Bush Starts "Second Surge" to Double Number of Troops in Iraq

[anitram]

Both American parties are only held accountable to international corporations and conglomerates. It's a sad state of affairs and it's almost pointless who you vote for.

These people's children have died for nothing. It's not pleasant to say, but that doesn't make it any less true. I would never, never give up my life for this ridiculous war, and for those who support it, if your life is too valuable to be shot down in some bumfuck village in Iraq, then so is the life of every soldier out there. Forget about joining - if you support this war, ask yourself if you are willing to die, today, for this cause? Yeah, I thought so.

[joyfulgirl]

Originally posted by MrsSpringsteen
Washington Post

I Lost My Son to a War I Oppose. We Were Both Doing Our Duty.

By Andrew J. Bacevich
Sunday, May 27, 2007; B01

I was just going to post this. I posted his son's photo earlier in this thread. I know the father through my work. He is a conservative Republican military man who has been outspoken against this war since it began.

[BrownEyedBoy]

Guerra means "War" in spanish...

[maycocksean]

What struck me about Bacevich's article is that here is a man who is actually THINKING about what's going on Iraq.

That's so rare in our culture of snappy comebacks, straw man arguments, knee-jerk politics.

Sometimes, I really fear for the future of our country that men like Bacevich (and thinking folks on the left and right found here in FYM) seem to be so rare.

[MrsSpringsteen]

Originally posted by joyfulgirl


I was just going to post this. I posted his son's photo earlier in this thread. I know the father through my work. He is a conservative Republican military man who has been outspoken against this war since it began.

I've been reading about him since it's a local story. What a handsome guy, yet another tragic loss His father is a credit to him and vice versa.

[anitram]

Here are some more troops who want to stay in Iraq forever:

Spc. David Williams, 22, of Boston, Mass., had two note cards in his pocket Wednesday afternoon as he waited for Sen. Joseph Lieberman. Williams serves in the 82nd Airborne Division from Fort Bragg, N.C., the first of the five "surge" brigades to arrive in Iraq, and he was chosen to join the Independent from Connecticut for lunch at a U.S. field base in Baghdad.

The night before, 30 other soldiers crowded around him with questions for the senator.

He wrote them all down. At the top of his note card was the question he got from nearly every one of his fellow soldiers:

"When are we going to get out of here?"

The rest is here.

[MrsSpringsteen]

I guess it all comes down to this

But as he waited two chairs down from where Lieberman would sit, Hedin said he'd never voice his true feelings to the senator.

"I think I'd be a private if I did," he joked.

What a place to be in, literally and figuratively speaking.

[A_Wanderer]

See I thought that getting rid of Saddam thus removing the need for troops in Saudi Arabia and eventually getting them out of the region was the long term goal (as in by 2008)

THE US Defence Secretary suggested for the first time yesterday that American forces could be in Iraq for at least another half century, under an arrangement similar to the effectively permanent US troop deployment in South Korea.

In comments that will dismay war opponents at home and alarm Muslim allies in the Middle East, Robert Gates said that "some force of Americans" will be in Iraq for a "protracted period of time" and pointed to South Korea as the model.

US troops have been in South Korea since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, in the heavily armed demilitarised zone that separates the country from North Korea.

US generals are in charge of the combined US-South Korean forces.

Mr Gates, speaking to reporters in Hawaii during a visit to US Pacific Command, said that current war plans still called for an assessment of the US "surge" strategy in September, but he said he was looking beyond that to the type of military presence the US would have in Iraq over the long term.

He contrasted the situation in South Korea to Vietnam, where, he said, "we just left, lock, stock and barrel", a reference to the US withdrawal after the fall of Saigon in1975.

"What I'm thinking in terms of is a mutual agreement where some force of Americans - with mutually agreed missions - is present for a protracted period of time," he said.

"The idea is more a model of a mutually agreed arrangement whereby we have a long and enduring presence but under the consent of both parties and under certain conditions.

"The Korea model is one, the security relationship we have with Japan is another."

All eyes in Washington are on the progress report to Congress in September by General David Petraeus, the US ground commander, with moderate Republicans saying that anything less than significant optimism will end their support for President George W. Bush.

Yesterday, General Raymond Odierno, the No.2 commander in Iraq, told reporters in Washington via video link from Baghdad that he might not be able to make a full assessment by September of whether the build-up was succeeding in stabilising Iraq.

General Odierno admitted that in an effort to quell violence, the US military was seeking talks with Shia Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr - believed to be behind the kidnapping of five Britons this week.

A Sadr aide confirmed US officials had approached the anti-American cleric's supporters, but said Sadr would never begin a dialogue with "occupation forces".

"He has a grass-roots movement that he's always going to have; we have to recognise that," General Odierno said in an interview this week.

"We're trying to talk to him. We want to talk to him."

In the video conference from Baghdad yesterday, General Odierno said the US was reaching out to Sunni Muslims as well as Shia armed factions such as Sadr's Mahdi Army.

[Irvine511]

Originally posted by A_Wanderer
See I thought that getting rid of Saddam thus removing the need for troops in Saudi Arabia and eventually getting them out of the region was the long term goal (as in by 2008)

Resolution 1441 justifies all of this. mistakes have been made, but things are going in the right direction. the only way that a bad thing will ever happen again is if we pull out in less than 60 years.

[A_Wanderer]

That may well be the case but the spectre of a nuclear Iran is worrying and the developments on the ground have changed (it isn't 2004, but then again it isn't 2005 or 2006 anymore - being able to consolidate the gains in the Sunni regions would be a good thing but given the political timetable it's impossible; especially since the Dems have basically declared that the change in strategy under Petreus is a failure regardless of the results.

[anitram]

Originally posted by A_Wanderer
especially since the Dems have basically declared that the change in strategy under Petreus is a failure regardless of the results.

Yes, because based on the results so far it's certainly been a stunning success. Troops want to get the hell out of there, May was the 3rd deadliest month since the beginning of the war and Bush thinks it'll get worse as the summer goes on. Stunning success!

[Irvine511]

i am proud that American troops will continue to guard Saudi oil for the next 60 years.

don't we all see the gigantic hole in the increasingly desperate justifications being put forward? if it is all about the oil, and protecting the oil from Saddam, why do we now need American troops to guard it from a world without Saddam?

[A_Wanderer]

^ All of which does nothing to reduce the risk of terrorism. It doesn't stop the cash flow, it doesn't open other avenues of protest against these governments, it doesn't create economic opportunities; it's as if they spent three years with a pro-democracy cause and are now shifting to a hard nosed realist one achieving the ends of neither.

[anitram]

Originally posted by A_Wanderer
the Dems have basically declared that the change in strategy under Petreus is a failure regardless of the results.

Well Petraeus has decided that his strategy will be successful in September regardless:

Officials told ABC's Martha Raddatz that the senior commanders in Iraq -- Lt. Gen. Ray Odierno and Gen. David Petraeus -- want the surge to continue until at least December and expect to report enough progress by September to justify the extension.

What a fucking sham.

[Bluer White]

Originally posted by A_Wanderer
especially since the Dems have basically declared that the change in strategy under Petreus is a failure regardless of the results.

Weren't most Dems declaring this strategy a failure, while at the very same time confirming the architect Petreus a few months ago?

Please, you had a legitimate argument questioning the surge, why vote for a plan you have no confidence in?