vtmarik wrote:Carebian Knight wrote:Nothing against you vtmarik but I'm getting tired of Americans saying that we should pull out because we've lost to many soldiers already, in WWII we had way more losses, some in one battle, than we've had in Iraq(referring to American troops) but not nearly as many people wanted to end the war and let the enemy win. They were willing to fight to the end. That's how it should be.
There's a massive difference between WWII and this war.
First off, this war was declared won by the President, or have you forgotten that whole "Mission Accomplished" banner?
Secondly, the main objective of the war was to get Saddam out of power. We've done that, and now he's dead. He's effectively no longer a threat.
Thirdly, the administration has stated that as the iraqi's step up we will step back. We need to focus more on training them to take over so we can bring our family members home.
They've done their jobs, they accomplished the mission, and the only reason many of them are still over there is because their tours of duty have been involuntarily extended.
If the soliders chose to stay, that'd be one thing. But the Pentagon is just changing the dates in the computers, I'm sure that a lot of families would like to see their proud American relations, spouses, and parents back.
EDIT: And the main thing I object to in Jay's post is how flippant and nonchalant he seemed about how taking out saddam was worth "a few more dead Americans." They're human beings, they aren't fodder for some machine. They are people who are putting their lives on the line for what they believe in, they aren't like the pixels in the video games. When they're killed it devastates families, and even whole towns.
It sickens me to think that some people in this country view them as a means to an end rather than human beings.
vt, I'm posting this as a person who fully intends to be in Iraq in 6 or 7 years. I pray that we're still there by that time, not because I want to be (who the hell would want to be in Iraq?), but because I think we need to be there.
This is basically the same thing I've posted in every Iraq-related thread on this forum.
A pullout now, or even in anything less than 10 years, would be catastrophic. No matter what you think of the war.
I don't care if you think it was a war for oil, a war for Georgie boy to live up to his ol' pa, or a war with good intentions involved - it doesn't matter. Fact is, we went to Iraq, destroyed their government, and now we're left with a mess and a civil war.
This is done. It's in the past. And we're reaping the harvest we've sown, for better or for worse. But it's not something we can just walk away from without consequences both for us and the Iraqis.
Consider the conditions in Germany after World War I and compare them to the conditions in Iraq. They're extremely similar, except the one in Iraq is worse. If a broken Germany spawned Hitler (and that was
sans religious fanaticism), imagine what a completely decimated and war-torn Iraq would create if left to its own devices.
Warlordism. More civil war. Eventually, a single party might rise to power, but you can bet that said single party will instate an Islamic fundamentalist regime extremely hostile to the US.
The Iraqi government as it is right now can't stand on its own. And it's not something we can fix without continued presence in Iraq. You can hardly expect a functional democratic government to bloom from conditions of civil war and terrorism. Those conditions must be neutralized before it can gain any strength. And at the moment, the US military is the only one with the will to do it. Which is how it should be - we created the mess, we get to clean it up.
That's why we need to be there now, regardless of whether we should have been there in the first place.
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