Michael Moore's letter to General Clark

[Tsyroc]

But it was a great stunt, nonetheless

Well it worked and in the end that's really what matters.

[Tsyroc]

Clark's an asshole.

A lot of brass can be. In my experience most of the assholes are weeded out before they get stars but sometimes they get through anyway.

I've read several op eds on him, and the general
consensus on Clark is that he improved the army by leaving it.

Are you going to go by those op eds or are you going to blindly follow what your good buddy Michael Moore says.

Since starting this thread Clark has already been rather shakey in establishing himself as a canidate in Iowa. I keep picturing his staff doing the Homer Simpson "D'oh! (with hand to face)" as he waffles on statements he previously makes.

Whatever good things I thought I saw in Moore's letter are being severely undercut when Clark can't get it straight whether he would have or wouldn't have voted to invade Iraq.

[Hobot]

Before we all lose sight of what this debate is about, let's re-examine the initial argument:

The best time to measure a mans character is when he's under pressure. This thread sort of shows that Clark is a fucking moron.

Now, even if Clark's plan can be considered incredibly stupid as BoredShirtless believes, we should recognize that this is one incident, and one that never escalated beyond an argument between two generals. To say that Clark is a "fucking moron" because of this one incident is a Hasty Generalization.

From this debate, being a fairly neutral party, I would conclude that Clark's plan was not very good at all, and it was a good thing that it didn't go through. However, I would not say it was totally stupid and without any merit nor can I fully judge how bad it was. We have the benefit of hindsight, but we don't know a lot of the details or the full extent of Clark's orders by his superiors. It would seem that Clark was following his orders and felt that the situation needed to be dealt with quickly and decisively. Thankfully, Jackson and his superiors were more politically minded and held off; and Clark conceeded to a general under his command despite contrary orders from his superiors. We all make mistakes and that's to be expected, learning and recovering from those mistakes is a true test of one's character. I think this incident proves that Clark, while arrogant, can still accept that he's made a mistake and act rationally under pressure, which is certainly a good characteristic.

[MKSheppard]

http://www.washtimes.com/commentary/200 ... -2743r.htm

Tracing Clark's military map
By Jack Kelly

Retired Gen. Wesley Clark has thrown his helmet into the ring. He has improved the Democratic presidential field by entering it, just as he improved the Army by leaving it.

Gen. Clark is a brilliant man, and a brave one. A Rhodes scholar, he was decorated three times for heroism as commander of an armor company in Vietnam.

"Those of us who knew him as a captain thought the country would be shortchanged if he didn't rise to very high rank," said a retired Army colonel who was a student of Wesley Clark's when Gen. Clark taught at West Point.

But Gen. Clark's kindergarten teacher probably noted he doesn't play well with others.

Gen. Clark "is able, though not nearly as able as he thinks, and has tended to put his career ahead of his men to the point of excess," said a defense consultant well acquainted with the Army's senior officers. "He is opportunistic and lacks integrity. He will be an absolute menace if he gets into a position where he can exert influence on the Army because he lacks true vision and is prone to be vindictive."

Gen. Clark "regards each and every one of his subordinates as a potential threat to his career," said an officer who served under him when Gen. Clark commanded a brigade of the 4th Infantry Division in the 1980s. An officer who served under Clark when he commanded the 1st Cavalry Division said he was "the poster child for everything that is wrong with the general officer corps."

Gen. Clark doesn't get along terribly well with superiors or with allies either, which lead to his premature departure as commander of NATO.

Gen. Clark was CINCEUR when the Kosovo war began, and bears
much of the responsibility for President Clinton's decision to try to bomb Serb dictator Slobodan Milosevic out of Kosovo. Gen. Clark argued that after a few days of bombing, Mr. Milosevic would fold his tent and slink away. When the Serbs didn't budge after months of bombing, Gen. Clark lost Mr. Clinton's favor.

As the war dragged on, Gen. Clark advocated the use of ground troops. This put him at loggerheads with Gen. Henry Shelton, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and with Gen. Eric Shinseki, chief of staff of the Army, who thought this was a terrible idea. These generals faulted Gen. Clark for getting America into an unnecessary war, and for having done a poor job of preparing for it.

"NATO did not expect a long war," wrote former Clinton national security aide Ivo Daalder. "Worse, it did not even prepare for the possibility."

The conduct of the war drew unprecedented criticism from Gen. Clark's predecessor, Gen. George Joulwan, and a quiet rebellion by subordinate commanders.

"Clark found his control over ongoing operations eroding," wrote retired Army Col. Andrew Bacevich. "Rather than the theater commander, he became hardly more than a kibitzer."

What may have triggered Gen. Clark's early departure from NATO was a confrontation with the British general who was to command NATO peacekeepers.

After a Serb surrender had been negotiated with the help of the Russians, Gen. Clark ordered British Lt. Gen. Michael Jackson to parachute troops onto the airport at the Kosovar capital of Pristina, so NATO would hold it before Russian peacekeepers arrived.

Gen. Jackson refused. "I'm not going to start the Third World War for you," he told Gen. Clark, according to accounts in British newspapers.

Shortly after the confrontation with Gen. Jackson, Gen. Clark was told his tour as CINCEUR would end two months early. Neither Gen. Shelton nor Defense Secretary William Cohen attended his retirement ceremony, a remarkable snub for a four-star general.

Gen. Clark read Mr. Milosevic wrong, helping to provoke the Kosovo war, which he then fought badly. Gen. Clark picked up where he left off in his second career as a television kibitzer of military operations. As an analyst for CNN, Gen. Clark harshly criticized the war plan for Iraq devised by Gen. Tommy Franks, the CENTCOM commander, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Gen. Clark turned out to be completely wrong.

It says something fascinating about the Democratic field that this failed general is the class of it.

Jack Kelly, a syndicated columnist, is a former Marine and Green Beret and a former deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration. He is national security writer for the Pittsburgh (Pa.) Post-Gazette.

[Tsyroc]

Thanks for the info Shep.

[RogueIce]

http://www.washtimes.com/commentary/200 ... -2743r.htm

Tracing Clark's military map
By Jack Kelly

[SNIP]
After a Serb surrender had been negotiated with the help of the Russians, Gen. Clark ordered British Lt. Gen. Michael Jackson to parachute troops onto the airport at the Kosovar capital of Pristina, so NATO would hold it before Russian peacekeepers arrived.

Gen. Jackson refused. "I'm not going to start the Third World War for you," he told Gen. Clark, according to accounts in British newspapers.

So what was it? British tanks or paratroopers? Were the Russians already there or weren't they? Now I'm confused...

[Illuminatus Primus]

I've read several op eds on him, and the general
consensus on Clark is that he improved the army by leaving it.

Are you going to go by those op eds or are you going to blindly follow what your good buddy Michael Moore says.

Did you just call Fatass Shep's buddy?

[Edi]

I see. So just because any plan would have made political fallout, we can't judge them to be "unsound"? What kind of bullshit is that?

We can judge a plan, yes, and Clark's plan was not without flaws, but that does not make it completely worthless either. Stop treating the issue as black and white.

It might help you to know that the Russians were playing a game of chicken with that stunt of theirs and they would have gone ahead and made their bluff a real play if NATO hadn't stood up to them.

How do you know they were playing chicken? The Kremlin said they wouldn't be taking the airport, but the troops did. So how exactly can you be so sure of the game they were playing?

I happened to follow the news about it pretty closely, and you can be sure any confrontation between Russia and NATO or something that would lead to one would be fucking big news here. It isn't that difficult to figure out if you look at a map. The Russians were posturing for all they were worth, some of their firebrands in the Duma talking openly about sending Russian troops to fight NATO forces alongside the Serbs (these clowns were dismissed as blowhards trying to score political points by everyone), and it was quite well known that Russia simply could not have afforded a confrontation. If you don't have the capability or a real motivation to actually go through with what you're threatening, the only option is that you're playing a bluff, and that was exactly the case.

They chose a plan other than Clark's, but even that would have worked.

You don't know that.

I know well enough that I'm definitely going to take Rob's judgment over yours on this issue, because he outlined clearly why it would work.

You've ignored every argument Rob has made against you where he demonstrates why the Clark plan would not have been a failure and was sound considering its parameters and objectives,

Are you for real? I ignored every argument Rob made...like what? I have also shown why Clarks plan is not sound. And the fact it was eventually ignored should sort of tell you it wasn't sound anyway. But if you think it was a sound plan, go ahead and show me why.

The fact that it was eventually ignored is an indication they found a better plan, not that Clark's plan was without any merit. I've acknowledged his plan was not perfect and had flaws, are you going to acknowledge that it did have some points going for it, even if they would have caused more political fallout?

and you keep bleating that your arguments are based on his plan, yet it was like squeezing blood out of a stone to actually get them from you, and they are not nearly as strong as you seem to think.

What do you mean? How was it like squeezing blood from a stone? And how was I bleating?

It took something like four or five posts after Rob's first rebuttal, and Tsyroc's intervention before you started addressing the real meat of the matter (the blood out of a stone bit), and you just kept repeating yourself prior to that (the bleating bit). The record is there for everyone to see, too bad it isn't very flattering to you.

Tsyroc addressed the good parts about them, and there seems to be agreement that the ultimate outcome was better than Clark's plan would have provided, but his plan would also have worked, just not as well.

Again, we do not know if his plan would have worked. Even if it did, it looks like we all agree that it would have generated more political fallout, and a possible military clash. IMO, the plan was crap, and Clark is a moron for suggesting it.

I'll amend my statements and say that his plan had a good chance of working out militarily (and less so politically, as I've said all along). The plan was certainly not optimal, and as generals go, Clark is obviously not the brightest bulb in the box.

The ultimate sticking point at that time was also that despite Russia's tough talk and the seeming importance they put on Serbia, as demonstrated by their backing Slobodan Milosevic as long as they did, they simpoly could not completely antagonize the US and the rest of western Europe. As bad as the political fallout would have been for the West, the political and economic fallout for them would have been many times worse.

That's rational. But I'd argue things which start wars aren't very rational. I mean, who would have thought assassinating two people would spark a world war? Does that seem rational to you?

Not really, not in today's context, but it makes more sense (as much as these things do) when you observe the context of the world at the time, nation-states isolated from each other and orders of magnitude less dependent on each other than today and far more nationalistic and less tolerant, many at a height of power they had rarely known before, so it was easier for them to delude themselves that they could take on all comers if just some would ally with them. The situation nearly a hundred years later is radically different.

You don't have much of a case, and if you want to continue making a moron out of yourself, be my guest, but don't get all huffy when you're smacked down.

I haven't been smaked down Edi. This is the first time you and I are talking, and to be honest, I'm getting a little pissed off with your colourful analogies. If you got upset because I called Rob a moron, know this. I don't like snobs who shove their military experience in my face like it even matters.

The first time we were talking in this thread, yes, but that doesn't mean I can't point out what is clear from the previous posts. I don't give a shit if you don't like my analogies or not, and I couldn't care less if you don't like people using expertise they have in a debate where it's relevant. If I start a thread (or take part in one) which calls for expertise on material physics and stress analysis and related issues and say something that might have some merit coupled with a lot of bullshit (would be easy for me to do on that subject, because I don't know enough about it), I'd not start whining about Mike being a snob when he smacked me down and calling his very relevant expertise irrelevant. If you want to be a whiny primadonna, and you're being one here, don't expect me to treat you as anything other than one.

The people here don't take hostages in these debates, but figuratively shoot to kill on sight of a bad argument, no matter who makes it, and you're making one now.

Shutup you drama Queen.

Getting a little riled up, are you? Well, too bad, the first part of my statement is true, and so is the second one in the sense that the argument you have been making is worse than the one made against you.

Well well well. Look what I just found. From http://edition.cnn.com/WORLD/europe/990 ... son.clark/

<snip article>

I see the Russians were already there. So was it still a sound plan Edi?

Militarily, all things considered, yes. There was an advance force of some 200 Russian troops, and if you think a lightly armed contingent of 200 can hold off a tank force of the size we're talking about, you're deluded. The tank force would have had little trouble securing the airport to prevent more troops from landing, and if it had really come down to a shooting war, those troops would never have gotten even near the airfield in the first place because they'd have been shot down enroute. The political fallout would have been big and ugly, but the Russians had painted themselves into a corner and knew it, which is why they gave up when offered a solution that allowed them to retain their dignity and score some cheap political points both at home and with the Serbs. You're acting as if everything here is just Clark's fault with the Russians just being some force of nature. The truth is somewhere in between. The Russians certainly did their level best to provoke the West over the whole Kosovo issue.

Like Vympel said, what they did ultimately amounted to nothing more than a flashy stunt, and everyone knew it from the get-go. It got them a lot of what they wanted, so in that sense it worked.

With the later additions about Clark's character, I think it can be reasonably concluded he's not anywhere near the best general around and calling him an asshole and moron can be at least partially justified, but as Hobot said, not solely on the basis of the Pristina airport incident.

Edi

[Tsyroc]

Did you just call Fatass Shep's buddy?

Shhhhhhhhh, Shep either missed it or is pretending that comment doesn't exist.

[BoredShirtless]

I see. So just because any plan would have made political fallout, we can't judge them to be "unsound"? What kind of bullshit is that?

We can judge a plan, yes, and Clark's plan was not without flaws, but that does not make it completely worthless either. Stop treating the issue as black and white.

The plan is either sound, or it isn't. What other options are there?

How do you know they were playing chicken? The Kremlin said they wouldn't be taking the airport, but the troops did. So how exactly can you be so sure of the game they were playing?

I happened to follow the news about it pretty closely, and you can be sure any confrontation between Russia and NATO or something that would lead to one would be fucking big news here. It isn't that difficult to figure out if you look at a map. The Russians were posturing for all they were worth, some of their firebrands in the Duma talking openly about sending Russian troops to fight NATO forces alongside the Serbs (these clowns were dismissed as blowhards trying to score political points by everyone), and it was quite well known that Russia simply could not have afforded a confrontation. If you don't have the capability or a real motivation to actually go through with what you're threatening, the only option is that you're playing a bluff, and that was exactly the case.

"Talk is cheap" sort of flew out the window when the Russian troops actually captured the airport, especially considering the Kremlin said they won't be taking it.

Anyway, whether NATO and Russia were playing chicken is sort of irrelevent. The fact is, the Russians were at the airport. As Vympel said, it'd take one idiot to instigate a clash if Clarks plan went ahead.

You don't know that.

I know well enough that I'm definitely going to take Rob's judgment over yours on this issue, because he outlined clearly why it would work.

Fishing with dynamite works. Does that mean it's a good idea? I don't care whether it would have worked. It was a bad idea, and that's what I'm saying.

Are you for real? I ignored every argument Rob made...like what? I have also shown why Clarks plan is not sound. And the fact it was eventually ignored should sort of tell you it wasn't sound anyway. But if you think it was a sound plan, go ahead and show me why.

The fact that it was eventually ignored is an indication they found a better plan, not that Clark's plan was without any merit.

Straw man. I didn't say his plan was without merit. I said it wasn't sound.

I've acknowledged his plan was not perfect and had flaws, are you going to acknowledge that it did have some points going for it, even if they would have caused more political fallout?

Yeah, it had points. But it was a stupid plan overall, and Clark's a .....well, you know by now what I think of him.

What do you mean? How was it like squeezing blood from a stone? And how was I bleating?

It took something like four or five posts after Rob's first rebuttal, and Tsyroc's intervention before you started addressing the real meat of the matter (the blood out of a stone bit), and you just kept repeating yourself prior to that (the bleating bit). The record is there for everyone to see, too bad it isn't very flattering to you.

That's a fucking lie. You've been asked to back your statements up Edi, now do it.

Again, we do not know if his plan would have worked. Even if it did, it looks like we all agree that it would have generated more political fallout, and a possible military clash. IMO, the plan was crap, and Clark is a moron for suggesting it.

I'll amend my statements and say that his plan had a good chance of working out militarily (and less so politically, as I've said all along). The plan was certainly not optimal, and as generals go, Clark is obviously not the brightest bulb in the box.

Moron...not the brightest bulb in the box...so what's the difference?

That's rational. But I'd argue things which start wars aren't very rational. I mean, who would have thought assassinating two people would spark a world war? Does that seem rational to you?

Not really, not in today's context, but it makes more sense (as much as these things do) when you observe the context of the world at the time, nation-states isolated from each other and orders of magnitude less dependent on each other than today and far more nationalistic and less tolerant, many at a height of power they had rarely known before, so it was easier for them to delude themselves that they could take on all comers if just some would ally with them. The situation nearly a hundred years later is radically different.

Yeah. But irrational things still do happen, and I wouldn't want to take the risk of starting something with a bunch of Russians who feel a kinship to the Serbs, both in religion and race. Would you?

I haven't been smaked down Edi. This is the first time you and I are talking, and to be honest, I'm getting a little pissed off with your colourful analogies. If you got upset because I called Rob a moron, know this. I don't like snobs who shove their military experience in my face like it even matters.

The first time we were talking in this thread, yes, but that doesn't mean I can't point out what is clear from the previous posts. I don't give a shit if you don't like my analogies or not, and I couldn't care less if you don't like people using expertise they have in a debate where it's relevant.

Of course I don't have a problem with people who use expertise. But where is it? All I saw was snide flambait. Rob's first post:

Perhaps with your incisive political insight or great military experience you could show us exactly where he acted like a moron and why those actions were wrong?

Or perhaps you'd like to go back to barndoor mudslinging and attacks on people and situations you know nothing about.

If I start a thread (or take part in one) which calls for expertise on material physics and stress analysis and related issues and say something that might have some merit coupled with a lot of bullshit (would be easy for me to do on that subject, because I don't know enough about it), I'd not start whining about Mike being a snob when he smacked me down and calling his very relevant expertise irrelevant. If you want to be a whiny primadonna, and you're being one here, don't expect me to treat you as anything other than one.

I'm not whining you stupid shit. As the quote shows, he was acting like a concecending smartarse. I don't have a problem with people using expertise, but I do have a problem when they rub my nose in it.

Shutup you drama Queen.

Getting a little riled up, are you?

That's almost funny, coming from the same guy who calls Axis Kast everyname under the sun and is so angry with him that he carry's forward his grudge with him to new threads. Or are you just a petty little shit? I can't decide, help me out will you?

Militarily, all things considered, yes. There was an advance force of some 200 Russian troops, and if you think a lightly armed contingent of 200 can hold off a tank force of the size we're talking about, you're deluded. The tank force would have had little trouble securing the airport to prevent more troops from landing, and if it had really come down to a shooting war, those troops would never have gotten even near the airfield in the first place because they'd have been shot down enroute. The political fallout would have been big and ugly, but the Russians had painted themselves into a corner and knew it, which is why they gave up when offered a solution that allowed them to retain their dignity and score some cheap political points both at home and with the Serbs.

Stop beating around the bush. Was the plan sound, considering everything, not just meeting the military objective? When you answer this, remember that Clark is not removed from considering diplomatic reprecussions to his military plans. And also, unlike the analysis above would suggest, the Russians were NOT NATO'S ENEMY! This means analysing the situation purely using military units [tank force against 200 troops] is just plain fucking DUMB!

You're acting as if everything here is just Clark's fault with the Russians just being some force of nature.

Straw man. I said Clarks plan was stupid, not that the Russians are guilt free in taking the airport. I never said that.

The truth is somewhere in between. The Russians certainly did their level best to provoke the West over the whole Kosovo issue.

Red herring, that's got nothing to do with Clarks plan.

Like Vympel said, what they did ultimately amounted to nothing more than a flashy stunt, and everyone knew it from the get-go. It got them a lot of what they wanted, so in that sense it worked.

Yes, it was a flashy stunt. But park tanks on their runway....

[Edi]

The plan is either sound, or it isn't. What other options are there?

Unsound != completely worthless.

"Talk is cheap" sort of flew out the window when the Russian troops actually captured the airport, especially considering the Kremlin said they won't be taking it.

They took the airport yes, does that mean that they still weren't bluffing? Russia was pulling all kinds of stunts aside from that one at the time, and they backed down on all of them.

Anyway, whether NATO and Russia were playing chicken is sort of irrelevent. The fact is, the Russians were at the airport. As Vympel said, it'd take one idiot to instigate a clash if Clarks plan went ahead.

Probably more than one, since I don't think anybody was eager to get into a shooting war and there'd be a real high threshold of actually opening fire. But the risk would have been a lot greater, yes.

You don't know that.

I know well enough that I'm definitely going to take Rob's judgment over yours on this issue, because he outlined clearly why it would work.

Fishing with dynamite works. Does that mean it's a good idea? I don't care whether it would have worked. It was a bad idea, and that's what I'm saying.[/quote]
Yes, I agree with you, it was all in all a bad idea. This is a little different than what you were saying at first, which was an utter dismissal. You'll also notice that I'm not exactly holding quite the position I started out with either.

The fact that it was eventually ignored is an indication they found a better plan, not that Clark's plan was without any merit.

Straw man. I didn't say his plan was without merit. I said it wasn't sound.

What strawman? You were dismissing his plan completely and ignoring the merits it had and focusing only on its flaws, and did not admit to the merits even when they were laid out. But I suppose it'd go into the territory of what we mean by sound/unsound and I'd rather not get into irrelevant semantics.

I've acknowledged his plan was not perfect and had flaws, are you going to acknowledge that it did have some points going for it, even if they would have caused more political fallout?

Yeah, it had points. But it was a stupid plan overall, and Clark's a .....well, you know by now what I think of him.

Yes, I do, and upon reading the article that was posted later, I'm inlcined to agree with you.

That's a fucking lie. You've been asked to back your statements up Edi, now do it.

You didn't address the main arguments Rob made before several posts had gone by, so no lie on my part. I'll admit that I was a bit harsh on you, so my apologies for that.

Moron...not the brightest bulb in the box...so what's the difference?

You don't have to be the best and brightest to be competent, and even someone a little slower can be competent, and they aren't the brightest bulb in the box by definition. The moron is the bulb with the broken tungsten wire, no light at all.

Yeah. But irrational things still do happen, and I wouldn't want to take the risk of starting something with a bunch of Russians who feel a kinship to the Serbs, both in religion and race. Would you?

Not really, since they live right next door, so even if we stayed out of it, we'd get fallout.

Of course I don't have a problem with people who use expertise. But where is it? All I saw was snide flambait.

You'd already told people who disagreed with you to piss off and acted pretty high and mighty yourself (not that I'm defending WP's ad hominems, I'm not, and have expressed my disapproval of his conduct in this thread elsewhere), so he was responding in kind after making his point.

I'm not whining you stupid shit. As the quote shows, he was acting like a concecending smartarse. I don't have a problem with people using expertise, but I do have a problem when they rub my nose in it.

They will definitely rub your nose in it if you act like you're an expert yourself when you're not, and I don't blame them. That sort of thing tends to piss people off, or are you telling me somebody with no practical qualifications at all began to act like an expert concerning your job, for example?

Getting a little riled up, are you?

That's almost funny, coming from the same guy who calls Axis Kast everyname under the sun and is so angry with him that he carry's forward his grudge with him to new threads. Or are you just a petty little shit? I can't decide, help me out will you?

I call Kast names because he readily deserves it on account of his stupidity, and when he uses a bullshit tactic he has used in the past, I'll call him on that too, and he was doing an exact repeat of his earlier bout with me but on Keevan. I don't have to politely stand by and watch him slander people I'm on friendly terms with, and reminding him of what he's done in the past and what it's gotten him (his title). Just so you know, about half the people of any liberal bent in N&P have some kind of vendetta against him, because he acts just like Darkstar, and we just don't care to look at his shit any longer.

Stop beating around the bush. Was the plan sound, considering everything, not just meeting the military objective? When you answer this, remember that Clark is not removed from considering diplomatic reprecussions to his military plans. And also, unlike the analysis above would suggest, the Russians were NOT NATO'S ENEMY! This means analysing the situation purely using military units [tank force against 200 troops] is just plain fucking DUMB!

The plan had some serious flaws, and was not sound compared to available alternatives, one of which was used. Does this answer your question?

You're acting as if everything here is just Clark's fault with the Russians just being some force of nature.

Straw man. I said Clarks plan was stupid, not that the Russians are guilt free in taking the airport. I never said that.

My mistake. Sorry.

The truth is somewhere in between. The Russians certainly did their level best to provoke the West over the whole Kosovo issue.

Red herring, that's got nothing to do with Clarks plan.

Argh, conceded. Has anyone seen the Knights Who Say "Ni!"?

Like Vympel said, what they did ultimately amounted to nothing more than a flashy stunt, and everyone knew it from the get-go. It got them a lot of what they wanted, so in that sense it worked.

Yes, it was a flashy stunt. But park tanks on their runway....

...is another flashy stunt too, and a worse option than the one that got used, yes. We don't disagree all that much, and this thread started pretty much on the wrong foot, no?

Edi

[BoredShirtless]

The plan is either sound, or it isn't. What other options are there?

Unsound != completely worthless.

When I say it's unsound, I don't mean to say it's "completely worthless". Unsound, crap or shit are pretty vague descriptions of something. What you did was you tried to derive a descriptive desciption from a vague one. And unless you clear up the assumptions you'd naturally have to make with me, you may take some wrong turns in your logic. Wrong turn: when I said his plan was shit, I didn't mean it was entirely devoid of any merit.

"Talk is cheap" sort of flew out the window when the Russian troops actually captured the airport, especially considering the Kremlin said they won't be taking it.

They took the airport yes, does that mean that they still weren't bluffing? Russia was pulling all kinds of stunts aside from that one at the time, and they backed down on all of them.

It's not within the realms of impossibility that the Russian government really didn't have control over those troops. They were after all saying one thing, but the troops were doing the opposite. It may have been another game of chicken....but why take the chance?

Fishing with dynamite works. Does that mean it's a good idea? I don't care whether it would have worked. It was a bad idea, and that's what I'm saying.

Yes, I agree with you, it was all in all a bad idea. This is a little different than what you were saying at first, which was an utter dismissal. You'll also notice that I'm not exactly holding quite the position I started out with either.

I'm still utterly dismissing it! But, unlike what you initially believed, me dismissing it doesn't equate to me thinking it's completely worthless. For me, wooden tennis racket are shit. Doesn't mean I'm saying you can't play tennis with them.

Yeah, it had points. But it was a stupid plan overall, and Clark's a .....well, you know by now what I think of him.

Yes, I do, and upon reading the article that was posted later, I'm inlcined to agree with you.

No don't wait for more evidence, live on the edge, and make flippant assessments of Generals to a bunch of military types! It's ok, I swear!

Of course I don't have a problem with people who use expertise. But where is it? All I saw was snide flambait.

You'd already told people who disagreed with you to piss off and acted pretty high and mighty yourself (not that I'm defending WP's ad hominems, I'm not, and have expressed my disapproval of his conduct in this thread elsewhere), so he was responding in kind after making his point.

Get out of here! He called me "a snot nosed fan boy who thinks his experience surfing military websites from his house makes him quite the military strategist." As if I'm gonna let that slide. And how the fuck am I acting high and mighty for firing back?

I'm not whining you stupid shit. As the quote shows, he was acting like a concecending smartarse. I don't have a problem with people using expertise, but I do have a problem when they rub my nose in it.

They will definitely rub your nose in it if you act like you're an expert yourself when you're not, and I don't blame them. That sort of thing tends to piss people off, or are you telling me somebody with no practical qualifications at all began to act like an expert concerning your job, for example?

What are you talking about Edi. Just because I don't agree with someone who has experience in the military, suddenly I'm acting "like an expert"? Unlike Rob and especially WP, I didn't try to dismiss or undermine their arguments based on Appeals to Experience.

Stop beating around the bush. Was the plan sound, considering everything, not just meeting the military objective? When you answer this, remember that Clark is not removed from considering diplomatic reprecussions to his military plans. And also, unlike the analysis above would suggest, the Russians were NOT NATO'S ENEMY! This means analysing the situation purely using military units [tank force against 200 troops] is just plain fucking DUMB!

The plan had some serious flaws, and was not sound compared to available alternatives, one of which was used. Does this answer your question?

Yes, it does.

...is another flashy stunt too, and a worse option than the one that got used, yes. We don't disagree all that much, and this thread started pretty much on the wrong foot, no?

Edi

Yeah. Ok, partly my fault, I shouldn't have been so flippant.