Breaking: Air strikes in Iraq and Syria

[nolabear]

Retaliation for the drones. B1 bombers.

[BootinUp]

1. Get 'em.

[beaglelover]

2. Yes, absolutely!!

[thatdemguy]

3. And in to another war we go. NT

[jimfields33]

4. Three Americans dead.

It’d be criminal to do nothing.

[BannonsLiver]

12. Your isolationist approach isn't the way to go either.

[TexasDem69]

13. I'd prefer we do both

And this is a justified and indeed required response

[mcar]

14. Did you make a wrong turn?

[thatdemguy]

15. No, and the last I heard the Democratic party was the anti war party.

Or have things changed in the last 10 years. If not the anti war party at least the anti industrial war machine party.

[BannonsLiver]

16. It's a big tent so you're going to have differing viewpoints.

[Happy Hoosier]

17. Being "antiwar" doesn't imply...

A willingness to tolerate outrageous attacks.

I don’t think we should go looking for a fight, but if someone else picks one, I am in favor of ending it.

[maxrandb]

18. No, the Democratic Party is the "SANE" Party

We are the intelligent and reasoned party that saves military action for when it's needed and warranted.

We are the thoughtful party that thinks before we act, acts proportionally, and anticipates, realistically, what the outcome/impact of our actions will be.

That's why I thank God that President Biden is our President at this moment.

I served almost 30 years in the Navy, and I served with a ton of other Democrats.

We were not "anti-war", or anti-use of military ootions to strike those that attacked us.
We were, however, pro-sanity.

FDR wasn't pro-war, but he wasn't afraid to wage war when necessary.

Lincoln wasn't pro-war, but he wasn't afraid to wage war when necessary.

Thank the lucky stars for that.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

19. The Democratic Party was never anti war, we're useless anti war,

like Vietnam, Iraq, etc.
There's a difference.

[NickB79]

25. FDR and Truman waged total war and won WW2

Democrats have never been anti-war if said war is justified and we were hit first.

[paleotn]

27. Armed response is sometimes a necessity.

Unfortunate, but that's the world we live in. To think otherwise is foolishly unrealistic and irrational. The world won't change via happy thoughts alone. Ask the average Ukrainian. They'll tell you.

[Calculating]

29. They literally keep shooting missiles and drones at us

Three troops are dead, we need to kick some ass over this

[EX500rider]

6. So terror groups kill US personnel and you think we should do what? Stern note?

[Torchlight]

8. Doubtful. Short operations with pre-set definitions of success ratios.

Simply put, it does not follow.

[honest.abe]

10. This is not "another war".

In fact its a way to stop those who are attempting to start another war.

[NickB79]

11. If anyone started another war, it's the guys who bombed a US military base

The ones we're now pounding in justified retaliation.

[WarGamer]

5. My son worked on a BONE line... ammo trooper

The year before he left, I wouldn't let him use my computer because I didn't want him to mess anything up...

A year later the Federal Government is letting him join warheads to bomb bodies and load them on a multi 100 million dollar bomber.

It's fascinating... he told me that all the parts to weapons are stored separately. The bomb body, warhead, detonator or trigger whatever... even the fins are bolted on only when deployed.

da BONE!!!!!!!!!!

He says they're the loudest thing he's ever heard, much louder than F-16's or C17's, C-130's... etc

[Hermit-The-Prog]

21. I had to do a search to figure out "BONE line"

First hits were a bit weird, then added "bomb assembly" to the search and the first hit was a wikipedia article with a picture.

D'oh! I think one of my dogs buried my brain in the yard while I wasn't looking.

[WarGamer]

22. Love that bird... and the kids who work on them love them too.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

26. The BONE is a beautiful aircraft and quite capable to this day.

The Russian Blackjack bomber is almost an exact copy of the Bone, think they somehow stole the blueprints for the B-1 Bomber?

[WarGamer]

33. For those that don't know what you and I are talking about...

4 engine full afterburner takeoff...

[ArnoldLayne]

7. It's about time now go after military installations inside Iran.

But no civilian targets at all.

[madinmaryland]

20. Here we go again. Another wargasm. ALL of the networks are in on it. The MIC is happy.

☹️

[EX500rider]

23. What do suggest as a reply to dead US military personnel?

[paleotn]

28. Pearl Harbor bombed.......

But, hey! If we give them Hawaii maybe they'll just leave us alone. Then again, maybe they'll want Alaska and California too.

By the way, the MIC provides the material that keeps your comfy bubble nice, warm and safe so you can post what you please on the internets with near impunity. Just saying. Defense and the occasional need for armed response has been part of the human experience since there's been humans and it ain't changing any time soon. Don't have to like it. A lot of stuff in life that's like that.

[Barry Markson]

30. Pearl Harbor Bombed......

But the United States didn't bomb Yakushima.

No, we firebombed Tokyo and nuked Nakasaki and Hiroshima!

Go to the fucking source of the problem! (pardon my French)

Barry Goldwater said when running against LBJ, if you're going to justify a war then use everything in our arsenal, including tactical nukes, as necessary.
He was vilified, but he was right as far as I was concerned.
No pussyfooting around, if our interests are rightous then do it.

70,000 kia and how many lives ruined

[paleotn]

31. That's more than a little extreme in this case and a bad analogy.

The horrors perpetrated by Japan and Germany were light years beyond what Iranian backed militias have recently been up to. A measured response to fit the problem is what Biden's administration is doing and I support it.

My point was the world is inherently unsafe. While the vast majority of humans are peaceful and just want to get on with their lives, there are more than enough bad actors to warrant an overwhelming deterrent and all the work that entails. A deterrent we unfortunately have to use on occasion, but only in a rational, measured manner. Otherwise, we're no better than the bad actors. Can't revel in it. There's no glory in it. War is an evil, but unfortunately, a necessary evil at times.

[Barry Markson]

32. Rational and measured is what lead us into the disasters of

Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

Dwight David Eisenhower didn't do rational and measured.

He won a World War.

The United States officially entered WW2 on December 8th 1941, Germany and Japan surrendered in 1945, 4 years later.
We spent 12+ years in Vietnam, 20 some years in Iraq and Afghanistan and we're still in Korea.

To HELL with rational and measured.

[BootinUp]

34. Just a suggestion

Stop trying to make the world fit into your little rudimentary equation. Because It is not that simple.

[Barry Markson]

35. Ok, point out the errors in my thinking.

I'm willing to regard superior logic.

[BootinUp]

36. I decided not to do that, but to encourage

You to go and find, study, understand it on your own. You could start perhaps by watching the documentary with Robert McNamara. It is excellent and he clears up popular misconceptions about Vietnam.

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0317910/

Mainly I encourage you to question assumptions.

[TheKentuckian]

37. Eisenhower had actual objectives and a vision of what victory meant

Korea, I don't think there was any actual intent to win. I think it was more a steam venting, dick measuring, and MIC profit protection operation.

Vietnam had some of that factor but add that there was no victory that actually made any difference to anyone to be had from the start.

Even with the advantage of hindsight it seems this one was a situation where the only way to win the game was to not play it but unfortunately it was deemed cheaper and more profitable to deter the spread of communism with war rather than capitalism winning with a strong safety net and commited community investment to win by providing a better deal to more people.

Iraq, we knowingly and purposefully fought a country that had nothing to do with the attack on us and broke it easily enough really but got stuck with the bought it piece.

Afghanistan very vaguely made some sense, maybe from orbit or so but getting bogged down in an occupation never made strategic sense in relation to objectives of going after Al Qaeda.
They could have just be treated like Pakistan and ignored/bribed the government for the most part but even more so because Afghanistan had far less command and control than their neighbors.

Hubris.

We are damage dealers not occupiers and society builders. Give us a direct objective and we can go home and it is done but the occupation for social reinvention by force of arms stuff isn't our bag.

[Barry Markson]

38. Eisenhower warned us.

I believe JFK even recognized the folly of bailing the French out of another war, especially a ground war in Asia.
My Old Man was a WW2 vet who would have been recalled for Korea except for being married with a kid, me.
He had a copy of Ike's 1961 farewell speech posted on our bulletin board at home. I took it to heart and in addition to "Coming Clean for Gene", I did all I could to avoid conscription.

The defense industry needs war for profits, the military needs war for medals and promotions.