Rand Paul op-ed: ‘I Am Not an Isolationist’

[kylejack]

I'm not saying that war is justified for humanitarian reasons only, just that your concern about civilian casualties isn't valid when ISIS was already slaughtering civilians by the thousands. If you want to oppose the air strikes because you think they won't work or because you don't think ISIS is actually a threat to our security, that's a valid argument and valid debate to have. But the collateral damage argument doesn't hold up when ISIS is already indiscriminately killing innocent people.

Saddam Hussein indiscriminately killed innocent people. That's why Cheney said we would be greeted as liberators. And did that happen? No. We made a lot more enemies including ISIS itself, because war's victims are many more than what is calculated by armchair generals.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

I'm only in favor of air strikes against ISIS, not ground troops.

Why? Because:

1. It's cheaper
2. It's faster
3. It's safer
4. It seems to you to have less lasting consequences.

But a dead man, or a dead wife, or a dead child, is still a dead man, or a dead wife, or a dead child. There are very real and serious consequences to bombing people and property.

An airplane is like a super-berserker. Get in, rampage, wreck havoc, get out. Before that, tanks were the super-berserkers. You don't need to march a whole battalion in and worry about scouting things out, logistics, carefully choosing and defending camp sites every night on the way to the final destination 50 miles away, etc. You just hit the throttle, blaze in, blast everything to smithereens, and zip back home.

It would make no sense to say "I'm for sending in tanks, but not infantry." Well, actually, it would make a lot of sense, but as a tactical statement, not a policy statement. Using tanks and not infantry is not a foreign policy. Airplanes is just tanks to the next level.

What if we had long-range lasers? Would you say:

"Oh, these guys whoever they are are not-nice guys, very not-nice. They are taunting us, even, and being meanypants. We need to take action and destroy them. I support siccing the lasers on them, destroying all their towns and families with lasers. But not sending actual airplanes over, oh no, not that. That's a full blown war, like the ISIS war we had a few years back. We'll get bogged down for years and spend trillions. That would be dumb. This time, we're smarter. Just lasers."

 

[Brett85]

So then I guess you also think we should go get involved in the Congo, where militias are taking territory and killing a lot of innocent people. Sorry, but I don't want the US to be the world's policeman. We have enough troubles of our own.

You know who is not contained in their own country? The US military. Maybe they should go back to protecting our country.

I don't want to be the world's policeman either. I only support military action against ISIS because I believe they're a threat to launch attacks against America.

 

[Brett85]

Saddam Hussein indiscriminately killed innocent people. That's why Cheney said we would be greeted as liberators. And did that happen? No. We made a lot more enemies including ISIS itself, because war's victims are many more than what is calculated by armchair generals.

I'm not saying that a country or a regime killing innocent people is reason enough for us to intervene or go to war. I'm just saying that when you bring up the issue of collateral damage with air strikes, you have to keep in mind that the people who are accidentally killed would've been killed by ISIS anyway had we not intervened. These aren't people who would be alive had we not launched air strikes.

 

[kylejack]

I'm not saying that a country or a regime killing innocent people is reason enough for us to intervene or go to war. I'm just saying that when you bring up the issue of collateral damage with air strikes, you have to keep in mind that the people who are accidentally killed would've been killed by ISIS anyway had we not intervened. These aren't people who would be alive had we not launched air strikes.

It's a question of who gets blamed. If our bombs kill people, they blame us (generally because the US military doesn't know how to do a limited campaign.)

 

[Brett85]

It's a question of who gets blamed. If our bombs kill people, they blame us (generally because the US military doesn't know how to do a limited campaign.)

I understand your argument. I think so far the air strikes have been pretty targeted, rather than just bombing indiscriminately. That's my view on what we should do, targeted airstrikes but not bombing indiscriminately. I don't think we should target large urban population centers.

 

[cajuncocoa]

No, no, Natural Citizen can tell you: it's four-dimensional chess.

Listen to Tom Woods' comments on the clip I posted. Tom thinks Rand really is sound and libertarian. But he's playing the political game, and sometimes he's being dishonest.

I agree. I think that Rand really is a non-interventionist. Or at least he was, before he ran for Senate. That is: for his entire life, until 2009. He was not just putting on an act for 40 years. He really and truly was a true-blue libertarian. But this is a dangerous game he's playing. He's playing with fire. Dishonesty is corrupting. Will he become what he's pretending to be? That's a real risk.

He needs to bring Tom Woods into his inner circle. He needs a voice of conscience. That doesn't mean he can't be very eloquent and careful in what he says. But he needs to surround himself with people of character, like Tom Woods, and be a person of character himself. He needs to ditch the John Tates and Jesse Bentons of this world. Just cut ties. Let them go. He doesn't need them, they need him.

+rep

 

[Brett85]

No, no, Natural Citizen can tell you: it's four-dimensional chess.

Listen to Tom Woods' comments on the clip I posted. Tom thinks Rand really is sound and libertarian. But he's playing the political game, and sometimes he's being dishonest.

I agree. I think that Rand really is a non-interventionist. Or at least he was, before he ran for Senate. That is: for his entire life, until 2009. He was not just putting on an act for 40 years. He really and truly was a true-blue libertarian. But this is a dangerous game he's playing. He's playing with fire. Dishonesty is corrupting. Will he become what he's pretending to be? That's a real risk.

He needs to bring Tom Woods into his inner circle. He needs a voice of conscience. That doesn't mean he can't be very eloquent and careful in what he says. But he needs to surround himself with people of character, like Tom Woods, and be a person of character himself. He needs to ditch the John Tates and Jesse Bentons of this world. Just cut ties. Let them go. He doesn't need them, they need him.

Everything that I've read about Rand suggests that he's less hawkish than the Republican Party as a whole but has never entirely agreed with Ron's foreign policy. Eric Dondero has said that Ron and Rand use to have knock down drag out fights over foreign policy. He is kind of a nut, and maybe you don't think his claims are credible. But I also remember Ron saying in an interview that Rand challenged his views more than any of his other children.

 

[Peace&Freedom]

I'm not saying that a country or a regime killing innocent people is reason enough for us to intervene or go to war. I'm just saying that when you bring up the issue of collateral damage with air strikes, you have to keep in mind that the people who are accidentally killed would've been killed by ISIS anyway had we not intervened. These aren't people who would be alive had we not launched air strikes.

So, on the basis of SPECULATING that the people would be killed anyway, it's okay for the US to launch air strikes that will DEFINITELY kill them? This is neurosis as foreign policy. And what if the only reason ISIS is killing people, is in order to provide a pretext for the US to perform the air strikes it wanted to do all along?

The US trained, equipped and funded ISIS. The common 'blowback' notion is "then they went rogue," but I see no evidence that ISIS ever stopped being an asset of US/Western intelligence. Their job, like al Qaeda before them, has been to perform false-flag/black ops to justify new or resumed US intervention in the Mid-east. Only when we completely remove ourselves from the theater (both military ops, and all the covert ops) will the killing stop.

 

[Brett85]

So, on the basis of SPECULATING that the people would be killed anyway, it's okay for the US to launch air strikes that will DEFINITELY kill them? This is neurosis as foreign policy. And what if the only reason ISIS is killing people, is in order to provide a pretext for the US to perform the air strikes it wanted to do all along?

The US trained, equipped and funded ISIS. The common 'blowback' notion is "then they went rouge," but I see no evidence that ISIS ever stopped being an asset of US/Western intelligence. Their job, like al Qaeda before them, has been to perform false-flag/black ops to justify new or resumed US intervention in the Mid-east. Only when we completely remove ourselves from the theater (both military ops, and all the covert ops) will the killing stop.

I'm not that much of a conspiracy theorist. I think that U.S intervention is responsible for the rise of ISIS, but I think it was just unintended consequences and not something deliberate. Our government is just stupid.

 

[Acala]

ISIS was slaughtering people by the tens of thousands, and there would've been a full scale massacre had we not intervened with air strikes. Our air strikes will kill some innocent people, but not nearly as many as ISIS would kill if we just left the situation alone. The air strikes are saving lives overall, so opposing the air strikes because of the possibility of collateral damage doesn't make sense.

It is not the proper role of the US government to police the world.

 

[Acala]

I don't want to be the world's policeman either. I only support military action against ISIS because I believe they're a threat to launch attacks against America.

You say you don't want to be the world's policeman but your real justification here has come out in several posts - you think they are evil and they have killed a bunch of people so it is okay for us to intervene. And I think if you were honest, you would admit that you have religious motivations as well.

You have yet to articulate any manner in which ISIS is a credible threat to the USA in any way that can be contained by another violent attack by the USA in that region.

 

[twomp]

You sound like Cheney right now talking about the horrors of the Saddam Hussein regime. Gassed his own people, slaughtered innocent civilians, yada yada yada. Sorry, but I'm not a fan of humanitarian war and making new enemies.

TC claims not to be a neo-con but uses all of their talking points.
Lies.... check
Fabricated facts... check
Fear mongering... check
Wanting America to go to war in the middle east... check
Dropping bombs for peace... check

Bombing for peace is like having sex for virginity.

 

[Brett85]

You say you don't want to be the world's policeman but your real justification here has come out in several posts - you think they are evil and they have killed a bunch of people so it is okay for us to intervene.

No, that's not the case. I'm not for intervening for humanitarian reasons. That's why I was opposed to the air strikes at first, because I thought it was simply a humanitarian mission. I was only pointing out that opposing the air strikes because of fear of collateral damage doesn't make much sense when ISIS is already murdering innocent people by the thousands.

 

[cajuncocoa]

Isn't this adorable?

 

[twomp]

Isn't this adorable?

It's heart warming to see the GOP unite against a common threat.

 

[cajuncocoa]

It's heart warming to see the GOP unite against a common threat.

Very....let's see, what word am I looking for? Oh, right....gratifying.

 

[MaxHen]

No, that's not the case. I'm not for intervening for humanitarian reasons. That's why I was opposed to the air strikes at first, because I thought it was simply a humanitarian mission. I was only pointing out that opposing the air strikes because of fear of collateral damage doesn't make much sense when ISIS is already murdering innocent people by the thousands.

If a murderer was going around killing people, would it be justified for you to drop a bomb on his house if it meant killing innocents who live near him? Killing innocents is unjustified when ISIS does it, and unjustified when we do it. End of story.

Since you keep claiming that ISIS is a national security threat, please explain two things:

1. The type of attack you think ISIS might launch against the US.

2. How airstrikes will prevent them from launching such an attack.

If you can't explain both of those things, then you can't show that the current bombing campaign is protecting our national security. Since you've said that's the reason you support airstrikes, failure to adequately, coherently, and comprehensively explain both of those things would invalidate your entire argument. Either explain in full WHY airstrikes will protect our national security against ISIS, or stop claiming that they will.

 

[Peace&Freedom]

I'm not that much of a conspiracy theorist. I think that U.S intervention is responsible for the rise of ISIS, but I think it was just unintended consequences and not something deliberate. Our government is just stupid.

The government is not stupid or incompetent when it comes to doing things that further expands or centralizes its power, or Empire---on that front, it is mercilously efficient. It is not a theory, it is a fact that ISIS was trained, funded and controlled by the US. The fact is the US tried the quick, direct false flag route last August to get into Syria (lying about Assad being behind a gas attack on other Syrians), and failed. This year, they are trying the roundabout false flag route, of directing their ISIS group to enter and seize parts of Iraq, which gave the Empire an excuse to re-enter Iraq, and now to expand the war against ISIS by going into Syria. And our 'stupid' government appears to be succeeding this time.

 

[twomp]

Very....let's see, what word am I looking for? Oh, right....gratifying.

LOL! This is the look of gratification right here!

McCain: We're back in Iraq!
Clinton: Teehee Teehee!