The American Spectator : The Spectacle Blog : Re: Is Obama Telling Tall Tales?

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The Spectacle Blog

Re: Is Obama Telling Tall Tales?

By J.P. Freire on 2.22.08 @ 2:01PM

Oh, and by the way, money quotes:

...[Obama] remarks that the platoon was under-strength because 15 of its men had been "sent to Iraq." Sorry, the Army doesn't work that way. Platoons are organic units, consisting of three rifle squads, a heavy weapons squad, and a headquarters section. You can't break it up. It is the smallest building block in the infantry that can conduct fire-and-movement tactics.

But Stuart! You don't understand. Obama transcends the norms of American military strategy!

To the best of my knowledge, no U.S. forces in either Afghanistan or Iraq ever ran out of ammunition for more than a few hours at most.

They also have never run out of hope.

As for not having enough HMMWVs, that's understandable, when you consider what it takes to get a HMMWV to Afghanistan and then to keep it up and running. Fact is, no unit ever has enough HMMWVs (in its own mind, at least), just as in World War II, no unit had enough Jeeps. Again, that we have managed to sustain our forces in Afghanistan so well is cause for congratulations not criticism.

Stuart is being so earnest I feel like I have to snark for him. It's simple. The Democratic candidates believe that the military has only accomplished great things when it is so armed to the teeth that no soldier can stand under the weight of his own gear.

I do find it weird though. This is the party that feels that our troops are scaring Iraqi families in the middle of the night (as John Kerry, I believe, once put it). Maybe they think that if they're going to do it, they should do it with more firepower?

topics:
Military, Iraq