Hell no.
How many times do we have to go down this road before we learn the lesson? Understand me, the lesson I'm talking about is not that "war is not the answer", or that we can't "impose our will" on another country. Sometimes war IS the answer, and there is no doubt we have the capability to impose our will on anyone we want, with the exception of maybe China. Maybe.
The lesson I'm talking about is two-fold.
1. America lacks the will to win.
2. The "world community" is a bunch of ungrateful bitches and doesn't deserve our help.
Let me start with 2.
Fuck you motherfuckers. That's all I have to say to the "world."
We've been fighting and dying on behalf of Europe and Asia since WWII. What has that gotten us? In Europe, a bunch of ungrateful bastards who have 5-week vacations and free health care, which they can't really afford, but have been able to get away with because they haven't had to provide for their own security for 70 years. So FYMF. We should do what they all say they want us to do and stop meddling around in their business.
We have been fighting and dying on behalf of Muslims around the world since at least the '91 Gulf War, and what has that gotten us? A bunch of ungrateful bastards who seem to want to kill us more the more we help them. So FYMF. We should do what they all say they want us to do and stop meddling around in their business.
Let me clarify something. No one else can do what we can do. No one else has the capability we have. If we disengage from the world, it will become a much more dangerous place. I don't want to see this happen. I joined the Army 25 years ago because I believed, and still believe, we are the good guys and we keep the world safe.
"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."
How many times do we have to go down this road before we learn the lesson? Understand me, the lesson I'm talking about is not that "war is not the answer", or that we can't "impose our will" on another country. Sometimes war IS the answer, and there is no doubt we have the capability to impose our will on anyone we want, with the exception of maybe China. Maybe.
The lesson I'm talking about is two-fold.
1. America lacks the will to win.
2. The "world community" is a bunch of ungrateful bitches and doesn't deserve our help.
Let me start with 2.
Fuck you motherfuckers. That's all I have to say to the "world."
We've been fighting and dying on behalf of Europe and Asia since WWII. What has that gotten us? In Europe, a bunch of ungrateful bastards who have 5-week vacations and free health care, which they can't really afford, but have been able to get away with because they haven't had to provide for their own security for 70 years. So FYMF. We should do what they all say they want us to do and stop meddling around in their business.
We have been fighting and dying on behalf of Muslims around the world since at least the '91 Gulf War, and what has that gotten us? A bunch of ungrateful bastards who seem to want to kill us more the more we help them. So FYMF. We should do what they all say they want us to do and stop meddling around in their business.
Let me clarify something. No one else can do what we can do. No one else has the capability we have. If we disengage from the world, it will become a much more dangerous place. I don't want to see this happen. I joined the Army 25 years ago because I believed, and still believe, we are the good guys and we keep the world safe.
"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."
Early in my career I went to West Germany (when it was still West and East Germany), and the Soviet Union was still our enemy. Wish I had kept my SMLM card for a memento. http://www.3ad.com/pio/memorabilia/soviet.mission.htm
Did the Europeans love us and shower us with gratitude for keeping them safe at great expense to our country and personal sacrifice to ourselves?
FUUUCK NO! They protested outside the main bases, and sometimes outside our little kaserne. So FYMF.
Same thing happened in Korea, protests all the time. FYMF.
Interestingly, the Israelis I met during the Gulf War were awesome. Once the war ended, and we were allowed off base, we were heroes to those folks. They loved us, I never bought a single beer. (Not that we were strictly speaking "allowed" to drink, but it was a different time...)
Now the individual Muslims that I met in Iraq in '91, and in early 2003, were also very grateful and happy we were there. Same with the Kuwati people. We all know how it turned out in Iraq, and as grateful as the Kuwaitis were for us saving their country in '91, I don't see them sticking up for us much now. I suppose I should be grateful they let us keep bases there.
I didn't deploy to Somalia, Kosovo or Bosnia, but those were also missions to save Muslim people. I'm sure I'm missing some examples.
And of course the end result of 20 years of saving Muslim lives? 9/11 and Benghazi. FYMF.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking for all these people to bow down and kiss our collective ass. But how about not attacking us? Or being so fucking smug, Europe.
You know what though? It's not even them that I'm most upset with. It's us.
This brings us to 1.
We will never win another overseas war that requires more than a few weeks of combat or any kind of real fighting. We have no heart, and we have no stomach for it. The American character has changed. (Not for the better.)
If anyone attacked us here at home we would wipe them out, no doubt. But I can't imagine a circumstance where we commit troops to an overseas war and go all 12 rounds. We snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq in about the 10th round. (Afghanistan was a pure waste of time and lives, let's not even talk about that.)
And that's were we are on the Syria debate. The right thing to do is go in there and punish Assad, and by punish I mean drop a bomb directly on him. Let the chips fall where they may after that. And we would have to deal with the fallout, but that is what we should do.
But we won't. We no longer have the stomach to do what needs to be done. We don't believe that the world is a dangerous, violent place. Assad kills 100k people and we "tsk" and flip the channel. We kill ten villagers by mistake while trying to stop a terrorist who has killed thousands and we are monsters!
This debate reminds me of 2002. When I left for Iraq in April 2003, I was fired up. We had the support of Congress, the people were with us, we were the Good Guys going forth to slay the dragon! Everyone agreed we were doing the right thing.
When I came back in May 2004, (coincidentally an election year), we were the stupid victims of Bush, fighting a mistake war based on a supposed lie.
“You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.” Said the same guy who had voted to send us to that war.
It was like a punch in the gut. Fuck all y'all, congress.
So that's it. Between politics and our weak stomachs, we should never enter any conflict anywhere but our own shores. I hope we stay out of Syria because I don't want any other Soldiers to go off to war thinking they are going off to fight a righteous battle, only to come home and be told how stupid they were to believe in anything, most especially America.
“You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.” Said the same guy who had voted to send us to that war.
It was like a punch in the gut. Fuck all y'all, congress.
So that's it. Between politics and our weak stomachs, we should never enter any conflict anywhere but our own shores. I hope we stay out of Syria because I don't want any other Soldiers to go off to war thinking they are going off to fight a righteous battle, only to come home and be told how stupid they were to believe in anything, most especially America.
