Too busy talking to all those foreign leaders found on American streets? Time for Effin' Kerry to resign...
More troops is good, imho. Hopefully more teeth than tail.
Does congress have the power to force an increase in forces, or only the power to authorize and fund an increase in forces? If the former, this strikes me as regretable micromanagement from the kibbitzers; if the latter, then it does no harm.
I have two responses to this.
One: the generals in Iraq say they have enough troops. The idea that we're "stretched thin" is a myth put out by liberals and the media (but I repeat myself). Remember, these are the same people who gutted the military for eight years under Clinton.
Two: let's say we're stretched thin. Okay, let's reassign troops from areas where they just take up space to areas where they're needed We have troops deployed to, what, over 100 countries? Why the hell haven't we cleared out the base in Germany, for example?
ABOUT TIME!
Clinton's halving of the Army (active divisions) went well beyond the planned decrease as a result of the "peace dividend" resulting from the end of the Cold War.
Congress SHOULD act. The Army is not known for crying, but for "can do, SIR" -- and the Army only gets about 1/4 of the DoD budget. AF and Navy have professionalized the lobbying aspect of the military sphere -- while the Army worries more about the troops and the mission and has tended (given the political envrionment, perhaps too much) to be the light-weight in political maneuvering for money . . . as I read it . . .
ABOUT TIME!
Clinton's halving of the Army (active divisions) went well beyond the planned decrease as a result of the "peace dividend" resulting from the end of the Cold War.
Congress SHOULD act. The Army is not known for crying, but for "can do, SIR" -- and the Army only gets about 1/4 of the DoD budget. AF and Navy have professionalized the lobbying aspect of the military sphere -- while the Army worries more about the troops and the mission and has tended (given the political envrionment, perhaps too much) to be the light-weight in political maneuvering for money . . . as I read it . . .
It's fun watching the Democrats moves to the right.
And I'm sure that all of the Senators voting "Aye" are tonight telling their sons to join up. Sure.
I am glad Kerry is earning his paycheck this week with the Senate deciding the future of our Defense.....
Kerry has only been on the floor of the Senate for one day this entire year.
Senate votes to cut committe staff by 20,000....hmmmm? is there a connection?
Besides, last week Kerry says that he'd increase the army by 40,000 without it costing the govt a penny, yet a 10,000 increase will cost 1.7 B. Must be some sort of majic on Kerry's part huh?
It would help to have more troops to seal the borders with Syria and Iran, but those are big long borders and we can't put 50,000 men on each border without also having much bigger supply convoys into Iraq. More supply convoys means more vulnerable targets for attackers.
My conclusion is that our problems are caused more by a lack of technology developed for this kind of nation-building in a hostile area, rather than a simple lack of manpower. We need much better surveillance technology and intelligence tech to keep an eye on what the insurgents are doing. Our military just doesn't have the technology to complete this kind of mission without taking some serious casualties. We have not developed the technology for fighting in the 360-degree urban battlefield of Iraq. McCain is just grandstanding for media approval (as usual.) Cheney should give him a call and tell him to shut up and stop looking for scapegoats in the civilian leadership. This is just a really tough mission in Iraq, but it's vitally important that we succeed.
IIRC, this was a big plank in JFKerry's plan. Just like a new UN resolution about Iraq and his attacks against the economy ("no jobs, bad jobs, burger jobs..."), this one has been overtaken by events. Politically, he has no platform left.
Bush campaign should make some noise about how if Kerry thinks this is important, maybe he should have shown up and voted.
HMMMMMMM!! Was Kerry there to vote or did he conveniently miss this one too?
will volunteers support this 20,000-troop increase?