We sustained 5,000 casualties and expended some $1.5 Trillion over like 15 years. Our equipment losses (in Iraq) barely touched our military capabilities. For perspective, we pissed away $3.7 Trillion in 2 months last year to shut the economy down (total cost well in excess of of 7 Trillion, when soft costs are factored in--and this doesn't include subsequent expenditures...). Russia has *allegedly* lost more than twice the number of soldiers we lost in Viet Nam over 20 years....IN TWO MONTHS!!! Their military capability has been reduced conservatively, by like 25%.. in TWO months. Their entire national economy crushed, their currency, crashed...and they weren't in a very strong economic position going in. Perspective much???
We draw ever closer to sending troops to the Ukraine and acting unilaterally. @BLING has made this point earlier in the thread and placing this much authority in the executive branch one has to wonder how cooler heads can prevail. New Resolution Would Allow the President To Send U.S. Troops to Ukraine Like military authorizations of years past, Kinzinger's AUMF is quite open-ended and would give the president a concerning level of power to enter the war in Ukraine. Though Kinzinger claims the AUMF would give Biden "leverage" and "flexibility" in the fight against Putin, that would come at the expense of the constitutionally mandated role of Congress in American war making. According to the AUMF text, once the president determines whether Russia has used chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons in Ukraine, he may then deploy U.S. forces as he "determines to be necessary and appropriate" in order to "protect the national security interests of the United States with respect to Ukraine" and "assist in defending and restoring the territorial integrity of Ukraine." The president wouldn't have to receive congressional approval prior to a troop deployment; rather, he would only have to determine that "diplomatic or other peaceful means alone" wouldn't protect U.S. security interests or Ukrainian territorial integrity. The AUMF text also contains a murky sunset provision: The president's authority to use the U.S. Armed Forces to defend Ukraine will "terminate the date on which the President certifies to Congress that the territorial integrity of Ukraine has been restored."
Were there any good guys in Iraq? Our soldiers were but how could you choose who you wanted to win or lose? The whole middle east seems to be a good argument for use of the neutron bomb.
OK, so this is proposed legislation authorizing the use of force after weapons of mass destruction are used. Point one isn't this what the constitution wants? Congressional approval of the use of the military. I guess you want a formal declaration of war. There is a trigger here. Russia has to nuke Ukraine. I think anything that prevents this is a good thing.
Abu Ghraib among other incidents comes to mind. In war the most deplorable actions of humans come to the forefront.
Agreed as of now it is proposed legislation. I recall the argument of putting nuclear weapons in the hands of President Trump now you want to put them in the hands of President Biden on a unilateral decision? Lets be clear the only reason the US didn't suffer a nuclear blast in WWII is because we were the only ones that had such a weapon. Today there are many more nations that have them. My personal opinion is the world doesn't need a nuclear war but if one should break out all bets are off.
And they were charged/convicted, not given medals like the Russians. And as bad as that was it was enemy combatants. They weren't going around gangraping little girls for example. But yes war brings out both the best & the worst in humanity.
You are right they were and there are many more that went unreported / adjudicated on all sides of a war. It is absurd to believe that any sense of Queensberry Rules apply in war when the object is to kill or be killed until submission of a nation or truce is called.
Whether it is meant seriously, or tongue-in-cheek, the day one can look at an instrument of war and death and refer to it as "beautiful", is the day I acknowledge that we are truly lost.
You are still defending Iraq? I didn’t say they were exactly equal, I pretty specifically said they weren’t. I simply replied to a poster that we did actually have a proximate thing, that “thing” being a totally illegitimate military invasion, to have been “shocked, embarrassed, and heartbroken” (uftaipan’s words) over.
"Well, we did have Iraq…" In response to that poster's (and my) exchange about the stats he posted, which included 104,000 soldiers (Russian casualties), 500+ tanks, like 150 choppers, battleships.. Here was your caveat: Obviously not as staggering in terms of American lives, but in terms of treasure and Iraqi lives…it was a low point in our history (and personally I think a big part of the insanity on the right we are still dealing with nearly 20 years later, is the reckoning with this reality that it was all lies, that they vocally supported this evil). Yeah, you did carve out the number of lives, but the difference was SOOOO vast, let alone 2 MONTHS (Russia here--again, 104k in 2 MONTHS!) vs 5,000 over 15 years in Iraq--that the stark difference begged to be pointed out... ...but then you expressly invoked "in terms of treasure"--i.e. cost of the war. That goes beyond night and day, to like seconds vs a year. 1.5 Trillion over 15 years was doable--clearly proven b/c we're still here, and for further perspective, I offered the 3.7 Tril Covid Stim (doubled with soft charges...). I don't know what Russia's numbers are, but I do know they weren't exactly rolling in it going in to this thing, and have since had their ruble crash and their economy stagnating, and the sanctions are just starting to take their toll, AND the rubble collapsing.... Iraq's effect on our life was squat next to what Putin's debacle is proving to be in Ukraine. He's killing his own country with this nationally suicidal fool's errand. He has literally created an existential threat to Russia (over the manufactured existential threat that he pretended NATO presented), while Iraq never even came close to presenting an existential threat to the US. Not even close. At no point was the existence and/or viability of the US EVER in question due to Iraq.
Respectfully, your comparison is not close, though. I have done four tours in Iraq, and I think it was a bad idea that was executed even more badly. Let’s just agree that if we could go back and unring that bell that the overwhelming majority of us would. If you want a fair comparison to what Russia is doing, then I think you have to go back to Germany’s invasion of Poland in 1939. North Korea’s invasion of the South in 1950 and Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990 would be closer models, but only Germany’s early campaigns of conquest fairly compare to what Russia is trying to do in terms of scope, severity, and the wronged country’s willingness to resist. The U.S. has also engaged in wars of conquest (Neither Iraq nor Vietnam fall into those categories), and I make no excuse for that other than to point out that the entire world did so in those days. Post World War I, wars of conquest have been rare and rightfully reviled by the rest of the world. I am always willing to engage in academic discussion about OIF, the right and the wrong, but I think it belongs in a wholly different category than what we are seeing in Ukraine and would request a new thread if you want to go there.
