Where are all the people who said "If you put an end date on military action X, then

[zbdent]

the terrorists will just wait until the day after to blow things up?"

Why are they so silent on the demand of having Obama set an end date on the "No Fly Zone" actions? Don't they realize that Gadafi would just withdraw until the day after the end date?

:silly:

[JoePhilly]

1. They lack a memory and a conscience.

[zbdent]

2. As do the media which chooses not to dig up their vids of the perps

and replay them ...

kinda like the 2004 debates, where John Kerry accurately pointed out that Bush said, about Osama bin Laden, "I'm not that concerned about him."

Suddenly, there were no copies of one of the few press conferences where GWB actually answered questions from the press, at a point in time in which, if George W. Bush wanted to fart into a microphone, they'd interrupt the program to bring a live bulletin ...

[JoePhilly]

4. agree

[Warren Stupidity]

3. The argument was bullshit then and now.

[Igel]

5. It depends on the context.

If you want to knock out a limited number of large targets--tanks, planes, munition dumps--then a limited engagement can do the trick. If you have good enough intel. The destruction can possibly convince an organized military to desist or risk losing more high-cost, difficult-to-replace materiel; it can provide the ability for a client army to seize ground.

If you want to knock out a large number of targets so small that they're indistinguishable from the surrounding population, each of which has a small munitions stockpile under the kitchen floor, then it's nearly impossible. The degree of intel has to be much, much higher. Destruction of 5% or 10% of the insurgents probably won't convince the insurgency to stop; there is no "ground" to be seized. Instead, you can only convert the insurgents to non-insurgents by demotivating them or getting them to "repurpose" themselves.

[Life Long Dem]

6. Maybe the whole reason they are silent on the end date.

You'd need to ask yourself when the next no fly zone end date would be.

[Igel]

7. They've swapped places with all the people who said

that it was absolutely necessary to have a fixed timeline for withdrawal and that a politican who set a deadline and failed to keep it lacked all legitimacy and moral standing.

[Meeker Morgan]

8. Maybe everybody knows there will be no end date.

It has sunk in that there never is.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

9. I thought that the people saying that were the neocons

Unfortunately, they're still here and they've been pretty vocal about demanding that Obama send the military after Ghadaffi and depose him (and that anything less would be considered a failure). :shrug:

[Clio the Leo]

10. Ha! Good one .... I hadn't thought of that. nt