Since I'm feeling political...

[c| Hathcock]

In a perfect world that would work Spetz, but if we would have done that 70 years ago we would all be speaking German right now.

[iblisajinn]

x1| Sixhits wrote...

"I really liked Colin Powel. The man had one, wonderful expression of policy: the Powell doctrine.

<doctrine points snipped>

---
The tests that you listed for the Powell Doctrine are tests of the Weinberger Doctrine, proposed by the then-Secretary of Defense in the 1984.   Weinberger wrote in the shadow of Vietnam, in the later stages of the Cold War when the world was still bi-polar.  He also writes a year after a confusing mission to Beirut ended with the death of 220 Marines, five years after the Iran hostage crisis, and in the midst of the Iran-Iraq war, all of which ended with questionable results.

The Powell doctrine, written after the 1991 Gulf War, covers some of the same ground but changes a few key points.  From an essay by Mr. Powell in Foreign Affairs (Winter 92-93):

"When a 'fire' starts that might require committing armed forces, we need to reevaluate the circumstances. Relevant questions include: Is the political objective we seek to achieve important, clearly defined and understood? Have all other non-violent policy means failed? Will military force achieve the objective? At what cost?? Have the gains and risks been analyzed? How might the situation that we seek to alter, once it is altered by force, develop further and what might be the consequences?"

Note the change from "vital interests" to "important objectives".  Powell also added the idea that, once these tests had been met, we would use "decisive" force to gain a rapid victory.

The Powell doctrine, to some degree, was superceded by the doctrines of Anthony Lake (Clinton's first NS Advisor) and William Perry (Clinton's 2nd SecDef).  These doctrines broadened the reach of the military for vital interest and humanitarian operations, to places where "important but not vital interests are threatened" (Perry); and to counter aggression, defend key economic interests, preserve/promote/defend democracy, prevent WMD proliferation, terrorism, and drug trafficking; and maintain partnerships (Lake).

While the Powell/Weinberger Doctrines were good outlines, I tend to think they were more appropriate to the bipolarity of the US/Soviet conflict and not as adaptable to the more fluid (and dangerous) world of the post-Soviet era.  To a large degree, the Lake Doctrine has been the defining doctrine of the past decade, including the later Clinton presidency and the current Bush presidency.  This doctrine covers both the Kosovo operations (gross abuse of human rights), the Afghan operation (terrorism, human rights, countering aggression, international crime), and the Iraq war (again, human rights, economic interest, arguably WMD, terrorism, and so forth.)

Sorry to go on for so long, gang, I'm an historian by trade.  More or less, anyway.

[c| Spetsnaz.]

Figures, http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/01/10/oneill.bush/index.html

[BTs_GhostSniper]

Never believe anything from anyone who has a reason to make the person he is talking about look bad.  Kinda like automatically believing the trash that one candidate throws at another candidate during an election.....half of the crap is make-believe and the other half is twisted into something totally different than the truth.

[iblisajinn]

To drop a question in your midst:

Many people make direct and indirect references to a so-called "Military-Industrial complex," with the suggestion that it is a negative bordering on the evil or sinister.

Excluding the original Eisenhower reference, would someone take a few moments to explain what exactly it is and why people believe it to be as bad as they do?

Thanks.

[c| Spetsnaz.]

The military-industrial complex is generally defined as a "coalition consisting of the military and industrialists who profit by manufacturing arms and selling them to the government."

Each major element of the Bush regime's national security strategy from the doctrines of preemptive strikes and "regime change" in Iraq, to its aggressive nuclear posture and commitment to deploying a Star Wars-style missile defense system was developed and refined before the Bush regime took office, at corporate-backed conservative think tanks like the Center for Security Policy, the National Institute for Public Policy and the Project for a New American Century.

Unilateralist ideologues formerly affiliated with these think tanks, along with the 32 major administration appointees who are former executives with, consultants for, or significant shareholders of top Defense contractors, are driving U.S. foreign and military policy.

The arms lobby is exerting more influence over policymaking than at any time since President Dwight D. Eisenhower first warned of the dangers of the military-industrial complex over 40 years ago.

It is not just industry-backed think tanks that have infiltrated the administration. Former executives, consultants or shareholders of top U.S. defense companies pervade the Bush national security team.

Exploiting the fears following 9/11, and impervious to budgetary constraints imposed on virtually every other form of federal spending, the ideologue-industry nexus is driving the United States to war in Iraq and a permanently aggressive war-fighting posture that will simultaneously starve other government programs and make the world a much more dangerous place.

The overarching concern of the ideologues and the arms industry is to increase military spending. On this score, they have been tremendously successful. In its two years in office, the Bush regime has sought more than $150 billion in new military spending, the vast majority of which has been approved by Congress with few questions asked. Spending on national defense is nearing $400 billion for fiscal year 2003, up from $329 billion when Bush took office.

Gordon R. England, former president of Lockheed Martin and former Secretary of the Navy, is now Deputy Director of Homeland Security.

[BFG]

Dosn't this all come down to one simple thing? : that george bush and his adminastraton are about as bent as as slalom course.

I must say i was stunned to hear that Bush's new tatic for trying to keep americans from looking at the state of the enomony etc is to spend billians and billions (which would be much better spent on narrowing the ever growing poverty gap etc) on stupid missions to build a pointless base on the moon to burn money and see if he can help fuck up and pollute another Planet.

Think of the more usefull things that this money could be spent on - not to mention the debt that the US is in... Bush simply sucks ass. Why why why put a retarded ape as your president?

[c| Hathcock]

Gordon R England is still the Secretary of the Navy.  He was only in the Department of Homeland Security for a short time and then returned as the SecNav after his replacement died.

As for defense spending.  Something had to be done after Clinton slashed it.  There is a mandatory raise of .5% over the civilian average so that the servicemen that risk their lives at work can earn some decent money.  And our defense spending is actually a fewer percentage of our total budget than it was 20 years ago.  

Would it have been better to do nothing after 3,000 people were murdered?  I guess we should have just let it go to "save a little money"

And I think most American's know the state of the economy.  It is improving and thats probably why Bush will get re-elected.  The Democrats lost their biggest argument unless something drastic changes.  

[c| Spetsnaz.]

Well that makes me feel better, that the former president of the largest weapons contractor in the world was restored to his position as Secretary of the Navy, im sure he was in no position to abuse his powers for personal gain (sarcasm).

As for Clinton slashing defense spending, that is simply inaccurate. A result of a rash of military-industry mergers encouraged and subsidized by the Clinton administration, created, the Big Three weapons makers Lockheed Martin Corporation, Boeing Corporation, and Raytheon Corporation which now receive among themselves over $30 billion per year in Pentagon contracts. This represents more than one out of every four dollars that the Defense Department doles out for everything from rifles to rockets.

 In 1999, the Clinton Administration five-year budget plan for the Pentagon called for a 50% increase in weapons procurement, which would be an increase from $44 billion per year to over $63 billion per year by 2003. Additionally, the arms industry launched "a concerted lobbying campaign aimed at increasing military spending and arms exports. These initiatives are driven by profit and pork barrel politics, not by an objective assessment of how best to defend the United States in the post-cold war period.

No one likes to see 3,000 people murdered, agreed, and we justly went in to Afghanistan to search out the Tailbane, in the process the U.S. my great country murdered more than all those that died in 9/11. This does not even take in to account the war in Iraq which has had a massive humanitarian cost.

There is no link between Iraq and 9/11. We were lied to by our president.

Mind you Bush did not win the popular vote in the previous election, and if the Dems select a candidate with balls (Gen. Clark) Bush will be packing his bags back to Texas, where he belongs.

[Cutter]

i seriously doubt a general that was forced into early retirement by the clinton regime will be elected president over bush. sorry.

[c| Hathcock]

I think Clark is just about the only Democrat that has a chance against Bush.  The people in this country need a true leader very badly.  We have not had one in a very long time.  Hopefully he is not quite as much of a politician as everybody else.

Why exactly did Clinton release a 5 year weapons plan when he only had 2 years left in office?  He must know that basically everything changes with a new President, unless he figured Gore would get elected.

I do agree with your views of pork barreled politics and who gets cash though.  The Air Force is getting it's F-22 which as of the last report I saw is overweight, underperforming, and overbudget.  Yet the Marine Corps is still using CH-46 Sea Knights  from Vietnam until we can get the Osprey into service which now is testing beautifully after it's early problems.  It might go into service in a couple of years if people don't keep trying to kill it.

[iblisajinn]

Spetsnaz wrote...

"Mind you Bush did not win the popular vote in the previous election,...:
---
Ah, that old chestnut.

For the record, President Bush is the fourth president to be elected without winning the popular vote.  (For those of you keeping score, that's 9.3%, 4 of 43.)

John Quincy Adams lost both the popular AND electoral vote but his principle opponent did not gain a majority.  He won elected by vote of Congress as outlined in the Constitution.

Rutherford Hayes lost the popular vote by a quarter-million (0.65% of a total population of 38 million) to Samuel Tilden but won the electoral vote by one over the required majority.

Grover Cleveland won the popular vote by 90,000 but received only 40% of the electoral votes (he ran the following term and won).

President Bush also won the electoral votes by 1 over the required 270, but lost the popular vote by roughly 540,000 votes, or about 0.178% of a population of 280 million.

People keep bringing up the "He lost the popular vote!" argument as if it were a novelty and something shockingly disasterous.  Get over it; it's nothing new.  President Bush and Mr. Gore are in good company - they were not the first, and almost as certainly will not be the last to have a split vote election barring major constitutional change.

[iblisajinn]

Hathcock -

I think the reason Clinton submitted a five-year budget proposal for Defense is because everybody does - the defense department goes to congress to set (and reset) budgets for the next five fiscal years.

With respect to major systems acquisitions - it's not always pork (although that frequently happens) - many decisions are political or economic realities.  An F/A-22 built in Seattle, Forth Worth, and a dozen other places is better for the economy in jobs and distributed labor than one company manufacturing assault boots in Kansas City.  F-22s are also high-visibility projects that have a high price tag - a V-22 (which God knows is necessary; a Phrog's older than I am by a lot) just isn't going to approach the $100 million price tag but the purchase order is roughly the same in number.  Beyond just the price tag, you want to keep skilled laborers and manufacturing processes from going idle - it's bad for your workforce.

The current and previous administrations have done some work to address this problem - shifting to smaller, less complex systems - in part realizing that the world is not likely to have a Fulda Gap style battle very often.

I have to disagree with your other point - I don't think Clark would do very well against Bush - he's on very shaky ground right now.

[c| Spetsnaz.]

Thank you for the history lesson, but that miniscule fact I reiterated had little bearing on my over all point. I am a firm believer in the simplistic democratic principle of majority rule.

We'll see this October.

[c| Hathcock]

Ys but Spetz, that means you are going to have to change the very constitution of the United States.  You're going to have to lobby a lot higher than this forum, but good luck to you.

[iblisajinn]

Laugh.

I am, for good or for ill, not a believer in majority rule, and would probably be best described as unrepentantly republican.

[Mr. Lothario]

     This line of argument brings to mind a pair of quotes from Heinlein. "Democracy is based on the assumption that a million men are wiser than one man. How's that again? I missed something." "Autocracy is based on the assumption that one man is wiser than a million men. Let's play that over again, too. Who decides?"

[c| Spetsnaz.]

Ys but Spetz, that means you are going to have to change the very constitution of the United States.  You're going to have to lobby a lot higher than this forum, but good luck to you.

If we are not willing to alter documents to keep up with the times of current, we may as well replace the Constitution with the Bible. The architects of the Constitution foresaw this dilemma and took the necessary measures to ensure its fluidity. I would hardly call posting on this forum lobbying, more or less it's the most simplistic way to practice freedom of speech within the microcosm of this community.



"If you will it, it is no dream." -Theodore Herzl

[iblisajinn]

Spetsnaz wrote:
"If we are not willing to alter documents to keep up with the times of current, we may as well replace the Constitution with the Bible. The architects of the Constitution foresaw this dilemma and took the necessary measures to ensure its fluidity."

---

While the authors of the Constitution included measures for changing it, they also created a framework that was deliberately not a democracy due to their concerns over what has been referred to as the "tyranny of the majority."  (See Federalist Papers #10 and #51 if you're really bored).  There is a critical difference between making amendments to the Constitution and replacing one of the foundations of the American system of government.

[c| Spetsnaz.]

Federalist No. 10 authored by James Madison on November 23, 1787, and Federalist No. 50 authored by Alexander Hamilton or James Madison on February 5, 1788 are well suited to suffice for the given time period. How well they are suited to fit the year 2004 is beyond my realm of knowledge, but I suspect it would have been impossible for them to take in account such vast and sophisticated human achievement. A "tyranny of the majority" in my humble opinion is more democratic than a "tyranny of the few and privileged".