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Well, some is expected. Just like Germany for years after the end of WWII.
It's a GLOBAL war on terror and our military needs to have strategic positioning to respond...GLOBALLY.
For the record, we have FAR less overseas "presence" than we had during the Cold War. Do you realized how many bases closed down after the fall of the Soviet Union?
Forget it, it's useless trying to explain military strategy to someone who obviously has no idea what he/she is talking about.
Well, some is expected. Just like Germany for years after the end of WWII.
That statement tells me all I need to know.
Another lie about honerable veterans.
Do you know why you are wrong?
Sure, transportation costs add some to the equation. However, we are going to maintain a certain level of military troops. Does it matter if it is here of there?
As for useless? no. The strategic positions have proven useful for several reasons to include humanitarian aid, outside of war duties.
I wonder. Do you ever use critical thinking skills, or for you always go off, half ed?
Sorry, but I am one veteran who is proud to have served.
At this point, I think the US could keep Iraq relatively calm with the numbers of troops we have there now. I have to give credit to the "surge" working along with being pragmatic with the Sunni sheiks. However, this is really a long-term money hole with not much help from anybody else and with Pakistan and Afghanistan not far from the edge. I wish Pakistan would go a little bit more out of control so we could go and take out the Taliban strongholds and at least chase around OBL for a while. This is where the problem is and we are (appropriately) fearful of making any moves in a nuclear country. Iraq is an expensive diversion from the real problem.
Iraq, if not handled correctly, could in fact intensify the issues in Pakistan and Afghanistan making the cost to the American public for continued support of deployed operations in the region even greater.
Actually, the latest developments in countries other than Iraq serve as good reason to have a permanant presence in the region.
When your worst enemy is in deep trouble,
has dig a deep deep hole,
right in your own backyard,
the last thing you want him to to do is run away,
just because he FINALLY hears voices that maybe he should just climb out.
So you release the pressure, for a little while,
to make sure,
to make VERY sure,
in a key decisions making year,
that those voices are not heard anymore.
The US will be in Iraq for years to come.
You can make a pretty good guess, though. Unlike the stock market, with Islamists, past performance IS an indicator of future returns. They've been doing it since Mohammed.Someone is a fortune teller...
As long as we're making predictions, I might as well throw mine into the hat...
The level of violence has decreased significantly since the troop surge and real progress has been made towards Iraq becoming a viable state.
The violence will continue to diminish and once the "training" mission is deemed complete by military commanders on the ground in Iraq, you will see a massive pullout of troops and a small contingency left behind at a permanent base. The massive pullout of troops will signify that the "occupying" force has left.
Truth is....nobody knows to what extent (time and level of intensity) we'll see the violence trend in the future.
"The level of violence has decreased significantly since the troop surge"
.. so you've bought the WH spin that surge caused the lowered violence? sucker.
The ethnic cleansing of Baghdad was completed during the surge (Sunnis out, , not because of the surge. Baghdad is now sub-divided by numerous barriers and walls and fiefdoms, with 100s of checkpoints to enforce the balkanization of Baghdad.
Petreaus is throwing 10s of $Ms of money and arms at Sunnis and provincial leaders to buy them off, give them "jobs", create CLCs, and allow them to enforce their local sovereignity. Maliki and other Shiites hate this tactic of the US empowering/subsidizing the Sunnis.
Petraeus has stopped having his bully boys kick in doors to 1000s of homes looking for insurgents, therefore the intense anger and desire for violent revenge from having your home violated is less. They aren't kicking ass, they quit kicking doors.
ALL the US military say the relative calm now is extremely fragile, meaning it's not stable or assurable. The pot is still at full boil, and the US new tactics and $$, not the surge in numbers alone, have turned the temp a little,but the lid is still ready to blow.
"and real progress has been made towards Iraq becoming a viable state."
The surge has failed in its primary objective, to allow reconciliation. And notice how the US and Mailiki keep delaying "democratic" provincial elections.
Iraq is not a functioning state, the cabinet and paliament are horribley divided or resigned, electricity and sewage don't work, unemployment is 50% or more, Maliki is cutting food rationing that 1000s of families depend upon, and the US and its Maliki puppets absolutely refuse to honor the vote of the democratically elected parliament for the US to set a date for withdrawal. The Iraqi parliament and the majority of Iraqi want the occupation to end, to get the ing foreigners out of their "country", just like the US super patriots would want to get ing foreign occupiers of US territory, and just like the VN never wanted (and didn't get) ChiCom occupying their country.
Iraq is a ing disaster totally created by dubya's and head's incompetent oil grab.
If Iraq was costing American citizens out of their monthly checkbooks, there would be no talk of long-term occupation. Especially the govt-hating right-wingers would absolutely refuse to pay out of their pockets to pay for the Iraq fiasco.
While the right-wing despises govt and is doing its best to destroy it while milking it for 100s of $Bs, the right chooses to believe every ing word and all the spin and myths about Iraq from ... the despised govt.
Try some counter-spin:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michae...u_b_79891.html
And don't worry about ponying up your $20K or more. dubya's creating his own bubble of funny money to pay for the Iraq fiasco. And you know you can trust dubya with money, proof being the sub-prime crisis that is tin on his last year of legacy pumping.
Last edited by boutons_; 01-06-2008 at 11:02 AM.
You can believe that a sequence of complex events not related to the troop surge has led to decrease violence or that it was something as simple as putting enough troops on the ground to confront the two missions (security and training of Iraqi troops).
EITHER WAY, YOU CANNOT DENY THAT THERE HAS BEEN DECREASED VIOLENCE IN IRAQ.
So the "viable state" issue is a legitimate concern. I did not say that Iraq was there yet, but that some progress has been made in that regard. Forming a legitimate government and working out policies for its governing is not an easy or quick process.
However, I am willing to admit that timetables for a pullout based on the sufficient training of Iraqi troops (as determined by commanders on the ground) would most likely put pressure on the Iraqi government to hasten the process.
Still, whether you believe the troop surge and decrease in violence to be coincidentally linked chronologically or that there is a causal relationship between the two, you HAVE to admit that violence is down.
'YOU CANNOT DENY THAT THERE HAS BEEN DECREASED VIOLENCE IN IRAQ.'
I can/not deny whatever the I want to.
I never denied there was a decrease in violence, only that the cause(s) for the decrease are not exclusively or even primairly due to the surge.
=================
Here's McCain caught flip-flopping on long-term occupation:
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/01/06/...rmanent-bases/
And McCain's speaking self-servingly about what "The American People" want is about as credible as Christian militants/supremcists/hucksters speaking for/knowing the mind of God.
My only question for the bas McCain is how does he want to pay for it? Oh I can answer my own question he'll just get together with his buddy Ted Kennedy and enact some more taxation.
My answr is this. The cons ution allows for military spending. It does not allow for social spending. Therefore, we reduce and eliminate some social programs.
HA HA McCain would never do that! McCain and the Nanny state go hand and hand!
According the cons ution: Article 1
"To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;"
Somebody better figure that one out.
That's why they appropriate the money on a regular basis.
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/McCain...Iraq_0106.html
The guy is ing crazy.
If the US "hypothetically" occupied Iraq for decades, NO deaths or casualties? GMAFB.
And what about $200B+/year or whatever to maintain the occupation? Americans don't care abouth the $2T wasted in Iraq because nobody has sent them a bill of higher taxes.
McCain sounds like the Iraqis have no say, through their "freedom and democracy" system that dubya is so ing proud of, about the Americans destabilizing, defacing their country with an occupation of any term.
Last edited by boutons_; 01-07-2008 at 10:26 AM.
You really are ing stupid aren't you?
trash talking typos? go fuk yosef
It's McCain who seems to have gone off the deep end...
RawstoryAccording to presidential candidate John McCain, only the handling of the Iraq war was a mistake -- not the war itself.
"It's not American presence that bothers the American people, it's American causalities," said McCain in an interview with Tim Russert on NBC's "Meet The Press" on Sunday.
When Russert asked him if, like Bush, McCain would have supported the Iraq war even if no weapons of mass destruction were believed present in Iraq, McCain seemed to dismiss the question as irrelevant.
"If frogs had wings ... we can talk about lots of hypotheticals," he said. "The point is if we had done it right, you and I wouldn't even be discussing it now."
like father, like son..
Yeah, not sure I like that answer.
Seems to me he's taking a de facto position of supporting "preemtion" as it relates to Iraq.
Still, I have a hard time believing any of the candidates would have turned the tragedy of 9/11 into the pursuit of hostile action against the Iraqi government....especially when there had been little to no provocation.
The Iran situation will serve as a decent litmus test for the candidates as to how they'll respond to a potential crisis.
Yes, I also think moreso, the current situation in Pakistan...and on that front, Huckabee failed miserably...The Iran situation will serve as a decent litmus test for the candidates as to how they'll respond to a potential crisis.
With regards to his statement on Iraq - taken way out of context.
I agree with him completely. As long as no harm is done, who cares if Americans are in Iraq?
They've been in Cuba for 100 years...
You may not care, but you should acknowledge that the Iraqis do care. Poll after poll has shown that the vast majorities of Iraqis of all ethnicities and sects want U.S. troops out of their country. John McCain's insistence that they should stay in Iraq clearly shows his blatant disregard of the Iraqis' wishes for the complete withdrawal of the American forces from Iraq.
As for Cuba, I really don't see how this is applicable to Iraq given that the situation between those two countries are completely different.
I would expect better from someone who has fought in a war.
South Korea has a clearly-delineated border secured by thousands of U.S. troops, backed up by the defending army who were sympathetic to the U.S. troops, and hundreds of thousands of mines to keep the sides apart. How is that model similar to Iraq?
Japan's military and government were soundly beaten down and ultimately surrendered after massive sacrifice and expense. There was dissent among some of the population about whether to accept surrender, but there weren't dozens of religious/tribal/sectarian factions looking for an opportunity to wipe out their compe ors by civil war or ethnic cleansing. Again, how does he see this situation as proof that occupation will be peaceful?
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