Poignant piece re Bin Laden

DARISC · 05-04-2011, 03:51 AM

Bin Laden’s war against the U.S. economy - Ezra Klein - The Washington Post

kach22i · kach22i's Garage

Spot on.

gt350mike · 05-04-2011, 05:40 AM

Do you want to fight them over in the states or overseas...you can't have your cake and eat it too.

DARISC · 05-04-2011, 06:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gt350mike

Do you want to fight them over in the states or overseas...you can't have your cake and eat it too.

What does that question have to do with the content and intent of the article?

DanielDudley · 05-04-2011, 06:43 AM

Mike, I think the average American has no idea of the true cost of our going to Iraq, and what it has done to the balance of power in the ME, or the effect on our economy. Nor did we need to go there, as OBL was not and is not Saddam Hussein.

The point of the article was just to point out some of the true cost of ''winning''. Hence my comment elsewhere that ''He may be dead, but he got what he wanted.''

If this thread gets shifted, I may go on about this.

DARISC · 05-04-2011, 07:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DanielDudley

Mike, I think the average American has no idea of the true cost of our going to Iraq, and what it has done to the balance of power in the ME, or the effect on our economy.

Correct.

Nor did we need to go there, as OBL was not and is not Saddam Hussein.

Whether or not we needed to go after Saddam is arguable, has nothing to do with OBL (see?).

The point of the article was just to point out some of the true cost of ''winning''. Hence my comment elsewhere that ''He may be dead, but he got what he wanted.''

Only partly. We haven't crumbled (and won't) like the Soviet Union.

If this thread gets shifted, I may go on about this.

..

duncan1437 · 05-04-2011, 07:04 AM

the Washington Post article simply repeats Bin laden's own speech of november 1, 2004:

"...All that we have mentioned has made it easy for us to provoke and bait this administration. All that we have to do is to send two mujahidin to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida, in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses without their achieving for it anything of note other than some benefits for their private companies.

This is in addition to our having experience in using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers, as we, alongside the mujahidin, bled Russia for 10 years, until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat.

All Praise is due to Allah.

So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah.

That being said, those who say that al-Qaida has won against the administration in the White House or that the administration has lost in this war have not been precise, because when one scrutinises the results, one cannot say that al-Qaida is the sole factor in achieving those spectacular gains.

Rather, the policy of the White House that demands the opening of war fronts to keep busy their various corporations - whether they be working in the field of arms or oil or reconstruction - has helped al-Qaida to achieve these enormous results.

And so it has appeared to some analysts and diplomats that the White House and us are playing as one team towards the economic goals of the United States, even if the intentions differ.

And it was to these sorts of notions and their like that the British diplomat and others were referring in their lectures at the Royal Institute of International Affairs. [When they pointed out that] for example, al-Qaida spent $500,000 on the event, while America, in the incident and its aftermath, lost - according to the lowest estimate - more than $500 billion.

Meaning that every dollar of al-Qaida defeated a million dollars by the permission of Allah, besides the loss of a huge number of jobs.

As for the size of the economic deficit, it has reached record astronomical numbers estimated to total more than a trillion dollars.

And even more dangerous and bitter for America is that the mujahidin recently forced Bush to resort to emergency funds to continue the fight in Afghanistan and Iraq, which is evidence of the success of the bleed-until-bankruptcy plan - with Allah's permission...."

the Bin Laden speech also explains his motivation for 9/11. full text here:

Full transcript of bin Ladin's speech

island911 · 05-04-2011, 07:10 AM

Some people just don't understand a head-fake. ..."got what he wanted"

DARISC · 05-04-2011, 07:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by island911

Some people just don't understand a head-fake. ..."got what he wanted"

What is your opinion of the article?

DanielDudley · 05-04-2011, 07:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by island911

Some people just don't understand a head-fake. ..."got what he wanted"

Or don't want to.

89911 · 05-04-2011, 07:55 AM

Me thinks if the US didn't spend on this, they would of spent most it elsewhere. I don't think the US was ever much for saving.

gt350mike · 05-04-2011, 08:15 AM

I'm not going to debate this issue because we all have our personal opinion and I seriously doubt that I going to change anyone's mindset. The consideration to the cost of going to war is weighted heavily not only in the monetary cost but also in the number of lives. We had a choice of going into a defensive posture and accept a greater risk of another successful terrorist attack(s) or we could go on the offense. Our country decided to take the war overseas versus dealing with the potential for more attacks in our own back yard. I agree with the article that the war has placed a greater financial burden on our country, but I disagree with the overall message of the article for two reasons; OBL didn't orchestrate the attacks against our country knowing that his strategy would bankrupt our country, and second, the government has significantly increased its spending and I can promise you, the increase isn't because of the war.

svandamme · svandamme's Garage

I think i have posted plenty times that OBL was laughing his head when Dubbya invaded Iraq as well as Afghanistan, that he got exactly what he wanted...Targets for guerilla warfare...That it was the wrong strategy and instead y'all should have kept out of it , beefed up the borders... The Big show down was just to expensive and did little in the way of countering terrorism... Every US soldier that died , he laughed, every civilian that died as collatoral damage from Coalition bombs or bullets, was bonus points for OBL because that gave him new followers.

How much did he spend to make 9/11 happen?
How many Billions did he make the US spend?!?!

His ROI was off the charts.
He must have known it would come to that when 9/11 occured, so he must have made his peace with that faight long time ago. He wanted to be a martyr, so in his final mindset, he didn't loose.

Not saying i regret his death, on the contrary, bigup to whoever did the double tap on him.
But it would have been nice if he had been captured, whisked away quietly, announced as dead.... But now put to forced labour in a pigfarm or sommin'.

That would not have been something he would have been prepared for...