Afghanistan

[fauxpaxfauxreal]

I just had the most absurd thought ever.

I was thinking of all things military, and the strangest sensation came over me...

Obama received a request for 50,000 troops.

How about he responds with a deployment of 400,000 troops.

Would this be beneficial or harmful?  If you think it is impossible, don't use that as part of the argument, assume it is possible.

[jonyem]

It would be beneficial to the efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but those 400,000 troops don't appear out of thin air, they'd have to come from other posts around the world, which would thin our military worldwide.

But, I get what you're saying, it wouldn't just be a game changer, it would be a game ender.

[fauxpaxfauxreal]

It would be beneficial to the efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but those 400,000 troops don't appear out of thin air, they'd have to come from other posts around the world, which would thin our military worldwide.

But, I get what you're saying, it wouldn't just be a game changer, it would be a game ender.

Here's the part where it gets amazing.  We don't draw troops from other parts of the world.  We utilize the jobless here in America.  Our unemployment number is hovering at about 10 percent.  We hire this ten percent.  That would be about 300,000 people by my count.  There are probably 100,000 more people who are currently not counted in the unemployment statistics. 

Basically, what I would foresee happening is that all of those who would want a job would have one, and would almost immediately receive crucial training, crucial lessons in life and for many of them, crucial paychecks.  As they succeed through life in the military, they would find opportunities opening up around them both here and overseas.  It could help us eliminate our poverty problem here, improve our society, and improve our focus in Afghanistan.

We could truly have enough people to focus on building a society that trusts us because we will be making the society stronger, more secure, more fair and most importantly, richer.

As we begin to export this model of Society worldwide, other societies begin to feel the benefits exported by our Society, making all Societies better for all of their members.

As long as we focus on our goals of Worldwide sustainable economic expansion, we could truly see our quality of life increase, as opposed to maintain stability.

[kellerb]

that's so absurd it might be profound.  Or vice-versa. 

[fauxpaxfauxreal]

I fudged the numbers.  We probably have 3,000,000 jobless in America.  300,000 is one tenth of the number of jobs we actually would need.

Perhaps we could utilize this strategy in 10 other nations...especially in Africa.

[gah]

Well, hows about paying those 300,000? That's coming from our tax dollars, and last I checked we don't have a surplus of reserves to pay those people. Oh, also, our military is volunteer based, just telling that 10% of unemployed to join just wouldn't happen. But, I do dig what you're saying on larger philosophical standpoint though.

[fauxpaxfauxreal]

Well, hows about paying those 300,000? That's coming from our tax dollars, and last I checked we don't have a surplus of reserves to pay those people. Oh, also, our military is volunteer based, just telling that 10% of unemployed to join just wouldn't happen. But, I do dig what you're saying on larger philosophical standpoint though.

I don't know the answers to these questions.  Perhaps we could have people invest in military bonds as opposed to spending their money on gasoline.

We've totally shot ourselves in the foot as far as asking our citizenry to be responsible.  Also, we've wasted great opportunities in 2001 and in 2008.

[sunrisevt]

It would also take time (years) and resources that don't come cheap to train & equip those 300k troops....

I do I like the basic idea. It'd be in line w/ Gen. Colin Powell's doctrine of fighting with overwhelming force, minimizing casualties all around by minimizing the length of the conflict.