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Obama Sets End of Iraq Combat For August 31st
eldavojohn writes "President Barack Obama has announced that on August 31st the United States will cease all combat operations in Iraq, although 50,000 troops will remain until the end of 2011. It's been a long seven-and-a-half years, with no guarantee of this announcement actually signifying the end of violence. Pundits are already speculating on whether or not this withdrawal speech is 'Mission Accomplished 2.' It's possibly the most significant confirmation of and commitment to a withdrawal the world will hear from the United States in Iraq."
It's about time.
The war, over there, has been over for years. Now, they are just working as cops. Not the type of job the military was ever cut out to do.
On the contrary. You announce the date and pull out sooner. When the little shits come out of hiding you nail them.
Real Americans don't give up so easy. A measly 7.5 years? Puhlease... If McCain had been elected we'd be there for another 7.5... along with 30 years in Iran and who knows how long on the Korean peninsula. I mean really, which party would you rather have in office?
What doesn't kill you only delays the inevitable
Yeah, right! Because if you don't notice it one month ahead, then insurgents would never notice that Americans have left and will stay home. They are that dumb you know.
You make it seem as if Iraq is going to be completely undefended or something. In reality, there's the Iraqi military and police forces, right?
Let's have a little bit of faith in them, okay.
It is by my will alone my thoughts acquire motion; it is by the juice of the coffee bean that the thoughts acquire speed
Let's hope the insurgents and other ne'er-do-wells get the message they're supposed to stop blowing people up on August 31.
From TFA: "While the US has been scaling down its troop presence in Iraq it has been stepping up its military commitment to Afghanistan, with the president ordering a surge of 30,000 additional soldiers there. " So, we're pulling our armed forces out of Iraq, just to send them to Afghanistan. A couple of nukes and they can all come home! I'm just saying...
It's my understanding that AQiI is pretty much dead, now, and JAM has devolved into civil disobedience now that al-Sadr is in self-imposed exile. If there are any insurgent groups left, they will be local, disorganized, and without the kind of tacit police protection JAM had up until 2005. They will also have no popular support whatsoever.
We shouldn't have been there in the first place.
You mean when Saddam invaded Kuwait? We've 'been there' since that time. Just the level of troops and mission changed.
There are no loopholes. It's either legal or it's not.
Target practice?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
You're kidding, right? It guarantees that the few remaining insurgent groups will prepare for the date, and then attack with whatever they have left.
That was the criticism in the article based on two car bombs and a drive-by killing eight in Iraq today -- the day of this announcement. I guess a better question should have been "will Iraqi security forces be able to contain the unavoidable violence following this withdrawal?"
That's why you *don't have a specific date* nor do you release your plans to the enemy.
Or perhaps you gamble and show the world that the situation is under control by releasing your "plans" of withdrawal showing that those now in charge are very capable hands. Otherwise what do you do? Sit there and then just magically disappear one day? And when that happens, you think you're not in the same scenario you just mentioned? No matter how you cut it, it's a delicate situation.
My work here is dung.
>> You announce the date and pull out sooner. When the little shits come out of hiding you nail them.
Is this a military tactic, or a birth control method?
This probably just means we can now devote more of those troops to Afghanistan. *sigh*
I wonder how much we're spending on all those troops in Germany, South Korea and Japan? Bring all the troops home from everywhere, cut the military budget in half, and we'd have no economic woes, and still have a gigantic military.
So does this means the libs are admitting that the surge worked?
You missed the "Stuff that matters" part of Slashdot's motto up there.
I was thinking something similar (that it's easy to declare you will leave on a certain date, but hard to do it if the situation on the ground doesn't match at the time), but I think the way they are doing it is actually good.
They aren't declaring the specific date to leave, they are planning on the specific date to stop fighting. Basically on August 31st they are going to turn everything over to the Iraqi government (who at this point can probably handle anything the insurgents throw at it), but they are going to stick around, just in case. That way if the insurgents do throw everything at them, there'll still be troops around to help deal with it if they really need help. If they can handle themselves for a year, it is a sign we can safely remove the troops. The Iraqis still won't be alone, we can give them air superiority almost instantly if any insurgency gets too bad, and we can easily re-conquer the country within a month if necessary.
Obama did well on this one. Let's give him credit.
Qxe4
if bush i in iraq i had decided to push on to baghdad and topple saddam in the early 1990s after racing across the desert unimpeded, then the world would have seen that as justified
however, the political fear of americans coming home in bodybags was too much, so they turned around and left saddam in power. kuwait was liberated, saddam was cowed, end of story... not
of course, the shiites who revolted under the false impression or false covert promise of american support were massacred. and of course, the tragedy is saddam was removed when war hawks in the usa sensed the political will finally existed after 9/11 to finish the job. not that 9/11 had anything to do with saddam hussein, but it had everything to do with agendas and the willpower to get them done. the world sensed this massive disconnect and the seedy trumped up lies, and therefore did not support the americans at all the second time around
and it was done at the price of probably many more american, and iraqi, body bags, many years later, under bush ii in iraq ii
so colin powell and assorted numbnuts: you screwed up in 1991. you should have gone all the way. if you start a job, finish it completely. leaving it half done meant a problem that festered
yes, you had the highest and noblest of intentions in mind, but war is messy and has nothing to do with nobility and good intentions, and you need to take some ugly jobs to completion, or don't start the ugly job at all
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Guarding the oil.
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power." -- Mussolini
Violence isn't the problem, extricating US troops is the problem.
It didn't matter when Saddam was killing Iraqis, and it won't matter when we hand off to the locals again. The insurgents "attacking" /= "winning", and UNLESS Iraqis buy their country with their own blood sacrifice it won't mean anything to them. There is obviously much more tribal violence to come, but that's normal in that part of the world.
It's called "self-actualization" and there is nothing much Caucasian Colonials can do about it.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Jesus Christ. Not only are you trying to play the race card, you're trying to play it in a game of marbles.
So, we are ending "combat operations" but keeping the soldiers with guns there? It's only slightly comforting to hear that nothing has changed in the military since I got out (Only in an "at least it isn't me" way). This used to be the trick they would pull on all the missions I was on. When people get tired, just tell them it's almost over, whether it really is or not. Since I'm allowed to think now, what does an end to combat operations really mean? It sounds like they are just going to end combat pay.
November 2 minus August 31 is two days?
Let me guess . . . you just graduated from high school in Texas?
I think those are the guys who the insurgents keep blowing up, right?
Since 2005, according to the icasualties.org website, there's been 3078 American casualties and 8286 ISF casualties.
While I mourn for the loss of life, it seems to be like the ISF aren't going to be able to handle the load alone. Not that the U.S. should bear this load alone (and we haven't), but it seems like those folks still need help.
I can only imagine that after the U.S. leaves (and other countries will probably follow, soon), Iraq is going to be the center of out-of-control violence like we've not seen over there.
So, what... The solution is for the US to stay forever?
Remember to maintain your supply of
Starting a war (even a war with collateral damage) is not a war crime; the idea of a war crime is simply to state that one's legal means to wage war is not unlimited. Deportation of entire populations for deprivation and/or genocide, for instance, is right out. To compare US conduct in Iraq to such things is histrionic nonsense.
We still have troops in every nation that we defeated post WW1. Why would Iraq be any different, especially given all the oil that's there?
Degaussing scares the bad magnetism out of the monitor and fills it with good karma.
Soldiers grow back, forests don't.
You've never planted a tree? Seriously, you put a seedling in the ground when it is small, and years later you come back, and it is actually bigger. Plant a soldier and come back in a few years, and all you have is the same small stone with the name of someone's kid on it.
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
Iran had one card to play in Iraq: al-Sadr. They played that card, and lost. Al-Sadr's political power now resides solely with Iran, where he now lives. I think you can expect as much outrage in Iraq over an invasion of Iran as you would expect from Egypt, Jordan, or the gulf states: public outrage coupled with private intelligence sharing with the US.
Except france!
Iraq's oil production capabilities are around $20B/year. We're spending $300B/year on the war. There literally isn't enough oil in the ground there to pay us back for the last 7.5 years, and it would take a century even if they tried. Can we please do some basic math and stop the stupid "it's all about oil" line of attack - it makes you look like an idiot.
Do you have ESP?
How long have we maintained 40,000 troops in Korea?
Hell, we still have troops in the South!
But Korea is fun. The women are good looking and the booze is good.
Only I can judge you.
There were French forces under the collaborationist Vichy government in North Africa fighting along side Italian troops when the US and UK invaded Morocco. I don't believe they tried very hard, though.
I have trained the Iraqi security forces (military and civilian) and they are pretty much not trainable by western standards. You have grown men/working professionals who don't know their right from their left. You spend one week trying to teach them military drill that takes the average 8th grader 20 minutes to master. Add a loaded rifle and an "Insha Allah" attitude, and you only make everything worse.
Granted, they have pretty severe brain-drain in that country. All the smart ones left years ago (in the 80s, then again in 1990, then yet again in the 2000s). If security ever improves, I have several friends and colleagues that would go back. The problem is, security won't improve without the likes of them returning and bringing their advanced degrees back to their homeland. It's a total "chicken-or-the-egg" conundrum.
Which is also stupid. Our troops should be defending our country. And with our troops in places like South Korea, we could very well be doing more harm than good.
we should not have military bases in 130 different countries.
Obama did well on this one. Let's give him credit.
Obama did well? Obama opposed everything that allowed Iraq to be in this position now. Obama had no plan for Iraq except a campaign promise (and like all of his campaign promises, it comes with a expiration date). Bush, and Patraus more so, deserves the credit here. They put all Iraq on this path, all Obama did was follow the blueprint given to him by Bush. A plan that called for the removal of troops in late 2010. Obama had no plan of his own
To be honest I still don't understand what you were trying to say.
Tim S-
Your pithy comment might look good on a bumper sticker or t-shirt, but it's not really this same thing and we both know it. It's about as dumb as the arguments from the right "when will we stop occupying (Chicago or other city) as there are more deaths there in (time period) than Iraq.
Germany is a strategic ally and fellow NATO member. Simply having operational bases in a country is not the same as occupation. The US does not patrol the streets of Germany, nor do they perform operational missions within Germany's borders aside from training simulations. Assignment in Germany is normally a cushy job and one many soldiers hope for.
US presence in Germany was scaled back following the re-unification of the two Germanys. Early in the Clinton administration early discharge was offered to many US soldiers as a scaling back "peace dividend" (I remember this personally because my wife took the opportunity to return to civilian life). Many troops who were stationed in Germany were moved to Saudi Arabia.
Your calculation is wrong.
You assume $20B/year - $300B/year = $-280B/year
This is how the people running the war see it.
$20B/year + $300B/year (in cost plus contracts) = $320B/year = War oil is much better than regular oil!
As everyone knows, before Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, he was a real sweetheart. Gassing Kurds, brutally oppressing any competing political parties, fighting the Iranians. And just how did he hold on to power for so long?
Back in the 60s, the Iraqi government was getting real friendly with the Soviet Union, which was bad news. Our installed dictator in Iran was keeping the oil flowing, but Iraq had a lot more of it and was right next door. So we supported a young man named Saddam Hussein and has Ba'athist Socialist party when the former government was coincidentally overthrown (wink wink). We liked Saddam, because he was a secular lawyer who liked Western culture, and in his 1970 Iraqi Constitution even mentioned things like equality for all religions, races, and genders. Even if it was an empty promise, that was some pretty radical stuff for an Arab state. But he also had stuff like, "Iraqi resources belong to the People," so we continued to favor the Shah in Iran. That is until 1979, when after decades of secret police torturing and killing Iranians so they could sell their oil more cheaply to Western powers, they overthrew their government and the Ayatollah came to power. From then on, Saddam became our primary political tool in the region, mostly for fighting the proxy war against Iran.
My favorite moment in US-Iraqi relations is when Reagan removed him from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list in 1982 so American firms and other international corporations could sell him biological agents and weapons. I'm sorry, I meant "dual use technology" and "farming equipment."
Or maybe it was when Ambassador Gillespie told Saddam that the US didn't care about Arab-Arab border conflicts just days before he sent his troops in to take over Kuwait.
Or maybe it was when the Kuwaiti Ambassador's daughter got up in front of Congress and lied about Saddam's troops placing babies on the floors so they would die - which was an amazing piece of propaganda, and a total fabrication.
When he was following orders, we ignored his crimes. When he stopped following orders, we suddenly remembered them. Unfortunately for us, the rest of the world doesn't stop and start history at our whim. An Iraqi will not forget that Americans were training Saddam's men to torture in the 1980s. They won't forget being left to die after the first Gulf War when we decided taking Saddam out would cause too much instability, and our choice to let Saddam mow people down with helicopters while we were still in control of their airspace. They will not forget starving in the 90s due to our embargo. They also won't forget that Saddam was our man until 2003. They won't forget our choice to use American companies to rebuild their infrastructure instead of Iraqi companies, or our choice to let Western oil companies get their pick of the oil field contracts without any input from their own government. They also won't forget that "terrorist" and "freedom fighter" can be the same person, depending on our political strategy that day.
They will never forget that the Americans cannot be trusted to act on any set of principles, because we simply don't have any. And the moment the Iraqi people try to kick out our corporations, we won't be too shy about reminding them.
No military force has ever walked away from Afghanistan as a winner.Not Alexander the Great, not the British Empire, not Russia nor will the U.S.. The only winners are those that just walk away.
The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
How little you know.
1) The US isn't in a position to bomb anything at the moment.
2) Israel will never bomb Iran. Israel knows that Iran is not a threat and has not really fought a war of aggression and won, they know this. Defensive wars give Israel the upper hand. Unlike the US, Israeli military leaders will not follow a failed strategy just because they started it.
The strange thing about the Jewish (Israel) and Persian (Iran) people is that they get on like a house on fire. When the Islamic republic started expelling certain religious people (Zoroastrian leaders, Baha'i, Jews and so forth) most of them fled to... Israel. There are several Iranian Jews are members of the Israeli government, Moshe Katsav, 8th president of Israel was Iranian. If Israel attacks Iran this will galvanise the people under the Islamic government and Israel knows this. If Iran attacks Israel, Iran knows full when Israeli tanks, lead by Farsi speaking Persian Israeli's arrive in an Iranian ville, no one will give a shit what religion they follow because someone's uncle has come home. Persian Iranians (Read, the vast majority of Iran) dont hate Jews or Israel, the Arab government hates Israel but knows it can never attack them without losing support of the people because the animosity between Arabs and Persians is legendary.
Now the Islamic government of Iran is facing a crisis it has never head to deal with. When the Iran Iraq war of the 80's started to deplete the Iranian population the leaders issued an edict, "start making babies" and the people followed. How old are the babies born in 1984-1989 today? Now a large, young population is angry and want to express it, they've never had 20 somethings in any significant number before, they aren't old enough to remember how bad the Shah was and why the Islamic revolution was supported. All they know is that they dont like the current government.
So Iran is no threat, if anything Israel has taken to supporting the current regime in order to distance Tehran from their Israel hating allies (Hezbolla and Hamas).
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.