Pentagon Expands Outposts in Middle East

[leftchick]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=6&u=/ap/20040922/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_military_outposts


WASHINGTON - The U.S. military is quietly expanding its network of small outposts worldwide to help fight terrorism in Middle Eastern and African hotspots, even as it prepares to send home tens of thousands of troops from Cold War bases in Germany and South Korea (

Among the places the military already has placed or hopes to establish such new "lily pads" or jumping off points: Bulgaria and Romania in Eastern Europe; a pier in Singapore, Azerbaijan in Central Asia, and a tiny island off the oil-rich coast of West Africa.


"Freedom of action," is a term the Pentagon (news - web sites) uses to describe the flexibility it seeks, and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld is to brief senators on the plan Thursday.


When President Bush (news - web sites) announced in August that 70,000 troops and 100,000 of their family members in Europe and Asia would move to bases in the United States, much of the public reaction was focused on the historic scale of withdrawal.

[leetrisck]

1. And there will be no families in those new areas

rumsfeld is getting rid of the families - they're too expensive

[Disturbed]

2. "getting rid of the families"

Yes, the US is getting rid of the families all over the globe and here in the US, as well. The method in Iraq and Afghanistan is bombing them to death.

[Ohio rules]

3. Rent is high in Germany

We don't need to support the local German city economies with our defense budget.

Defense dollars are comming back to certain congressional districts in the United States.

[Rose Siding]

6. Besides, this is a perfect time to screw allies

:eyes:

[bemildred]

4. Ze Legionaires at Fort Zinderneuf will be better able to focus

on ze mission without ze distractions of ze family life.

We have foreign soldiers doing it for citizenship and little
"outposts" all over the place, can we call it the "American Foreign
Legion" yet?

[teryang]

5. Lily pads- they float but you can't stand on them

This policy is diastrous. Armed forces need logistical stations but that is not what these are, these are inroads for political influence. In many cases, they are too small or too remote to support significant and sustainable military operations. The dispersion of resources, contrary to what is asserted, is cost ineffective, and in a pinch, as demonstrated by Iraq and Afghanistan, mission ineffective.