Can you support out troops and still be against the war?

How can we hold these young men and women responsible for the misguidence of our govt? They went into the armed forces for various reasons, they knew there was a possibility of war, but i don't think they knew what Bush had in store for them.
I can support them, respect them for doing their jobs, and love them, but i don't have to support Bush's war, it's not their fault.

Amen to that!

icono1

The troops where sent in by Congress at the request of the President et al.. The whole rush to judgment by the American body politic was partially to curry favor with the white house and to individually position themselves as true patriots which, by calculation, would give them an advantage during the next election over any challenger. The soldier by contrast is bound by 'duty' (contract) to go where ordered by the pentagon, which is told by congress where to go, and as such has no 'immediate' politically binding vote, as a block, as to either go or not to go to war. So personally I can support the troops in the field without supporting our govt's policy of war. Our politician's should always be held accountable for what they say and do. Also, if we the people, allow our elected politician's to send in troops to fight an ill advised war, then we the people need to hold the politicians accountable for such a failure of policy and vote them out.

No you cannot support our troops and not support their mission. They believe in their mission, and they will not respect your half-hearted support.

Support the troops by getting less of them killed. I think most people would respect that kind of support.

So, if there are fewer deaths overall while ultimately conceding defeat as a result, that is acceptable to you? I wonder how all the soldiers that have made the ultimate sacrifice would interpret your support when they realized their sacrifices were for nothing simply because you didn't have the constitution to see it through. I support the troops and I say that without hesitation because I support their mission as so many did for my brothers in '91.

-Castle

\

I disagree. There are those in the military who disagree with the mission in Iraq. Not everyone in the military believes in the mission. Don't believe me? Read the letters to the editor in the Stars and Stripes, visit some of the military blogs and forums that people in the military hang out in. But they all put that aside and do their duty to support their fellow troops who are in harms way. That goes for family members and friends of the troops also. That is what is important and that is supporting the troops.

I would just end the discussion here sqt schultz holds a good point and what would be the point of arguing any further~

You can certainly disagree with the war yet support our troops and demand victory.

Exactly. What I've been trying to get across this entire thread.

Demand a Victory over an Ideology?


can you explain that to us? we waged war against an ideology not a country or peoples..........

there can be NO clear Victory therefore

It worked against the ideologies of Communism, Fascism, and Nazism.

Hey Folks

Only a disconnected fool who has no idea about the military could say there's a difference between supporting the mission and the man.

how??????????????

................can you support our country and our troops but not the war





we must not lose !!!



all the troops are our lives blood we need to get some help from IRAQ and OTHER COUNTRYS we SHOULD pull back to the borders of syria and iran ..........that would stop the problems in iraq

REally?

so your saying to me then.............
that in this world there are NO FASCISTS?

and there are NO Nazis

and there are NO communists?

winning and DEFEATING the IDELOGY means ERADICATING the IDEOLOGY


can you clearly demonstrate the VICTORIES and ELIMINTATION of the idelogies you listed?

NO of course not ......WHY

becuase they are IDELOGIES and they STILL LIVE in the minds of men and women around the globe
In all three instances you have listed we were at war with a COUNTRY not an Ideology and besides all 3 of those ideologies are alive and flourishing in todays world

nice attempt though

Shooter Cheney has declared in so many words that HE and JUNIOR are going to hold the troops hostage to get the funding for the occupation for profit.
He has threatened over and over that HE will see to it that if the occupation funding ends THEY WILL be in danger.
Apparently congress has decided to pay the ransom to keep most of them alive.

You can't be against the mission and support the people carrying it out. I'm reminded of Joel Stein's article in the LA Times:

"Warriors and wusses
By JOEL STEIN
January 24, 2006

I don't support our troops. This is a particularly difficult opinion to have, especially if you are the kind of person who likes to put bumper stickers on his car.

Supporting the troops is a position that even Calvin is unwilling to urinate on.

I'm sure I'd like the troops. They seem gutsy, young and up for anything. If you're wandering into a recruiter's office and signing up for eight years of unknown danger, I want to hang with you in Vegas.

And I've got no problem with other people -- the ones who were for the Iraq war -- supporting the troops. If you think invading Iraq was a good idea, then by all means, support away. Load up on those patriotic magnets and bracelets and other trinkets the Chinese are making money off of.

But I'm not for the war. And being against the war and saying you support the troops is one of the wussiest positions the pacifists have ever taken -- and they're wussy by definition. It's as if the one lesson they took away from Vietnam wasn't to avoid foreign conflicts with no pressing national interest but to remember to throw a parade afterward.

Blindly lending support to our soldiers, I fear, will keep them overseas longer by giving soft acquiescence to the hawks who sent them there -- and who might one day want to send them somewhere else. Trust me, a guy who thought 50.7% was a mandate isn't going to pick up on the subtleties of a parade for just service in an unjust war. He's going to be looking for funnel cake.

Besides, those little yellow ribbons aren't really for the troops. They need body armor, shorter stays and a USO show by the cast of "Laguna Beach."

The real purpose of those ribbons is to ease some of the guilt we feel for voting to send them to war and then making absolutely no sacrifices other than enduring two Wolf Blitzer shows a day. Though there should be a ribbon for that.

I understand the guilt. We know we're sending recruits to do our dirty work, and we want to seem grateful.

After we've decided that we made a mistake, we don't want to blame the soldiers who were ordered to fight. Or even our representatives, who were deceived by false intelligence. And certainly not ourselves, who failed to object to a war we barely understood.

But blaming the president is a little too easy. The truth is that people who pull triggers are ultimately responsible, whether they're following orders or not. An army of people making individual moral choices may be inefficient, but an army of people ignoring their morality is horrifying. An army of people ignoring their morality, by the way, is also Jack Abramoff's pet name for the House of Representatives.

I do sympathize with people who joined up to protect our country, especially after 9/11, and were tricked into fighting in Iraq. I get mad when I'm tricked into clicking on a pop-up ad, so I can only imagine how they feel.

But when you volunteer for the U.S. military, you pretty much know you're not going to be fending off invasions from Mexico and Canada. So you're willingly signing up to be a fighting tool of American imperialism, for better or worse. Sometimes you get lucky and get to fight ethnic genocide in Kosovo, but other times it's Vietnam.

And sometimes, for reasons I don't understand, you get to just hang out in Germany.

I know this is all easy to say for a guy who grew up with money, did well in school and hasn't so much as served on jury duty for his country. But it's really not that easy to say because anyone remotely affiliated with the military could easily beat me up, and I'm listed in the phone book.

I'm not advocating that we spit on returning veterans like they did after the Vietnam War, but we shouldn't be celebrating people for doing something we don't think was a good idea. All I'm asking is that we give our returning soldiers what they need: hospitals, pensions, mental health and a safe, immediate return. But, please, no parades.

Seriously, the traffic is insufferable."

Supporting the troops means that you wish them the best. You want them to be given an obtainable goal with an exit strategy.

You don't want incompetence and poor planning and misunderstanding of the region by their Commander and Chief. You don't want their vehicles to lack proper armor. And you don't want their tours extended longer & longer.

So the answer is obviously yes... you can support the troops and not support the mission because the mission is not their fault and you truly in your heart want them out of a endless religious Civil War and back home safely with their families.

Are they still a threat? No, Nazism, Communism, and Fascism are no longer threats. They have been minimized -- marginalized to the point of insignificance. We should strive to do the same with the 21st century ideology of terrorism.

I didnt know a jarhead could think,let alone type.

Now,I can say that because I am a retired FMF corpsman,last assigned with the 15th MEU in Nassiriyah Iraq.

As for supporting the troops,ANYTHING that gives our enemies hop,be it calling for our withdrawal,a timetable,or anything that can let the enemy think we are weak is NOT supporting me or my comrades.

You dont need to send me letters and "care packages",but dont say anything against me or my brothers either.
The enemy hears everything the anti-war crowd is saying,and they will use it as a weapon.