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By bballfan84
Registration Days Posts
#460851
If you are the president what action do you take on these two dynamic situations.
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#460857
bballfan84 wrote:If you are the president what action do you take on these two dynamic situations.
With Russia, I would have landed AF1 at Kiev International. And as I was shaking hands with their PM, with cameras flashing and rolling, have had several C-17's landing in the background. My first statement would be. 'Here is the stuff you wanted. Since I was in the area I figured I'd go ahead and drop it off myself, just so I know you got it. Hers my cel number, just give me a call if you need anything else. Well, gotta go. I have a Tee Time at St Andrews, and you know how hard those are to get.just tell my guys where you want them to put the stuff. And I'm sure they wouldn't turn down a couple of cases of Ukraine's best Vodka."

ISIS. 'Mr Iraqi PM? Purple Haize here. Look, we have this treaty that says we will only supply the Kurds through your guys. That's a real good idea since you guys can monitor what weapons they have. I know you are real busy right now, and I want to help. So you guys don't have to take troops and resources away from fighting ISIS or ISIL or whatever I'm calling it this week, here's what we are going to do for you guys. Were going to go ahead and ship the materiel directly to the Kurds. Now, I know that makes you a little nervous, but rest assured we are going to email you, in advance mind you, the invoice of what they will be receiving to be followed up by a signed hard copy of the Delivery invoice. What's that? Oh no no no. Don't bother yourself. The Kurds have offered to help with some airstrips so we can land our equipment. But since you offered, what about letting us keep some of our Close Air Support units on some of those bases? No, we don't need anything fancy, even a couple of unused ones will be fine. This will let us help you guys a lot more quickly. What's that? Sure, we were hoping to put some Vipers and Apaches there too. I mean F-18's can only do so much, am I right? Plus, some idiot phased out our A-10's so these are what we have. Hey, look it, it know your busy and I have a photo thing with the FFA Biggest Hog Winner from Fargo. What's that? Yeah, I guess you guys don't have a lot of hog farmers over there. Man, you don't know what you're missing when I say bacon. Alright, great, I'll have those invoices emailed to you right away."
User avatar
By bluejacket
Posts
#460883
We should definitely not continue gunrunning. If anyone in the media put any effort into their jobs, they would uncover a scandal 100x bigger than Iran-Contra.
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#460907
bluejacket wrote:We should definitely not continue gunrunning. If anyone in the media put any effort into their jobs, they would uncover a scandal 100x bigger than Iran-Contra.
:dontgetit
Were you even alive during the Iran-Contra hearings? I most certainly hope we are shipping weapons to both the Ukraine and the Kurds. Well, we are the Kurds but they don't seem to be getting to them due to Iraqi bureaucracy. While we are at it reinstall the missile shield in Poland etc.
User avatar
By bluejacket
Posts
#460943
For the past several years, we have been trafficking arms to Syria and sending advisors to train the rebels, including members of IS. Regardless of what we do, the Kurds and Iraqis are going to be fighting bloody battles against weaponry that we have been sending to Syria, in addition to the airpower and armor that IS has captured from Iraqi, Kurdish, and Syrian forces. Some sources estimate that 3,500 tons of weapons have already been sent from the US to Syria through the CIA and other intermediaries and that flow of weapons continues to flow. Benghazi was just the tip of the iceberg; US arms trafficking is the scandal that almost no one talks about. Libya and the rest of the Middle East are directly related to this issue, but that is beyond the question.

Step #1: pressure the Turks to stop buying and trading IS's oil and freeze their international financial assets as much as possible. That is how IS keeps functioning; stopping those two things, combined with stopping our weapons flow to Syria, should steadily decrease IS's military capabilities and their ability to maintain their military. Step #2: following Congressional approval (in this scenario, I'm calling an emergency session), tell the Iraqis and Kurds we are going to begin destroying IS in Iraq immediately and force them back into Syria with special forces/CIA and air/drone strikes (both of these are already happening, but not nearly at the levels that they need to be) in conjunction with the forces that they have. Internationally, we will work with our allies through diplomatic channels and encourage them to join us in the fight against IS but be prepared to fight alongside only the Iraqis and Kurds if others will not join. Step #3: tell Bashar al-Assad that we will continue the offensive against IS inside his country as long as he agrees to the conditions we set (mainly related to ending the Syrian Civil War). If Assad doesn't agree, he can deal with the remnants of IS himself. They are his enemies as well as ours and he will have to continue fighting them whether we help him or not.

Poland doesn't need a missile shield; they are already members of NATO and in no danger of being attacked by the Russians or anyone else. The NATO Rapid Response Force in Eastern Europe that the President announced yesterday would do absolutely nothing; 25,000 NATO troops (air, land, and sea) rotating every six months are not even a speed bump to the Russian military. The only thing that these actions would do is escalate the tensions between NATO and Russia even further, cost us diplomatic power in the current crisis, and damage relations in the long-term.

Unfortunately, we waited far too long to keep eastern Ukraine and Crimea attached to the rest of Ukraine. Russian troops are already all over those parts of the country and, for all intents and purposes, cannot be stopped from fully annexing eastern Ukraine if they want to take it. Crimea showed it definitively. Further arms trafficking in Ukraine would just create more casualties and further destabilize the entire country. This situation only had a slight chance for recovery during the initial stages of the Ukrainian Revolution in 2013-4 at the very latest. Most likely, it would have required more prudent actions during the Orange Revolution of 2004-5. In short, we have to get out of the current crisis as quickly as possible, stabilize Ukraine, and then press for their membership in NATO.
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#460963
Do you have a source for the US arming ISIS? I know there was scuttlebutt about the Benghazi Annex being a way station for arming the Syrian rebels but ISIS. In fact the criticism has been that we waited too late into the conflict to even thinking about arming the Syrian rebels. Had we acted sooner, we could have supported more moderate Syrian rebels and denied ISIS a recruiting ground.
As for Poland not needing the missle shield, you might wanna check with the Poles about that. In fact, the US was planning on putting a system in place in Poland and Czechoslovakia under the W administration, but it was cancelled under the current Admin. Granted, it was theoretically being placed there to counter annIranian threat, I'm sure those 2 countries had their eyes looking East as well.
As for the Rapid reaction force, it could be used as trip wire or something to buy time,but I seriously doubt its effectiveness.
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By BJWilliams
Registration Days Posts
#460969
I have a more detailed answer but basically (and I am in the minority here) but I would give Putin 48 hours to clear out then send inspectors in with soldiers accompanying them, and if they attacked them, blow them off the face of the earth (after congressional approval of course)
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#460974
BJWilliams wrote:I have a more detailed answer but basically (and I am in the minority here) but I would give Putin 48 hours to clear out then send inspectors in with soldiers accompanying them, and if they attacked them, blow them off the face of the earth (after congressional approval of course)
What type of inspectors? Didn't really work in Iraq or Korea
You are willing to start WW3 over this?
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By bluejacket
Posts
#461187
Purple Haize wrote:Do you have a source for the US arming ISIS? I know there was scuttlebutt about the Benghazi Annex being a way station for arming the Syrian rebels but ISIS. In fact the criticism has been that we waited too late into the conflict to even thinking about arming the Syrian rebels. Had we acted sooner, we could have supported more moderate Syrian rebels and denied ISIS a recruiting ground.
Yes. There are other credible articles, but this is one off the top of my head. If you would like to see more, let me know and I'll pass them along. http://www.washingtonpost.com/postevery ... ning-them/ I have seen nothing recently to suggest that we are continuing to directly arm and/or train IS or people who are likely to join IS (either with our "advisors" or through other intermediaries who we deal with), but there are other problems because we continue arming the Syrian rebels. One problem is that the arms that the US is still sending to Syria are now flowing into Iraq, Kurdistan, and Syria. Often times, IS is purchasing weapons and ammunition from the poorer Syrian "rebel" factions that we are funding in addition to the weapons that they have captured or already purchased. Once our weapons arrive in Syria, we have no control over which group they remain with. Our weapons are not their sole source of weapons and arms (many of their supplies are coming from Turkey), but our flow of weapons in the region should be stopped.

There are very few "moderate" Syrian rebels. I can expand on that more, in another post if you would like.
Purple Haize wrote:As for Poland not needing the missle shield, you might wanna check with the Poles about that. In fact, the US was planning on putting a system in place in Poland and Czechoslovakia under the W administration, but it was cancelled under the current Admin. Granted, it was theoretically being placed there to counter annIranian threat, I'm sure those 2 countries had their eyes looking East as well.
I am sympathetic with the Poles and understand their concerns. Events 75 years ago this very week caused a national tragedy in their nation that taught them hard lessons in international diplomacy. But they are in a much stronger place than they were in 1939 through the creation of NATO. It is understandable that they need reassurances, but they need to understand that NATO will protect them against any aggression. Ukraine does not have those guarantees, which is one of the reasons why Russia is more brazen in their actions in that nation.
Purple Haize wrote:As for the Rapid reaction force, it could be used as trip wire or something to buy time,but I seriously doubt its effectiveness.
We have 28,500 military personnel in the United States Forces Korea, a comparable but far stronger force to what this new NATO group would ever be. They are not even a speed bump if North Korea ever decides to invade South Korea again. This force in eastern Europe will be the exact same thing except far weaker because NATO troop rotations will destroy unit cohesion every six months and the force will be asked have to cover a military front of at least 2000 kilometers in distance (Tallinn, Estonia to Istanbul, Turkey is around 2069 kilometers). In either case, the troops will not buy time or trip any wires. Instead, almost all of them will be killed, wounded, or captured if they are unfortunate enough to run into the enemy.
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By bballfan84
Registration Days Posts
#461327
I have a solution for Iraq and Syria...we take it over completely..it becomes apart of America..we then make it a requirement for all people seeking citizenship to live in Iraq and Syria for a full two years as US Citizens. Once that 2 years is over they are free to live wherever they want within the states. Additionally all males between the ages of 18-40 seeking citizenship will have to serve in the military unit that is protecting Iraq and Syrai..once your two years are up WELCOME TO THE US!!! problems solved. We no longer have issues in Iraq, Syria and the border..and to top it off we have even more oil!!
By Humble_Opinion
Registration Days Posts
#461352
Here's my question: How and where does that hot microphone comment Obama made back in 2012 to Medvedev fit in with everything that is going on relating to the Ukraine...? More flexibility after the election?

As an aside... Mitt got it right for the most part in this article. Peace through strength should be considered a universal truth by now. I'm not sure why liberals are so willing to ignore the history here, but it's dangerous.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ ... story.html
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#461368
BuryYourDuke wrote:I prefer the "peace through peace" option. Also known as the "peace through minding your own business" option, or the "how about we actually try to understand the people we are fighting" option. Additionally, see the "we don't go bankrupt" option.

Now that we got that out of the way...commence with bombing the world for guys.
I prefer the Peace through Strength option.
I side with those who realize that their is evil in the World and if those who can do something don't, then evil wins.
Now that we got that out of the way, let's go back into our little bubble :D
By SuperJon
Registration Days Posts
#461378
You cannot and will not stop radical religious battles, no matter what you try. It's been going on since the beginning of time.
By Humble_Opinion
Registration Days Posts
#461380
BuryYourDuke wrote:I prefer the "peace through peace" option. Also known as the "peace through minding your own business" option, or the "how about we actually try to understand the people we are fighting" option. Additionally, see the "we don't go bankrupt" option.

Now that we got that out of the way...commence with bombing the world for guys.
I know this is on the micro-scale, but at what point do you draw the line in when it's right to intervene in another's affairs? I get it... you're a libertarian and think we should only use force when it's a direct threat against our own soil. But what about in your own personal life? Do you really not think that there are people out there who are more than willing (and plenty able) to threaten your own life without you provoking them? What about the life of a friend? Would you be fine intervening in a scuffle if you saw your friend get attacked on the street, or would you apply your libertarian logic to that situation as well?

It seems to me that the sort of logic you employ as it relates to international policy and foreign affairs really only works in a vacuum. In reality it seems more like a suicide pact to me, especially considering the types of enemies we have come across in our short 250 years of existence.
Last edited by Humble_Opinion on September 8th, 2014, 3:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
By Humble_Opinion
Registration Days Posts
#461383
SuperJon wrote:You cannot and will not stop radical religious battles, no matter what you try. It's been going on since the beginning of time.
There are a lot of things that have been going on since the beginning of time, such as violent crime. You're not an advocate of getting rid of self-defense laws and police forces are you?
By SuperJon
Registration Days Posts
#461386
No I'm not. But I'm an advocate of knowing the causes of things and realizing the big picture instead of just bombing the crap out of everything in a giant, global, pissing contest.
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By Purple Haize
Registration Days Posts
#461414
SuperJon wrote:No I'm not. But I'm an advocate of knowing the causes of things and realizing the big picture instead of just bombing the crap out of everything in a giant, global, pissing contest.
You can know the cause of things and the big picture and still bomb the crap out of them! :D
I'm anti just randomly bombing people for no reason. But I'm a Peacenik that way. :mrgreen:
User avatar
By thepostman
Registration Days Posts
#461431
bballfan84 wrote:isis killed two americans what bigger picture do you need
with that logic there are a lot of countries killing American missionaries, should we go and bomb those groups too? I think it is absolutely terrible and incredibly sad but this logic is awful.
By SuperJon
Registration Days Posts
#461434
bballfan84 wrote:isis killed two americans what bigger picture do you need
Two lives are not worth thousands.
User avatar
By bluejacket
Posts
#461440
One day, Americans are going to understand the threat that radical jihadists and their supporters pose to US national security. Unfortunately, its going to take an event more severe than 9/11 to clarify things.
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