StrangeSox

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 01:17 PM) Nobody, from the start, argued that these weren't disgraceful actions. As a matter of fact, I outright said I didn't condone such actions, and they are clearly out of bounds for any military personnel. The argument I made was this incident was NOT going to create any new terrorists. That's all. This is a slight-of-hand. Balta explained his point in detail here and clearly tied it to local support. If this is the case, then you're arguing against a position that no one is really advocating, that this will create new terrorists. This is still ignoring local perceptions of foreign armies, availability of information and the effectiveness of propaganda. Any clear thinking individual in 1930's Germany should have seen right through the anti-Semitic propaganda, but it provided an easy scapegoat for their problems. More to the point, however, is that the importance of local support doesn't mean relying on a bunch of Afghan political junkies who will follow this story closely. They may only ever here of it from people sympathetic to the Taliban. Hell, look at the level of political and current-events ignorance in America, and that's in a country with huge amounts of freely available information.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 01:06 PM) That's not what I did...that's the problem. I NEVER said local support isn't important. As a matter of fact, nobody did. Let me rephrase that: the importance of local support in intelligence gathering. If you read these papers, you'll see that your rejection of how this sort of incident impacts local support and how that impacts intelligence gathering does not hold up. Afghanis are not static people whose opinions don't change. The US military does not rely on one or two key people in a village but needs support of the village as a whole to suppress insurgency. That is the importance of local support. If you accept that, then we're back to square one, where your claim is that this video has no impact on local support.

Here is another paper from a Major General who was in charge of intelligence operations in Afghanistan. Is he also wrong in claiming that local intelligence gathering is crucial? http://www.cnas.org/files/documents/public...e507_voices.pdf Reading through these two papers should give you a clearer understanding of exactly why many people in the military and intelligence community regard these disgraceful situations as so damaging.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:58 PM) I give up. I am wrong to conclude that your central claim is that this will have no impact on support for the US military by local Afghani civilians?

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:57 PM) So reading a single paper makes you the expert on all matters military? Great paper...too bad it's just one of a million of such papers. No, reading lots of things over the last decade makes me a little knowledgeable but certainly far from an expert. I provided the paper because of your childish "oh Colonel SS" remarks dismissing my claims of the important of local support. So, I provided something I'd read before provided by someone in the military. I've supported my position. If you have other reliable sources claiming that local support is inconsequential to counter-insurgency and intelligence gathering, please provide them. Until then, you have an unsupported assertion directly contradicted by current military doctrine.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:56 PM) us supporters will still support the us, taliban supporters will still support the taliban regardless of incident. That it will not lessen support for the US military. This is the argument you've made. .

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:47 PM) Oh so none. I'll admit my own direct experience is tangential, but there's some at least. But here's a paper detailing exactly how important local support is and exactly how wrong you are. Please read this paper before making any more claims about the importance or lack thereof of local support in counter-insurgency operations.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:53 PM) No, I didn't. You made it up. Ok, then you're back to "what members of the US military do" having zero impact on local opinion of the US military.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:49 PM) Again, we will NOT lose local support of this incident no matter how badly you seem to wish we will. If this was ordered by those in charge of these solders, it would damage the US military's reputation, but as it stands, this is CLEARLY soldiers breaking rules/laws. You're denying the effectiveness of propaganda.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:49 PM) Again, we will NOT lose local support of this incident no matter how badly you seem to wish we will. I don't hope that we lose support. I am applying what I see as common, basic human emotional reaction to situations to draw the conclusion that, hey, when members of the US military do s***ty things to Afghanis, other Afghanis probably won't like the US military as much.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:49 PM) Again, we will NOT lose local support of this incident no matter how badly you seem to wish we will. But up above you've indirectly admitted that you will lose some support, just that those people don't matter because they weren't really helping the US before. This idea is conclusively wrong.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:44 PM) No, that's not how it works. You made an argument you cannot prove right. Everything about your argument is hypothetical, and it jumps to the conclusion you want it to jump too, be it increased hate toward the US occupation, OR lessened support from the locals. It's not up to me to prove an argument that hasn't be proven right to be wrong. The people helping the US military in this operation won't suddenly stop helping them because of this incident, because these people will understand this incident wasn't condoned by the US military and it was just a fringe group of idiots that did something clearly out of bounds with the rules of being a US soldier. Just as it won't create added Taliban support, except from those that already planned on supporting them anyway. Please read the paper I just linked for a clear explanation of how insurgency and counter-insurgency works, how vital local support is and how wrong it is to assume that damaging the reputation of the US military and giving ready-made propaganda material to the enemy won't harm US operations.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:45 PM) If I told you...you would be dead. Oh so none. I'll admit my own direct experience is tangential, but there's some at least. But here's a paper detailing exactly how important local support is and exactly how wrong you are.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:38 PM) That's NOT how they collect local intelligence. You sure showed me! How sure of you about that? What's your background knowledge?

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:38 PM) I'm happy to see you've finally figured out how much you're stretching it. You need to explain why that's such a stretch. You're basically arguing against the entire concept of propaganda here.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:36 PM) No, it's not pretty much exactly wrong, General SS. You are beyond your scope of understanding now, and you've just shown it. Oh, ok. I guess local intelligence is completely unimportant for military operations in foreign countries. You sure showed me.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:35 PM) Now maybe you won't miss it. I know, that's what I was addressing--you're just restating your same position without actually addressing anything or explaining why it's such a STRETCH! GET ON BACK THERE! to assume that Afghanis will like the US military less when they see the US military pissing on dead Afghanis.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:33 PM) And it has nothing to do with who they'd gather information from. You don't just walk down the street General SS, and ask randoms for such information. Those that they have gathering this information for them aren't going to be swayed by such an incident...and it's beyond a stretch for you to suggest they would be. This is pretty much exactly wrong. Like, you can't get more wrong about local intelligence gathering in asymmetrical warfare.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:27 PM) And you've done even less to support yours. I've laid out a clear path of how this leads to lessened support, how that harms intelligence-gathering and how that increases risk and danger. It's a pretty straight-forward argument. You've asserted repeatedly that this will have no impact whatsoever because they're all just a bunch of crazy people anyway, external stimuli have no impact on their state of mind or opinions.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:31 PM) Too bad I already fixed my post to reflect that, and it's just as much of stretch. No, all you did was reassert your argument. You haven't really addressed anything yet.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:29 PM) Had no idea you knew such ins and outs of information gathering in the field, Colonel SS. "local people know s***" isn't an advanced concept.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:24 PM) You ARE arguing something really, really dumb like that. You just did it AGAIN. You are saying, it's fine that they blow up my countrymen into little bits of meat...but DAMN THEM TO HELLLLL FOR PISSING ON THEIR BLOWN TO BITS CORPSES!@#$!@#!#$@! BECAUSE OF THAT DAMN THE PAST, I'M JOINING THE TALIBAN!@#$@!@#$! That's the argument you continue to make. And it's really, really dumb. Nah, it's pretty clearly not the argument I'm making. It's the dumb strawman you and jenks keep throwing up. I've stated directly that my contention is that it will lessen support for the US military, not instantly create Taliban warriors. That is an argument of your own creation. I'd hate to be making the ridiculous-on-its-face argument that actions by foreign military personnel have zero impact on the level of local support they receive. Man, I'd sure look silly then.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 11:10 AM) Fixed. But he needs congressional authority to do it. Good luck with that. I guess he doesn't? The decision to bring SBA Administrator Karen Mills into the president's Cabinet does not need congressional approval. However, Obama's much broader proposal to merge overlapping agencies does -- the president appealed to Congress Friday to help make that happen. Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/01/13.../#ixzz1jMedHYwD

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:22 PM) LOL. "I've created a hypothetical to prove my point. You haven't. I WIN!" Come on man. No, you haven't done s*** to support your argument other than to assert it repeatedly. The claim that "video of offensive acts performed by US soldiers in Afghanistan will not have any noticeable impact on support of US soldiers in Afghanistan" is pretty extraordinary.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jan 13, 2012 -> 12:20 PM) Yes, the neutral Afghanis might think negatively about this, but I don't see how suddenly they're going to ASSIST the Taliban because of it. You keep ignoring key points for some reason. They may not ASSIST the US MILITARY because of it. Which, you know, is pretty f***ing important to gathering intelligence.