Bill Kristol: What 'Grown Up' Serious Argument is There That Sending 15, 000 Troops is Any Better Than 40,000?
By Heather Sunday Oct 11, 2009 3:00pm
I suppose Bill Kristol fancies himself the "grown up" during this argument on Fox News Sunday. While discussing whether President Obama should be increasing troop levels in Afghanistan or not, Juan Williams points out that President Obama already gave Gen. McChrystal 21,000 additional troops this year, and the result has been nothing but increased casualties. Later in the segment Kristol responds.
Wallace: I know there are political pressures but I would like to think that this President—I do think that this President is trying to make the right decision. There is no guarantee if you give McChrystal the 60,000 troops that it’s going to work…(crosstalk) …particularly given the nature of the government that is in control in Afghanistan.
Kristol: Look, what is better about giving him, “giving him”—I like that—why do we have to use that formulation?—The President is sending as many troops as he thinks he should send, as many troops as he thinks best to accomplish the mission—unless he wants to abandon the mission. But he doesn’t want to abandon the mission. What argument… what serious grown up argument is there that sending 15,000 is any better than sending 40,000 troops when the generals, Gen. McChrystal and Gen. Petraeus think 40,000 is what we need to adequately resource the counter-insurgency.
Maybe we shouldn’t send so many bullets either—we shouldn’t send too many vehicles. They’re very expensive. I mean this notion that we’re sending—that we’re going to have more casualties is ridiculous Juan. Short term of course when you engage the enemy you might have more casualties. Ask any soldier or marine over there, “Would you prefer to have 110,000 of you or 70,000 of you?”—that we are stretched too thin. If we’re going to fight, let’s fight the war.
So when are you signing up to go over there Bill? Liz? Both of you ready to suit up and go put your lives on the line over there? I think if you asked those soldiers what they'd rather be doing, most of them would rather be home. Not on their third, fourth and fifth tours of duty.
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We need to reinstitute the draft. After that we need to put anyone related to Kristol, Limbaugh, Hannity, Malkin, etc... to the front of the line. Until then, not another soldier.
(or shut up)!
.
I fourth it!
Even if there were another draft, the wealthy, well connected, etc. will always find ways to keep their sons and daughters out of harms way, just like in the '60's until the draft was discontinued in '73.
Do you Really think that the G.W. Bushes and Rush Limbaughs of the world would actually be forced to get their nails dirty.
There is something about these two 'men' that causes them to come across on teevee as being very small in stature.
I'm not talking about physical stature.
To paraphrase Teddy Roosevelt; " I could carve better men out of a banana."
Their privileged upbringing and their Daddies may have gotten them on the teevee, but they sure didn't make men out of them.
Like using a little squirt of Girl Scout juice on your bonfire
Or a humongous rubber tire?
Of course logistical time, cost, and the potential for escalation are factors to be considered.
Only the worse sort of chess players try to sacrifice all their pawns at once.
"If we're going to fight this war, let's fight this war".
"We"? "Let's"? Hey! Let's you and him fight!
we should just send Kristol and Rummy and Cheney et al over there, and little Georgie might want to tag along.
If they were so freakin' smart they would have won both of these stupid PNAC wars long ago!!!!!!
...why he is'nt advocating for the deployment of 20,000 - 50,000 (or so) "Israeli troops" over there instead? (?).
Help is help right?
Iran could see that as weakness.
How about...?
...we pulled our military out and sent them to Israel instead to "watch over it" while the Israeli army goes and gets themselves killed (instead...?)
Instead of fighting Israeli wars we defend their homeland while they do the fighting themselves. Let's see how well that goes over with the Jewish population in this country. Who cares, they are part of the problem when it comes to this country.
It's about time Israel took a turn anyway...
...and use up some of those weapons we gave em'!
Maybe well get to see how tough they are (when its not) a bunch of poor starved and embargoed Palestinians (with toy rockets) they're fighting...
(and let em' do their own torturing)
By force if need be, and damn their ages. They've been reactivating and sending some fairly old guys already. If they're too old too fight, they can do support, KP, latrine duty, etc, at camps closest to the front.
Another “A new way forward”
“Let’s wait to see if the surge works before dismissing it.”
“Let the Generals on the ground determine the tactics.”
“If we’re going to fight this war, let’s win it.”
These are all talking points circa 2007. What’s the matter Bill, Rove no longer around to give ya new ones?
We need to round up Bloody Billy, Five Deferment, AWOL W, and the rest of the chickenhawk warmongers of my generation and send them to Afghanistan to complete their obligation to the country. While we are at it we should send that hateful Cheney daughter along with them. I would be that we would have a change in attitude toward war in no time. I served, they can too.
Kristol turned 18 while the war in Veitnam was still going on. But like many other smug little chicken hawks of his ilk, he couldn't quite get the nerve to make it there. I just love when chicken hawk, draft dodgers like Kristol are so eager to send more troops into a war zone. He says "let's fight the war." "Let's?" . . . He didn't have the guts back in the 60's to become one of the troops to fight in Vietnam. A war of which we had a casualty count of over 58,000. And now he sits in a safe studio with that smart ass, smug little look on his ugly face giving his expertise on sending troops into war. All this while sitting next to Liz Cheney, whose father was another one of the aformentioned(5 deferment)chicken hawks.
where everytime I hear one of these idiots spewing their nonsense, I look for cues to who is funding their speech.
Doesn't take much to figure out where Billy's Wingnut Welfare check is coming from does it?
Hey Billy, you and your neocon ilk already did that in Iraq, or didja forget the humvees that had to be "up armored" or the GIs who were un-armored.
Eff you Kristol. Near as I can tell there aren't any adults sitting in that studio.
It would be interesting to go back and read what Kristalnacht was saying about Rumsfeld's limited force strategy in Iraq in 2003.
There Billie goes speaking figuratively again.
Daddy got 5 draft deferments. He never served in Vietnam. I don't think Liz Cheney has served in the military either. Kristol(nacht) and Wallace, both silver spoon boys have never so much as gotten their hair mussed. What a panel of fuckheads.
Aren't escalating troop numbers a hold-over from the days when actual troops clashed in battle?
It seems a commitment to intelligence and special forces is what's needed.
Additionally, we need to rethink our "War on Drugs," since poppy and marijuana sales is what's financing the Taliban. Combined with medical health care reform we start treating people for their addictions and using PSA's instead of cops and courts.
Offering advice on ANY subject is like getting marriage counseling from OJ Simpson.
Hey...if Republicans are so great at running wars...how come the last one they actually WON was The Spanish-American War...in 1898?
Well shit Billy, why stop at 40,000? Why the hell don't we send 200,000? The question is, "Why are we there?" I thought we were there to get rid of al Qaeda. Billy "The Bloody's" favorite general says al Qaeda are gone. I say. "Let's leave too."
Actually in Afghanistan it's the Taliban.
Interestingly enough, they were considered our ally in the "War on Drugs."
... in Afghanistan Al Quaeda were our 'allies.' Where do you think they got the arms?
The Taliban is not Al Queada, they just gave them refuge and they were willing to give OBL up as long as he could get a fair trial in a neutral country.
We give arms to people to fight someone else. Then we invade and they use our arms to fight us.
Does anyone else see patterns here?
My suggestions:
Stop selling arms, (including to Israel.)
Stop invading whole countries that have no ability to attack us as a country.
Stop supporting dictators.
Track down and legally prosecute the individuals involved in attacking us.
Maybe it's too late for that because we've ignored the above rules for so long.
And now there are probably as many folks in this country that want to kill our democratically elected leaders as in the whole rest of the world.
Can someone point that out to me? He has been proved wrong about every prediction he has ever made. How does that qualify him as an expert on anything?
Remember republicanism is a mental illness!
Strap an M16 onto that chickenhawk and sent him to Jalalabad.
No bullets though. Gotta save some $$$$. Plus he will just throw the gun away when the pee runs down his leg.
can stick it. i'm sick and tired of her nuanced bullshxt.
he has to man up and talk tougher than the girl. BTW, has he been right about ANYTHING in this current millenia? I thought the winning strategy agreed upon was to do the opposite of Kristol to guarantee an outcome.
According to NATO's website, the US currently has 29,950 troops in Afghanistan. According to its website, The Weekly Standard has a circulation of "more than 65,000". Since it's pretty safe to assume that The Weekly Standard's readers are of the same mindset as the magazine's founder, William Kristol, all we need to do is draft the readership to go and fight this war that they so enthusiastically support. We could double the number of Americans in Afghanistan AND bring our troops home in one fell swoop...it'd be a "win-win" for everybody (except, of course, the Afghans...).
...lump troops in with ammo and vehicles. They're just 'supplies' to you right?
"Short term of course when you engage the enemy you might have more casualties"
And you're pretty feewheeling with other peoples live making a statement like this. You're a fuckin shame and a disgrace and if you're so hot to fuckin wage war, get your boots on, pick up a gun, and get your hands dirty you slimy chicken shit scumbag.
kristol might be correct in asserting that in order to succeed in the mission obama would be remiss if he were to undercut his ground commanders requests for troop deployment levels. what kristol however does not understand (or as a republican still refuses to admit) is that as the CINC, obama has the authority to alter the mission objectives at any time, thus making the present troop deployment requirements a moot point at best.
kristols attempt to put an "uppity" CINC in his place for even considering to dare to mess with mission objectives thus overriding the generals wishes is reminicent of a similar recent news cycle in which a certain speaker was "put in her place".
it pleases me to no end that the opposition yet struggles with the core notion of not only themselves being out of power, but also that they have been trapped by the demographics of the people the democratic party chose to replace them with, as they are so perfectly tuned to foster "teh stoopid" in the oppositions base.
so sorry gop, the uppity white girl and black fella know their job descriptions.
He was way too coked up in the eighties to follow the Soviet misadventure in Afghanistan.
"What grown up argument could there be against escalating the war in central Asia and propping up a corrupt puppet government until the war can become Vietnamiz... er, Afghanized?"
So Afghanistan actually bordered the Soviet Union, and they were still unable to occupy it during their ten year war. What "grown-up" argument can be made in favor of an occupation by the American empire from the other side of the globe?
never seems to work out well, does it?
Kristol is the same idiot who used that phrase, when referring to suggestions the the Sunni and Shia would have a problem getting along in Iraq. He's wrong on everything, and also doesn't want women to vote anymore, why believe anyting he's got to say.
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