Simple Question ChumpDumper or anybody else....

[clambake]

I don't consider the attacks in Beirut to be terroristic.

good. that way you don't have to call reagan soft.

Why do you argue with ghosts?

i thought the G was for ghost.

[Ignignokt]

And you never answered this question:

Do you think the Marine barracks attack happened in Ohio?

Do you think Beirut bombed the Marines?

[ChumpDumper]

Do you think Beirut bombed the Marines?

Already answered.

Do you think the Marine barracks attack happened in Ohio?

A simple yes or no will suffice.

[Ignignokt]

Already answered.

Do you think the Marine barracks attack happened in Ohio?

A simple yes or no will suffice.

Who said the marine barracks attack happened in Ohio?

Link?

[ChumpDumper]

Who said the marine barracks attack happened in Ohio?

Link?

It's a simple question. Just make yourself clear here since you were the one who brought up Ohio.

Do you think the Marine barracks attack happened in Ohio?

Yes or no.

[PixelPusher]

After all, i was just illustrating absurdity by being absurd.

k.

So you can stop ing about strawmen now.

[jack sommerset]

Do you think Reagan's response to the Marine barracks attack in Beirut, made him soft on terrorism?

This is how you answer a simple question.

No.

[SnakeBoy]

Do you think Reagan's response to the Marine barracks attack in Beirut, made him soft on terrorism?

I don't think so. I think his response simply showed he had better judgement than the last president and the current one.

As 1984 began, it was becoming clearer that the Lebanese army was either unwilling or unable to end the civil war into which we had been dragged reluctantly. It was clear that the war was likely to go on for an extended period of time. As the sniping and s ing of their camp continued, I gave an order to evacuate all the marines to anchored off Lebanon. At the end of March, the ships of the Sixth Fleet and the marines who had fought to keep peace in Lebanon moved on to other assignments. We had to pull out. By then, there was no question about it: Our policy wasn't working. We couldn't stay there and run the risk of another suicide attack on the marines. No one wanted to commit our troops to a full-scale war in the middle East. But we couldn't remain in Lebanon and be in the war on a halfway basis, leaving our men vulnerable to terrorists with one hand tied behind their backs. We hadn't committed the marines to Beirut in a snap decision, and we weren't alone. France, Italy, and Britain were also part of the multinational force, and we all thought it was a good plan. And for a while, as I've said, it had been working.


I'm not sure how we could have anticipated the catastrophe at the marine barracks. Perhaps we didn't appreciate fully enough the depth of the hatred and the complexity of the problems that make the Middle East such a jungle. Perhaps the idea of a suicide car bomber committing mass murder to gain instant entry to Paradise was so foreign to our own values and consciousness that it did not create in us the concern for the marines' safety that it should have. Perhaps we should have anticipated that members of the Lebanese military whom we were trying to assist would simply lay down their arms and refuse to fight their own countrymen. In any case, the sending of the marines to Beirut was the source of my greatest regret and my greatest sorrow as president. Every day since the death of those boys, I have prayed for them and their loved ones.


In the months and the years that followed, our experience in Lebanon led to the adoption by the administration of a set of principles to guide America in the application of military force abroad, and I would recommend it to future presidents. The policy we adopted included these principles:


1.) The United States should not commit its forces to military action overseas unless the cause is vital to our national interest.


2.) If the decision is made to commit our forces to combat abroad, it must be done with the clear intent and support needed to win. It should not be a halfway or tentative commitment, and there must be clearly defined and realistic objectives.


3.) Before we commit our troops to combat, there must be reasonable assurance that the cause we are fighting for and the actions we take will have the support of the American people and Congress. (We all felt that the Vietnam War had turned into such a tragedy because military action had been undertaken without sufficient assurances that the American people were behind it.)


4.) Even after all these other tests are met, our troops should be committed to combat abroad only as a last resort, when no other choice is available.


-Ronald Reagan

[Winehole23]

Both of you guys are wrong.


According to your stipulations that deny Hasan's acts from being terroristic, the marine attacks were not terroristic because they were not being aimed at civilians, but marines.

I never denied Hasan's acts were terroristic. I just asked the posters who said it's obvious to state their definitions of terrorism and show how it applies to the case. SnC is the only poster who even tried, and he failed miserably. All I said was convince me. I'm pretty sure there's a good argument out there somewhere. Too bad SpursTalk security trolls don't have one. You sure don't, gtown.

You could say, that this is different because the attacks were committed by foreigners. Well, then that's silly because that disqualifies Timothy Mcveigh from being terrorist.

False dilemma. Terrorists can be foreign or domestic.

So the former disqualifies the attack on the pentagon on 911 as being terrorist, and the latter disqualifies Timothy McVeigh.

Federal law doesn't.

In conclusion, according to your prerequisites of terrorism, Reagan was neither soft nor hard on terrorism

I actually said something like this, but in your zeal to rip your own strawman to pieces, you seem not to have noticed.

Your set piece failed on delivery. So did your hysterical attempts to resuscitate it, page after page.

Hope you had fun. I thought it was pitiful.

[Winehole23]

i don't think so. I think his response simply showed he had better judgement than the last president and the current one.

+1

[Winehole23]

1.) The United States should not commit its forces to military action overseas unless the cause is vital to our national interest.

Being peacekeepers in Lebanon wasn't. The attack on US troops there did not make it more so.

2.) If the decision is made to commit our forces to combat abroad, it must be done with the clear intent and support needed to win. It should not be a halfway or tentative commitment, and there must be clearly defined and realistic objectives.

Both of these conditions are absent in Afghanistan.

3.) Before we commit our troops to combat, there must be reasonable assurance that the cause we are fighting for and the actions we take will have the support of the American people and Congress. (We all felt that the Vietnam War had turned into such a tragedy because military action had been undertaken without sufficient assurances that the American people were behind it.)

The USA probably wouldn't have supported involvement in the Lebanese Civil War. GWB would say he doesn't run the country on the basis of polls, but Reagan took popular and Congressional support seriously.

4.) Even after all these other tests are met, our troops should be committed to combat abroad only as a last resort, when no other choice is available.

Reagan may not have been tough on terrorism, but he was tough-minded about it. US national interests came before *tuff* posturing and macho cries for vengeance. Too bad 9/11 turned our brains into porridge.