Afghanistan

[roberth]

This is how it's going to be. We are going to fight this war, there is no escape, no running away. The terrorists have made their decision and we can't talk them out of it. Where we fight this war is up to us, we control the location. Terrorists like Aziz in Aurora are trying to bring it here, the stateside guys are doing a great job of finding them before they can kill a bunch of Americans.

I prefer to use professional soldiers in Afghanistan an Iraq to fight it. If we don't fight it over there, we will fight it here. I have no fantasies about my ability to live in a war zone.

I agree with Hoser, I don't want to have this fight here in Colorado or in the United States. That would be an unprecedented disaster.

Our CIC(gawd I hate saying that) is more on the side of the terrorists then on the side of my country, his preference is obvious as seen in his lack of decision on increasing troops in Afghanistan.

I cannot express in words my eternal gratitude for the good work our troops are doing around the world, specifically in Afghanistan and Iraq.

[DocMedic]

I’ve been fortunate (perhaps unfortunate?) to serve 15 month tours both in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now this alone doesn’t qualify me to say if we should stay or go, but I liked to think I’m a subject matter expert of the situation that I was in.

When stationed in Afghanistan, I spent ten months at a Forward Operation Base near Khoast, which is basically 12miles away from the Pakistan border. Being a grunt with a bunch of Band-Aids, I can tell you that I’ve seen my share of combat in the mountains of Afghanistan.

Morale is unnerving thing. I find morale is only as low as the leaders allow it to go. There have been a handful of times I remember were it rained and snowed on us, yet we still had to make movement. Was morale lowered because of this, perhaps? Hell you would have a few screws loose to even enjoy that environment under those conditions. This is where your leaders and NCO’s come in, Yea things suck they know this, but they also know the situation can become even worse if soldiers get complacent, twiddling their thumbs asking themselves what’s the point.

I found that I had to find ways to motivate myself, one such way is when we would go into a village, me and my PA would setup shop. Taking look at the sick and injured and try everything within are limits to help them. To me at least I believed this was helping our efforts in the country, the only way the Afghan people our going to accept us is if we show are selfless service to them that were not just invaders.

I think that the worst thing we have ever done (though truthfully I don’t have all the details about it) is turning the security of Afghanistan over to NATO. When I was in Iraq I remember hearing about the events that were happening while NATO was in control on CNN. And the only thing me and couple of my fellow NCO’s were thinking was NATO is unraveling everything that we has Just accomplished in the past 4 years in that country. Worst part is I understand why we had to give it over to NATO, with the lack of troops in the military, there was no way we could have a strong presence in both Iraq and Afghanistan, So to strengthen are support in Iraq, we had to pull troops from Afghanistan deployments and send them to Iraq. With no new deployments happing in Afghanistan, and troops coming back from their deployments we slowly became one of the weaker presence (at least what we were before) in the country.

SA Friday really hit it on the head. And since now I’m back in school studying this stuff from a university level in hopes to return to the military as an Officer. Its really has open my eyes how oblivious people are about what’s happening outside of the US, War or not. I find a good mix between Protesters and supporters on this university, but anytime I ask either or why they feel that way, the only thing I get quoted back is what is being letter headed in the news. The smarter ones with “agendas” will often question me on how I feel about it. Or try to corner me with a question that would only serve to their “needs” with the answer I might give. Usually I just Shrug and tell them I’m a Grunt and just look at them stupid like. But you know what, I’ll defend their rights to be ignorant, that means they can think for themselves without the threat of someone over them to tell them different.

Can we win this war? This isn’t a war that the US can afford to lose, but this isn’t a war that the US can win with “Traditional” means of War fighting either. For example the first Iraqi war, yes we won, but what end up happening, we went back. (Possibly not because of the same reasons.) We are finding that Traditional means of fighting wars do not work in the long run in this modern age.

Just my .02 cents

[omio]

The Taliban are and will always be part of Afghanistan. Bailey Guns said it best when talking about Iraq there are Taliban now in the government. This war will not be won by traditional means these pashtun people don't give three shits about our "democracy" they just want to farm their damn fields without getting blown to bits. And as long as we are over there fighting those "terrorists" we once called freedom fighters back in the 80s they wont be able to so they will resort to fighting us in the mean time. Its just one big fucked cycle and Dearborn, MI is a prime example that the fighting them over there idea doesn't work.

[PogoManiac7]

Sorry to correct you foxtrot.

The 2nd Engine for the F-35. Is merely an alternate power plant to help foster competition and lower prices between the two competing companies (Pratt&Whitney, GE). The F-35 is a single engine fighter, the 2nd engine program is just to help lower maintnance time and reduce costs.

The F-22 program is very dangerous in the long run to eliminate, however if we merely delayed the F-22 program so that immediate efforts and funds went towards building weapons to help us win the current wars (If i'm not mistaken our AC-130 fleet is very old).

We'll want those F-22's ten years down the road when the F-15's stop working.

Of course, why are we talking about saving money here? The only thing that this administration has done to cut costs is axe vital military programs.

[Graves]

Btw I'd love to fight some islamic warriors over here in the Rockies. Shit my own weapons, tactics, no shaving and i don't have to take shit from a dumb ass LT or Ssgt

Eeer....fail.

[MichiganMilitia]

...we need to exponentially increase the asskicking


...all these things that need to happen are all the things that obama will never do. he will screw the pooch and americans will die. just like clinton (WTC 93, mogidishu) and carter (iran).

Yes! More asskicking please!

Seriously though... Obobo has no balls. Reagan had a spine of steel. Obobo is like stretch armstrong when it comes to shaking hands with our enemies.

[Pancho Villa]

Its a no-win situation, in my opinion.

Not because the war isn't winnable per se. But the war is not winnable the way we are fighting it.

There is a good principle here: a half-fight is worse than no fight. No fighting simply doesn't confront your enemies. A half-fight hastens their victory by making them look better, weakening you and making your enemies look like they have the big advantage in willpower.

No denigrations at all at those who fight over there. But in many ways their hands are tied - between "political considerations" and the ROE, they don't do what they're best at (killing bad guys) nearly as much as they should.

Now, we have beat the enemy in the field whenever its a standup fight. That is well and good. But what has our reaction to our early victories been? Our enemy, recall, is Islamism - the political implementation of the religion of Islam. While our military is peerless and has performed, if not flawlessly, as well as any human could expect it to under the restrictions it was put under, the way the political class has handled the war has been nothing short of shameful.

For all his rhetoric about winning the war, Bush's (and now Obama, only moreso) moral premise about war remains in line with much modern thinking: war is only justifiable, not on grounds of national self-interest or protecting the rights of your citizens, but if you conduct the war in such a way as to benefit the people you are making war on. So now Iraq and Afghanistan both are gigantic drains on the treasury - not mainly for military expenditures, but for what amounts to gigantic welfare programs for both countries. That American soldiers should fight and die - so that we can supply the Afghans with roads, power, education and welfare payments - is an obscenity.

We have let both countries create their own constitutions, and - surprise! - Islam is cited by both as the ultimate law, the ultimate source of the government's authority, and so forth. Explicitly Islamic parties are not only tolerated but powerful in both countries. If you look at only one part of the enemy - Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Saddam Hussein - you can arguably say that we are moving the ball forward. But if you look at Islamism, you will see that it has taken gigantic steps forward since 2001. Al-Q is and was a terrorist organization. The Taliban and Hussein were international pariahs. But now we have handed - in the form of recognition, support, cash - Islamists a victory they could not have acheived on their own: legitimacy in the eyes of the world.

What should we do? We should man up, stop treating the middle east like one gigantic welfare state, and get down to the business of smashing Islamic governments and leaving them in ruins as a warning to anyone else who wants to try it again. Barring that, there are no good options. Staying keeps US soldiers in an un-winnable situation - not un-winnable by nature, but un-winnable because they aren't allowed to win. Leaving gives a gigantic coup to Islamic propagandists - and probably hands both countries over to the Islamic parties in their midsts.

[Hoser]

(If i'm not mistaken our AC-130 fleet is very old)

Sorry to correct you Pogo...

The latest version of the Gunship is the AC-130U. Commonly called the U-Boat. Most of them were built in the mid-late 90s.

The older Hs (30-ish years old) from the 16th SOS are still around also.