Obama admin considers Attacks on Somali Pirates’ Land Bases

I thought this story seemed rather familiar to me.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= ... refer=home

Obama wants to go to Somalia and attack pirate bases on land. Then they want to train security forces and develop its own coast guard.

Correct me if im wrong but we did do this somewhere else didnt we. Oh yes IRAQ. But now its cool since Obama wants to do it.

We will blow up pirate bases and pirate ships and most definitely kill innocent civilians in the process. Then we will tell the Somali government how to run a coast guard to defend against there own people (the pirates).

It seems to me that Obama is all talk about war and innocent people dying. When push comes to shove people that are a lot smarter then him bring him back to reality and tell him how things need to be done. Example Killing those 3 pirates. He had nothing to do with that. The white house keep saying he was staying apprised of the situation. Well so was i. I followed very closely just like obama did. All he did was answer a phone when the miltary called to say hey we have em in sight can we finally take the damn shot. Then he sat and pondered for a few minutes then realized he had no other choice.

Now he realizes we have a huge problem with the pirates, so he is going to do what bush did. Blow up Somalia and its surroundings then set up a coast and tell them how to run it. Obama is a puppet. He doesn't know what he is doing. Everyone else has to make decisions for him. He is by far the worst president we have ever had and has no good ideas nor no new ideas. "Change" ?? i think he meant MORE OF THE SAME. That would of made a good campaign slogan.

brckwlt wrote: I followed very closely just like obama did. All he did was answer a phone when the miltary called to say hey we have em in sight can we finally take the damn shot. Then he sat and pondered for a few minutes then realized he had no other choice.

I'd agree that Obama wasn't making decisions here but taking the advice given to him by subordinates as most Presidents would. Presidents don't really make decisions. They are presented with a set of options of what has already been decided on. I'm going to take a guess they had standing orders to end the situation when the opportunity presented itself. I only say guess because I obviously don't know the details but they aren't going to be screwing around trying to get a decision from him. Either Obama or someone else made that a long time before the incident.

In any event it's going to be interesting to see how this develops.

Richard S. wrote:
I'd agree that Obama wasn't making decisions here but taking the advice given to him by subordinates as most Presidents would. Presidents don't really make decisions. They are presented with a set of options of what has already been decided on. I'm going to take a guess they had standing orders to end the situation when the opportunity presented itself. I only say guess because I obviously don't know the details but they aren't going to be screwing around trying to get a decision from him. Either Obama or someone else made that a long time before the incident.

In any event it's going to be interesting to see how this develops.

I agree with your statement that they probably had standing orders to take a shot ... that being said the thing that bothers me the most is how the media says how obama did such a great job with this. They praise him like he made all the decisions even down the picking out the guns and ammo for the head shots. They said obama had a cool hand and showed he can handle major crisis. I Just think he shouldnt get any credit. Ill give him credit when credit is due but in this situation he deserves none.

But the problem is he didnt do a damn thing. Just said yeah or okay or go ahead but i dont like this or something to that mater.

brckwlt wrote:I thought this story seemed rather familiar to me.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= ... refer=home

Obama wants to go to Somalia and attack pirate bases on land. Then they want to train security forces and develop its own coast guard.

Correct me if im wrong but we did do this somewhere else didnt we. Oh yes IRAQ. But now its cool since Obama wants to do it.

Obama did his job. The Navy did their jobs.

In Iraq the military did their job. The executive branch failed at their jobs (SecDef in particular).



I read junk like your post and it seems like you WANT Americans to die so that Obama looks bad. I'm sure if one of the Seals missed and the Captain ended up dead you'd be blaming Obama, not the Seal who missed the shot.

I meant to ask something this morning before I left for work.

An AP wire report stated there were two authorizations given by the President

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama twice authorized the military to rescue a U.S. captain held by Somali pirates and whose life appeared to be at risk.

This begs more questions. I can understand the Commander on scene asking for permission to fire but once the authorization is granted why would a second request be needed. It seems likely that there were restriction placed the order or the initial authorization was unclear.

I have not heard this discussed, opinions please.

ErikLaurence wrote:


I read junk like your post and it seems like you WANT Americans to die so that Obama looks bad. I'm sure if one of the Seals missed and the Captain ended up dead you'd be blaming Obama, not the Seal who missed the shot.

I Thought we should of blown up somalias ports and ships way before this story appeared. Collateral damage is bound to happen. We should of sent a message saying you dont *censored* with the usa and get away with. If we did what i said then there would be no more pirate attacks. Problem solved.

I dont have to do anything to make obama look bad. He is already a joke on the international scene. No one respects him.

Its just funny how when civilians died in iraq it was front page news every day. If obama did the same in somali you would barely ever hear about it and when you did they would spin it in a postive way somehow saying im sure the people who died would of ended up being pirates one day anyway.

And no if the seal who took the shot missed and killed the captian then its the seal fault not obamas. Obama is at fault for taking so freaking long to do anything. This should of been taken care of day one.

Wow, did somebody drop acid in your collective Kool-Aid now?

First, Iraq wasn't doing anything to us before the 2003 invasion. Not bombing our buildings. Not intercepting or taking pot shots at our shipping. Not providing a safe haven for Osama or Al Qaeda. Nothing. Nada. Zero. Bush trumped it all up and invaded Iraq so he could kill Saddam for trying to kill his old man, 41. No other explanation for the diversion away from Afghanistan makes a bit of sense. And now our int'l cred is shot.

Plus, more than 7 1/2 years after 9/11, Osama's still on the loose, despite all the "bring it on," "dead or alive" and other Dubya bluster. Another shot to our cred.

Now, on this Somali piracy thing, Obama handled it perfectly. Like the good poker player he is, he didn't talk about it, he quietly got his cards together and played them. And the SEALS hit a home run. No, a grand slam. That you guys can't give him credit for that speaks volumes. He understood EXACTLY what a President should do in the circumstances: make his decision about the level of intervention, keep that close to his vest, and let the military carry his orders out within the parameters he set.

As to what to do about Somalia going forward, Obama's much too smart to send our troops in unless there's a GENUINE international group of nations to do it with. OTOH, if he can find where these people operate, he can and should "incapacitate" them with drones, planes or missiles.

What you guys can't stand is that a "community organizer" got an A+ on his first semester of foreign policy, including the military ops test.

Black_And_Blue wrote:This begs more questions. I can understand the Commander on scene asking for permission to fire but once the authorization is granted why would a second request be needed. It seems likely that there were restriction placed the order or the initial authorization was unclear.

I have not heard this discussed, opinions please.

I don't know why it actually happened like that but i suspect that obama was trying to figure out a way to do this without getting any blood on his hands so he wouldn't seem like a bad guy. he always tries to distance himself from every decision so lit looks like other people are making the decisions if something goes wrong. Then i think obama gave an order to shoot if necessary then once the seals didn't fire for whatever reason. maybe the target wasn't clear anymore. Then obama was still trying how to get this done without any blood on his hands then once he couldn't find another way to do it, he did what they seals were telling him needed to be done since day one and finnally gave an order to shoot after they twisted his arm enough.

There's a simpler, less derogatory explanation: the ops have to be dovetailed with the negotiations. It's an ongoing push-pull and the President didn't, and isn't supposed to, turn the negotiation process completely over to the military.

And, by not making a public show out of it, he denied the pirates the media stage they were seeking.

stockingfull wrote:Wow, did somebody drop acid in your collective Kool-Aid now?

That was years ago and im still feeling the affects of it

I here your iraq comments but decline to comment on it as it has been justfied many of times and we were right to go there and had the support of nato.

stockingfull wrote: He understood EXACTLY what a President should do in the circumstances: make his decision about the level of intervention, keep that close to his vest, and let the military carry his orders out within the parameters he set.

He didnt make any decisions. The military leaders told him what to do and he had no choice but to do what they told him.

stockingfull wrote:As to what to do about Somalia going forward, Obama's much too smart to send our troops in unless there's a GENUINE international group of nations to do it with. OTOH, if he can find where these people operate, he can and should "incapacitate" them with drones, planes or missiles.

I wouldnt go as far as saying obama is smart. He hangs out with unrepentant terrorist and white hating preachers.

stockingfull wrote:What you guys can't stand is that a "community organizer" got an A+ on his first semester of foreign policy, including the military ops test.

I would not give him an A+ on this since nothing that happened was of his liking or doing.
I would give him a solid C+ for doing the right thing after many many days of the military twisting his arm and forcing him to make the call.

brckwlt wrote:
And no if the seal who took the shot missed and killed the captian then its the seal fault not obamas. Obama is at fault for taking so freaking long to do anything. This should of been taken care of day one.

The ship was taken on Wednesday.

The Bainbridge arrived on scene on Thursday. Sometime after the Bainbridge arrived the seals parachuted in and were picked up.

The order was given on Friday.

When did the seals arrive? Neither you nor I know that. No point in giving the order before they're there.

They took the lifeboat under tow on Saturday. Given the difficulty of the shot they needed to be close. They spent a day slowly reeling it in. Given the difficulty of the shot (randomly moving target from a moving platform under cover). When they got them close enough (75 feet) they waited until they had a shot.

When they did, they took it.

Where do you see that this could have been speeded up?

brckwlt wrote:i suspect that obama was trying to figure out a way to do this without getting any blood on his hands so he wouldn't seem like a bad guy.

He isn't to bashful about killing Al Quida and Taliban in Pakistan. Almost daily the Predators are whacking them.

They were following the ship since the 6th of april. Right then and there we should of used one of our subs to blow there ship up. Then no hostages would of been taken on an american ship for the first time in 200 years

http://www.rferl.org/content/Somali_Pir ... 05617.html

they say april 6th. so obama knew since atleast then. they might of known the pirates were planning this even earlier

coaledsweat wrote:

brckwlt wrote:i suspect that obama was trying to figure out a way to do this without getting any blood on his hands so he wouldn't seem like a bad guy.

He isn't to bashful about killing Al Quida and Taliban in Pakistan. Almost daily the Predators are whacking them.

Well true, but he doesnt get slammed for it like bush did. and when is the last time cnn or abc whoever led with a story about how many of our soldiers or innocent iraq's have died in iraq or Afghanistan.

Such a huge double standard with our pathetic media. I guess its alright when our soldiers die on obmas clock and when he authorizes a mission that ends up killing innocent children or women. then its just oh thats war for ya nothing he could do about that.

If obama had media coverage like bush did, He would be the laughing stock of the entire world for how he handles things.

Wait i went to far. if we had fair media coverage he would of never even been the democrat nominee or elected president

brckwlt wrote:They were following the ship since the 6th of april. Right then and there we should of used one of our subs to blow there ship up. Then no hostages would of been taken on an american ship for the first time in 200 years

http://www.rferl.org/content/Somali_Pir ... 05617.html

they say april 6th. so obama knew since atleast then. they might of known the pirates were planning this even earlier

The ship was taken on April 8th.

You want someone to blame for the ship being taken? Blame Maersk. They're the ones who are too cheap to properly crew their ships. 21 crew members on a ship that size means 6 guys on watch at any given time. That lightly crewed there's no one watching the horizon, there's probably only 1 or 2 guys on the bridge. The Dunkin Donuts where I bought coffee this morning has more people on duty at any given time than the Maersk Alabama did.