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2007-08-01 Iraq

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Posted by Mike 2007-08-01 08:15|| || Front Page|| [1 views ] Top
File under: Iraqi Insurgency

#1 Buy thier F%&^*ing cigarettes, goats, or the by products of thier herds. Then stop all movement across the border. Be a hell of a lot cheaper then losing our soldiers.

Posted by plainslow 2007-08-01 09:32|| 2007-08-01 09:32|| Front Page Top

#2 Keep enough drones overhead to pinpoint where they are coming from, safehouses or a camp, whatever. Then, if a tree falls at night in western Syria and there's no one left alive to report it, did it make a sound ?

Posted by wxjames 2007-08-01 09:51|| 2007-08-01 09:51|| Front Page Top

#3 wx,
You mean Eastern Syria, or Western Iraq? (Western Syria is our potential debarcation point for the return home via the Med. Sea.)
We can't afford to shut down all smuggling, even if it was possible, because it would make the smugglers active enemies rather than quasi-neutrals or passive enemies. Ideally trade in cigs, goats, etc. would become legitimized, and we would only crack down on smuggling of arms and jihadis. That won't happen either. So your idea has some merit - quietly monitor the trade and ID where really bad stuff is coming from (or going to) and cause those places to go away. Even if they're in Syria, Jordan, or Iran. The capitalist trader will then raise his risk premium and thus the cost of moving bad stuff, or focus on safer goods. He will be more opposed to us than before, but perhaps not to the point of doing much about it (sort of like my opposition to TSA confiscating my peanut butter.)

Posted by Glenmore">Glenmore 2007-08-01 10:16|| 2007-08-01 10:16|| Front Page Top

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