Do you support the war in Iraq?

[telewinz]

"We are weaker now WITH Saddam gone"

Senator Russ Feingold(D), member Foreign Relations Committee 8/21/05. "We owe it to the the men and women who have died in Iraq to have a realistic exit policy."

"Average lifespan of insurgents throughout history NINE YEARS!" as stated last week the by US ground forces commander in Iraq.

Trent Lott(R) (8/21/05)"Do not withdraw until goals are met, do not set a target date!" "in Bush's private leadership meetings during August and the Fall of 2002, Bush talked about WMD in Iraq, not terrorism".

Bush Spin: The Bush “war on terror” is making the American people more secure.

The number of “significant” international terrorist attacks rose to about 650 last year from about 175 in 2003, according to congressional aides briefed Monday on the numbers by U.S. State Department and intelligence officials.

Bush Spin: Iraq was connected to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

President Bush continues to invoke the September 11th terrorist attacks as a part of his rationale for the war in Iraq. The 9/11 Commission and numerous intelligence investigations have found no evidence that Iraq was linked to 9/11. Iraq is only part of the war on terror because the president chose to invade.

Bush Spin: The United States is prevailing in Iraq.

After a brief respite following the January elections, Iraq has descended into greater insurgent and sectarian violence. More than 1,800 American troops and at least 25,000 Iraqis have been killed. Iraqis suffer from double-digit unemployment and a lack of basic services like water and electricity. The political process is mired by factional bickering by the Iraqis. The United States has spent more than $200 billion on the war, with no end in sight.

Bush Spin: The training of Iraqi troops is going well.

"I know the party line. You know, the Department of Defense, the U.S. Army, five-star generals, four-star generals, President Bush, Donald Rumsfeld: The Iraqis will be ready in whatever time period," said 1st Lt. Kenrick Cato, 34, of Long Island, N.Y., the executive officer of McGovern's company, who sold his share in a database firm to join the military full time after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. "But from the ground, I can say with certainty they won't be ready before I leave. And I know I'll be back in Iraq, probably in three or four years. And I don't think they'll be ready then."

Bush Spin: Iraq is inspiring democratic transitions in the Middle East.

The limited political openings in Egypt, Lebanon, and the Palestinian territories have nothing to do with Iraq. Hardly any of the democratic activists in those countries cite the chaotic situation in Iraq as their model. Furthermore, elections do not automatically mean democracy, especially when terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hizbollah win positions.

Some Americans seem to enjoy the "ride" they are being taken on. History continues to repeat itself. :barf:

Polls report that, for the first time, a majority of Americans reject President Bush’s contention that the war over there is making us safer over here. Indeed, unless there is major progress in Iraq, 2005 may well be remembered as the year when public opinion went south and never came back — a mood shift roughly analogous to 1968, when domestic confidence in the Vietnam war began its slide.
There has long been some public frustration about the gap between administration pronouncements and battlefield realities; witness the fact that 92 percent of all U.S. military deaths have come since Bush declared on May 1, 2003, that “major combat” was over

When the war was a year old, in March 2004, roughly 65 percent of Americans supported the decision to wage it. But in the latest CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll, support has sagged to 44 percent. Meanwhile, 57 percent now say the war has made the United States “less safe from terrorism” — a record high in the Gallup poll and a figure that undercuts a core Bush argument for launching the war.

 

[butch50]

The all or nothing part is a consequence of putting lives at risk to achieve the objectives, NOT a consequence of the type of objectives. The determination of objectives and the decision to commit to military action to those objectives is where the decisions are made. Once the commitment is made there is no honorable course of action but to follow through.

Up to a point I agree. First should be a rational determination that the objective is worth committing the Soldiers lives to. But, sometimes we committ ourselves, in good faith, to a faulty objective. When we do determine that we are committed to a faulty objective, it is beyond foolish to continue with that committment - it is beyond wrong to continue to lose Soldiers for a committment that was based in error or was made in poor judgement. Soldiers do not get upset when they are pulled back from an objective that is either unreachable or doesn't make sense to reach. The battle of Hurtgen Forest is a good example of this.

A little thought will tell you that the citizenry usually doesn't have a way to effectively make those kinds of assessments because they don't have access to the proper information and generally don't have the expertise to make those kinds of decisions anyway

I believe that it is leaderships responsibility to lay the facts out for the public as to the reasons to go to war, and what the committment is to, what the objective is. The President should state his case, and provide substantiation for that case, much the way a lawyer presents his case in court. A President should not lead us into an undefined war with mumbo jumbo reasoning. Not to mention he shouldn't lead us into a war on false premises or false pretenses. The citizenry will mostly react emotionally and without logic - it's a shame and we have a deeper responsibility than that. We, the citizens should not support war decisions based on emotions.

I'm all for being more cautious about making these commitments in the first place, but commitment means something, and it's not something to be taken lightly. It's wrong to ask soldiers to risk their lives for something and then just simply back out after things stop looking rosy. Besides being dishonorable, it cheapens human life.

I agree up to the same point mentioned above. When/If you determine that you have entered into a conflict in error, then it is time to do something different - not continue to fight simply because you already decided to in the beginning.

 

[gc70]

Wow! I had not looked in several days and could hardly believe that this thread was still going.

With 302 total posts, butch50 appears to be the winner through sheer perseverence (62 posts or 21%), although Handy is a strong second (45 posts or 15%).

 

[Ol'Coach]

The "Do Nothings"

I believe that's what the political party was called prior to the Civil War?

I really don’t see how the war in Iraq can be compared with any other war, or so-called “conflict” in which we have been involved. There really is no “country” to which we can respond. Thus, we fight in Iraq. If not there, where else might we have gone? Regardless of where, I’m sure we would be hearing the same complaints from the same people now!! Or, are some saying we should not have responded at all?

If any identifiable country had sent its own aircraft into the towers of NYC with the same result, would you have the United States not respond? Fewer United States citizens were killed in Hawaii in 1941 than were killed in NYC, but we should not respond? Or did we error tremendously in responding to Japan? Would not responding have kept us out of a war?

As a previous poster stated, the “war” in Iraq is over. We won! The occupation has begun. The media would have us believe that it is the Iraqi citizens that are unhappy with that occupation. It’s not the citizens who voted in the elections that are unhappy with us (and who shamed us with the percentage of their turnout despite the strong possibility of losing their lives just to vote.)

Would those who say we should not be occupying Iraq now also have said after WWII we should not occupy W. Germany? Remember the Berlin Airlift? Remember the Berlin Wall? Remember when it came down? Remember all the skirmishes and tension between those two events? Would there be any Germany today if those events had not occurred, or would that area be just another part of Russia, given to them with our blessing!

What would our relationship with Japan be now if we had not aided in its recovery? Would there even be a Japan? How long would it have taken Russia to expand its borders in that direction as well as in Europe? And would we have sat back and let it happen? Enter the age of atomic warfare…

I really wonder what the world map would look like today without those occupations, and I wonder what it might look like in the future without our occupation of Iraq!

Maybe I’m just too old!

 

[telewinz]

An in between option

It doesn't have to be to an all or nothing policy, why not strike terrorists camps WHEN they become a worthwhile target? Why don't we let the Iraqi people have there cities...we will strike only when a serious military threat develops. Use air strikes and our Special Forces, don't use a hatchet to carve a toothpick, use a scalpel instead. Thats what we excel at and are unmatched in our ability. Our military was/is built for small quick wars...when did everyone forget that? Like Rummy said " you go to war with what you have, not with want you would like to have." Wrong training, wrong cause, wrong equipment, wrong army, wrong DECISION!

 

[Eghad]

It doesn't have to be to an all or nothing policy, why not strike terrorists camps WHEN they become a worthwhile target? Why don't we let the Iraqi people have there cities...we will strike only when a serious military threat develops. Use air strikes and our Special Forces, don't use a hatchet to carve a toothpick, use a scalpel instead. Thats what we excel at and are unmatched in our ability. Our military was/is built for small quick wars...when did everyone forget that? Like Rummy said " you go to war with what you have, not with want you would like to have." Wrong training, wrong cause, wrong equipment, wrong army, wrong DECISION!

you go to war with what you have because the dummies that do the plan forgot to make a plan.......and had thier panties in a wad to go to war with Iraq form Sep the 12th on........

GEN Swartzkopf called that passing the buck

When you have a soldier form the 4th ID tell you about some of the days there was a shortage of rations and bottled war its pretty damn obvious logistical planners had screwed the pooch.

Is there any part of Irregular warfare that is not understood. These guys have no plan to fight force on force battles. We win they lose.

These insurgents borrowed the play book from Uncle Ho......

The only way I see to win this war is to ship more troops over to clamp the lid down on the borders and let the Unconvetional warfare folks start cleaning up with enough troops to cordon off areas.

maybe we should borrow a page from GEN Forrest and get there the firstest with the mostest and the sneeky petes stealthing in.

When Kissinger a pro war supporter tells you that you have the begginings of terminal colon blockage.. When Colin Powell says hey lets slow down........

and you dont listen

then you have the present situation in Iraq. The Insurgents are reading the history books while Rumsfeld ignores them.

 

[butch50]

Why don't we arm the Iraqi Citizens, and step back and let them determine their own destiny?

If the Iraqi's really want freedom and democracy, and we arm them all, don't you think that they will obtain freedom and democracy? If they want it?

 

[JohnKSa]

When we do determine that we are committed to a faulty objective, it is beyond foolish to continue with that committment

Sure. But you don't know that it is a faulty objective because you don't know all the facts that went into making the decision/commitment.

I believe that it is leaderships responsibility to lay the facts out for the public as to the reasons to go to war, and what the committment is to, what the objective is

Can't be done. Maybe SOME of the reasons, and SOME of the objectives can be laid out, but much of the information isn't for public consumption. A little thought will tell you that a good bit of the classified information is quite critical to the decision making process and the reasons for not publicizing it are equally critical. That is why we must choose leadership that we trust to make decisions for us in some circumstances.

Why don't we arm the Iraqi Citizens, and step back and let them determine their own destiny?

Well maybe that's why we're there and maybe it's not... Besides, if we back out before they have a semblance of a government in place, they'll be annexed by Iran before we can get our last guy out.

The need for government secrecy is why the media can have a field day if they decide to oppose a war. Because they KNOW that all the cards can't be laid on the table, they can say nearly anything they want without fear of being contradicted. That's why I said what I did in my first post on this thread. That public opinion has more to do with the amount of time that the media has had to chip away at it than it does with the facts.

Ok, here are some thoughts along the lines of why objectives aren't always publicized. I'm not going to argue the below points dogmatically, but they are interesting lines of thought...

Has anyone else realized that Iraq and Afghanistan are now TERRORIST targets? Has anyone else heard any terrorism experts make the comment that Iraq and Afghanistan have become a high priority for terrorists? Anyone totaled up the number of terrorist attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan over the last few months? The number of civilian casualties in these countries? Has anyone thought about what terrorists might be doing or where they might be attacking if they weren't so busy in Iraq and Afghanistan? Has anybody thought of the ramifications of having terrorists busy using their resources and expending their lives to attack Iraqi/Afghani citizens and our MILITARY instead of our civilians?

Has anyone else realized that Afghanistan and Iraq are effectively U.S. military outposts in the Middle East? We have airfields and flyover privileges that can't be withdrawn on a whim by the local governments. Does anyone realize the value of having military bases like that in places like that? Might be worthwhile to watch the news and wonder what's going on in countries that neighbor Iraq and Afghanistan...

 

[gc70]

JohnKSa, you missed a major aspect of the terrorist attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan - they are mostly Islamic terrorists attacking Muslim citizens of those countries. Eventually, the widespread support that Islamic terrorists have in Islamic countries will wear thin as they keep killing other Muslims.

 

[ottosear]

we all have an opinion, its all good?

rewind! here is the way i see it. the people jumping to escape the burning world trade center. it could have been us. the people who have thier lives, and the freedom to post on this forum. this is NOT just about Iraq!! the American Revolution: gave us our country. the American Civil War: ended slavery. W.W.2: ended the holocaust. Vietnam: made us respect our armed services. we make SOME mistakes. but not all, and i feel we (by and large) are spreading a democratic hope to some of worlds most oppressed people. sure, form your opinions! but remember how you got the freedom to do it.

 

[telewinz]

Facts NOT faith based patriotism

July 28, 2005
." The US military is deeply worried. General Barry McCaffrey, now a professor at the Military Academy at West Point, wrote in the Wall Street Journal that the US is in a "race against time" in Iraq because of the strains on the military - the military is "starting to unravel". He argues that "The US army and the Marines are too under-manned and under-resourced to sustain this security policy beyond next fall."

Senator Jack Reed, the leader of the Democratic Party in the Senate, has said that US military commanders in Iraq have told him that they need more troops but they know none are available. Reed has said, "The conclusion I reach is that they know the soldiers aren't there, so why ask for something you know doesn't exist?"

A recent study by the RAND Corporation, a military think-tank, 'Stretched Thin: Army Forces for Sustained Operations' found that the troop shortage in the army is so severe that it calls into question the Pentagon's policy of being able to fight two major regional wars at the same time while also having sufficient soldiers for the war on terrorism and providing security in America.

So far this year, the US army is reported to be 40 per cent short of its recruitment target. The army has failed to meet its monthly recruiting goals in each of the preceding four months. In mid-July, the US military reported that the Army National Guard, which makes up more than one-third of the US soldiers in Iraq, had missed its recruiting goal for the ninth straight month. This was an understatement of the larger trend. The Army National Guard has apparently missed its recruiting targets for at least 17 of the last 18 months.

General Peter Schoomaker, the US army chief of staff told the Senate that "We've got enormous challenges" when it comes to recruitment of new soldiers. The army's goal of 80,000 new recruits for this year "is at serious risk", and next year "may be the toughest recruiting environment ever". These recruiting problems, he believes, are likely to stretch "well into the future".

These problems are despite the enormous incentives now being offered to join the military. There is a joining bonus of $ 90,000 paid over three years, of which $ 20,000 is in cash and $ 70,000 in benefits, along with a cancelling of the loans many a young American must take to afford to go to college. There are reports also that people almost 40 years old are now eligible to join the military, and that the physical and intellectual standards for recruits have been lowered.

About 7 per cent of the US military are not citizens. There are about 30,000 foreign soldiers in the US military from more than 100 countries; more than a third are Hispanic. To encourage recruitment, in 2002 the Bush administration made it easier for foreign-born US troops to become naturalised citizens.

Despite all this, the numbers of non-citizens joining the military is falling fast. The number has fallen by 20 per cent since 2001. It is not slowing down, as much of the decline came last year.

Army's Reserve Officers' Training Corps, which trains and commissions more than 60 per cent of the new army officers each year, has been facing similar problems. It now has the fewest participants in nearly a decade, with recruitment having fallen by more than 16 per cent over the past two years.

In its efforts to find out why there are now such problems with recruitment, the army called in the research company Millward Brown to do a study. It found that the resistance was due to popular objection to the war in Iraq, the casualties and media coverage of the torture at Abu Ghraib. The study reportedly concluded that "Reasons for not considering military service are increasingly based on objections to the Iraq situation and aversion to the military."

It is not just recruitment. The military has been having problems keeping its soldiers. Almost 30 per cent of new recruits leave within six months

The Wall Street Journal has reported a military memo directing commanders not to dismiss soldiers for poor fitness, unsatisfactory performance or even for pregnancy, alcoholism and drug abuse.

The Pentagon has admitted that more than 5,500 soldiers have deserted since the start of the Iraq war. In comparison, 1,509 deserted in 1995

A telephone hotline to help soldiers who want to leave the military has reported that the number of calls it is receiving is now double of what it was in 2001 - they had 33,000 calls last year

Max Boot, a prominent military commentator, named among "the 500 most influential people in the United States in the field of foreign policy", has offered his solution for the problem of finding people to fight America's wars. In a recent article, Boot proposed that the path to a bigger American army lay in offering a new deal, "Defend America, Become American". Boot has proposed the US should look beyond just US citizens and permanent, legal residents for soldiers to fight in its military.

If the emotion based arguments by some for staying in Iraq are nothing less than tragic. Truth is stranger than fiction. It's not Vietnam, it's not Vietnam, it's not Vietnam!

 

[telewinz]

YOU bear the moral responsibility!

To you 136+ die-hard "patriots", As far as I am concerned you are more of the problem and not the solution. All you have done is taken the easy way out "kill everyone and let God sort them out" should be your motto. I'm a (6 year+) veteran and I've earned the right to speak MY unpopular opinion!

 

[butch50]

Has anyone else realized that Iraq and Afghanistan are now TERRORIST targets?

Thought about it a lot. Maybe, just maybe, a positive for the war in Iraq is that it is acting as a "terrorists sink", using a heat sink (Often used in electronics where it is necessary to keep heat from sensitive circuit parts during soldering, this metal shape has good heat conductivity to draw heat away from an area) for an analogy.

In other words, Iraq is easier to get to for terrorists and it is where the action is for them right now, so instead of trying to get to the US and blow themselves up, they are content to blow themselves up in Iraq.

The problem with that is twofold - One: The terrorists are getting training in Iraq that will make them far deadlier than they would have been, and when they do come here they will be far deadlier than before. Two: Iraq is creating more terrorists than there were before.

Do you realize how open our border with Mexico is?

 

[butch50]

YOU bear the moral responsibility!
To you 136+ die-hard "patriots", As far as I am concerned you are more of the problem and not the solution. All you have done is taken the easy way out "kill everyone and let God sort them out" should be your motto. I'm a (6 year+) veteran and I've earned the right to speak MY unpopular opinion!

Telewinz, I do not follow what you are saying here, can you restate it?

Thanks

 

[telewinz]

What I didn't learn during Vietnam

Telewinz, I do not follow what you are saying here, can you restate it?

I grant that we are intelligent adults here and as such I hold people accountable for their political beliefs. Just "Feeling" that the war is right is pretty lame. In the "information age" there are plenty of facts to support an informed opinion. The opinions for our staying in Iraq at this point hasn't had much in the way of FACTS to support the views expressed (just as during Vietnam). I want America to be all powerful, I want America to achieve it's goals at the snap of a finger, I want the lives we have invested in Iraq to be well spent, and yes I want God on our side but it ain't going to happen! I can't "turn-off" my brain in order to support Bush and HIS war in Iraq. If we quit now it will be painful, if we quit later it will be tragic. Most everyone who supports staying the course in Iraq ASSUMES our "victory" will make the Middle East a better place. This is an ABSURD assumption! The most powerful army in the World is next door to Iran and Syria yet we haven't slowed either down a bit. Our being in Iraq has NOT slowed down terrorism, it's increased! What if your assumption(s) is as poorly thought out as the Iraq war is/was? It's nothing short of a crap shoot as to what the Middle East will be like REGARDLESS of our staying or leaving Iraq. Maybe, could be, should be isn't much for another American to die for. We CAN NOT WIN short of using NUKES! We made that decision when we opted to reduce the size of our military years ago. As painful as it might be to admit we made a mistake, once the writing is on the wall those 136+ own it to our service people to HELP pull the plug and put an end to the waste of American lives. Life will never be the same to those who are DEAD! Protesting an American war is not cowardly (as I thought during Vietnam), it might be the RIGHT, responsible thing to do. Yet for many of the 136, I suspect it ain't as fun nor as exciting as "kill them all and let God sort them out".

 

[JohnKSa]

Maybe, just maybe, a positive for the war in Iraq is that it is acting as a "terrorists sink"...The problem with that is twofold...

ASSUMING that's part of the plan (which neither you nor I know for certain) it seems to be working for the moment. It's certainly not perfect--I'd say the problem is far more than simply "twofold"--but if you have a better one, there are people who would like to talk to you.

 

[butch50]

Assuming, you bet. I don't know what our leadership is actually up to. They haven't been very accurate or possibly honest yet.

My plan would be to redistribute our soldiers along our North and South boundaries and put them on constant patrols. Use whatever technology we have to supplement them, build fences and ditches as necessary and seal our borders off.

The Navy and Coast Guard would seal off our shores and the Air Force will fly support missions for all of them. We may never stop them all from getting in, but we don't have to leave the door wide open either.

 

[JohnKSa]

Isolationism has been a poor strategy for virtually everyone who's tried it. Certainly it has been for us, in the past.

 

[butch50]

Who said any thing about isolationism?

I proposed that we use our military to seal our borders to stop terrorists from just walking right in. If we want to protect Our Country from terrorists, the first logical step is to deny them entry.

Are we really truly honestly protecting ourselves by fighting them in Iraq and almost totally ignoring our borders, and hoping that they don't figure out that if over 1 million illegal aliens come in through our borders each year that, hey, maybe they can sneak in a few teams too?

 

[JohnKSa]

butch50,

How long do you think public opinion would support such a visible and massive endeavor?

Besides, with today's technology you don't have to be inside the borders to make a mess. If you've got the money, there are folks out there selling missiles, and the products are getting better all the time. Give it another decade--maybe less--and the ones that "glow in the dark" will be for sale too. Whole new ballgame then. Talk about not being able to win now... It gets worse--a LOT worse.

BTW, you pretty much ignored the second part of my "speculation". The part about military bases. Notice anything else that Iraq and Afghanistan have in common?