Spy vs Spy....

[Svartalf]

At one of them is a dummy organization for the Illuminati.

You'll be the chap to know how it was in WWII. Did the competing agencies like to hold on to their info? And did that lead to any major cock-ups?

Didn't SOMEBODY catch the Japanese fleet setting out for Pearl harbour and fail to notify the Merkins?

Didn't you hear? The US knew about it all along, and allowed it to happen. FDR wanted the war, and all...

Yeah, right... when you want a tussle with somebody, but don't want to strike the first blow, and you know he's coming to kick you in the nutz, you just keep your pants conveniently down for him to aim better.

[Coito ergo sum]

The irony is that, in the war against Al Qaeda, it is the intelligence agencies that actually scored the wins. George W. Fucking Stupid Bush sent the armed forces out to do battle, and reaped a harvest of corpses, mostly innocent bystanders, interspersed with a bunch of Americans and allies. In the mean time, the intelligence agencies (of the USA, Britain, France, Israel, Pakistan, and probably others) were inserting people into Al Qaeda and sending back intelligence.

George Bush was not in charge of the US intelligence agencies?

Note, the armed forces were sent quite sparingly into Afghanistan, with a high degree of success, in conjunction with intelligence forces. And, the invasion of Iraq was, regardless of the aftermath, among the most audacious and successful, and one sided, invasions in the history of mankind. No other country could have done it.

These myths that the US has somehow been beaten or did horribly in Afghanistan and Iraq is monumental bullshit, pedaled like the nonsense about FEMA's reaction to Katrina. FEMA's reaction was the fastest and largest response in American history. The reason why help didn't get, however, to people in the areas affected any sooner, however, was that the Governor of the State of Louisiana did not ask for help, and federal and other state agencies are not permitted to head into a state to help unless they are asked.

Result : a series of Al Qaeda sabotage efforts nipped in the bud, and Osama dead, plus a few of his other top leaders. Al Qaeda emasculated, with minimal cost.

So what the fuck was the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq about?

It's a tad bit naive to think that what happened in 2009 and 2010 had nothing to do with what happened before. There wasn't a sea change in policy. There was a continuation in policy.

[Thumpalumpacus]

There were certainly communications failures between American agencies at our entrance to WWII.

[Blind groper]

These myths that the US has somehow been beaten or did horribly in Afghanistan and Iraq is monumental bullshit,

That is not my point.
My point is not whether the operations were failures or not. My point is that they were :
1. Unnecessary
2. Horribly expensive in terms of the human cost. Not so much Americans dead, but the massively greater numbers of dead among the citizens of Iraq and Afghanistan.

To fight Al Qaeda, the invasion of Afghanistan was not needed. The undercover operations have been very, very successful and did not need the invasion. And what was achieved in Iraq that justified the million plus dead Iraqis? Saddam was hanged, and that justified all the death and misery? Yeah, right.

[Coito ergo sum]

At one of them is a dummy organization for the Illuminati.

You'll be the chap to know how it was in WWII. Did the competing agencies like to hold on to their info? And did that lead to any major cock-ups?

Didn't SOMEBODY catch the Japanese fleet setting out for Pearl harbour and fail to notify the Merkins?

Didn't you hear? The US knew about it all along, and allowed it to happen. FDR wanted the war, and all...

Yeah, right... when you want a tussle with somebody, but don't want to strike the first blow, and you know he's coming to kick you in the nutz, you just keep your pants conveniently down for him to aim better.

I was being ironical.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

There were certainly communications failures between American agencies at our entrance to WWII.

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/PTO/EastWind/index.html

[Coito ergo sum]

Bush sent the troops out so that his friends that have companies that contract with the military would get fat payouts.

Halliburton alone made tens of mmillions, and dick cheney used to be big brass there... I'm sure generous kickbacks were handed out.

Odd how Obama didn't fire Halliburton. Maybe the kickbacks continued?

[Coito ergo sum]

That was the minimal cost.

Since the real victories were all gained by intelligence agencies, and covert operatives pretending to be Al Qaeda, why should there have been a war in Afghanistan at all (or Iraq)? That it, apart from the political and economic reasons (Bush wanting to be seen by the electorate as 'strong'), and the quest for oil.

The thing is that Al Qaeda was not really the reason for war. Al Qaeda needed to be countered, but that was best done via more subtle methods using good intelligence. Not the blunt and horribly destructive method of going to war.

All very easy to say, in hindsight.

[Svartalf]

Irony CES? oh, man, I guess I was just deadpan then...

[Coito ergo sum]

Irony CES? oh, man, I guess I was just deadpan then...

Well, yes. I don't really think that FDR purposefully allowed the Japanese to bomb Pearl Harbor.

[Svartalf]

Bush sent the troops out so that his friends that have companies that contract with the military would get fat payouts.

Halliburton alone made tens of mmillions, and dick cheney used to be big brass there... I'm sure generous kickbacks were handed out.

Odd how Obama didn't fire Halliburton. Maybe the kickbacks continued?

Or maybe the contracts were ironclad and it would have cost him more to end them, or he was so deep in the cesspool that he could not afford reducing its presence due to how it would have hurt your position even worse?

Who knows?

[Coito ergo sum]

Bush sent the troops out so that his friends that have companies that contract with the military would get fat payouts.

Halliburton alone made tens of mmillions, and dick cheney used to be big brass there... I'm sure generous kickbacks were handed out.

Odd how Obama didn't fire Halliburton. Maybe the kickbacks continued?

Or maybe the contracts were ironclad and it would have cost him more to end them, or he was so deep in the cesspool that he could not afford reducing its presence due to how it would have hurt your position even worse?

Who knows?

The former isn't true, since the contracts are annual.

So deep in the sess pool? What does that mean?

But, you're right. Bush always acted in his own self-interest and to help his "buddies" get rich, no matter how many lives he ended and destroyed. Obama, of course, would never do anything wrong, unless he was locked into it by someone like Bush. That's the thinking man's opinion.

[Svartalf]

Nice strawman.

[Coito ergo sum]

Nice strawman.

So, you didn't say that Bush took the nation to war to "help his buddies" get rich? You basically called Bush a bloodthirsty, mass murderer who could give a shit less about sending young men and women to horrible deaths because he's getting kickbacks from funneling war business to his "buddies."

And, you didn't say that Obama was hamstrung by the lengthy policies and/or as too deep in the sess pool, and therefore it wouldn't be anything you'd ascribe to him? You basically came up with whatever you could so you don't have to judge Obama negatively for continuing to work with Halliburton, the evil company you thought Bush murdered 10s of thousands of people for....

[Svartalf]

He did... wasted thousands of lives and billions of taxpayer money and destroyed much of what stability the middle east had for... well, very little.
Without Saddam Iraq is teetering on the edge of balkanisation and civil war, and Afghanistan is treating the US military as it served the Reds, that and we now now for a fact that Karzai is president of Kabul, not much anywhere else.

As for Obama, He's doing what he can with what he inherited, and when you inherit that kind of Augean stables to clean, that takes time, because you know as well as anybody (except maybe the likes of Ian and Zilla) the disaster that cutting your losses and instant withdrawal would have produced. Maybe he's not been the exemplary guy he was touted during his first election campaign, maybe he's as much a scuzzball as any guy who ever sat in the House or senate... but I can't find that much fault with his handling of that particular pile of manure... maybe more expert eyes do, I can't.