In light of the recent massacre of Afghan civilians by a U.S. soldier, is anyone's thinking regarding the proposed (2014) withdrawal of U.S. troops changed?

 

Should the president's timetable change?

I will start with accelerated withdraw. You do not do wars on timetables.

 

I heard someone say we need to go big or go home. Go big means going into Pakistan to route out the Taliban strongholds and destroy them as an viable entity for now. Anything short of that is not worth staying for. And this has nothing to do with the recent events. The mission is ill-defined at this point.

I don't have any answer for this question. What I do think is that any knee-jerk response will be a mistake. At this point, the best course of action, IMO, is to prosecute this soldier to the fullest extent of the law. What he did was heinous...not only did he murder innocent people, many of the children, but he placed at risk every soldier in Afghanistan, and possibly every Western citizen. What he did is beyond "simple" murder. I don't know if his actions can ever be overstated in their atrociousness.

I will start with accelerated withdraw. You do not do wars on timetables.

 

I heard someone say we need to go big or go home. Go big means going into Pakistan to route out the Taliban strongholds and destroy them as an viable entity for now. Anything short of that is not worth staying for. And this has nothing to do with the recent events. The mission is ill-defined at this point.

 

If we go into Pakistan, the Taliban will just go to Afghanistan and we play ring around the rosey chasing them from country to country.

My thinking hasn't changed. I'm not sure what more we can do there. It's time to wrap it up.

^ We got the big bad guy and by many accounts, have significantly reduced his followers' effectiveness.

 

I'm inclined to agree with you.

At this point I think it's time to bring our troops home. There really isn't a clear reason for us to be there any more. Trying to fight the Taliban, Al Qaeda etc etc is just a never ending battle, it's like the President announcing that the national guard is going to be going door to door throughout the US talking to every one until they can rid the entire country of criminals and people that may break gun laws, drug laws or be violent in nature. It is just not going to happen and it's rather unrealistic and naive to think otherwise.

I would rather be there fighting them instead of fighting them over here. I think we have to stay on the offensive and not redraw and play defense. I would rather fight over there instead of over here.

I would rather be there fighting them instead of fighting them over here. I think we have to stay on the offensive and not redraw and play defense. I would rather fight over there instead of over here.

 

Feel free to volunteer and go. The truth is we have been in this conflict for 10 years. Our troops have logged more time in combat than the WW II generation, Vietnam or the Civil War. Our armies can't sustain this level without conscription, funding or attainable goals.

Reports are that the withdrawal discussion has been going on for weeks and now this incident plus the violent reaction to it will likely speed it up.

Pull the troops out today and do what I wanted to do in the first place, carpet bomb, smart bomb, and bunker bomb the breeding ground of al-Qaeda back to the stone age and keep them back there by repeating the cycle when we notice that they've rebuilt.

 

(I'd rather just drop a hand full of ICBMs on them and make the dump uninhabitable for the next 250,000 years, but the line has to be drawn somewhere.)

When Karzi is dead.

 

When someone is in that is against the taliban.

 

When we want to, not when they want us too.

When Karzi is dead.

 

When someone is in that is against the taliban.

 

When we want to, not when they want us too.

 

As I mentioned before, then by all means enlist and go. We just don't have the manpower to keep boots on the ground for this kind of time without endangering our military troops psychologically if not physiologically.

Too old to enlist, wish I had of long ago.

 

I am for this.

Bring our troops home from everywhere.

Put them on our borders to keep any foreigner out (especially of Middle East origin)

Get rid of all foreigners in America. No visas, no illegals, only US citizens.

Put prisoners to work on farms doing the work the illegal immigrants do, but now for free. Should help economy and farmers by lowering price of food.

 

This allows us to better protect ourselves at home, since we cant go elsewhere and stop the enemy.

^So any one who wasn't born in America has got to go?