How about ‘Never get involved in a land war.’? Or, ‘Never get involved in a war.’ ? (Unless you absolutely have to in order to stop a maniac from murdering people. For real.)

Gates is definitely not a fan of the Ledeen Doctrine, then.

Gates wants them to know to never bet against a Sicilian when death is on the line?

Just kidding! :)

See the news story about the US military leaving the Pech Valley in Afghanistan, because its presence was destabilizing and counter-productive? Why can’t the geniuses at the State Department and the Pentagon put their heads together and make loud coconut sounds, and substitute the word Afghanistan for Pech Valley?

In the name of God, what is America doing there? What would a ‘victory’ possibly look like? What can the US do now that it couldn’t do in 10 years already?

I’m lost.

Bush didn’t care about our military or winning. It was all about oil and resources and giving his biz buds some more foreign market share.

They must think there is money to be made there. Nothing else even remotely makes sense. The only thing that has really changed since the invasion is the price of opium has dropped. Dramatically. Bumper crops every year.

And I thought Rummy channeled him with the “known unknowns.”

So nobody wants these “wars.” Even those who are stuck carrying them out are sick of them. Even those who keep ordering them ostensibly don’t want them. Absolutely nobody wants them.

Yet on they somehow must go, and do. Strangling the life out of our nation, literally.

where do I sign up for mine?? Gonna need it if the teachers and public employees and all union loose this War in Wisconsin…

Ya know the tell was when people still pretended to take that asshat seriously after that little speech.

Follow the opium. Anywhere there are large amounts of poppy fields, you’ll find Americans. And if you dig deeply enough, those Americans have ties to the Bush family.

Read his lips — Gates said “send a big American land army into Asia” which applies to Iraq, which everybody and his dog knows was a mistake, and not to Afghanistan which is a genuine COIN™ effort to “stabilize” the country.

So the door is open to more “stability” exercises to “keep America safe” and “to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaeda and to prevent their return in the future.”

Dick Cheney is a classic example of someone who should have a psychological examination.

President Obama has now said Mr. Gaddafi has ‘to go,’ that he’s lost his ‘legitimacy.’ Hellz bellz, how could anyone in their right mind ever have considered this madman as legitimate? The record is there. Furthermore, if Gaddafi doesn’t die in a hail of bullets or by an assassin, he shouldn’t be allowed to go anywhere–except a front-row seat before a court of law. (European I suppose; not much law going on here.)

The best thing that Obama could do, for the country and for his historical reputation is to get the hell out of Afghanistan and Iraq. Now.

Announce that Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld were complete idiots to put us there in the first place.
Declare victory and leave. Now.

Of course, this would be political suicide; the right wing would go absolutely batshit insane.
Guess what? They are already batshit insane.

He would then, of course, have to announce that he will not be running for re-election. (Don’t worry, his corporate backers will make sure that he is VERY comfortable for the rest of his life.)

Future historians will praise him for recognizing that to continue the current path is folly; getting out NOW is the only smart thing to do.

How about “never get involved in any war unless you’re sending your kid there on the front lines.”

I’m still trying to decipher “But for now, rest well and dream of large women”.

Pay close attention to what Gates is saying to see how that he’s changing quote – what Gates is saying could be interpreted as treating things like Pakistan with lots of drones killing civilians along with many “diplomat” assassins running around those countries. Vizzini was actually saying NOT to do what Gates is saying to do.

I prefer my wife’s version of Santayana:

Those who remember the past are condemned to watch others repeat it.

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. – George Santayana

Those who aren’t prepared to say “Are you crazy?” when someone asks if it’s possible to do something stupid are condemned to spend a lot of time doing something stupid. – Cujo359, and possibly others…

There’s a tendency among military officers, at least in the American military, to never admit that they can’t do something, no matter how obvious it might be that they can’t. That’s probably a good attitude if it’s not carried to extremes, but when you have someone like Rumsfeld or Bush in charge, it’s a problem. I don’t know how much that attitude did to get us into Iraq and keep us in Afghanistan, but I’d bet some day we’ll find that it had its little part to play in those tragedies.

I sense a little of that realization in Gates’ speech.

There’s a tendency among military officers, at least in the American military, to never admit that they can’t do something, no matter how obvious it might be that they can’t.

That’s true, the military has a genetic “can-do” attitude which is why we have civilian leadership of the military, thus providing wise counsel. Unfortunately Gates despite his rhetoric at West Point is basically pro-MIC and has no aversion to wars he thinks might be won, which is just about any war except perhaps sending a “big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa”. That leaves out Europe and the Americas, as well as small American land armies anywhere.

Anyhow, foreign policy is not supposed to be determined by hack political appointees, is it. Gates doesn’t know any more about these matters than you or I do, and he’s certainly more prejudiced toward the MIC.

In a democracy the people acting through their elected representatives ought to be making these choices in accordance with international law.

It looks like Gates has taken Bill Maher’s advice and bought a bottle of GrowASet.

I don’t know if the phrase “big American land army” was meant to exclude Afghanistan, but 100,000 troops (not including contractors) is big enough by my definition. The entire U.S. Army is only 600,000 or so.

Yeah no kidding.

The Taliban totally eradicated poppy production so… pappy has junior invade a few months later. With junior in charge, Afghanistan once again started to produce record poppy crops. Mission acomplished!

can anyone tell us what ‘victory’ has looked like in Afghanistan over the last 1,000 ears or so? IFAIK, the only army that has ever ‘won’ in Afghanistan would be Reagan’s mujahadeen, whose victory brought chaos and a return to the 14th century.

it may be that Afghanistan is ungovernable, and therefore unwinnable by anyone but the most savage armies. in the future, will our historians say “we had to destroy Afghanistan in order to save it”? i thought we learned THAT lesson 40 years ago in another corner of asia.

The only thing the past teaches us is that we fail to learn from it.