Obama’s Afghanistan Strategy Copies Bush’s Surge
The decision by the Obama administration to fire General McKiernan as commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and replace him with General Stanley McChrystal has been met with widespread praise, with former vice president and current chief Obama critic Dick Cheney describing McChrystal as “an absolutely outstanding officer.” With all the focus on whether McChrystal can decisively change the situation in Afghanistan, commentators are missing what McChrystal’s selection means.
Think about President Obama’s new strategy for Afghanistan. He’s put in place a reputable new commander in preparation for a broad counterinsurgency campaign. He’s dispatching over 20,000 additional soldiers to help bring security to the country and is putting pressure on the country’s neighbors to crack down on those trying to destabilize Afghanistan and kill our soldiers.
Sound familiar?
McChrystal’s selection is an unstated admission that the surge in Iraq, which President Obama opposed as a senator and presidential candidate, worked; now he intends to use that formula to win in Afghanistan. President Obama has also kept General Petraeus as head of CENTCOM and General Odierno as head of Multi-National Force Iraq — these two were the architects of the surge — not to mention President Bush’s replacement of Don Rumsfeld as defense secretary, Bob Gates. The Obama plan for Afghanistan is the logical progression of the war-fighting strategy President Bush bravely embraced in 2006 for Iraq under immense political pressure few elected officials could withstand.
McChrystal, who served for five years as the head of the Joint Special Operations Command that kindly gave Zarqawi his wish of martyrdom, is undoubtedly a master of 21st-century warfare. His success in that capacity shows he knows how to gain intelligence and manage the mind-boggling array of government agencies and red tape so as to allow for quick and efficient strikes based on the latest information.
There is some concern that McChrystal’s ability to target leadership indicates the new strategy will focus more on killing important individuals, rather than a comprehensive counterinsurgency strategy. Based on General Petraeus’ position as head of CENTCOM, Gates’ specifically pointing out McChrystal’s “unique skill set in counterinsurgency,” and a simple look at Afghanistan, it is doubtful that that mistake will be made. Furthermore, he has demonstrated an understanding of what today’s wars require. As Time magazine noted, he ordered soldiers returning to Iraq to be stationed in their original neighborhoods of deployment, allowing for them to revive and maintain the personal relationships and local knowledge required for successful counterinsurgency operations.
But Obama does it with so much more style! Just look how that Hugo Boss suit hangs on him.
/end snark
What goes around comes around..you duplicitous POTUS.
Ah ha!
So it never was, exactly, about “what Bush did” or the wisdom of his policies or the results of his decisions.
It was just that they didn’t like him!
Now they have the best of all worlds: a POTUS they like and who, simultaneously, is going to destroy the United States of America from the inside. Such a deal.
A few small corrections;
First, it is not the Iraq strategy, but the Burma strategy, since the ‘ink blot’ or ‘fortified hamlet’ strategy was first done there in the 19th century.
Second, it isn’t a strategy, but an ops plan.
Strategy is deciding which country to take military action against.
As FMFM1 ( Fleet Marines Fighting Manual One) says, Strategy is picking the country, operations is picking which hill, tactics are the techniques used to take that hill.
If it all works right, the proper tactics allows the hill to be taken. Taking the correct hills in the correct order allows the country to be taken.
If you are going to write about military stuff, you need to learn the terminology.
If you are wrinting about football and keep calling the PAT ‘free throws’ people will think you are an idiot. Rightfully so.
Here is a clue.
There is only one war going on right now. Iraq and Afghanistan are two of the theaters (campaigns is an acceptable synonym). They are NOT separate wars. When ever you hear somebody speak of them as separate wars, they don’t have the slightest idea what they are talking about, no matter how many stars they are wearing.
Something else to keep in mind is that the Paki government is very much in our corner. They just have to give a certain amount of lip service to their own local nutbags, to keep them from going off the reservation. If the Paki government wanted to stop the UACV’s from hunting terrs in the tribal regions, they could. A flight of F-16′s would be more then capable of doing that.
And they blamed Bush before. What a bunch of fakes!!!!
Some of us lefties did not have a problem with the war but rather where bush chose to fight it. I voted for Obama in part because he promised during his campaign that he would focus on where the war should have been fought in the first place, afghanastan.
C: Here’s the problem with your statement. Iraq was and is a nation – with a national identity and traditions. With schools, infrastructure, roads, etc… It was hard work to take down the old regime, kill the terrorists who followed us there, and stand the country back up as a democratic republic. Along the way we killed tens of thousands of terrorists. Now we have an ally in the region instead of an enemy.
Afghanistan has never really been a nation, it’s just a place on the map full of warring tribes and wacky zealots. We can and will continue to kill terrorists and extremists there for a while. We won’t ever turn Afghanistan into a functioning western democracy, we’ll never be allies. Eventually the Democrats will get frustrated decide to leave.
The trouble is that this has been tried there before. Iraq wasn’t Vietnam, but Afghanistan may well be. The British couldn’t do it, the Russians couldn’t do it (with comparable forces and hardware just 25 years ago), but now it will be easy? Really?
The choice to take on AQ in the Iraqi theater will look smarter and smarter as things progress, I’m afraid.
6.c.afganistan is exactly where bin laden wanted us to go..he as betting on it.do a little reading into what happened to every army that has ever gone there before.
it would take about 700,000 troops to make COIN doctrine feasable…we have around 70,000.
as far as obama following bush’s policies….what a SHOCKA!
But I thought we “won” in Iraq. So what’s wrong with going with something that “worked” in Iraq and use a similar strategy in Afghanistan?
Pat J: Yeah right. Nice to change your tune now when it’s convenient. Why not just fess up and admit that TeleBama is an imbecile and has now discovered that Bush was right all along?
You bought into his “I will get us out of Iraq” BS hook line and sinker (not to mention his “I will close Guantanamo immediately” BS). So many promises broken in such a short time. That surely must be a record.
Not so fast. Clinton Abrams was a great officer who wanted to institute a counter-insurgency program in Vietnam, but he was just Nixon’s cover for withdrawl. I bet this is the same. Fight a little, then declare victory, then leave.
operation enduring turmoil update
Afghanistan has been a bandit republic since Alexander with no historical superpower able to tame it. It is the Silk Road waystation from Europe to India and China with only opium as a production.
Bush wanted to win in Afghanistan. Barry has put the military in a landlocked box with no allied support. The big reality is Pakistan with its Taliban/Muslim culture and nukes. That is where the chips are on the table. The players around the table Are Obama, Putin, and the Chinese with Iran and Israel as the wild card players.
The side issue dance is weither the sociopathic narcisstic wanna be a messiah can out ego the wanna be the 12th Iman. It could be a hot summer with the time tables of demands.
President Obama’s words come with expiration dates; his turnabout on Afghanistan is no different. The man is just looking to increase his political power at any price. Anyone who stands in his way goes under the bus….
Yeah the Russians had a real hard time in Afganistan. I wonder why? Could it be because the US armed and funded a group of people to fight them off and expel them from their country? And wowsers that group thanks us by murdering 3500 Americans! That sure was a great policy!
And we now have a friend in Iraq! Of course, back in the 80′s, our adminstration had no problem with being Saddam’s friend, even as he was gassing his own people! Because he sure did hate those Iranians, and hey that’s what really mattered! How well did that turn out again?
Here is a thought, why don’t we stop backing terrorist organizations that we will eventually have to defeat ourselves?
RV asks…
why, it’s almost as if you’ve never heard of creative destruction.
10. Pat J: The plan one uses to repair a broken washing machine does not necessarily work when fixing a flat tire. Cookie cutter strategies do not work. Trying top create a functioning polity out of the disparate populations in Afghanistan is a real challenge.
16. RV: A good point but sometimes you have to make the best of a bad situation. Politics makes some very strange bedfellows indeed. What is your suggestion for the future? Is there a non-terrorist group in the area we can back that will help end the craziness without a mushroom cloud being involved?
My hope is that Obama will discover India, and make nice with them They have more at stake than we do and are much closer to the source of the problem. An alliance with a motivated, dependable (counts out our EU friends-for the most part), stable democracy would be a pleasant change.
india’s already sacrificing access to persian gulf and central asian energy in service of the neocon project…
india’s expectation is that they will be rewarded by the neocons dismantling pakistan and neutralizing pakistan nukes… the neocons’ main goal being: obstructing chinese access to persian gulf energy.
meanwhile, the long range indian strategy might include awareness of peak oil, and the decision to begin tapering down from dependence on fossil fuels now, rather than pumping themselves up with a resource that’s on its way out, anyhow… the theory being, if they dont pump themselves up, they wont have so far to fall when the energy crunch comes.
it’s likely that the petroleum-fueled “green revolution” has already allowed india to exceed its sustainable population level by hundreds of millions, and then you got the near-certainty that there’s enough oil, coal and gas left to raise the co2 level by another 100 parts per million, and nobody really knows how that’s gonna affect the climate…
…it could be that tens of millions of indians will be flooded from their homes and land, and if the methane gets away from us…
“Despite the obstacles, McChystal’s appointment is a major sign for optimism. President Obama is not so narrow-mindedly partisan that he can’t see Bush’s success in Iraq and use it for the good of the country — and, not to mention, his future reelection campaign.”
While it is reassuring that Obama is not making radical deviations from the Bush administration in the prosecution of Iraqi and Afghan wars, I do not see how the McChrystal appointment signals a degree of open-mindedness from the administration. How will open-mindedness prevail if Democrats do not allow Obama to prosecute an effective war in Afghanistan, if they are forced to respond to all the grumblings in their base? If Obama is politically motivated, he should have calculated that a continued and aggressive military presence in Afghanistan would destroy his chances at a second term. The political arithmetic here seems to be that Obama would like to be perceived as strong as decisive, even if the Afghan war eventually becomes an “inherited” failure.
Although it may be bad form to say this, I hope our soldiers are “shooting to kill” in Afganistan. If we aren’t exterminating as many terrorists as we can even as the political will to stay in Afghanistan and Pakistan wanes, and if the current majority cannot decide on a way to capture militant terrorists and hold them without hurting people’s feelings, then the “war” on those who create “man made disasters” is in name only. I do not believe that Obama can escape cleanly from the Democrat’s politics of war, because I do not believe that Obama will find the inspiration necessary to successfully challenge his base on the issue of war.
Interesting points made here that I will mull over. Old soldier, you really made me think. One problem I see with dealing with terror is that the us is not going to go to the extreme it will take to send the message. My dad said the way to deal with this is to kill the terrorists and then hunt down all of the relatives who would carry a grudge. I hope we never resort to this action but I wonder if we will find our kids fighting this same war again
god forbid we run out of terrorists before we grab all the oil and secure israel.
…but i spose we’ll have terrorists as long as we keep bombing weddings, eh?
And today he decided closing Guantanamo was a hasty decision after all. What a lying flake Obama is.
President Obama makes Jimmy Carter look like he comes from MENSA.
“But I thought we “won” in Iraq. So what’s wrong with going with something that “worked” in Iraq and use a similar strategy in Afghanistan?”
Pat J., Afghanistan isn’t Iraq. Using your logic, what would be wrong with putting an outboard motor on your SUV and going fishing? It worked on your ski boat, didn’t it?
Why do you put quotes around “won”? We DID win in Iraq. Saddam was caught and hung, the video is on Youtube if you don’t believe it. There is a consensual government in place in Iraq that represents the Majority of the Iraqi citizens.
That puts Iraq ahead of America on the Democracy index.
The Mission in Iraq was to dispose of Saddam. Period. Restoring Iraq to a functional nation was an obligation under the Rules (Laws) of War. That has also been done.
Now it is up to the Iraqi’s to keep what we gave them. Whether they do or not has no impact on President Bush’s place in History or his decision to invade Iraq.. Our job is done.
I expect Iraq to fall into a pretty serious civil war once the US pulls the last of it’s troops out. But then again I’m expecting America to go into a civil war once the Usurper cancels the mid terms.
If he doesn’t cancel the mid terms, enough Democrats will get tossed to make it possible to impeach the Usurper. He is, after all, NOT a natural born citizen. If he was, why would he have spent over 600,0000 in legal fees last year to avoid being forced to produce a birth certificate. That doesn’t even count whatever ‘arrangement’ he reached with Judge R. BARCLAY SURRICK to get him to reverse his original order to produce his birth certificate.
And for you that think Afghanistan is unwinnable, the Mongols did it. Guesstimates on their numbers vary from 40,000 to 150,000. The later number is almost believable, since the Mongols lived off the land and killed an estimated 90% of the population before moving on. All this can be taken with a grain of salt, what IS a proven fact is that Mongol sub-cheifs ruled the land, which paid tax to the great Khan and lived under Mongol law, which was VERY enlightened for that time.
Mongol tactics were simplicity itself. They surrounded a city/village and gave the inhabitants one chance to surrender. If they did, they joined the golden horde. If they didn’t, they died. Like Rome, a new citizen had the same rights as an old citizen. The same laws applied to all.
These tactics are illegal today, so we will see if their replacement works as well. I don’t think they will.
C: I wish it was easier. I didn’t know much about the region until I did my time there in 90-91 and came home frustrated with our half-victory. We sure could have kicked out Saddam and restored the Iraqi democratic government a lot easier in ’91 than 12 years later.
Afghanistan requires a different definition of victory. Before 911, it was a safe-haven for AQ to plot spectacular acts of international terrorism. Now they plot attacks on the next village over – that’s a big improvement.
We need to find efficient ways to keep knocking down AQ and the Taliban without getting mired down in nation-building a bunch of tribes. As long as they are hiding in caves instead taking flight lessons or assembling dirty-bombs, we win.
there’s no reason to “win” in afghanistan… or for that matter, in pakistan.
the main thing is to cause enough commotion that those pipelines can not be built from the persian gulf (iran) and central asia (turkmenistan) eastward, to china, pakistan and india.
europeans and americans need that energy way more than the backward people of asia need it, and we’ve got a right to it by virtue of being the most powerful military… that’s a very simple moral concept, aka “might makes right”.
…and if any of this energy escapes to the east, it should first be piped to israel —so the israelis have a way of making a living after america collapses— by skimming some transit fees while controlling the amount of energy heading towards asia… chinese access to energy will have to be restricted, especially…
and of course, that’s what the trouble is about in afghanistan and pakistan, trouble enough to prevent pipelines to china, nevermind that pipelines to india are also screwed up… the indians seem willing to put up with that, for reasons stated above.
so it boils down to a simple matter of creating enough trouble (creative destruction) by either subsidizing or antagonizing hillbillies who will cause trouble… and sometimes it becomes necessary to give the hillbillies guns (subsidize them), then bomb them, and if they run out of enthusiasm, bomb them some more until they’re pissed off enough to cause the desired amount of trouble.
simple
The fact that Bam-Bam is not doing what he said he would do by bring every one home, and instead co-opting the original Bush plan just go’s to his inability to be truthful about what he really intends on doing any where. Just look at what he is doing here at home. taking over banks, car manufactures, he really does believe he is the Messiah, and that is the scariest of all. I served this country in the Marines, my daughter serves in the Naval academy, my grandfather in WW1 in the Navy, my brother in the Air Force, my uncle in WW2,Korea, his son in Vietnam,and his son presently in Iraq. We did not and do not do this so some Socialist S.O.B. regardless of color or faith is free to destroy the USA from the inside out. Wake and smell what he’s shoveling. Semper Fi.
22. wadosy:
“god forbid we run out of terrorists before we grab all the oil”
That’s getting so old.
Sounds like the 2nd grader yelling at his new enemy, “Oh, yeah? Well, you’re adopted and I think you stink!” (interlaced, of course, with the profanity some 2nd graders have learned from their parents)
26.typos are us.heh.good one.
worth the read.http://exiledonline.com/cat/war-nerd/
The war in Afghanistan is a farce. Why are our soldiers fighting and dying to establish a Sharia based government when the goal of all Muslims is to impose Sharia governments all over the world? We are helping them.
It makes no sense. The same with the situation in Iraq. Just keep them away from nukes.
If you really want to be safe stop all Muslim immigration into United States.
meryl,
i admit that the wars are mostly about securing israel, but in order to secure israel, the israeli american war machine must have access to oil, and it must prevent the chinese from buying the remaining oil…
…and the above situation must continue to exist until israel is secured.
time is running out, and as israelis abandon their morals in defense of israel, it’s only fitting that americans should also abandon their morals in pursuit of oil, if american needs oil to defend and secure israel.
here’s an overview of the plan to secure israel, which consists basically of making sure persian gulf and central asian energy is routed through israel on its way to market.
doc aumann, the nobel-winning game theorist and economist, says you can figure out what people know by what they do.
well, it really doesnt take a nobel-winning intellect to figure out that oil production has peaked, america’s collapsing, and israel must be secured before america disintegrates to the extent that it will no longer be able to protect israel.
replacement for “overview” above
if you cant be content with embracing the “might makes right” neocon philosophy, well… i dont know what to tell you…
…except maybe that, at the rate america is disintegrating, you wont have to tolerate for very long, because america’s abandonment of morals is hastening its disintegration.
I think following the Petraeus plan is a great idea. It was a gamble, it could have gone badly. However, it went very well and it should be implemented in Afghanistan. Personally, I’m glad the President is making decisions based on evidence and reality, rather than making up evidence to support some decision he’d already made.
and if a few million people are willing to addict themselves to heroin to prop up the banking system that finances economy that finances the israeli american war machinery, what’s the problem with that?
it’s just the free market in action, isnt it? …and besides, we’ve abandoned even the pretense of morality.
the fact that israel was founded in lies, terror and injustice —all of which continue to this day— is no cause for concern, because we’ve abandoned morals.
israel and israeli america have repealed laws of morality that developed over hundreds of thousands of years.
that’s just how it is, and you’ll have to live with it.
and if your grandchildren glow in the dark and have two heads, well, welcome to the new post-moral world order.
it would probably be good to keep the following in the back of your head:
there’s a very powerful faction of sociopathic predators that has given up on everything (if they ever cared about anything in the first place) including america, israel, morals, decency…
…given up on everything except loot, and they’re exploiting the so-called “war on terror” to do the biggest looting operation in history.
some select “gems” from wadosy;”i admit that the wars are mostly about securing israel, but in order to secure israel, the israeli american war machine must have access to oil, and it must prevent the chinese from buying the remaining oil… ”
really?…..so you would rather want a commumist dictatership with an apalling human rights record to have control over resources vital to US interests?
“if you cant be content with embracing the “might makes right” neocon philosophy, well… i dont know what to tell you…”
you mean that same philosophy that has kept the world from erupting into global conflict since 1945?…and triggered the longest period of stablity and economic growth in recorded history.not to mention the toppling of a brutal totalitarian regime controlling hundreds of millions of lives through forced misery and terror.
“and if a few million people are willing to addict themselves to heroin to prop up the banking system that finances economy that finances the israeli american war machinery, what’s the problem with that?”
yes i sure the billions of dollars generated from the narcotics trade is proping up a system based on tens of trillions of dollars…with a trillon or more circulated daily…..
“the fact that israel was founded in lies, terror and injustice —all of which continue to this day— is no cause for concern, because we’ve abandoned morals.”
yes thousands of years ago you were present when israel was born…..and let us not dwell on the “morals” of israel’s current neighbors.why don’t you just put them side by side and compare them shall we…..
your maps are HILARIOUS!you should call micheal moore and collaberate…….you two would make quite a team….or just switch your medication and loosen the strap on your aluminum helmet.
good thing neocons have the solutions to all your problems…
for instance…. from the Jewish Institute for National Security:
although it’s beyond me why you’d bomb the new york times, the washington post and the televison networks… seeing as how they were a vital part of the mechanism that lied us into the iraq war…
…not to mention their part in enforcing the official conspiracy theory of 9/11, which was the justification for this whole neocon project.
but all’s fair in love and war, so we’re perfectly justified in killing a few thousand of our own citizens if that’s the excuse we need to protect israel and grab the rest of the oil… because we have, after all, abandoned even the pretense of morality.
good thing neocons have the solutions to all your problems…
for instance…. from the Jewish Institute for National Security:
although it’s beyond me why you’d bomb the new york times, the washington post and the televison networks… seeing as how they were a vital part of the mechanism that lied us into the iraq war…
…not to mention their part in enforcing the official conspiracy theory of 9/11, which was the justification for this whole neocon project.
but all’s fair in love and war, so we’re perfectly justified in killing a few thousand of our own citizens if that’s the excuse we need to protect israel and grab the rest of the oil… because we have, after all, abandoned even the pretense of morality.
of course, JINSA is part of the neocon apparatus that includes people like rumsfeld, cheney, wolfowitz, perle, kristol and the rest of the AEI/PNAC likud establishment…
…you remember them, dont you? …the guys and gals who coalesced into PNAC, and published their need for “a new pearl harbor” in september of 2000, just months before they were installed into positions from which they could make their “new pearl harbor” happen…?
but there’s no problem in wishing for “a new pearl harbor”… in fact, there’s no problem in staging a new pearl harbor that kills a few thousand of your own citizens, if that’s what it takes to get your project rolling…
because we have, after all, abandoned even the pretense of morals.
do you remember this map?
the peters guy who wrote that neocons will have to bomb the media (even though the media has, so far in the “war on terror” and 9/11, been the main neocon propaganda instrument) …well, peters is the guy that dreamed up the map below…
neocons’ new map of the middle east
the problem seems to be that we just dont have enough people to cover all the requirements, especially when we include africa and south america… which means you will need a new “new pearl harbor” to gather support for the draft that will enable israeli america to complete the PNAC project.
and if the original “new pearl harbor” was “very good” (according to no lesser authority than bibi netanyahu), then there should be no problem with staging your new new pearl harbor, should there?
…especially in view of the fact that you’ve abandoned even the pretense of any morals other than “might makes right”.
wadosy, I don’t even know where to start.
I personally think that Jews are better then Sand _iggers, but that is only because I know both sets of near humans well. I shed no tears over the demise of any of them. My solution to the Arab-Israeli problem is to send both sides lots of ammo, encourage them to fight it out then after the dust settles, kill off the survivors.
As far as the OIL thangie, you and your nutbag doctor both need to educate yourselves;
http://ostseis.anl.gov/guide/oilshale/index.cfm
{snippet}
“While oil shale is found in many places worldwide, by far the largest deposits in the world are found in the United States in the Green River Formation, which covers portions of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. Estimates of the oil resource in place within the Green River Formation range from 1.2 to 1.8 trillion barrels. Not all resources in place are recoverable; however, even a moderate estimate of 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil from oil shale in the Green River Formation is three times greater than the proven oil reserves of Saudi Arabia. Present U.S. demand for petroleum products is about 20 million barrels per day. If oil shale could be used to meet a quarter of that demand, the estimated 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil from the Green River Formation would last for more than 400 years.
Did you get that? 3 X the reserves of Saudi Arabia. Enough for 400 years. Nancy Pelosi might even be dead by then.
The moonbats such as yourself don’t want the USA to process shale OIL. That is because it would make your predictions as foolish as those of the algorenuts.
BTW, that estimate is a CONSERVATIVE one. I have seen them as high as 8.4 TRILLION barrels.
The wjole idea of there being a shortage or OIL is misleading. What there is is a shortage of cheap to get at OIL, Production costs ata KSA well head are less then a dollar per barrel. Shale OIL costs about 45$US per barrel to produce. So the OIL companies aren’t interested in a product that costs 45$ that they sell for 65$ when they can get that same product off thru off coast drilling for about 18$ per barrel. The swampies want no OIL anywhere for anything. They want us all to go back to living in a cave, or maybe even returning to the trees. So the swampies and the OIL Companies have shut down Shale OIL processing.
Next the swampies are going after off-shore drilling;
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aBUoYKhu7PWk&refer=home
Most of the environmental efforts are funded by the OIL companies to keep the price and profits of OIL high.
shale oil might cost $45 a barrel to produce now.
how much does shale oil cost to produce when oil costs $150 a barrel?
how many barrels of oil does it take to produce a barrel of shale oil?
if you’ve got a trillion barrel reserve of shale oil, and it takes a trillion barrels of oil to produce it, what’s the point?
how much water does it take to produce shale oil? …do we have enough water, or are we gonna have to use the whole colorado river system to produce shale oil?
…not to mention the fact that, so far, we’ve burned up about a trillion barrels of oil, which has resulted in about 100 part per million increase in the co2 concentration.
if we get a 100 part per million increase in co2 for every trillion barrels of oil burned, and we burn another couple trillion of shale oil, in addition to the trillion barrels of remaining conventional oil, plus the remaining coal and gas, what’s gonna happen to the climate?
are you beginning to see why the israeli americans of the AEI and exxon are partners in denying global warming?
are you beginning to see why the israeli americans at CERA and exxon are partners in denying peak oil?
china’s gonna have the advantage as long as conventional oil costs less than shale oil.
the only strength america has left is military, which is why 9/11 became a necessity.
it’s unimaginable that the chinese dont understand how this neocon project is supposed to work, and the fact that they havent yet demolished america economically might be seen as an indication of the contempt they have for the neocon scheme.
it’s just so haywire in so many ways, it will never work.
the neocons are not stupid, and it seems most likely that even they dont believe in their project: they’re just using it as cover for looting america as it dies.