At least on the surface it sounds like the surge counter-insurgency tactics used in Iraq. It may be that they’ve decided to try something like it in Afghanistan, but a counter-insurgency before you’ve actually taken primary control seems a bit premature.
SigFan - 08:07am on 07/02/2009
“Differently”? Yeah! I’ll say! You can do it right or you can do it differently! This is going to get people killed for no good reason. Another reason why it is desirable to elect a Commander-in-Chief who has at least the slightest acquaintance with the military and its mission!
Is this the most boneheaded thing you’ve heard of in a long time? As Commander-in-Chief, Obama votes “Present”!
This is exactly how the Surge started in Fallujah (before it was taken Iraq-wide) with huge success. This strategy was also being formulated under Bush.
Afghanistan is not Germany, and this is not WW2. We’re not fighting a well organized, highly trained, and lethally efficiant enemy. We’re fighting a band of rag tag militias who blow themselves up as a means of attack and cowardly strike civilians. The same tactics that worked for WW2 will not work here.
Kenny - 09:07am on 07/02/2009
This is exactly how the Surge started in Fallujah (before it was taken Iraq-wide) with huge success.
Although I wish them every success, I remain skeptical.
Proof - 09:07am on 07/02/2009
Maybe it’s the “instead of” that I’m dubious about. It seems to me that you could do one and not neglect the other!
Proof - 09:07am on 07/02/2009
The mistake is to take an “either/or” approach, when a “both/and” approach is needed. This is just appeasement. Iraq is not the same situation that exists in Afghanistan, and treating it the same way is just stupid.
robert108 - 09:07am on 07/02/2009
If these hamlets are the primary supply centers for the Taliban trhough intimidation, then occupation and denial seems like an interesting strategy. It also sounds like this would be much more effective than the zippo raids in Vietnam at winning the support of the locals.
My concerns are twofold. Marines dispersed in penny-packet positions will be vulnerable to defeat in detail. Hopefully they have an effective QRF SOP. The second is static positions invite attack especailly with indirect fire weapons. Unless the units dispersed in the villages are actively patrolling they’re going to invite an attack.
Grunt - 09:07am on 07/02/2009
I wonder if OBAMA is going to have our Troops surrender?
goon - 09:07am on 07/02/2009
It’s time to call a spade a spade. The fact of the matter is that Pat Robertson Jerry Falwell, Fred Phelps and others like them are not Christians. They are functional nihilists. They are Christian Nihilists, and their lies go marching on.
If we understand the basis of nihilism to be, “…the view that the world, and especially human existence, is without meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value.” Then it becomes very easy to trace the outlines of their belief system, and arrive at the conclusion that they are practicing nihilists in all but name.
The first problem is their rabid and fanatical belief in a coming eschatological event. As you know many Christians belief in a future time called the Rapture in which God puts an end to this world, and then commences a sorting system whereby Christians go to heaven, and Non-Christians go to hell for eternity. Understanding that this is for eternity is important, we’ll get back to it. This event takes a lot of different shapes and shades of meaning, but this is pobably the most popular understanding.
So, by believing in a final judgement that actually sends people to the place they will be for eternity immediately renders this present world as strictly temporary. This goes a long way towards removing meaning from human existence. Since Earth only temporary nothing we do here can really matter, except in as much as it might affect your final destination.
Through the rendering of this world as a temporary place these Christians fulfill the most fundamental part of nihilism which is that the world is meaningless. And what could be more meaningless than a temporary world?
And finally these Christian Nihilists put the final nail in their own coffin with their callousness towards their fellow humans. By asserting that destruction will visit any geographic area that does not follow the thinking prescribed by Pat Robertson, and then by blaming this destruction on God, Pat Robertson shows that he does not place any value on human life or existence. After all its all out of his hands. The world, the people, everything in it is temporary and subject to the whims of God. Which Robertson freely admits he cannot predict.
Its clear then that Robertson is only focused on such a time as all decisions are final. Such a time when we don’t have to wonder, “why He hasn’t helped you when problems begin, if they begin. I’m not saying they will, but if they do…”
You see in the future all these questions have been decided, and all of us are getting are just desserts.
But in the meantime? Who knows what God’s gonna do. All you can do is wait.
This kind of ambiguity again works to remove meaning from our lives, and provides the final piece of the puzzle. The answer to why these Christian Nihilists don’t seem to DO more nice things. It is because the underlying assumptions of their beliefs inform them that doing anything is useless. You just have to let go and let God, to quote a popular evangelical saying.
So, to summarize, the world is temporary and human life is without meaning since we are unable, ultimately, to change anything because God is in control and we are subject to his whimsy. And Pat Robertson and his ilk are not Christians. They are nihilists.
Chrisitan Nihilism - 09:07am on 07/02/2009
Although I wish them every success, I remain skeptical.
That skepticism is not unfair. The same hyenas in Congress who demanded defeat in Iraq and many who gave us defeat in Vietnam have their finger on the abort switch. A good strategy means little if it won’t be stuck to. But, if it is stuck to, there’s little reason this shouldn’t succeed.
Kenny - 09:07am on 07/02/2009
Maybe it’s because I’m old enough to remember how Lyndon Johnson dealt with the troops in Viet Nam, listening to policy wonks like Bill Moyers rather than his military commanders.
This whole thing just has a “PC” smell about it. Maybe it just reflects my lack of confidence in the Commander-in-Chief?
(Maybe I’m not the only one?)
At least on the surface it sounds like the surge counter-insurgency tactics used in Iraq. It may be that they’ve decided to try something like it in Afghanistan, but a counter-insurgency before you’ve actually taken primary control seems a bit premature.
This is exactly how the Surge started in Fallujah (before it was taken Iraq-wide) with huge success. This strategy was also being formulated under Bush.
Afghanistan is not Germany, and this is not WW2. We’re not fighting a well organized, highly trained, and lethally efficiant enemy. We’re fighting a band of rag tag militias who blow themselves up as a means of attack and cowardly strike civilians. The same tactics that worked for WW2 will not work here.
Although I wish them every success, I remain skeptical.
Maybe it’s the “instead of” that I’m dubious about. It seems to me that you could do one and not neglect the other!
The mistake is to take an “either/or” approach, when a “both/and” approach is needed. This is just appeasement. Iraq is not the same situation that exists in Afghanistan, and treating it the same way is just stupid.
If these hamlets are the primary supply centers for the Taliban trhough intimidation, then occupation and denial seems like an interesting strategy. It also sounds like this would be much more effective than the zippo raids in Vietnam at winning the support of the locals.
My concerns are twofold. Marines dispersed in penny-packet positions will be vulnerable to defeat in detail. Hopefully they have an effective QRF SOP. The second is static positions invite attack especailly with indirect fire weapons. Unless the units dispersed in the villages are actively patrolling they’re going to invite an attack.
I wonder if OBAMA is going to have our Troops surrender?
It’s time to call a spade a spade. The fact of the matter is that Pat Robertson Jerry Falwell, Fred Phelps and others like them are not Christians. They are functional nihilists. They are Christian Nihilists, and their lies go marching on.
If we understand the basis of nihilism to be, “…the view that the world, and especially human existence, is without meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value.” Then it becomes very easy to trace the outlines of their belief system, and arrive at the conclusion that they are practicing nihilists in all but name.
The first problem is their rabid and fanatical belief in a coming eschatological event. As you know many Christians belief in a future time called the Rapture in which God puts an end to this world, and then commences a sorting system whereby Christians go to heaven, and Non-Christians go to hell for eternity. Understanding that this is for eternity is important, we’ll get back to it. This event takes a lot of different shapes and shades of meaning, but this is pobably the most popular understanding.
So, by believing in a final judgement that actually sends people to the place they will be for eternity immediately renders this present world as strictly temporary. This goes a long way towards removing meaning from human existence. Since Earth only temporary nothing we do here can really matter, except in as much as it might affect your final destination.
Through the rendering of this world as a temporary place these Christians fulfill the most fundamental part of nihilism which is that the world is meaningless. And what could be more meaningless than a temporary world?
And finally these Christian Nihilists put the final nail in their own coffin with their callousness towards their fellow humans. By asserting that destruction will visit any geographic area that does not follow the thinking prescribed by Pat Robertson, and then by blaming this destruction on God, Pat Robertson shows that he does not place any value on human life or existence. After all its all out of his hands. The world, the people, everything in it is temporary and subject to the whims of God. Which Robertson freely admits he cannot predict.
Its clear then that Robertson is only focused on such a time as all decisions are final. Such a time when we don’t have to wonder, “why He hasn’t helped you when problems begin, if they begin. I’m not saying they will, but if they do…”
You see in the future all these questions have been decided, and all of us are getting are just desserts.
But in the meantime? Who knows what God’s gonna do. All you can do is wait.
This kind of ambiguity again works to remove meaning from our lives, and provides the final piece of the puzzle. The answer to why these Christian Nihilists don’t seem to DO more nice things. It is because the underlying assumptions of their beliefs inform them that doing anything is useless. You just have to let go and let God, to quote a popular evangelical saying.
So, to summarize, the world is temporary and human life is without meaning since we are unable, ultimately, to change anything because God is in control and we are subject to his whimsy. And Pat Robertson and his ilk are not Christians. They are nihilists.
That skepticism is not unfair. The same hyenas in Congress who demanded defeat in Iraq and many who gave us defeat in Vietnam have their finger on the abort switch. A good strategy means little if it won’t be stuck to. But, if it is stuck to, there’s little reason this shouldn’t succeed.
Maybe it’s because I’m old enough to remember how Lyndon Johnson dealt with the troops in Viet Nam, listening to policy wonks like Bill Moyers rather than his military commanders.
This whole thing just has a “PC” smell about it. Maybe it just reflects my lack of confidence in the Commander-in-Chief?
(Maybe I’m not the only one?)