The_Dude Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 5 minutes ago, Tiberius said: Yes, what would Putin be so happy about?! From Mattis 'take this job and shove it' letter Take off the blinders Well ***** me....Tibs is right for once. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tiberius Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 Mattis will be called to the Hill to testify as to the fitness and competence of this President. No subpoena will be needed. He will be asked about Russia and our foreign policy He will be asked about the fitness and competency of this president He will be asked to explain what damages this president has done to our alliance to the other free nations on this earth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
plenzmd1 Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 21 minutes ago, Deranged Rhino said: That's China talking, not the DPRK. DPRK deal is being dangled in the tariff negotiations. i ain't buying that.. I believe it is same ole same ole from DPRK...agree to do one thing with some immediate concessions from the other side....then just keep delaying, then put additional conditions on it..then the whole thing falls apart. This will be time # 4 this particular gameplan has been put in use. We are in no worse shape in regards to North Korea than before...but again Trump's rhetoric and his supporters blind devotion to everything he says as Gospel is just again put to the test. I know us Trump detractors are supposed to "get" what he really menat..or there is some bigger end game here... I just am not seeing the results on US foreign Policy that Trump supporters claim as wins. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deranged Rhino Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 Here we go 2 minutes ago, plenzmd1 said: i ain't buying that.. I believe it is same ole same ole from DPRK...agree to do one thing with some immediate concessions from the other side....then just keep delaying, then put additional conditions on it..then the whole thing falls apart. This will be time # 4 this particular gameplan has been put in use. We are in no worse shape in regards to North Korea than before...but again Trump's rhetoric and his supporters blind devotion to everything he says as Gospel is just again put to the test. I know us Trump detractors are supposed to "get" what he really menat..or there is some bigger end game here... I just am not seeing the results on US foreign Policy that Trump supporters claim as wins. If it were the same ole, there would be evidence in their actions. So far, despite the press trying to downplay it/ignore it, the actions taken have been in line with the deal. Not just with relations with the US, but also with South Korea and Japan. China still has a heavy hand in the DPRK, we're in a stand off with them at present. This is a dangle - and from the evidence we actually have of the deescalation/disarmament going on at the DMZ - it's likely a bluff. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
plenzmd1 Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 ^^^^^ @Deranged Rhino , please explain the deal to me and what deal North Korea has been following???? Mattis leaving I think is pretty damaging too..his letter is pretty freaking damning of Trump policy. But again, I am sure you and all Trump supporters will find the positive/conspiracy theory here, and why I good man leaving was in Trumps grand plan all along 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B-Man Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 Quote Kurt SchlichterVerified account @KurtSchlichter FollowFollow @KurtSchlichter I am of two minds on Syria, and I see both sides of the argument. The same with Afghanistan. But make no mistake. The Beltway consensus that we need to stay indefinitely is not uniformly shared outside it by the people who send their sons and daughters to fight. And PDT knows it. 3:19 PM - 20 Dec 2018 #1- "Who cares about the Texas/Arizona Borders, where illegals flood into our country and kill Americans. No need for a wall." #2- "Americans need to die and defend the borders of Afghanistan/Syria." This is how Trump won. Quote MollieVerified account @MZHemingway 5h5 hours ago Mattis' resignation letter, which I just read, shows this is exactly right. Trump has not hidden his desire to wrap up operations in Syria. That bureaucracy ignores and even expanded operations is not healthy, regardless of your view on whether Syrian warfighting should continue. . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B-Man Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 Sean DavisVerified account @seanmdav 17m17 minutes ago Short-sighted intervention in Libya was similarly disastrous, leading to American deaths that never should have happened all because politicians apparently decided a vicious Islamic theocracy that loathed America was preferable to a brutal yet kept tyrant who feared it. One would think that kind of disastrous record, which has failed across the board to make America and its allies safer or the Middle East more stable, would lead to some soul-searching and humility from those who enabled it. Unfortunately, we’ve seen the exact opposite reaction. Just as Marxists will tell you that their own failures are no such thing because true communism has never really been tried, so, too will the unyielding interventionists swear that Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria et. al. only went sideways because we didn’t intervene enough. The complete inability to define the specific goals and account for the resultant costs to attain them in Afghanistan has led to 17 years of war, tens of thousands of American lives lost or permanently scarred, and to what end? A down payment on another 17 years? If you are clamoring for a never-ending U.S. military presence in Syria and Afghanistan, the burden is on you to specifically define what military and political victory looks like in each country, when/how it will be achieved, and the costs in lives and dollars it will require. . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DC Tom Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 12 minutes ago, B-Man said: Sean DavisVerified account @seanmdav 17m17 minutes ago Short-sighted intervention in Libya was similarly disastrous, leading to American deaths that never should have happened all because politicians apparently decided a vicious Islamic theocracy that loathed America was preferable to a brutal yet kept tyrant who feared it. One would think that kind of disastrous record, which has failed across the board to make America and its allies safer or the Middle East more stable, would lead to some soul-searching and humility from those who enabled it. Unfortunately, we’ve seen the exact opposite reaction. Just as Marxists will tell you that their own failures are no such thing because true communism has never really been tried, so, too will the unyielding interventionists swear that Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria et. al. only went sideways because we didn’t intervene enough. The complete inability to define the specific goals and account for the resultant costs to attain them in Afghanistan has led to 17 years of war, tens of thousands of American lives lost or permanently scarred, and to what end? A down payment on another 17 years? If you are clamoring for a never-ending U.S. military presence in Syria and Afghanistan, the burden is on you to specifically define what military and political victory looks like in each country, when/how it will be achieved, and the costs in lives and dollars it will require. . The fallacy in that being the idea that Afghanistan and Syria are the same war. They're not. They're very different. Afghanistan is a half-assed multinational attempt at nation-building where a nation has never existed. Syria is a limited action against a specific group in a nation that can reasonably be called a "failed state," with no nation-building component. The two are not even remotely the same...which probably has something to do with Mattis' retirement. He'd understand the difference, and wouldn't care to be forced to implement a simplistic "bring the troops home" policy as promulgated by a halfwitted candied yam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deranged Rhino Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 1 hour ago, plenzmd1 said: ^^^^^ @Deranged Rhino , please explain the deal to me and what deal North Korea has been following???? Mattis leaving I think is pretty damaging too..his letter is pretty freaking damning of Trump policy. But again, I am sure you and all Trump supporters will find the positive/conspiracy theory here, and why I good man leaving was in Trumps grand plan all along No missile tests or nuclear tests for over a year. When that changes, the deal has changed. Until then you've seen nothing but positive developments including: * North and South meeting several times * Demolition of guard posts along the DMZ * Removal of artillery from the DMZ * Remains continue to be returned * Shuttering of several missile and research sights. Inspectors and denuclearization come last. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
plenzmd1 Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 4 hours ago, Deranged Rhino said: No missile tests or nuclear tests for over a year. When that changes, the deal has changed. Until then you've seen nothing but positive developments including: * North and South meeting several times * Demolition of guard posts along the DMZ * Removal of artillery from the DMZ * Remains continue to be returned * Shuttering of several missile and research sights. Inspectors and denuclearization come last. I agree on the missile tests..good thing for sure. Worth giving up joint exercises? Someone smarter than me on how important those are to readiness would have to expound. I agree 10 of 150 guard posts have been dismantled, maybe some of the 2M mines have been disarmed.. and yep, some artillery has been removed from the DMZ..but you know and I know that's like saying the Bills offense is no longer a threat cause Peterman was cut. But then we have this https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/12/06/new-satellite-images-reveal-north-korea-expanding-key-missile/ the whole point of my posts was Trump declaring that North Korea was no longer a nuclear threat was assinine....I said it at the time and will continue to say it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ALF Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 Major Chinese shipyard rapidly expands in size amid military buildup It comes amid a concerted campaign by Beijing, pushed by Xi, to rapidly expand and update China's navy, with 32 ships commissioned in 2016 and 2017 alone, according to US government reports. https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/20/asia/china-military-jiangnan-satellite-intl/index.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Brown Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 Even more respect for Mattis. He didn't write any anonymous op-eds. He's not going to leak anything to the press. He's not going to go on a book tour. He resigned because he had a difference of opinion with our president. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pine Barrens Mafia Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 I applaud Trump's decision to leave Syria. Anything that has Arabs killing other Arabs is a GOOD thing in the long run, and we should be encouraging it rather than stopping it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Dude Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 1 hour ago, Doc Brown said: Even more respect for Mattis. He didn't write any anonymous op-eds. He's not going to leak anything to the press. He's not going to go on a book tour. He resigned because he had a difference of opinion with our president. To his credit and my disappointment he’s a modern day Belisarius. I say that because I’d love for him to challenge Trump for the republican nominee in 2020, and he’d immediately create mass defections of GOP support for Trump. Veterans would rally to his side over the draft dodger. However, knowing what I know of the man I do not believe that is something he’s considering. But if he does, he’d be a very serious threat to Trumps political future. 8 hours ago, DC Tom said: The fallacy in that being the idea that Afghanistan and Syria are the same war. They're not. They're very different. Afghanistan is a half-assed multinational attempt at nation-building where a nation has never existed. Syria is a limited action against a specific group in a nation that can reasonably be called a "failed state," with no nation-building component. The two are not even remotely the same...which probably has something to do with Mattis' retirement. He'd understand the difference, and wouldn't care to be forced to implement a simplistic "bring the troops home" policy as promulgated by a halfwitted candied yam. Without genocide there is no winning solution in that country. Kill a million of them and they’ll offer you a million more to kill. And when they run out of those they’ll find more Afghanis for us to kill. The Afghanis desire an unoccupied Afghanistan so that they can refocus their efforts on killing their greatest enemy the Afghanis. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Dude Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 https://www.yahoo.com/news/canadian-detained-china-questioned-daily-no-lawyer-access-020840144.html China has my concern over Russia at this point. To some extent Putin can be reasonable. The same cannot be said of the Chinese. It is an evil, lawless empire that needs to be checked at every turn. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
keepthefaith Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 3 hours ago, Doc Brown said: Even more respect for Mattis. He didn't write any anonymous op-eds. He's not going to leak anything to the press. He's not going to go on a book tour. He resigned because he had a difference of opinion with our president. Yes and his leaving bothers me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buffalo_Gal Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 11 minutes ago, keepthefaith said: Yes and his leaving bothers me. Why? They come and go all the time. For a little comparison, he's been on the job for 700 days and leaves in a bunch more days - under Obama, Panetta served 606 days, Hagel 720 and Ashe Carter 702 (he left when Trump came on) and no one wet their pants over their leaving. Secretaries of Defense. Click on the bio to see how long in office (if you care about that sort of thing). 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B-Man Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 Trump’s Syria Withdrawal Policy Is Correct, But Communicated Horribly Requiring "enduring defeat" in Syria will only result in endless war. “Trump Criticized For Breaking With Longstanding American Tradition Of Remaining In Middle Eastern Countries Indefinitely,” joked the Babylon Bee upon the news President Donald Trump is bringing troops home from Syria, but the joke wasn’t far from the truth at all. The news deeply angered the Washington foreign policy consensus, which argues that troops should stay in the region indefinitely even though the stated mission of defeating ISIS has been accomplished. It’s true that Trump’s decision to depart Syria was sudden and poorly communicated. Viewed one way, however, it was not a complete surprise. Since at least 2013, Trump has repeatedly argued against the idea we need a sustained conflict in Syria: . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deranged Rhino Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 56 minutes ago, keepthefaith said: Yes and his leaving bothers me. He'll be missed, but he was always going to leave once his primary job was done (and it is). But the hypocrisy being displayed by the media (who lamented Trump surrounding himself with Generals originally) will be endlessly entertaining. As is the hand wringing over leaving Syria... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B-Man Posted December 21, 2018 Share Posted December 21, 2018 I need clarification: Wednesday, Trump was bad because he is going to stop a war. Thursday, Trump is bad because without Mattis to constrain him he's going to kill us all in wars. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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