wikistan

Time for some Paris Peace Accords! Somebody get ahold of John Kerry’s schedule for the next 24 months!

War

But 2002 was soooo long ago.

That’s what I’m opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics

Americans don’t want anything political in AFPAK, Mr. President.  We only want revenge on the well-funded lunatics of 9/11.  We don’t want the equivocation of a waffling pinko.

War afghanistan, obama

Naw, he’s not, but Obama rejected a much different Biden proposal on Afghanistan.

War afghanistan, biden, Iraq

I would defer to SecDef Gates, but sheesh, what’s really going on here?

Additionally, why has it taken eight years to understand who’s funding them?  Is it because the cast of characters has changed?

It’s probably because we don’t want to know.

War afghanistan, russia

At stunt, fer sure, to test “The One Who Promised So Much But Fell So Short”

War obama, russia, sub

OBL’s son *may* have been killed by US airstrike — sometime this year.

Not 100% verified, but maybe he did bite the big one.

But sometime this year? I question the timing. The President’s domestic agenda might be getting hammered on all sides but, gosh darn it all, he’s still tough enough to kill them ter’rists.

War obama, osama

I can’t even pronounce these names, let alone understand what the article says.  But I’m still pissed!

Who will be Obama’s Ollie North?

Money quote:  “George Bush knows that I have never supported engagement with terrorists.”

War obama, terror

Bush Saddam Hussein misled us into war.  Clarity without all the stoopid bumperstickers!

And apparently he was more concerned about looking “weak” to Iran than we are right now.

Even then, as now, it’s still all about Persia.

War bush, hussein, iran, wmd

‘Bout time we dictated the g*damn situation over there.

With a coveted seat on the Guardian Council, al Sadr would undoubtedly speak for millions of disaffected Iranian Gen Y’ers.

Oh yeah, this is a completely unfounded rumor.

Politics, Religion, SocioFascism, War al sadr

Not so?  Then why would he flip as such:

“The President would be the last to excuse the actions depicted in these photos. . . But the President strongly believes that the release of these photos, particularly at this time, would only serve the purpose of inflaming the theaters of war, jeopardizing US forces, and making our job more difficult in places like Iraq and Afghanistan,” the White House official said.

As if Bush excused these actions!

Democrats were willing to sacrifice the success of the mission in Iraq and score political points by absolutely exploiting the terrible images of Abu Ghraib.  But now, on the cusp of exited the battlefield as victors, they only now see the potential danger such information poses to our servicemen.

Logic begs: How much sooner could we have exited Iraq if it weren’t for the left throwing fuel on a fire which was already being adjudicated by DoD? Better yet, how many American lives were wasted?

Craven bastards.

War abu ghraib, craven, obama

Hitchens figures murderous al Qaeda masterminds merit no harsher treatment than German agent provocateurs received during World War II. Treat them with a little human dignity, and our chances of flipping them are greater.

We know that often works.  So why is there this assumption that the American interrogators don’t try this approach?  Who started the myth that, the instant we capture a potentially valuable target, we immediately begin waterboarding him?  Perhaps every other approach up to  that point had failed?  Seems like everybody would be happier if we just shot these assholes at their point of capture.

It’s OK to slaughter dozens of militants on an Afghan battlefield but it’s absolutely reprehensible to collar one in a cell in Cuba.  Or pour water on their face.

Politics, War torture, waterboarding

I think they’ve looked into our souls and are ready to, shall we say, exercise their territorial “rights”.

Who the fuck is gonna stop them? Hillary Clinton?

War georgia, russia

Israel interdicts Iranian weapons smuggling efforts.

H/T Weasel Zippers.

War hamas, iran, israel, sudan

Not sure why the French have had to wait so long for an official confirmation but maybe it has to do with the endemic anti-semitism festering in them parts.

War concentration camps, france, holocaust, jews, vichy

The Bad: Six years on and, sadly, there’s still much to be learned about objective reporting.  At least one intrepid marxist reporter “gets it.”

Media, War Iraq, liddick, malay

Democrats have been whining about Gitmo for more than seven years.  During that time, they have had ample time to study and propose an alternate solution. But apparently Obama needs another 120 days to figure out how to prosecute some of the most dangerous people in the world, because seven years wasn’t enough time.   We apparently have to send a message to all of the violent malcontents in the world that, even in their most insidious manifestations, are entitled to a publicity-laden, ACLU-supported joy ride in the American civil justice system at taxpayer expense.

Governance by symbolism is a sick disorder.  We may actually find out who the President is within 120 days.

Exit question:  Why does CNN feel it necessary quote only Gitmo antagonists in response to Obama’s decision?  And by antagonists I mean a Soros-funded international leftist organization with ties to just about every top-level socialist front?  Could they find no one, outside of outgoing President Bush, to provide an opposing viewpoint?

War gitmo, obama

CNN’s Peter Bergen offers a critique of Bush’s war on terror.  Lunchtime and recess soon to follow.

Bergen begins righteously:

The dean of military strategists, Carl von Clausewitz, explains the importance of this decision-making in his treatise “On War”: “The first, the supreme, the most decisive act of judgment that the statesman and commander have to make is to establish…the kind of war on which they are embarking; neither mistaking it for, nor trying to turn it into something that is alien to its nature.”

Clausewitz’s excellent advice about the absolute necessity of properly defining the war upon which a nation is about to embark was ignored by Bush administration officials who instead declared an open-ended and ambiguous “war on terror” after the United States was attacked on September 11, 2001.

So, Bush failed to define the war correctly at the onset, and thus doomed the effort from the start.  But I distinctly recall he (and Rumsfeld) leaving plenty of room on this, saying this war will NOT be like any others we’ve fought,  and it will be ambiguous and lengthy.

Read more after the break

Read more…

Politics, War

Obama maintains radio silence on Gaza situation, sticking with his “one president at a time” defense.  Is he really this humble or is he trying to avoid pissing off his Jewish base for as long as possible?

Of course, his silence is defensible; undoubtedly, he’s biding his time and drawing on his renowned capacity to absorb enough important data to make a highly nuanced and informed decision.  He picked that skill up as an organizer for the local GOTV drive.

Here’s to hoping this little war is cleaned up in a couple of weeks, eh?

Politics, War hamas, israel, obama, war

Reuters almost makes it through a story about George Bush’s farewell visit to Baghdad this weekend without a crude display of subjectiveness.

They make it to the last sentence before dropping the time-tested zinger “The war has also damaged U.S. credibility abroad.” Says who?
War critics?

The same leftist thumsucker union who also says the North Pole will vanish in five years?

Apparently Reuters could not locate a single, balancing viewpoint outside of the (now greatly outdated) 2003 Russian – French – German – Chinese – Iranian worldview.

War bush, Iraq, wmd

Tom Friedman has long been considered a leading expert on foreign affairs, especially in the post-9/11 world. Liberals consider him one of their own, always seeking ways to use his ‘well-considered’ positions to leverage their cynical isolationism and moral relativism.� Moderates feel content when they discover his stance nicely counterbalances their occasional lapse into exuberant hawkishness.� But, realistically, what would either group think of his solution to defend against the sort of violence we’ve seen in Mumbai?

. . . it takes a village. The best defense against this kind of murderous violence is to limit the pool of recruits, and the only way to do that is for the home society to isolate, condemn and denounce publicly and repeatedly the murderers � and not amplify, ignore, glorify, justify or �explain� their activities.

Sure, better intelligence is important. And, yes, better SWAT teams are critical to defeating the perpetrators quickly before they can do much damage. But at the end of the day, terrorists often are just acting on what they sense the majority really wants but doesn�t dare do or say. That is why the most powerful deterrent to their behavior is when the community as a whole says: �No more. What you have done in murdering defenseless men, women and children has brought shame on us and on you, and now we’re all gonna get fucking killed by drones and Special Ops shock troops.

I might have added a few words to the end of that, but I needed to finish Friedman’s astonishingly stupid and naive brain tremor.� Is this what passes for reasoned foreign policy commentary at the New York Times?

I could be wrong, but even if the terrorists responsible for the Mumbai attack perhaps found significant favor among other people in their homeland, aren’t they still engaging in a crossborder paramilitary action?� Akin to an attack launched by an official military?�� An attack that should invite reprisals?

And, Tom, if terrorists are indeed in line with what the majority in their society believe, then it is a society irretrievably comfortable with the idea of mass murder. � Only a fool would you expect them to condemn it.

More at HotAir

War friedman, india, mumbai, nyt, pakistan, terror, terrorism

Chopra: Attack prompts tough questions (insane relativism in bold below)

Chopra: I think Mr. Obama has a real opportunity here, but a challenging opportunity, a creative opportunity.

Get rid of the phrase “war on terrorism.” Ask for a creative solution in which we all participate.

King: Is it because the war on terrorism really can never be won because the terrorists (inaudible)?

Chopra: Because it’s an oxymoron. It’s an oxymoron, Larry, a war on war, a war on terrorism.

You know, terrorists call mechanized death from 35,000 feet above sea level with a press of a button also terror. We don’t call it that, because our soldiers are wearing uniforms. They don’t see what is happening, and innocent people are being killed. So, you know, terror is a term that you apply to the other.

King: Thanks, Deepak Chopra, as always, extraordinarily enlightening.

I dunno but calling a preventive and retributive war against terrorist organizations and their sponsors actually sounds like a ‘War on Terrorism’.

We heard some of the same nonsense in the middle years of the conflict in Iraq (and to some extent in Afghanistan)–if you posture against terrorism, it will only inflame the hurt egos of the jihad and rally their unwitting but not unwilling allies in Western politics. � Doesn’t matter if the jihad itself is an artificially generated phenomena, fashioning both violence and extreme anti-Western misinformation as both its technique and its excuse, and whose sympathizers consider it some noble sort of grassroots political phenomena that deserves all of the plaudits of false moral relativism.

Religion, War chopra, king, obama, terrorism, war

More direct reporting from Michael Yon.

It’s not that we and our allies can’t win hearts and minds, it’s because we’re still fighting Charlie Wilson’s war.

War afghanistan, army, nato french, yon

Not that his al Qaeda would ever cooperate with a non-Sunni group. Just saying.

But collaborating? We’ll ya never know what to believe from this d-bag, but I thought we had “no leverage” with Iran.

In order to collaborate, you need to have one or both of the following: 1) some open channel to discuss your working relationship or 2) some leverage. According to the screenwriters guild on the left, we don’t have either. So, if the Egyptian’s assertion is true, I’m completely baffled.

War al qaeda, bin laden, diplomacy, iran, ryan crocker, terrorism, us, zawahiri

It’s still the same old story, told to the same adoring crowds of “open minded” supporters (and a few mythical Obamacons!). ‘We were attacked on 9/11 by Islamic zealots and we responded by. . . invading Iraq and chasing Saddam Hussein around a secret network of spiderholes.’ What a terrible example America has set–Russia now thinks it can do the same.

Russia’s incursion into Georgia closely parallels the actions the international community took against Hussein since 1990. Wait, dumbass, no it didn’t. It’s not even like that confusing affair in Kosovo, as the Ruskies claim. And Putin didn’t appear to have been stalled the least bit by corrupted allies and a disinformation regime funded by Georgian strategists giddy on the silly money leaking from unenforceable UN transfers.

So, yeah, keep making the morally equivalent jabs. It really seems to be working.

Politics, War Iraq, mccain, obama, russia, russian, war

“Sullyboat” Sullivan SWEARS McCain received some good, ol’ fashioned habeus corpus at the Hanoi Hilton, but lacks the moral stones to denounce it today.

Poor McCain. He still thinks the wrong side won the war in Vietnam.

The truth, Andrew, you’ve become the Gorgeous George Galloway of the anybody-but-McCain Left.

Politics, War john mccain, mccain, sullivan, torture, vietnam