Tag: US Troops

How Soon We Forget

Back in the day, the early 1980s, I was teaching a class on US foreign policy and the first day I handed out a map of Asia and asked the class to circle Vietnam on the map…..only one junior in class got the question right and he was one of the last units to leave the country….

I thought then that it was sad that so many students did no idea about the war that was over less than 10 years before.

That memory came back after I read an article in ‘The Conversation” about the last Iraq War.

The United States invaded Iraq 20 years ago in March 2003, claiming it had to disarm the Iraqi government of weapons of mass destruction and end the dictatorial rule of President Saddam Hussein.

U.S. soldiers captured Saddam in December 2003. And a 15-month search revealed that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction to seize.

But the conflict between Western powers and Iraq dragged on until 2011. More than 4,600 American soldiers died in combat – and thousands more died by suicide after they returned home.

More than 288,000 Iraqis, including fighters and civilians, have died from war-related violence since the invasion.

The war cost the U.S. over $2 trillion.

And Iraq is still dealing with widespread political violence between rival religious-political groups and an unstable government.

Most of these problems stem directly or indirectly from the war. The 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq and the war that followed are defining events in the histories of both countries – and the region. Yet, for many young people in the United States, drawing a connection between the war and its present-day impact is becoming more difficult. For them, the war is an artifact of the past.

I am a Middle East historian and an Islamic studies scholar who teaches two undergraduate courses that cover the 2003 invasion and the Iraq War. My courses attract students who hope to work in politics, law, government and nonprofit groups, and whose personal backgrounds include a range of religious traditions, immigration histories and racial identities.

https://theconversation.com/its-been-20-years-since-the-us-invaded-iraq-long-enough-for-my-undergraduate-students-to-see-it-as-a-relic-of-the-past-199460

How sad is that?

Americans fought and died and no one gives a crap.

Just as Vietnam has become a forgotten war so shall Iraq…..and this scenario will happen all over again because no one wants to remember the sacrifice of their countrymen.

A bunch of candy ass morons!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

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Let’s Invade Mexico (Again)

Another trigger happy politician.

The US has invaded Mexico a couple of times….once in 1846 and again in 1916…the last time was 1916…..

During the Mexican Revolution (1910-1917), the United States government ordered two military incursions into Mexico. The first entailed an invasion and occupation of the city of Veracruz in 1914, and the second was the “Punitive Expedition” of 1916-1917, commanded by General John J. Pershing. President Woodrow Wilson was reluctant to send U.S. troops to Mexico in 1914, but “yielded to pressure from American business interests, cabinet members, newspapers, and representatives of the Southwest.” Reluctant or not, Wilson desired to depose the government of General Victoriano Huerta by seizing the port of Veracruz, through which flowed most of the armaments and supplies imported for the Mexican army. Wilson’s quarrel with Huerta was twofold: first, Huerta “could not maintain order and protect U.S. private and public interests” in Mexico; and second, Huerta was “a dictator who imposed himself on the Mexican republic after murdering his democratically elected predecessor.” American warships arrived on the scene in April, 1914 and shelled the city, taking “a terrible toll” on the civilian population, which had decided to resist the invasion. At the same time, the U.S. Navy and Marines seized the opportunity to experiment with amphibious landing techniques, with “an almost comic opera” effect. Between the landing and the occupation (which lasted through November) U.S. troops did help oversee the removal of Huerta from office mainly by supplying the revolutionary forces of Venustiano Carranza with arms and other critical materials.

Research: United States Interventions in Mexico

I present this little slice of history because of what that idiot from South Carolina proposed….

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said Monday that he was prepared to introduce legislation to “set the stage” for US military intervention in Mexico.

Graham’s comments came after four Americans were kidnapped in the Mexican border city of Matamoros, an area said to be dominated by cartels, and two were found dead. He was asked how he would deal with kidnappings or the cartels in general, and said he would get “tough.”

“I would put Mexico on notice,” the hawkish senator told Fox News host Jesse Waters. “If you continue to give safe haven to drug dealers, then you are an enemy of the United States.”

Graham said he agreed with former Attorney General Bill Barr, who wants to declare the cartels “foreign terrorist organizations.” Barr wrote in The Wall Street Journallast week that the US should take military action against cartels.

Barr expressed support for a joint resolution proposed by Reps. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) and Michael Waltz (R-FL) that would authorize the president to use military force against “those responsible for trafficking fentanyl or a fentanyl-related substance into the United States or carrying out other related activities that cause regional destabilization in the Western Hemisphere.” So far, the resolution has 16 Republican cosponsors.

Graham said he wants to put forward a bill that would designate cartels as terror organizations. “I’m going to introduce legislation, Jesse, to make certain Mexican drug cartels foreign terrorist organizations under US law and set the stage to use military force if necessary to protect America from being poisoned by things coming out of Mexico,” he said.

Other Republicans have called for military intervention in Mexico, which would be a dramatic escalation of America’s decades-old war on drugs. “We should strategically strike and take out the Mexican Cartels, not the Mexican government or their people, but the Mexican Cartels which control them all,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) wrote on Twitter on Monday.

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Tuesday warned the US against military intervention in his country. He said his government was “working and cooperating” with US authorities against cartels but wouldn’t allow “foreign countries” to intervene.

(antiwar.com)

Seriously?

These idiots in DC just want to force war on this country at ever turn.

Hopefully clearer heads will prevail on this issue….but I have NO confidence that they will.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The ‘Yellow’ Menace Is Coming

If you bother to keep up with the news then you will have heard the canned predictions that if Russia does not come for us then it will be China.

The words are starting to become louder and louder as the public opinion on Ukraine is starting to crack….we need that enemy and the M-IC and the MSM will make sure we have what they want us to have.

Sadly the reports coming out after a war game that was recently held to impress China that we mean business had an unexpected side effect.

Last year, a war game simulation looked at what might happen if China launched an amphibious attack on Taiwan. China would be happy with the results: The US side ran out of long-range cruise missiles in a week, writes Michael R. Gordon in the Wall Street Journal. The reasons behind that are complex, as detailed by Gordon in a lengthy and bleak assessment of America’s military readiness in the modern era. “Five years ago, after decades fighting insurgencies in the Middle East and Central Asia, the U.S. started tackling a new era of great-power competition with China and Russia,” writes Gordon. “It isn’t yet ready, and there are major obstacles in the way.”

Among those obstacles: The US has fewer arms manufacturers because of corporate consolidation, military recruitment is down, shipyards “are struggling to produce the submarines the Navy says it needs to counter China’s larger naval fleet,” and US weapons designers lag those in Russia and China on hypersonic missiles. Yes, the US had military successes in the Mideast and Afghanistan, thanks largely to air superiority, but things would be different in a conflict with China. For one thing, our Asian bases rely on “long and potentially vulnerable supply routes.” The US has new weapons systems in the works that may be game-changers (Gordon provides details. But they won’t be operational for another decade or so, raising fears China will strike before then.) Read the full story.

But yet the cheer leading for confrontation continues….why?

I know why but do you?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Wars That Were Mistakes

It is Sunday and what better time for a little history?  What better time to correct some historic misconceptions?

AS most people know that I am an antiwar supporter after witnessing combat first hand…..

With Ukraine exploding and the war of words over Taiwan the US seems to be running head long into another war……of all the wars that have erupted since the end of WW2….must were a mistake that all it did was waste money and cost many American lives.

Wars like the Spanish-American, World War One, Vietnam….this is the one that I am most familiar with…..Vietnam…..

The U.S. war in Vietnam had an undeniably just cause which was to defend the Republic of South Vietnam from Communist takeover. However, Vietnam was never a U.S. vital national interest and the loss of 58,000 soldiers killed in action was not justifiable and did nothing to further U.S. national security. This is particularly the case given that Communist North Vietnam ended up annexing South Vietnam anyway, and the Communists took control of Laos and Cambodia as well. The Vietnam War proved to be the worst strategic mistake by U.S. leaders since President Harry Truman cut off all military assistance to the Nationalists in 1946 at a time when they were on the verge of winning the Chinese Civil War—leading mainland China to fall to the Communists instead.

That is one read about the others….

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/8-wars-united-states-should-never-have-fought-201824

Any opinions on these wars?

As long as we are talking about Vietnam…..here is some info that you probably did not know…..

We all have heard about the bravery and costs of places like Khe San, Hue…..but most of that was all show…..did we win all conflicts with our superior military?

Not really they were seldom reported….you know keep the home fires burning brightly….sort of thing….

One theme presented by supporters of the American empire is the U.S. military is invincible and can never lose unless stabbed in the back by impatient politicians. They claim the U.S. military never lost a battle during the entire Vietnam war. On August 30, 2011, President Barack Obama proclaimed to a gathering of veterans: “But let it be remembered that you won every major battle of that war. Every single one.” Vietnam vet Senator John McCain repeated this lie in a 2013 article in the “Wall Street Journal.” This myth was disputed by America’s most decorated officer of that war, Colonel David Hackworth, in his book “About Face.” The U.S. military had every advantage, yet mistakes were made and battles lost. Internet research turns up these 112 lost battles of the Vietnam war: 

1. Battle of Ap Bac – In January 1963, American advisors launched a battle after they pressured reluctant South Vietnamese officers to use American air mobility assets to destroy the Viet Cong. The attack was a disaster in which the VC mauled a far larger force while shooting down five American helicopters (pictured) and damaging eight, while killing three Americans and wounding eight.

2. The Sinking of the USNS Card – This World War II aircraft carrier was later used as a transport for American military cargo. On May 2, 1964, it was moored in a heavily defended harbor in the Saigon River. Two VC commandos crawled down a sewer pipe and attached explosives to the ship. The explosion knocked a huge hole in the hull and killed five American crewmen, causing the ship to sink 45 feet to the river bed.

There are so many more…..checkout the list…..

http://www.g2mil.com/lost_vietnam.htm

As you can see not all was blued skies and unicorns….and I would bet every war has had their failures that we seldom hear about until many years later.

Here is one last thought—-the US has been in a state of war since the end of WW2…..that is damn near 80 years….just think what this country could have accomplished with the funds that was wasted on wars we could win.

Was all that waste worth it in the end?

Say what is on your mind

Have a day…..be well….

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Drone Operator’s Dilemma

We all are aware of the death and destruction that our military drones can deliver on our many perceived ‘enemies’.

They are deadly and administer a punishment indiscriminately.

Since these drones are pilot-less has anyone considered the operators?

Probably not….but their actions are having a toll on the mental faculties.

Kevin Larson was a churchgoing Eagle Scout and honors student with dreams of becoming a fighter pilot. He received his officer’s commission in 2012, but by then, the Air Force didn’t need airplane pilots, it needed drone pilots. Larson was disappointed, according to a story in the New York Times by Dave Philipps, but he settled in and did his job, completing some 650 combat missions and launching 188 deadly airstrikes from 2013 to 2018. All the details of Larson’s missions are classified, and because drone pilots aren’t considered combat troops, he did not receive the psychiatric resources, recovery periods, and other benefits offered to deployed troops. Instead, per the Times, he was treated as an ordinary office worker.

What started as a “tightly controlled operation” in the wake of 9/11 has steadily expanded, especially after the Obama and Trump administrations loosened the rules of engagement. Times investigations show that “over time, the rules meant to protect civilians broke down … and the number of innocent people killed in America’s air wars grew to be far larger than the Pentagon would publicly admit,” writes Philipps. The USAF is working to provide more support for drone crews now, but for many—including Larson—it’s too late. After a breakdown and a bust for psychedelic drugs, which he used for self-medication, Larson was convicted in military court on multiple charges. Fearing a jail sentence, he fled into the wilderness, and—with police drones searching overhead—he shot himself. Per the Times, on Larson’s military file under “Combat Service” is the word “none.”

(Read the full story.)

I am sorry but what did they expect?

War is not some silly game like HALO or other such killing games…..you cannot hit the ‘restart’ button and make things right.

Drones kill….men, women and children it is indiscriminate….there is NO restart to bring them back from death.

Any thoughts?

Turn The Page!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Another Interventionist Speaks

AS the conflict in Ukraine continues there are those here in the US that are calling for US troops to intervene…..Congresspeople, pundits, and retired generals….and there is the latest war hawk calling for US troops…

Former NATO top commander Gen. Philip Breedlove is the latest big name to come out for putting troops on the ground in Ukraine. Breedlove, who has been angling for weeks for a more muscular policy against Russia, told The Times of London that it’s time for real action. And he may have the ear of the White House: the article says he’s named as one of “several high-ranking retired commanders advising the Biden administration on Ukraine.”

“So what could the West do? Well, right now there are no Russian troops west of the Dnieper River. So why don’t we put Nato troops into western Ukraine to carry out humanitarian missions and to set up a forward arms supply base?”

Of course it wouldn’t stop there. Most likely Russia will react aggressively, if not explosively, since setting up “a forward arms supply base” would be fully entering this war on the side of Ukraine. NATO would be a co-belligerent in every way, with its 40,000 troops now stationed on alliance’s eastern front considered future enemy combatants. At the end of April, the Pentagon mobilized some 14,000 troops, along with F-35 strike fighters and Apache helicopters to Poland, Hungary, and the Baltics. A total of 100,000 U.S. troops now spread across Europe would no doubt be on some level of alert if NATO entered the fray.

Former US-NATO commander wants to put troops on the ground in Ukraine

Seriously?

Old soldiers never go away…they hide behind national security to get the rest of us killed.

Why are troops always the answer for these people?

This ‘solution’ has seldom ended well for the US and its troops.  The attitude that “we are the US and we are here to help” has seldom worked out the way it was planned….but yet it is always the answer for these people.

When will we stop continuously looking for as military solution and start trying to find ways to solve conflict without the use of US troops?

Just wondering.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Warhawks Gain Footage

There are some in our Congress that are more than willing to put US troops in the thick of the fighting in Ukraine….the latest is Dem Senator Coons of Delaware….

Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) signaled that he wants the US to send troops into Ukraine to fight Russia in an interview on Sunday. When pressed about the issue, Coons said Russian President Vladimir Putin “will only stop when we stop him.”

Coons was asked on CBS News’s Face the Nation about comments he made last week in an address to the University of Michigan. In the speech, Coons said the Biden administration and Congress should “come to a common position about when we are willing to go the next step and to send not just arms but troops to the aid in defense of Ukraine … If the answer is never, then we are inviting another level of escalation in brutality by Putin.”

When asked in the CBS interview if President Biden was wrong to say he’ll never send troops into Ukraine, Coons said, “The American people cannot turn away from this tragedy in Ukraine. I think the history of the 21st century turns on how fiercely we defend freedom in Ukraine, and that Putin will only stop when we stop him.”

(antiwar.com)

Coons is not alone…..

Rep. Adam Kinzinger, an ultra-hawk who has been one of the biggest proponents for a no-fly zone, signaled he favored sending troops in a tweet on Sunday. “It’s time to understand that Ukraine must win… and negotiation is not in the cards at the moment,” Kinzinger wrote. “Our generations are getting a lesson that our grandparents understood: the only way to defeat evil is to destroy it.”

The UK has already sent some troops into Ukraine…for training purposes…..

Over the weekend, The Times reported that the British Special Air Service (SAS) soldiers have deployed to Ukraine to train Ukrainian forces on anti-tank weapons provided by London, the first known NATO troop presence in the country since Russia invaded on February 24. While meant as a training mission. the presence of British troops in Ukraine risks provoking a response from Moscow.

Coons is earning his money from his masters by beating the war drums…..

My thought is he needs to walk the streets in Ukraine and see for himself what his actions will bring.  He needs to stand beside Irene’s only son and experience the blood, mud and death before he fires off a inexperienced mouth.

My thought is he needs to STFU about the involvement of US troops.

Hopefully he will not spread his crap any further than to make the news bite for back home.

Turn The Page!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

NATO And Ukraine

Since NATO seems to be at the center of the Ukrainian conflict I thought it would be a good idea to keep an eye on their moves to answer the growing problem in Ukraine.

Did not take long for me to see a disturbing trend starting up……

NATO officials announced the alliance was activating part of its Response Force and is sending thousands of troops to countries near Ukraine amid Russia’s assault on the country.

The US and NATO have reaffirmed that they have no plans to send troops into Ukraine to fight Russia. But NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance is prepared to defend “every inch” of NATO territory, which includes countries that border both Russia and Ukraine.

The Response Force consists of 40,000 troops from NATO countries, but Stoltenberg said the alliance wouldn’t be deploying the entire force and did not specify exactly how many troops will be sent to Eastern Europe. The Response Force was first created in 2003, and this marks the first time it has been activated.

On Thursday, President Biden ordered 7,000 troops to be deployed to Germany. In recent weeks, the US has bolstered its forces in the Baltics, Poland, and Romania, which means US troops are not far from the fighting in Ukraine.

Stoltenberg also Friday that NATO countries announced the types of weapons they plan to give to Ukraine as it fights Russia. The Pentagon said the US will “provide additional security assistance” to Ukraine as well. On Thursday, Ukraine’s defense minister pleaded with the US to send Javelin anti-tank missiles and Stinger anti-aircraft missiles.

(antiwar.com)

This will be the first time NATO’s Response Force is being activated since it was formed in 2003.

Sorry but to me this sounds a lot like an invitation for the invoking of Article 5 of the NATO charter.

If a NATO member is attacked then it will be the US duty to respond….to protect our NATO ally.

Here’s a thought for you to contemplate…..Whatever the real motivations, most post-Vietnam wars have been justified on the grounds of “humanitarian intervention”–that is one of the nuclear powers (usually the US) justifies a war to save civilian lives, even though these wars have invariably proved catastrophic to the very people they pledged to protect. Look no further than Syria, where both the US and Russia claimed to be conducting bombing campaigns to shield civilians from terrorists. In both cases, these “humanitarian missiles” killed far more civilians than the “terrorists” who were supposedly the targets, leaving most of the country in ruins. It’s hard to imagine the Russian “intervention” in Ukraine turning out any different.

Time for Americans to do what the Russians do…..take to the streets and protest our wars of intervention…..maybe ‘intervention’ is not the proper word for Ukrainians do not have brown skin….so let’s us the word ‘salvation’.

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“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–14Feb22

Happy Valentine’s Day to all my readers and their loved ones.

The US is engaged in several wars (all of which are undeclared) and with our troops are stretched so thin the country has turned to the state’s National Guard to fill the gaps in troops.

I have a problem with this on several levels…..Nat Guard is the state’s to use in time of emergencies…they should be used by the states not the national military muscle.

There has been a movement to keep the troops out of unauthorized wars…….

According to the Constitution, Congress has the sole power to declare war—but that hasn’t stopped presidents from sending U.S. troops to many conflicts that haven’t been congressionally authorized. Now state lawmakers across the country are introducing legislation that could challenge unconstitutional deployments.

“Defend the Guard” legislation would allow state governments to prevent their National Guard units from being deployed into conflicts abroad unless U.S. military involvement has been officially authorized by Congress through a declaration of war. “Over 45% of the soldiers deployed in the Global War on Terror have been National Guardsmen,” notes Defend the Guard, a project of BringOurTroopsHome.US. By withholding this manpower, Defend the Guard notes that states could compel the federal government to limit “its endless wars and ensure that the U.S. Constitution is followed.”

Congress last issued a declaration of war in 1942, during World War II. The U.S. military footprint abroad has ballooned in the 80 years since. Active-duty American soldiers are involved in counterterrorism training missions in 65 nations and are engaged in direct-fire combat operations in 14 of them. The U.S. conducts drone strikes in seven countries.

None of these activities have been explicitly authorized by Congress, but many have been made possible through Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMFs) issued in 2001 and 2002. The AUMFs give the president broad discretion “to use all necessary and appropriate force” against “nations, organizations, or persons” determined to have been involved in the September 11 attacks. The 2001 AUMF has been used to justify 41 operations in 19 countries, while the 2002 AUMF hasn’t been the sole authorization used in any military force since 2011.

Defend the Guard legislation seeks to hobble this presidential carte blanche. Lawmakers in Arizona, Idaho, Kentucky, Oklahoma, and other states have introduced bills in the past month that would keep their National Guardsmen out of unauthorized conflicts. Should these bills pass, the federal government would still be able to deploy the National Guard to other states or send them to training missions abroad, among other explicitly constitutional activities. A 1990 Supreme Court decision ruled that the federal government could deploy a state’s National Guard for peacetime training purposes without a governor’s approval.

These Bills Would Keep the National Guard Out of Unconstitutional Wars

This in my opinion is a good thing….the states should be in control of their troops.  If the US wants to use these troops then they need to grow spine a start declaring these wars.

In stead they just keep using troops that are not theirs to use.

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“lego ergo scribo”

The Effects Of Being A Soldier

The army has its first female sniper…..

A Montana soldier is the first woman to graduate from the US Army’s sniper course, the Montana National Guard announced. “We are extremely proud of this soldier’s achievement and recognize that this is a milestone for not only Montana, but the entire National Guard and Army,” said Maj. Gen. J. Peter Hronek, per the AP. The military is not identifying her at this time. The soldier enlisted in the Montana Army National Guard in December 2020 and underwent a 22-week training course at Fort Benning in Georgia that combines Army basic training with advanced individual training in infantry skills.

Her training staff recommended she be given the opportunity to attend the sniper course after she qualified as an expert shooter. She began the US Army sniper course in September and graduated on Nov. 5. “We’re all incredibly proud of her,” says Capt. Joshua O’Neill, her company commander. “There wasn’t a doubt in our minds that she would succeed.” The course trains soldiers to deliver long-range precision fire and to collect battlefield information. Now that her sniper training is completed, she will rejoin her Montana National Guard unit. Though she is the first to complete the Army’s intensive course, several women have previously completed the shorter training of the Air Force, notes Military.com.

I say good for her…..but…….

I recently wrote a post for those thinking about enlisting in the military…..

Thinking Of Enlisting In the Military?

As a continuation I would like for my readers to think about the psychology of being a soldier…

Firstly we all should be aware of the large number to veterans who are choosing suicide as a way out of their torment.

It is a seldom told cost of war.

When I returned from Vietnam I had a difficult time re-entering society. Within 48 hours I went from rain soaked Mekong Delta to the streets of New Orleans…..dealing with that was mind bending….the sounds and smells could trigger a response at any time.

I only had two tours and it is hard to realize what someone is going through with 10 or more deployments.

This article is what the psychological effects of being a soldier….

Supreme Court ruled that there is no place for a cowardly soldier in the army. The incident in question occurred in 2006 in the Kashmir Valley, when the army had surrounded militants inside a cordon. During the ensuing firefight, the dismissed soldier chose not to engage with the cornered militants and instead deserted his post, because of which the militants were able to break the cordon, kill an army personnel and decamp with a machine gun.

The soldier was armed with an assault rifle and a pistol but did not retaliate with either. The honourable bench pointed out that soldiers cannot be exonerated from cowardice just because they had participated wholeheartedly in previous operations, and had never displayed fear prior to this incident and upheld his dismissal from service.

The Psychological Toll of Being a Soldier

These are things that are seldom considered when one enters the military….with promises of signing bonuses and health care and training and….on and on….but NO where is the side effects are discussed….and it should be.

If you are thinking of entering the military to do your part to protect your country then please do some research.

Please, please take the time to do the searches and then weigh the pros and cons of military service….the side effects can be lethal.

Turn The Page!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”