John Kerry the Braggart: Unfit For Command, Part 4

[Joseph]

Just a bum, so I can cont. to follow.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Straybow
[
Since when does transfer of sovereignty only have validity if the recipient has conquered the territory first? Was France's sale of Louisiana Territory "illegitimate" because the US didn't declare war against France and conquer the land first? No.

If Spain could not "lawfully" transfer sovereign control to the US by treaty, then Spain could not "lawfully" transfer control to some two-bit, self-appointed militant rebel, either.

I'm sorry, are you hard of reading?


Spain no longer possessed sovereignty over the Philippines, effective or otherwise.

Did France possess sovereignty over the Louisiana Territory?

Had its inhabitants declared their independence and fought a war to secure it?


Perhaps you think in a similar situation, if after the American colonies rebelled and Great Britain no longer had control of them it would have been perfectly fine to have ceded them to Mexico, or Austria-Hungary.



Or better yet, perhaps you think the colonists should have asked nicely for permission to rebel and declare their independence....




Gosh, 'a two-bit self-appointed militant rebel.'

A harsh description for any of the Founding Fathers....

[Ned]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat


WEll, John won't be appointing me to any policy positions until after he's sworn in, so I don't speck for him at this time.

And it's really not "opinion" unless you want to revise both the concept of "defend" and the location of "America."

Saddam couldn't project a goat turd successfully beyond his own borders, and there's no evidence as of yet that he would have been capable of doing so directly or through future proxies in the near future. Certainly our ability to ramp up and respond to an actual future threat is and at all times was far faster than his ability to develop any such threat.

This had nothing to do with "defending America" it had everything to do with an excuse to go after former perceived American lackey Saddam Hussein for biting the hand that fed him, same way Noriega had to go in the ****ter. Bush II had a hardon for Saddam way before he even assumed office, and he stacked his policy deck with Saddam-hawk advisors.

Saddam was training al-Qaida, built terror training bases inside Iraq, was helping to fund terror against Israel. He had (at least at one time) WMD, the capability to make more, and was working on nukes. So much for your lack of ability to project "turds" concept.

You can only believe that Saddam was no threat to the US and to Israel if you believe in ..... John Kerry. (I was going to say, the "Tooth Fairy," but believing in John Kerry says it all.)

[Ned]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat


The failure was in place since 1954. No RVN government had ever had popular legitimacy, all were corrupt, inept, unable to control their own territory, prevent infiltration, or deal with a peasantry who on average was at least as sympathetic, and in many cases moreso, to the "enemy."

RVN itself was a fictional creation - the French last ditch attempt to retain some influence and prevent total humiliation by partitioning a former colony rather than ceding defeat over the whole of it.

Other than the ARVN Rangers, LDNN, and the ARVN Marines and Airborne forces, which were all highly trained, committed volunteer forces, the main ARVN forces were a sad joke, and riddled with infiltrators (as happened in some cases even with the ARVN Rangers and Marines). In 1972 at Quang Tri, the ARVN was caught with it's pants down despite obvious indicators of NVA units shifting into an offensive posture, and the exemplary leadership of ARVN officers such as Phan Van Dinh and Huang Xuan Lam is still legendary.

Kerry didn't stab America in the back, the stupid mother****ers who got us into that mess and killed over 60,000 American troops in support of an inept, corrupt, and fraudulent leadership of a half-country are the ones who stabbed America in the back.

Just a couple of quibbles. The government of Vietnam was not intended to be a regional government. When France ceded the North to Uncle Ho and us merry men, the government of Vietnam only had control over the South.

It is interesting also, is it not, that this government, the government of Vietnam, never signed the Geneva accords and never agreed to any "national elections."

I agree, though, that Diem was a failure because he was more interested in advancing his and his family's interests rather than being popular. This had something to do with his being a dictator.

In retrospect, somebody should have pulled his plug a lot sooner, because it is quiet true that his harsh treatment of the Buddists and other religious groups contributed to rebellions that had nothing to do with communist infiltration, but had everything to do with the formation of the NLF (Viet Cong) in 1961.

I also agree that what Johnson did in getting US ground troops involved in what in many ways was a civil war was ludicrous.

[Ned]

Molly, we purchased Florida from Spain, Lousianna from Napoleon (who really didn't own it when he sold it to us), New Mexico and California from Mexico, Oregon from the Brits, Alaska from the Russians, and the Philippines, Guam and Puerto Rico from Spain. Were all these transactions illegitimate in your view simple because the inhabitants (such as the native indians) were not consulted?

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ned
Molly, we purchased Florida from Spain, Lousianna from Napoleon (who really didn't own it when he sold it to us), New Mexico and California from Mexico, Oregon from the Brits, Alaska from the Russians, and the Philippines, Guam and Puerto Rico from Spain. Were all these transactions illegitimate in your view simple because the inhabitants (such as the native indians) were not consulted?

In how many of those places had the local inhabitants fought, or just fought, a war for independence?

And I notice you omit Cuba.

What's the difference between the Philippines and Guam on the one hand, and Cuba?


Couldn't possibly be anything to do with race, or the perception of race, could it?


In any case, I still say it's hilarious to find an American defending this kind of high handed colonialism and imperialism.


Did the United States fight a war with Mexico ?

There really is no point in trotting out all these land acquisitions and pretending or assuming that in every single case there is a valid comparison with the Philippines.

You still can't get around the sticking point that the United States had no more 'right' to be in the Philippines than Great Britain or Siam, and that the only thing that makes it legitimate is might.


Everything else is just eyewash, and justification after the event.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Spiffor

I would have tried to immediately start negociating the independance, and tried to oversee the political project of an independant Vietnam. I would probably have favored a mixed government, under the symbolic leadership of the royal family, and with input from all factions of the Vietnamese society, including the Communists, and French interests.

I would have tried to keep Vietnam in a kind of French "commonwealth", with favored trading pacts, and military alliance.

And I would have requested money from Paris to build some infrastructure to show our goodwill to the local factions, and to show they had more to win by cooperating with us than by fighting.

Hindsight is always 20/20 however. This a strategy similar to that which we used in Africa in 1960 (save for Algeria). And this part of Africa remained under French influence, and the cold war barely affected it.

By 1950, France had done all you suggest, and still Ho Chi Mingh fought on to get the French out even when there was a legitimate government of Vietnam.

Also, btw, I have been doing so reading on how France got involved in Indochina. Apparently, the Vietnamese Emperor begin conducting an extermination campaign against the Catholics in Vietnam circa 1836. This continued with the increasing ferocity until France was forced to intervene. No French intervention was ever permanent and the slaughter of Christians would resume. There is a final confrontation between the French and the Chinese, who were the overlords of the empire of Vietnam, in early 1880s. France defeated the Chinese fleet and blockaded Formosa, forcing a Chinese capitulation. As a result, China ceded their protectorship of Vietnam to France. (Cambodia voluntarily sought French protection. Laos switched from Siam to France.)

So looking at this history, it does seem that the French involvement in Indochina was an effort to bring some measure of civility to a region that was quite used to barbarous governments -- primarily to protect Catholics. I find it interesting that I actually had two read up this in order to find the truth. All I ever heard here, and elsewhere before, was that France only wanted to take control of Vietnam the purpose of sucking it dry of its resources.

That is a lie.

Rather, the French are to be applauded for what they did.

[Ned]

Molly, perhaps you are right. But I also understand that many Americans did not understand that Spain had lost control of the Philippines "before" they sold it to us. Had American understanding of the Philippines been greater, we would have acted like we did in Cuba, provide a stablizing force while the new government formed and was established.

One thing, though, Aquinaldo himself did not control most of the Philippines. He would have had to fight a war against other groups to gain control. The Philippines may have descended into chaos and may have been an early example of what happened in our own time to Afghanistan when the Russians pulled out.

[Drake Tungsten]

Come on, let's get back on-topic! Don't make me report you two to Ming; he's on the lookout for thread-jackers now.

Kerry on Iraq: Wrong War, Wrong Place, Wrong Time
By Patricia Wilson

CANONSBURG, Pa. (Reuters) - Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry on Monday called the invasion of Iraq "the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time" and said his goal was to withdraw U.S. troops in his first White House term.

Under pressure from some Democrats to change the subject from national security -- regarded by many as President Bush's strongest issue -- Kerry tried to focus exclusively on the economy and other domestic topics at a neighborhood meeting but supporters raised Iraq.

The Massachusetts senator, who has said he would have voted to give Bush the authority to use force if necessary against Iraq even if he had known at the time that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction, has struggled to draw clear contrasts with the president.

"I would not have done just one thing differently than the president on Iraq, I would have done everything differently than the president on Iraq," Kerry said.

He denied that he was "Monday morning quarterbacking."

"I said this from the beginning of the debate to the walk up to the war. I said, Mr. President don't rush to war, take the time to build a legitimate coalition and have a plan to win the peace."

Kerry said Bush had failed on all three counts. He called the president's talk about a coalition fighting alongside about 125,000 U.S. troops "the phoniest thing I've ever heard."

"You've about 500 troops here, 500 troops there and it's American troops that are 90 percent of the combat casualties and it's American taxpayers that are paying 90 percent of the cost of the war," he said. "It's the wrong war, in the wrong place at the wrong time."

GETTING OUT OF IRAQ

Kerry, like Bush, promised that the United States would stay the course in Iraq until the country is secure, saying: "We have to do what we need to do to get out and do it right."

He pledged to internationalize the forces in Iraq and do a better job of fighting "a more effective, smarter" war on terror that he said would actually make Americans safer.

Although he declined to set a precise timetable for pulling out U.S. troops, Kerry said it would be possible if certain conditions were met, such as bringing allies to the table to help with security and reconstruction.

He also said Washington should make it clear to the world that the United States had no "long-term designs to maintain bases and troops in Iraq.

"We want those troops home and my goal would be to try to get them home in my first term and I believe that can be done," he said.

If Kerry were to beat Bush in the Nov. 2 presidential election, his first four-year term would end in January 2009.

Kicking off a Labor Day offensive in three crucial battleground states -- Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio -- Kerry focused on pocketbook issues as he tried to reinvigorate his campaign after new polls showed him trailing Bush by double digits.

On the front porch of Dale and Jody Rhome's house in Canonsburg, he assailed the president's economic policies and said if Americans wanted four more years of losing jobs and health care "then you ought to go vote for George Bush"

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/nm/20040906/pl_nm/campaign_kerry_dc

Yet another sign that Kerry is considering a cut-and-run in Iraq. Why anyone trusts this vacillating douchebag to be our Commander in Chief during a time of war is beyond me...

[Ned]

Drake, what about his previous statements that Bush has really screwed up because he doesn't have enough troops in Iraq? What is the right answer from Kerry's POV? Do we have enough or do we not, and how do we tell? Consult the generals? Which generals? The one's there, on the ground, or silver-haired, retired news commentators who are/were running for president?

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Ned
Molly, we purchased Florida from Spain, Lousianna from Napoleon (who really didn't own it when he sold it to us), New Mexico and California from Mexico, Oregon from the Brits, Alaska from the Russians, and the Philippines, Guam and Puerto Rico from Spain. Were all these transactions illegitimate in your view simple because the inhabitants (such as the native indians) were not consulted?

Hmmm, lessee - we purchased Florida and the Louisianna purchase from European enemies of Great Britain, with the not too thinly veiled implication that they'd be better off selling what they really had no means to keep if push came to shove.

The only purchase made from Mexico was the Gadsden purchase of the southernmost portions of Arizona and New Mexico territory, the one part of northern Mexico we didn't steal in 1848. We made that purchase when we figured that mineral wealth > pain in the ass from Mescalero + Chiricuhua + Bedonkohe Apache.

We took the former Spanish possession by force, then decided that the little brown people therein weren't competent to have any voice in running things, so Congress passed a number of acts, subsequently endorsed by SCOTUS, to make sure that the Constitution didn't apply to the little brown people.

The question of "legitimacy" is just an exercise in pseudointellectual masturbation. The imperial powers (including the US) who engage in this sort of wholesale conquest and acquistion of other lands and other peoples also happen to make up for themselves their own criteria of "legitimacy."

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Ned
Drake, what about his previous statements that Bush has really screwed up because he doesn't have enough troops in Iraq? What is the right answer from Kerry's POV? Do we have enough or do we not, and how do we tell? Consult the generals? Which generals? The one's there, on the ground, or silver-haired, retired news commentators who are/were running for president?

How about Eric Shinseki, former Chief of Staff of the Army? He told the truth, and it cost him his job. The generals "there" are well aware of that, and they know what Rumsfeld and Bush want, so they go with the show. You don't claim your commander is wrong or contradict him if/when you're still interested in your career.

[MichaeltheGreat]

[SIZE=1] Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
Yet another sign that Kerry is considering a cut-and-run in Iraq. Why anyone trusts this vacillating douchebag to be our Commander in Chief during a time of war is beyond me...

If we can't consider being out of that ****ing ****hole by January 2009, then we're in serious trouble.

At the present post-"mission accomplished" rate of casualties and expenditures, we'll be over 2,500 KIA, 20,000 WIA (about line combat strength of two full divisions), and in excess of a half trillion in direct expenditures, not counting Halliburton's pork bailouts and giveaways to the Iraqis. If we haven't got a viable chance to be over and done with the mess before that point, then Bush, Cheney et al have royally ass****ed us all, and there's going to be a perpetual global shortage of Preparation H.

But of course, that will be someone else bleeding and dying, so the "We're gung ho cuz we'll never have to go" crowd can still cheerlead and go "rah rah rah."

[Berzerker]

Molly, we purchased Florida from Spain, Lousianna from Napoleon (who really didn't own it when he sold it to us), New Mexico and California from Mexico, Oregon from the Brits, Alaska from the Russians, and the Philippines, Guam and Puerto Rico from Spain. Were all these transactions illegitimate in your view simple because the inhabitants (such as the native indians) were not consulted?

Of course, why do you even need to ask?

[Agathon]

I propose a new entry in the Apolyton lexicon.

Call it "Ming's Law" if you like (although he is rarely guilty). It has two versions:

1) The length of a discussion on the Apolyton Civilization Site Off Topic board is inversely proportional to the truth of accusations made in it. Things get progressively more bullcrappish the longer it goes (2000 posts?),

2) 1) The length of a discussion on the Apolyton Civilization Site Off Topic board is inversely proportional to the importance of what is at stake in said discussion.