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Obama: No ground troops against Islamic State

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M

Malyse

Member
Describing the Islamic State as "the face of evil," President Obama said Monday he will continue working with other countries on a coordinated strategy to destroy the militant group — without U.S. combat troops.

We have the right strategy and we're going to see it through," Obama said after a Group of 20 nations summit that focused on counter-terrorism in the wake of last week's attacks in Paris.

The president defended a strategy based on air strikes, working with allies on intelligence gathering, and training local military forces, and said that deploying a large U.S. military force to fight the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq — a step recommended by Republican presidential candidates and other critics — would be ineffective.
Military advisers have told him that ground troops "would be a mistake," Obama said during a news conference in Turkey, the site of the G-20 summit.
In addition to likely casualties, Obama said the United States would be put in a position of occupying large parts of Syria and Iraq without any clear way out, as happened after the 2003 invasion of Iraq. He said the United States should not "shoot first and aim later," and cited terrorist threats from other nations like Libya and Yemen.
"A strategy has to be one that can be sustained," Obama said.
Instead, the United States is coordinating local military in the forces to fight against the Islamic State, Obama said, and they have pushed the militants back within their self-declared caliphate. The strategy uses all elements of U.S. power, Obama said: "Military, intelligence, economic, development and the strength of our communities."
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More at link:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...ence-turkey-paris-attacks-terrorism/75863678/
 
K

King Tubby

Member
Guevara said:
Finally, a justifiable war but we blew all our good will on stupid wars.
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This is one of the worst ironies. Relative to a lot of the conflicts that the United States has gotten involved in/started since World War II, this would be the one with the most justification and international support, and yet the desire to go forward with it has been greatly sapped by the wars that preceded and led to the current situation in the first place
 
B

Byakuya769

Member
Guevara said:
Finally, a justifiable war but we blew all our good will on stupid wars.
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A war with who?

Unless someone can show me that we could be more tactical, lessen civilian casualties and foster less anti-imperial pushback, it's not justifiable at all.
 
I

ItWasMeantToBe19

Banned
Guevara said:
Finally, a justifiable war but we blew all our good will on stupid wars.
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Yes, we should definitely go to war with ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and Assad (backed by Russia and Iran). There's only five major factions in Syria to defeat and then the U.S.'s nation building is so good that no other terror group would arise afterward.
 
D

DrArchon

Member
I'd love to believe that coordinating with local military forces will work, but Iraq is still mostly a hellhole despite the efforts of their armed forces. I know we just can't take over every country that ISIS has a hold in, but I don't think we can trust these countries armies at all.
 
F

Funky Papa

FUNK-Y-PPA-4
King Tubby said:
This is one of the worst ironies. Relative to a lot of the conflicts that the United States has gotten involved in/started since World War II, this would be the one with the most justification and international support, and yet the desire to go forward with it has been greatly sapped by the wars that preceded and led to the current situation in the first place
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It's also way too problematic since the international community left the conflict to stew in its own blood, as a result there are no viable parties to support. Assad is a murderous asshole, Daesh is, well, we all know them by now, the opposition is rife withAl-Qaeda types since most of the moderates have been killed or radicalized and the Kurds have no intention to rule the country (and it's not like they don't have a fuckton of issues of their own).

Ideally speaking, the UN should intervene in the same way as it did during the Korean War, but these days America doen't seem to swing that way and it's not like Russia nor China would allow to be fucked over again.
 
P

PopeReal

Member
Good. Remember that all these people beating their chests for war are not going to be going over there. Their kids are not going to be going over there. They will happily send someone else to die.

I can't believe that people still don't see what is happening. ISIS wants Americans there. They would love American targets right in front of them. They want American soldiers on the ground as it would further their recruitment in the region.

Stay the fuck out.
 
C

Coins

Banned
The Lamonster said:
Good. Ideally these animals would never kill another American again - civilian or soldier.
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Iraq would have never used chemical bombs or nukular weapons on the US. ISIS will not hesitate to use a dirty bomb in Europe or the US if they can smuggle it in. We are going to have to use troops eventually. We might as well do it now while the entire world is pissed.
 
K

King Tubby

Member
PopeReal said:
Good. Remember that all these people beating their chests for war are not going to be going over there. Their kids are not going to be going over there. They will happily send someone else to die.

I can't believe that people still don't see what is happening. ISIS wants Americans there. They would love American targets right in front of them. They want American soldiers on the ground as it would further their recruitment in the region.

Stay the fuck out.
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You understand that if the left does not respond and ISIS continues to perpetrate terrorist attacks and kill civilians in the West, the right will take power and put those boots on the ground anyway?
 
M

Malyse

Member
animlboogy said:
And then leave troops there indefinitely. Because even a decade isn't enough to gain any semblance of stability.

How many times can we do that? How much of the world will have standing American troops by the time we're done taking on radical Islam?

There is no magic bullet for this.
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Sure there is.

latest
 
C

CCS

Banned
The problem is, it's likely the right policy to pursue. It is also the perfect way to hand the Republicans a massive stick to beat him and the Democrats with.
 
S

Suikoguy

I whinny my fervor lowly, for his length is not as great as those of the Hylian war stallions
CCS said:
The problem is, it's likely the right policy to pursue. It is also the perfect way to hand the Republicans a massive stick to beat him and the Democrats with.
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Too early to tell, the next "Do we want troops on the ground?" poll should be interesting.
 
D

DrArchon

Member
PdotMichael said:
From a foreign policy/international politics point of view history will not look that well for Obama.
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His international politics legacy will be polarizing I feel. A lot of people will look at stuff like the Iran deal and relations with Cuba favorably, but a lot will focus on the rise of ISIS and the handling of Libya and blame Obama.

On the whole it'll be way better than W.
 
P

PopeReal

Member
King Tubby said:
You understand that if the left does not respond and ISIS continues to perpetrate terrorist attacks and kill civilians in the West, the right will take power and put those boots on the ground anyway?
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So we send American kids to die because we are afraid that in theory idiots might send them in the future?
 
C

ClosingADoor

Member
Good. Russia is already there, it will be a shitstorm if the US marched in also.

And if other countries need to get involved on the ground, how about some countries there take it on, either in the region itself or from the EU.
 
C

Cagey

Banned
diffusionx said:
Why do people keep saying this.

ISIS has a government, a bureaucracy, a capital city, an infrastructure, a military, it collects taxes and enforces laws.
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Of the market-state terrorist organizations, IS is the only one who desperately wants to become an actual market state, like the market states it fights against.

This isn't al-Qaeda: this is a group that seeks to claim territory and establish methods of governance.
 
K

KHarvey16

Member
CCS said:
The problem is, it's likely the right policy to pursue. It is also the perfect way to hand the Republicans a massive stick to beat him and the Democrats with.
Click to expand...

That will backfire on them. When the irrationality generated by an event like the one in France fades, you'll have more and more people realizing the type of fight they're advocating isn't a good idea, especially if the military itself believes a ground fight is foolish.
 
C

CCS

Banned
I think its too early to comment upon how history will look back on Obama. A lot of that will depend on what happens in the long-run as a result of the rise of Daesh.

EDIT:
KHarvey16 said:
That will backfire on them. When the irrationality generated by an event like the one in France fades, you'll have more and more people realizing the type of fight they're advocating isn't a good idea, especially if the military itself believes a ground fight is foolish.
Click to expand...

I sure hope so.
 
K

King Tubby

Member
PopeReal said:
So we send American kids to die because we are afraid that in theory idiots might send them in the future?
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I would only want troops on the ground there as a last resort, I am simply saying that if other measures do not severely cripple them/limit their capability to carry out further attacks, it will be the inevitable result, and if it is going to happen I don't want it to result in the right gaining more ground politically.
 
S

SomedayTheFire

Member
P

PdotMichael

Banned
DrArchon said:
His international politics legacy will be polarizing I feel. A lot of people will look at stuff like the Iran deal and relations with Cuba favorably, but a lot will focus on the rise of ISIS and the handling of Libya and blame Obama.

On the whole it'll be way better than W.
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Bush Junior shouldn't be the baseline for an American president.

But not just he couldn't archive what he wanted 8 years ago many places in the world are worse places now than years ago.
 
E

esmith08734

Member
Obama is facing a tough situation at the end of his term like Bush did at the beginning of his term. It's difficult to say what is the right move. Obviously we don't want Americans to be killed but any potential attack in the future on our soil won't be forgiven since the foreshadowing is overwhelming.
 
W

WaffleTaco

Wants to outlaw technological innovation.
In all honesty...we should have stayed over there and fixed the mess we made instead of leaving. Yes this is all hindsight now, but we need to deal with our mistakes we have made as a country. We need to be working with other countries to eliminate ISIS, and I am not sure how to do this besides just bombing them repeatedly. Ground Troops are not the answer at the moment, unless we are backed by other countries.
 
A

avaya

Member
This is going to sound callous but when will we have ground based drones? I get the feeling when we reach that point and you don't need to send thousands of troops the only thing preventing intervention will be cost factor.
 
entremet

entremet

Member
It's a such a tough nut to crack.

Every time Western powers do something in the Middle East, it ends up biting them in the ass.

I'm stumped, honestly.
 
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