[$tinkle]

How would you say that it is working? And don't give me that "killed 3 insurgents on 4/17/07" crap.

necessary condition for a working surge is smiting/capturing/buggering lotsa terr'ists. most every day this happens. how else would you define a working surge?

you think they [terr'ists] take comp time? even though they'll never ever ever be able to successfully fight us in the open, they still don't fade back into the woodwork for more than a few minutes. as i wrote earlier, they have a stronger stomach for this than the gen'l public back home.

i don't think the pull-out types are less patriotic, but i do think their caring stops at the domestic borders. who really cares more for a free & stable iraq?

that's the armored elephant in the room.

 

[Secret Squirrel]

Progress as Rice talks to Syria and chats with Iran

Thanks!!

 

[jimmydean]

necessary condition for a working surge is smiting/capturing/buggering lotsa terr'ists. most every day this happens. how else would you define a working surge?

you think they [terr'ists] take comp time? even though they'll never ever ever be able to successfully fight us in the open, they still don't fade back into the woodwork for more than a few minutes. as i wrote earlier, they have a stronger stomach for this than the gen'l public back home.

i don't think the pull-out types are less patriotic, but i do think their caring stops at the domestic borders. who really cares more for a free & stable iraq?

that's the armored elephant in the room.

I think the main issue is this:

They have an unlimited (for the most part) supply of "troops" willing to draw blood. The longer we stay there, the more "troops" they gain as we continue to piss off the general public in Iraq and surrounding areas.

We, on the other hand are losing troops hand over fist. Not just dead/wounded, but the retention rates are at the suck level and recruiting is at an all time low. I know the military likes to say "we continue to meet our recruiting goals..." but they fail to mention that the goals have been reduced in order to be met.

If we pull out soon, we may be able to salvage what is left of our existing fighting force. If we stay for 4 more years (Powell predicted 8 years to "succeed"), we will have to rebuild the fighting force from the ground up because there will be nothing left.

As for the "who cares" comment, I am guessing it's not the Iraqi Government considering they are about to take 2 months off.

 

[MMike]

What has Egypt done?

No-one's gonna comment on that one? That was funny!

 

[Transcend]

What has Egypt done?

If only someone in the cabinet had asked that about Iraq!

 

[$tinkle]

<reasonable stuff>

:word:

 

[Kafir]

You have to love the use of a few specific stories to try and prove overall success.

Let's try for a bit of intellectual honesty:
It is not "a few stories".
In point of fact it was 70 stories, in less than 4 months, at less than full troop strength.... and with Congress playing political games with the purse strings.

And since the creation of that video, there have been additional successes:
4/28/2007 - US, IRAQI RAID IN MAHMUDIYAH NETS IRANIAN MARKED ROCKETS, MORTARS
4/28/2007 - IRAQI ARMY-LED MISSION NETS LARGE CACHE, 17 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS DETAINED
4/30/2007 - IRAQI SECURITY FORCES RAID LANDS SUSPECTED DEATH SQUAD LEADER
4/30/2007 - 72 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS DETAINED
5/1/2007 - 5 TERRORISTS KILLED, 20 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS DETAINED
5/3/2007 - 11 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS DETAINED

These headlines were taken directly from CENTCOM's website, and each one indicates a success on the part of Coalition forces since the February 1 beginning of the troop surge.
These are not random incidents, and while they do not indicate that we have 'won', they most certainly do not indicate that we have 'lost', as Senator Reid, his partisan cronies and the mainstream media would have you believe.

Just as the media cherry-picks news based on the premise 'if it bleeds, it leads', I have chosen to portray only the positive headlines in this video. Americans are basing their perception of the war on less than complete information, and the video's goal is to provide the other side of the story.

Also, to use expressions like 'single front war' indicates that the true the nature of this conflict eludes you.
This war was being waged on multiple fronts long before we even set boots on the ground in Afghanistan. From sub-Saharan Africa to Asia, from Europe to the Middle East, this war is being waged on a global scale, no matter how much you would like to compartmentalize it.

 

[ohio]

they most certainly do not indicate that we have 'lost',[/I]

Yeah, and not losing is a great reason to stay there. Even if we continue to not lose for the next 20 years because there's no way to actually win.

 

[Westy]

Let's try for a bit of intellectual honesty:
It is not "a few stories".
In point of fact it was 70 stories, in less than 4 months, at less than full troop strength.... and with Congress playing political games with the purse strings.

And since the creation of that video, there have been additional successes:
4/28/2007 - US, IRAQI RAID IN MAHMUDIYAH NETS IRANIAN MARKED ROCKETS, MORTARS
4/28/2007 - IRAQI ARMY-LED MISSION NETS LARGE CACHE, 17 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS DETAINED
4/30/2007 - IRAQI SECURITY FORCES RAID LANDS SUSPECTED DEATH SQUAD LEADER
4/30/2007 - 72 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS DETAINED
5/1/2007 - 5 TERRORISTS KILLED, 20 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS DETAINED
5/3/2007 - 11 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS DETAINED

These headlines were taken directly from CENTCOM's website, and each one indicates a success on the part of Coalition forces since the February 1 beginning of the troop surge.
These are not random incidents, and while they do not indicate that we have 'won', they most certainly do not indicate that we have 'lost', as Senator Reid, his partisan cronies and the mainstream media would have you believe.

Just as the media cherry-picks news based on the premise 'if it bleeds, it leads', I have chosen to portray only the positive headlines in this video. Americans are basing their perception of the war on less than complete information, and the video's goal is to provide the other side of the story.

Also, to use expressions like 'single front war' indicates that the true the nature of this conflict eludes you.
This war was being waged on multiple fronts long before we even set boots on the ground in Afghanistan. From sub-Saharan Africa to Asia, from Europe to the Middle East, this war is being waged on a global scale, no matter how much you would like to compartmentalize it.

You could list 700 successful missions and it would indicate neither failure or the success you tried to make it look like. Attempting to bend the truth toward the reality you would like to see does not help to inform people, no matter how bad you think the liberal mainstream media conspiracy does it. Presenting an alternative skewed "news" source does not inform people but continues to polarize them. It just gives the pro war folks more reason to pump their chests and the anti war folks more reason to hate the war. If you truly have a unique insight on what is really going and would like to inform others you'd be better off to present it in a more impartial manner, that includes getting rid of the evil villain mood music when you have a Democratic senator on screen. A nice touch would have been to play some Barry White in the background of a Bush speech or maybe a power ballad would be more your style.

 

[Kafir]

Yeah, and not losing is a great reason to stay there. Even if we continue to not lose for the next 20 years because there's no way to actually win.

Just gotta love that defeatist attitude.

With your brand of 'surrender first' mentality, The United States of America would still be a collection of British colonies, Europe would be under Nazi control and the Soviet Union would still be a going concern.

Congratulations on taking that first long step towards dhimmi status.

 

[Kafir]

You could list 700 successful missions and it would indicate neither failure or the success you tried to make it look like.

Perhaps you should work on your reading comprehension.
I made my point, and will no longer waste time defending it to people with closed minds.
Life is too short.

 

[Westy]

Perhaps you should work on your reading comprehension.
I made my point, and will no longer waste time defending it to people with closed minds.
Life is too short.

The Democrats would have you believe the war in Iraq is lost, but that is all 'smoke and mirrors'.

The Coalition forces are getting the job done.

While the mainstream media seems to be preoccupied only with bad news, this video will tell you the other side of the story... the side Harry Reid refuses to acknowledge.
Americans should have all of the facts before allowing the Democratic 'leadership' to damage our national security for decades to come.

The video and your explanation imply 'winning' by mirroring Reid's own one sided view with your own one sided view. What else is there to comprehend? Reality lies somewhere between the two views which unfortunately is a quagmire.

 

[Westy]

necessary condition for a working surge is smiting/capturing/buggering lotsa terr'ists. most every day this happens. how else would you define a working surge?

you think they [terr'ists] take comp time? even though they'll never ever ever be able to successfully fight us in the open, they still don't fade back into the woodwork for more than a few minutes. as i wrote earlier, they have a stronger stomach for this than the gen'l public back home.

i don't think the pull-out types are less patriotic, but i do think their caring stops at the domestic borders. who really cares more for a free & stable iraq?

that's the armored elephant in the room.

I've never been a supporter of a pull out (unless the condom broke) because we caused this cluster**** and should be responsible for fixing it. But in our attempts to fix it there are thousands of innocents dying. It is clear that no matter how well things go Iraq will never be that free or that stable. Pulling out would cause mass anarchy and more would die but I am starting to wonder that more may die and the suffering prolonged by staying there. Our presence is a catalyst for violence the big question is how big would the ensuing furball be if we left and how long would it last?

 

[fluff]

Just gotta love that defeatist attitude.

With your brand of 'surrender first' mentality, The United States of America would still be a collection of British colonies, Europe would be under Nazi control and the Soviet Union would still be a going concern.

There are two flaws in your logic:

It's easier to fight for your own freedom on your own land and it's easier to fight for your own freedon on your own land.

I know that technically that's only one flaw but it's such a ****ING HUGE ONE that I thought it merited repitition.

I guess you'd have won Vietnam by now?

 

[Echo]

There are two flaws in your logic:

It's easier to fight for your own freedom on your own land and it's easier to fight for your own freedon on your own land.

I know that technically that's only one flaw but it's such a ****ING HUGE ONE that I thought it merited repitition.

I guess you'd have won Vietnam by now?

Thank you.

 

[$tinkle]

You could list 700 successful missions and it would indicate neither failure or the success you tried to make it look like.

i can't think of any other reasonable way to read this than you sticking your head in the sand (& finding a mass grave, just for the irony)

If you truly have a unique insight on what is really going and would like to inform others you'd be better off to present it in a more impartial manner, that includes getting rid of the evil villain mood music when you have a Democratic senator on screen.

you seen inconvenient truth? loose change? reefer madness? (ok, last one was more of a downtempo-charleston-breakbeat)

A nice touch would have been to play some Barry White in the background of a Bush speech or maybe a power ballad would be more your style.

done
strangely, shouts of "allah fubar" curiously absent

 

[$tinkle]

There are two flaws in your logic:

It's easier to fight for your own freedom on your own land and it's easier to fight for your own freedon on your own land.

I know that technically that's only one flaw but it's such a ****ING HUGE ONE that I thought it merited repitition.

I guess you'd have won Vietnam by now?

this would have merit had the fighters been indigenous. unfortunately for your point, this is both a proxy war & a civil war.

iran & s.a. need to STFD & STFU; but it won't happen.

 

[Westy]

i can't think of any other reasonable way to read this than you sticking your head in the sand (& finding a mass grave, just for the irony)

How is that? You could list a few thousand drug arrests that happened in the past month, would this show that we are making headway in the war on drugs? Not really. My point is that a list of recent successes on its own proves nothing one way or the other. To really show progress or lack there of you would want to look at whether there was an increase or decrease of successful missions. Of course a trend one way or the other could be indicative of the volume of ter'rist activity and not how affective we are so you would really need a broader measure of what is going on to really say what progress is being made. What irks me on the subject is that both sides are just looking at what ever small pieces of data that support what they want to beleive and I can't help but think the jerks running the show are doing the same thing.

you seen inconvenient truth? loose change? reefer madness? (ok, last one was more of a downtempo-charleston-breakbeat)

Nope. I don't watch movies.

done
strangely, shouts of "allah fubar" curiously absent

Fvck yeah!

 

[Echo]

reefer madness?

I thought that was a Cheech & Chong flick.

 

[$tinkle]

How is that? You could list a few thousand drug arrests that happened in the past month, would this show that we are making headway in the war on drugs? Not really.

then we should start killing drug dealers.
just like in saudi arabia, pakistan, & other islamic nations.

 

[Westy]

then we should start killing drug dealers.
just like in saudi arabia, pakistan, & other islamic nations.

If we can start with the spammers pushing dick drugs I'm all for it.

 

[ohio]

Just gotta love that defeatist attitude.

With your brand of 'surrender first' mentality, The United States of America would still be a collection of British colonies, Europe would be under Nazi control and the Soviet Union would still be a going concern.

Congratulations on taking that first long step towards dhimmi status.

That's a great list of conflists for which we had a well defined finite enemy, a clear goal, and a strategy to achieve it. Show me those things WRT to Iraq and I'll change my tune.

How'd vietnam work out for ya?

 

[fluff]

this would have merit had the fighters been indigenous. unfortunately for your point, this is both a proxy war & a civil war.

iran & s.a. need to STFD & STFU; but it won't happen.

Ask yourself why the US bothered to liberate France in 1944.

 

[Transcend]

will no longer waste time defending it to people with closed minds.

You mean like the close minded, religiously intollerant, xenophobic nitwits who thought they'd attempt a second crusade againts islam and "spread democracy"?

You should probably remove your head from your ass. It will give you perspective.

 

[Transcend]

How'd vietnam work out for ya?

The hawks still claim they didn't lose there either.

 

[DirtyDog]

Sure, enlist.

So only enlisted people that have served in Iraq are entitled to an opinion? Well, I think you have just busted this case wide open! We are losing because the people running the war are not qualified to have opinions about it!

 

[$tinkle]

Ask yourself why the US bothered to liberate France in 1944.

would you suggest we're freeing iraq from a modern form of nazi-ism? that would be very much appreciated.

 

[$tinkle]

You mean like the close minded, religiously intollerant, xenophobic nitwits who thought they'd attempt a second crusade againts islam and "spread democracy"?

until i got to "second crusade", i thought you were being ironic. after which (this happened 900 years ago), i'm tempted to add to that "willfully ignorant".

that's my charitable way of saying this:

You should probably remove your head from your ass. It will give you perspective.

fwiw, 2 days after you suggested nachtwey, war photographer was on fstv, and i checked it out. the kid's got skillz, to be sure. good tip.

 

[fluff]

would you suggest we're freeing iraq from a modern form of nazi-ism? that would be very much appreciated.

Sadly I had the comparison transposed. We are the occupiers.

 

[$tinkle]

Sadly I had the comparison transposed. We are the occupiers.

that explains your custom title.
i liked your prev one better.

 

[Transcend]

that's my charitable way of saying this:fwiw, 2 days after you suggested nachtwey, war photographer was on fstv, and i checked it out. the kid's got skillz, to be sure. good tip.

War photographer is an amazing film. The on camera POV shots are pretty damn sweet. Natchwey is unreal. That scene in the lab shows how much work and thought gets put into each and every photo.

 

[lugnuts]

So only enlisted people that have served in Iraq are entitled to an opinion? Well, I think you have just busted this case wide open! We are losing because the people running the war are not qualified to have opinions about it!

sweet sarcasm. I almost missed it.

That wasn't the point I was trying to make. I was more trying to point out that the armchair politics being discussed here by what (sounds like) little kids is pretty silly. A lot of what I've read in here just sounds like folks reciting crap they've read in the papers or heard on CNN/Fox News, and claiming it as their own opinions. I was just wondering who has formulated their opinion from their own personal experiences, and who makes their decisions based on what Wolf Blitzer, or Bill O'Reilly or any of those other tools on the tv tells them to think.

My response of "sure, enlist" was to point out that there is a "magical trip" that the average Joe can take. Although the "average length" part you were asking about might not exactly work out so well.

Look, I make no claims at being the end all decision maker on who is qualified to have an opinion. Anyone can have an opinion, however I think that most the people on here with such heated feelings over it all are full of sh*t. Thats all. Oh, and that goes for ALL sides of the argument.

 

[BurlyShirley]

Thats all. Oh, and that goes for BOTH sides of the argument.

The fact that you use the term "both" here implies that you think this argument is only two sided, which in turn tells me you're far too partisan to offer an actual opinion of your own either. Just sayin'

 

[jimmydean]

The fact that you use the term "both" here implies that you think this argument is only two sided, which in turn tells me you're far too partisan to offer an actual opinion of your own either. Just sayin'

Your either for it, or against it, or you don't care. I guess that makes 3 sides, right?

 

[lugnuts]

The fact that you use the term "both" here implies that you think this argument is only two sided, which in turn tells me you're far too partisan to offer an actual opinion of your own either. Just sayin'

point taken, but you know what I meant. I shall edit it for you...

 

[ohio]

point taken, but you know what I meant. I shall edit it for you...

Yeah, what you meant is that there's two sides. That IS how you see it. Burly's comment was very insghtful...

 

[lugnuts]

not sure I follow you guys on the point of this whole "only two sides" argument.

anywho. . . .look at the title of the thread, "More reason Iraq is headed for worse and not better." Those are the only two sides we were talkin about here, right?

and besides, I haven't offered my opinion. Just questioning other peoples, and apparently pushing some buttons in the mean time. heh heh.

 

[DaveW]

Well you won't win without getting locals onside, and

 

[Changleen]

Loud Noises!!!

 

[MMike]

Well you won't win without getting locals onside, and