Young Turks: Generals Refused To Give President Obama War Exit Strategy

[CherylK]

Run time: 04:52 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kcJsF2A9cQ   Posted on YouTube: September 24, 2010 By YouTube Member: TheYoungTurks Views on YouTube: 14890   Posted on DU: September 26, 2010 By DU Member: CherylK Views on DU: 1310

 
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/21/AR2010092106706.html

[rocktivity]

1. Then, as commander in chief, Obama should give THEM

an exit strategy!

:mad:
rocktivity

[JTFrog]

4. Bob Woodward: Obama Determined to Find Afghanistan Exit Strategy.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/woodward-obama-determined-find-afghanistan-exit-strategy/story?id=11698528

In "Obama's Wars," Woodward writes that in 2009, the president was intent on pursuing a way out of the war in Afghanistan. Obama is said to have pushed doggedly for an exit plan from his military advisers, only to be confounded when they offered plans that called for an increase in troops.

When his advisers did not offer a strategy that satisfied him, Obama "finally crafted his own strategy, dictating a classified six-page 'terms sheet' that sought to limit U.S. involvement," according to the Washington Post's write-up of "Obama's Wars." Woodward draws from interviews with top administration officials, detailed meeting notes and classified documents.

[vaberella]

11. LOL. You haven't been keeping up. He did. n/t

[Hassin Bin Sober]

14. He fired General "You are fucking with the wrong guy" Petraeus?

Last I heard, he got a promotion.

[vaberella]

15. Uh did you read the comment the poster said, that I responded too.

Don't spin things so you can push your views. Petraeus is under Obama's orders and now has to suck it up. He's following the timeline set forth by the President (which is what I said and the poster claimed wasn't done). So why fire him when you make him eat shit by listening to what you have to say...so all his loudmouthed crap is out the window because Obama set the ground rules.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

16. Yes, I read that poster's comment. And I grasped its meaning.

Apparently you didn't.

[vaberella]

17. No, I took it at face value.

I didn't realize there was an intended secret message. Maybe the poster can inform us lesser mortals of his "real" intentions instead of putting it in code. I'm not 12 years old to sit there and decipher code speak.

[izquierdista]

2. "I'm the President"??

Hah! Obama asserts himself like pile of wet spaghetti. He's passed up opportunities for 'change' from day -1. Never should have kept Gates on in Defense, never should have left Bushie U.S. attorneys stay on, never should have recycled Bill Clinton's hand-me-downs (like Summers), and should have kept firing generals until he got to one who could do what he was asked to do. I believe that's the way Eisenhower made it up from Lt. Col. at the beginning of WWII.

[sulphurdunn]

3. The US doesn't operate

like a traditional oligarchy but more like an organized crime syndicate or a feudal kingdom. Everyone has his turf and works with other gangs when it serves their purposes. When it doesn't, they fight. Every syndicate or kingdom has a titular head, a king or a boss who is not always as powerful as some of his barons or capos. Right now I think the executive office gang is pretty small time compared to the Pentagon and Wall Street gangs. If Obama bucks these guys too much they'll make him an offer he can't refuse. They may already have.

[Diclotican]

6. sulphurdunn

sulphurdunn

Or they could do, as they did when Kennedy wanted to get out of Vietnam, A war both the Secretary of Defence, and most of the higher brass in Pentagon KNEW was lost alleready in the early 1960s, but for political reasont draged on into 1975, when US had to depart in shambles from the rooftop of the Ambassadey in Saigon, leaving ten of thousands south vietnamese in the mercy of the north.... Ten of thousands who had suported US, and who had given US more information about the war, than most wanted, or want to reqonize today

We all know what happened to John F. Kennedy in Dallas 1963, but we still do not know who was behind the kill... Oswald was just a puppet on a string, a kill like that have more "friends" in high places than this. And I would say the kill is still unsolved into more info is coming to light

And we all know that Kennedy and the generals NEVER got aye to aye on most things.. From the botched invation in the Bay of Pigs, via the Cuba missile crises to Vietnam. The generals and the Kennedys never was in agreement, and Kennedy had to fight nail and hand combat with them over every difficult issue for not loosing total control

Maybe we are in the same area her.. Where Obama want one thing, to get out of Afghanistan - the graveyard of Empires when the generals want to get "a victory with honor" situation, where they could get their soldiers back that way... In fact Afghanistan are not a easy country to leave, when you are first stuck into it.. I for one doubt that Pakistan, or Russia want ten of thousands of US/NATO forcers on their ground, even for a short time if the worst is to happend.. AKA total loss of control, and the need for leaving the country in a hurry... One thing is to get soldiers out, that can be arrenged by air, but all the equipment, and all the weapons who can not be sendt by aircraft... That is another matter.. And one of the few routs out of Afghanisten, the Khyber pass, is dangrous, and have to be protected 24/7 for weeks, if NATO/US forcers was to use that road to get out.. Not to say, that the roads had to be more or less rebuild from scratcs, as the roads today can not even handle local traffic (I have read a lot) on a decent level... The Khyber pass is a bottleneck not easy controlled, and even greater empires than US, have had their problems protecting that bottle neck... But off course, they do not have UAV to keep an eye on the area, and I doubt even the british had airplanes to bomb everyone who was seen as a danger when they was in the area...


Diclotican

[sulphurdunn]

9. Had Kennedy lived

I think I would not have gone to Vietnam.

[Diclotican]

10. sulphurdunn

sulphurdunn

I belive MANY who had to go to Vietnam from the 1960s, to 1975 would not be put in the pithull of worms if Kennedy had stayed alive and maybe get US out of Vietnam all togheter.. He, and many around him, included McNamara Know that Vietnam was a lost cause before Kennedy got shot.. And should have raised more hell about it than he did when he had the opportunity to do it... He failed many missrabley over that case.... Even tho he regret it in later day, it was a stain, many never forgot him for..

I am not an american, and was born a year after Vietnam was over, and have just the know-how from the history book but I would say, you have doing your country a good service, and I hope you was not just trown out with the garbage when your use was up, and had to fight for yourself when you came home.. At least I hope you had caring familiy who was there for you, even after you was changed from what you was before the war.. And I really hope you have not been damaged to mutch, after what you experienced in the war..

Hope you are well and that your memories are not to bad..

I had familiymembers who never got over their experienses of World War two.. And who regulary had flashback to earlies times, specailly when they was sick and had to go to hospital. My fosterfather, when he was on his last leg in his jurney in life, was often really scared about why he was in hospital, and belived Gestapo to be out for him, to poisend what he drunk and so one.. It was allmoust just my foster mother, who could convince him, that what he drunk was not spiket or poisened in any form... Thankfully he got away "easy" after just two weeks in hospital, not years as his mother had been living as a "thing" rather than a human beeing.. My real mother had a uncle, who surived tree years of Bergen-Belsen and Dachau KZ camps, and even tho he never told anyone about his experienses, he weighted 40kg when he got home - when he was arrested he was a healty man about 100kg hevy.. He died in 1989 Im been told... He never got back to 100 kg again, the body was just not able to get enough kg on him again...

Diclotican

[felix_numinous]

5. I knew it-the presidency has more limits than people realize

and there are some things they have to go along with. Explains so much.

[watajob]

7. "We're not some military junta!"

Unfortunately, Cenk, we are. Ike warned us about this 2 generations ago. It was already happening then and it's done nothing but get worse since. I weep for my children.

[Joe Chi Minh]

8. Truman knew what to do with uppity generals, and no messing.

You shall NOT return!

[vaberella]

12. You do realize that would be political suicide in America.

There has been way too much praise of the military in the United States. The Generals have a lot of push.

[Joe Chi Minh]

13. Only political? Maybe things are looking up.

[Devil_Fish]

18. Obama should tell Patrayus: "OK Budy, you have one month to take a platoon

Filled with the rest of your Chicken Hawk Generals into the hills of Afganistan and get Bin Ladin. Don't come back untill you have his head.