Obama 02: Let's finish the fight with Bin Laden and al-Qaeda

[Clio the Leo]

I stand before you as someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances. The Civil War was one of the bloodiest in history, and yet it was only through the crucible of the sword, the sacrifice of multitudes, that we could begin to perfect this union and drive the scourge of slavery from our soil.

I Don't Oppose All Wars

I don't oppose all wars. My grandfather signed up for a war the day after Pearl Harbor was bombed, fought in Patton's army. He fought in the name of a larger freedom, part of that arsenal of democracy that triumphed over evil.

I don't oppose all wars. After September 11, after witnessing the carnage and destruction, the dust and the tears, I supported this administration's pledge to hunt down and root out those who would slaughter innocents in the name of intolerance, and I would willingly take up arms myself to prevent such tragedy from happening again.

I don't oppose all wars. What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other armchair, weekend warriors in this administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.

What I am opposed to is the attempt by political hacks like Karl Rove to distract us from a rise in the uninsured, a rise in the poverty rate, a drop in the median income, to distract us from corporate scandals and a stock market that has just gone through the worst month since the Great Depression.

That's what I'm opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics.

Now let me be clear: I suffer no illusions about Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal man. A ruthless man. A man who butchers his own people to secure his own power.... The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him.

But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors...and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history.

I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a U.S. occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences.

I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al-Qaeda.

I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars. So for those of us who seek a more just and secure world for our children, let us send a clear message to the president.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let's finish the fight with Bin Laden and al-Qaeda, through effective, coordinated intelligence, and a shutting down of the financial networks that support terrorism, and a homeland security program that involves more than color-coded warnings.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let's fight to make sure that...we vigorously enforce a nonproliferation treaty, and that former enemies and current allies like Russia safeguard and ultimately eliminate their stores of nuclear material, and that nations like Pakistan and India never use the terrible weapons already in their possession, and that the arms merchants in our own country stop feeding the countless wars that rage across the globe.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let's fight to make sure our so-called allies in the Middle East, the Saudis and the Egyptians, stop oppressing their own people, and suppressing dissent, and tolerating corruption and inequality, and mismanaging their economies so that their youth grow up without education, without prospects, without hope, the ready recruits of terrorist cells.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let's fight to wean ourselves off Middle East oil through an energy policy that doesn't simply serve the interests of Exxon and Mobil.

Those are the battles that we need to fight. Those are the battles that we willingly join. The battles against ignorance and intolerance. Corruption and greed. Poverty and despair."

State Senator Barack Obama, October 2, 2002.

http://usliberals.about.com/od/extraordinaryspeeches/a/Obama2002War.htm

[rug]

1. What is smart about the Afghanistan war?

[TheWraith]

2. Cleaning up the clusterfuck we created. nt

[ShortnFiery]

5. What? We've already figuratively cut them in half with a machine gun, now offering them band-aids?

By sending more combat troops we will only INCREASE the killing and dying.

GO! Let the native sort out the civil war ... The TALIBAN had NOTHING to do with 9/11 and will NOT welcome al Qaeda back in their areas. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

[TheWraith]

6. I'm glad you find jingoism enough of a solution for foreign policy.

However the real world is a little more complicated than that, not least for the reason that the Taliban has a great deal to do with Al Qaeda.

[ShortnFiery]

13. General Petraeus ADMITS there's no al Qaeda in Afghanistan - that's the truth.

The TRUTH does not have to be complicated.

How many more troops and innocents must be killed before we realize that NOW, it's a CIVIL WAR between the illegitimate Karzai government and the rural area Taliban?

Do we want in the middle of THAT civil war when al Qaeda is essentially back in Pakistan?

[TheWraith]

14. No no, Petraeus is a total disgusting liar according to your compatriots...

...because he said there WERE Al Q groups in Afghanistan.

Get your talking points straight.

[ShortnFiery]

30. Watch the video above. General "Peaches" says that al Qaeda has relocated to Pakistan. eom

[ClarkUSA]

7. 'Gen. Petraus "says affiliated organizations still have "enclaves and sanctuaries" in the country'

The country Gen. Petraus was referring to is Afghanistan, of course.

Link: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x3870206

Also from a recent BBC article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/8384994.stm

Later Foreign Secretary David Miliband said Britain wanted Pakistan to "join us in upping our game" in tackling terrorism
on its border with Afghanistan... he said it was "right that we recognise that stability in Afghanistan requires stability in
Pakistan too and that requires a combined effort."

We've all got to do more, Pakistan has got to do more, Afghanistan has got to do more and the international community
has got to do more, but we've also got to do better."

Between this source and the other source that quoted Petraeus, they bolster the reasons why Candidate wanted and why
President Obama wants to "finish the job" in Afghanistan and why he has the support of both the Afghanistan President
and the Pakistani PM to do so, especially since fighting will take place along the mountainous Af-Pak border region where
the Al-Qaida leadership is ostensibly hiding.

[Techn0Girl]

11. You mean General "Betray-us"? The guy we hated during the Bush Years?

Can't wait for you to start quoting Buchannen.

[ClarkUSA]

24. Ignore the facts to keep spewing the red-meat rhetoric. That's all you've got.

BTW, Pat Buchanan agrees with you. Maybe your next OP should quote him. :rofl:

[ShortnFiery]

15. I have it on video where General "Peaches" concurs that "al Qaeda are no longer in Afghanistan."

So we're sending 30,000 combat troops JUST IN CASE, or to slaughter a group that had NOTHING TO DO WITH 9/11 (Taliban) in order to prop up an illegitimate puppet (Karzai) who will do our geopolitical bidding?

Oh, here's the site reference ... it's toward the end of the video, you can hear General "Peaches."

http://rethinkafghanistan.com/blog/?p=702

[Techn0Girl]

22. "JUST IN CASE" ... is called "The Bush Doctrine" ... which a loud number of DUers now support

[Clio the Leo]

27. But most of us are smarter than Sarah Palin....

.... and we know what the Bush Doctrine is. We realize that what President Obama is trying to do does not include the four fundamental tenants of the Bush Doctrine, most notably unilateralism, preemptive strikes, regime change or attacking nations that harbor terrorists.

If we have the consent of the government to send in troops, then we're not attacking them.

[Techn0Girl]

29. UNilateralism?

Hello wtf did unilateralism ever enter into the Iraq war. Bush made a big deal of his coalition of forces.

The rest of your post makes no more sense.
Either way you can not be reasoned with or argued with any more than a right-wing teabagger can be argued with.

You're on ignore from now on. You are just not worth spending time with.

[ClarkUSA]

25. He said that but also said what I quoted. Check the link I gave, Shortie.

Thanks for the video link. :hi:

[ShortnFiery]

3. Let's insert ourselves in favor of a illegitimate government within a civil war.

AND as a result get thousands of OUR TROOPS and INNOCENT CIVILIANS killed in the crossfire.

God Bless the American Empire's Geopolitical Advantages and Corporate Profits for the MIC: That's what our troops are fighting for. :grr:

[Techn0Girl]

12. Yes...Because that worked out so very well for everyone in iraq

[Cha]

4. I just posted this on another thread..

And, thanks for making an OP out of it..

"So for those of us who seek a more just and secure world for our children, let us send a clear message to the President today. You want a fight, President Bush? Let's finish the fight with Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, through effective, coordinated intelligence, and a shutting down of the financial networks that support terrorism, and a homeland security program that involves more than color-coded warnings. You want a fight, President Bush?"

[ShortnFiery]

8. There is NO more al Qaeda in Afghanistan to *FIGHT.* Even Gen. Petraeus admits that.

Who are you going to *fight*?!? The LOCALLY motivated Taliban who had NOTHING TO DO with 9/11 save for allow al Qaeda to set up CAMP?

We have NO mission!!! However, Obama is attempting to MORPH decentralized and global al Qaeda into the LOCAL AREA Taliban. That's not only WRONG, it's VILE.

There's no one left "to fight."

Time to back out and let the corrupt Karzai government battle it out with the Taliban and then work with whomever WINS THEIR CIVIL WAR.

[Techn0Girl]

9. You might want to give that poster the bad news on Iraqi WMDs as well...

[Cha]

20. Yeah, this one isn't interested in facts. FACTS? They don't

need no stinking facts.

[ShortnFiery]

33. We (USA) own the WORLD'S largest stockpiles of WMDs. In our hands WMDs are DoublePlusGood.

[wileedog]

16. You're missing the point

Obama wants to finish the fight with AQ.

AQ is in Pakistan.

We obviously are not invading Pakistan, which is why he mentioned several times in his speech the importance of partnering with them, and how Pakistan military have "launched their largest offensives against AQ ever this summer." Unmentioned is the undoubtedly huge CIA and Intelligence network we will put on the ground in Pakistan.

The extra troops are to help create an environment to train Afghan security forces without pressure from the Taliban insurgents. But more importantly they are to keep AQ penned right where they are.

I'll bet you this right now - we snag Bin Laden, the troop drawdown will start not long after that. Obama's speech showed he has no intention of 'fixing' Afghanistan.

[Clio the Leo]

21. How much do you think it has to do with Iran?

We cant very well make a big show of putting troops into Pakistan to protect their plants while asking Iran to NOT build enrichment plants at the same time. Something I realized last night.

[wileedog]

35. Nothing to do with Iran.

The Pakistan government is wobbly as it is. They can't put American troops on Pakistan soil without inflaming the country.

They need to seal off the Afghan border and let Pakistan and Intel units do the rest.

[ShortnFiery]

32. How many more "summary executions" by drone or gunning down of TALL FARMERS will

we do/slaughter before we realize that Osama bin Laden is DEAD? :eyes:

The peoples of the Middle East, especially those occupied within Iraq and Afghanistan HATE the USA and NATO invaders. Every day we occupy those countries AMERICANS are less safe.

It is the FACT of us OCCUPYING two countries that is making Americans LESS SAFE, not unlike our military in Saudi Arabia that contributed to the attack on 9/11/01.

[wileedog]

34. Got proof he's dead?

Lot of people may be interested in that.

[NYC Liberal]

17. Except we do have a mission.

Quote

*The President has decided to deploy an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan. These troops will deploy on an accelerated timeline to reinforce the 68,000 Americans and 39,000 non-U.S. ISAF troops already there, so that we can target the insurgency, break its momentum, and better secure population centers.

*These forces will increase our capacity to train effective Afghan Security Forces, and to partner with them so that more Afghans get into the fight. And by pursuing these partnerships, we can transition to Afghan responsibility, and begin to reduce our combat troops in the summer of 2011.

*We will maintain this increased force level for the next 18 months.

*beginning in July 2011, we will transfer lead security responsibility to Afghans and start to transition our combat forces out of Afghanistan

*We will work with our partners, the United Nations, and the Afghan people to strengthen our civilian effort, so that Afghanistan’s government can step in as we establish better security.

*we will also focus our assistance in areas – such as agriculture – that can make an immediate impact in the lives of the Afghan people

*A continuing significant increase in civilian experts will accompany a sizable infusion of additional civilian assistance. They will partner with Afghans over the long term to enhance the capacity of national and sub-national government institutions and to help rehabilitate Afghanistan’s key economic sectors so that Afghans can defeat the insurgents who promise only more violence.

*Our top reconstruction priority is implementing a civilian-military agriculture redevelopment strategy to restore Afghanistan’s once vibrant agriculture sector

*An emphasis of our governance efforts will be on developing more responsive, visible, and accountable institutions at the provincial, district, and local level, where everyday Afghans encounter their government.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/way-forward-afghanistan

[Cha]

19. Chill the fuck out..Obama has this.

[ShortnFiery]

31. No, I have friends and family who have been deployed and WILL BE deployed.

I will NOT "chill the fuck out." :grr:

[FailingParachute]

10. And by sending drones to kill innocent Afghan civilians!!!

We won't even ask the Afghan citizenry if they want us there - we'll just go because, because, well because..

we're the U.S.A., that's why!!

[Clio the Leo]

18. Some of the arguments on your side of the debate make sense...

... "We won't even ask the Afghan citizenry if they want us there", however, is not one of them.

[FailingParachute]

23. Do you what the phrase "hoisted on your own petard" means?

If not, just look at your "proof." :)

[Clio the Leo]

26. Do know what.......

"thank you for kicking me thread means?"

Feel free to list more reasons why you disagree with me ...... but if you could wait a few hours between posts that would be much appreciated. ;)

[Oregone]

28. Afghanistan: "A war based not on reason but on passion"

It temporarily filled America's bloodlust and hurt from 9/11