From what I have seen, modern liberals are infected with very bad idea called moral relativism. This concept teaches us that good and evil are mythical and that we are no better than our enemies. This is completely opposed to the warrior spirit, which teaches self-selection for survival. In you're really interested, view How Modern Liberals Think, a presentation by Evan Sayet at the Heritage Foundation.
You also have to factor in the military mindset... These guys were given a mission, a goal, to fix the infrastructure, save the civilians, kill the terrorists, secure the borders, install a democracy, find weapons of mass destruction, rebuild the oil pipelines, and put an end to the religious civil war... No easy task... But the mindset that some of them are in, is that they don't want to leave because they feel they haven't accomplished their goals... Some of them are not looking at the big picture, seeing that we're depleting our equipment and stretching our troops too thin; they're just focused on their mission... And while there's nothing wrong with wanting to accomplish the mission, one needs to be able to take a step back, and try to decide what to do based on all variables...
Those are just very nice people who are confused because they don't understand that nationalism, as we previously knew it, is now a historical relic. We are moving to a world defined more accurately by terms like "the core" and "the gap" than by older simpler concepts such as "us" and "them." We are moving to a world where borders are little more than hopeful lines on paper. We are moving to a world where our enemies, who made effective use of this change earlier than we did, can attack our interests at any time in any nation. It's not all bad though. We have some advantages too. The core is wealthy and powerful. If properly motivated, the core can do much to strengthen itself by closing the gap. We also have some time. No real "gap" states have effective WMD at this time. We probably have 5-15 years until they do. Heck, we could stick our heads in the sand for an entire eight year Democratic administration and probably still act quickly enough to avoid losing a major U.S. city to a nuclear attack. But, technological and cultural shifts do not manage themselves. The Bush administration has been operating since late 2001 under one set of rules and assumptions. The next administration is going to bring in it's own prejudices and assumptions. If they are good, then we will do well. If they are unrealistic, then a lot more people will die earlier than they have to. Hillary Clinton is very likely to be our next President. She and her husband have long had a very poor relationship with the U.S. military and there is no reason to expect that it will improve magically just because she and Bill have switched roles. There really is much to think about. It deserves a book, not a forum post.
nationalism devotion and loyalty to one's own nation; patriotism. the desire for national advancement or independence. expansionism A nation's practice or policy of territorial or economic expansion. Some people don't understand the difference between nationalism and expansionism.
Thank you for that stroll down the road to nowhere. And now, back to our regularly scheduled topic...
Collectivism Collectivism is a term used to describe any moral, political, or social outlook, that stresses human interdependence and the importance of a collective, rather than the importance of separate individuals. "Resistance is futile you will be assimilated." ~~~~~~~~ Individualism Individualism is a term used to describe a moral, political, or social outlook that stresses human independence and the importance of individual self-reliance and liberty. ~~~~~~~~ Which concept mentions the word liberty???
I have to agree w/ Will. I didn't see Sanchez saying anything substitive. He is a deeply unhappy guy. He was removed from command and denied the opportunity for a 4th star. He commanded troops in Iraq during a period where things got worse. His dissatisfaction is not unusual. Many retired officers have complained about the progress and leadership of the war. There were virtually no complaints or public dissatisfaction while in office. Two reasons. That goes against the position and appropriate actions of officers while on duty. Secondly, the example of Shinseki speaking out and essentially being demoted, and banished to official purgatory strongly convinced officers not to publicly speak to their disagreements with Rumsfeld and the administration. Of interest there was a lot of unvoiced dissatisfaction, during the war and is being investigated and reviewed as noted; http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/14/us/14army.html?hp=&pagewanted=print
During your service, it is the duty of an officer to express any concerns he may have with his chain of command -- and only with his chain of command. After you're out of the service... well... most military people believe that you have a continuing duty to your country, but... not all military people believe this. That can lead to interesting scenarios: It is considered acceptable to visit individually with every single member of Congress and tell them what you see as being wrong -- but it is not considered acceptable (by some) to say the same things on television. Why? Because television is an international medium. You could be giving aid and comfort to the enemy. More interesting: You could say some very nasty things at a VFW meeting in Kansas and be find, but if you said something a tenth as nasty during a speech in France you might find yourself ostracized by every officer you ever worked with.
Yet some would think telling it how it is, letting the 'country' know the truth is part of their duty Keeping it quiet and in the background so only those responsible for the mess helps how exactly? If the people dont' know the truth we will remain in the dark, the elected people who continue to mess things up might also stay in power that much longer.
Grim: Diagramming your weaknesses to those people who can fix them is considered acceptable. Diagramming your weaknesses publicly so that they will both encourage the enemy (comfort) and help the enemy to exploit them (aid) is considered unacceptable. That's just military thinking. Military people are very focused on not getting dead and people who share secrets publicly are very often responsible for getting other people dead.
I couldn't agree more... There's something (classified material) that doesn't need to be discussed... But not everything military related is classified...
Are you talking about Iraq? There's a difference between discussing certain things you see and do overseas and discussing something that's been classified...
Yet he didn't discuss anything 'secret' and you attacked him on one point for not saying more, but then he doesn't say much and he's attacked for not saying enough. To me I'm seeing an argument to attack him no matter what, if he's not for the war it's attack mode. To much, not enough, all have been shown to be attacked. The people in the background 'who can fix things' have shown to not want to fix things. The people who can fix things since those in power will not are obviously the next step, the people who decide who is in power.
Disagreements against the policies and how they were carried out was a doubly sticky situation for officers in Iraq. General Shinseki gave his opinion before Congress with regard to troop levels and was instantly banned to the sh1tter. It was a strong signal to officers not to publicly disagree with the civilian command. He did this in testimony before Congress. It was one hard @ss signal from Rumsfeld to the Pentagon. On top of that was the military credo, which is not to publicly disagree. Of interest the Times hard cover article (but not the web version) referenced an officer who resigned in late 2002 as the build up was occurring, because of disagreement with troop levels and developing strategy. But Sanchez's comments were not substitive. He is one of quite a number of retired military who have voiced disagreement with strategy during the war. I think he referenced that "more is to come". I guess we will see if something is substitive.
I don't particular like war, that's just some lunacy that ferret invented as a personal attack against my character. However, as John Stuart Mill said "War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself." For this war, of course, Hemingway is most appropriate, "Once we have a war there is only one thing to do. It must be won. For defeat brings worse things than any that can ever happen in war." The Muslims brought this war to us and we're in it. It is exceptionally poor thinking to fail to understand that there is no such thing as the "Iraq War", only the "Iraq Campaign" as part of the larger war to defend Western Civilization against Islamist expansionism. Hemingway was, in a certain sense, continuing the thought of Winston Churchill, "If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when victory will be sure and not so costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no chance of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves." We can either choose to fight Islamist expansionism now, or after they have developed nuclear or biological weapons of tremendous destructive potential. My vote is now. Of course, Churchill was just echoing Machiavelli, who stated "One should never allow chaos to develop in order to avoid going to war, because one does not avoid a war but instead puts it off to his disadvantage." It's best not to put this war off, which would be to our disadvantage. We have the advantage now and we should use it. We may not be so lucky in the future.