Random Politics & Religion #00

Problem is, none of them are leaders, negotiators, nor decision-takers. Professionally speaking of course. There are few people who can actually do that job.

I understand that, that's where negotiations come into play. Who's Syria's main ally? We can always get Putin's involvement into this to help save Syria from collapse. Turkey is also stronger than you think. We don't have to do all of the legwork ourselves.

Again, need somebody who can really do the job of leading and negotiating.

As for the religious divide...I can't help that. There is going to be that divide regardless of international politics.

We don't have to leave when our troops go back home. We can help them create a society where unity among towns and tribes can be achieved. Although it probably won't happen in a decade, possibly two, but it can be achieved. Let them know that we are here to help, but not to control over them.

If they want to break up Iraq into several states, them let them do it. Let them decide for themselves.

But at least give them a taste of a unified country.

Then don't take on more than one problem at a time? Sure, keep problems from growing if you can, but focus on one problem at a time and get it to a point where somebody else can take over for it.

Let them go to war with each other then. Again, that's where the whole "letting regions police themselves" comes from, instead of the US being the world's peacekeeper and police officer.

People in the US tired of being the cop? Let others take care of themselves instead of us taking care of them for them.

I already said Obama framed the Iraq war ending for his own benefit. There was no political will to stay in Iraq.

We're in Korea and Germany as means of power projection. To intimidate North Korea and as a holdover from the Cold War.

Also, paged 3 times in a row!

The US also had something to show for staying and maintaining a presence in Germany and Korea. The US actually has positive and productive international agreements. The people wanted to keep a presence in those countries because there was the belief they could be worked with for diplomatic purposes, as well as strategic areas of operations.

Also helps to be in an allied nation in case of needing a first response.

Canada is the World's peacekeeper. Which is why we keep getting shot by the world's police force.

It's naive, idealistic, and impractical?
So by recover, you mean conquer. Again.
The training isn't the issue. The equipment isn't the issue. You have to address issues in the culture of the country itself, which takes a significant amount of time(decades). It's hard to recover from decades of systemic abuse by authority figures.
And having those allies alienates others. Some of those we are trying to convince aren't exactly bastions of light and wholesome goodness either.
Wait, I thought we recovered their lands in the previous phase?

So how are you going to solve the economic issues of these countries that have been gutted by insurrection? How are you going to help make sure the crops are sown and recovered? How are you going to get food, water, and medicine to the needed areas until you can build up the infrastructure (and stores) again to produce these items locally?

What are you going to do about the power vacuum that occurs when you remove ISIS? Are you going to keep running the drones, and killing people's relatives terrorists?

How exactly do you intend on extracting yourself from this situation?

It's been far too long since I've seen an actual discussion in here.


It's spooky.

1) How is it conquering if we obtain nothing?
2) I already stated that there's going to be a lot of time needed for them to become a self-sustaining country. But that doesn't mean we have to have a military presence there. But the training and equipment there are issues that need to be addressed at the same time....
3) How come you think we cannot have them negotiate among themselves? You honestly think that they have no common ground, especially against a terrorist group out to destroy their way of life....
4) Recovered but not conquered. You know, because we aren't there to conqueror their lands, but let them do it themselves. Protect them while they are rebuilding their army that we let them fall apart, but let them take care of themselves.
5) Again, our responsibilities should be limited to helping them rebuild their infrastructure, due to our involvement in their destruction. Yes, we have to support them until they become self-sufficient enough to support and protect themselves. I see the underlying problem that this will A) take time, B) require different opinions on being sufficient, and C) protect them while this is going on. But you know what? We made this bed, it's high time we lie in it. It is our fault this ***happened in the first place, let's take responsibility towards their resurrection.

And when they are good to take care of themselves? Leave and only come back when there's an absolute pressing need to do so, and most importantly, not meddle with their politics. If they want to kill each other after we left? Fine, we tried, they still chose to self-destruct. At least we righted the wrong we caused to them.

Germany had many things going for it after WWII. Well once Europe got past trying to ***all over the it following the war by trying to pull it apart.

Unskilled workers could be brought in to rebuild, the German population was skilled and the country had industry and potential. Industry that could benefit Europe as a whole. Also the Cold War ramped up reasons to bolster Germany (and all of Western Europe proper) against the Soviet Union.

US holdings in the East are a means of both easing tensions between Korea, China and Japan and a means of preventing a massive military buildup in those countries. It's no secret there is little love between those nations.

1. In order to recover, one must first be willing to re-conquer.

America is seen as an invading, conquering nation to it's enemies. Especially if you are "recovering" something, you must first subdue, and conquer your enemies.

2. To maintain security and defense after recovering (Re: Conquering) Stolen Lands, you need to maintain a militaristic presence. It also doubles as a reason to maintain said presence for strategic and emergency responses (as you've already pointed out in your other post a few moments ago)

3. In the time following the immediate resolution of a strife, there needs to be some kind of mediator to make sure the first few years of negotiations go smoothly and amicably. Otherwise, even in the aftermath of war clearing out, another could break out just as easily. Politics 101. Knowing your enemies 101.

4. This comment and idea is in direct contrast, and contradictory to points 1, 2, and 3. And contrary to itself. If the US is there to protect them during said aftermath so they can rebuild, why then, are they required to do it themselves, when they are focusing entirely on rebuilding?

I could say how you plan to sell this to the American people again but I'd become painful repetitive. The whole reason libertarians have become vocal and the whole isolationist sentiment has become a thing again is because your proposing MASSIVE amounts of spending with little if any returns.

Trillions to start. Countless American lives would likely be lost in this conflict. Again. Maybe 10 years if we're optimistic.

It's an invasion because we'd have to team up with regional actors to take back territory and hold it while pushing out ISIS. You're invading a nation with the means of stabilizing it against terrorists. Textbook nation building.

And you damn well bet we'd need a standing army there or what's happening now will simply happen again. The internal corruption of the Iraqi government would have to be rooted out, the religious conflicts are what cause distrust in government and the regional provocateurs only add fuel to the fires.

That's before you throw in that many Iraqis didn't trust the Americans to begin with. So you're 'helping' people who don't even want you there. And then you propose to build up this country only to see your structures bombed into oblivion or become hideouts for groups that'd pour in to wage jihad? Like AQ in Iraq did the first time. Before they'd morph into elements of ISIS.

I've mentioned this before but it seems this needs to be repeated

Bush negociated the Iraq treaty in 2008 to withdraw all troops by December 31, 2011.

This was a bipartisan decision.

As for Germany and South Korea, completely different situations. Bases were set-up and maintained there because of the cold war/communisim and the countries wanted the US there, unlike Iraq.

Many bases in Germany have been closing down since the 90's and more will be closed down soon. Some are there to support NATO operations and will continue under NATO funding.

Oh wow thats what we did, have been doing, and continue to do, despite the interference from the past and present Iraqi gov't. They were trained, armed, and put in easily defensible positions throughout their country. When it came to time to fight, they ran away. It wasn't because they were improperly trained, it was because they were either cowards/their commanders were cowards/their commanders were a different religion than them. None of that is America's fault.
They were trained..they haven't maintained their training. Their fault.
They were armed, they haven't maintained their equipment. Their fault.
They held the key positions in their country, they abandoned them. Their fault.

Blame Obama as much as you want based on your feelings and not actual events, at some point in time, Iraqis are going to have to wake up and realize they have an overwhelming physical advantage over their enemy, get over their mental disadvantage and take their country back.

Also:

If you can find a way to make the Sunni and Shia stop hating each other for the first time, EVER, then you will win a Nobel Peace Prize. They don't care that ISIS is overrunning their country, they only care about being Sunni and Shia. Thousands of years of hate pretty much says there is no common ground nor will there ever be.

We're Americans, so...

...Clearly the answer is embracing the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal and only savior. If only they would see it...

We should totally send missionaries over there to show them the light.

1) Because what you perceive it to be doesn't really matter. It's what the people who live there perceive it to be. And the US doesn't have the most sterling of reputations anymore, with drone strikes, renditions, NSA spying, invasions, meddling in foreign governments.
2) Uh, yes it does. Otherwise, you start the spin all over again. The reason is typically twofold (at least). Static military presences generally provide more stability/security from both a physical and economic perspective.
3) History?
4) This will take decades. Anyone that has experience to any extent is probably someone you don't want, so you are looking at establishing a military from scratch. Or you are just re-establishing problems.
5) See 4) regarding timeframe. And the US hasn't really meddled in politics to prevent one faction or country from killing the other (unless it would hurt US interests, of course). In fact, we're fairly notable for *not* intervening in those cases.

It's an attack of the MERFs!

but we don't get to overthrow obama and install a military junta if we do things your way.

It's amazing how many times that comes up in conversation.

The German and Japanese bases continued to be staffed because of disarmament agreements stemming from their surrender in WWII as well. No such agreements exist with a lot of the countries we continue to occupy, though, that's a subject for a different day.

To answer both of you:

I keep forgetting that we aren't dealing with rational human beings in the Middle East. Or, that's the way you are making it sound like.

Yes, their religious difference will be there, and if they want to kill each other after we leave, so be it. But at least let's fix the problems we left them with instead of leaving them high and dry, ok?

Can we at least agree to that, or are you going to find faults in that? I have yet to see any solutions coming from either of you, just criticisms.

That would kill two birds with one stone. Give them something new to shoot at and I wouldn't dread the doorbell.

As a species, humans aren't particularly rational.
And you asked for comments, not solutions.
But if you want an actual, long-term solution, you are looking at spending on the order of 1-5 years of active military presence followed by 40-60 years with passive military presence in the area. That appears to be a solution which generally works historically. (for some values of "works")

Which is why the US has fallen victim to one of the classic blunders - the most famous of which is "never get involved in a land war in Asia" .

The only slightly less famous classic blunder is never challenge a Sicilian to a game of wits when his life is on the line!

I did ask for comments, but I assumed that the comments would have been met with either ideas on either improvements on my idea or a completely new idea.

But basically you just said a very simplified version of what I said.

http://news.yahoo.com/did-gop-create-isis-why-rand-paul-says-163355832.html

The problem is one of history and one of time. America is not willing to stay the period needed to create substantive change (decades at least) or apply the type of capital required in order to make it work. Because Iraq ain't worth it. Living under dictatorships and unstable governments, it's not surprising when people simply keep to themselves in small units. Small units that then get picked off by invading armies like ISIS.

At best we could attempt to go in, hit ISIS hard in an attempt to degrade their capabilities but even that could shape up to be a years long campaign, and im not talking about nation building. Syria again is a problem because the Islamic *State* spans the two countries.

Secondly would be to get state actors in the region to unite to defeat IS. It's not like this is impossible given countries like Jordan and Saudi Arabia have commit to a bombing campaign under the aid of the US but actual ground forces. That's the rub.

It isn't like bitter enemies haven't banded together against a common enemy before but honestly I feel like we're still waiting for a major ISIS victory to get peoples *** in gear. Bad as that sounds.

Either way it's gonna be alot of handwringing to get 'Murica back on the ground.