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First, lord knows how Shik and UM manage to have comic timing over the medium of type, but they have.
Second, this is great fun. I wish I lived in America. No, wait, I don't. Sorry.
Third, if we all live in different realities, can I move into Charisma Carpenter's reality? It's probably better than my current one.
Forth, it's absolutly pissing down here. A whale has just swam up to the window.
Fifth, I can't actually think of anything relevent to say. Er, why don't you vote fascist? They get the job done.
------------------ "If every vampire who said he was at the Crucifixion was actually there it would've been like Woodstock. I was at Woodstock. I fed off a flower person and I spent six hours watching my hand move." - Spike, BtVS
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Omega, it is obvious Karrde enjoys head-trauma, and no matter what we say, it will only make him more angry. I'm giving it up, as it is a lost cause.
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When Gore gets elected, I'll thank god Americans are smart.
I mistyped, sorry. I meant "speaking spot" not "chair"
Omega, yes, we have the most powerful military. But when we were moving our troops in to Saudi Arabia, they were very vulnerable, and very much outnumbered by the Iraqis.
US Military Intelligence analysts "warned that liberating Kuwait could means U.S. casualties in the thousands." (Newsweek, Nov. 6, 2000)
------------------ Read My Lips: NO NEW TEXANS! *** Gore/Lieberman 2000 *** "I think anybody who doesn't think I'm smart enough to handle the job is underestimating." - George "Dubya" Bush
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Dude, 99 times out of 100 these so-called 'analysts' are nothing more than people who went to an air show once. Like CBS used to call on Dale Brown to 'analyze' military actions. Well, I trust him to write an entertaining story about souped-up B-1's and large-chested female pilots, I don't think he's all together qualified to comment on the affairs of the military.
American military officers vocally support Bush, expecting him to open the bank. The reality is that under Bush, the services would face upheavel. Gore has defended the status quo, boasting that "our military is the strongest and best in the entire world" - and promising to keep it that way. Bush, by contrast, has called for a "division of labor" with longtime American allies as well as sweeping through unspecified cuts in new weapons programs.
The new president will command a US military that has shrunk by a third since the cold war ended. American forces in Europe have been cut by almost 3/4ths. Nine in every 10 military family members now live on US soil. That has turned the military largely into an expeditionary force - and inspired Bush's charge that the Clinton administration has send underfinanced divisions to meet overstretched commitments. This supposed overstretch is largely a myth. Claims of a threefold increase in deployments under Clinton come from a misread congressional report.
Two regions pose the problems. The Persian Gulf is a huge, new and open-ended US commitment: precisely what Bush has been criticizing, even though it began with his father's failure to topple Iraq's Saddam Hussein. Now 20,000 US troops are stationed in the region, and the Navy's carrier fleet and some scare Air Force aircraft for electronic warfare and command and control have been run ragged by the low level war. Neither candidate has a plausible plan to overthrow Saddam, so the conflict presumably will continue.
In the Balkans, the US Army (active strength: 475,000) complains about the diffculty of keeping 13,000 peacekeepers in Bosnia and Kosovo (one fifth of the NATO force there). The Army's own structural problems are largely to blame. Bush says he would pull US troops out of the Balkans and leave future peacekeeping missions to the Europeans - reserving the US miltary for Big Wars only. European politicians warn this would cost the US its leadership role in NATO, America's main alliance.
Whoever wins, the military faces cuts. The $310 billion defense budget is already larger than the world's next 12 military budget combined, and three times the combined defense spending of Russia, China, and seven "rogue" states, including North Korea and Libya. Still, by some measures, US forces are underfunded. To replace all aging equipment would cost an extra $35 to $60 billion a year. To fully fund operations and maintenance would take at least an additional $10 billion. Neither candidate is promising that kind of money. Gore talks of an extra $100 billion over 10 years. Bush promises $45 billion, going mainly for research and development to hasten the next generation of weapons.
Here Bush appears the radical. Looking to predict advances in computers, sensors and communications, he would "skip a generation" of weapons and instead push toward the truly revolutionary generation after next. That, says Gore, would be to gamble on uncertain future technologies."
------------------ Read My Lips: NO NEW TEXANS! *** Gore/Lieberman 2000 *** "I think anybody who doesn't think I'm smart enough to handle the job is underestimating." - George "Dubya" Bush
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1o2: We thought it was going to be a cakewalk, as long as we didn't get in to an NBC enviroment, because we knew what our NBC gear was like, and didn't really trust it.
NBC = Nuclear/Biological/Chemical
The US thought wrong when the USSR split apart, because of the stabilizing effects of 2 super powers. Now, with the lopsided balance of power, smaller nations want to flex their muscles. The US should not have made such cuts, I was depressed when my first division, 3rd Armored, was deactivated. Maybe making smaller units, brigades and battalions to back up lighter units of leg/airborne/air assault divisions. The US fucked up, plain and simple. Fixing this FUBAR is going to cost.
------------------ Stupid bastards and religious freaks, so safe in their castle keeps...
[This message has been edited by Ritten (edited November 01, 2000).]
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The cuts are regrettable, especially with what happened regarding the COLE.
How do you see the US Military in the future? Mobile and powerful?
What about the role the military will play? Do we play peacekeeper to the world, or only when our interests are threatened?
------------------ Read My Lips: NO NEW TEXANS! *** Gore/Lieberman 2000 *** "I think anybody who doesn't think I'm smart enough to handle the job is underestimating." - George "Dubya" Bush
"I don't believe we can be all things... to all people."
The military's job is to protect American interests.
------------------ Pilot: You're sure they were Americans, eh? Fraser: They were all wearing new boots, they were driving a Jeep Wrangler, and they carried big guns. Pilot: Americans it is. - "due South"
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I'd imagine America's interests would be met by remaining in NATO.
You know, maybe this is just me, but I really don't see how the most powerful nation in the world can simply stand by and do *nothing* when people are being repressed and killed.
When I see a big bully knocking down someone smaller than him, I like to step in.
So should the U.S.
------------------ Gore/Lieberman 2000 *** I'll hug your elephant if you'll kiss my ass. *** "I think anybody who doesn't think I'm smart enough to handle the job is underestimating." - George "Dubya" Bush
quote:You know, maybe this is just me, but I really don't see how the most powerful nation in the world...When I see a big bully knocking down someone smaller than him, I like to step in. So should the U.S.
Yeah. You guys do a hell of a lot for world peace. Nevermind the fact that your noses are sore from being buried in the affairs of countries of which you have no business.
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I mean, working in cooperation with the United Nations. Bush wants to let Europeans handle affairs in Europe ...
I think we should help.
My grandfather landed on Normandy, and I lost several family members during both World Wars. I'd rather have our troops helping keep the peace in Europe then have to face a larger conflict.
First, you were dragged through the streets of Mogadishu?
------------------ Gore/Lieberman 2000 *** I'll hug your elephant if you'll kiss my ass. *** "I think anybody who doesn't think I'm smart enough to handle the job is underestimating." - George "Dubya" Bush
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No, but some of our people were, as a direct result of TRYING to do something 'nice' for people who didn't like them, didn't want them there, and were only too happy to stab them in the back.
Or is Somalia only a memory?
------------------ "Ed Gruberman, you fail to grasp Ty Kwan Leap. Approach me, that you might see." -- The Master
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