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Sure they do. But not as a part of a military operation to aid in the invasion of a country like Britain did in Iraq. They are UN peacekeepers. France supplied non UN troops in Afghanistan, ie French Military force.
IIRC, Germany didn't even provide troops post-invasion. Italy and France certainly did. We have a lot of infrastructure in those countries. Italy has a big base that's very important for operations. They also provided a bunch of troops once the Saddam statue was down and we didn't know what to do next.
Sure they do. But not as a part of a military operation to aid in the invasion of a country like Britain did in Iraq. They are UN peacekeepers. France supplied non UN troops in Afghanistan, ie French Military force.
And France was all in going into Syria. So they're not actually reluctant when they buy into what you're selling, which is the point I'm trying to make. Italy also sent non-UN troops into Afghanistan AND Iraq. But post-invasion, because they wouldn't buy into the invasion to begin with.
Going back to the OP, Iraq will likely get back into the mess it was before we were there. They're just going to have millions death/displaced thanks to the conflict, and a reinforced hate for America. The whole 'sanctions' thing is indeed hypocritical, but we knew that a long time ago.
Britain has had the IRA blow up all kinds of things and they did not invade Ireland.
It's not quite the same type of long historical bad blood.
And no problem, good discussion. We all have our impressions.
The UK had the buses blown by these same guys later on. But Britain and the US are military interchangeable. What we say, goes, and vice-versa. That's why I pointed to Spain (which also had an incident with these same dudes), but it's much more independent.
France was in on Afghanistan as well but soured quickly. Britain is really the only European country that can handle long conflicts in the name of NATO. We too have become much more reticent. Even without a long history of war after war. I expect our mentality to be a bit more passive will wane however. Time heals, even for the propensity to use violence.
Spain is a very shaky country still, the Basque separatists weigh heavily upon them.
Sort of I guess. We did not want to have much to do with the Falkland Islands. Not that there was much to be done.
The problem with Iraq is that it wasn't really a NATO operation. And the fact that we went to the UN with a ty lie didn't help. We already knew China and Russia were going to go thumbs down, that's always a given, but out of that meeting, only the UK (obviously) was the only country outwardly expressing support. You might not agree, but that invasion was amateur hour, IMO (not in the execution, but on the long term planning and selling).
As far as America, I think people in general got tired of the neocons/warhawks. Don't know how long it's going to last, but like I said earlier, I think people underestimate how lasting is the damage dubya did, both to his party and on foreign relations.
They actually pretty much dismantled ETA. They have other problems now, mostly economic and there's still some non-violent secession talk which is pretty common from them.
The US was fairly involved in intelligence gathering, through Pinochet in Chile. Militarily, the UK didn't need much help, tbh.
Iraq was a pure, 100% US operation. Any other countries were window dressing.
UK couldn't have done the Falklands without US fueling its ships. US won the Falklands "war" as much as UK did.
Spain, like USA, Iceland, Ireland, has a Banksters crisis. After Geman $Bs pumped into the Spanish property bubble, made their $Bs, it crashed, then the Germans demanded brutal austerity in Spain.
Most Americans don't know what "neo-cons" are, and certainly don't know what their policies are, but they certainly are tired of wasting 1000s of (US) lives (foreign lives don't count) and losing $Ts while losing bull Repug wars.
Probably should not even mention Spain as far as the ability to project a military force is concerned. It was a colonial power so the tendency is put them on the list.
Of course it was. So was Afghanistan from an inception point of view. Do you think France was going to go after the Taliban to give up Bin Laden on its own?
Some have stated the British needed help and of course they got it. But they could have eventually got the job done alone. And they would have. It would have taken longer and been tougher but Argentina??? What the was Argentina going to do in the long run? It was a silly token invasion to begin with over so little. That's why the British got help, everyone wanted the silly thing to end as quickly as possible.
BAMF ... that's why.
btw, Rachel Maddow has a new show tonight on the war-criminal Repugs lying USA into Iraq
http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/why-we-did-it
I think that the OP is a good one. I never did understand why we got away with the invasion of Iraq. We were lied to as a nation. France kept saying "Let the weapons inspectors do their work". Cheney and W didn't want to wait. They used the nation's fear of 9/11 to do something that they wanted to do before 9/11 ever happened. It was a bad move on our part. And our treasury and our young people paid a terrible price for it.
"I never did understand why we got away with the invasion of Iraq."
US was scared less after 9/11, and the Repugs exploited the confidence NAIVE confidence, trust in the Repugs , and the solidarity of the world with USA after 9/11, in a time of crisis to invade Iraq while switching resources from Afghanistan.
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