Do you support sending large U.S. ground forces to retake territory ruled by ISIS in Syria/Iraq?

[Hutch Starskey]

Here's the thing with America sending in ground forces. We would need to send and maintain a few hundred thousand troops to the region indefinately.

Let's say we run Daesh out of Iraq and into Syria. We need to then hold that ground in Iraq lest they return.

Now we need to decide if we are going into Syria. If we do, what is our goal? The destruction of Daesh and then what? Do we immediately pull out or hold the territory lest they return? If we hold the territory what then is our policy regarding Assad? What if he objects? With Russia now involved in the region and backing Assad ,how is that a tenable strategy?

The whole region is a total cluster fuck. Any action we take does nothing to mitigate the underlying causes of continued radicalization. It only makes it worse.

I believe Daesh is mostly contained within the region. What we need is a coalition that is diligent in removing any and all paths to resources. Stop their money, access to communications, weapons, stop westerners and others from joining wherever we can.
Rally military support from regional partners.
Before leaving Iraq, we had nearly a million troops trained. Some 900 k. We need to find a way to inspire some sort of nationalistic pride in Iraq to inspire them to fight to be free of this crap.

I believe that ultimately this is a problem that will have to be solved by Muslims. Sending more US troops or having a decades long presence will only result in thousands of more casualties with little or no result in ending terror.

 

[Mac1958]

Maybe we could wait and see how well our friends over there do before we start ordering more body bags. Proximity breeds action, and those folks are a lot closer to the danger..

Its been 18 months and these are the results. How much longer do you want to wait? Are you waiting for an attack that kills 10,000 people in a U.S. city? Do you prefer that happened before doing something more?

Exactly who do we attack, and where? There are terrorist agents all over Europe and probably here. We could completely lay waste to ISIS-held territory one day and be attacked the next.

Putin is not going to be bound by rules of engagement, either. I'd like to see what he does when he's pissed and threatened, and that could be happening now.
.

 

[bravoactual]

ISIS has already been rolled back by 25% of their maximum land holdings. If NATO or the UN decides to put together a force,

we should honor our treaty obligations, but no more.

Would you still feel that way if 6 months from now ISIS successfully attacks the Washington ds of U.S. lives because you want some procedural process. Is that how you would go about defending your home or one of your family members if you were attacked personally?

What if a fucking bear was to fucking come?

Jeez, why don't gen up the fear factor?

 

[bendog]

Obama's killed over a thousand innocents as collateral damage in the drone war, expended around 2000 dead US soldiers and committed us to decades in Afghan.

Gen Odierno repeatedly says defeating Isis is not that huge an effort, but there's no civilian govt to fill in, so we're essentially looking at another several decades occupying Iraq, which the US public has no appetite for, or doing W all over again, and this time hoping against hope the Shia Iraqis are up to the task .... or MORE likely having Hezbollah take over N. Iraq and half of Syria, with the rest controlled by their pal Assad.

If Hollande or anyone else has a better solution, do tell.

Iraq was largely under control and at a low ebb in violence when the U.S. left in 2011 which was a mistake. ISIS occurred after the United States left. Afghanistan continues to function and maintains control of all 34 provincial capitals, the U.S. role is limited with 10,000 troops. Ironically right now, Afghanistan is more successful then Iraq which has two of its 18 provincial capitals under control of ISIS.

There is more the United States can do. ISIS will not go away on its own. I wonder how many minds will change here if tomorrow or next week there is large scale terror attack in the United States.

The reason ISIS controls the territory is the Iraqi army W so successfully built ran away from a couple hundred haphazardly armed terrorists. give the W success myth/bs a rest.

 

[KissMy]

Maybe we could wait and see how well our friends over there do before we start ordering more body bags.

Proximity breeds action, and those folks are a lot closer to the danger.
.

Its been 18 months and these are the results. How much longer do you want to wait? Are you waiting for an attack that kills 10,000 people in a U.S. city? Do you prefer that happened before doing something more?

Obama defends the US & kills terrorist. He is not Bush who let 9/11 happen so we could wage war & let terrorist escape & create more to keep the war going.

 

[U2Edge]

Nah, not under Obama... he'd send them over there with nothing but rainbow flags and peashooters.

How many American civilians would you be willing to watch die from ISIS attacks while we wait 14 more months to get a new President?

More Americans would die fighting the war you want -- and it still doesn't protect folks here.

Sorry, but its the other way around. Naturally that is what ISIS hopes you believe. We have a chance to destroy much of their organization, but you'd prefer to wait until thousands of Americans are killed here in the United States before doing anything.

The ISIS caliphate is a large territory the size of Indiana that is launching attacks around the world and killing their citizens. When Germany and Japan did this in World War II, we went to war with them. Perhaps you are Amish or a some sort of pacifist and would prefer to wait to be slaughtered. Sorry, but I disagree, when another nation/state or area that acts like a nation/state attacks us, we go to war defend ourselves. Failing to do so only allows the terrorist to recruit more people, take more territory, pump more oil, make more money, finance more attacks and kill more people.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Do you support sending large U.S. ground forces to retake territory ruled by ISIS in Syria/Iraq?

why risk troops when we can just bomb them?

 

[Faun]

No. We don't need to spend another 9 years and thousands of American lives in that shit hole. They've been fighting for over 1000 years; we do not need to be part of that war which is not even ours and which continue will for another 1000 years;

And so, your response to ISIS and its international terrorism...?

Beef up security here and bomb the shit out of them if they pull off a terrorist attack here.

Bombing is only fully effective when they are combined with ground troops. Half of US sorties come back with their bombs because they can't find any targets. U.S. ground troops would massively enhance U.S. airpower.

We're done fighting in that war. It's a civil war that we should not be in the middle of.

 

[Hutch Starskey]

I say we either beat them or leave it be. One or the other.

Don't forget to vote in the poll!

Whether by accident or design, the poll question is faulty. What, exactly, does "large" mean and in relation to what military strategy? Almost no one advocates a permanent occupation by US ground forces, although a UN peace keeping force in some areas might be warranted.

However, I do believe that a US base should have been established in Iraq as a stabilizing presence and counterweight to Iranian threats to its neighbors.

I said large ground forces, in the sense of those sufficient to retake the territory from ISIS and hand it back to the legitimate government authorities in Iraq and Syria. This is about resetting the battlefield so the locals can handle it themselves, this is not about a permanent occupation.

We already did that!!!!

 

[U2Edge]

This is stupid. If anyone could identify who would offer to secure the borders of the territory with ISIS killed or run to ground, Obama would have had the 101st and a mechanized division in there months ago. But he's not going into a war without an exit strategy.

Iraq had largely secure borders when the U.S. left at the end of 2011. The U.S. would leave or reduce its forces when the legitmate Iraqi forces or Syrian forces take over. That's what has happened in Afghanistan and why there only needs to be small force there. The mistake was when Obama completely abandoned Iraq after 2011 and it was not ready to stand on its own. The training wheels were taken off too early. The premature withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq helped to create the conditions that allowed them to take 1/3 of Iraq in 2014.

There must be a ground component that takes back this territory from ISIS and the best ground component in the world is the U.S. military. They can do it in weeks. The local forces will take years to do it. Years during which the rest of the world will be at risk for large numbers of massive terror attacks while the ISIS caliphate is still in existence.

 

[U2Edge]

I say we either beat them or leave it be. One or the other.

Don't forget to vote in the poll!

Whether by accident or design, the poll question is faulty. What, exactly, does "large" mean and in relation to what military strategy? Almost no one advocates a permanent occupation by US ground forces, although a UN peace keeping force in some areas might be warranted.

However, I do believe that a US base should have been established in Iraq as a stabilizing presence and counterweight to Iranian threats to its neighbors.

I said large ground forces, in the sense of those sufficient to retake the territory from ISIS and hand it back to the legitimate government authorities in Iraq and Syria. This is about resetting the battlefield so the locals can handle it themselves, this is not about a permanent occupation.

We already did that!!!!

No we did not. Obama abandoned that mission completely in 2011. That abandonment weakened Iraq and the Iraqi military making it easy pickens for the ISIS invasion in 2014. This time we would stay and not take the training wheels off until the Iraqi military and security forces were ready to handle things on their own.

That is precisely why OBAMA is EXTENDED the US presence in Afghanistan rather than withdrawing completely!

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Bombing is only fully effective when they are combined with ground troops..

Actually Japan surrendered rather quickly when we bombed them

 

[Faun]

Nah, not under Obama... he'd send them over there with nothing but rainbow flags and peashooters.

How many American civilians would you be willing to watch die from ISIS attacks while we wait 14 more months to get a new President?

More Americans would die fighting the war you want -- and it still doesn't protect folks here.

Sorry, but its the other way around. Naturally that is what ISIS hopes you believe. We have a chance to destroy much of their organization, but you'd prefer to wait until thousands of Americans are killed here in the United States before doing anything.

The ISIS caliphate is a large territory the size of Indiana that is launching attacks around the world and killing their citizens. When Germany and Japan did this in World War II, we went to war with them. Perhaps you are Amish or a some sort of pacifist and would prefer to wait to be slaughtered. Sorry, but I disagree, when another nation/state or area that acts like a nation/state attacks us, we go to war defend ourselves. Failing to do so only allows the terrorist to recruit more people, take more territory, pump more oil, make more money, finance more attacks and kill more people.

No, it's not the other way around. In the worst attack in U.S. history, we lost 3000 lives. We lost more than that in Iraq & Afghanistan..

We didn't go to war with Germany and Japan until they attacked us.

This isn't about pacifism. It's about not falling for the terrorists' bait again.

And you have it completely backwards. ISIS doesn't give a shit if we think more Americans will die fighting them. What they are looking for is a war. More than anything else, a war is what delivers them recruits. Just like it did when we first invaded Iraq. That's why they're doing these attacks beyond the Levant. They're trying to goad other countries into their war. Republicans & Conservatives are actually dumb enough to fall for it.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Bombing is only fully effective when they are combined with ground troops..

Actually Japan surrendered rather quickly when we bombed them

Indeed. Nuclear weapons have that effect.
Good to see you support using them on ISIS.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

We're done fighting in that war. It's a civil war that we should not be in the middle of.

too bad ISIS will not agree to let us stay out of their Civil War

 

[U2Edge]

No. We don't need to spend another 9 years and thousands of American lives in that shit hole. They've been fighting for over 1000 years; we do not need to be part of that war which is not even ours and which continue will for another 1000 years;

And so, your response to ISIS and its international terrorism...?

Beef up security here and bomb the shit out of them if they pull off a terrorist attack here.

Bombing is only fully effective when they are combined with ground troops. Half of US sorties come back with their bombs because they can't find any targets. U.S. ground troops would massively enhance U.S. airpower.

We're done fighting in that war. It's a civil war that we should not be in the middle of.

The United States is involved in the war and will continue to be especially since the U.S. homeland could be hit at any time killing thousands of people. This is not a civil war, this is a global war against terrorism being launched worldwide by ISIS. We stuck are heads in the sand when the Taliban took Afghanistan in the 1990s. Then the trade towers came down in 2001. You appear to be willing to stick your head in the sand on this. Wonder if you'll still feel that way if in the next few months 10,000 U.S. civilians are killed in a terrorist attacked trained and paid for from territory currently controlled by ISIS in Iraq and Syria.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Bombing is only fully effective when they are combined with ground troops..

Actually Japan surrendered rather quickly when we bombed them

Indeed. Nuclear weapons have that effect.
Good to see you support using them on ISIS.

certainly we could eliminate Raqqa, the heart of the Caliphate, without nukes.

 

[M14 Shooter]

[
And you have it completely backwards. ISIS doesn't give a shit if we think more Americans will die fighting them. What they are looking for is a war. More than anything else, a war is what delivers them recruits

ISIS does not want to go to war with the US.
ISIS recognizes that, should they go to war, the US will wipe them of the map and disperse the survivors to the wind.
ISIS has only tried to do what it has done because it correctly perceives the leadership of the US to be weak.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Bombing is only fully effective when they are combined with ground troops..

Actually Japan surrendered rather quickly when we bombed them

Indeed. Nuclear weapons have that effect.
Good to see you support using them on ISIS.

certainly we could eliminate Raqqa, the heart of the Caliphate, without nukes.

Wait.... does your nuke example apply, or not?

 

[Hutch Starskey]

Nah, not under Obama... he'd send them over there with nothing but rainbow flags and peashooters.

How many American civilians would you be willing to watch die from ISIS attacks while we wait 14 more months to get a new President?

Does it make sense to kill a few thousand and wound thousands more American soldiers to stop an attack here that may or may not happen and if it did it certainly wouldn't have as many casualties?

Your plan just turns up the hatred of America. Been there done that.