"Victory Is Not an Option"

[RGBVideo]

You guys already won. All the original objectives of the war were completed when Hussein was captured. The problem is with stupid opposition leaders who somehow reframed the objectives of the war after victory so they could come up with something to bash sonny Bush with. Since when did it the duty of Americans to upkeep Iraqi police forces and pay for all the costs of the Iraqi government?

Time to declare victory and go home.

[Patroklos]

Japan, 1945.

Thats what I said

WWII,

There are some things we could have done to make the aftermath of Iraq similar to Japan.

1.) Start out with equal conventional militaries.
2.) Slaughter their equal military by the millions so they feel defeated.
3.) Completely destroy every urban center and economic hub in the country.
4.) Make it known we are out to defeat every one of them, not some hand picked few, and well continue destroying them en masse until they all give up.
5.) use an unimaginaly devastating weapon on them for the first time. Nukes are so WWII, we need something new. Perhaps drop a small asteroid on them.

Not so much what happened in Iraq. So not so much of a useful comparison.

[Patroklos]

First you wrap the argument over coming up with historical comparisons, then you dismiss all historical comparisons as stupid. Brilliant.

No VJ, what I did was make a small comparison based on only a few hand picked factors. Then, I pointed out that even though on the surface it may seem the same in reality when looked at in their entirety the similarities are superficial. Which is what Rufus and I were agreeing up somewhat in reference to WWII comparisons.

And in Iraq's case, comparing it to any other war is next to useless..

[Arrian]

For those who still believe it's a good idea to "stay the course" I'm curious as to how you define "victory" and how you believe said victory can be achieved.

I used to think "stay the course" was the right thing to do, having made the initial mistake of going to war in 2003. Now I'm wavering between that and the position outlined in the OP. Have been for some time now. Make the case for me. LotM has in the past, and has to an extent in this thread, but I don't find it convincing anymore.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

Originally posted by The diplomat
Just imagine if we had said "victory is not an option" in World War 2. This kind of defeatist attitude makes me sick.

This sort of blind rah-rahism makes me sick. Not every war we fight is WWII, ffs. Or Vietnam. Or Korea... etc.

The guy who wrote the OP is a "realist" FP guy, a paleocon, IIUC. Go ahead and call him a sickening defeatist if you will, but I'd like to know why his point isn't worth considering.

-Arrian

[padillah]

Originally posted by lord of the mark


So you believe hes asserting not, that we are fighting to stop the current civil war/violence/horror, but that we are fighting to prevent our presence in Iraq?

No, and I won't cop to that argument no matter how many times you restate it. I think the guys point is very clear:

We must continue the war to prevent the terrible aftermath that will occur if our forces are withdrawn soon.

This is what he is presenting as the current thinking. That we must stay because if we leave then things will fall apart and violence will rise.

I bolded the above words in order to highlight the cause and effect statement. I'm hoping this will help illucidate things.

The argument he is addressing is that our troops leaving will cause (or, at least allow) the violence to rise.

Reflect on the double-think of this formulation. We are now fighting to prevent what our invasion made inevitable!

Our invasion made the presence of our troops inevitable. Like I said before, if you invade a country your troops will end up in that country.

OK, since there will be violence if we leave... and if we invade we will be there... how do we address the situation? The simplified version of the argument is "We can't leave because we're there". That's doublespeak.

If any current situation is inevitable, and doing something to stop an inevitable situation is absurd, than doing something to change any current situation is absurd.

Who ever said doing something to change a current situation was absurd? Oh, right the people that think we shouldn't leave because we're there. Sorry, for a second I thought you ment either myself or Mr. Odom, both of whom have advocated changing the situation despite the protests regarding our being there.

I think you are misreading what Mr Odom means by inevitable. If he does mean what you claim he means (its not contingent cause its the case) then theres no point to the rest of what he says.

I have no idea what you think Mr. Odom said or what argument you think I'm putting up but you phraseed it quite well above: If we are in Iraq and we can't leave, what are we left to do? Be "more" in Iraq? How is adding more troops going to make our presence in Iraq any more palitable?

It's been said time and time again: "Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results is the definition of insanity".

Tom P.

[Sandman]

Originally posted by lord of the mark
2. Iranian nukes. The Europeans tried for years to stop them with negotiations. The mullahs jerked them around and humiliated, which is why they are now supportive of using sanctions. Sanctions that have led to growing discontent with the regime. Is it wise to stop that now? And what exactly does the situation in Iraq have to do with this?

Would the Iranians still be after nukes if they'd not been included in the Axis of Evil? That must have been a bit of a surprise for them, after they'd helped out the US in Afghanistan.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Sandman
Would the Iranians still be after nukes if they'd not been included in the Axis of Evil?

Yeah. The program was in existance before the Axis speech.

[padillah]

There's no real way to tell but Pakistan persued and aquired nukes and they weren't in an "Axis".

This is one of the arguments I have against pre-emptism - you can never tell what a person "might" do.

Tom P.

[Sandman]

It's certainly given them a reason to speed it up.

[DinoDoc]

Switching assumptions now?

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Switching assumptions now?

Nope. He's still operating from the assumption that if Bush did it, it must be wrong.

[Arrian]

Be honest, the "Axis of Evil" thing was just stupid.

As for Iranian nukes... they wanted them before Bush and will want them after Bush. Bush's policies (more than his words) would seem to make the goal of getting nukes all the more attractive to Iranians, though (nukes = USA cannot attack you).

-Arrian

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Arrian
Bush's policies (more than his words) would seem to make the goal of getting nukes all the more attractive to Iranians, though (nukes = USA cannot attack you).

-Arrian

Bushs policies (and the hash made of implementing those policies) have "deep sixed" any possibility of a conventional invasion of Iran for purposes of regime change. I mean really. At this point its Irans nuclear program that makes it a target. If Irans main concern is to avoid being targeted for military action, theyd be better off without nukes.

If OTOH, their goal is to mess around in the region with impunity, or worse, then nukes are a more logical part of that strategy.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Sandman


Would the Iranians still be after nukes if they'd not been included in the Axis of Evil? That must have been a bit of a surprise for them, after they'd helped out the US in Afghanistan.

they helped out themselves in Afghanistan. Theyd been supporting the Northern Alliance for awhile, esp Muhummad Khan "emir" of Herat, and they expected their influence there to increase with the fall of the Taliban. Meanwhile they were supporting Hezbollah and Hamas, and they already had a nuclear enrichment program. And theyd been subject to US economic sanctions for years. They could hardly have been surprised.