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Was the Yemen raid really a success?

CriticalThought said:
So killing 25 civilians, of which 9 are children, to kill 14 men, one who was 80 years-old, is a "success" And at the expense of a 90 million dollar chopper? When no valuable intel was retrieved and the target of the raid was unharmed? That is your definition of success?

https://www.thebureauinvestigates.c...-the-full-details-of-botched-us-raid-in-yemen

Yemen SEAL Raid Has Yielded No Significant Intelligence: Officials - NBC News

Take off your partisan glasses for one minute, look in the mirror, and ask yourself with all the same facts if you would be calling this a "success" if it had been ordered by Obama or Clinton.
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It's 25 civilians, now? :lamo
 
CriticalThought said:
So killing 25 civilians, of which 9 are children, to kill 14 men, one who was 80 years-old, is a "success" And at the expense of a 90 million dollar chopper? When no valuable intel was retrieved and the target of the raid was unharmed? That is your definition of success?

https://www.thebureauinvestigates.c...-the-full-details-of-botched-us-raid-in-yemen

Yemen SEAL Raid Has Yielded No Significant Intelligence: Officials - NBC News

Take off your partisan glasses for one minute, look in the mirror, and ask yourself with all the same facts if you would be calling this a "success" if it had been ordered by Obama or Clinton.
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Keeping in mind that Obama left office with the military a wreck in most every way, for several reasons, all of which end up under the heading of mismanagement, party Obama's fault and partly Congress, so it is highly unlikely that Trump bares much responsibility here, though I am of course ready and willing to look at evidence.
 
CriticalThought said:
So successful missions involve killing 8 year old American girls?
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Could Be, I am not now nor have I ever been a fundamentalist.

Us civilized pro justice guys take in all of the relevant evidence before we conclude.
 
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Hawkeye10 said:
Keeping in mind that Obama left office with the military a wreck in most every way, for several reasons, all of which end up under the heading of mismanagement, party Obama's fault and partly Congress, so it is highly unlikely that Trump bares much responsibility here, though I am of course ready and willing to look at evidence.
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Lol. Well at least you are not claiming it is a "success" like apdst. Obama would be happy to accept responsibility for it, as he has in the past, but he did not order it, Trump did. Now Trump wants to blame everyone but himself. He blames Obama. He blames the Generals. You know what, go for it. I don't expect him or his followers to have an ounce of character or to feel any responsibility.
 
CriticalThought said:
Lol. Well at least you are not claiming it is a "success" like apdst. Obama would be happy to accept responsibility for it, as he has in the past, but he did not order it, Trump did. Now Trump wants to blame everyone but himself. He blames Obama. He blames the Generals. You know what, go for it. I don't expect him or his followers to have an ounce of character or to feel any responsibility.
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He is in fact not responsible for systemic military deficiencies, which we know exist in alarming degree, nor being this fresh into the job can he be expected to be aware of how badly our military has been allowed to rot.
 
Hawkeye10 said:
He is in fact not responsible for systemic military deficiencies, which we know exist in alarming degree, nor being this fresh into the job can he be expected to be aware of how badly our military has been allowed to rot.
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Yeah...I do not recall you complaining about deficiencies when Osama bin Laden was laying dead. Funny how those suddenly appeared when Trump ordered a botched military operation. This is, after all, the man who knows more than the generals.
 
CriticalThought said:
Yeah...I do not recall you complaining about deficiencies when Osama bin Laden was laying dead. Funny how those suddenly appeared when Trump ordered a botched military operation. This is, after all, the man who knows more than the generals.
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I got here 12/15, however if you scoot over to Able2know.org you will find that I started talking extensively about military rot around the time Iran captured our guys. This was a very high priory unit which was not properly supported with gear, and which was horribly commanded. At this time I noticed first that the Navy is a disaster through and through, then I noticed that the other services are about as bad.
 
Hawkeye10 said:
I got here 12/15, however if you scoot over to Able2know.org you will find that I started talking extensively about military rot around the time Iran captured our guys. This was a very high priory unit which was not properly supported with gear, and which was horribly commanded. At this time I noticed first that the Navy is a disaster through and through, then I noticed that the other services are about as bad.
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I like that your argument is that Trump bears no responsibility because he ordered a military operation from a military he obviously does not trust to do the job.
 
CriticalThought said:
Wow, that was utterly disgusting of you. Thank you for proving exactly what kind of human being you are.
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The numbers keep changing. I'm sorry if the inconsistancy makes it appear more like propaganda than facts.

I'm going to start going with 41 terrorist KIA's since that's what the Yemeni government is saying.
 
Why do Trump's "succesful" missions need to be blamed on somebody else?
 
CriticalThought said:
So killing 25 civilians, of which 9 are children, to kill 14 men, one who was 80 years-old, is a "success" And at the expense of a 90 million dollar chopper? When no valuable intel was retrieved and the target of the raid was unharmed? That is your definition of success?

https://www.thebureauinvestigates.c...-the-full-details-of-botched-us-raid-in-yemen

Yemen SEAL Raid Has Yielded No Significant Intelligence: Officials - NBC News

Take off your partisan glasses for one minute, look in the mirror, and ask yourself with all the same facts if you would be calling this a "success" if it had been ordered by Obama or Clinton.
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Of course they wouldn't. They would be calling for an investigation.
 
Vetplus40 said:
Of course they wouldn't. They would be calling for an investigation.
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In the words of General Zinni: "It might be interesting to wonder why all the generals see it in the same way, and all those, who never fired a shot in anger and really held back to go to war, see it in a different way. That's usually the way it is in history."
 
apdst said:
We scored a 14 to 1 kill ratio. How is that a failure?

No mission begins under perfect conditions and, "no plan survives first contact with the enemy".

Your standard of success isn't realistic.
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At least 23 civilians, including women and children, were killed in the January 29 mission on an al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) target, according to London-based NGO Reprieve and a Sanaa-based human rights worker.

link...​

Congrats on that kill ratio you are embracing.
 
Hawkeye10 said:
I dont know that this was a fail that is the first hing. The second thing is that the Iran Rescue failure was such a huge thing because Carter himself had let the military rot, which nobody can accuse Trump of because he just got here. The third thing is that Carter let the failure eat away at him, even if this Yemen thing was a failure Trump is highly unlikely to make the same mistake.

So you see, you strike out.
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You have a very unique version of reality. Hard to bat against that.

If I am to defend Carter, I will surely strike out. I have always thought that Carter was weak. But, if you recall, and you can look it up, when the rubber met the road, Carter capitulated and ended up caving in to the Republican demand to increase military spending. Like I said. Carter was weak.

IMO, Carter's fail was that, in the first place, the plan was hair-brained to begin with. The pressure upon him to take some kind of action crushed him. As they say, "Nobel concept. ****ty execution." It was not properly thought out. (I couldn't imagine Obama EVER folding to pressure and not think something through before taking action but I digress.) The military brains advising Carter was not up to the task. Can you imagine SpaceEx having a mission failure because they did not anticipate helicopter propellers would kick up sand and dust? Carter's plan was just plain stupid. And he owns it.

Trump's attempt was a fail too. You can think otherwise if you like. But Trump owns it. (sorry......)

On another note, and this is just a personal opinion without links or sources. I know you didn't intend to, but I found your post to be somewhat offensive, personally. Carter took office on Jan. 20, 1977. The rescue attempt happened in April 1980, 3 years later, if my aging mind remembers correctly.

During this time, I was in the service of our great nation. I was in the presence of hundreds of thousands of other people doing the same. We were well trained. We were well fed. We were well exercised. We had the latest, greatest, war toys the world had ever known and we knew how to use them. And they were WELL maintained. WE were well maintained. We were dedicated too. Striving to always be the best of the best. Our government was spending more money on us than any other government in the world was spending on their's.

For you to say we had rotted is not only a bald faced lie, it is insulting. To me and to all I served with. I was there.
 
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Captain America said:
You have a very unique version of reality. Hard to bat against that.

If I am to defend Carter, I will surely strike out. I have always thought that Carter was weak. But, if you recall, and you can look it up, when the rubber met the road, Carter capitulated and ended up caving in to the Republican demand to increase military spending. Like I said. Carter was weak.

IMO, Carter's fail was that, in the first place, the plan was hair-brained to begin with. The pressure upon him to take some kind of action crushed him. As they say, "Nobel concept. ****ty execution." It was not properly thought out. (I couldn't imagine Obama EVER folding to pressure and not think something through before taking action but I digress.) The military brains advising Carter was not up to the task. Can you imagine SpaceEx having a mission failure because they did not anticipate helicopter propellers would kick up sand and dust? Carter's plan was just plain stupid. And he owns it.

Trump's attempt was a fail too. You can think otherwise if you like. But Trump owns it. (sorry......)

On another note, and this is just a personal opinion without links or sources. I know you didn't intend to, but I found your post to be somewhat offensive, personally. Carter took office on Jan. 20, 1977. The rescue attempt happened in April 1980, 3 years later, if my aging mind remembers correctly.

During this time, I was in the service of our great nation. I was in the presence of hundreds of thousands of other people doing the same. We were well trained. We were well fed. We were well exercised. We had the latest, greatest, war toys the world had ever known and we knew how to use them. And they were WELL maintained. WE were well maintained. We were dedicated too. Striving to always be the best of the best. Our government was spending more money on us than any other government in the world was spending on their's.

For you to say we had rotted is not only a bald faced lie, it is insulting. To me and to all I served with. I was there.
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Interesting...about a year ago I read a long defense of Carter on the hollow military charge, which became conventional wisdom labeled as fact, however this defender said that it was not true, the claim is that Carter got rolled.

However, this is politics, perception most of the time is reality, whether it started out as reality or not.

Than you for your service.
 
Simple question: If the raid is being touted as a success - based on the value of information gained that can be used in FUTURE raids - wont we have to wait until THOSE raids are ACTUALLY conducted to see how useful the obtained Yemen Raid information really was?

It seems only logical that then and only then can a true value be given on the Yemen raid.
 
poweRob said:
At least 23 civilians, including women and children, were killed in the January 29 mission on an al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) target, according to London-based NGO Reprieve and a Sanaa-based human rights worker.

link...​

Congrats on that kill ratio you are embracing.
Click to expand...

Now, it's 23 civilians?
 
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