But in any case I don’t think that was what the argument was. It was not about the protesters’ effect on American soldiers, it was about the effect, or lack therof, on the enemy.

Um, yes, exactly.

American soldiers ABSOLUTELY have enlistment duration obligations. American soldiers can’t quit at will. Why would you think I was referring to American soldiers?

I was referring to the BOOST in (or at the very minimum support to) morale the protestors provided to the enemy.

We can only disagree if you are willing to contend that war protesters have a material effect on morale and if you contend that this directly led to American deaths.

I contend that the protestors had, at the very minimum, a marginal effect on the morale of the enemy and that such effect contributed, at least minimally, to American deaths.

However, it’s possible that the action of the protestors provided impetus for the surge, and that such effect may have saved American lives.

While I’m not sure how that nets out, this would be a much stronger argument for you.

For example: Scenario 1: I make fun of your ugly girlfriend in a bar. You hit me. I would say you are directly involved. Scenario 2: I make fun of your ugly girlfriend in a bar. The bouncer takes exception to my use of the word “fugly whore” and kicks me out to the curb. I would not say that you, or your girlfriend, were directly involved in that altercation, though you (or she) were the motivation behind it.

Fail. Terrible analogy.

However, if I decided to take an aggressive posture towards you in defense of my ugly girlfriend, and as a result, get hit by a self-appointed bouncer, then I’m left with two choices in order to avoid being hit again while defending my ugly girlfriend. 1) Remove my girlfriend from the bar. 2) Remove you from the bar.

Either such action would then no longer require me to maintain the aggressive posture which caused the self-appointed bouncer to hit me. Most importantly, I would be correct to state that you were directly involved in the hit I suffered. In fact, I have trouble understand how you could deny this.

First, give me the decency of admitting that Iraq war protestors weren’t hypothetical and that their influence on democrat (and republican) politicians wasn’t hypothetical.

All right. I deserve that. May have gotten a bit overzealous.

Then, I’ll just assume that you won’t argue that morale is an extremely important contribution to the effectiveness of a fighting force – especially a volunteer force with no obligation with respect to enlistment duration.

I agree that morale is important. I also hope that our soldiers are not so dainty as to get all worked up to the point of ineffectiveness about actual debate and disagreement about the utility or morality of the war. I would think that maybe some sort of ingrained self preservation instinct would kick in. But in any case I don’t think that was what the argument was. It was not about the protesters’ effect on American soldiers, it was about the effect, or lack therof, on the enemy.

We can disagree about whether this morale contributed to the death of Americans.

We can only disagree if you are willing to contend that war protesters have a material effect on morale and if you contend that this directly led to American deaths. Please clarify.

How am I confusing the two?

For example: Scenario 1: I make fun of your ugly girlfriend in a bar. You hit me. I would say you are directly involved. Scenario 2: I make fun of your ugly girlfriend in a bar. The bouncer takes exception to my use of the word “fugly whore” and kicks me out to the curb. I would not say that you, or your girlfriend, were directly involved in that altercation, though you (or she) were the motivation behind it.

Duh! Ya think?

Did you bother to read beyond that paragraph? Their caveats and exceptions to their research were so wide open as to render that study absolutely useless.

their results show that insurgent groups are not devoid of reason and unresponsive to outside pressures and stimuli. “It shows that the various insurgent groups do respond to incentives and shows that a successful counter insurgency strategy should take that reality into account,” says one of the paper’s coauthors, Jonathan Monten, a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

Duh! Ya think?

On August 31st, 2009 at 9:43 pm, T-Bone said:

http://www.usnews.com/articles/news/iraq/2008/03/12/are-iraqi-insurgents-emboldened-by-antiwar-reporting.html

Here is the first line of this US News and World Report article.

“Are insurgents in Iraq emboldened by voices in the news media expressing dissent or calling for troop withdrawals from Iraq? The short answer, according to a pair of Harvard economists, is yes.”

And by the way, this is just plain common sense that if your enemy is divided, you have an opportunity to take advantage of their division. Come on. Your argument to the contrary is pure speculation and conjecture. And if 1 American soldier died because some terrorist was “emboldened”, I rest my case. Now stop it.

On September 1st, 2009 at 11:27 am, chapoutier said:

But until you have something other than maybes and perhapses and possiblys, I am done.

You mean like this:

I am saying is that there is a hell of a lot more direct causation between a change in military tactics having an influence on the enemy

I’m sure you’re going to provide this empirical evidence. Just kidding.

… a hypothetical person who hypothetically may protest our involvement in the war, which protest might hypothetically influence a politician’s decision on the war that might hypothetically be known by an insurgent that might hypothetically influence their decision as to whether or not to engage US troops that might hypothetically lead to a soldier being killed by the insurgent.

First, give me the decency of admitting that Iraq war protestors weren’t hypothetical and that their influence on democrat (and republican) politicians wasn’t hypothetical.

Then, I’ll just assume that you won’t argue that morale is an extremely important contribution to the effectiveness of a fighting force – especially a volunteer force with no obligation with respect to enlistment duration.

We can disagree about whether this morale contributed to the death of Americans.

You are free to agree with sonofdy frontierguy and call me a soldier killer.

I would never call you a soldier killer. However, war hawks have also certainly been responsible for troop deaths. It doesn’t make sense to analyze the negative effects of war hawks and ignore the negative effects of war resistors. BTW, try to remember that I was against the Iraq invasion for a multitude of reasons so don’t think that I disagreed with all criticisms of the war. I believe that criticism led to the surge (which wasn’t necessarily the result many of the critics wanted). But sorry, I don’t empirical evidence of that.

You are confusing motivation for an action with the action itself.

How am I confusing the two? If your car gets stolen by crack addicts that live next to you, then you can either stop parking cars in your driveway or eject the addicts to prevent further theft.

Think of the cars as the Iraq containment. Removing your cars from your driveway is like ending the containment.

Bush chose to do both. The Afgan war was ejecting the crack addicts. The Iraq war was moving the cars.

Some people (eg zyzzyg) are still obsessed with catching the actual addicts which stole our car while others don’t think it should be the primary concern for keeping us safe.

And you knew that this CHANGE was inevitable? Is it possible that a withdrawal could have occurred instead of a surge? Is it possible that the fighters in Iraq were hoping for a withdrawal? It is possible that the fighters in Iraq were watching the ground swell efforts (the MSM certainly made it easy enough to watch) hoping that it would influence the policy?

No. All I am saying is that there is a hell of a lot more direct causation between a change in military tactics having an influence on the enemy than a hypothetical person who hypothetically may protest our involvement in the war, which protest might hypothetically influence a politician’s decision on the war that might hypothetically be known by an insurgent that might hypothetically influence their decision as to whether or not to engage US troops that might hypothetically lead to a soldier being killed by the insurgent.

Enough of this nonsense. You are free to agree with sonofdy frontierguy and call me a soldier killer. But until you have something other than maybes and perhapses and possiblys, I am done.

The containment of Iraq was an ongoing, continuous problem – not some one-time dynamic such as freeing the slaves. Try again, chap.

Please. Ongoing or “one time dynamic” has nothing to do with it. Your definition of “direct involvement” is absurd. You are confusing motivation for an action with the action itself. That or being purposely obtuse about what people generally mean when they say “directly involved.”

On September 1st, 2009 at 9:25 am, chapoutier said:

He said directly involved. Al Quaeda may have been pissed about the US containment of Iraq, but to state that this means Saddam was directly involved in 9/11 is to say that Lincoln was directly involved in the 1963 Birmingham church bombings by the KKK.

No, it’s not “to say.”

The containment of Iraq was an ongoing, continuous problem – not some one-time dynamic such as freeing the slaves. Try again, chap.

On September 1st, 2009 at 9:15 am, chapoutier said:

I am surprised by you, corkie. I guess, just like we didn’t kowtow to protesters in Nam… until we did, you are all about the empirical proof… until you aren’t.

I’m not “all about empirical proof” for everything. Only a fool would be.

I believe there was also a change in tactics, i.e., clearing and holding territory in the major cities. Also, see below.

I never gave the surge full credit for anything. Forget about what “also” helped. Do you think the surge had any demoralizing effect on those fighting against the US in Iraq?

Perhaps.

Great there’s my answer.

But you know what the surge was? A CHANGE IN ACTUAL STRATEGY.

And you knew that this CHANGE was inevitable? Is it possible that a withdrawal could have occurred instead of a surge? Is it possible that the fighters in Iraq were hoping for a withdrawal? It is possible that the fighters in Iraq were watching the ground swell efforts (the MSM certainly made it easy enough to watch) hoping that it would influence the policy?

You seem to give them a lot of credit and high level of sophistication and knowledge about the inner workings of our governmental system.

Right. Sophistication and knowledge. Well maybe their intelligence apparatus had access to this sophisticated training material.

Tell us then super trooper, tell us how supportive you are of the troops, but then tell us how you do not support the mission.

First off, it is not about supporting or not supporting the mission. Just because one thinks it is a stupid plan of attack does not mean one hope it fails. My football team is the Buffalo Bills. I love the team. I think the coach is an idiot for thinking they can run a no-huddle offense. Do I want them to go three and out every possession? No. Nor does it mean I hate Trent Edwards.

The fact that you cannot or do not allow yourself to understand that says a lot more about your intellectual failings than it does about me.

…I have to go to work now, enough wasting time, I don’t get to make a 2 min phone call and bill someone for the entire hour, spending 58 mins blogging.

Then maybe you picked the wrong line of work. Don’t let your jealousy show too much.

Have fun on your long march toward irrelevance.

Great. Let’s stick with this.

Do you also admit that protestor movements can influence politicians?

Perhaps. Did they actually? I would like something out of anyone else here other than freaking speculation or hypothetical.

You honestly don’t know sh** about me or my relationship with troops.

Tell us then super trooper, tell us how supportive you are of the troops, but then tell us how you do not support the mission. How many of the “troops” agree with you on that one? You have no idea what it is like to be a warrior. By how angry you are now, that is apparent. If you are not for the war, that is fine, but people like you support orgs that get people killed, ie. Newsweek (they got so ginned up on making Bush look bad they got people killed), people like you who convince yourself that being “dangerous” through your words and actions is chic and cool gets people killed. You just don’t like being called out, the truth makes people really edgy and angry…I have to go to work now, enough wasting time, I don’t get to make a 2 min phone call and bill someone for the entire hour, spending 58 mins blogging.