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Exclusive: Rumsfeld unloads

apdst said:
"Terrorism", can be defeated, by simply taking away the terrorist's will to wage terrorism. It ain't rocket sience. The basic principles of warfare have been the same for a few thousand years, now. They haven't changed.
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There will always be people willing to wage violence against the United States. It's just what comes with the territory when ur the biggest boy on the block, whether we deserve it or not. As long as we're the hegemonic superpower some freak out there is going to want to bomb the crap out of us. You make it sound like taking away a terrorist's will is easy. Ideologically motivated individuals aren't easily stopped.
 
Boo Radley said:
A person who will blow himself up has a different mindset than one who is fighting to stay alive. But, share with us how you would do this.
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The same way we defeated the Japanese. They were the cats that were willing to fly airplanes into American ships.
 
apdst said:
The same way we defeated the Japanese. They were the cats that were willing to fly airplanes into American ships.
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There's a major and important difference. Japan was a country, that could surrender and stop, and had a leader who could surrender. This foe flys no flag, belongs to no country. I'm afraid you can't treat them like Japan, and I think this has been the flaw in most our thinking as a country to date.
 
Boo Radley said:
There's a major and important difference. Japan was a country, that could surrender and stop, and had a leader who could surrender. This foe flys no flag, belongs to no country. I'm afraid you can't treat them like Japan, and I think this has been the flaw in most our thinking as a country to date.
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Precisely. Japanese troops were indoctrinated to serve the state. We could defeat them militarily because they were tools of the Japanese state. Terrorist organizations today are non-state actors, makes a HUGE difference.
 
Any one who claims that politicians had less input in WW2 than Vietnam should never speak of history again. Lordy lordy lordy. Hell, just for one example, why do you think we focused on Europe before Japan?
 
StillBallin75 said:
There will always be people willing to wage violence against the United States. It's just what comes with the territory when ur the biggest boy on the block, whether we deserve it or not. As long as we're the hegemonic superpower some freak out there is going to want to bomb the crap out of us. You make it sound like taking away a terrorist's will is easy. Ideologically motivated individuals aren't easily stopped.
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I agree with that. But, they can be stopped; it's not impossible. The, "how do you defeat an ideology", and, "how do you defeat an enemy that isn't afraid to die", arguments are simply a display of ignorance. We just have to kill them faster and at a higher rate, until they run out of people who are willing and people who aren't afraid to die.

Personally, I think an enemy that isn't afraid to die can be defeated more quickly than an enemy that is afraid to die.
 
Redress said:
[Any one who claims that politicians had less input in WW2 than Vietnam should never speak of history again/b]. Lordy lordy lordy. Hell, just for one example, why do you think we focused on Europe before Japan?
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Anyone that thinks anyone even said that needs to actually read the ****ing thread.
 
Boo Radley said:
There's a major and important difference. Japan was a country, that could surrender and stop, and had a leader who could surrender. This foe flys no flag, belongs to no country. I'm afraid you can't treat them like Japan, and I think this has been the flaw in most our thinking as a country to date.
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There are two options for actors in a war. 1) they can officially surrender, because they lost their will and means to carry on the fight, or 2) they can just cease to exist, because they've lost the will and means to carry on the war.
 
StillBallin75 said:
Precisely. Japanese troops were indoctrinated to serve the state. We could defeat them militarily because they were tools of the Japanese state. Terrorist organizations today are non-state actors, makes a HUGE difference.
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No, not really. If we invoke the maximum amount of violence upon a terrorist org, then there will be fewer and fewer people that will be willing to join their ranks.
 
apdst said:
I agree with that. But, they can be stopped; it's not impossible. The, "how do you defeat an ideology", and, "how do you defeat an enemy that isn't afraid to die", arguments are simply a display of ignorance. We just have to kill them faster and at a higher rate, until they run out of people who are willing and people who aren't afraid to die.

Personally, I think an enemy that isn't afraid to die can be defeated more quickly than an enemy that is afraid to die.
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But if you kill innocent people along the way, what you do is create more faster than you kill them. It isn't their lack of fear to die that is the problem. It is the reasons why people join such groups that is. And that there is no real head to cut off or convince to surrender.
 
Erod said:
We forgot how to fight a war after World War II.
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Erod said:
We took a hill, then we retreated. Then we took it again, then we retreated. We fought Vietnam without any clear objective of what it was we wanted to achieve. We had a 150 decision makers worried more about elections and public opinions than the soldiers that were stuck in limbo halfway around the world.

What I described in the earlier post is the way wars have ALWAYS been won. You can choose to hate it - I hate it, too - but that's just the way it is.

Killing the innocent is unavoidable. Not as much as it used to be, but still completely unavoidable, unless you really aren't committed to winning the war.
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apdst said:
Anyone that thinks anyone even said that needs to actually read the ****ing thread.
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You probably should start reading.
 
Boo Radley said:
But if you kill innocent people along the way, what you do is create more faster than you kill them. It isn't their lack of fear to die that is the problem. It is the reasons why people join such groups that is. And that there is no real head to cut off or convince to surrender.
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How many German, Japanese, Italian and French terrorists did we create during WW2? There were 15,000 civilians killled during the early days of Operation Overlord. How many terrorists were created?

I think people have bought into a bull**** idea and don't even realize it.
 
I agree with that. But, they can be stopped; it's not impossible.
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I agree it's not impossible, but it might be so difficult as to be not even worth the effort. It takes a huge amount of economic resources and manpower to fight an asymmetrical enemy.

The, "how do you defeat an ideology", and, "how do you defeat an enemy that isn't afraid to die", arguments are simply a display of ignorance.
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I think we fundamentally disagree here. Those arguments are pretty legitimate imo.

We just have to kill them faster and at a higher rate, until they run out of people who are willing and people who aren't afraid to die.
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Sounds good in theory, but I'm not sure how practical/possible that is, or if it will even work. In warfare, the moral is often stronger than the material, especially in asymmetrical conflicts. And again, even if we do break the enemy's back by killing every last one of them, would it even be worth it in the end? Currently we spend $20 million for every one combatant killed in Afghanistan.

Personally, I think an enemy that isn't afraid to die can be defeated more quickly than an enemy that is afraid to die.
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I believe that an enemy who is afraid to die is already defeated. His will to fight you is already absent.
 
Redress said:
You probably should start reading.
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I don't see anyone saying that politicians didn't have a say in what happened during WW2. Perhaps you could point it out for me? As always, thanks in advance.
 
StillBallin75 said:
I agree it's not impossible, but it might be so difficult as to be not even worth the effort. It takes a huge amount of economic resources and manpower to fight an asymmetrical enemy.
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I disagree. I think it would cost alot less to defeat an unconventional force than a conventional force.



I think we fundamentally disagree here. Those arguments are pretty legitimate imo.
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History tells a much different story.



Sounds good in theory, but I'm not sure how practical/possible that is, or if it will even work. In warfare, the moral is often stronger than the material, especially in asymmetrical conflicts. And again, even if we do break the enemy's back by killing every last one of them, would it even be worth it in the end? Currently we spend $20 million for every one combatant killed in Afghanistan.
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It's not theory, because it's been done hundreds of times, throughout history, in many different wars.



I believe that an enemy who is afraid to die is already defeated. His will to fight you is already absent.
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A fighter that is afraid to die, is going to fight harder to stay alive. As General Patton said, "no bastard ever won a war by dieing for his country. He won it, by making that other poor dumb bastard die for his country". Dead soldiers can't win wars; there's no way to argue that they can.
 
apdst said:
A fighter that is afraid to die, is going to fight harder to stay alive. As General Patton said, "no bastard ever won a war by dieing for his country. He won it, by making that other poor dumb bastard die for his country". Dead soldiers can't win wars; there's no way to argue that they can.
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I would agree with you for A fighter. If a force of fighters who aren't afraid to die is large enough, then they would be nearly impossible to defeat.
 
FilmFestGuy said:
I would agree with you for A fighter. If a force of fighters who aren't afraid to die is large enough, then they would be nearly impossible to defeat.
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You're still wrong.

If the entire force isn't afraid to die, then they're all going to die and then what?
 
apdst said:
You're still wrong.

If the entire force isn't afraid to die, then they're all going to die and then what?
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Did I not say if said force outnumbers you?

OR - if they outnumber the will of the enemy. I believe this is the theory behind those who use suicide bombing tactics. It's not that they can win in a standard fight; it's that they hope to break the political will of their enemy.
 
History tells a much different story.
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History tells us that we don't usually defeat ideologically motivated individuals by force/killing. Usually they are defeated because their own ideology falls on its face, or people just get so sick of the fighting that they stop. In recent memory, the only asymmetrical conflict to be won by the conventional side using brute force that comes to my mind is Sri Lanka vs. the Tamils. I'm not so sure that's a model we should, or even want to, adopt.

It's not theory, because it's been done hundreds of times, throughout history, in many different wars.
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The nature of the state, and therefore of warfare, has changed throughout history. Back then it was cool to just massacre entire populations because they didn't possess the capability to fight back. That isn't the case anymore, especially in a world where terrorists have access to more and more technology.

A fighter that is afraid to die, is going to fight harder to stay alive. As General Patton said, "no bastard ever won a war by dieing for his country. He won it, by making that other poor dumb bastard die for his country". Dead soldiers can't win wars; there's no way to argue that they can.
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We're not talking about conventional warfare and armies of nation-states though. For the terrorist, winning takes on an entirely different definition than it does for the private soldier in an army. For a terrorist organization, "winning" is entirely different from what a nation-state and its army would define as winning.
 
FilmFestGuy said:
Did I not say if said force outnumbers you?

OR - if they outnumber the will of the enemy. I believe this is the theory behind those who use suicide bombing tactics. It's not that they can win in a standard fight; it's that they hope to break the political will of their enemy.
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No, you said, "if it's large enough".

The Chinese outnumbered American forces in Korea and they weren't afraid to die. At the end of the day, that didn't work out very well for the Chicoms.

Again, "No bastard ever won a war by dieing for his country. He won it, by making some other poor bastard die for his country".
 
StillBallin75 said:
History tells us that we don't usually defeat ideologically motivated individuals by force/killing. Usually they are defeated because their own ideology falls on its face, or people just get so sick of the fighting that they stop. In recent memory, the only asymmetrical conflict to be won by the conventional side using brute force that comes to my mind is Sri Lanka vs. the Tamils. I'm not so sure that's a model we should, or even want to, adopt.
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Well, that's not true, but I know you've convinced yourself, so rock on, dude.



The nature of the state, and therefore of warfare, has changed throughout history. Back then it was cool to just massacre entire populations because they didn't possess the capability to fight back. That isn't the case anymore, especially in a world where terrorists have access to more and more technology.
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Depends on why you're doing the slaughtering.



We're not talking about conventional warfare and armies of nation-states though. For the terrorist, winning takes on an entirely different definition than it does for the private soldier in an army. For a terrorist organization, "winning" is entirely different from what a nation-state and its army would define as winning.
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But, at some point, for the terrorists, "winning", has to include some dudes living through the experience.

Terrorists have a post war plan, too. How do they implement that, if all their true believers are dead? Short answer: they don't.
 
apdst said:
I don't see anyone saying that politicians didn't have a say in what happened during WW2. Perhaps you could point it out for me? As always, thanks in advance.
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When you start reading the thread, I suggest you start with my post. That will show you the straw man you created here.
 
Well, that's not true, but I know you've convinced yourself, so rock on, dude.
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Give me a few examples of insurgencies or guerrilla movements that were ever successfully suppressed through the use of brute force, besides the one I mentioned above.

But, at some point, for the terrorists, "winning", has to include some dudes living through the experience.

Terrorists have a post war plan, too. How do they implement that, if all their true believers are dead? Short answer: they don't.
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That's true. AQ definitely hasn't "won" in any sense of the word given what OBL's original vision was. But neither are they easily defeated.
 
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Redress said:
When you start reading the thread, I suggest you start with my post. That will show you the straw man you created here.
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Do you have any actual input? If not; then carry on.
 
apdst said:
No, you said, "if it's large enough".

The Chinese outnumbered American forces in Korea and they weren't afraid to die. At the end of the day, that didn't work out very well for the Chicoms.

Again, "No bastard ever won a war by dieing for his country. He won it, by making some other poor bastard die for his country".
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Fair enough; and you're right - I didn't say exactly what I thought to say. So my apologies for that. This isn't really something I'm going to get to passionate about, so I can concede that point to you.
 
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