Inside the Ring

The current war on terror requires the kinds of hunter-killers exemplified by our SOCOM soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen. This is what they DO, and they are the best in the world at what they do. It is an insult to all of them, and to the brave heros who have falled in the line of duty, for us to handcuff them and expect results. UNLEASH THEM NOW!! OBL would be dead and moldering in his grave if we had simply given our military free hand in the matter. Shame on us for not doing it.

Why not just nuke the whole "garbage dump"?

Wouldn't it be a swell change of pace if we didn't tie the military's hands behind their backs before sending them off on a mission? Release the hounds, and let God sort them out later.

I agree, our military has been handcuffed since the beginning of this war on terror (not just al-Qaeda, as many seem to forget). But I supect they are really not trying that hard to capture or take out ULB. Because, once they do, the left would declare the war over

I am a conservative, a former business manager in the private sector. This kind of infighting drives me nuts! When I was a manager and this happened, I called a meeting with all my business heads and told them in no uncertain terms that this bs must stop. "If you don't work together on a solution and have it on my desk by next week, I'll find someone who can!" Now who in the administration has that kind of clout? Hmmm, that would be Bush. Wasn't he a businessman and MBA? Why isn't he kicking butt and taking names? As Dan Quayle said, "a fish rots from its head". I love the title of Bernie Goldberg's book, "Crazies to the left of me, whimps to the right".

bigbaby: " Hmmm, that would be Bush. Wasn't he a businessman and MBA? Why isn't he kicking butt and taking names? " This post is offensive to businessmen. How many other idiots do you know that have failed on an oil venture? Not many. Bush was a failure at running businesses, and has been a failure at President.

This is all orchestrated, they have never wanted Bin Laden he was instrumental in 9/11 and helped this administrations cause. Now the passing of FISA also confirms it, steal your liberties in the cowardly name of fear.

Just shoot first answer questions later!

Nobody1234... Sorry, did not mean to offend businessmen, businesswomen, or even MBA's. I should have added baseball team owners as he was the one who, while owning a part of the Rangers let Sammy Sosa go. We in Dallas are STILL scratching our heads on that one. Just read that he said goodbye at the G8 conference in Japan with "Bye from the world's biggest polluter" which caused shock to all. He was trying to make a joke which flopped. Geez!

Timidity in Washington's war councils is nothing new. Rewind back to the days of the Korean War (1950-53). MacArthur and his able successors were prevented by Washington's timidity from exploiting Allied successes in the field. Time and time again, the enemy was on the run (Inchon Landing in Fall of '50, winter offensive in early '51, enemy's massive retreat following her failed April '51 offensive, more in ensuing years). Recommendations to bring the war more aggressively into enemy-held territory along the border with China were repeatedly denied. Although some were actually approved by the JCS, somewhere between the offices of the Secreary of Defense, Gen. George C. Marshall (the well-meaning general-turned-diplomat who lost China by recommending in 1946 an end to all support of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek's forces on the verge of winning the war against Mao's emaciated armies. General Marshall's mission was to achieve a U.S. State Dept-mandated "ceasefire"), the Secretary of State Dean G. Acheson, and President Truman, the recommendations were quietly pigeonholed. We took the course leading to the stalemate of positional warfare, by all odds the most costly and least productive method of waging war. Note that during this critical period in the Cold War, the U.S. was the only superpower left standing - the proverbial sheriff in town - with an atomic arsenal and a delivery system capable of reaching and vaporizing every major city and military center in the vast Soviet Union. While the U.S. mainland was untouched, USSR and China were still reeling from the devastation of WW 2 and were therefore in no position to get into another nasty fight, let alone with the world's sole superpower. Truman apologists would later claim that he was only trying to prevent WW3 with a Soviet entry. But Stalin had no atomic arsenal nor a delivery system at the time that could reach mainland America. Although USSR could theoretically drop a bomb over Tokyo (Stalin had an estimated arsenal of 5 in 1950-51 vs. hundreds in America's), she would face complete annihilation of all her cities by a massive U.S. nuclear retaliation. Not a fair trade-off, Uncle Joe could tell right away. He probably would not like to see the day when one of Curtis LeMay's dreaded B-29s, armed with a nuclear bomb, would be seen heading toward his private dacha. Chances are Stalin would not commit hara-kiri this early over little North Korea nor upstart Red China.

The US military failed the country on 9/11. They have failed the country since 9/11 by not being able to find Bin Laden despite bankrupting the country and mismanaging a trillion dollars of tax payers money. Seven years of intelligence failures to find one person. Here is a clue: maybe Bin Laden lives somewhere near Langley, VA. Also, Bush never pumped a barrel of oil. He made his money through securities and banking frauds. Do your research, please.

Yes, by all means, let's go in guns blazing into Pakistan and destabilize what's left of that government. That way we'll have to deal with our twin disasters of Iraq and Afghanistan, an Iranian nation rapidly developing nuclear weapons, and of course, a few nuclear weapons that go missing in the country that we just pushed over the edge. Had we finished bin Laden in Afghanistan, then we wouldn't be having this crazy conversation with a bunch of loons that seem to think that the United States operates in a vacuum without consequence or care. Perhaps if Mr. Gertz and the commenters on this piece spent some time speaking to the guys who's job it is to look out for our men and women in uniform (i.e. the guys that have fought in previous wars), they might have received a different answer than, "let's go in there and kill the lot of them." SOF guys are paid to be killers, they are not paid to think through the consequences of what they do. As to the rest of you, since you don't routinely risk your lives for this country's well-being, use your brains for a moment and think about Pakistan being run by ISI radicals. If that doesn't convince you to proceed with caution then I pray that you'll never have the chance to make a nation security decision.

Those who really care most about the lives of men and women serving under them are those who want to prosecute the war quickly and decisively so that you minimize casualties on both sides and then send them home, not a prolonged, politically correct one only to achieve a so-called "stability" (p.c. code for: don't get in war to win it and ruffle feathers. Well, you may die doing it but at least you've achieved something called "stability.") Had we followed this course in WW2 in favor of "stability," commentaries such as those from some geniuses in this forum would all be in German (with an optional Pacific edition in Japanese).

It was the turf warriors who were so introspective and internally focused that they missed the signal about 9/11. Now comes the turf-minded bureaucrats in the Pentagon and CIA that will afford the next Al Qaeda attack. SoD Gates was an idiot to remission the SOF. This is the first I've hear that Armitage is an adviser for McCain. Talk about your gabby glory hounds, Armitage comes front and center.

Frankly I don't see much distance between the Clinton Administration and the current Bush Administration when it comes to the timidity of confronting our avowed enemies. The Clinton Administration vastly reduced the size of Human Intelligence whilst the frequency and severity of terrorist attacks committed against Americans soared. Western Pakistan has been an increasingly festering haven for terrorists since 2001 and today rivals pre-9/11 Afghanistan.