Osama bin Laden claims victory over US

[BigBallinStalin]

http://www.theagitator.com/2011/05/02/he-won/

In The Looming Tower, the Pulitzer-winning history of al-Qaeda and the road to 9/11, author Lawrence Wright lays out how Osama bin Laden’s motivation for the attacks that he planned in the 1990s, and then the September 11 attacks, was to draw the U.S. and the West into a prolonged war—an actual war in Afghanistan, and a broader global war with Islam.

Osama got both. And we gave him a prolonged war in Iraq to boot. By the end of Obama’s first term, we’ll probably top 6,000 dead U.S. troops in those two wars, along with hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans. The cost for both wars is also now well over $1 trillion.

We have also fundamentally altered who we are. A partial, off-the-top-of-my-head list of how we’ve changed since September 11 . . .

[click here for the list: http://www.theagitator.com/2011/05/02/he-won/

I’m relieved that bin Laden is dead. And the Navy SEALs who carried out the harrowing raid that ended his life have my respect and admiration. And for all the massive waste and abuse our government has perpetrated in the name of fighting terrorism over the last decade, there’s something satisfying in knowing that he was killed in a limited, targeted operation based on specific intelligence.

But because of the actions of one guy, we allowed all the bullet points above to happen. That we managed to kill him a decade after the September 11 attacks is symbolically important, but hardly seems worth the celebrations we saw across the country last night. There was something unsettling about watching giddy crowds bounce around beach balls and climb telephone polls last night, as if they were in the lawn seats at a rock festival. Solemn and somber appreciation that an evil man is gone seemed like the more appropriate reaction.

Yes, bin Laden the man is dead. But he achieved all he set out to achieve, and a hell of a lot more. He forever changed who we are as a country, and for the worse. Mostly because we let him. That isn’t something a special ops team can fix.

People who have celebrated his death and think that we've won something should realize that the US has "won" an insignificant battle while not at all achieving victory over the war.

$1 trillion in war-related funding (tax money mostly from Americans)
+1 war in AFG
+1 war in Iraq (as lagniappe)
+ongoing and even stronger Al-Qaida and various guerrilla organizations
_____________________________________________________________
=one dead Osama bin Laden? .....

Conclusion: DERP.

[john9blue]

i celebrate his death because maybe it means this lunacy will finally end

[JoshyBoy]

i celebrate his death because maybe it means this lunacy will finally end

Ahahahahahahahahahahaha! You are deluded!

[radiojake]

i celebrate his death because maybe it means this lunacy will finally end

Yeah - I am sure the families of those thousands killed by US operations are going to sit idly by while they witness the destruction of their home culture

[stahrgazer]

http://www.theagitator.com/2011/05/02/he-won/

In The Looming Tower, the Pulitzer-winning history of al-Qaeda and the road to 9/11, author Lawrence Wright lays out how Osama bin Laden’s motivation for the attacks that he planned in the 1990s, and then the September 11 attacks, was to draw the U.S. and the West into a prolonged war—an actual war in Afghanistan, and a broader global war with Islam.

Osama got both. And we gave him a prolonged war in Iraq to boot. By the end of Obama’s first term, we’ll probably top 6,000 dead U.S. troops in those two wars, along with hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans. The cost for both wars is also now well over $1 trillion.

We have also fundamentally altered who we are. A partial, off-the-top-of-my-head list of how we’ve changed since September 11 . . .

[click here for the list: http://www.theagitator.com/2011/05/02/he-won/

I’m relieved that bin Laden is dead. And the Navy SEALs who carried out the harrowing raid that ended his life have my respect and admiration. And for all the massive waste and abuse our government has perpetrated in the name of fighting terrorism over the last decade, there’s something satisfying in knowing that he was killed in a limited, targeted operation based on specific intelligence.

But because of the actions of one guy, we allowed all the bullet points above to happen. That we managed to kill him a decade after the September 11 attacks is symbolically important, but hardly seems worth the celebrations we saw across the country last night. There was something unsettling about watching giddy crowds bounce around beach balls and climb telephone polls last night, as if they were in the lawn seats at a rock festival. Solemn and somber appreciation that an evil man is gone seemed like the more appropriate reaction.

Yes, bin Laden the man is dead. But he achieved all he set out to achieve, and a hell of a lot more. He forever changed who we are as a country, and for the worse. Mostly because we let him. That isn’t something a special ops team can fix.

People who have celebrated his death and think that we've won something should realize that the US has "won" an insignificant battle while not at all achieving victory over the war.

$1 trillion in war-related funding (tax money mostly from Americans)
+1 war in AFG
+1 war in Iraq (as lagniappe)
+ongoing and even stronger Al-Qaida and various guerrilla organizations
_____________________________________________________________
=one dead Osama bin Laden? .....

Conclusion: DERP.

Arguments like this are like saying the United States should never have entered WWII and gone after Hitler.

Nazi-ism isn't "dead" either.. but Hitler is, and most of the genocidal atrocities committed by order of Feuhrer stopped with his death.

Not every malicious act by nazi and neo-nazi zealots is over, just as Osama's death doesn't end terrorism by neo-moslems (if they truly read their holy scriptures, they wouldn't do what they do, so they're not moslem, they're neo-moslem).

But it does cut off one head of the multi-headed snake, and weaken some of its venom.

Further, it shows that the United States can be as methodically dogged with its enemies as the nuts that think genocide and suicidal mass bombing is a great way to conquer a people that didn't strike first. It shows those few who survived Osama's brand of Holocaust that the US will work hard to help them against their vipers just as we helped Europe against its viper years ago.

God Bless the USA, God Bless those brave men and women who landed inside that 18-foot-walled fortress to put a bullet in Osama's soul-less brain, and God Bless all the folks who toiled for years to get us to this point.

[Timminz]

Good old, crazy Stahr. Quite a character, that one.

[john9blue]

Ahahahahahahahahahahaha! You are deluded!

Yeah - I am sure the families of those thousands killed by US operations are going to sit idly by while they witness the destruction of their home culture

i don't think you understood my post. with bin laden out of the picture, supposing al-qaeda is weakened, it will become harder and harder to justify our extensive military presence in the middle east. is that a bad thing?

[radiojake]

Ahahahahahahahahahahaha! You are deluded!

Yeah - I am sure the families of those thousands killed by US operations are going to sit idly by while they witness the destruction of their home culture

i don't think you understood my post. with bin laden out of the picture, supposing al-qaeda is weakened, it will become harder and harder to justify our extensive military presence in the middle east. is that a bad thing?

I did mis-interpret, sorry.

[clapper011]

trouble is that there will always be another to step up into his spot.. they are only weak for a short time. the future will tell what happens now.

[jefjef]

stahrgazer

BBS. I'd say ole fish bait lost. Big fail.

FYI: We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with trash. Godaffy is next to be terminated.

[radiojake]

stahrgazer

BBS. I'd say ole fish bait lost. Big fail.

FYI: We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with trash. Godaffy is next to be terminated.

You are right - You are not at war with Islam: You are just continuing the history of land upsurption, resource grabbing and western imperialism.

Whenever I read or hear some twat bandy on about 'God blessing America' I can't help but think about the brainwashed moron who believes such patriotic bullshit.

[Army of GOD]

http://www.theagitator.com/2011/05/02/he-won/

In The Looming Tower, the Pulitzer-winning history of al-Qaeda and the road to 9/11, author Lawrence Wright lays out how Osama bin Laden’s motivation for the attacks that he planned in the 1990s, and then the September 11 attacks, was to draw the U.S. and the West into a prolonged war—an actual war in Afghanistan, and a broader global war with Islam.

Osama got both. And we gave him a prolonged war in Iraq to boot. By the end of Obama’s first term, we’ll probably top 6,000 dead U.S. troops in those two wars, along with hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans. The cost for both wars is also now well over $1 trillion.

We have also fundamentally altered who we are. A partial, off-the-top-of-my-head list of how we’ve changed since September 11 . . .

[click here for the list: http://www.theagitator.com/2011/05/02/he-won/

I’m relieved that bin Laden is dead. And the Navy SEALs who carried out the harrowing raid that ended his life have my respect and admiration. And for all the massive waste and abuse our government has perpetrated in the name of fighting terrorism over the last decade, there’s something satisfying in knowing that he was killed in a limited, targeted operation based on specific intelligence.

But because of the actions of one guy, we allowed all the bullet points above to happen. That we managed to kill him a decade after the September 11 attacks is symbolically important, but hardly seems worth the celebrations we saw across the country last night. There was something unsettling about watching giddy crowds bounce around beach balls and climb telephone polls last night, as if they were in the lawn seats at a rock festival. Solemn and somber appreciation that an evil man is gone seemed like the more appropriate reaction.

Yes, bin Laden the man is dead. But he achieved all he set out to achieve, and a hell of a lot more. He forever changed who we are as a country, and for the worse. Mostly because we let him. That isn’t something a special ops team can fix.

People who have celebrated his death and think that we've won something should realize that the US has "won" an insignificant battle while not at all achieving victory over the war.

$1 trillion in war-related funding (tax money mostly from Americans)
+1 war in AFG
+1 war in Iraq (as lagniappe)
+ongoing and even stronger Al-Qaida and various guerrilla organizations
_____________________________________________________________
=one dead Osama bin Laden? .....

Conclusion: DERP.

Arguments like this are like saying the United States should never have entered WWII and gone after Hitler.

Nazi-ism isn't "dead" either.. but Hitler is, and most of the genocidal atrocities committed by order of Feuhrer stopped with his death.

You're literally comparing apples to a pile of shit.

We didn't go to war to kill Hitler, we went to war to stop Germany and Japan from enslaving all of Asia/Africa/Europe and killing millions in their way. Osama is, MAYBE (just because someone says they did it, doesn't mean they did it), responsible for a few thousand deaths. 9/11 was an absolutely shitty event, but it does not justify OUR killing of thousands of THEIR innocents to find a few guys who already finished what they wanted to.

9/11 was a fluke compared to the Holocaust. Anyway, the US has a history of glorifying mass-murder (see: WW2; bombing the f*ck out of Japan).

But hey, we trudged through the piles of dead bodies that we made and spent more money imaginable and took 10 years to find one guy who was near death anyway, and gave him a quick, painless death. For all we know, he's in Muslim heaven right now.

If you think it was worth it, I'm sorry, but you're a fucking idiot.

[john9blue]

9/11 was a fluke compared to the Holocaust. Anyway, the US has a history of glorifying mass-murder (see: WW2; bombing the f*ck out of Japan).

the atomic bombings of japan were an extremely complex decision that may have saved thousands if not millions of lives. you can't just dismiss it as "mass-murder".

[Army of GOD]

9/11 was a fluke compared to the Holocaust. Anyway, the US has a history of glorifying mass-murder (see: WW2; bombing the f*ck out of Japan).

the atomic bombings of japan were an extremely complex decision that may have saved thousands if not millions of lives. you can't just dismiss it as "mass-murder".

Not just the a-bombs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo

Anyway, yes you can. There's a difference between soldiers killing each other and dropping bombs on innocent people. Soldiers are more prepared for death. Innocents are caught in the cross-fire.

[john9blue]

9/11 was a fluke compared to the Holocaust. Anyway, the US has a history of glorifying mass-murder (see: WW2; bombing the f*ck out of Japan).

the atomic bombings of japan were an extremely complex decision that may have saved thousands if not millions of lives. you can't just dismiss it as "mass-murder".

Not just the a-bombs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo

Anyway, yes you can. There's a difference between soldiers killing each other and dropping bombs on innocent people. Soldiers are more prepared for death. Innocents are caught in the cross-fire.

oh okay. even so, i maintain that mass murder can theoretically still be justified, provided that it prevents some greater catastrophe. that's the whole concept behind just war.

[Army of GOD]

Well obviously, as it's not objective at all.

I hate subjectivity =(

[oVo]

Soldiers are more prepared for death. Innocents are caught in the cross-fire.

It's true, innocents are caught in the crossfire... the World Trade Towers are another example.
Then again how innocent are citizens who support their government's goals of global conquest
or covert military operations carried out in remote parts of the world?

"Soldiers are more prepared for death?" No more than any teenager driving a fast car.

Osama Bin Laden may have achieved his goals, but victory over the US wasn't one of them.
His demise is just another chapter in the ongoing tragedy perpetrated by World leaders and
there are plenty more chapters remaining to be written. Dancing in the streets to celebrate the
death of Bin Laden made no sense to me or the photo ops some politicians created to get
in the public eye nationally. The war isn't over and there is no shortage of idiots on both sides
of terrorism for it to end it any time soon.

[Gold Knight]

It's true, innocents are caught in the crossfire... the World Trade Towers are another example.

Wouldn't really consider that attack crossfire; that was pretty much a direct shot at their objective... But death is a part of war, and it's shocking how many justify their anti-war stances on the deaths of the innocent civilians. They have been and continue to be casualties in every war to date and that point is not going to change any time soon.

[Army of GOD]

Then again how innocent are citizens who support their government's goals of global conquest
or covert military operations carried out in remote parts of the world?

Sorry, couldn't tell if you were talking about the United States or al Queda.

[pimpdave]

trouble is that there will always be another to step up into his spot.. they are only weak for a short time. the future will tell what happens now.

I don't know about that. Bin Laden was a money guy. How many money guys do they really have left? How many were there before him and how many do you think will be made now that he's gone?

Plus, we crippled him financially after 9/11 by freezing all of his assets (the single biggest reason we haven't been attacked again, and by far the lowest cost weapon we've used in GWOT). The apparatus exists now to track the financial machinations of anyone who rises to take his place and I doubt we'll let someone new skate by for so long like we did with Bin Laden. Don't forget, he'd been targeting us and bankrolling operations since '93, but it took until 2001 for us to shut down his cash flow.

I for one refuse to let them make me be afraid and I won't judge you or anyone else if you are. But you really don't need to be.

[stahrgazer]

If you think it was worth it, I'm sorry, but you're a fucking idiot.

No, you're the idiot, forgetting what he did to his own ppl, too.

Or does it not matter to you because the others he's been murdering in his country and surrounding countries during his terror reign are Moslem instead of Jewish?

[stahrgazer]

trouble is that there will always be another to step up into his spot.. they are only weak for a short time. the future will tell what happens now.

I don't know about that. Bin Laden was a money guy. How many money guys do they really have left? How many were there before him and how many do you think will be made now that he's gone?

Plus, we crippled him financially after 9/11 by freezing all of his assets (the single biggest reason we haven't been attacked again, and by far the lowest cost weapon we've used in GWOT). The apparatus exists now to track the financial machinations of anyone who rises to take his place and I doubt we'll let someone new skate by for so long like we did with Bin Laden. Don't forget, he'd been targeting us and bankrolling operations since '93, but it took until 2001 for us to shut down his cash flow.

I for one refuse to let them make me be afraid and I won't judge you or anyone else if you are. But you really don't need to be.

Ask yourself, if we'd "crippled" him financially, then how was he able to fund what he's been doing since nearly ten years ago?

The answer, pimpdave, is that we didn't get his gold.

For years OBL bought real gold, not just gold certificates, paid to have it transported, and stashed it some place or some places - "He probably has more gold than Fort Knox," one analyst said about two weeks ago.

#2, #3, or #4 probably know where that gold is. So clapper's right, just getting one head of he snake isn't enough.

[Army of GOD]

If you think it was worth it, I'm sorry, but you're a fucking idiot.

No, you're the idiot, forgetting what he did to his own ppl, too.

Or does it not matter to you because the others he's been murdering in his country and surrounding countries during his terror reign are Moslem instead of Jewish?

The only reason we went after him is because Americans demanded his blood be spilled, not because he was killing his own people.

[stahrgazer]

9/11 was a fluke compared to the Holocaust. Anyway, the US has a history of glorifying mass-murder (see: WW2; bombing the f*ck out of Japan).

the atomic bombings of japan were an extremely complex decision that may have saved thousands if not millions of lives. you can't just dismiss it as "mass-murder".

Not just the a-bombs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo

Anyway, yes you can. There's a difference between soldiers killing each other and dropping bombs on innocent people. Soldiers are more prepared for death. Innocents are caught in the cross-fire.

Well, we're unlikely to get an entire world to agree "no bombs, ever."

However, in this instance, Obama made a choice to send in a team to strike rather than bomb - the US still has enough bombs and capability to have taken out the complex. Just, not without risking more lives. Then again, most of OBL's neighbors were apparently retired military, so are they innocent?

But there's still a difference. With WWII, Japan or Germany; and with OBL; the United States wasn't making the first strike. I mean, ask the dead of Pearl Harbor if the US shouldn't have done Hiroshima and Nagasaki and such... oh, wait, you can't. Because Japan killed them long before the US decided to "bomb the f*ck out of them."

Just as OBL killed lots of people around him who wouldn't cooperate, others around the world who didn't cooperate, and eventually used his piles of gold, misplaced religious zealousness, and psychopathic brilliance to gather the right people to plan a strike against a bunch of civilians in New York a few years ago. A lot of civilian bankers in suits. And a few thousand assorted others whose spirits are probably still hovering despite the debris of two crashed towers is long removed.

[Night Strike]

trouble is that there will always be another to step up into his spot.. they are only weak for a short time. the future will tell what happens now.

I don't know about that. Bin Laden was a money guy. How many money guys do they really have left? How many were there before him and how many do you think will be made now that he's gone?

Plus, we crippled him financially after 9/11 by freezing all of his assets (the single biggest reason we haven't been attacked again, and by far the lowest cost weapon we've used in GWOT). The apparatus exists now to track the financial machinations of anyone who rises to take his place and I doubt we'll let someone new skate by for so long like we did with Bin Laden. Don't forget, he'd been targeting us and bankrolling operations since '93, but it took until 2001 for us to shut down his cash flow.

I for one refuse to let them make me be afraid and I won't judge you or anyone else if you are. But you really don't need to be.

Who are you and what have you done with pimpdave? A rational post that I actually agree with.