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As usual, the problem with these often-well intentioned peace activists is that they offer no realistic alternatives.  This, more than anything, is what has undermined their cause for years (certainly through the Cold War).  They are a "protest industry" that succeeds (to varying degrees) in...

If you're talking about the Territorial Defence Battalion Groups, then we're probably not talking about new units or sub-units.  These are still works in progress, but they're probably just going to be groupings of existing Res F units that would be employed, as needed, for domestic ops under...

As you said, nothing is concrete about this, including there being a "significant number of troops on Class B"--certainly outside of unit-level HQ elements.  We should probably wait until some more water goes under the bridge before trying to make any definitive statements about these things. ...

I think you may be referring to the Territorial Defence Battalion Groups that are being considered for formation in various major urban centres across the country.  These are not "new" units; they are intended to be groupings of existing Reserve units tagged for force employment in domestic...

As has been pointed out, these similarities are superficial.  It's facile and, frankly, insulting to those who live there to lump together two countries which have rich, diverse and complex cultures and histories on the basis of an insurgency.  I assume you're attempting to show that NATO has...

...and so on. Unfortunately, you're just as ethno-centric and culturally biased as you accuse others of being.  You suggest that there are as many reasons for insurgents fighting as there are insurgents (which is potentially true) and then generalize the thinking of all Afghans: It's really...

I'd be extremely wary of that.  First, the messaging and optics--we're going to send you on longer tours, but we're also going to curtail or eliminate HLTA--could do more psychological harm than practical good.  Second, and again from a psychological point of view, HLTA breaks the mission into...

The truly glaring flaw in Deserter's argument is conflating Iraq and Afghanistan.  They are two different operations, with two different realities.  One could argue at length about the wisdom of the US engaging itself in Iraq, and the effect that has had on the Afghanistan operation.  But to...

This assumes there's a role for Canadian ships in this effort.  Even then (and being mindful of the fact that the news media is hardly an authoritative source), I doubt that sufficient numbers of personnel to completely render the navy dysfunctional would be pulled away, because a) it's not...

The Mongols come to mind.  They were successful across the full spectrum of warfare, using clever strategy, adaptability, a huge investment in understanding their enemies, and remarkable mobility and flexibility at the operational and tactical levels.  Through much of the 13th century, they were...

Well, thank you.  And, yeah, that birthday cake thing is cool...well done to whoever among the site gurus thought that up. Troi and a filmy thing...yeah.  As for Riker, well, I see nothing wrong with noting a good looking man.  It's the 21st century, you know, and besides, I'm secure in my...

I was on a battlefield tour of Gettysburg a few years ago.  Our tour, a fellow who retired from the US Marine Corps in the 1960s (yup...he landed at Iwo Jima as a private) mentioned in a side conversation that there are still some in the southeastern US who refer to the Civil War as the "War of...

This is complete nonsense.  What a ridiculous thing to introduce into an earnest and thoughtful discussion like this. I mean, everyone knows that Picard was way better than Kirk, so it would be the the Enterprise-D that arrived at the battle and beam down: -Riker, who would stand in profile a...

So the 9/11 hadn't happened, would that mean the U.S. would have just taken a pass on the Khazakstani oil?  9/11 was just a "convenient excuse" to attack Afghanistan?  Very handy. Or...why not extend the conspiracy theory to its (il)logical conclusion--that the 9/11 attacks were engineered by...

Which they cannot afford.  I've been "fortunate" enough to see some of the more recent data respecting the US economy and the direction it's heading (it gives me the creeps, frankly).  To put it in black and white terms, the Chief Economist of Citibank (no slouch when it comes to reading the...

I've been drawn into these sorts of things before, usually resulting in an interesting waste of time.  I mean, how can you answer something like this?  There are simply too many variables.  Not all "medieval" armour was superior to Roman armour, not all "medieval" armies were heavy in cavalry or...

As suggested above, no one is going to flatten anything.  The result would be massive outflux of refugees from NK into China and SK.  Moreover, before the "flattening" is complete, NK will have had ample opportunity to devastate large bits of SK with artillery fire. NK has to definitively prove...

I think China's motivation to not simply cut off aid to NK was to avoid collapsing what little life there is that country's economy, and end up with hundreds of thousands , if not millions, of economic refugees streaming into China and South Korea.  In fact, I'd go so far as to suggest that...

Well, there's that.  But the article does suggest what advantage it brings...an attack on the Golan, if successful, would put Israel into a deep, deep security hole; if the heights fall, there's not much to prevent an invasion from pushing on southwards (in Israeli minds).  Therefore, the...

If you did that, you'd have a hard time justifying a non-proliferation line regarding Iran...and, for that matter, Egypt, Syria, Venezuela, or any other country wealthy enough to afford the technology to manufacture nuclear weapons. This really does represent a watershed moment in global...