A Good Trade-Off

[Dog Wonder]

What is that 'it'?

 

[Ms Tree]

Seems we have propped up numerous despots in our history. Seems we also do not learn from our mistakes. C'est la vie. How is it we then wonder why people have their doubts when we offer to help?

 

[SparrowHawk]

Seems we have propped up numerous despots in our history. Seems we also do not learn from our mistakes. C'est la vie. How is it we then wonder why people have their doubts when we offer to help?

Well Ms Flippy Floppy I seem to recall that when I mentioned our interventionist policies and how they backfired in our faces I was a kook. What happened?

The CIA calls it "Blow Back"

Overthrow the ELECTED government of Iran in 1953, Install Shah, Iranians Revolt toss out Shah and become enemies of the US and begin work on A bomb. Surprised?

US props up Fulgencio Batista y Zaldívar in Cuba. Castro overthrows Batista install Communist Dictatorship resulting in the ill-fated Bay of Pigs, Cuban Missile Crisis, Mariel Boat lift and a 50 year trade embargo

US support Anastasio Somoza, Leading to the overthrow by the Sandinista's, Iran Contra ect ect.

CIA Murder of Salvador Allende dully elected President of Chile. Installation of Augustin Pinochet and his rain of terror leading to the disappearance of thousands of citizens.

Anyone seeing a pattern here? Or is it just me? These events are but a few examples of how an interventionist, imperialist foreign policy hurts the US for year after year. Now we can't afford the foreign adventurism yet we keep 50K soldiers near harms way. There is money to pay for Medicare and SS. It's in Kuwait among other places.

If/When Iran nukes Israel it will be the Interventionist policies dating to 1953 that will be the cause. We created the wacko's in Iran and sooner or later we will reap what we've sown.

 

[Ms Tree]

Well Ms Flippy Floppy I seem to recall that when I mentioned our interventionist policies and how they backfired in our faces I was a kook. What happened?

I believe you have me confused with someone else. I very well may have called you a kook but not on this issue. Our foreign policy has made huge mistakes. The despots we have supported have come back to haunt us countless times as you showed.

 

[southwind]

HEY, wait a minute "tree",.........that was Bin Laden that we built up and gave $$$ to, not Sadam.

OOOPS, sorry "tree"................it was BOTH of THEM !

A LOT of the time, this country IS a FxxxxxG Disgrace !

Sorry for those feeling OFFENDED by the TRUTH !

It IS what it IS !

Then move B!TCH !

No ones forcing you to live here !

 

[delldude]

The IRAQ WAR is officially Over !
Any victory demonstations in the streets of US Cities or towns ?
Any Nurses getting kissed in NYC ?
Any significant media coverage By A N Y network pertaining to the "event" today ?

4,500 US men/women KILLED+Thousands upon Thousands of innocent Iraqi Men/Women/Kids too !
50,000 US men/women Wounded, possibly ruined For LIFE !
800 $ B I L L I O N of tax payers money spent !

And in exchange, we got rid of 1 Nasty P-----rick, and NOTHING ELSE in return !

Was that a fair trade, or was it an indelible STAIN that will NEVER be able to be erased from the US history Books ?

Feel PROUD to be an American Today ????????

To state that "this" was a Disgrace is a VAST Understatement !!!

That feeling of Guilt is probably from the Stare(s) coming from our brothers and sisters of our good next door neighbors in CANADA as Canadians shake thier heads in Disbelief !!

YES, That Canada who offered ANYTHING we needed in the war with Afganistan !!

"GOD bless the USA" for this event in IRAQ ??

"G O D DAMN the USA" for this unspeakable Disgrace !!

I don't think your party God is comfortable with the word "WIN".

In Washington, federal agencies take the lead on planning parades, and so far nothing is in the works.

By Ben Nuckols and Samantha Gross

Americans won't be seeing a huge ticker-tape parade in New York City anytime soon for troops returning from Iraq.

It's not clear if veterans of the nine-year campaign will ever enjoy the grand, flag-waving, red-white-and-blue homecoming that the nation's fighting men and women received after World War II and the Gulf War.

Officials in New York and Washington say they would be happy to help stage a big celebration, but Pentagon officials say they haven't been asked to plan one.

 

[SparrowHawk]

Barack Obama took a page right out of the Richard Nixon Playbook and his withdrawal from Viet Nam.

He essentially declared Victory and left.

One can only speculate as to what the "Blowback" from another interventionist excursion will be, but it's likely not good for the US

 

[Ms Tree]

When/where did he declare victory?

 

[SparrowHawk]

When/where did he declare victory?

Thus the word "Essentially". Nixon called the "Vietnamization" of the war to be a success and announced our withdrawal.

I pledged in my campaign for the Presidency to end the war in a way that we could win the peace. I have initiated a plan of action which will enable me to keep that pledge.
The more support I can have from the American people, the sooner that pledge can be redeemed; for the more divided we are at home, the less likely the enemy is to negotiate at Paris.
Let us be united for peace. Let us also be united against defeat. Because let us understand: North Vietnam cannot defeat or humiliate the United States. Only Americans can do that.

Entire Nixon Speech

More from our friends at Wikipedia:

Vietnamization was a policy of the Richard M. Nixon administration during the Vietnam War, as a result of the Viet Cong's Tet Offensive, to "expand, equip, and train South Vietnam's forces and assign to them an ever-increasing combat role, at the same time steadily reducing the number of U.S. combat troops."[1] This referred to U.S. combat troops specifically in the ground combat role, but did not reject combat by U.S. air forces, as well as the support to South Vietnam, consistent with the policies of U.S. foreign military assistance organizations. U.S. citizens' mistrust of their government that had begun after the offensive worsened with the release of news about U.S. soldiers massacring civilians at My Lai (1969), the invasion of Cambodia (1970), and the leaking of the Pentagon Papers (1971).

If all of this sounds familiar it should. I'd invite you to substitute the Iraq and Barack Obama where Nixon and Viet Nam are mentioned and see if the two stories of international interventionist foreign policy sound nearly the same despite 40 years between our incursions into sovereign nations.

From a Vietnam-era Republican senator: Declare a victory in Iraq and get out.The late Sen. George Aiken, R-Vt., gave that counsel to both Presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard M. Nixon when things were going from bad to worse in the Vietnam War,

 

[delldude]

When/where did he declare victory?

I think he plans to give out Participation Trophy's to all who attended.

 

[Ms Tree]

I know what Nixon saidd and did. I was asking what Obama said/did that was the equivalent.

I know he finally pulled the fighting troopskout of Iraq but I was not aware of any statement he made thatbequated the withdrawal of troops with any type of victory. I seem to recall him saying something to the effect that this is as good as it gets and our troops need to come home. I also seem to recall him using the immunity thing as a cover to get the troops out. Hey, what ever works. At least soldiers lives and taxes won't be wasted there any more, at least not in the volume it was.

 

[delldude]

I know what Nixon saidd and did. I was asking what Obama said/did that was the equivalent.

I know he finally pulled the fighting troopskout of Iraq but I was not aware of any statement he made thatbequated the withdrawal of troops with any type of victory. I seem to recall him saying something to the effect that this is as good as it gets and our troops need to come home. I also seem to recall him using the immunity thing as a cover to get the troops out. Hey, what ever works. At least soldiers lives and taxes won't be wasted there any more, at least not in the volume it was.

Its called a re-election effort to shore up his base wonks.

As for soldiers lives and taxes.......why they keeping a rather sizable group in Kuwait? Iranistan?

The taxes not being spent over there aren't going to reduce the deficit one dime, Congress is already taking about using the amount of money that was already being spent for other noble causes.

Its a friggin' joke.

 

[Dog Wonder]

Barack Obama took a page right out of the Richard Nixon Playbook and his withdrawal from Viet Nam.

He essentially declared Victory and left.

As opposed to the BushW/Cheney position fighting a war is some one else's job.

They only started them.

 

[SparrowHawk]

I know what Nixon saidd and did. I was asking what Obama said/did that was the equivalent.

I know he finally pulled the fighting troopskout of Iraq but I was not aware of any statement he made thatbequated the withdrawal of troops with any type of victory. I seem to recall him saying something to the effect that this is as good as it gets and our troops need to come home. I also seem to recall him using the immunity thing as a cover to get the troops out. Hey, what ever works. At least soldiers lives and taxes won't be wasted there any more, at least not in the volume it was.

For the record the stated reason for withdrawal was at the Iraqi Governments request. So on paper we were thrown out. Again the parallels are striking when compared to Vietnam.

As for the US being out of Iraq, take note that we've built the largest Embassy in the world which will employ 17,000 Diplomats and "contractors". Contractors being code for CIA types and assorted Mercenaries. Then for good measure we're keeping 50,000 troops in Kuwait in order to preserve the empire.

Note that the decline of the Roman Empire began with hiring Mercenaries. The Hessian Mercenaries hired by the Brits didn't so so well here either in 1776 as the British Empire began it's long slow slide. History does repeat itself

 

[jimntx]

You are all forgetting the main purpose for the war which made it a resounding success...Halliburton and it's subsidiaries (V-P Cheney's company) made $BILLIONS off the war as no-bid contractors on any number of "jobs"--like building shower facilities for soldiers with faulty wiring that resulted in soldiers being electrocuted.

Oh, and I hope you are all following current events in Iraq. Iraq, which was a cobbled together country created by Great Britain, is on the verge of falling apart into the separate tribal/religious warring areas--Sunni, Shiite, and Kurds--which existed for centuries before the British Mandate. I think we will see a Middle Eastern version of the fate of Yugoslavia before the end of 2012. As Delldude said...get back to me in 12 months.