US wants to leave peacekeeping and rebuilding Afganistan to Europe!

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
Episode? Series?

Probably Voyager.

No. It would be The Next Generation. I think that you would be closer to the Klingons than the Borg.

[Wiglaf]

Since when did the borg make sense in TNG?

[Lonestar]

Originally posted by Wiglaf


Since when did the borg make sense in TNG?

More sense than in Voyager.

Your brains must not fill an eggcup if you can't see that.

Besides, what's a (alledged) red-blooded American like you claiming yer like "The Borg"? Those people are even more communistic than the Federation!

Dinodoc

Wig is closer to NG's Pakleds than any major group.

Simple speach, simpler train of thought....yep.

[KrazyHorse]

DP

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by GP
1. If other countries don't want to help they don't have to.

2. Several countries have offered to help. why shouldn't we take them up?

3. Several posters on this board...err...well KittyHorse from other countries have said that their countries should/would help in peacekeeping.

No problem, but at least let us laugh about it. The US has a not-undeserved reputation in the undeveloped nations for being more reticent than average in actually seeing its soldiers dying. I've discussed this with quite a few third-worlders. Oh, and we'll need those fancy planes you boys are so fond of, cuz peacekeeping a landlocked country without air support would be pretty dumb.

Wiglaf, the "clean" job is the fighting. The "dirty" job is the peacekeeping. It goes on for years at a time, and opens your soldiers up to situations where there might not be a "right" answer, where they have to let themselves get shot at, etc. How many casualties has the US taken? A dozen or so?

[TCO]

Kitty, have a blast. It's all cool.

We are much more reluctant to take casualites than our foes in the 3rd world that is correct. So are most western armies. I would say that the difference between Somali attitude on casualites and Western attitude is much bigger than differences between Canada and the US. Do you really think Canadians are much less attuned to casualites than we are? I think you also know that the effectiveness of the peacekeepers is often determined by how well they are backed. And in this case, we have often been the force that was either defacto or actually labeled as the backing force. Ref: Bosnia.

You should read Blackhawk Down. It's a very well researched account of the mission in Somalia where we lost 18 soldiers. What shines out from that is how well the troops on the ground did in an incredible cluster**** of a situation. (They actually needed bayonets at one point...and didn't have them.) They got trapped in the city in different patches, had two helos down and ended up killing 500+ Somalis with the whole city after them. It could have easily been a complete wipeout but discipline in an extreme situation won out. As they completed the mission succesfuly (the snatch) and were extracted by ground. Read it. It's even written by a liberal.

FYI: We've lost soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines in several areas of the world in the last few years. It doesn't always hit your TV screen when it's 1 guy in an embassy evacuation in Central African Republic of Bum****. But there's usually some mintor press note.

[KrazyHorse]

I'm not saying individual americans don't have to cajones to fight and possibly die in place, and I'm not saying that any Western country would endure the sort of bloodshed so prevalent "everywhere else", but ask people what they think of (for instance) the US military and the British military. The prevalent opinion is that the Brits are willing to do things Yanks aren't, even though the Yanks can do things the Brits can't.

And stop pushing Blackhawk Down.

[kittenOFchaos]

Bets on the SAS getting moron 578 first...?

Blair helped put a coalition together and keep world governments on-board despite in MANY arab countries there being VAST support for moron 578...

Blair is the PR side of the operation because outside of the USA Bush is considered a bit dim considering his position as HEAD of a country.

Saying "god bless america" seems to be enough to be a US president...

[TCO]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
I'm not saying individual americans don't have to cajones to fight and possibly die in place, and I'm not saying that any Western country would endure the sort of bloodshed so prevalent "everywhere else", but ask people what they think of (for instance) the US military and the British military. The prevalent opinion is that the Brits are willing to do things Yanks aren't, even though the Yanks can do things the Brits can't.

And stop pushing Blackhawk Down.

I've heard that comment about the Brits and the French. I think they still go in and kick ass in some of their former colonies every now and then. I really haven't heard that to be the case of other countries. You should realize that we (US) often have people in danger in remote areas of the world and it does not always hit the news screen.

[TCO]

Oh and KH, go read the Orion report too. You can wait a little with BlackHawk down. I've done OK in giving you good reading material...

[Sprayber]

Originally posted by kittenOFchaos
Bets on the SAS getting moron 578 first...?

Blair helped put a coalition together and keep world governments on-board despite in MANY arab countries there being VAST support for moron 578...

Blair is the PR side of the operation because outside of the USA Bush is considered a bit dim considering his position as HEAD of a country.

Saying "god bless america" seems to be enough to be a US president...

Your just so witty.

[Roland]

Bobby:
"Roland don't know Fox News since he doesn't even get it, he only hears what La REvolution Commie Newspaper tells him. Try watching it. Oh you're an Austrian you can't."

If that only were so. But the evil empire II (Murdoch) managed to put it on Astra after Sept-11, so I can watch it now. It's even a bit addictive in its crappiness...

[Lonestar]

Just like to throw this out here:


IIRC, The President of Pakistan wants Muslim countries to compose the PeaceKeeping force, not Western Forces.

(of course, "Muslim" Peacekeepers were the ones who got in trouble Somalia, but I digress)

Also note; Dispite what the Eurocoms think, we have a rather strong presence in Haiti right now, so it isn't like we've totally stepped out of peacekeeping.

[Immortal Wombat]

I'm very grateful for the third page in this thread. It gave me a chance to calm down and decide I couldn't be bothered to say anything at all to Wiglaf. Except: Bugger off to Newsmax and go lick right-wing **** over there.

[Wiglaf]

great way to argue, man. but I can do it much better, seeing as you just exploded without a trace of a coherent response before your second post in this thread.