Hello Gents,
I have lurked around this thread since inception. An it is interesting to see and read all of the various twists and turns as the thread has evolved, and events have unfolded. Here is my take on the original thread subject "War with Iran".....
1. Never get involved in a land war in Asia. Oops! Too Late.
2. Never give a Theocracy a Victory. Aw hell! They got that one too!
3. Never tangle with someone who you do not intend to whip. Ouch! This is starting to hurt!
4. Never engage in arguments with idiots. Enough said.
5. Why fire once, when you can fire a thousand times and really scare the piss out of everything down range? I think we missed this lesson......
My take on things:
We won against Al Queda, and the Taliban because we were attacked, and the Afghan people understand the concept of vendetta. They respect it, and clearly found our cause to be intertwined with their needs. Natural Allies. Everything was going along pretty well, we kicked the snot out of the Iraqi insurgency and they fled Iraq and went to Pakistan, to wait.
Along come Obama. And he decries the war in Iraq, and declares that the war in Afghanistan is the "Good War". Honor and Vendetta are now null and void. Friendship and gratitude are gone. NATO is now seen as an invading Army. The US is no longer prosecuting a vendetta, but is now bent on fighting a war, and subjugating the Afghani peoples.
It's sad and funny, pathetic and horrible. All the while, Iran has been plotting and preparing. They have made some major strides forward on their capabilities. That will cost us in blood if we cross swords with them.
If it does come to war with Iran, we will have no choice but to bleed them white. I can see no other course of action that will succeed. We will lose a lot of air power there. If the Republican Guard gets lucky, there might be a Nuclear Carrier hosting a lot of fish in the Persian Gulf.
Will we win? I guess it depends on how bad the Democrats want to humiliate America. Just recently, they seen to have had their fill of that. but if there is a big Republican Sweep in November, they may get hungry again.
Our real enemy is not Iran. It is those who do not see the world as it is.
I want all of our boys and girls to come home now. There is nothing in central Asia that interests me. We need to solve our own problems, and stop considering the Middle East as a possible solution. Then, maybe, things will get done and decided. I am all for a new WPA that is tasked with building Micro-Nuke plants and re-wiring the infrastructure to support them.
Sorry, Too much Red Wine this evening....