When does anti-war activism cross the line?

Voronwë · Post by **Voronwë** » May 4, 2004, 1:40 pm

Pahreyia wrote:
miir wrote:
And if you are talking about America looking past two months. They often are. The Iraq thing is a prime example.

....my fellow Americans, major combat operations in Iraq have ended
Combat operations have ended. We've moved on to suppression and policing. We're not fighting an army anymore.

so a battallion (or whatever the correct term is) of Marines attempting to occupy Fallujah and calling in airstrikes from C-130 Gunships is not a 'combat operation'?

that's a police operation i guess? more American soldiers died this past April than died in "major combat operations". so i'm not really sure how important it is to play semantics.

Republican strategist Friday interviewed on CNN's crossfire said about the banner on the aircraft carrier "that was obviously a mistake".

Bush was hoping for a photo-op with that whole thing, and he got one, and it looked great at the time. He trusted Rumsfeld, Cheney, et al. to have a transition/occupation plan that would work, so there really was no reason for him to think that this was going to bite him in the ass. Unfortunately for a lot of people, least of all the president among them, the Pentagon was completely incorrect in several critical strategic approaches to post-war Iraq, even though there were capable experts within the military as well as State Dept who had worked on post-war strategies. unfortunately these strategies are now trying to be initiated 1 year too late. (ie not disbanding the army - we just turned Fallujah over to former Iraqi army officers).

The fact is that the aircraft carrier photo op, turned out to kind of bite Bush in the ass. That's the way things go when you are not engaged personally in policy planning, and trust the judgement of people who will trust their own zealot-like advocacy over the advice of the experts whose boots have been/will be on the ground.

we've come a long way from Truman's "the buck stops here". Bush is a likeable guy, so you know i guess that is more important than personal accountability or capably executing the responsibilities of your job...i don't know...like making sure the people you deputize to perform critical tasks do not pay more attention to their personal agendas than the larger organization's agenda.

Pahreyia · Post by **Pahreyia** » May 4, 2004, 1:49 pm

To the point, we're currently fighting a guerilla war against insurgents and fanatics within the borders of Iraq. By and large we're not fighting any army of note. I think the semantics make more sense here since the geneve convention rules apply to soldiers in standing armies captured in battle, terrorists and insurgents don't get such protections. It'll make a lot more of a difference if/when we get around to defending the actions of the soldiers abusing the captives in iraq (woops! insurgents aren't protected ~loophole~).

I may be willing to play less semantics games if most people here weren't so hell bent on bringing that card out whenever anything resembling a republican/conservative/moderate/not-liberal viewpoint is posted.

miir · Post by **miir** » May 4, 2004, 2:10 pm

may be willing to play less semantics games if most people here weren't so hell bent on bringing that card out whenever anything resembling a republican/conservative/moderate/not-liberal viewpoint is posted.

Nobody has brought that up but yourself.
I couldn't care less if Dubya was a memeber of the Green party or a Nazi.... the justification, reasoning and planning that went into this botched invasion was sketchy at best, and it's painfully apparent that their contingency plan for Iraq was short sighted and incredibly ignorant.

It's becoming blatantly obvious that your country's current administration had no idea what it was getting itself into when it came up with this ill concieved plan.
They essentially declared victory last May...
If that's not clear evidence of short sightedness, I don't know what is.

Kelshara · Post by **Kelshara** » May 4, 2004, 2:29 pm

It's ridiculous to not consider it a war, wether you fight guerriljas or 1 million man strong standing army. Of course, if you see a loophole in how they treat enemy PoWs I guess American PoWs go by the same loophole eh? No whining then when American soldiers are tortured?

Pahreyia · Post by **Pahreyia** » May 4, 2004, 2:29 pm

miir wrote:
may be willing to play less semantics games if most people here weren't so hell bent on bringing that card out whenever anything resembling a republican/conservative/moderate/not-liberal viewpoint is posted.
Nobody has brought that up but yourself.
I couldn't care less if Dubya was a memeber of the Green party or a Nazi.... the justification, reasoning and planning that went into this botched invasion was sketchy at best, and it's painfully apparent that their contingency plan for Iraq was short sighted and incredibly ignorant.

It's becoming blatantly obvious that your country's current administration had no idea what it was getting itself into when it came up with this ill concieved plan.
They essentially declared victory last May...
If that's not clear evidence of short sightedness, I don't know what is.

I never said that it was a genius campaign. What I did say is that semantics play a large part in this campaign to date and that people on this board, specifically you Miir, won't let a post sit 20 minutes without breaking out the semantics card to play some liberal viewpoint off of anything that doesn't conform to your views absolutely.

I don't need the same rehash of how many fuckups have been made so far in this series of operations, you do a wonderful job of making sure that every single person of average intelligence of better knows the exact statistics, your views, kerry's views, kyoukan's views, why you think your views are superior, why your views are obviouly superior and the exact milliliter volume that the bleeding-hearts have poured out in the last 18 months.

The reason Bush's statement is still true is made very clear in terms that you might even appeal to if your bloodrage didn't blind you to the central focus of my previous post once you read my reasons for playing semantics.

miir · Post by **miir** » May 4, 2004, 2:43 pm

If I told you that I had you on ignore, would you stop taking all of my posts personally?

*edit*
Done and done.... You're on ignore...

Cartalas · Post by **Cartalas** » May 4, 2004, 2:48 pm

miir wrote:If I told you that I had you on ignore, would you stop taking all of my posts personally?

*edit*
Done and done.... You're on ignore...

Pahreyia
You are so lucky!!!! I wish the Pole smoker would put me on ignore.

Voronwë · Post by **Voronwë** » May 4, 2004, 3:03 pm

what is semantics about a gigantic 100 foot wide "Mission Accomplished" poster hanging on an aircraft carrier's superstructure?

masteen · Post by **masteen** » May 4, 2004, 3:08 pm

Voronwë wrote:what is semantics about a gigantic 100 foot wide "Mission Accomplished" poster hanging on an aircraft carrier's superstructure?

The mission they accomplished was successfully serving lunch. I don't see what the problem is!

Pahreyia · Post by **Pahreyia** » May 4, 2004, 3:20 pm

Voronwë wrote:what is semantics about a gigantic 100 foot wide "Mission Accomplished" poster hanging on an aircraft carrier's superstructure?

The standing army was defeated, the government was toppled and for all intents and purposes, the country was completely occupied.

Military campaign's over, policing mission begins. It may smell the same, but the rules of engagement are different.

Once the Iraqi military was dismantled, you're no longer fighting military personnel, you're fighting insurgents / anarchists / terrorists.

nobody · Post by **nobody** » May 4, 2004, 4:46 pm

Kelshara wrote:It's ridiculous to not consider it a war, wether you fight guerriljas or 1 million man strong standing army. Of course, if you see a loophole in how they treat enemy PoWs I guess American PoWs go by the same loophole eh? No whining then when American soldiers are tortured?

one instance consisting of a small group of people and all of a sudden american's are torturer's? if you look at the big picture the american military as a whole treats POW's pretty damn good. and i do agree with you, it IS a war conventional or not.

Fredonia Coldheart · Post by **Fredonia Coldheart** » May 4, 2004, 4:52 pm

Pahreyia wrote:
Voronwë wrote:what is semantics about a gigantic 100 foot wide "Mission Accomplished" poster hanging on an aircraft carrier's superstructure?
The standing army was defeated, the government was toppled and for all intents and purposes, the country was completely occupied.

Military campaign's over, policing mission begins. It may smell the same, but the rules of engagement are different.

Once the Iraqi military was dismantled, you're no longer fighting military personnel, you're fighting insurgents / anarchists / terrorists.

So, if it should befall that while the US was meddling in the Middle East with it's army, Canada invades the US, topples the government, and dismantles the home army, the civilian population would be wrong to fight the Canadians? They would be insurgents, anarchists, terrorists and wouldn't deserve any consideration? They should just blindly accept what Canada has in store for the country?

miir · Post by **miir** » May 4, 2004, 5:04 pm

one instance consisting of a small group of people and all of a sudden american's are torturer's? if you look at the big picture the american military as a whole treats POW's pretty damn good.

There seems to be a few other reports of alleged mistreatment... Obviously, you and I know that such actions are neither widespread or condoned by the US military... however, how these incidents are dealt with should be of paramount importance to your country's leaders.

US credibility is currently running on fumes in Iraq...

Kelshara · Post by **Kelshara** » May 4, 2004, 6:48 pm

The standing army was defeated, the government was toppled and for all intents and purposes, the country was completely occupied.

Like there was every any doubt that the standing army would be defeated. What people said in advance was that it would not be easy to handle the country in the long run. And look what is happening! Exactly what people said! Whoopedo, you defeated 4 guys with WW2 rifles! Grats! Mission accomplished!

Please, the way you preach this crap almost makes me think you believe it yourself.

ne instance consisting of a small group of people and all of a sudden american's are torturer's?

No. But when you then complain about one group of enemies doing the same to you, you end up being hypocritical. You know, like when Bush whined up a storm about pictures of American prisoners yet released pictures of not only live Iraqi prisoners, but dead ones?

When you say one thing and do another you have a credibility problem. When you have a credibility problem while asking a distrustful population to "Trust us, we will help you!", you got a problem.