Bush says, "read my lips, NO DRAFT!", some disagree

[whistle]

<snip>
10-04-2004

Uncle Sam Will Soon Want Your Kids
By David H. Hackworth

Recently, when John Kerry brought up the possibility of a return to the draft, SecDef Donald Rumsfeld was quick to respond that Kerry was full of it.

But my take is that Kerry is right on the mark. Not only because Rummy has been flat wrong on every major military call regarding Iraq, but because this is a war that won’t be won by smart weapons or the sledgehammer firepower we see every night on the tube.

Right now – with both our regular and Reserve soldiers stretched beyond the breaking point – our all-volunteer force is tapping out. If our overseas troop commitments continue at the present rate or climb higher, there won’t be enough Army and Marine grunts to do the job. And thin, overworked units, from Special Forces teams to infantry battalions, lose fights.

<snip>

Israel, a country that has lived under the barrel of the Islamic terrorist gun for decades, has the most combat-experienced counterinsurgent force in the world – and boy and girl draftees are its major resource. <more>

<link> http://www.sftt.org/cgi-bin/csNews/csNews.cgi?database=Hacks%20Target.db&command=viewone&op=t&id=92&rnd=430.8514199218088

[LynnTheDem]

1. bush LIES. Often. Like when bush said...

"If we don't stop extending our troops all around the world in nation-building missions, then we're going to have a serious problem coming down the road."

[Sugarbleus]

2. This is my take on his "No Draft" speech

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=1019563&mesg_id=1019707

[eriffle]

3. My concerns on a draft

As a male in the draft age range, I am not too concerned about being drafted because of Iraq. This is what I worry about. What if North Korea attacks/invades/nukes South Korea. We would have to deploy troops to South Korea. We simply do not have enough troops today to deal with a 3rd front, this is when a draft would have to happen. Now, it may not be the North Korean example I listed above, it could be Iran and Israel, or some unforseen 9-11 type attack. These are the things that worry me.

[whistle]

4. Bush has that covered, he will use nuclear weapons which is....

...the reason he set up the $70 billion anti-missile defense system which is not likely to be very effective.

<link> http://slate.msn.com/id/2079062/

Bush is confident he has a missile defense, but his military does not share that confidence:

<snip>
$100 Billion anti-missile system effectiveness is doubted

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Anti-missile system
set, but doubts remain
Interceptor network hasn't
been realistically tested

At a newly constructed launch site on a tree-shorn plain in central Alaska, a large crane crawls from silo to silo, gently lowering missiles into their holes. The sleek white rockets, each about five stories tall, are designed to soar into space and intercept warheads headed toward the United States.

With five installed so far and one more due by mid-October, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld is preparing to activate the site sometime this autumn. President Bush already has begun to claim fulfillment of a 2000 presidential campaign pledge -- and longtime Republican Party goal -- to build a nationwide missile defense.

But what the administration had hoped would be a triumphant achievement is clouded by doubts, even within the Pentagon, about whether a system that is on its way to costing more than $100 billion will work. Several key components have fallen years behind schedule and will not be available until later. Flight tests, plagued by delays, have yet to advance beyond elementary, highly scripted events.

The paucity of realistic test data has caused the Pentagon's chief weapons evaluator to conclude that he cannot offer a confident judgment about the system's viability. He estimated its likely effectiveness to be as low as 20 percent.

"A system is being deployed that doesn't have any credible capability," said retired Gen. Eugene Habiger, who headed the U.S. Strategic Command in the mid-1990s. "I cannot recall any military system being deployed in such a manner."
<link to more>
http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?t=353705

So if the missiles aren't for defence, then what are they being built and deployed for? Attack!

Projected costs over $200 billion and these are not defensive weapons, they are offensive weapons. So if North Korea invades, Bush will simly send in ICBMs with nuclear warheads and wipe the country out. He suggested as much in the debate last night when he said technology will take the place of troops:

http://www.cdi.org/hotspots/issuebrief/ch5/