of American GIs dead and/or hundreds of Iraqis killed in terrorist attacks. If you can't find such, you probably lapse into a depression.
All your tears for the dead are phoney as hell. I don't care for Bush and his crew, but I don't hate him to the extent that I bounce up and down with glee anytime something happens (usually a lot of dead in Iraq) that makes the Iraq situation look worse than it is.
So, I'm off for a day on the rocks; and, you Matt, can slither through the net trying to find all the negative news you can.
Good hunting.
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 01:00pm PT
|
I disagree Dingus
Bush is his boss yeah, but he's an idiot and no military commander nor fighter.
Up his ass and he should of taken Bush out back and gave him a good hard whipping.
|
|
stevep
Boulder climber
Salt Lake, UT
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 01:10pm PT
|
Go read Fiasco. It gives a pretty good assessment of Petraeus.
If it's anything like remotely accurate, he's much more well-suited to run the military in Iraq than anyone who has held the job previously. Unlike Franks or Abizaid, Petraeus's area of expertise is fighting this type of counterinsurgency war. And on a tactical level, he probably is being reasonably successful.
The problem is, it's way too late. And no matter how good he is, he probably doesn't have much chance of fixing this clusterf*ck.
As for his testimony, it's not been too bad. It's not his job to set or explain strategic and political policy. If Fallon has better ideas he should speak up.
|
|
maestro8
Trad climber
Sunnyvale, CA
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 01:15pm PT
|
You fix Patraeus at the ballot box and no where else
With this post, this thread is now over.
It seems Dubya fills his cabinet with "yes-men" so that he doesn't have to worry about any free thinking / dissent. Hence the cabinet is full of Mini-Dubyas... we won't see any change in course until Dubya is ousted.
|
|
WoodySt
Trad climber
Riverside
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 01:33pm PT
|
While I'm waiting for the crew to gather: I predict that, if the Dems get the White House next time around, and Iraq is still on the table, they will continue trying to solve the problem of Iraq. What they say during the campaign about the situation is primarily for the left wing of the party, and they're having problems there as it is. They remember how much damage they suffered after Viet Nam. Anything said now is pure politics. Once in control, they'll fall back on "Real Politic" because they won't want a bloodbath on their hands and a collapse and chaos in the ME.
Right now it looks like some modest progress is occurring with the tribes beginning to co-operate against the insurgents. It also appears that more attention is being given to separate sectors of the country for the Kurds, Shia and Sunnis. This wasn't what the US administration wanted, but it may be the only viable solution. The situation is evolving, and anyone that claims they know the future of this mess is delusional.
|
|
Ouch!
climber
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 02:17pm PT
|
All Bush is doing is trying to buy time till he can dump the mess he made on some unlucky sucker who gets stuck with the ruined office. Then he can skulk out the sally port.
|
|
WoodySt
Trad climber
Riverside
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 02:30pm PT
|
It might well come to that Ouch.
|
|
healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 02:35pm PT
|
Petraeus' problem is straight out of 'Mission Impossible'. And while he's a bright boy who understands the regional dynamics quite well, he's stuck with a no-win dilemma. He knows to abandon Iraq at this point means, at a minimum, four things: a disasterously complex withdrawl which leaves an ocean of material in the country, yet another historic military defeat of the US Army, chaos in the region, and worst of all - an emboldened China.
Yet, he also knows America has no stomach for this conflict and the average Joe doesn't think any aspect of Iraq is worth 85 U.S. lives and $9 billion per month. His dilemma is exactly the reason the invasion should never have happened. The U.S. is now fully entrained in a tarbaby of its own making. It isn't a disaster waiting to happen - it is already a full-fledged disaster.
And, as a side note, we've squandered about a $50 billion in Iraq reconstruction funds at a time when we have failed to rebuild New Orleans and have only funded $1.5 out of $5 billion of the levy reconstruction effort. These twin reconstruction failures basically send a bigger message to the Chinese than our military failures. Both failures were completely unnecessary.
|
|
UncleDoug
Social climber
N. lake Tahoe
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 03:17pm PT
|
Woody,
I find this comment interesting.....
"Matt, you and a few others must get up each morning, rush to info sources and hope that you can find lots of American GIs dead and/or hundreds of Iraqis killed in terrorist attacks"
In all reality, it is the peple like Fatty and yourself that look for this type of thing, to keep the war going.
If there is relative peace in Iraq( or the ME in general), it would mean that "we" could get out, and there would be no reason what so ever for "us" to be there any more.
|
|
turd
climber
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 06:38pm PT
|
Matt -
Would you expand a little further on your original statement that Petraeus "had never been in combat or 'led' a f*#king thing"?
Don't post another link, I know what the press says. I want to hear your thoughts on it.
|
|
turd
climber
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 07:32pm PT
|
Hey, thanks for the links. Just what I wanted.
For now, I'm not interested in arguing about whether the guy is an ass kisser or not, or how he's doing running the war, or whether he wants to be the next president.
What I am interested in right now is your (and Matt's) critical analysis of why you think the guy doesn't have any combat experience. Since it's a cornerstone of your larger point (that I don't necessarily disagree with) I want to see how you got there from here. I'm not really interested in hearing you tell me what Anderson Cooper thinks.
|
|
stevep
Boulder climber
Salt Lake, UT
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2007 - 07:40pm PT
|
Crowley, not saying your links are wrong, but reading Fiasco (by a Washington Post writer, Thomas Ricks, and very critical of the war), Petraeus comes across as one of the few romotely bright spots in the first couple of years. It is very clear in saying that there were lower levels of violence in the areas his units oversaw, as well as fewer instances of abuse of Iraqis.
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!