Let's talk about the Pentagon vs Trump: Options, the foreseeable, and the future... - Belle of the Ranch

Well, howdy there Internet people. It's Belle again. So, today we're going to talk about the Pentagon versus Trump. Options, the foreseeable, and the future.

Reporting has come out that the Pentagon is preparing a new package of places that could be hit that is based on the site being dual use. It supplies or is used by both civilians and the military. The package is at odds with Trump's ill-advised public statements about hitting civilian infrastructure in the country.

The problem Trump has is that the US is pretty much out of critical or strategic military locations to go after. After more than a month of strikes, there's legitimately not much left that is worth hitting militarily. That presents a problem. And I know it doesn't sound like a problem, but it is. Especially when you're running a high tempo operation.

It would have been an easily foreseeable problem if Trump had a plan with identified, measurable objectives before going in instead of trying to keep his options open like it was a real estate deal.

It's easy for me to stand here today with the benefit of hindsight and say they should have seen it coming. But it was also easy to say on February 11th when I was talking about Trump sending another carrier in and I said there comes a point when air strikes really serve no purpose beyond making the rubble bounce. A lot of people thought that was some kind of dark humor, but it's a genuine military problem when you're not actually wanting to fight a ground war, but are instead trying to use air strikes to gain compliance.

If you hit them all too quickly, first you could run out like here. Second is that the opposition doesn't have time to really feel the strikes. They go numb to them. Instead of waiting each day to find out what was hit, they've just sustained massive losses and it steels their resolve. That may have contributed to the level of defiance.

This is why you need a plan before you commit, but because Trump didn't have a plan, the Pentagon is reportedly trying to work up a list of targets to hit that both semi fit Trump's rhetoric and avoid blatant war crimes by selecting infrastructure targets that have some connection to the military.

The problem is that since Trump has already announced his intention, it only serves as legal papering. It doesn't protect against the blowback hitting civilian infrastructure causes. When the electricity goes out, there will be people who lose family members to things that would have been preventable had the power been on. Some of those people will be the people we call foreign fighters. The next time some president with a failing economy and falling poll numbers starts a war to distract from his scandals.

This move will create the next generation of non-state actors. If Trump didn't see this coming, he doesn't have a clue what a ground war in a country that has prepared for it for decades and that purpose-built their military for it would be like. He kind of acknowledged this when he said they were destroyed militarily, but noted they still control the strait.

Trump needs to declare victory and leave before we get sucked into something we can't get out of.

Anyway, it's just a thought. Y'all have a good day.