Also btw. we're supposed to only have 5500 troops left there by the end of this year. So think positive
I have no idea what I am talking about but I'd love it if somebody who did would knock me upside the head (with words).
swampman posted:If we had stayed out of afghanistan we could have given every homeless person in america a million dollars. Fuck my laughing ass off
Now now: that 640 billion belongs to the military industrial complex and the finance class. They worked very hard for that war, and it would be a violation of the rule of law for us to deny them the fruits of their labour.
camera_obscura posted:I assume that sort of spending is intended to stimulate/maintain the arms industry, or to use materials that are nearing obsoletion. It's weird because I know about the meetings in 2000 and 1999 about invading the 'ghan, and how the Pentagon used to (still does?) calculate American oil reserves and control of oil supply in relation to a hypothetical world war, but it seems like at least the Saudis are operating under the assumption that oil will not be energy source du jour forever, so has Afghanistan reduced in importance relative to our military strategy because of that or what? Has our military decided that ground troops will be of reduced importance over time and therefore might as well be used for international projects like any other soon-to-be-obsolete materiel?
I have no idea what I am talking about but I'd love it if somebody who did would knock me upside the head (with words).
Last time I read up on Saudi Arabia they're bombing Yemen to rubble with the blessing/insistence of US and friends but not really winning decisively, the IMF was talking about structural adjustment loans in order to fix their burgeoning debt crisiahahahaha and something about the Saudis contemplating privatizing parts of Aramco. So I think the West intends to keep Saudi Arabia (or at least w/e becomes of a future Arabian state(s)) well integrated (with or without the Saudi royal family I don't know/remains to be seen).
As for Afghanistan, I thought we increased troop counts there just this year, bombed some red cross hospital and saw the greatest increase in violence there in some odd years?
wasted posted:camera_obscura posted:
I assume that sort of spending is intended to stimulate/maintain the arms industry, or to use materials that are nearing obsoletion. It's weird because I know about the meetings in 2000 and 1999 about invading the 'ghan, and how the Pentagon used to (still does?) calculate American oil reserves and control of oil supply in relation to a hypothetical world war, but it seems like at least the Saudis are operating under the assumption that oil will not be energy source du jour forever, so has Afghanistan reduced in importance relative to our military strategy because of that or what? Has our military decided that ground troops will be of reduced importance over time and therefore might as well be used for international projects like any other soon-to-be-obsolete materiel?
I have no idea what I am talking about but I'd love it if somebody who did would knock me upside the head (with words).
Last time I read up on Saudi Arabia they're bombing Yemen to rubble with the blessing/insistence of US and friends but not really winning decisively, the IMF was talking about structural adjustment loans in order to fix their burgeoning debt crisiahahahaha and something about the Saudis contemplating privatizing parts of Aramco. So I think the West intends to keep Saudi Arabia (or at least w/e becomes of a future Arabian state(s)) well integrated (with or without the Saudi royal family I don't know/remains to be seen).
yeah the new government in canada took about two minutes of flak about continuing the previous government's arms sales to the kingdom before it just disappeared from media zoop so it's clearly an establishment no-dissent zone
drwhat posted:yeah the new government in canada took about two minutes of flak about continuing the previous government's arms sales to the kingdom before it just disappeared from media zoop so it's clearly an establishment no-dissent zone
sometimes this was trotted out as a pro-establishment talking point: "sure we aren't buying jets that can't fly from the states anymore and we're Very Very Sorry about that but we're still selling hardware to the Saudi's so don't worry we're still part of the military industrial complex you guys!"
soicowboy posted:http://www.dni.gov/files/documents/ubl/english/Instructions%20to%20Applicants.pdf
finally a useful template for our new user application page
The fighting has intensified over the last two months, as CIA-armed units and Pentagon-armed ones have repeatedly shot at each other while maneuvering through contested territory on the northern outskirts of Aleppo, U.S. officials and rebel leaders have confirmed.
In mid-February, a CIA-armed militia called Fursan al Haq, or Knights of Righteousness, was run out of the town of Marea, about 20 miles north of Aleppo, by Pentagon-backed Syrian Democratic Forces moving in from Kurdish-controlled areas to the east.
http://www.latimes.com/world/middleeast/la-fg-cia-pentagon-isis-20160327-story.html
wonder how much this shit costs lol
President Obama this month authorized a new Pentagon plan to train and arm Syrian rebel fighters, relaunching a program that was suspended in the fall after a string of embarrassing setbacks which included recruits being ambushed and handing over much of their U.S.-issued ammunition and trucks to an Al Qaeda affiliate.
glad we're bringing that plan back, remember that shit?
tpaine posted:http://forums.somethingawful.com/member.php?action=getinfo&userid=121012
What do you think I could get for my 07 reg date account? $3? I accept bitcoin.
ilmdge posted:$500m that was earmarked to train 3000 moderate rebels in 2015 and 5400/year. in reality they trained 54 rebels and every single one went missing, quit, or died within 2 months
russian intervention blitzing the nato deathsquads: $500 mill
the eternal gratitude of the people of the global south: priceless
Edited by xipe ()
swirlsofhistory posted:tpaine posted:http://forums.somethingawful.com/member.php?action=getinfo&userid=121012
What do you think I could get for my 07 reg date account? $3? I accept bitcoin.
Just because tpaine linked to your account doesn't mean he wants to buy it.
glomper_stomper posted:ilmdge posted:
didn't they pull this shit about 5 different times in the past 4 years or did they just drum up reports about the same training mission, that presumably happened the first time, whenever they needed to run cover in the mass media for white-wine takfiri enthusiasts and think-tankers?
yeah its a longstanding tactic to make press releases Officially commencing acts of war in a region over and over again to create a general impression in the population that you've only been (Officially) at war since the last announcement two weeks ago
what also happens is that the almost identical announcements obfuscate the continuous escalation of commitment and deployed forces when they all run together in your memory
getfiscal posted:bush was poised to extend that further - rumsfeld wanted to scale back troop levels all over the place
is there any reason to believe this other than that they said it on national tv presumably during elections?
c_man posted:getfiscal posted:bush was poised to extend that further - rumsfeld wanted to scale back troop levels all over the place
is there any reason to believe this other than that they said it on national tv presumably during elections?
Rumsfeld had all sorts of goofy ideas about using technology to make conventional ground forces obsolete. To an extent he was right and us doctrine is drones planes and special forces these days. He wanted to dump the budget into r&d and get super soldiers with mechanized armor and all sorts of sci fi stuff. He just didn't expect to get caught up in two simultaneous major occupations for which all of his ideas and inclinations were hopelessly out of place.
c_man posted:getfiscal posted:bush was poised to extend that further - rumsfeld wanted to scale back troop levels all over the place
is there any reason to believe this other than that they said it on national tv presumably during elections?
Your mind: having less troops would be good but rumsfield is bad so he wouldn't want the good thing.
Mind using Marxist science methods to divine the truth of currently happening history (present-history or the "now" of wolf-thought): it is an important part of neo liberal ideology to create a permanent worldwide underclass of unemployed and under employed men in order to destabilize and undermine orgizinational and financial capabilities of nations, creating a vast class of neo-serfs or slum dwellers. To this end the mechanization and computerization of every profession is a necessity and it's actually more important for the armed forces, not less. (Because they have guns.) using this method of "world-understanding," I've come to the conclusion the Donald Rumsfield legitimately would want to replace the armed forces with a mechanics wing that fixes the ED-209s and washes the blood of the innocent off them, etc.
Like it's perfectly normal to be treated as a moderate when you say something like "I'm against a fullscale invasion of Syria, but special forces and airstrikes are fine".
I wonder whether Rumsfeld et al. prefer the "drones, airstrikes and special forces" tactics on its merits, or whether they are just using whatever means have been made acceptable by propaganda. They've been trying to reduce conventional ground forces, but the special operations commands have been growing a lot. I think the CIA has their own drone operators. Less oversight on budgets and operations too.
Edited by Soviet_Salami ()
Of course not, I'm a moderate!
Are you in favour of selecting the best soldiers, turning them in to career soldiers, letting them operate with less oversight than normal soldiers, having them train the most reactionary elements of Libyan society into unaccountable militias then letting them loose?
Yes, that is moderate enough for me.
Soviet_Salami posted:One thing that makes me wonder at the effectiveness of American propaganda is that it has been able to make the distinction between operations involving "drones, airstrikes and special forces" and "traditional" military forces.
Like it's perfectly normal to be treated as a moderate when you say something like "I'm against a fullscale invasion of Syria, but special forces and airstrikes are fine".
I wonder whether Rumsfeld et al. prefer the "drones, airstrikes and special forces" tactics on its merits, or whether they are just using whatever means have been made acceptable by propaganda. They've been trying to reduce conventional ground forces, but the special operations commands have been growing a lot. I think the CIA has their own drone operators. Less oversight on budgets and operations too.
Rumsfeld and his ilk were shaped immensely by the Vietnam experience. I don't think they trust the military outside of the officer class. Turning everyone into an officer or specialist is a desirable end for them. It removes the unreliable failure point found in enlisted grunts who care more about getting out alive than bureaucrat's political objectives. The propaganda issue is related but seperate.
Soviet_Salami posted:I wonder whether Rumsfeld et al. prefer the "drones, airstrikes and special forces" tactics on its merits, or whether they are just using whatever means have been made acceptable by propaganda.
i think: its both, you can sell one using the other
