The US must stay the course in Iraq

[Barinthus]

Originally posted by MrFun


MAN -- give me whatever your smoking or snorting!

Come on over, I'll share

[Urban Ranger]

They won the war didn't they? That's all that mattered. You could win every battle and still lose the war.

[Barinthus]

Aye, that they did, UR.

[POTUS]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
They won the war didn't they? That's all that mattered. You could win every battle and still lose the war.

Well, they lost every battle, and then when they were trying to just survive, the US retreated. Yes, the US lost. But, the US could have just as easily won.

[DAVOUT]

Re: The US must stay the course in Iraq

Originally posted by The diplomat

We have to win because if we don't, we send a signal to all would-be enemies that the US is weak and can be kicked around at ease.

The US has already send multiple signals :
- that their intelligence is below any expectation
- that the Pentagon is able to plan a military offensive, not a war
- that the service in charge of implementing the democracy ignored that it would need an irakian admin, and let destroy the ministries
- that the White House is accelerating the transfer of power (to be done by june 30), after claiming for months that it could not be achieved in 2004.

If I were a would-be enemy, I would understand that the US has not a clear idea of how democracy can be establish in Irak, or that it does not really intend to do it. In both cases I would conclude that harasment should continue.

The will to win whatever the cost alone gives the advantage to the would-be enemy because his costs are much, much, lower.

[Dinner]

The June 30th date was set last summer. I really don't follow your logic about how recent, post last summer, violence has lead to the hand over date being moved up.

[Dinner]

BTW the Pentigon knew full well what it needed to win the war and to effectively occupy the country. They wrote up a plan which called for 400,000-500,000 soldiers just so they could saturate the country with soldiers in order to provide security. The plan also called for the Iraq Army not to be disolved but for the senior leadership to be removed and then to have the Army help provide law and order.

Rumsfield vetoed the plan claiming it "wasn't imaginative enough" but several insiders have claimed Rumsfield and Bush didn't like the financial and political costs of having a half million man occupation force.

[Frozzy]

"The Americans will always do the right thing... After they've exhausted all the alternatives."
- Winston Churchill

[DAVOUT]

Originally posted by Oerdin
The June 30th date was set last summer. I really don't follow your logic about how recent, post last summer, violence has lead to the hand over date being moved up.

I do not say that; I only observe that, from an enemy point of view, the hand over date has been moved up, compared to the initial plans or declarations.

[DAVOUT]

Originally posted by Oerdin
BTW the Pentigon knew full well what it needed to win the war and to effectively occupy the country. They wrote up a plan which called for 400,000-500,000 soldiers just so they could saturate the country with soldiers in order to provide security. The plan also called for the Iraq Army not to be disolved but for the senior leadership to be removed and then to have the Army help provide law and order.

Rumsfield vetoed the plan claiming it "wasn't imaginative enough" but several insiders have claimed Rumsfield and Bush didn't like the financial and political costs of having a half million man occupation force.

Again, from an enemy point of view, Rumsfeld/Pentagon have launched a WAR with 150000 soldiers which appear to be not enough to settle the war. This is obviously a signal, particularly considering the costs you mentionned.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by DataAeolus
Aye, that they did, UR.

** plants victory flag on Data's head **

[GePap]

Originally posted by lord of the mark


hello!!!

The thread was started by a poster calling himself "the diplomat" not by George W Bush (who AFAIK doesnt post to Poly) The Diplomat made no reference whatsoever to the date of the turnover.

Your posts have little to do with the post of the person who started the thread.

Did you see the thread title and just respond to that, without actually reading the first post??? OK, it happens to all of us

I always read the OP. Maybe you have not figured out the diplomat basically holds a 100% pro-Bush agenda, and when he says "stay the course"! He means, Bush is doing it right, we should support what he is doing! Well, I don't. I think the course he has set, doing it on the cheap, on the fly, and running iraq with a continual eye to his re-election, politicizing the occupation, is wrong. Hence, we should NOT stay the course, but change courses.

[East Street Trader]

Well the voice which it would be good to hear would be the voice of those Iraqis who are trying to get on with leading their lives.

Not the people who took to looting as soon as the invasion destroyed law and order; not the people intent on killing so as to earn the favour of their God; not the people who, under the previous regime, made life (and death) miserable for lots of their fellows; not the people excited by the present power vacuum and manoevring to increase their own influence; just the rest of the folk who did not ask to be invaded, do not ask to be looted, and would like some peace and stability so they can get on with earning a living, bringing up their families and maybe get to see a movie on a Saturday afternoon every now and then.

A recent poll suggested that many such folk would be happy for the US/UK forces to stay for a year because they recognise that their presence increases the chance of law and order being better maintained. But they don't want foreignors having anything to do with their government.

Quite how the two things can be reconciled I don't know. But there certainly have been peacekeeping forces that kept out of local politics. So maybe something could be done.

Somehow, however, I do not have the impression that the US/UK political leaders are going to listen to that voice.

Nor, for that matter, would it, if heard, seemingly strike much of a chord with Poly posters. The US/UK politicians (and, perhaps, their electorates) are concerned with the "war on terrorism" not with the conditions in which Iraqis lead their lives. The fact that events happen to be unfolding in Iraq is just coincidental. It could equally well be Afghanistan or Ireland or any other place where Mr Bush or Mr Blair persuaded themselves terrorists lurk.

Which does have quite a strong parallel with Vietnam. The voice of the Vitnamese people was likewise never heard about that conflict. The US had its Commie bugbear to battle and its domino theory to worry about. Just as it now has its obsession with terrorism.

Come to think of it, the peace protesters have their own agenda too -,because they are all busy demanding immediate withdrawal of the troops. None of them thinks it necessary to ask the Iraqi people what they want either.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse
hmmm, the tet offensive was ordered by Hanoi - it was probably the most successful operation of the war.

But not militarily, politically.

[GePap]

East Side Trader:

I think a UN mandate for the occupation ofrces after soverignty is handed over would be best to work out the problem of balancing the need for foreign forces to keep security and as little direct interference from any specific foreign government in the internal dealings of Iraq and it's government.