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Blackhawk Down 31 Yrs Ago - a case study

You're right that in the Biblical sense we should reach out to the marginalized, the outcasts, the poor, the diseased. But what if they don't want it?
Jesus was crucified between two robbers. One mocked him and rejected him, the other accepted Jesus.

I bring this up to illustrate that not everyone sees the US as their savior, nor do they want our help. We've done a lot of good in the world but often times in our history, we were selfishly helping ourselves in the guise of helping others. When the Master Narrative is peeled back the US history of enslavement, greed and power is exposed which doesn't follow what the Bible teaches at all. We've done some pretty terrible things to other countries in the last 60 years or so. Yes, we've done a lot of good too but we keep involving ourselves in other people's business way too much.

To me the US has spent more time meddling in the affairs of other countries than we have spent trying to help them. Just my opinion.
 
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You're right that in the Biblical sense we should reach out to the marginalized, the outcasts, the poor, the diseased. But what if they don't want it?
Jesus was crucified between two robbers. One mocked him and rejected him, the other accepted Jesus. Guess which one was saved?

I bring this up to illustrate that not everyone sees the US as their savior, nor do they want our help. We've done a lot of good in the world but often times in our history, we were selfishly helping ourselves in the guise of helping others. When the Master Narrative is peeled back the US history of enslavement, greed and power is exposed which doesn't follow what the Bible teaches at all. We've done some pretty terrible things to other countries in the last 60 years or so. Yes, we've done a lot of good too but we keep involving ourselves in other people's business too much.

To me the US has spent more time meddling in the affairs of other countries that we have trying to help them. Just my opinion.
part of me agrees with a portion of what you are saying. but part of me (perhaps the more dominant part), thinks of very complicated issues in more simple terms. need help? how many times have you been asked for help that you thought you could provide, but refused to do so? it’s who we are. it’s how we’re built. always successful? oh hell no. still willing to give it a shot? oh hell yes. apparently we got no quit in us. and another part of me takes a lot of pride in us for that.
 
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Well said Ed. After the fall of communism (cold war) in Russia, we're experiencing in the current era a massive apparatus (MIC) looking for significance (meaning $$ and power). Now we chase terrorism and the likes...and it ain't working out so well.
 
so the rangers wanted ac130, a10 warthogs, tanks and armored vehicles

and got none

sad
 
IIRC, by the time they realized the assets were needed, they weren’t close enough to arrive in time. and they already had an issue with the helos not being able to land for exfil. they could drop lines, but that was it. the whole theatre was hot - more than what was planned for. total shitshow if there ever was one.
 
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gotta kinda disagree with this. the UN has, as part of it’s charter, the goal to ‘maintain international peace and security’. it has no direct ability to do that with forces other than those of member states. as eldritch pointed out, the mission in somalia was a UN mission to provide humanitarian assistance to the starving population. the US forces were sent to provide security for those relief efforts. and yeah, in typical peacekeeping strategy, the mission also included a secondary mission of taking out the head of the snake (the cause of the acute crisis the population was facing in the first place).

as to whether or not it’s any of our concern - maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. personally, i’d prefer to live in a country that tries to help the downtrodden, than one that is willing to turn a cold shoulder.

WRT that particular very tragic event, if anything positive came from it, it was a complete overhaul of the future strategies and tactics of such operations. many important changes were made. fool me once… try it again, and we’ll see what’s what.
The UN isn't comprised entirely of the United States, nor are we always the only one that can respond...yet we tend to do that. Especially when there's a higher potential for bloody conflict. Gee, I wonder why? :nchantr
 
The UN isn't comprised entirely of the United States, nor are we always the only one that can respond...yet we tend to do that. Especially when there's a higher potential for bloody conflict. Gee, I wonder why? :nchantr
each according to their capability? that said, we’re nowhere on the list of manpower providers. money? yes (at the top).

 
Wtf is anyone talking about the bible/jesus with regards to national policy?

S-e-p-a-r-a-t-i-o-n

Morality without dogma
 
If I'm walking down the street and I see some guy beating on a woman, I'm not going to just stand by or just take video.
If I see a bully picking on a younger kid, I'm not going to just keep walking or stand by.

Nor will I go meddle with other people just to enrich my self.

I think our country should act like decent human beings, I'd think that religious and non-religious folk could agree on that, if they possessed decency.
 
IIRC, by the time they realized the assets were needed, they weren’t close enough to arrive in time. and they already had an issue with the helos not being able to land for exfil. they could drop lines, but that was it. the whole theatre was hot - more than what was planned for. total shitshow if there ever was one.
Hmm maybe I misread, I read it as the generals knew going into these urban warfare needed these heavier duty wmd.

But somebody in Congress was saying we need to have less military presence in middle east, never allowed it, we ran few operations in meantime like they planned for this to be quick hr in/out and THEN Blackhawk played out
 
There were several requests for armored transports. Bradleys. And gunships, IIRC. As it turns out, Bradleys would have made all the difference after super 64 went down. Gunships likely would have helped the QRF to break out of their ambush too...in theory.
 
They knew enough before going in, ran successful operations with no heavy duty wmd, thought this was another simple infil by Blackhawk and exfil by caravan. Terrorists got rpg and took it down, rest is history.

If they gotten the air support and all the other wmd their entire approach would have been different, literally no infil by Blackhawk, the security perimeter would probably expanded and those areas may have been deweaponized already due to the heavy presence of wmd

All imo
 
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