Monday, May 10, 2010

Our failure in Iraq


It has now been more than seven years since the invasion of Iraq, and it’s getting harder and harder to hang onto any shred of hope that this is all going to turn out well. Where do we stand today? Well, 84 people were murdered and hundreds more were wounded today in attacks across Iraq. It has been more than two months since the March 7 election, and not only does Iraq not have a new government, it doesn't even have final results of the balloting. The closest thing they have to an emerging government came to the fore last week, when it was announced that two Shiite blocs have allied with hopes of running the country. Those would be the two Shiite blocs supported by none other than Iran. And it gets worse. The two groups have signed a deal that would give Shiite clerics the final say in political disputes between the blocs. Isn’t that just great. Thanks to George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and the other chickenhawks in that administration, a secular dictatorship that did not allow fanatic Shiites to gain a foothold is now on the brink of becoming an Islamic theocracy. Nice work, George. I'm not trying to argue that Saddam Hussein was a lovely man, but he certainly provided a counterpoint to Iran's strength in the region. Now, Iran may be running Iran and Iraq. And let's not forget that the waging of this war of choice in Iraq was accomplished only by virtually abandoning the war in Afghanistan. Now Iraq seems very much on the brink of descending into bloody chaos, and our prospects of ever turning things around long-term in Afghanistan appear almost as bleak. If these misadventures had come with little cost to the United States, that would be one thing. But we have spent hundreds of billions of dollars we can ill afford on the war in Iraq. And Bush can scrub his hands 24/7, but he can’t wash off the blood of 4,000 American servicemen, servicewomen and Department of Defense civilians. That stain should haunt him always.

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6 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yeah, we really protected the helpless and planted the seeds of democracy, didn't we? So we withdraw, and the region goes to hell even more so that it already has. Do we go back? Do we admit defeat? Do we let Russia try Communism there? Or do we, as I think we should, take over Iraq, make it the 51st state, and use the oil?

May 10, 2010 at 4:25 PM  
Anonymous x anonymous said...

82 people was killed across Iraq and it's W's fault in 2010?

Did I read that right?

We freed the Iraqi people, we turned the govt over to them and let them have elections. They went down the wrong path, yet that is freedom. Sometimes you just can't make that horse drink.

Obama will get our troops out of their. Then he will dry up funds for the Afghan war. I don't know why our troops are in Afghan guarding poppie fields!

May 11, 2010 at 6:48 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

We wouldn't be in Iraq if it hadn't been for W's ego and the dollar signs in the eyes of his advisers. How many people have been killed because we stomped in and tried to make all Iraqis good little Arabs in th Western mould? How much infrastructure was destroyed by us and not yet rebuilt? How much looting and how many reprisal killings were carried out because we didn't have a plan to handle the "peace?"

I hope Obama gets us out of both Iraq and Afghanistan. And I hope whoever replaces him as president has sense enough not to go back.

May 11, 2010 at 12:35 PM  
Anonymous x anonymous said...

We wouldn't be in Iraq if it hadn't been for W's ego and the dollar signs in the eyes of his advisers.

Here we go with the blame game. I mean hell if you really want to blame someone lets blame the right guy. Hitler. Now go learn your History son. I'm sure we can go biblical... cause john murtha told us all how his base was... you know they hold onto their bibles and guns. You bunch of rednecks! Not my words... John Murtha's.

May 11, 2010 at 8:30 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

X anon --

I know my history just fine. You seem to have forgotten the idiots who divided up the Middle East after WWI. That would be, in case you missed that chapter, The French and British.

If they hadn't stuck their noses in there and created arbitrary boundaries that didn't take into account sects and tribal differences, things might not be so bad today. How much of the hatred for all things Western goes back to that?

Of course we didn't help by setting up a puppet government in Iran and by helping Saddam and others get into power in Iraq in the first place.

But no matter who you blame, if there hadn't been a 9/11, Bushie Pie would've invaded Iraq just to prove that he had more cojones than daddy Bush, who let them goofy
A-rabs escape.

May 12, 2010 at 2:35 PM  
Anonymous x said...

But no matter who you blame, if there hadn't been a 9/11, Bushie Pie would've invaded Iraq just to prove that he had more cojones than daddy Bush, who let them goofy
A-rabs escape.

You know your history well grasshopper! Iraq and Saddam delt it's hand in this game. They broke 17 un resolutions! SADDAM WAS ON THE TAKE IN THE UN OIL FOR FOOD PROGRAM! After 9/11 I guess we had to call his bluff on the 18th one. So the rest of the terrorist nations would know we wasn't pissing around. What happen right after that? What did Gadhafi do right after that?

May 13, 2010 at 5:31 AM  

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