(no subject)

[unnamed525.livejournal.com]

Comments

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

I was thinking of everyone in the post-WWII era.
Who would you nominate above him?

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

Johnson. Or Kennedy.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

LBJ? "How many babies did you kill today?" Really?

JFK did get us started in Vietnam, but it occurs to me
that Carter did start the Afghanistan stuff.

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

JKF got his brains blown out from not understanding our military. And he hated Vietnam, IMO, and would have gotten us out had he lived.

LBJ fucked up and I truly believe he regretted it.

[moonshaz.livejournal.com]

Agreed on both counts.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Carter did start the Afghanistan stuff

What stuff? He declared the "Carter doctrine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carter_Doctrine)" but it was President Reagan who really started the ball rolling on specific policies.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

Carter did not send in 'advisors' and weapons
to help kill the Russian invaders?

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Yes and no; but Reagan officials really ramped up specific policies and involvement. Carter wasn't a saint on this (well, compared to what the Bush administration did regarding faked evidence regarding Iraq, maybe he was/is). But still, there's a big difference in what Carter did; and what happened later: U.S. troops on the ground in one of the longest involvements for the U. S. military

According to Peter Bergen, writing in Holy War, Inc., no Americans trained or had direct contact with the mujahideen. The skittish CIA had fewer than 10 operatives in the region because it "feared it would be blamed, like in Guatemala". Civilian personnel from the U.S. Department of State and the CIA frequently visited the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area during this time, and the US contributed generously to aiding Afghan refugees.

The U.S.-built Stinger antiaircraft missile, supplied to the mujahideen in very large numbers beginning in 1986, struck a decisive blow to the Soviet war effort as it allowed the lightly armed Afghans to effectively defend against Soviet helicopter landings in strategic areas.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

Yes, I would think Carter to be an uncontroversial
selection for least militaristic president.