Yeah, it's not about oil

Link?

Fingers said:

Link?

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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21975351/

I'd bang my head against my desk if I hadn't just gotten a shiny new CPU for an early Christmas present. I can only hope that the next President is a Democrat who will actually do something productive with Iraq instead of getting us even more stuck in it.

US military presence in countries where we have waged war is nothing new.

you could leave 1 in 5 US soldiers in iraq after the fighting has finally ceased, and our presence there would still be lower than our presence in either south korea, japan, or germany.

William Haskins said:

US military presence in countries where we have waged war is nothing new.

you could leave 1 in 5 US soldiers in iraq after the fighting has finally ceased, and our presence there would still be lower than our presence in either south korea, japan, or germany.

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Well said- I can add no more.

We're like tar that way, once we're in we tend to stick.

Maybe in three or four generations, there will be a group of middle-easterners we can actually call allies.

Bartholomew said:

Maybe in three or four generations, there will be a group of middle-easterners we can actually call allies.

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you mean like bahrain, kuwait, oman, qatar, turkey, israel, saudi arabia, jordan, egypt, UAE...?

christ, kid. crack open a book....

Those ones don't count because....well, because.

William Haskins said:

you mean like bahrain, kuwait, oman, qatar, turkey, israel, saudi arabia, jordan, egypt, UAE...?

christ, kid. crack open a book....

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save for israel and maybe turkey, those countries are allies to us the way germany was an ally of russia before world war 2.

William Haskins said:

you mean like bahrain, kuwait, oman, qatar, turkey, israel, saudi arabia, jordan, egypt, UAE...?

Christ, kid. crack open a book....

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Sure. Any titles you'd like to suggest? I have a big chunk of vacation time coming up between semesters.


#

I'm not sure any of those places are our allies. I admit ignorance on the subject; my reading about middle eastern politics does not much exceed front-page newspaper articles.

I'm suspicious of the list you've presented, though. Are they our allies, or do they merely not currently attack us?

And in the case of Isreal, I grant you that we are their ally. I find myself wondering if the relationship works both ways.

I mean, an Ally would no doubt have helped us when New York was bombed. What sort of relief effort did Isreal offer New York? Honest question. I have no idea one way or the other.

William Haskins said:

US military presence in countries where we have waged war is nothing new.

you could leave 1 in 5 US soldiers in iraq after the fighting has finally ceased, and our presence there would still be lower than our presence in either south korea, japan, or germany.

Click to expand...

When I was in korea in 74-75 there was a total of around 40,000 troops there. That included all the support troops, not just combat troops. When I was stationed at Kimpo AB the life expectancy of any US soldier within 50 miles of the DMZ was estimated to be 45 minutes in case of attack by North Korea which had an estimated 2 million troops on the other side of the DMZ. There are less american military there now than there was when I was there.

yer pal Brian

Fingers said:

When I was in korea in 74-75 there was a total of around 40,000 troops there. That included all the support troops, not just combat troops. When I was stationed at Kimpo AB the life expectancy of any US soldier within 50 miles of the DMZ was estimated to be 45 minutes in case of attack by North Korea which had an estimated 2 million troops on the other side of the DMZ. There are less american military there now than there was when I was there.

yer pal Brian

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as of 2004, there were 37,000 US troops there. so, yes: 3000 fewer.

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/06/07/skorea.troops/index.html

I recently read something that said that we have a US military presence in 130+ countries...there are 193 countries in the world (194 if Kosovo declares independence Dec 10th and we acknowledge it). And that's not counting diplomatic security corps We're everywhere!

As for allise, we pick strange bedfellows (Sudan being one of them). Politics is fun sometimes...you find strange ways of making allies.

When we were planning to invade Afghanistan, Iran unofficially approached us and offered us emergency landing privileges should one of our planes be shot down or encounter difficulty. We were having trouble finding this guarantee from other regional players...and here came Iran. And we accepted that plan.

As for oil, I think that oil was definitely part of it...but energy/environmental policy IS the new national security policy. It'd be foolish to consider it otherwise.

Fingers said:

When I was in korea in 74-75 there was a total of around 40,000 troops there. That included all the support troops, not just combat troops. When I was stationed at Kimpo AB the life expectancy of any US soldier within 50 miles of the DMZ was estimated to be 45 minutes in case of attack by North Korea which had an estimated 2 million troops on the other side of the DMZ. There are less american military there now than there was when I was there.

yer pal Brian

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boink -- why can't I delete me own messages here? Hmmm...

William Haskins said:

as of 2004, there were 37,000 US troops there. so, yes: 3000 fewer.

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/06/07/skorea.troops/index.html

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Such a significant number in troop reduction.

In all seriousness, William, thanks. I hope I know you well enough to rightfully assume that you recognize the absurdity in the argument of occupation/peace keeping/maintenance forces vs. actual "combat troop withdrawal."

Regarding this issue, I beg we are in accord as we're ultimately dealing with semantics aka spin. As you must know, three thousand is a drop in the proverbial occupation/peace keeping/maintenance/combat troop withdrawal. . . bucket.