The sacrifices we make... or not

[pecunium]

Fred Kagan, the much touted "expert" claiming we can win the War on Terror, if only some 30,000 troops are added to the mix, for not less than months, is younger than I am.

He thinks this is the defining struggle of the age. It is at least as perilous to the state of things as WW2.

Is he enlisting? No. But he does hope other people will heed his call, that the President will make an impassioned plea for more people to enlist, and that such exhortations will lead to the needed troops enlisting.

For his part, he is more than willing to stay home (like Jonah Goldberg, who at least responded to people who asked him why he wasn't signing up) and make lots of money convincing people to send more troops to Bagdad and al Anbar.

It's all summed up at This Modern World

Comments

[sinboy.livejournal.com]

I tend to suggest 100,000 or more, just for fun. It's is about as much as we suggested bringing the Iraqi army up to. They're about as useful as a screen door on a submarine, so if we expect that many soldiers to be able to pacify Iraq, we should have about that many more, given that that's how many soldiers we expect the Iraqis to have to keep the peace.

It's also an impossible number. But when Republicans accuse me of being a defeatist I tell them I'm in favor of increasing troop levels to the original metrics that Bush gave us. Just with our troops, and not the Iraqis, as the Iraqi forces are not competent or trustworthy.

This usually leaves them confused. Few pro-war Republicans I've met actually have a handle on how bad the political situation in Iraq is in terms of the Shia in charge being a hair's breadth away from either turning the country over to Iranian Mullahs or just killing off Sunni wholesale, instead of piecemeal

Oh, and I loooove the suggestion that we grant amnesty to illegal immigrants by offering them an army tour. Yes, let's *arm* the Mexican immigrants. And train them. At our own expense. Brilliant!

[wcg.livejournal.com]

And why stop with the Mexican immigrants living mostly lawful lives? Let's just draft La Familia en masse out of the California prison system! Send a few regiments of Aztec-identified, Quatl-speaking hardened criminals over there led by lifers who would otherwise live out their days in the California SuperMax! I mean, what could *possibly* go wrong?