kuzi16:all of you are forgetting: we are not supposed to judge him by his deeds or their outcomes, but rather his good intentions.
Archangel32G:ok so his good intentions, ill start this off by saying im STILL in afghanistan. Yes he may have signed to send an additional 60,000 troops here god knows that we ned it. But he has also extended a lot of the infantry here so they get to stay an extra 3 months because he took so long to rouse up the extra troops. The infantry cats that im attached to has already lost 9 guys and they are about a month away from finally getting a break, and now they are most likely extended. Im currently a gunner in the lead truck of almost every convoy we are involved in, it takes an act of congress before i can really shoot an oncoming vehicle that could possibly explode and kill everyone in my truck, We all know that you cant effectively stop a speeding vehicle when its within 50 meters. My COP gets hit constantly with indirect fire ie rockets, mortars, rocoiless rifles. when we find a POO site (Point of origin) and its anywhere near or even in most cases in a house (yes they love to shoot from their houses) we cant fire, all we can do is sit in the bunkers and hope another rocket doesnt come in and kill someone. I dont get why people are showering this guy with compliments and even awards, everyday it gets harder and harder to complete our job out here because our hands are tied from doing anything. All this is going to result in is us staying here for YEARS to come. Sounds like another great idea.
JZ:Former Cuban leader Fidel Castro calls Obama's Nobel Peace Prize 'a positive measure.' Well as long as he is happy with the selection; has anyone detected a trend here?
phobicsquirrel: Archangel32G:ok so his good intentions, ill start this off by saying im STILL in afghanistan. Yes he may have signed to send an additional 60,000 troops here god knows that we ned it. But he has also extended a lot of the infantry here so they get to stay an extra 3 months because he took so long to rouse up the extra troops. The infantry cats that im attached to has already lost 9 guys and they are about a month away from finally getting a break, and now they are most likely extended. Im currently a gunner in the lead truck of almost every convoy we are involved in, it takes an act of congress before i can really shoot an oncoming vehicle that could possibly explode and kill everyone in my truck, We all know that you cant effectively stop a speeding vehicle when its within 50 meters. My COP gets hit constantly with indirect fire ie rockets, mortars, rocoiless rifles. when we find a POO site (Point of origin) and its anywhere near or even in most cases in a house (yes they love to shoot from their houses) we cant fire, all we can do is sit in the bunkers and hope another rocket doesnt come in and kill someone. I dont get why people are showering this guy with compliments and even awards, everyday it gets harder and harder to complete our job out here because our hands are tied from doing anything. All this is going to result in is us staying here for YEARS to come. Sounds like another great idea. Being someone who was there in 01, and watching the way the ground was handled I can tell you that I would have loved to have had some REAL planning on how to run things. I remember hearing my LT on the phone with command pleading for more rangers but every time it was denied. Later I found out that the CIA and the white house wanted to do things their way. I'm not going to get in the middle of this hate fest but since your actually in combat right now let me ask you, would 40,000 troops really make a difference? I mean can WE really win there? Doubtful, and what are we fighting? Al Queda (however it's spelled) isn't even there, they are in Pakistan. If 40-80 thousand more troops were brought there, WE will be there for YEARS to come. Re-focusing the efforts of the military need to be done. Moving troops into an area, fighting these crazies isn't going to do anything. There really needs to be a re-focused effort. And btw, the rules of engagement have always sucked since these wars began. I remember going through the same crap, and it wasn't only until someone got shot did you KNOW it was okay to return fire. I feel ya on that, but it's the way it goes.
Archangel32G: phobicsquirrel: Archangel32G:ok so his good intentions, ill start this off by saying im STILL in afghanistan. Yes he may have signed to send an additional 60,000 troops here god knows that we ned it. But he has also extended a lot of the infantry here so they get to stay an extra 3 months because he took so long to rouse up the extra troops. The infantry cats that im attached to has already lost 9 guys and they are about a month away from finally getting a break, and now they are most likely extended. Im currently a gunner in the lead truck of almost every convoy we are involved in, it takes an act of congress before i can really shoot an oncoming vehicle that could possibly explode and kill everyone in my truck, We all know that you cant effectively stop a speeding vehicle when its within 50 meters. My COP gets hit constantly with indirect fire ie rockets, mortars, rocoiless rifles. when we find a POO site (Point of origin) and its anywhere near or even in most cases in a house (yes they love to shoot from their houses) we cant fire, all we can do is sit in the bunkers and hope another rocket doesnt come in and kill someone. I dont get why people are showering this guy with compliments and even awards, everyday it gets harder and harder to complete our job out here because our hands are tied from doing anything. All this is going to result in is us staying here for YEARS to come. Sounds like another great idea. Being someone who was there in 01, and watching the way the ground was handled I can tell you that I would have loved to have had some REAL planning on how to run things. I remember hearing my LT on the phone with command pleading for more rangers but every time it was denied. Later I found out that the CIA and the white house wanted to do things their way. I'm not going to get in the middle of this hate fest but since your actually in combat right now let me ask you, would 40,000 troops really make a difference? I mean can WE really win there? Doubtful, and what are we fighting? Al Queda (however it's spelled) isn't even there, they are in Pakistan. If 40-80 thousand more troops were brought there, WE will be there for YEARS to come. Re-focusing the efforts of the military need to be done. Moving troops into an area, fighting these crazies isn't going to do anything. There really needs to be a re-focused effort. And btw, the rules of engagement have always sucked since these wars began. I remember going through the same crap, and it wasn't only until someone got shot did you KNOW it was okay to return fire. I feel ya on that, but it's the way it goes. Well man to be honest, 40000 troops may or may not help out it depends on what type of combat arms will be sent out here. I think where they messed up is that they sent out to many of the psychological guys out here to try to 'better' the relations with the public and the government when we shouldve been doing pushes out to the vast enemy territory with straight infantry and other jobs that are geared more towards combat. the trouble is is that right now it seems that were are fighting a ghost, and you are correct its not al quaeda were fighting here its the Taliban which as you may know consists of a lot of extremeists and ex Muhadjideen. We are definitely going to be here for YEARS to come like you said simply for the fact that corruption in their government goes so deep you cant effectively catch them because there is always one more guy higher than him that is covering up his BS. I just think that instead of trying to make it sound like were doing a lot of good out here we need to really take a look at what has been going, on which sometimes seems like a whole lot of nothing, and see if we can take a more direct approach. But either way i dont think that there will be anything remotely close to a complete mission out here for many years to come. everything is so spread out its hard to make a push out to almost anywhere. as for everyone elses posts, i hope i answered some questions and i appreciate the responses. im glad a found this forum one for my love for cigars, and for the intelligent people that you come across. Talk to you all soon.
The other thing, and what might give us clues as to why he won the Nobel, is the United States Economy. There is very little in the work that is not, in some way, tied into the United States; be it shipping, accounting, or really any aspect of business, everything has roots in the United States. If our economy hurts, so does the Global Economy. I think you'll start to see a lot of countries realize this, and things like a random prize will become commonplace in order to boost support in Obama, and lend credibility to his actions.
Finally, there is Afghanistan, the wars we have going as a whole, and our military guidelines and actions. I do not agree that we need to be in Afghanistan right now. It's a slippery slope, though; 9/11 happened, and we couldn't do nothing. However, it's really starting to feel like another Vietnam. If we could win, it would be a decisive victory and a great thing for many people, but the cost would be unheard of. We are not at war with Afghanistan, we are at war with an individual group within it's borders. Unfortunately, it's not something we can overcome with might alone. I agree that the rules of engagement are insane. We're basically handcuffing our soldiers and throwing them into a firefight. The reason why we have to, however, is because we're in a delicate state right now, in the world view. If we bomb a school accidentally, there will be a global outcry. Had we handled the planning of the war better, and reacted logically instead of emotionally, we would be in a place where we could have laxer rules.
So what to do? We're in a rough place right now, and I think we need a hell of a leader. I hope Obama can be that leader, we'll just need to wait and see.
betasynn:we'll just need to wait and see.