And so completes the absolute failure of the Iraq foreign policy of George W. Bush. I'm still waiting for Iraq to reimburse us for the costs of this war! Wait, maybe we can just take it from Cheney and Rice's speaking fees.

So if these guys are this mean and this good - what happens if they get to Mexico and set up operations there?

And so completes the absolute failure of the Iraq foreign policy of George W. Bush. I'm still waiting for Iraq to reimburse us for the costs of this war! Wait, maybe we can just take it from Cheney and Rice's speaking fees.

 

Obama ended Bush's war... This one is all Obamas..

Let's recall that Obama inherited a pacified Iraq, where al Qaeda had been defeated — both militarily and ideologically.

 

This is a foreign policy failure older than Barack Obama, older than George W. Bush, older than Bill Clinton...

 

Over the years we've tried to involve ourselves in the Middle East in a positive way on any number of occasions. Iraq specifically has been a disaster. In the 1980s we feared the new Islamic state in Iran, so we embraced as an ally a man we didn't fully understand in Saddam Hussein. Once he got what he wanted from us, it became clear that he was a serious problem in the region since he was sitting on a pile of U.S.-made weapons and was perfectly prepared to use them. We took him on in the early 1990s and beat him back from his neighbors.

 

Then the neighbors got mad that we were involved, completely forgetting the fact that we were INVITED. Nonetheless, we stuck it out and finally in the early part of the last decade we captured Saddam Hussein in a perhaps futile attempt to bring freedom and democracy to the cradle of civilization. But not everyone was happy with the newfound freedom, believing themselves to be entitled to a greater share of that "freedom".

 

After years of fighting back insurgencies and capturing and killing terrorists, Iraq was mostly under the control of the central government and in January of 2009, fewer Iraqis were killed in conflict than in any month since the 2003 invasion (keeping in mind that number was still 191 dead in acts of violence for the month).

 

Then, at the end of 2010, something happened that almost no one could have anticipated: the people of Tunisia rose up against their oppressive government and toppled it, resulting in the first free elections since 1956. Almost immediately, numerous states rose up against their governments, pitting militaries against secularist students, democratic revolutionaries, Islamist militants and numerous other constituencies. Demonstrations began in Yemen and Oman, demonstrations turned into uprisings in Egypt and Libya, uprisings turned into civil wars in the Sudan and Syria. It was the same across the region.

 

But it was Syria that changed everything, especially as we look at Iraq. The conflict in Syria has grown so complex it's difficult to comprehend. The government fights against the Free Syrian Army which fights against ISIS which fights against Hezbollah. The conflict was bound to spill over into the country with massive wealth and a government with limited power to control its own territory. Syria has created massive numbers of now-experienced fighters with the ability to carry out an insurrection and a serious need for new money to finance their war, a need that led directly to recent assaults on major cities in which the first thing they went for were the banks.

 

We have (not untruthfully) assigned blame to the foreign policy failures of withdrawing perhaps to early from Iraq and of entering Iraq in 2003 at all. I would say without hesitation that it is more than possible for both of these things to be true. President Bush warned when he left that this might happen in Iraq but apparently had no qualms whatsoever about picking a fight he had no intention of sticking around to win.

 

President Obama entered office on the promise of ending that war. Like President Bush before him, he perhaps entered into a bargain he shouldn't have. Iraq, despite a decline in violence, was not ready to be left to its own devices. Perhaps he should have seen it coming and backed off of his commitment (can't pretend it would be the first time).

 

Assign blame all we want, but looking back at the last 12 years, what I see is this: President Bush sacrificing our well-being on the home front in order to play cowboy in the Middle East and make everyone feel better after 9/11 despite Iraq having nothing to do with it and President Obama sacrificing a long-term foreign policy plan in order to play politics here at home and I see no reason to be overly impressed with either one of them or their ideologies.

 

I'm done with the blame.

 

How do we fix this? Are we stuck in a place where the only way to fix Iraq is to forget that the last four years ever happened and start sending huge numbers of troops back into the country?

So if these guys are this mean and this good - what happens if they get to Mexico and set up operations there?

 

Completely different ideologies. Mexico is over run with strong drug cartels that only care about one thing and that's money. Cartel's make that money by getting their drugs across the boarder into US consumers hands they would gain nothing by ISIS setting up shop in Mexico. It would ultimately lead to more US forces in Iraq, more surveillance throughout the country and even more border security. None of which would benefit the Cartel's.

President Obama entered office on the promise of ending that war. Like President Bush before him, he perhaps entered into a bargain he shouldn't have. Iraq, despite a decline in violence, was not ready to be left to its own devices. Perhaps he should have seen it coming and backed off of his commitment (can't pretend it would be the first time).

 

Assign blame all we want, but looking back at the last 12 years, what I see is this: President Bush sacrificing our well-being on the home front in order to play cowboy in the Middle East and make everyone feel better after 9/11 despite Iraq having nothing to do with it and President Obama sacrificing a long-term foreign policy plan in order to play politics here at home and I see no reason to be overly impressed with either one of them or their ideologies.

 

I'm done with the blame.

 

How do we fix this? Are we stuck in a place where the only way to fix Iraq is to forget that the last four years ever happened and start sending huge numbers of troops back into the country?

 

I don't think it's as easily fixed as sending back troops (or having kept them there in the first place). Surely, the US military could have better maintained order there (and even that is a potentially specious statement), but at what cost? Would another ten years have made a difference?

 

Iraq is a parallel case with many other countries mired in ethnic violence. Democracy in those cases simply becomes a tool for the dominant ethnic groups to rule and persecute the rest and the minority ethnic groups deny the legitimacy of the government and/or result to violence against it. You don't have to look very far around Africa to see how this pattern plays out in multi-ethnic "democracies."

 

Iraq has exhibited all of these signs: rival ethnic groups, a majority ethnic groups capable of holding on to the government, the use of the government as a tool of persecution, and the chaos it leads to. Is a larger military presence going to fix those problems or just hold the stitching together? So, it seems to me the problem in Iraq is a problem of governance as much as anything. Maliki is corrupt and incompetent and the government has been used a tool in the playing out of ethnic rivalries. How do you fix that? What are the US's interests in fixing it and if there are compelling interests is the US capable of doing it?

I'm done with the blame. How do we fix this? Are we stuck in a place where the only way to fix Iraq is to forget that the last four years ever happened and start sending huge numbers of troops back into the country?

 

I agree! Not all, but some want to blame this president for anything and everything, he can't win no matter what he does.

 

As I posted earlier, people like McCain and Graham were blasting the president for not arming the Syrian rebels, and here these same rebels are now in Iraq, the same people who are causing the current trouble, and the same people trashing Obama then for not arming the rebels are blasting him for not helping more to stop them in Iraq?

 

I do give credit to our own Mnt Ref, if I am not mistaken he even said it was a bad idea to arm the Syrian rebels.

 

But now some want to blame Obama for the troops leaving Iraq? As you asked, how much longer do people thing we are needed? 1 year? 5 years? Another 12 years? How about 15 or 20 more years? It's already our longest war, and we have spent far to much in this war! We are already in a mess economically over it, should we have to pay to continue the war? I'm not apposed to a war if it's needed. BUT, if we are going in to "save" a country, if that country can afford it, they need to pay us to come bail them out, no more free garbage! If I recall correctly, Gulf War I was supposed to be paid off in oil, until we got paid back, what ever happened to that? It could have been either I or II, but pretty sure it was I.

 

I don't care how we got here, or who may or may not have made a mistake in going back into Iraq! That is not the issue!! The issue is how do we get out ? How are we able to leave without creating a vacuum and having insurgences just laying back waiting for the day we leave?

 

Here is an idea. The top 7 private military groups such as Academi (formerly known as Black Water) are now merging. Send private military over if needed! It would cost a lot less and Iraq can pay them to be there, the US can help with Intel and drone strikes.

 

No matter what we do, the insurgences will lay back and wait for us to leave, they are doing it now in Afghanistan. How much longer do we stay there as well? Answers without blaming others, just answers on how the heck do we finally end our longest war? Or do we have too much pride to just give up and say we didn't win, and stay there hoping things will finally roll our way?

CNN spent over a half hour today with a guy putting all of the blame on Bush and Cheney...glad to know there are things we can still count on!

CNN spent over a half hour today with a guy putting all of the blame on Bush and Cheney...glad to know there are things we can still count on!

I agree! But as you know it goes both ways, some will blame Bush while others will blame Obama. They do this as they themselves have no real solutions. As with a lot of people, all they want to do is complain, if they do not then they aren't happy. Plus it gives them their time on TV to fill their "look at me" attitudes.

CNN spent over a half hour today with a guy putting all of the blame on Bush and Cheney...glad to know there are things we can still count on!

 

You watched a half hour of CNN?

 

Trapped? Handcuffed?

You watched a half hour of CNN?

 

Trapped? Handcuffed?

I was actually playing a new "Rook" app on my phone and I had gotten board channeling the TV and happened to stop on a commercial of "Tammy". Watched "Tammy" trailer and then went back to playing cards on phone :lol2:

 

I'm done with the blame.

 

How do we fix this? Are we stuck in a place where the only way to fix Iraq is to forget that the last four years ever happened and start sending huge numbers of troops back into the country?

 

So far only two models for peaceful nation-states exist for Muslim-dominated countries. A model where the government that is in place with the approval the military and is non-secular (i.e. Egypt) and the tyrant model (i.e. almost all other nations there were considered 'stable'). Democratic Republics will not work - as Iraq shows.

 

Since Islam is not just a religion but a religious-government system intertwined controlling the Mullahs and their power is essential. Controlling means having the force to put them down if and when required.

 

We destroyed the Iraq Republican Guard - their enforcers. We left Iraq with a very weak military. That left the government function with no way of controlling the militant Islamists when we pulled out. We can call them 'terrorists'. But Islam is a militant religion and the true believers do not believe in Constitutional law - they believe in Shariah law controlled by the religious leaders. In this manner Islam and Constitutional governments are not compatible. Without a strong counter to Islamists - via a powerful military or a ruthless tyrant - the result is and will be chaos and civil war - not to mention death and despair for the entire country. Iraq shows this.

So far only two models for peaceful nation-states exist for Muslim-dominated countries. A model where the government that is in place with the approval the military and is non-secular (i.e. Egypt) and the tyrant model (i.e. almost all other nations there were considered 'stable'). Democratic Republics will not work - as Iraq shows.

 

Since Islam is not just a religion but a religious-government system intertwined controlling the Mullahs and their power is essential. Controlling means having the force to put them down if and when required.

 

We destroyed the Iraq Republican Guard - their enforcers. We left Iraq with a very weak military. That left the government function with no way of controlling the militant Islamists when we pulled out. We can call them 'terrorists'. But Islam is a militant religion and the true believers do not believe in Constitutional law - they believe in Shariah law controlled by the religious leaders. In this manner Islam and Constitutional governments are not compatible. Without a strong counter to Islamists - via a powerful military or a ruthless tyrant - the result is and will be chaos and civil war - not to mention death and despair for the entire country. Iraq shows this.

 

What about Turkey?

What about Turkey?

 

Apparently if is actually more of the Egypt model. The military is the 'stabilizer' to keep the non-secular government in place.

 

A very recent article.

 

Turkey's Military Is a Catalyst for Reform: The Military in Politics :: Middle East Quarterly

 

Ominously, the Europeans want the military to have less role in Turkey as they integrate into the EU according to the article.

 

From the article above:

 

The military has deep roots in society, and its influence predates the founding of the republic. But rather than hinder democratization, Turkey's military remains an important component in the checks and balances that protect Turkish democracy. Herein lies an irony: European officials have made diminishment of military influence a key reform in Turkey's European Union accession process. This may be a noble goal, but by insisting on dismantling the military role in Turkish society without advancing a new mechanism to guarantee the constitution, well-meaning reformers may actually undercut the stability of Turkey as a democracy.

 

Emphasis added.

I don't think it's as easily fixed as sending back troops (or having kept them there in the first place). Surely, the US military could have better maintained order there (and even that is a potentially specious statement), but at what cost? Would another ten years have made a difference?

 

Iraq is a parallel case with many other countries mired in ethnic violence. Democracy in those cases simply becomes a tool for the dominant ethnic groups to rule and persecute the rest and the minority ethnic groups deny the legitimacy of the government and/or result to violence against it. You don't have to look very far around Africa to see how this pattern plays out in multi-ethnic "democracies."

 

Iraq has exhibited all of these signs: rival ethnic groups, a majority ethnic groups capable of holding on to the government, the use of the government as a tool of persecution, and the chaos it leads to. Is a larger military presence going to fix those problems or just hold the stitching together? So, it seems to me the problem in Iraq is a problem of governance as much as anything. Maliki is corrupt and incompetent and the government has been used a tool in the playing out of ethnic rivalries. How do you fix that? What are the US's interests in fixing it and if there are compelling interests is the US capable of doing it?

 

:thumb:

 

Good analysis...

This is a foreign policy failure older than Barack Obama, older than George W. Bush, older than Bill Clinton...

 

Over the years we've tried to involve ourselves in the Middle East in a positive way on any number of occasions. Iraq specifically has been a disaster. In the 1980s we feared the new Islamic state in Iran, so we embraced as an ally a man we didn't fully understand in Saddam Hussein. Once he got what he wanted from us, it became clear that he was a serious problem in the region since he was sitting on a pile of U.S.-made weapons and was perfectly prepared to use them. We took him on in the early 1990s and beat him back from his neighbors.

 

Then the neighbors got mad that we were involved, completely forgetting the fact that we were INVITED. Nonetheless, we stuck it out and finally in the early part of the last decade we captured Saddam Hussein in a perhaps futile attempt to bring freedom and democracy to the cradle of civilization. But not everyone was happy with the newfound freedom, believing themselves to be entitled to a greater share of that "freedom".

 

After years of fighting back insurgencies and capturing and killing terrorists, Iraq was mostly under the control of the central government and in January of 2009, fewer Iraqis were killed in conflict than in any month since the 2003 invasion (keeping in mind that number was still 191 dead in acts of violence for the month).

 

Then, at the end of 2010, something happened that almost no one could have anticipated: the people of Tunisia rose up against their oppressive government and toppled it, resulting in the first free elections since 1956. Almost immediately, numerous states rose up against their governments, pitting militaries against secularist students, democratic revolutionaries, Islamist militants and numerous other constituencies. Demonstrations began in Yemen and Oman, demonstrations turned into uprisings in Egypt and Libya, uprisings turned into civil wars in the Sudan and Syria. It was the same across the region.

 

But it was Syria that changed everything, especially as we look at Iraq. The conflict in Syria has grown so complex it's difficult to comprehend. The government fights against the Free Syrian Army which fights against ISIS which fights against Hezbollah. The conflict was bound to spill over into the country with massive wealth and a government with limited power to control its own territory. Syria has created massive numbers of now-experienced fighters with the ability to carry out an insurrection and a serious need for new money to finance their war, a need that led directly to recent assaults on major cities in which the first thing they went for were the banks.

 

We have (not untruthfully) assigned blame to the foreign policy failures of withdrawing perhaps to early from Iraq and of entering Iraq in 2003 at all. I would say without hesitation that it is more than possible for both of these things to be true. President Bush warned when he left that this might happen in Iraq but apparently had no qualms whatsoever about picking a fight he had no intention of sticking around to win.

 

President Obama entered office on the promise of ending that war. Like President Bush before him, he perhaps entered into a bargain he shouldn't have. Iraq, despite a decline in violence, was not ready to be left to its own devices. Perhaps he should have seen it coming and backed off of his commitment (can't pretend it would be the first time).

 

Assign blame all we want, but looking back at the last 12 years, what I see is this: President Bush sacrificing our well-being on the home front in order to play cowboy in the Middle East and make everyone feel better after 9/11 despite Iraq having nothing to do with it and President Obama sacrificing a long-term foreign policy plan in order to play politics here at home and I see no reason to be overly impressed with either one of them or their ideologies.

 

I'm done with the blame.

 

How do we fix this? Are we stuck in a place where the only way to fix Iraq is to forget that the last four years ever happened and start sending huge numbers of troops back into the country?

 

No, the only thing "we" can do is pray for ideal outcomes within our homes and abroad. Our US Military, CIA, NSA, etc.. will need to adapt and overcome via infiltrating the "power players" and help influence decisions and respond to eminent threats to our country. These new players will carry on in Iraq/Syria just like they did before the Gulf War. The question is to what extent do they tick us off and endanger US interests before we pull the trigger again?

 

We sacrificed the efforts of our military personnel when we pulled out from an unstable puppet regime. These tribal factions have been killing one another for hundreds of years. They simply played us to help or id future gains and actions to subsist.

 

In the meantime, hats off to the many US Service Men & Women who have served in the Middle East. It is my sincere hope the efforts, sacrifices, and relationships built were not in vain.

Edited June 19, 201412 yr by mcpapa