When I'm not being bombarded by pros and cons about the escalation of troops, oops, I mean SURGE, in Iraq, I'm being inundated with discourses on whether we're winning in that country.
Hmmm.
My first question would be: how does one 'win' an occupation?
My second would be: since when is 'winning' the measure of an advanced society?
As an Air Force intelligence officer, my job was not to 'win' the exercises in which I took part, but to 'accomplish the mission'. If I had a Euro dollar for every time I heard those three all-important words, I'd be manning my own site instead of blogspot blogging.
Now that I think of it, the Air Force tends to love and employ those trios of words often...'attention to detail'...'chain of command'...ACCOMPLISH THE MISSION...(remember that little banner thing on the carrier....)
Unless the military has changed beyond all recognition, there's not a soldier, airman or marine who has been sent to Iraq 'to win' but rather to accomplish the mission.
And yet, today I heard someone claiming the morale is so much higher in Iraq because the troops there feel they're 'winning'.
Perhaps, to play devil's advocate with myself, they are referring to winning against the terrorists, 'Winning the War on Terror'.
So my next question would be: how does one 'win' a technique or method?
And my next question would be: why did we accept such a humvee load of tripe as a 'war' on an amorphous definition of violence practiced by anyone, anywhere, anytime?
You know what? IF the morale is higher it's probably because there's been 'a slight downtick in violence' of late, and more of the troops are LIVING.
So my last question would be: when are we all going to get good and fed up with being fed this kind of crap?
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5 comments:
The occupation mentality of the military is based upon the false premise that there is a potential to win something other than control of Iraq's oil reserves...like freedom and democracy or at least ridding the country of SoDamnInsane.
Most thinking folks (i.e. the entire rest of the planet!) recognize the propaganda and manipulation applied and reject the entire venture out of hand.
The question of 'winning a technique or method'? I interpret your query as 'how do we win a war with an 'idea'? Oh, I know, kill all who even come close to uttering the idea!! That aughduh werk...
And as for the rest, I'd say you are thinking out loud...perceptive thoughts...but much ground into and already aboard that 'humvee load of tripe' we call national political dialogue..
Doubt Nothing...Question Everything
Don't you just get thoroughly sick of all the lies and propaganda, Paul Revere? Why, though, should we be duped by them while others possess some discernment?
In fact, my query is, 'how do we win a war against an idea?'
I suppose it was a rhetorical question because I know the answer: YOU DON'T.
And that's why it was begun.
M'am, at several points over the evolution of this republican take over of our country (became most public w/GHWB as CIA head in mid 70's)I have wondered about my sanity. It came to a particular head with BC's blow job fiasco and then again when SCOTUS just GAVE the election to dumb_uck and the spineless dems just sat there...and then the obvious manipulation around 9/11 put me over the edge...yes, 'thoroughly sick' is a mild description thank you.
Yeh, and as for the depth and scope of the traction these guys have procured in the psyche and governing structures (ideas) of OUR COUNTRY and how to dissemble THAT...well, time will tell, but the winds of that change smell sulpherous to me.
Btw...that seemingly insurmountable mountain of psychic division in America is precisely why we are communicating and precisely what the founders had in mind as the stimulus for change...
"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed."
Doubt Nothing...Question Everything
Question one: You can't. You leave.
Question two: We're advanced?
How does one win a technique? Nope, can't defeat a tactic. Even more so, the tactic is designed to create an emotion: Terror. And the war is on TERROR. How do you conduct a war against an emotion?
Fourth question: cuz we (present company excluded) believe everything we see on teevee? Because no one is taught to think critically any more? If they ever were...
Final question: I got fed up a long time ago. How do I get off this merry-go-round?
You express futility well...the only answer for a true patriot is 'persevere' as an old lefty KPFA commentator in L.A. used to end his soliloquy with.
If we, the motivated choose to abandon the 'cause', I can only feel that to be weak. You know, the old saw, when the goin' gets tough the tough get goin'...trite to a point, but when faced with today's political realities like ruthless elimination of 'cause oriented' individuals, overt manipulation of the media and the blatant hammering of fear tactics, I just freakin' HAVE to rebel!!
Back to the Declaration of Independence paragraph I quoted above...there DOES come a time and the way I see it is that those who recognize the plight, recognize each other and eventually form a critical mass...
Doubt Nothing...Question Everything
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