If defeating the Taliban is not our goal, what is?

[haldir]

What Is Victory? by Andrew C. McCarthy on National Review Online

Staunch supporters of our military are seething as President Obama dithers over Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s request for an additional 40,000 troops. Their frustration would be justifiable if the main issue were Obama’s inconstancy. Months ago, the president endorsed the counterinsurgency strategy of McChrystal, his hand-picked commander. Now, he is balking. In what has become a habit for Obama, he changes the rationale for his temporizing almost daily: from the need to study further a situation he had purportedly studied plenty before backing McChrystal; to the notion that a counterterrorism strategy, rather than counterinsurgency, may be the way to go; to the latest excuse, floated this weekend by White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, that the uncertainty hovering over Afghanistan’s fraud-ridden election makes a deployment decision premature.

On the right, we like to pride ourselves on seeing things as they are. Abortion is the killing of the unborn, not the “right to choose.” Illegal aliens are illegal aliens, not “undocumented immigrants.” “Reform” is not a term we would ever use for a government grab of a sixth of the private economy — and if this “reform” of health care consists of rationing and death panels, we say, “Hey, this consists of rationing and death panels.” We don’t usually abide a situation in which Robert “We’re Gonna Let You Die” Reich is the only guy in the room calling a spade a spade.

So why are we pretending that the mission in Afghanistan is something it is not? McChrystal is not trying to defeat the Taliban. Indeed, McChrystal tells Filkins it would be useless to attempt that. “You can kill Taliban forever,” he says, “because they are not a finite number.”

And here is the not-so-secret dirty little secret: Islamic militancy, whether in the form of the Taliban or its many other varieties, is “not finite.” That is because neither its source nor its center of gravity is confined to Afghanistan. Nevertheless, we have chosen not to address the source, which is Islamist ideology, and we have chosen to fight only in Afghanistan, as opposed to the many places where the enemy rolls new fighters off the assembly line. We have made these choices because we lack the will for a broader fight.

 

[CombatVet]

The huge *** pipe line that has been being built for the past 5ish years. Oh and to "Train their soldiers".

 

[jedi]

What Is Victory? by Andrew C. McCarthy on National Review Online (from the author of the article)
We have made these choices because we lack the will for a broader fight.

We can not fight the broader fight because it can NEVER be won. There is no way you can stop a ideology.

 

[45calibre]

it is to control the flow of oil over there.

 

[Esperanza]

We can not fight the broader fight because it can NEVER be won. There is no way you can stop a ideology.

I completely agree. Moreover, Afghanistan is a nation that has never been invaded successfully...food for thought.

 

[El Cazador]

We can not fight the broader fight because it can NEVER be won. There is no way you can stop a ideology.

What's your alternative?

I completely agree. Moreover, Afghanistan is a nation that has never been invaded successfully...food for thought.

I think you have your terms mixed. Afghanistan has been invaded successfully numerous times. Occupation has not been successful, yet.

 

[jedi]

We can not fight the broader fight because it can never be won. There is no way to stop an ideology.

What's your alternative?

Honestly I do not have an alternative. Look back at history and see all the wars/death that have occured bewteen christians and muslims over the right of jerusulm. The many christian crusades that all ultimatley failed. Different religious beliefs (aka ideology) have caused war on mankind as neither side can live with what the other believes in and can not leave them alone.

The logical answer to win an ideological war is to get rid of all of mankind. A 100% extinction of the spieces would thus mean there is no ideology and thus no reason to fight about it. That soultion, off course, is not an option for mankind. (Computers aka Terminators might see it different).

So if we must have mankind in the equation then their is no peaceful solution since mankind is the only animal that fights/kills "just becuase". In the animal kindgom lions only kill enough game to eat and allow the rest to escape so that the game can reproduce and the circle of life continues. Male rams fight for the privillage to mate with the females during mating season only, otherwise they don't fight each other but protect the herd.

In all cases animals only kill/fight for survival. Mankind, however, kills/fights for more than just survival. They fight/kill for greed, revenge, etc. Thus while they are the smartest of all animals they are also cursed with being the worse, most destructive.

So I don't think logically their is a valid alternative that will not result in war/fighting between the parties in the future. Thus why they say "Peace is the time of preparation between two wars." Mankind will alwalys be at war with itself and thus "world peace" is not achieavble unless you remove mankind from the equation.

I think these quotes say it best. There is no way to beat the DARK but at the same time the DARK is it's own biggest weakness.

The DARK is generous, and it is patient, and it always wins. It always wins because it is everywhere. It is in the wood that burns in your hearth, and in the kettle on the fire; it is under your chair and under your table and under the sheets on your bed. Walk in the midday sun and the DARK is with you, attached to the sole of your feet. The brightest light case the darkest shadow.

The DARK is generous, and it is patient, and it always wins - but in the heart of its strength lies weakness: one lone candle is enough to hold it back. Love is more than a candle. Love can ignite the stars.

[SOURCE: Star Wars: Episode 3 – Revenge of the Sith Novel, 2005]

 

[PatMcGroyne]

Stop the illegal immigration and Invasion by mongrels of All races.

Seal all the borders to all but legal immigration. Deport all illegals, by having the legals report the illegals for deportation, so that the relatives of the legals could come in. 0ne-out-for-one-in. Shoot to kill any interlopers, 100% dead. Treat them as our own border-guards are treated. Use traffic-stops to catch all the others. The only way to escape deportaion woulld be b a 4-year stretch in the USMC, WITH STRICT ENGLISH LESSONS. Pat

 

[CarmelHP]

There is no way you can stop a ideology.

Tell it to the Nazis.

 

[CarmelHP]

I think you have your terms mixed. Afghanistan has been invaded successfully numerous times. Occupation has not been successful, yet.

Both are nonsense. In the last 2000 years, present day Afghanistan has been held by some Empire or another for about 1800 of them, most relinquishing control only when pushed out by other invaders.

 

[haldir]

Both are nonsense. In the last 2000 years, present day Afghanistan has been held by some Empire or another for about 1800 of them, most relinquishing control only when pushed out by other invaders.

Don't take from the "its another Vietnam" theory, people on the left will get confused.