Libya

excon · Mar 26, 2011, 06:48 AM

Originally Posted by tomder55

The question is what is the US role ? Either we are going to influence the results or we are likely to get a situation where both the Gulf of Arabia and the Mediterranean become lakes of the jihadist ummah.

Hello again, tom:

If the protesters were burning American flags, or saying death to America, or burning Obama in effigy, I'd agree with you. But, they aren't. It looks, to ME, like a homegrown upwelling of a people throwing off the yoke of oppression... To you, it looks the beginning of our worst nightmare... I'm just not sure how our influence in the arena is going to benefit us.

excon

tomder55 · Mar 26, 2011, 09:47 AM

Assuming that the old guard dictatorship/kingdom models both fall (no guarantees there ),the question is what are they replaced with ? That is where our influence I believe will matter .It's still an open conflict between modernism and jihadist Islamism .
I see maybe one or two winner states emerging out of the ummah . Either the Iran model will be the template ,or if we are lucky,Turkey... the return of the Ottomans .

You talk of the President "understanding " ? What I see is him throwing some jabs as he disengages.

excon · Mar 30, 2011, 09:05 AM

Hello again,

Well, Obama's war would have worked out, if war can be worked out. But, it can't. The rebels are in retreat. If we went in to save them from being slaughtered, what's our next move? Arm them? Send our guy's in? Let 'em be slaughtered?

This has the makings of another LONG Mideast war that we had NO business getting into.

excon

excon · Mar 30, 2011, 09:41 AM

Hello again,

Ach... No wonder Obamas war can't be worked out. It's NOT a war, after all. According to Sarah Palin, it's a squirmish.

excon

RickJ · Mar 30, 2011, 09:49 AM

Originally Posted by tomder55

Why isn't President Obama calling for Muammar Gaddafi to step down ?

I think that Obama is now asking for that... but it's not the issue.

Why didn't we do something when so many in Uganda were killed years ago?

The bottom line is that we cannot police the world. Bad stuff happens in many countries. We Americans cannot be the Police of the world.

tomder55 · Mar 30, 2011, 11:05 AM

I think that Obama is now asking for that... but it's not the issue.

Why didn't we do something when so many in Uganda were killed years ago?

Had he acted at the time of this posting I believe much of this would've been avoided .
I still think there is a good chance that Daffy will go into exile .

I think the thing that is preventing it is his memory of Charles Taylor making an exile deal... the world renaged and now he sits in a jail in the Hague .

No one is asking we police the world. I have been clear (forget which response on this or other similar ops) that my bottom line is we should go against dictators who have also sponsored terrorism or directly attacked us. Daffy is guilty of both.

tomder55 · Mar 30, 2011, 02:18 PM

Originally Posted by excon

Hello again,

Well, Obama's war would have worked out, if war can be worked out. But, it can't. The rebels are in retreat. If we went in to save them from being slaughtered, what's our next move? Arm them? Send our guy's in? Let 'em be slaughtered?

This has the makings of another LONG Mideast war that we had NO business getting into.

excon

I am hearing that the US used ground clearing A-10s in the 'no fly zone' .
My original op was for protection of demonstrators . This goes far beyond what I called for ,and the UN mandate (which now appears to be the final arbiter for US military deployment).
I'm hearing the Russians and other nations that did not vote for the no -fly zone ,but did not veto it ,did so because there was an assurance that the US would not attack ground forces combatting the rebels ,and would stick to a narrow mandate of civilian protection.

speechlesstx · Mar 31, 2011, 10:41 AM

Man, those Democrats are sounding an awful lot like those neocons.

Obama Authorizes Secret Help for Libya Rebels

President Barack Obama has signed a secret order authorizing covert U.S. government support for rebel forces seeking to oust Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, government officials told Reuters on Wednesday.

Dianne Feinstein says we have 3 options - go in and arrest him, move him to another country or, "meeting the same fate that, that Saddam Hussein met." "I don't know how you solve this problem with a recalcitrant leader who isn't going to quit at this point," she said.

When is Rep. Lynn "Petraeus is giving us the Charlie Sheen counter-insurgency strategy" Woolsey going to rally her Code Pinksters to fire up the anti-war masses?

Wondergirl · Mar 31, 2011, 11:42 AM

In that article,

Such findings are a principal form of presidential directive used to authorize secret operations by the Central Intelligence Agency. This is a necessary legal step before such action can take place but does not mean that it will.

"I will reiterate what the president said yesterday -- no decision has been made about providing arms to the opposition or to any group in Libya."

smoothy · Mar 31, 2011, 11:53 AM

They are already there on the ground. You don't go into a NO-FLY into an area until you have enough intelligence to give specific targeting directions. Otherwise you are going to have to blow up a lot of stuff that doesn't need blown up in the process of getting to the stuff you NEED to blow up.

But then yet again... the left publicises something that really needed to remain a secret until the operations are over.

But a publicity stunt apparently means more than the lives of operatives still on the ground to this administration.

I'm glad I'M not one of those operatives right now. Not that I'd have any chance of blending in, in the first place.

speechlesstx · Mar 31, 2011, 12:38 PM

Originally Posted by Wondergirl

ISuch findings are a principal form of presidential directive used to authorize secret operations by the Central Intelligence Agency. This is a necessary legal step before such action can take place but does not mean that it will.

Yeah well...

The CIA has placed covert operatives on the ground in Libya to gather intelligence for air strikes and reach out to rebels fighting Muammar Qaddafi's loyalists. Yesterday Reuters reported that President Obama had signed a secret order called a "finding" — the first step in authorizing a clandestine CIA mission. But officials now say it's been underway for weeks. When Obama first addressed the country about enforcing the U.N. resolution a little under two weeks ago, one of the parameters for U.S. involvement was no ground troops. Even as the coalition moved under NATO's leadership, Obama has insisted that the U.S. military will not deploy ground troops to Libya. Nonetheless, small groups of CIA operatives have been communicating and vetting rebels for weeks, "as part of a shadow force of Westerners that the Obama administration hopes can help bleed Colonel Qaddafi’s military," officials told the New York Times. The apparently not-so-secret finding was signed earlier this month.

Now that we've cleared that up, which of Feinstein's solutions do you favor?

tomder55 · Mar 31, 2011, 12:51 PM

But officials now say it's been underway for weeks.

Of course . Someone had to be on the ground to direct the air campaign.

tomder55 · Apr 1, 2011, 05:27 AM

I figured it out . The President says there will be no 'boots on the ground.' He sent in the CIA wearing sandals .

speechlesstx · Apr 1, 2011, 08:03 AM

"Sneakers, they're wearing sneakers, not boots," said John Pike of the Globalsecurity.org think-tank . "That's how they're clandestine."

excon · Apr 1, 2011, 08:17 AM

Hello wingers:

I hear you complaining, but me theenks it's only because its OBAMA doing it. You wanted him to go in, now you don't like what going in involves... Sounds like Iraq all over again.

excon

speechlesstx · Apr 1, 2011, 08:26 AM

What's good for the goose...

I just know if this were Bush all hell would be breaking loose from the left. It is they who are the hypocrites because it's Obama.

excon · Apr 1, 2011, 08:30 AM

Originally Posted by speechlesstx

It is they who are the hypocrites because it's Obama.

Hello again, Steve:

There's SOME of them, of course... But the lefty YOU'RE dealing with is even handed, brilliant and good looking to boot.

excon

KBC · Apr 1, 2011, 08:45 AM

Any bets on who is the first NATO force to high-tail it out of there when things get really heated up?

excon · Apr 1, 2011, 08:49 AM

Hello K:

I don't know. The French? The Arab League?? What's important, is who's going to be LEFT to do the dirty work, and that, my friend, is going to be US.

excon

PS> (edited) Uhhh, the Arab League ain't in NATO - but you get my meaning..

KBC · Apr 1, 2011, 08:53 AM

Originally Posted by excon

Hello K:

I dunno. The French? The Arab League??? What's important, is who's going to be LEFT to do the dirty work, and that, my friend, is gonna be US.

excon

PS> (edited) Uhhh, the Arab League ain't in NATO - but you get my meaning..

Ding,ding,ding, winner,winner,chicken dinner!

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