Military convoy seen flying a Trump flag belonged to Navy SEALs

Alright I'll clarify a few things here for everybody.

These are Navy SEALs, not regular military, rules and regulations don't apply to them the same way they do for the regular military. On paper yes the rules apply to all servicemembers. In actual practice, not so much. So in laments terms they get away with doing a whole lot of stuff that normal Private John Doe cannot do.

The military overall likes Trump. Especially the combat arms units. Combat arms units always tend to favor Republicans over Democrats in recent times.

I was deployed overseas during the election and virtually everybody on the base was glued to a TV somewhere watching this entire thing go down. When Trump won the place erupted into cheers as if we just won the war on the spot. For days on end everybody was giving each other high fives when walking by, talking about it, celebrating it, etc. It was two fold, combat units tend to support Republicans, Trump "says" he will take our gloves off and let us actually fight, he says he will rebuild our military, and NOBODY, and I mean NOBODY, wanted Hillary Clinton.

We had a military ball a few nights ago. We did our formal ceremony where we give toasts to the Army, the Unit, the President etc. You're supposed to just toast and be done with it but when it came time to toast to the President we basically broke "professionalism" and cheered with multiple people shouting out "Trump!!".

The guy is popular in the military there is no denying that. Combat arms units love the guy. These are the things that many on the Left are weary about hearing but they are true. The military as a whole tends to be Conservative. The Combat Arm of the military is virtually ALL Conservative. It shouldn't come as a surprise that the military is happy that Obama is gone and Hillary has lost. We simply prefer Republicans over Democrats, those are facts.

Many folks in the military today have been in for awhile and fought these continuous wars under both Bush and Obama. We saw the difference between the way the two Commanders in Chief fight wars. Most prefer the way Republicans fight wars over the way Democrats do. You have to understand that these are COMBAT ARMS men. They are trained from day 1 to FIGHT, from day one in Basic Training or Boot Camp or whatever the branch calls it, they recite chants like "BLOOD makes the green grass grow!" Go to any military outpost around the world and see what the guys are doing during their off time. They are either in the gym pumping iron or sitting around playing Call of Duty video games. Why? Why play Call of Duty when you're living real life Call of Duty? Because they want to fight, thats their job, and when they're done doing it in real life or when they CAN'T do it in real life they do it in the video games.

So you have Battalions, Platoons, Sqauds, SEAL Team's, Rangers etc full of men who are trained to fight, who want to fight, who get deployed overseas to a war zone and are told they cannot fight. They will "advise" or something or likely never leave the wire.

Unlike the majority of people who talk around here, I was there, on the ground, fighting these wars. I was there a mere few months ago. I heard the talk, the constant non stop complaining from everybody saying literally "What the hell are we doing here? This is (*)(*)(*)(*)ing stupid, let us fight or send us home." With leadership doing they best they can to salvage morale by giving speeches every week talking about "I understand guys, this isn't the war we thought it would be, but we play the hand we were dealt this time".

I saw the real world damage that was done when we have absolutely ridiculous ROE's that tie our hands behind out backs. In the years past we've had ROE's so ridiculous that even the most Liberal of people would likely shake their heads. All because of the way Obama and his administration believed war should be fought. It was dangerous, and in plenty of cases it was literally fatal. US military members literally died because of some of these rules. I saw it with my own eyes. Obama was not popular among those of us who have to leave the wire and actually fight these wars.

Trump isn't like that. He might be reckless, he may be smarter than I give him credit for, he might be a nutcase, he might be all talk, he might get us thrown into WWIII with his attitude, I honestly have no idea. But what I do know is that he can't be worse than what we had before. And when we are sent to fight again, Trump and Mattis will let us fight and remove the deadly handcuffs that Obama thought were such a good idea.

Plus whether anybody likes it or not, hanging up in every single military building on every single military installation is a picture of Donald Trump next to a picture of a very mean looking General James Mattis. They are our Commanders now.

And whether it upsets you or not, WE (the ones who are actually fighting the wars) are happy as hell about that. The fact that we are happy about that SHOULD make the public happy, because at the end of the day it is we who go off to foreign lands and fight and die. If I were a civilians I'd be happy that the military is actually happy about who is in charge of them for once.

 

Thanks for yours as well.

But let me clarify, I'm not saying Marines, Soldiers, SEAL's, etc are a bunch of programmed robots who just want to go out and kill things. That's a misconception that I don't want to put out there.

What I am saying is that they are trained to fight, that is their job, it's not that we WANT to go off to war and fight. I've yet to meet a single person who has been in an actual firefight and said they had fun who didn't have legitimate mental issues. I'm saying that IF we are sent to war, THEN let us fight, and if you let us fight then let us actually fight. Those were the sentiments we have.

It's no so much the war as it is the stupid restrictions put on war. My father, a veteran himself, says the same thing all the time "It's called (*)(*)(*)(*)ing war". For the past 8 years we had a President who basically said "Alright I'm sending you to war, BUT!" No, there's no but, don't send people to fight a war then tell them ok go win but don't do this, or this, or that, or this, or that. And by not being able to to this, or that, many of you will die.

That, for lack of better words, pissed off a lot of people in the military and had them lose nearly all respect for the COMMANDER in Chief that sent us there.

Trump, coupled with Mattis, has promised not to do that. That is why they are so popular and why a group of Navy SEALs is flying the Presidents flag on their convoy.

So just to clarify because I know this place, I've been here awhile, and somebody will undoubtedly come in here and read my first post and say "Oh you guys just want to go off and kill people, you're sick in the head".

NO

I would love nothing more than to live in a world where people like us don't have to exist. I would love to wake up tomorrow and wave a magic wand and have everybody in the world lay down their arms and shake hands and never raise them at one another again. Legitimate world peace. You know who hates war more than anybody else in the world? The people who have actually been in one.

All we are saying is that if you are going to send us to fight a war then let us fight a war or keep us home. I have no problem leaving home for years to fight bad guys, I have a problem with leaving home for years to fight bad guys and not being allowed to fight bad guys. Or being told to go fight bad guys with a blindfold and one arm tied behind my back.

The first quote from General Mattis basically sums up it absolutely perfectly and I sincerely hope he stays true to that quote as SecDef. Trump basically said the same thing during his campaign speeches. We are the most powerful military in the history of planet Earth, and we are rebuilding it even stronger, and we pray we never have to use it on anybody, but if we do then there will be no more of this tiptoeing through broken glass half ass war fighting of the past 8 years.

^^That right there is why the military is happy with those two. And that is why you see the deadliest professional human beings on the planet flying Trumps flag on their convoy.

 

Trump is not a king in spite of what people think, or maybe even what he may think. The Commander of that SEAL team didn't call President Trump on his cell phone and ask for clearance to go through with this mission. This mission went through multiple intel analysts, SEAL brass, SOCOM brass, Pentagon brass, then Trump. Trump doesn't know what SEALs do, he was briefed by his staff who was briefed by other brass who were briefed by other brass all the way down to the SEAL team itself.

So yes, Trump may have gave the mission the green light, but lets not act like Trump took out a map and single handedly said alright guys I want you to go here. It doesn't work that way.

Plus you cannot plan for everything. With every mission there are risks, risks that are understood by those who fight war. Saying a mission is a failure because somebody died during a WAR makes no sense.

If you are unfamiliar I would suggest you do a bit of research on what the Pentagon considers success vs failure and what is considered "acceptable casualties" via doctrine when conducting operations. It will probably surprise you. But for this particular incident I will give you the answer. This wasn't a failure.

Well you may consider it so by your own personal definition, however, the Pentagon (who runs the military) does not.

 

So since Trump is President then the blood of the fallen are all on his hands correct?

Then, without being hypocritical, you must accept that the blood of the fallen in the past lay directly on the hands of Obama. The policies of the Obama Administration in fighting these wars have been catastrophic and have directly led to the deaths of many service members. I have literally seen it with my own eyes. So you are willing to accept these deaths as Obama's fault, yes? You have to, these are your words, not mine.

No it's not a matter of perspective whether or not this mission was a success, it's a matter of doctrine. Like I said before, please read up on military doctrine before making conclusive statements regarding whether or not a mission was a success or a failure. Right now you are factually wrong. Your OPINION may be that the mission was a failure, but FACTUALLY the mission was not a failure, it was a success, by military doctrine.

But yes you are correct, we are not officially at "war", we have not officially declared "war" since WWII. But we can play semantics all day long, we are at war, I was at war, I have been to war multiple times.

But fine we can use the literal definitions if you like, I have never been to war, I have been in a "conflict" with Islamic terrorism multiple times.

 

I didn't assume you have been or haven't been anywhere...

You know full well that operators like SEALs, Rangers, Special Forces, etc are all over the world right now in places that the general public doesn't even think about, not just in the Middle East. I don't know the full details of this mission or why it was given the green light, nobody does but those involved, but there is a reason it was given the green light and that reason extends well beyond Trump's ego. He doesn't make decisions like this on his own.

There are a whole lot of people involved both military and civilian who make these types of decisions and they aren't all just sitting around a table saying "Lets send SEALs to raid this village in this random country today, I'm bored". There was a reason they went there.

These Special Ops guys are the spearhead in this counter insurgency fight. This is their type of fight and they are much better equipped to handle it than the conventional military who was designed to fight conventional wars. People who join elite units like Navy SEALs fully understand the dangers of their profession and know that death is a very real possibility.

We aren't just casually throwing away lives, I was just over there and things have changed a lot since when you were there. High brass is so worried about ANYBODY getting hurt that us even being there now has become virtually pointless. Which is what I explained earlier in the thread.

But for what its worth I actually agree with you to some extent. I see the Middle East as one big revolving door that we will never get out of unless we just say screw this and leave. I don't think we should have been in Iraq in the first place, I personally don't think we should have went back again. I say if Iraq is too weak to fight for themselves then so be it, you just got conquered by ISIS. The human rights violations and all that crap I couldn't care less about, that's their problem not ours, if they don't like it then they need to learn how to defend themselves, if they can't then they die. I said this on this very forum years ago when ISIS was still a small faction, if we are going to fight these people again then lets go now while they're still small, don't wait until they grow and then send us to fight them. Either send us right now or just say screw it and let ISIS conquer whoever they conquer and stay out of it.

What did we do? Option 3, the worst option, wait until ISIS is powerful and conquers half of Iraq THEN send us to go fight them again. That was about a dumb of a decision as invading Iraq in the first place in 03.

Which brings me back to my original point. We either need to steamroll these people Desert Storm style with no mercy and be done with it or we need to leave. This half ass warfighting we're doing isn't cutting it and is going to keep us hanging around in the Middle East for the foreseeable future. Trump and company have said they are going to stop this "COIN" style fighting and just start pounding people the way the conventional US military was designed to do. That is why he and Mattis are loved by virtually all combat arms folks right now. Those are the frustrations of the current military right now. It's not so much the war but looking over the horizon and seeing no real end to this crap. Let us fight, or keep us home, either one is perfectly fine with me because I for one am tired of playing this game with these people in the Middle East.

Trump has 3 choices. Pull us out, unleash us, or continue the current path of tiptoeing around over there. Either 1 or 2 would be perfectly fine with me but number 3 needs to get completely kicked off of the table.