Comments on: Senator Leahy takes Obama to task over landmines http://blogs.reuters.com/talesfromthetrail/2009/12/01/senator-leahy-takes-obama-to-task-over-landmines/ Tracking U.S. politics Fri, 24 May 2013 07:25:41 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.4.2 By: eddieblack http://blogs.reuters.com/talesfromthetrail/2009/12/01/senator-leahy-takes-obama-to-task-over-landmines/comment-page-1/#comment-405302 eddieblack Mon, 07 Dec 2009 13:20:20 +0000 http://blogs.reuters.com/frontrow/?p=22728#comment-405302 Wallace 167, you can not extrapolate that land mines are protecting people around the world. Land mines are meant to kill people. Does the term oxymoron mean anything to you? Yet we plant them where civilians tread. This is the problem with using military forces for civilian matters. Farmers and children are still dying from mines and blasting caps in the fields where WW I was waged in France. It would take hundreds of years with current technology to clean up that mess. I seriously doubt any comprehensive review of landmine deployment has or ever will be done. By all accounts the use of drones to bomb Taliban forces on the Pakistani border has only served to widen the conflict into Pakistan. The Taliban have now gone to Pakistan to fight. Over a million Pakistanis are now refugees as they cannot return to their homes safely. Perhaps a comprehensive review of the use of military forces for diplomatic and political objectives by the United States is in order. Wallace 167, you can not extrapolate that land mines are protecting people around the world. Land mines are meant to kill people. Does the term oxymoron mean anything to you? Yet we plant them where civilians tread. This is the problem with using military forces for civilian matters.

Farmers and children are still dying from mines and blasting caps in the fields where WW I was waged in France. It would take hundreds of years with current technology to clean up that mess. I seriously doubt any comprehensive review of landmine deployment has or ever will be done.

By all accounts the use of drones to bomb Taliban forces on the Pakistani border has only served to widen the conflict into Pakistan. The Taliban have now gone to Pakistan to fight. Over a million Pakistanis are now refugees as they cannot return to their homes safely. Perhaps a comprehensive review of the use of military forces for diplomatic and political objectives by the United States is in order.

]]> By: Wallace167 http://blogs.reuters.com/talesfromthetrail/2009/12/01/senator-leahy-takes-obama-to-task-over-landmines/comment-page-1/#comment-405235 Wallace167 Fri, 04 Dec 2009 15:41:46 +0000 http://blogs.reuters.com/frontrow/?p=22728#comment-405235 "The Administration's decision to attend this Review Conference is the result of an on-going comprehensive review of U.S. landmine policy initiated at the direction of President Obama. This is the first comprehensive review since 2003. As such, it will take some time to complete, given that we must ensure that all factors are considered, including possible alternatives to meet our national defense needs and security commitments to our friends and allies to ensure protection of U.S. troops and the civilians they protect around the world." See: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2009/dec/132891.htm “The Administration’s decision to attend this Review Conference is the result of an on-going comprehensive review of U.S. landmine policy initiated at the direction of President Obama.

This is the first comprehensive review since 2003. As such, it will take some time to complete, given that we must ensure that all factors are considered, including possible alternatives to meet our national defense needs and security commitments to our friends and allies to ensure protection of U.S. troops and the civilians they protect around the world.”

See: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2009/de c/132891.htm

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