White House reviews plan to deploy 120,000 troops to Middle East: NYT

[left-of-center2012]

Source: The Hill

Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan last week presented the White House with a plan to send up to 120,000 troops to the Middle East in the event that Iran escalates tensions, according to a New York Times report.

The Times reports that national security adviser John Bolton issued an order for the plans and the proposal does not include a ground invasion, which would require many more troops.

The plan was ordered to prepare in the event that Iran attacks American forces or accelerates the development of nuclear weapons, according to the Times, citing administration officials. It is largely driven by Bolton, who has pushed for more aggressive action against Iran under both Trump and former President George W. Bush.

It was also unclear whether Trump had been briefed about the number of troops the plan called for, which would be nearly the size of the initial American force that invaded Iraq in 2003, according to the Times.

Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/defense/policy-strategy/443533-trump-admin-considering-plans-to-send-120000-us-troops-to

[queentonic]

1. Selective Service

Will the draft be activated as well? The Selective Service is currently reviewing it's protocols. Will women also be drafted? Stay tuned. The Dumpster has a lot more planned for us.

[getagrip_already]

2. I sure hope so!

While I have 3 kids of draft age, I still support a draft, including woman. Let them choose public service if they don't want to fight.

But this is the single biggest difference between vietnam and iraq/afghanastam/iran. People don't have anyone in the game. Sure, volunteers families are effected, but they kind of expect risk.

Let the public participate and war will become a lot less popular. It will also dilute out the nazi clan percentage.

[Traildogbob]

10. Spot on

I was part of the Veitnam era draft. My number was 324, the draft only reached into the mid 200's. I joined and served 4 years. We could not vote. We knew Nixon was killing us. What that skin in the game meant to my generation; we faught for the right to choose who put us in war, useless wars while they never served. We died here at home in that fight for our rights. After we got the right to vote, because we were old enough to die, we damn sure voted and gave a damn about who was going to decide on wars. All the knuckle dragging trumpanzees that love military weapons and gear, will get it paid for, in a socialist way. Bring on the draft and watch the Republican Party die. John Bolden loves sending other's children to die in far away wars, while, as did Cheney et al, make ass loads of cash.

[DENVERPOPS]

12. Whoa, get a grip

YOU would allow your kids to go fight and possibly die for another phonied up war????

What can you be thinking?????????

Bush/Cheney/Rummie were short handed going into Iraq in Desert Storm, but they knew that if they started the draft all over again they would be stopped dead in their tracks from going into Iraq.
How would you feel if your kid went to Iraq and got killed so Cheney Incorporated could divide up the oil among U.S. Oil companies including his former employer Haliburton. Rumsfeld stated that the war would only last three days and only cost the U.S. Taxpayers three billion dollars. Flagrant Lies and all the Republicans in the administration knew it. The total sum so far on Iraq is over ONE TRILLION DOLLARS....and thousands of our kids had to Die.

And do you think that ANY of the wealthy's spawn will ever be forced to go????????????
They will all have exemptions of one thing or another. My guess is that you weren't even born when VietNam was going on.............

[LanternWaste]

16. Think deeper than a red plastic party cup.

"In the post-industrial age, the draft is one of the most efficient and elective methods *preventing* a nation from going top war. (Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, Paul Kennedy).

As in Vattel's The Law of Nations; "It may not be doubted that the very conception of a just government and its duty to the citizen includes the reciprocal obligation of the citizen to render military service in case of need, and the right to compel it. To do more than state the proposition is absolutely unnecessary in view of the practical illustration afforded by the almost universal legislation to that effect now in force."




But sure... guess away, as it means nothing and changes less.

[DFW]

24. Vattel included something that should have been heavily emphasized:

"....to render military service in case of need"

IN CASE OF NEED.

Invading Grenada was not a case of need.
Invading Panama was not a case of need.
Invading Iraq was not a case of need.
Invading Iran would not be a case of need.

The notion that a citizen has a "reciprocal obligation to render military service" only holds when that military service is vital to the survival of that nation or a close ally. Invading Iraq or Iran, chasing down Mexicans on the Texas border...these are NOT reciprocal obligations, and they are not cases of need. Trump, McConnell and Bolton saying so does not make it so. The conscripts would be submitting to narrow interests that have no national or international interests at heart.

My father was drafted into the US Army to fight the Nazis in Europe. He understood and accepted that. My father in law was drafted off his farm into Hiitler's Wehrmacht at age 17 and sent to Stalingrad where he lost a leg to a Soviet artillery shell in minus 40° weather. He had a totally different perception of the concept of national need. Neither he nor his family saw any need to invade the Soviet Union in 1941. His most fervent wish was that all his grandchildren be girls, so as to avoid compulsory military service (a wish fate was to grant him), something Germany has since abandoned. He was literally the "poor slob on a farm" that Hermann Göring was referring to:

Hermann Göring in his cell at the Nürnberg trials:

"Why, of course, the people don't want war. Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship."

(U.S. interviewer) Gilbert: "There is one difference. In a democracy, the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars."

Göring: "Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."

WMD, anyone? Saddam didn't attack Dallas. He was a sadistic son of a bitch who happened to be sitting on more oil than Dick Cheney could stand to see not be his. No case of need, no justification for my government to be ordering an invasion. For a so-called "Law of Nations" to be a valid application, a nation should act responsibly to the needs of its people and the world community. Not all nations do that. "Hell, no, we won't go" was not a cry of traitors or even exclusively of pacifists. It was the cry of a generation who saw its nation's might being used cruelly and irresponsibly. I support their view that a citizen does NOT have a blanket compelling "reciprocal obligation" to join a military force and fight if that fight is not for the purpose of protecting the integrity of the nation, or that of an ally in mortal peril.

[Javaman]

19. how about we just don't have a war? nt

[demigoddess]

21. Congressmen, especially republicans, will get their kids out of serving anyway.

It has always been like that, and always will be.

[getagrip_already]

22. It's not about congress or the rich..

It's about the kids who could potentiaslly be drafted as soon as they are out of school.

Wonder why there are no real protests as bad as trump is? Kids aren't being drafted and sent off to fight some assholes war.

Sure, school shootings motivate them, but a draft would mobilize them. And their parents would support them.

[Brother Buzz]

25. This dumb draftee is against it but the late Colonel Hackworth had some thoughts on a citizens' army

"Even when they pissed me off, I had to admit there was something I liked about the draftees who didn't want to be there and made no bones about it. I like draftees in general, even with the attendant problems. Historically draftees have kept the military on the straight and narrow. By calling a spade a spade, they keep it clean. Without their "careers" to think about, they can't be easily bullied or intimidated as Regulars; their presence prevents the elitism that otherwise might allow a Regular army to become isolated from the values of the country it serves. Draftees are not concerned for the reputation of their employer, the Army (in Vietnam they happily blew the whistle an everything from phony valor awards to the secret bombings of Laos and Cambodia); a draftee, citizens' army, so much a part of the history of America, is an essential part of a healthy democracy, one in which everyone pays the price of admission." - Colonel Hackworth, About Face

[MineralMan]

8. Nope. They'll just deploy National Guard troops to

remove them from the control of Governors.

[cheri010353]

28. Question

Can the Governors refuse to allow their National Guards to be deployed?

[watoos]

3. Anyone miss Mattis yet?

[ADX]

17. I certainly do...

...but I don't blame him for getting out while the getting was good...

[IronLionZion]

4. "in the event that Iran attacks American forces"

So they're planning for false flag events to justify. Meanwhile Russia and China have openly launched cyberattacks against the US but that's just fine.

[BruceWane]

5. Working title

"Operation Impeachment Distraction"

[MineralMan]

6. And so, Operation "Wag the Dog" Begins.

[left-of-center2012]

9. Just in time for the election

Rally 'round the flag !

[RKP5637]

7. Here we go again. FFS!!!

[underpants]

11. Any ideas where one might put 120,000 troops and their equipment?

Asked for a friend

[zipplewrath]

14. Qatar

That was the go to country in the past.

[underpants]

15. Yeah I should've figured that

Thanks.

[wiggs]

13. Where is congress? Why aren't dems and gop alike calling for congressional

involvement? This does not fall under a previous authorization to invade Iraq for reasons related to 9/11.

Is war already baked into our near future?

[Baclava]

18. "the proposal does not include a ground invasion, which would require many more troops"

So, Air Force and Navy, setting up a no-fly zone?

[Dan]

26. Well once people start to die

It might start as a ‘remote war - from the air and sea’, but once people start dying, I suspect that their will be boots on the ground.

Those that liked Vietnam (police action) are going to love a war with Iran (and her allies). I think that we are not looking at 120,000 but on the north side of half a million - starting.

There will be a draft, men and women (not sure about the children of the rich/famous, politicians) of all colors will be allowed to attend. The poorer you are - the more opportunities they will have.

Of course the question is - how will you keep this little war from becoming a world war - but I am sure that our fearless leader has a plan. Of course, one has to hope that dear leader understands that our ‘true allies’ probably will decide not to join this new adventure. But as I think about it, since Trump is Putin’s female dog - I wonder how does a potential war help Russia, except make the protest of the sixties look like a garden party. And Trump will definitely need a wall - to prevent some of our young men and women from deciding that Canada looks nice, especially when we start hearing on the news of hundreds of our young kids dying each week.

I am so tired, wrote to our Congress critter when they wanted the Iraq war - and nothing came of it.

[Baclava]

27. There wont be any war with Iran, all the trouble will be blamed on Yemen rebels

The Saudis will dump some more bombs on them, Iran will shrug, crisis averted

[Dan]

29. Hope you're right...

Actually pray that you’re right because I hate to think of some of the alternatives.

[Baclava]

31. Just like I predicted, 'Arab coalition carries out air strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen'

RIYADH — The Joint Forces Command of the Coalition to Restore Legitimacy in Yemen carried out several air strikes on Houthi targets in the Yemeni capital Sanaa on Thursday after the Iranian-aligned militants claimed responsibility for drone attacks on Saudi oil installations.

A coalition statement carried by the Saudi Press Agency said the air strikes were against a number of legitimate military targets, which military intelligence confirmed were military bases and facilities used by the Iranian-backed Houthi militias for weapons and ammunition storage. "The air operations achieved their objectives," statement added.

"The coalition forces are resolved to follow all terrorist elements across all of Yemen, and will be resolute to target all locations from which terrorist attacks are initiated," the statement said.

http://saudigazette.com.sa/article/5...rgets-in-Sanaa

[beachbum bob]

20. I love the idea of GOP having to defend more Middle East warfare

Just in time for 2020 elections.

[trev]

23. Republicans won't be put off by another war

especially one started by a Republican.

[robbob]

30. My favourite line?

“In the event that Iran escalates tensions”.

Sending 120,000 troops to the area (not to mention battleships being deployed to the area) is, by definition, “escalating tensions”.

[left-of-center2012]

33. Plus B-52 bombers

Just in case?

[yardwork]

32. I hope the people who couldn't bring themselves to vote for Hillary are happy.