singrdave

Join Date 07/2004

The Okinawa Option

There's no IEDs on the other side of Asia! >WHEW!<

From Sunday's Meet the Press, Murtha and Russert having a sit-down. Apparently the good Mr. Murtha is on crack:

MR. RUSSERT: You say redeploy. Again, Mr. Rove challenges that comment.

Let's listen and give you again a chance to respond to the White House.

(Videotape, Monday):

MR. ROVE: Congressman Murtha said, "Let's redeploy them immediately to another country in the Middle East. Let's get out of Iraq and go to another country." My question is, what country would take us? What country would say after the United States cut and run from Iraq, what country in the Middle East would say, "Yeah. Paint a big target on our back and then you'll cut and run on us." What country would say that? What country would accept our troops?

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: What's your response?

REP. MURTHA: There's many countries understand the importance of stability in the Middle East. This is an international problem. We, we use 20 million barrels of oil a day. China's the second largest user. All these countries understand you need stability for the energy supply that's available in the Middle East. So there's many, many countries.

MR. RUSSERT: Who?

REP. MURTHA: Kuwait's one that will take us. Qatar, we already have bases in Qatar. So Bahrain. All those countries are willing to take the United States. Now, Saudi Arabia won't because they wanted us out of there in the first place. So -- and we don't have to be right there. We can go to Okinawa. We, we don't have -- we can redeploy there almost instantly. So that's not -- that's, that's a fallacy. That, that's just a statement to rile up people to support a failed policy wrapped in illusion.

MR. RUSSERT: But it'd be tough to have a timely response from Okinawa.

REP. MURTHA: Well, it -- you know, they -- when I say Okinawa, I, I'm saying troops in Okinawa. When I say a timely response, you know, our fighters can fly from Okinawa very quickly. And -- and -- when they don't know we're coming. There's no question about it. And, and where those airplanes won't -- came from I can't tell you, but, but I'll tell you one thing, it doesn't take very long for them to get in with cruise missiles or with, with fighter aircraft or, or attack aircraft, it doesn't take any time at all. So we, we have done -- this one particular operation, to say that that couldn't have done, done -- it was done from the outside, for heaven's sakes.

Okay, either Jack Murtha needs to reevaluate his priorities or he needs a geography lesson. It's absolutely ridiculous to consider a redeployment to Okinawa, since 1) it's 7,000 miles from Iraq and 2) we're currently drawing down our Okinawa presence. Sending a cruise missile in from the Sea of Japan is no way to help the Iraqis clean up the mess we would have left in our wake.

This is an unrealistic, cowardly strategy and I would love to see the Democratic Party HQ embrace it. Let's get Jack Murtha's plan on the Democratic flagpole this November and see how many people salute THAT. In the meantime, we owe it to Jack Murtha to keep this quote (direct quote, mind you, in context) in the public eye.

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Island Dog

Join Date 06/2003

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Yeah, but why Okinawa? Does he have fond memories of his time in the Marines on Okinawa or something?

Why not say "Savannah, Georgia" or "Germany"? They're even closer to Iraq than Okinawa!

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Dang, you fast, Dog. :

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Murtha needs to look in the mirror and ask himself how he and others like him and their desire to paciify and placate terrorists like the scum and killed Pfc. Kristian Menchaca and Pfc. Thomas L. Tucker will feel if he gets his way.

Then he needs to take his fat useless self out of the way and let people with guts, brains, and integrity do the jobs that need doing in Iraq even now -- especially now.

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http://moderateman.joeuser.com/index.asp?AID=121304

sure do not forget to redeploy these two men while you are at it Bagdad Murtha!

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I think it's even more hilarious that he tries to be logical in his presentation. See for yourself.

here's many countries understand the importance of stability in the Middle East. This is an international problem. We, we use 20 million barrels of oil a day. China's the second largest user. All these countries understand you need stability for the energy supply that's available in the Middle East. So there's many, many countries.

OK, at this point I can see where he's going. But look who he uses for examples of oil-needy countries that welcome US presence...

REP. MURTHA: Kuwait's one that will take us. Qatar, we already have bases in Qatar. So Bahrain. All those countries are willing to take the United States.

Huh? Qatar needs Iraqi oil? Bahrain? Umm, those are already oil-rich nations, Rep. Murtha (D-PA). How about some other willing, oil-starved neighbors?

Now, Saudi Arabia won't because they wanted us out of there in the first place. So -- and we don't have to be right there. We can go to Okinawa. We, we don't have -- we can redeploy there almost instantly.

So he went straight from Saudi Arabia (Iraq's other oil-rich neighbor, this time to the south) to Okinawa?! An island in the South China Sea, half a world away? What? That's the next best option? Admittedly, Okinawa has no oil, and it's not a Muslim nation, but it's hardly close to Iraq!

I fail to see the mental pathway Mr. Murtha took.

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Could he have meant Oman? But his response indicates his senility when he insisted upon it after being questioned by Russert on that one.

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But Oman has oil, too... I still fail to see what COL Jackie was thinking.

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I still fail to see what COL Jackie was thinking.

AH! I see your problem. You are trying to discern what he was thinking. And there is the flaw. Like all the loony left, he does not think.

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Doesn't think well on his feet, does he? I'm amazed that he wasn't calling for our pullout there when the Okinawans were demanding it and when some of soldiers were accused of rape and other crimes there. The idea that they want us there is insane, given their periodic declarations of the opposite...

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Okinawa? Okinawa is five time zones away -- over 5,000 miles from Baghdad. And that's considering a straight flight, which unfortunately means we would have to violate Chinese airspace for about half of the trip. Do you suppose the Chinese would give us access to their airspace if we explained that this huge mission of military bombers and fighters would pass through quickly on their way to Iraq?

Is John Murtha really that dumb?

Anyone lacking even the geographical notions of strategic deployment, anyone who cannot read a map and see a very large hostile nation between a staging area and a target and not discern a problem, is someone who has absolutely disqualified himself as any sort of military expert. The question for Democrats is why they keep putting Murtha out as their defense expert when he can make statements like this with a straight face. It reveals the utter lack of military scholarship on their part when their two most hailed experts on military affairs are a man who cannot see why Okinawa might be a bad place for a staging ground for Southwest Asia, and a man who wants to turn over Iraqi sovereignty to Iran and Syria.

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It turns out that Murtha wasn't winging it at all with his Okinawa Option -- he proposed it last December!

They keep saying the terrorists are going to control Iraq -- no way. Al Qaida's only 7 percent of the people in Iraq and doing this fighting. The terrorists -- there's several factions, but let's say Al Qaida is 7 percent at the very most.

Iraq will get rid of them because they'll tell the Iraqis where they are and it will be the end of the terrorist activity.

Now, my plan says redeploy to the periphery, to Kuwait, to Okinawa, and if there's a terrorist activity that affects our allies or affects the United States' national security, we can then go back in.

This was no misstatement on national TV! This shows that Murtha has thought this through. And he has absolutely no concept of deployments or strategic geography. You know, deploying men takes a lot of preparation. Each man needs one gallon of water per day, especially in that area of the world. If you have to deploy 300 men for ten days, transporting 3,000 gallons of water is not a big problem. If, however, the US needs to send 30,000 men for just ten days, it needs to transport 300,000 gallons of water for them to survive their deployment -- and water is just one of the many critical needs that Logistics has to resolve in any deployment. Other nagging items include material such as ammunition, weapons, artillery, armored personnel carriers, tanks ...

And all the way from Okinawa. Good plan, COL Jack.

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