Potential military pardons

If you've ever seen the effects of a blood or blister agent you may think twice about that.

The upper end of the military would function perfectly if the fuckstick politicians would stay out of it.

This is how it should go
Politician: We have to go to war over there
General: Great, we'll get it done sir
Politician: We need you to...
General: Shut the fuck up. You have no lines in this play.

 

I won't argue that.

 

The info is out there.
I don't care for the whole damn thing. Yeah, war is war. Get 'er done and shit. This officer disobeyed orders, not because they were illegal or immoral, but because HE wanted it that way. He is innocent of murder because you can't prove that he did not act in self defense. They should have just kicked his ass out.

 

If I remember right, they knew it was him but couldn't prove it. So after the interrogation was over, Golsteyn followed him and killed him. That's what I hate about these police actions - they wind up with some crazy ROE's that mix up civilian policing (which soldiers aren't usually trained for) and warfighting.

 

I haven't found a good source but I only did a limited search. Also, I do not know how the military operates in cases like this and thought somebody with direct experience might see the thread and weigh in.

 

Didn't this happen in Afghanistan in an active combat region? If so, that's more WTF is going on? He was sent over for a reason and it seems like he was doing that.

 

Politics is economics by other means. War is politics by other means. Thinking you can separate the 3 is just idealism.

Know how we crushed the Confederacy? Lincoln manipulated those retards into attacking Fort Sumter and this created the political will to destroy them by making them the aggressor. There was zero consensus to fight them when they seceded. If he’d just let the generals march on them we’d have brought European powers onto their side and he’d never have unites the country against them.

I think you’re on the right track, but we need an allegory:

If you can’t create or maintain the political will to crush the enemy, don’t fight. Call it at an addendum to the Powell doctrine.

I don’t think politics interfering with war is the problem. I think the problem is we go to war without the political consensus to win absolute victory.

Iraq isn’t seen as a mistake because we invaded, it’s seen as a mistake because we lost. If we’d had the will to completely control and subjugate the country and remake them how he wanted, it’d be seen as genius today.

The problem isn’t political interference, the problem is lack of will and political consensus to achieve total victory. Colin Powell is completely right. Fight and win with overwhelming force or stay home.

 

The problem with the PD is that it's not universal to different cultures. We were so successful in Europe because we were the same people (there wasn't such a huge culture clash between the occupiers and the occupied). Things worked out with the Japanese solely because of their "honor in defeat" culture - they respected us because we bested them. The middle east is different in that as long as they follow islam, will never be subjugated by a non-islamic force.

 

I don’t know if you can attribute our successful occupation of Germany and Japan to cultural factors. We crushed them utterly and showed them they were totally beaten. I mean we literally burned Japanese civilization to the ground, we nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki because we’d already torched their bigger cities. If I remember correctly, there were German groups that tried to mortar occupation troops. The standard response was counter battery fire with full fledged artillery right into whatever town or shithole it came from.

We were successful by the fact that we completely crushed both societies first, then occupied them with utter ruthlessness. We’ve never brought that in any of our later misadventures. People that haven’t been shown they’re beaten can’t be controlled.

 

I can't disagree with most of that.

Take Somalia as an example. The complete military superiority of US forces couldn't win because their hands were tied from the get go because of politics. As ryoung pointed out, the middle east will not be ruled by a non Islamic force, so the mind set to fight over there must be different. You don't win that war with overpowering force, you win it by making them not want to fight Americans. In order to do that, less than PC culture must be applied. They can't do it, again because of politics. Broadcast US soldiers dipping their ammunition in pigs blood and see how quickly the enemy is willing to go into combat. Carpet spray pigs blood instead of bombs on enemy strong holds. You get the picture.

 

Nope, while there is politics for sure and I bet some branches more so... The Lt Col and up that I have met have generally been sharp and VERY focused on achieving the mission. The best ones know what they don't know in the tech area and demand to be briefed in terms that help them get it done. Yes I have seen exceptions such as the cat killer of kwaj.....

Of course when they are at the Pentagon it gets more political for sure and if they have to deal with politicians for sure at a minimum at that time. Obama injected a bit more political correct tests on getting to upper command for sure though others in the past had some also.

 

So while most don't want to say it we need to destroy the religion. Just as we subjugated 'god' aka the emperor in Japan. Thus breaking the rule. If the dome of the rock was leveled, along with Mecca with no final imam appearing it might be enough. Sadly this would cost 100's of thousands of lives just as WWII with Japan.

 

I don't know that you can kill a religion at this point. There's over a billion of them worldwide. It needs to just dwindle on it's own, in the same fashion Christianity and Judaism have slid to a secondary role in the western world. That'll probably happen eventually, but we may not have 600 more years...

 

AOC will be happy you are spreading her gospel!

 

The only global warming I'm concerned about is the instantaneous kind that comes with multiple detonations of thermonuclear warheads.

 

Kill is the wrong word as you pointed out. However just as the defeat of the emperor proves logically he is not 'god' you need a similar event (I vaguely remember part of surrender was him also stating he was not a deity) In the case of Islam when the Mosque at Mecca is destroyed it is supposed to trigger an event. Unlike in Christian religions which recognize Armageddon yet have not specific trigger that could be forced externally. Thus the contents of my post. But no it would not make everyone drop the mic and walk off.