REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Regarding the stupid myth that Reagan brought down the evil Soviet Empire...

POSTED BY: CHRISISALL
UPDATED: Saturday, February 18, 2023 16:43
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Friday, October 9, 2009 8:46 PM

MAGONSDAUGHTER


The myth re Reagan is definitely a made in America one - I never even heard of it before I started ghosting around boards on the Internet. I was completely astounded.

I always thought the Soviet union fell because it was decaying from within and only being held together by the tyranny of the State. When the State started to lose its grip - then it fell apart like a house of cards.

Was Reagan responsible for the reunification of Germany as well.

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Friday, October 9, 2009 8:54 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


Hello,

I think the common wisdom regarding Reagan is this...

Poor management and financial woes troubled the Soviet Empire, threatening it with collapse.

And Reagan gave them a little push.

I do think the Soviet Union would have collapsed regardless. I don't think it can be denied that Reagan helped apply pressure to an unsustainable system.

What is frequently overlooked, in my opinion, is that he did that at home as well as abroad.

--Anthony


"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Saturday, October 10, 2009 8:25 AM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:


I do think the Soviet Union would have collapsed regardless. I don't think it can be denied that Reagan helped apply pressure to an unsustainable system.

What is frequently overlooked, in my opinion, is that he did that at home as well as abroad.



We really need a big thumbs-up smiley around here!

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Saturday, October 10, 2009 9:31 AM

SKYWALKEN


http://www.amazon.com/Face-Evil-Reagans-Word-Deed/dp/B0007Q3SII

From Harry Truman to Jimmy Carter, the policy when dealing with the Soviet Union was containment. Containment failed. The ultimate goal of the Soviet empire was a global communist revolution, therefore the Soviets could never have been contained. When Ronald Reagan came into office, he initiated a policy of confronting the Soviet Union, marking a sharp departure from the "détente" policy of the 1970s.

Reagan advocated a radical agenda: challenge the Soviets everywhere. Economically, politically, militarily, and especially psychologically. Not just coexist with the Soviets, but defeat them. His strategy for an endgame to the Cold War was that there would be no coexistence with the Soviets. From beginning to end, the goal was the destruction of the Soviet Union.

He realized that a planned economy could not compete against a market economy in a renewed arms race and so he made the Cold War hot in an economic and rhetoricall sense. Reagan and his team devised a plan. The secret plan was to dismember the Soviet Union brick by brick. It would be coercive. Confront the Soviet head on to fight and win a protracted four part war.

The first part was a war of action. The Reagan administration used paramilitary ops, covert action, small unit combat, and simly taking the torch to the enemy. The instruments were anti-communist Nicaraguan freedom fighters, anti-communist Afghan freedom fighters and anti-communist Polish freedom fighters.

The second part was a war of material. Reagan began a massive re-armament based on high-technology that obsoleted a generation of Soviet weaponry. Before Reagan took office, U.S. defense technology had fallen badly behind the Soviets during the Jimmy Carter administration. The defense upgrade include a 600 ship Navy, new Army divisions, tanks, planes, and missiles. Under the orders of Reagan, Caspar Weinberger cleared out the Carter Defense Department, instilled an esprit de corps within the ranks, and rebuilt the military as an instrument for the Soviets to fear. The method was unpredictable. Incursions into Russian airspace, sending B-52s in attack formation over the North Pole, disrupting naval exercises. The weapons build-up forced the Soviets to increase military spending, freeing the CIA to inflict massive damage in Afghanistan and Central America without obvious U.S. involvement.

The third part of the plan was a war of ideas. Reagan recognized that mass communications was the new most important instrument. He used Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, and Radio Marti; bombarding the captive nations with broadcasts, embedding coded messages for the leaders of resistance movements, secretly distributing Korans and pamphlets and that detailed the ongoing Soviet abuse of Muslims. Reagan knew that the struggle against communism was not simply between two political ideologies, but it was fundamentally about core beliefs and values and faith in a higher power. So when he changed the radio stations and made them voices of advocacy, he also added religious programming. Particular the Catholic mass was provided to listeners in Poland and that was a very energizing and mobilizing influence in a country where Catholicism and resistance to communism worked well together. They were also providing information and spiritual food to Muslims in Soviet Central Asia. They were printing brochures and they were having radio programs that talked about the incompatibility between Islam and the forced militant atheism of communism.

The fourth and final part of the plan was a war of money. Reagan devised a plan to bankrupt the Soviet Union. He had always known that the Soviet economy was no more than the size of California's and CIA analysis proved him right. Their 500 billion dollars paled in comparison to the 2.5 trillion dollars of the United States. Reagan used this discrepancy to America's advantage with economic warfare on a scale never seen before. One fought with a new weapon. Reagan made the dollar a weapon for the first time in Soviet history. The Soviet system had been in crisis since 1917, but they had always figured out a way in the Kremlin to have the West bail them out. Reagan saw to it that that was not going to happen this time. So it was a struggle about dollars and credits as much as it was about tanks and missiles. The means Reagan used oil through a partnership with Saudi Arabia. The Soviet Union's hard currency came from a single source: its mineral wealth of oil and gas. Reagan secretly sent William Casey, the Director of Central Intelligence, to Riyadh to strong arm the Saudis into tripling oil production, cutting prices by fifty percent. Casey was successful and got the Saudis to go along. Reagan's objective was an economic boom in the West and a crippling blow to the struggling Soviet economy. The desperate Soviets needed hard cash, so they resorted to gas fields in Siberia. There solution was a 4000 mile pipeline connecting the fields to the markets in Western Europe. The prize was billions of cubic feet of gas flowing from Siberia and therefore tens of billions in hard currency flowing back to Moscow.

This was an appropriate time to launch a more strategic initiative designed to go after the Soviet Union's dominating of Western Europe's natural gas markets and major American conglomerates really had no stomach for that at all. In the end, there interest in profits oversees. There was enormous pressure that was brought to bare by companies that were going to be damaged by Reagan's economic war against the Soviet empire. This economic warfare would be applied to wherever the Soviets struck.

The first of these was Poland, which was the epicenter of the Soviet empire and they considered it the crossroads of Europe. It is where all the historic invasions of Russia had taken place. Tanks rolled onto the streets of Warsaw, road blocks where everywhere, 3.4 million telephones were rendered dead, 250 thousand military personnel deployed. The Soviets determined that controlling and dominating Poland was vital to protecting the survival of the Soviet empire. Martial law was declared, the Solidarity organization was banned and Lech Wałęsa and five thousand activists were arrested. With the rise of Solidarity, for the first time in the Cold War there was a challenge to their authority in Poland. They installed a puppet government in the country. After the Soviets backed a coup in Poland and declared martial law, Reagan was furious and determined to see Solidarity succeed. The secret funding for Solidarity commenced. It payed for the tools of subversion: printing presses and radio transmitters. Reagan decided that the Soviet sponsorship of martial law in Poland need to be responded to with economic sanctions. Reagan canceled trade agreements, made grain sales tougher, and restricted credit. The Europeans saw Reagan's tenacity and knew he would not give in. So they fell in line, tightening their lending to the regime in Moscow.

Reagan also went out of his way to deliver Western Europe from being a sitting duck to the Soviet missiles that were aimed directly toward it. One of Reagan's early and most important goals was to station missiles in Europe to provide a defense for the people of Western Europe. In the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Thatcher mobilized Western Europe to deploy the new generation of nuclear weapons.

Reagan's game plan had been to only meet with the Soviets on his terms, when the power had shifted in America's favor. By the 1985, that was happening. In the Strategic Defense Initiative's embryonic stage, it had new partners: Japan, West Germany, Italy, Israel, and the United Kingdom. In Poland, Solidarity had refused to surrender. In Nicaragua, the anti-communist freedom fighters fought on. In Africa and Southeast Asia anti-communist CIA covert operations were underway. In Afghanistan, the simple goal of making the Soviets retreat in disgrace was working. The Reagan war plan was now beginnng to converge; the military build-up, the cover actions, the economic sanctions, and the Strategic Defense Initiative.

The combined effects on the Soviet economy was costing the Soviet empire billions. The Soviets had increased defense spending by 45 percent, billions were lost in hard currency, billions more was spent on bolstering nervous third world communist dictators and all they had to show for it was dead young Russian and other Soviet citizens shipped home from the battlefields of Afghanistan. Reagan's leverage had worked and the Kremlin was now backed into a corner. After less than five years of Ronald Reagan, the hardliners of the Soviet leadership could no longer hide the economic damage of their rule. This gave the reformers an opening. Mikhail Gorbachev has elected by a one vote majority in the politburo because they knew the only way they could compete with the United States and meet the Reagan challenge is by changing. So Gorbachev was brought into power in response to Ronald Reagan. So Reagan was really responsible for bringing Gorbachev into power.

Eventually, the ten year war in Afghanistan against Reagan-supported Afghan freedom fighters exhausted the resources and morale of the Soviet socialist system. With more than 15,000 Soviet military personnel dead, the Soviets withdrew their forces in 1989 and admitted to a humiliating defeat. It was payback for the Vietnam War. Also in 1989, the Reagan-supported Polish Solidarity organization was legalized and allowed to participate in elections which sparked off a succession of peaceful anti-communist counter-revolutions in Central Europe and Eastern Europe.

Take the fact that communism drives any country broke, add a Reagan-supported arms build up as well as a Reagan-supported second arms race in space, add a Reagan-supported Vietnam-like quagmire, and mix in Reagan-supported socio-political upheaval in Soviet satellite states. It was more than the Soviet system could take. Especially with a Reagan-supported reformer in charge of the Soviet Union.

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Saturday, October 10, 2009 11:04 AM

FREMDFIRMA


I don't know what's funnier, that you posted this to try and boost your case, or that you actually believe this crap.

I think imma go with that fact that on close inspection, this piece actually WRECKS your case, and also amusing is that you don't even realize it cause you skimmed it, mentally triggered on the buzzwords, then accepted it entire and threw it at us.

I know how to key and trigger buzzwords too, and it's funny as hell to watch you guys dance unknowning to my tune, especially when it leads you right off a cliff.

Meep Meep!

-F

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Saturday, October 10, 2009 11:36 AM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:

Skywhackin wrote (or copied and pasted):


The first part was a war of action. The Reagan administration used paramilitary ops, covert action, small unit combat, and simly taking the torch to the enemy. The instruments were anti-communist Nicaraguan freedom fighters, anti-communist Afghan freedom fighters and anti-communist Polish freedom fighters.



"Freedom fighters"? Don't you mean "terrorists"?

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Saturday, October 10, 2009 2:06 PM

GINOBIFFARONI


Quote:

Originally posted by Kwicko:
Quote:

Skywhackin wrote (or copied and pasted):


The first part was a war of action. The Reagan administration used paramilitary ops, covert action, small unit combat, and simly taking the torch to the enemy. The instruments were anti-communist Nicaraguan freedom fighters, anti-communist Afghan freedom fighters and anti-communist Polish freedom fighters.



"Freedom fighters"? Don't yoy mean "terrorists"?



and after one term in power the " anti-communist Polish freedom fighters " were thrown out of power and replaced by the communists by popular vote.

also the " anti-communist Nicaraguan freedom fighters " were prolific drug smugglers and terrorists, and the US was actually found guilty of war crimes in their support, although the US simply ignored the verdict.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaragua_v._United_States


Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists




" I don't believe in hypothetical situations - it's kinda like lying to your brain "

" They don't hate America, they hate Americans " Homer Simpson


Lets party like its 1939

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 7:43 AM

KPO

Sometimes you own the libs. Sometimes, the libs own you.


Quote:

and after one term in power the " anti-communist Polish freedom fighters " were thrown out of power and replaced by the communists by popular vote.


But the long term damage to communism had been done?

Interesting topic this.

Heads should roll

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 10:03 AM

DREAMTROVE


Except in how in 1945 we withdrew the Japanese forces under American command from China which they controlled, allowing the soviets to arm Mao in the takeover of the world's most populous and powerful nation, killing 70 million people, and now if Russia were still communist it would be less than 10% of the world's communist population

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 10:46 AM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:

Originally posted by kpo:
Quote:

and after one term in power the " anti-communist Polish freedom fighters " were thrown out of power and replaced by the communists by popular vote.


But the long term damage to communism had been done?

Interesting topic this.

Heads should roll



I think you mean the short-term damage to communism had been done. Like most other 'isms', it comes around from time to time, just like fascism, socialism, and free-market capitalism. None of them ever existed in the "true" or pure form, but are mixed to varying degrees time after time after time - often right here in the U.S.

By the way, I could argue that the defeat of the United States by the communist-backed Viet Cong meant that the "long-term damage" to capitalism had already been done. Would you agree with that assertion?

Mike

The percentage you're paying is too high-priced
While you're living beyond all your means;
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he's made on your dreams

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 11:13 AM

PIRATENEWS

John Lee, conspiracy therapist at Hollywood award-winner History Channel-mocked SNL-spoofed PirateNew.org wooHOO!!!!!!




Quote:

"Mr. Dodd, all of us here at the policy making level of the foundation have at one time or another served in the OSS [the Office of Strategic Services, the forerunner of the CIA] or the European Economic Administration, operating under directives from the White House. We operate under those same directives...The substance of the directives under which we operate is that we shall use our grant making power to so alter life in the United States that we can be comfortably merged with the Soviet Union."
-Rowan Gaither, President of the Ford Foundation, speaking to Norman Dodd, Research Director for U.S. Congressman B. Carroll Reece Special Committee on Tax Exempt Foundations
youtube.com/watch?v=YUYCBfmIcHM

"Gentlemen, comrades, do not be concerned about all you hear about glasnost and perestroika and democracy in the coming years. These are primarily for outward consumption. There will be no significant change within the Soviet Union, other than for cosmetic purposes. Our aim is to disarm the Americans and let them fall asleep. I am a convinced Communist. For some this may be a fantasy but for me it is my main goal. The environmental crisis is the cornerstone for the New World Order. My hope is that this Earth charter will be a kind of Ten Commandments, a Sermon on the Mount, that provides a guide for human behaviour toward the environment in the next century and beyond. We need a new paradigm of developement in which the environment will be a priority. World Civilization as we know it will soon end. We have very little time and we must act."
-Mikhail Gorbachev, Communist Russian dictator and chief of KGP secret police
www.rense.com/general12/gobie.htm



Nancy Pelosi: One of Mikhail Gorbachev's Most Useful Idiots
http://kenraggio.com/KRPN-Gorbachev-PresidiumtoPresidio.htm

Are you ready for Civil War?

For those who watched live TV from the military coup in Commie Russia in 1991, it's gonna be cop against cop, soldier against soldier, tank against tank, jet fighter against jet fighter. Tanks firing on government buildings to kill government employees and politicians, just like 1991.

The look on Gorby's face in parliament when Yeltsin stripped him of all power and placed him and his family under arrest for stealing $3-billion, as the parliament cheered... Priceless. 100% censored on youtube, of course.

Now Commie traitors in USA gave Gorby the entire Presidio Naval Base in San Francisco, to plot Obama's overthrow of USA.


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Sunday, October 11, 2009 2:52 PM

KPO

Sometimes you own the libs. Sometimes, the libs own you.


Quote:

I think you mean the short-term damage to communism had been done.


Ah all right, I mean the long term damage to the Soviets then, and their brand of communism. As for the long term damage to international communism as a whole, I guess we can only wait and see. My hunch is that international communism has peaked, historically speaking.

Heads should roll

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 3:46 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:

Originally posted by kpo:
Quote:

I think you mean the short-term damage to communism had been done.


Ah all right, I mean the long term damage to the Soviets then, and their brand of communism. As for the long term damage to international communism as a whole, I guess we can only wait and see. My hunch is that international communism has peaked, historically speaking.

Heads should roll



You're probably right. I have a hunch that free-market capitalism, if it ever really existed, has likely peaked as well, and we'll just see more movement towards a capitalist-socialist hybrid, with the degree of each changing dependent on where you are in the world, and what the prevailing government du jour is. There will still be profit and entrepreneurship, but you'll see more redistribution of wealth and social welfare, as well as more government intervention in business, as well as businesses intervening more into government. Some will skew more fascist, some more socialist, some more capitalist, and a few will likely retain some alleged communism - and always, always, the calls will come from all the "others" that one form or another is evil, or that their way is the "best" or "only" way, despite the fact that all of them have their pros and cons.

Mike

The percentage you're paying is too high-priced
While you're living beyond all your means;
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he's made on your dreams

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 6:39 PM

MAGONSDAUGHTER


Quote:

Originally posted by kpo:
Quote:

I think you mean the short-term damage to communism had been done.


Ah all right, I mean the long term damage to the Soviets then, and their brand of communism. As for the long term damage to international communism as a whole, I guess we can only wait and see. My hunch is that international communism has peaked, historically speaking.

Heads should roll



The USSR made the mistake of spreading themselves too thin militarily, Afghanistan was kind of the last straw. It's the kind of thing that has undone countless empires, the Roman and the British included. The USA should keep this in mind when thinking of it's foreign policy decisions.

The cost, militarily, economically and morally of their continued expanionist policies, coupled with a corrupt, dishonest regime and basically a system of society that didn't really work, and it was bound to collapse sooner or later. Reagan's aggressive stand may have contributed but it also led the world perilously close to nuclear war.

In many ways, the US involvement in Afghanistan was a disaster for the world - sure it stemmed the Russian invasion, but you also armed and trained a whole lot of extremists in a society that had basically been dismantled. And we wonder why the Taliban exist?

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 6:59 PM

GINOBIFFARONI


Quote:

Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
Quote:

Originally posted by kpo:
Quote:

I think you mean the short-term damage to communism had been done.


Ah all right, I mean the long term damage to the Soviets then, and their brand of communism. As for the long term damage to international communism as a whole, I guess we can only wait and see. My hunch is that international communism has peaked, historically speaking.

Heads should roll



The USSR made the mistake of spreading themselves too thin militarily, Afghanistan was kind of the last straw. It's the kind of thing that has undone countless empires, the Roman and the British included. The USA should keep this in mind when thinking of it's foreign policy decisions.

The cost, militarily, economically and morally of their continued expanionist policies, coupled with a corrupt, dishonest regime and basically a system of society that didn't really work, and it was bound to collapse sooner or later. Reagan's aggressive stand may have contributed but it also led the world perilously close to nuclear war.

In many ways, the US involvement in Afghanistan was a disaster for the world - sure it stemmed the Russian invasion, but you also armed and trained a whole lot of extremists in a society that had basically been dismantled. And we wonder why the Taliban exist?




Actually US involvement in Afghanistan predated the Soviet invasion. Jimmy Carter and Zbigniew Brzezinski ordered a CIA / Pakistan ISI operation whose objective was to both overthrow the government in Afghanistan as well as spread Islamic fundamentalism through the Southern Soviet Republics in order to destabilize the Soviet Union... and in fact helped to provoke the Soviet invasion.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/BRZ110A.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidency_of_Jimmy_Carter#Intervention_i
n_Afghanistan


the domino effect I guess, and they just keep going down








Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists


Lets party like its 1939

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 7:19 PM

MAGONSDAUGHTER


Thanks for that info. I wasn't aware of that. Poor old Afghanistan - seems to be one of those places that's bickered about in proxy wars for generations.

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Sunday, October 11, 2009 7:29 PM

GINOBIFFARONI


Quote:

Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
Thanks for that info. I wasn't aware of that. Poor old Afghanistan - seems to be one of those places that's bickered about in proxy wars for generations.




It is really no wonder after the Taliban took power they tried to keep all foreign influences out...

I mean look at all the pain and suffering foreign influences there caused, I think I'd be a little bitter too being a part of that history.





Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists


Lets party like its 1939

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Monday, October 12, 2009 2:21 PM

YINYANG

You were busy trying to get yourself lit on fire. It happens.


Quote:

Originally posted by AnthonyT:
Quote:

Originally posted by rue:
[BSad that a full-time cynic and misogynist like Heinlein captured the future so well.

***************************************************************

Silence is consent.



Hello,

Just what is it that Heinlein wrote that makes so many women on this board think of him as misogynistic?

I remember him as one of the (few) sci-fi writers of his age who wrote many intelligent, strong, and capable women. I sometimes felt that the women in his works were more capable than the men.

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner



Hey, Anthony, I sent you a message that I hope helps answer your question.

A witty saying proves nothing. - Voltaire

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Monday, October 12, 2009 2:39 PM

CHRISISALL


Quote:

Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
It's the kind of thing that has undone countless empires, the Roman and the British included. The USA should keep this in mind when thinking of it's foreign policy decisions.


How DARE you invite us to use common sense, MD???? We are allowed to eff-up & fall just like any other dynasty!!!


The laughing Chrisisall

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Monday, October 12, 2009 2:53 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:

Originally posted by chrisisall:
Quote:

Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
It's the kind of thing that has undone countless empires, the Roman and the British included. The USA should keep this in mind when thinking of it's foreign policy decisions.


How DARE you invite us to use common sense, MD???? We are allowed to eff-up & fall just like any other dynasty!!!


The laughing Chrisisall



Thing is, we have it in our heads that we simply are incapable of failure. We have myriad reasons why we CAN'T fail - and never consider that it only takes one thing to prove we can: failure.

Mike

The percentage you're paying is too high-priced
While you're living beyond all your means;
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he's made on your dreams

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Monday, October 12, 2009 3:02 PM

CHRISISALL


Quote:

Originally posted by Kwicko:

Thing is, we have it in our heads that we simply are incapable of failure. We have myriad reasons why we CAN'T fail - and never consider that it only takes one thing to prove we can: failure.


Failure never proves failure- it merely proves success in another venue.
Mike, you need Dr. Phil...


The laughing Chrisisall

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Tuesday, October 13, 2009 1:36 AM

MAGONSDAUGHTER


Quote:

Originally posted by chrisisall:
Quote:

Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
It's the kind of thing that has undone countless empires, the Roman and the British included. The USA should keep this in mind when thinking of it's foreign policy decisions.


How DARE you invite us to use common sense, MD???? We are allowed to eff-up & fall just like any other dynasty!!!


The laughing Chrisisall



If you could just wait until I've completed my US road trip, that would be....swell

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Tuesday, October 13, 2009 1:47 AM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:

Originally posted by chrisisall:
Quote:

Originally posted by Kwicko:

Thing is, we have it in our heads that we simply are incapable of failure. We have myriad reasons why we CAN'T fail - and never consider that it only takes one thing to prove we can: failure.


Failure never proves failure- it merely proves success in another venue.
Mike, you need Dr. Phil...


The laughing Chrisisall



Well, it does prove success at failing, so I suppose that's success of a sort...

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Tuesday, October 13, 2009 8:55 AM

FREMDFIRMA


Quote:

Originally posted by GinoBiffaroni:
It is really no wonder after the Taliban took power they tried to keep all foreign influences out...

I mean look at all the pain and suffering foreign influences there caused, I think I'd be a little bitter too being a part of that history.


Well hell, that's many middle eastern countries, Iran in particular after us setting up The Shah and SAVAK and backing them up against their own people.

Part of the REASON these people tolerate the radical islamic fundamentalists is that they're the only force to ever SUCCESSFULLY kick us and our puppets out of the country, and manage any kind of decent track record against our abuses and exploitation attempts.

Fact is, most of their people hate em as much or worse than WE do - come on, think about it, YOU ain't gonna live down the street from these assholes, don't have to put up with em, and mostly only hear about em on the news.

Take those drunken right wing assholes in that trailer park down the road with all the stupid bullshit that comes with em, and how you feel about them and you get a pretty good idea of how it is - it's NOT that they have warm fuzzies for the sumbitches, it's just that they find their own homegrown sumbitches to be less offensive and dangerous than our puppets.

Pretty damning implication against us, but that's the way it is folks - maybe if we weren't such a goddamn THREAT to them, with our rapacious corporations and sabre rattling, these dipwads wouldn't have a leg to stand on, and you can bet they know it, too - cause that's how the game works, they use US as a threat to maintain power in their own country, and our bad actors use THEM as a threat to maintain power in this one.

All the while sending us peons to go slaughter each other to protect the fucking illusion, and us peons keep listening to em, and obeying them.

Tell me again, who's the stupid ones here ?

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Tuesday, October 13, 2009 1:20 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:


Part of the REASON these people tolerate the radical islamic fundamentalists is that they're the only force to ever SUCCESSFULLY kick us and our puppets out of the country, and manage any kind of decent track record against our abuses and exploitation attempts.



This is exactly what I was saying prior to the Iraq War. These people don't love what they have - they think their leaders are assholes. But they are THEIR assholes. Yeah, Ahmadinejad is an ass, but he's the guy they know, he's FROM THERE, so he's the one they're going to trust over an outsider like us.

As much as so many of us hated Bush, how would we have reacted if some other nation had waltzed in here and tried to depose him and install their own guy? Would we have put up with that, or would we have risen up as one force against them? Yes, Bush was an asshole, and a nightmare, but he was our problem to deal with in our own way.

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Tuesday, October 13, 2009 5:36 PM

GINOBIFFARONI


Quote:

Originally posted by Fremdfirma:
Quote:

Originally posted by GinoBiffaroni:
It is really no wonder after the Taliban took power they tried to keep all foreign influences out...

I mean look at all the pain and suffering foreign influences there caused, I think I'd be a little bitter too being a part of that history.


Well hell, that's many middle eastern countries, Iran in particular after us setting up The Shah and SAVAK and backing them up against their own people.

Part of the REASON these people tolerate the radical islamic fundamentalists is that they're the only force to ever SUCCESSFULLY kick us and our puppets out of the country, and manage any kind of decent track record against our abuses and exploitation attempts.

Fact is, most of their people hate em as much or worse than WE do - come on, think about it, YOU ain't gonna live down the street from these assholes, don't have to put up with em, and mostly only hear about em on the news.

Take those drunken right wing assholes in that trailer park down the road with all the stupid bullshit that comes with em, and how you feel about them and you get a pretty good idea of how it is - it's NOT that they have warm fuzzies for the sumbitches, it's just that they find their own homegrown sumbitches to be less offensive and dangerous than our puppets.

Pretty damning implication against us, but that's the way it is folks - maybe if we weren't such a goddamn THREAT to them, with our rapacious corporations and sabre rattling, these dipwads wouldn't have a leg to stand on, and you can bet they know it, too - cause that's how the game works, they use US as a threat to maintain power in their own country, and our bad actors use THEM as a threat to maintain power in this one.

All the while sending us peons to go slaughter each other to protect the fucking illusion, and us peons keep listening to em, and obeying them.

Tell me again, who's the stupid ones here ?

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it



True True


How many Americans view themselves



How many view Americans from abroad






Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists


Lets party like its 1939

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 4:52 AM

DREAMTROVE


MAGONSDAUGHTER,

I think the Soivet error was the common imperial one: To view territories as possessions rather than allies. They liberated a good number of countries from oppression from both the Nazis and the Ottomans, and there was a great deal of gratitude initially. Then they occupied those countries with military force, used them for labor sources, and imposed russian laws and language. Instead, they should have tried to woo the newly liberated nations as friends of Russia. By 1989, everyone hated them, including a fair number of places formerly called Russia.

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 1:00 PM

DREAMTROVE


Mike,

Yes, they trust Ahmadinejad to do precisely one thing: Keep them out of the war. We've elected presidents in the past for that reason alone, and I have to say, so far, he's done a better job than ours have: Wilson, Johnson, Nixon, now Obama? Eisenhower was the one guy I can think of that was elected for that purpose who actually stuck to it.

Many people may not know this, but part of what got G.W.Bush so much of the Christian vote was his pledge to not be a warmonger like Clinton. Didn't work out too well...

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 1:10 PM

FREMDFIRMA



Hey Gino ?

I've actually gotten MILEAGE out of pointing out to american rednecks that most of them Pashtuns are in fact, middle eastern rednecks.



Showed this vid to a couple of PA national guardsmen, who's essential response to it was..
"Shit, they're just like us!"

-F

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 1:22 PM

CHRISISALL


Quote:

Originally posted by GinoBiffaroni:

How many Americans view themselves



How many view Americans from abroad





GINO! If I were a delusional no-questions-asked American psuedo-patriot with a thin skin, I'd be TOTALLY offended by that, dude!!!!!


The laughing Chrisisall

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 1:58 PM

GINOBIFFARONI


Quote:

Originally posted by chrisisall:
Quote:

Originally posted by GinoBiffaroni:

How many Americans view themselves



How many view Americans from abroad





GINO! If I were a delusional no-questions-asked American psuedo-patriot with a thin skin, I'd be TOTALLY offended by that, dude!!!!!


The laughing Chrisisall




Watching the news lately we have had Palin, old people who don't seem to know anything about the issues screaming at townhall meetings, guys going to townhall meeting packing heat, Palin, folk talking about killing ragheads, folk talking about hating black barrack hussien obama, etc, etc

throw in Bush, and all that idiotic reality TV...


The face of America is Cletus the slack jawed yokel





Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists


Lets party like its 1939

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 2:07 PM

GINOBIFFARONI


Quote:

Originally posted by Fremdfirma:

Hey Gino ?

I've actually gotten MILEAGE out of pointing out to american rednecks that most of them Pashtuns are in fact, middle eastern rednecks.



Showed this vid to a couple of PA national guardsmen, who's essential response to it was..
"Shit, they're just like us!"

-F




Well, obviously the training of the Afghan military has been quite effective. Looks like they have watched their instructors closely,


Mind you most only serve a year or maybe two, then sell their weapons and retire

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,4783151,00.html?maca=en-en_nr-189
3-xml-atom


or just go over to the Taliban when they run afoul of the corrupt local government

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1924322,00.html







Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists


Lets party like its 1939

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 2:18 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


It's really kinda funny, in a sad way...

Here we keep saying, as in Iraq, "We'll stand down when they stand up." And we keep on saying that we'll leave as soon as we have them trained up.

We've been there for going on NINE FUCKING YEARS now. What are we training them to be, exactly? Doctors? Cardiologists? Lawyers? Tenured professors? I mean seriously, how long does it take to train someone to be a soldier? Six weeks? Eight? Twelve?

It seems pretty obvious that what we're doing isn't working. So why are we still doing it, and trying to increase the level at which we do it?

[shakes head]

Mike

The percentage you're paying is too high-priced
While you're living beyond all your means;
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he's made on your dreams

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 2:27 PM

CHRISISALL


Quote:

Originally posted by Kwicko:

Here we keep saying, as in Iraq, "We'll stand down when they stand up." And we keep on saying that we'll leave as soon as we have them trained up.


Bottom line, we leave- they're f**ked. It's gonna happen. We can't stop it, only delay it. Do we want to delay it for 10 more years at the cost it's costing us?
Thanks Cheney, you sullen bastard.


The laughing Chrisisall

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 2:28 PM

GINOBIFFARONI


Quote:

Originally posted by Kwicko:
It's really kinda funny, in a sad way...

Here we keep saying, as in Iraq, "We'll stand down when they stand up." And we keep on saying that we'll leave as soon as we have them trained up.

We've been there for going on NINE FUCKING YEARS now. What are we training them to be, exactly? Doctors? Cardiologists? Lawyers? Tenured professors? I mean seriously, how long does it take to train someone to be a soldier? Six weeks? Eight? Twelve?

It seems pretty obvious that what we're doing isn't working. So why are we still doing it, and trying to increase the level at which we do it?

[shakes head]

Mike

The percentage you're paying is too high-priced
While you're living beyond all your means;
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he's made on your dreams




Come on Mike,


If they got their shit together, how much aid money would the US send them?

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/10/2009101420273739662
1.html


you have invented a whole new industry

whether it is GM, citibank, or the sadsacks in Baghdad...







Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists


Lets party like its 1939

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 3:52 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:


you have invented a whole new industry

whether it is GM, citibank, or the sadsacks in Baghdad...



Add to that the fact that one of the few things keeping OUR industries afloat is sales to the Pentagon, so they can keep shipping shit overseas, to be used by us AND sold to "them" - usually by the same people. Often, it's even the same equipment! We buy it for OUR soldiers, who then turn around and "lose" it, and then we find it being used by OUR contractors, who are specifically banned from having such weapons, but paid a good price for it (which we picked up the tab for, AGAIN)...

Or worse yet, the contractors then turn around and sell the stuff to the very people we - and THEY - are supposed to be fighting. Or trade it for heroin, which can be sold for a higher markup over here, and in which case they actually view it as "fighting two enemies at once" (the enemy there and the addict here). And there's about zero chance they're going to get caught bringing it in, since if they don't run the security at the ports and airports, are at least in bed with those who do...

Mike

The percentage you're paying is too high-priced
While you're living beyond all your means;
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he's made on your dreams

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 3:56 PM

GINOBIFFARONI


Quote:

Originally posted by Kwicko:
Quote:


you have invented a whole new industry

whether it is GM, citibank, or the sadsacks in Baghdad...



Add to that the fact that one of the few things keeping OUR industries afloat is sales to the Pentagon, so they can keep shipping shit overseas, to be used by us AND sold to "them" - usually by the same people. Often, it's even the same equipment! We buy it for OUR soldiers, who then turn around and "lose" it, and then we find it being used by OUR contractors, who are specifically banned from having such weapons, but paid a good price for it (which we picked up the tab for, AGAIN)...

Or worse yet, the contractors then turn around and sell the stuff to the very people we - and THEY - are supposed to be fighting. Or trade it for heroin, which can be sold for a higher markup over here, and in which case they actually view it as "fighting two enemies at once" (the enemy there and the addict here). And there's about zero chance they're going to get caught bringing it in, since if they don't run the security at the ports and airports, are at least in bed with those who do...

Mike

The percentage you're paying is too high-priced
While you're living beyond all your means;
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he's made on your dreams




who did you really think was running things ?



It's Milo Minderbinder

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milo_Minderbinder





Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists


Lets party like its 1939

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 4:07 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


You're right! Frakkin' Minderbinder equipping both sides to fight his own little private war, and all for his own profit!

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Tuesday, January 31, 2023 10:53 AM

JAYNEZTOWN


Irangate and He brought jihads into the Whitehouse

The Taliban Are Losing Some of Their Cash Cows
https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/01/10/taliban-afghanistan-women-ban-hum
anitarian-aid
/

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Saturday, February 18, 2023 4:43 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Wow.

Is this the stupidest thread ad title on FFF.net?

At least Twitchy, Thuggery, Two/Sloppyseconds can beat it.

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