Non sequitur

Conventional warfare, yes. We excel at that. Asymmetrical warfare requires us to have the stones to do ANYTHING and EVERYTHING that is necessary. We don't. We proved it time and again.

I guess we are going to differ on that. We will go into war with one hand tied behind our backs. When we fight, we should have a "no holds barred" approach.

If we didn't in Tora Bora, what makes you think we will?

Hence, one hand tied behind our backs.

Could they have slaughtered every man, woman and child? Yes. However, like us in many other conflicts since WWII, we have chosen to play politics and fight a limited war when others are not. Bring a knife to a gun fight and you lose. Yes, you have a huge arsenal in your basement. Good for you. Doesn't matter. If you bring your knife and he brings a gun, you lose. PERIOD.

:confused: I'm no military expert, but I doubt that it is as simple as that.

What do you propose, heavy bombardment? Followed by what?

I can't believe we are having this conversation. Are people in this country really serious about starting a war with Iran? I don't mean to be disrespectful, but that seems completely insane to me.

aklim and hatterasguy are talking about nuclear war in the Middle East as if that might be a pretty cool thing, just to see what happens over there. Are you guys serious about that?

So the better approach would have been for Isreal to slaughter every man, woman, and child? Seems a tad harsh.

Something like that might cripple Iran which supplies our friends in Iraq so at worst, it might give them a headache and divert their attention. If they kill each other, what have we lost? I'm sure we would lose an ally there but oh well.

Yes, I suppose you are right. We should abide by The Marquess of Queensberry rules. After all, Hezbollah has manufactured bombs that only go off on soldiers. Never civillians. It isn't Lebanon's fault for giving them sanctuary either. :rolleyes: Lebanon is having a hard time from a bad childhood. Mommy and Daddy didn't love them enough, blah, blah, blah.

If I were Israel, I would ask, How were they NOT the enemy? They gave aid and shelter to the enemy, they even had the enemy in PUBLIC OFFICE, what makes them separate from the enemy? They don't restrain themselves, why should we? They take hostages and in so doing, Lebanon takes hostages. What makes Lebanon NOT the enemy? Just because you are not holding the AK-47 and wearing the bomb vest doesn't make you a civilian. If you aid the guy, you are as responsible. He dies, you die. Again, I'm sorry that the idea of your army meeting my army on a deserted field of battle has died out.

We can't afford another war, literally.

Not at the way we fight it with one hand tied behind and a ball and chain on the other leg. OTOH, if Israel wants to do it for us and wipes them out, who are we to say "No" you cannot?

All Isreal has to do is send in the wimmins again and win this in seven days!

According to the Bible, there's a precedent. I think that going after crops, farm animals and wells is okay, too.

They can win in 7 days but only if they don't fight in a restricted fashion. It moves, shoot it. Still moves, shoot again.

I never said we should go to war with Iran, the ability to and actualy doing it are two different things. However the ability to, makes the threat real and is very usefull, in this case more usefull than actualy using it.

I have for quite a few years now viewed Iran as a problem that will eventualy solve itself. As Bot said the people are pretty liberal and forward thinking, and not big fans of the currant government. All this smoke from the currant guys in power is a bid to unit the people to deflect crap from them. If we do something dumb like drop bombs they win, if we do what Obama wants and start talking to the currant nut jobs we piss the people of Iran off. We have the luxury of time on our side, they don't, as the older generation dies off the call for change is going to get louder.

Iran is a problem best solved with political and maybe some economic pressure, and possible in the future some CIA and $$$ aid to the right group. IMHO the worst thing we can do other than drop bombs on them is try to be friendly with the currant nut jobs in power. That would really piss the people off, as we have seen and done before in this area of the world. No we need to keep pissing them off and letting them go down this path. They have no intention of actualy shooting anything.

IMHO all we need to do with Iran is sit back and poke at the currant government for the next 20 years until it falls apart. Than get friendly with the more moderate government that replaces them.

That's true. I kind of mixed up several posts in my response. I was commenting on your previous comment about somebody nuking nuking somebody else over there.Sounds right to me.

You have to nuke something!

Nuke the whales!:D