why do some of you think pulling out troops is a good thing?

Commy

Cosmo wrote:

...
But... if it is U.S. troops providing security... I would imagine the ones in the Iraqi government want us to stay. And why not? Our guys are the targets. As long as they are there, they are the ones facing danger. When they leave... those in charge over there will become the targets. If we begin a slow measured withdrawal... and violence heats up again... what do we do? Like this so-called 'surge'. What will happen if the violence returns? We have no choice but to re-deploy the troops.
...
And trust me.. I WISH we could leave. But it would have to be a massive evacuation of all of our personel and resources. We could possibly relocate command and control... and set up forward air bases outside their borders.... but, where? And we would still have to figure out a way where we can draw down our combat troops... who are providing security for our support personel... and without our support personel... our combat troops cannot function. We are caught in a Catch-22.
We've screwed ourselves with this bullshit... or, our leaders have screwed our military people.

Seems everyone forgets the "insurgency" is actually a resistance group. guerillas. They are fighting for Iraq. When we leave they win, and fuck, that's progress. Fighting for independence, that's what the US was founded on. It may be the spark tehse people need to take back their coujtry.

catefrances

Cosmo wrote:

...
I agree... we are basically having our troops sit on a pressure cooker. If we leave today.... there will be violence. If we leave 20 years from now.. there will be violence. We are expecting our military to find a military solution for a political problem.
But, we DID break it... so we DID buy it. It's a fuck up that we knew about from the beginning, but still insisted that we go forward with it. Hoping for the best scenario outcome is NOT a military strategy... it is a pipe dream.
I blame Jesus for telling President Bush that WAR was the solution.

the biggest mistake after invasion was sacking the iraqi army.

sorry cant agree cosmo. on one hand you say it doesnt matter when the troops leave, there'll be violence regardless. and then you say we broke it, we own it. so we stay?

so do you reckon the troops should be withdrawn or not? judging by the above post, you sound like youre having an each way bet to me?

jeffbr

Cosmo wrote:

...
I agree... we are basically having our troops sit on a pressure cooker. If we leave today.... there will be violence. If we leave 20 years from now.. there will be violence. We are expecting our military to find a military solution for a political problem.
But, we DID break it... so we DID buy it. It's a fuck up that we knew about from the beginning, but still insisted that we go forward with it. Hoping for the best scenario outcome is NOT a military strategy... it is a pipe dream.
I blame Jesus for telling President Bush that WAR was the solution.

So you're essentially saying that whether we leave now, or leave in 20 years the outcome is the same. In the meantime, if we stay, thousands of people will continue to die, and we'll spend billions and billions of dollars to let it happen. If the outcomes are equal, I'll choose the path that involves less risk to our troops. Bring them home tomorrow.

Cosmo

jeffbr wrote:

So you're essentially saying that whether we leave now, or leave in 20 years the outcome is the same. In the meantime, if we stay, thousands of people will continue to die, and we'll spend billions and billions of dollars to let it happen. If the outcomes are equal, I'll choose the path that involves less risk to our troops. Bring them home tomorrow.

...
That's my feeling, too.
But, logistically speaking... this is a great undertaking. The spin up towards the initial invasion took months... staging the troops and equipment outside of Iraq. Once the whistle blew.. the invasion was easy. Everything was in place.
Now.. getting out is another story. You have to have a rear guard to protect the mass exodus from the place. we should have though about this before we went in. The Powell Doctrine states you go in with overwhelming forces (check), with the ovewhelming support of the homefront (not check), have clearly defined military objectives (check.. sort of), have contingency plans in place (not check) and have a clearly defined and realistic exit strategy (definately, not check).
We have the game plan... the problem occurred when Bush and Rumsfeld called an audible before the snap. The plan was to have us greeted as liberators, our troops strewn with roses and kisses, have Baghdad streets and boulevards named after Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, a ticker tape parade down Wall Street and the free flow of Iraqi oil money coming into the coffers of Haliburton. Well... at least that last part was accomplished.

lalalalaaaaaaaa

GreenTeaDisease wrote:

I'm terrified of prison, it's definitely akin to a gun held to my head!

Being alive is not akin to being dead. I'll revise what I said and remove the "voluntary" part, but the pressures we face with taxes are not the same as the ones people in Iraq face. They're not even comparable. That's why we look foolish when we say "I don't support this war" and act like helpless victims of the big bad U.S. government.

GreenTeaDisease

Saturnal wrote:

Being alive is not akin to being dead. I'll revise what I said and remove the "voluntary" part, but the pressures we face with taxes are not the same as the ones people in Iraq face. They're not even comparable. That's why we look foolish when we say "I don't support this war" and act like helpless victims of the big bad U.S. government.

I'm sorry, I'm not going to blamed for the war because I pay my taxes. I think this is the dumbest metaphor ever, I'm sorry. I didn't say anything about my life being comparable to someone in Iraq- nobody did. you started the analogy by saying that everyone who pays taxes is basically pulling the trigger.

lalalalaaaaaaaa

GreenTeaDisease wrote:

I'm sorry, I'm not going to blamed for the war

I'm not blaming you or any other tax payer for the war. I'm saying it makes us look foolish when we say we don't support it. That's it.

stupidcorporatewhore

Saturnal wrote:

I'm not blaming you or any other tax payer for the war. I'm saying it makes us look foolish when we say we don't support it. That's it.

Funny, we never EVER blamed the iraqis for the evils of Saddam.

yet I'm GWB's buddy!?

I'm a bad person, who knew?

beachdweller

Heineken Helen wrote:

You fucking started the mess... you go in, destroy a country for absolutely no good reason (oil NOT being a good reason), take everything you want from it... and then just fuck off and leave THEM to clean up the mess? :mad: Your troops should be over there NOT intimidating, not fighting... but building at YOUR expense... and cleaning up... and trying to make things right. If you can't fucking do it, at least give the UN some support and let us go in and do it properly :cool:

You can't get out of it this easily.

first, irish and english troops & governments were involved also, and have pulled out already for the most part. second, we give the UN more support exponentially than any other country, and has since it's inception. I agree we messed it up and have ownership of that, but if they have a democratically elected government, then we should start to move out, but work with other countries to fill the void.

if the US stays, it's because of the money it generates for the war machine/western countries industrial military complex.

the US consolate being built will be one of the largest, and the most fortified complexes in the world when completed. so I doubt the US will be completely out of Iraq ever...

Hollyweird

Heineken Helen wrote:

You fucking started the mess... you go in, destroy a country for absolutely no good reason (oil NOT being a good reason), take everything you want from it... and then just fuck off and leave THEM to clean up the mess? :mad: Your troops should be over there NOT intimidating, not fighting... but building at YOUR expense... and cleaning up... and trying to make things right. If you can't fucking do it, at least give the UN some support and let us go in and do it properly :cool:

You can't get out of it this easily.

What the hell do you think they are doing over there? The "war" has been over for some time. The occupation is what continues and American lives are being taken every day while we try to stabilize the country so it does not descend into anarchy. We need to stay. And despite the BS the Democrats say, we have no choice but to stay,

Hollyweird

Heineken Helen wrote:

You fucking started the mess... you go in, destroy a country for absolutely no good reason (oil NOT being a good reason), take everything you want from it... and then just fuck off and leave THEM to clean up the mess? :mad: Your troops should be over there NOT intimidating, not fighting... but building at YOUR expense... and cleaning up... and trying to make things right. If you can't fucking do it, at least give the UN some support and let us go in and do it properly :cool:

You can't get out of it this easily.

What the hell do you think they are doing over there? The "war" has been over for some time. The occupation is what continues and American lives are being taken every day while we try to stabilize the country so it does not descend into anarchy. We need to stay. And despite the BS the Democrats say, we have no choice but to stay,

Hollyweird

Heineken Helen wrote:

I agree with you on this... troops CAN go in as peace keepers/peace enforcers... what exactly are they doing there at the moment that's so important? Just both sides shooting at eachother? what's the point of that? While they're there... they should be helping to rebuild the infrastructure the way the UN/Nato/EU troops do when they go in. Help build up communities and relationships with the locals... prove you're there to help rather than just blow stuff up. The US made sure they've got every available person in the military... why not use them for a good cause for once?

Seriously. The UN? Give me a fucking break. They did such a wonderful job in Srebernica why not send them back to sit on their weapons and watch another massacre. Thats what they do best.

Hollyweird

Commy wrote:

WE invade, fuck up a country, kill tens of thousnads of its civilians. Its my guess, and going on a limb here, I"m thinking they want us the fuck out asap.

Would they be Al Qaeda? Iran? THEY definitely want us out. Many Sunnis are already turning on Al Qaeda in Iraq and those people do want us to stay. While I dont agree with Helen's view that WE are all responsible for this mess. Half of this country voted for Gore in 2000. Then there were the fools who voted for Nader and actually got Bush elected. Maybe you ought to be mad at them.

catefrances

Hollyweird wrote:

What the hell do you think they are doing over there? The "war" has been over for some time. The occupation is what continues and American lives are being taken every day while we try to stabilize the country so it does not descend into anarchy. We need to stay. And despite the BS the Democrats say, we have no choice but to stay,

well thats just bullshit, there is always a choice. tis just the wrong ones are being made. no matter when foreign troops leave, iraq will descend into 'anarchy' as competing interests jockey to fill the void created when the 'security' leaves. iraq will never be stabilised by foreign troops cause there is and always will be opposition to the occupation. you can delude yourself into thinking eventually there will be a modicum of peace whilst the troops remain, but by what right does the coalition of willing justify their presence? deposing saddam was a good thing. continued occupation is not.

DixieN

One of the worst decisions we have made as a country was to go into Iraq. This is not surprising given who the "decider" was in the decision to go in. The term "quagmire" was always attached to Iraq for good reason. Saddam was a terrible, evil man--but, he served us a good purpose when he was in place--he was a lynch pin keeping the area relatively stable. When we leave, which we should at some point, though I'm not sure which point...all we can do is hope to leave enough dogs on side alive to match the dogs alive on the other...in other words...we're going to have to hope that whoever is left is so busy going after one another, that things don't entirely collapse and some other opportunistic third party comes in and tries to grab a handful for themselves. If that happens, the mother of all messes will break loose for us. Our final accomplishment in this whole mess will have been to establish a significant military presence within the entire region, which we will need should the mother of all messes come knocking. But, this is a huge cost to us...this just in case presence...which we didn't need to incur. This mother of a mess would have been happy to bide her time--perhaps even dropping dead of her own recognisance, and we could have productively spent the billions we've spent on this otherwise. Or perhaps not spent it and have a more decent economy going for ourselves and our descendants.

Im still here

No More War.......

Hollyweird

catefrances wrote:

well thats just bullshit, there is always a choice. tis just the wrong ones are being made. no matter when foreign troops leave, iraq will descend into 'anarchy' as competing interests jockey to fill the void created when the 'security' leaves. iraq will never be stabilised by foreign troops cause there is and always will be opposition to the occupation. you can delude yourself into thinking eventually there will be a modicum of peace whilst the troops remain, but by what right does the coalition of willing justify their presence? deposing saddam was a good thing. continued occupation is not.

Sadaam or not were stayin. I dont care what anyone says. Any draw down would be symbolic. Once Barak wins and he gets educated about whats at stake for the world economy no one will be going anywhere.

Commy

Hollyweird wrote:

Would they be Al Qaeda? Iran? THEY definitely want us out. Many Sunnis are already turning on Al Qaeda in Iraq and those people do want us to stay. While I dont agree with Helen's view that WE are all responsible for this mess. Half of this country voted for Gore in 2000. Then there were the fools who voted for Nader and actually got Bush elected. Maybe you ought to be mad at them.

Gore would have us in IRaq too.


THey refers to the people of Iraq, the millions that have been affected by Washington's wars and sanctions/.

Heineken Helen

Saturnal wrote:

We do voluntarily pay taxes, no one holds a gun to our heads. It's not like if we don't, we'll be blown to little bits as many civilians and soldiers are in Iraq all the time. Going to prison and dying aren't even comparable. We support the war because if we don't, our lives become disrupted and inconvenient. But because we support it, other people die. That's something all of us should recognize.

I don't say this because I think we should feel guilty either. I was born into this machine, I didn't create it. But I am a part of it nonetheless. And for us to sit here and say "we don't support this war" would be wrong, and it makes Americans look like jerks when we do. Most non-Americans reading this thread would agree with that I'd imagine.

No, I agree to a SMALL extent... when I said earlier that the US should fund the rebuilding and the rest of us shouldn't have to pay a penny, I took it back since our government did nothing to stop the war and supported the US as much as they could and even beyond that (being that we're a 'neutral' country :rolleyes: ). But most people realise that a huge chunk of Americans were against the war from the beginning.

We're all responsible I guess... the fact that we let these fuckers run OUR world how they want... well aren't we all a little bit fucking stupid?

Heineken Helen

beachdweller wrote:

first, irish and english troops & governments were involved also, and have pulled out already for the most part. second, we give the UN more support exponentially than any other country, and has since it's inception. I agree we messed it up and have ownership of that, but if they have a democratically elected government, then we should start to move out, but work with other countries to fill the void.

if the US stays, it's because of the money it generates for the war machine/western countries industrial military complex.

the US consolate being built will be one of the largest, and the most fortified complexes in the world when completed. so I doubt the US will be completely out of Iraq ever...

First, Irish troops were NOT involved... there are some Irish guys in the British army or in the US army but the IRISH army didn't go in... there are guys in Afghanistan now but that's a whole different country, right? Our government betrayed our neutrality though by helping the US... I never denied that.