Help please

[nicky g]

The Dunkirk situation si not the same; Britain had absolutely no choice but to pull out, or have most of its army crushed by the Nazis.

The US troops in Beirut were not supposed to be there as allies to anyone but as part of an internation peacekeeping forece, but I find it interesting you say they were allied with the Phalange. Anyway, same old; a Republican withdraws after an attack and it's fine, there were good reasons far it etc, a Democrat does it and it's weakness. Amazing how you'll spin anything.

[Utah]

"Anyway, same old; a Republican withdraws after an attack and it's fine, there were good reasons far it etc, a Democrat does it and it's weakness. Amazing how you'll spin anything."

I have always found it distasteful to argue a position from a standpoint of what party you belong to and from a standpoint of what the other guy party would do. Decisions and actions stand on their own and they should be analyzed as such if you are looking for some truth. Argung for political position seems boring and petty.

To the argument at hand, there can be very legitimate reasons for retreat and withdrawl. However, neither Somalia or Lebanon were retreats for legitimate military means. Maybe we should not have been in lebanon. If so, why withdraw only after the attack?

[Felix_Nietsche]

"Britain had absolutely no choice but to pull out,"
************************************************** *
Of course they had a choice.
The WISE decison was for the British army to retreat.
The WISE decision was the USA to leave Lebanon.
If you have AA on a KKQQx board, and your facing an all-in bet, the WISE decision is to throw those Aces away. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]


"Anyway, same old; a Republican withdraws after an attack and it's fine, there were good reasons far it etc, a Democrat does it and it's weakness."
************************************************** ****
Lets talk facts. First lets list the military actions of Democrats.

Harry Truman: Korean War. I concede that he dealt with the communist strongly.
J.F.Kennedy: He first committed troops to Vietnam.
J.F.Kennedy: Cuban missle crisis. He dealt with the communist strongly.
L.B.Johnson: He increased America's invlovement in Vietnam. This was a strong move and in hindsite probably unwise. being a Texan, LBJ born to be strong. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]
J.Carter: Uber-Wimp with the Iranian takeover of the American Embassy.
B.Clinton: Somalia. His failure to allow the American military to deploy armor and other heavy weapons was criminally stupid. For an Arkansas lawyer to over-rule professional military men on what equipment should be deployed was mind boggling.
B.Clinton: Serbia/Kosovo. I thought this was a completely unnessasary war but he accomplished the political goal.
B.Clinton: He fired a few missles and bombed a few SAM sites .
T.Kennedy(and other Dems): Has called for an immediate retreat of US troops from Iraq.

When you compare the use of the American military by Republicans to accomplish political ends vs. the Democrats.
The Republican party is OVERWHELMING seen as being FAR STRONGER in foreign affairs. There are MANY polls in the USA that support this position. In every US election, the Democrat party is seen as weak in foreign affairs.
Numerous polls support this conclusion. And you can't spin this away. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]


"Amazing how you'll spin anything."
*********************************************
Translation = That damn Felix out-debated me again. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[bholdr]

It camn be dangerous and misleading to ask for this kind of advice on the OT politics forum here at 2+2, largely what you'll get is simple restatements of the standard partisan lines, and propaganda designed to influence your opinion towards the posters own position. If you're after opinion, however, you''ve come to the right place.

There are two ways to look at this (and indeed any) hot political issue: from a pragmatic standpoint and from an ideological one. I'll try to give you a fair overview of the current arguments. other posters are invited to fill in what i may miss. many of these are, IMO, invalid and prepostorous, but i won't say which.

here are the standard arguments as they now stand:

first for the ideological positions:

the cons will say:
We cannot pull out because....
a: we need a stable and democratic iraq to stabilize the middle east
b: there are terrorists there and we are better off fighting them there than in the U.S.
c: radical islam is the greatest threat to world security in this day and age. we must fight it.
d: We're winning, why should we pull out?

the libs will say:
we should pull out because...
a: we had no business there in the first place, we simply OUGHT to pull out.
b: It is not our perogitive to force our system of governance on other peoples (nation building)
c: radical islam cannot be fought with guns and bombs alone, we have to seek other ways to subdue/ change our enemy
d: we're losing, lets get the hell out!

and the pragmatic positions:
cons:
a: we need not only a stable iraq, but the oil, land, militay presense and diplomatic power that would result from us staying in iraq.
b: somebody has to do something before that part of the world blows us all up. we can so we should.
c: we can't afford not to do this

libs:
a: we can't leave quite yet, but it should be a priority to get out ASAP, we should not have a permanant military presence in iraq.
b: we are not the world's policeman and cannot afford to be.
c: we can't afford this.


those are the arguments as i understand them, ignoring the wackos on the fringe of both parties who say things like:
'the u.s. is conquoring the world. iraq is a first step' 'we just wanted to pick a fight' 'we're there for oil and only oil' 'this is a mission from god, and we're doing the lord's work' 'this is turning into veitnam' 'kill all the towelheads' etc...

i hope this (very brief) summary has given you something to work with, i've tried to be non-partisan aboput it, but i'm sure the libs will say i'm being a hawk and the cons will accuse me of coddling the enemy or some such nonsense.

[UOPokerPlayer]

Thanks for your comments, and thanks to everyone. It was a lot of help. Funny you mention that people on the fringe are comparing this to Vietnam, because that's what my paper essentially asked me to do. I just wrote my first draft last night, so I may be grazing this forum for the next week.

I'd wonder if any of these posters are college parli debaters because i see the same polarization here that i do at debates, (people at debates, not the actual events.) Agreed that sometimes the comments here are pretty out there. I don't think the liberals or the conservatives are going to lead to the downfall of civilization anytime soon.

In my personal opinion I believe we should look towards a pullout in the near future. I tried to find something more broad and unclear to say but that's the best i could do. The economic disadvantages are big, there are more important places troops are needed and the clincher is this: we know if we pull out tomorrow civil war is imminent, but at what point is this country going to be stable? 5 years, 10 years, 20 years? The country is going to implode anyways, why should we bear the costs? The social costs of this war go up with every casualty, and with each piece of reported violence the American public grows weary. This war certainly will take a long time to be done right, and I don't know if americans will let it go on for that long.

[Felix_Nietsche]

http://www.news.navy.mil/search/disp...story_id=17111

Each Jimmy Carter sub comes equiped with a nuclear powered white flag surrender system plus a redundent automatic white flag surrender system.

[bholdr]

[ QUOTE ]
Funny you mention that people on the fringe are comparing this to Vietnam, because that's what my paper essentially asked me to do.

[/ QUOTE ]

I wasn't saying that there aren't some very valid comparisons, just that Veitnam was on a whole different scale, and in a completly different political, economic, and geographic environment. If i were to be writing a compare/contrast paper on the two, i would focus on the impact of the (international and internal)support and orginizational systems of the communists in veitnam vs the loose affiliations of the iraq 'insurgency'.

I too would argue in favor of the quickest feasable pullout, perhaps another year would allow the iraqui security forces to reach a level of sophistication orginization and leadership ability for them to handle their own internal security. they actually have many advantages, even now, over coalition forces- the ability to communicate and relate to the people, to infiltrate the resistance, and the credibility that comes with being fellow citizens of their troubled new nation. the south veitnamese haad no chance of defending themselves.

What the debate will become in the future, and the prospect is both frightening and curious, is wether the U.S. should be maintaining a permanant militar presence in iraq. There are some dozen + military bases already established or under construction in iraq; do we ask the iraquis to tolerate a permant presence? is that smart, for us to have such a presence in the middle east? are we there in the intrest of spreading democracy, and freedom and to provide a base from which to fight radical islamic tyrrany, or are we there in our own self intrest and that of the saduis and Kuwaitis (oil? securing middle eastern investment capital? providing jobs and $$$ to companies like haliburton?). Or is it a mix of the two, and if so, which takes precedence?

another posibility: perhaps you should compare our national motivations for this war to those of veitnam (which was mostly 'stop the commies')? and don't forget to mention the 1400+ dead americans and countless dead iraquis. GL on your paper.

[sam h]

good post bholdr.

[lastchance]

Very nice post, but I do buy into the nice conservative argument you missed which is that pulling out may be a sign of weakness and get people to raise you (attack you more), which is dangerous and bad.

[bholdr]

ahh... good point forgot about that one.