Uhhhh... Even the Iraqi government wants a timetable for withdrawal of U.S. combat forces.

The "empirical evidence" also fails to point out that ethnic cleansing of neighborhoods/towns by militias was actually the cause of stability.

Genocide. It's patriotic when it's done under our watch.

Mission Accomplished, on the reduction of violence front.

Well, that is until they try to tell the Kurds to give up their sovereignty. That will be fun. We'd better pull out before that happens.

Yeah! I bet if we moved America in its entirety to Iraq, Iraq would be, like, the world's biggest superpower overnight.

What about the four years before that?

As Obama pointed out in the debate tonight, the Iraq war started in 2003, not 2007.

NewportBarGuy: Well, that is until they try to tell the Kurds to give up their sovereignty. That will be fun. We'd better pull out before that happens.

I think they'll be a spike in violence regardless of who wins, since I think Sadr and his ilk have been waiting out the "surge" (which just ended) and are looking to the U.S. election for their next move.

If McCain wins I think the Mahdi army suddenly reappears (their recent "disarmament" was about as real as McCain's recent "suspension") and things get worse. Not to ethnic cleansing levels (since that's played out), and directed at the U.S. presence.

If Obama wins violence will increase because of the lag between the general election and any significant change in Iraq policy (which would probably lag by at least 3 and probably 6 or more months).

The Iraqis know this is an election year and they're all too aware that no matter what happens there won't be a Bush in power in 4 months. Much of what's happened in the past year has to be judged based on that.

So we'll see.

dameron: I think they'll be a spike in violence regardless of who wins, since I think Sadr and his ilk have been waiting out the "surge" (which just ended) and are looking to the U.S. election for their next move.

Exactly. Which kind of bothers me about the 'timeline' controversy, too.

These people aren't stupid. Some people are looking to make trouble, certainly. If they know the date we're going to leave, they'll make trouble. If they don't know, they'll make exactly the same amount of trouble when they see we're gone. I don't see much in the way of practical difference, except if we're not physically there, they can't kill our soldiers.

How about that whole sentence from TFA...

Yet the empirical evidence of the past year suggests the opposite: that only the greater security produced and guaranteed by American troops allows a political environment in which legislative deals and free elections are feasible.

Correlation, causation, meh.

What Obama supposedly "continues to argue" hasn't been disproved yet, either.


As has been stated by others, our troops haven't been there for only one or two years.

hillbillypharmacist: If they know the date we're going to leave, they'll make trouble.

You're both missing the point. The sectarian strife in the middle part of the country and the south has been resolved. The perceived enemies to the Shia have been killed or are part of a massive diaspora. That means 75% of the country is pacified, in the eyes of the Shia.

That leaves no impetus to cause any kind of hindrance to our withdrawal of U.S. forces by the Mahdi Militia. Mission Accomplished in their eyes.

What we are failing to discuss is the Kurdish "free" State. Now, the INC wants the revenue from the Kirkuk oil fields to be placed in trust with the Iraqi Oil Ministry. The Kurds are never going to go for that.

Basically, look at the situation in Georgia, multiply it by a thousand and you're still nowhere near it. The Kurds will not give up their pseudo-sovereign status. The Peshmerga are fierce fighters and will not lay down their arms.

We need to be withdrawn before the real civil war starts.

Declare "Mission Accomplished", execute a withdrawal plan (it will take 18-24 months, according to the Army logistics guys I know) and call it a day.

Trust me, you don't want to pick a side and fight the real civil war that is yet to be fought in Iraq. Ask Winston Churchill.

SphericalTime: What about the four years before that?

As Obama pointed out in the debate tonight, the Iraq war started in 2003, not 2007.

NewportBarGuy: stuff

Yeah, that. All of that. Especially the part about the Peshmerga. They'll fight until they're down to old men, young boys, and cripples before they'll allow Baghdad to exert meaningful control over Iraqi Kurdistan.

I'm still wondering how the Iranians will play this... I could seriously see Iran playing both sides, supplying arms to the militant groups who will be harassing the Kurds while simultaneously "standing in solidarity" with the Kurds. A friendly Kurdistan would simultaneously lessen US influence in the region while putting an ally on their border.

THE SURGE WAS SUCCESSFUL!

It didn't meet any of the benchmarks set out by the Bush administration, but gosh darnit violence is lower!

Occam's Chainsaw: I'm still wondering how the Iranians will play this... I could seriously see Iran playing both sides, supplying arms to the militant groups who will be harassing the Kurds while simultaneously "standing in solidarity" with the Kurds. A friendly Kurdistan would simultaneously lessen US influence in the region while putting an ally on their border.

Iran has played the role of China and Russia: point to follow. Remember how supporters claimed Iraq was not Vietnam because they did not have a Big Brother? Ludicrous. Iran has played their hand brilliantly. U.S. forces have not only been killed by Irainian-trained forces, they have been killed by Iranian forces directly.

You want to talk about the Kurdish problem? Got an hour? We're talking about Jordan, Turkey, Iran and Iraq. It's going to be an epic regional conflict and, trust me, we want absolutely no part of it. Saudi Arabia and Iran will be the proxies, when Iran isn't attacking their own Kurdish encampments in the north.

Embrace the Surge, love it, own it. Use it as a reason to withdraw. The sad part is that I wanted to re-deploy the troops to Afghanistan and, now, I'm not certain we can regain lost ground. We have probably missed the boat on that. I'm still for a build-up in the A'stan and a move into Waziristan.

Iraq is not the "central front in the war on terror", it just sounds good as a deflection for a retarded policy. There is no way in hell AQ can establish a "permanent base" (ironic) in Iraq, a Shia dominated country.

Pull out now or we will suffer a significant increase in casualties as the Kurdish issue moves from theory to reality.

NewportBarGuy: Occam's Chainsaw: I'm still wondering how the Iranians will play this... I could seriously see Iran playing both sides, supplying arms to the militant groups who will be harassing the Kurds while simultaneously "standing in solidarity" with the Kurds. A friendly Kurdistan would simultaneously lessen US influence in the region while putting an ally on their border.

Iran has played the role of China and Russia: point to follow. Remember how supporters claimed Iraq was not Vietnam because they did not have a Big Brother? Ludicrous. Iran has played their hand brilliantly. U.S. forces have not only been killed by Irainian-trained forces, they have been killed by Iranian forces directly.

You want to talk about the Kurdish problem? Got an hour? We're talking about Jordan, Turkey, Iran and Iraq. It's going to be an epic regional conflict and, trust me, we want absolutely no part of it. Saudi Arabia and Iran will be the proxies, when Iran isn't attacking their own Kurdish encampments in the north.

Embrace the Surge, love it, own it. Use it as a reason to withdraw. The sad part is that I wanted to re-deploy the troops to Afghanistan and, now, I'm not certain we can regain lost ground. We have probably missed the boat on that. I'm still for a build-up in the A'stan and a move into Waziristan.

Iraq is not the "central front in the war on terror", it just sounds good as a deflection for a retarded policy. There is no way in hell AQ can establish a "permanent base" (ironic) in Iraq, a Shia dominated country.

Pull out now or we will suffer a significant increase in casualties as the Kurdish issue moves from theory to reality.

Ooops. Iraq is Sunni, Iran is Shia.

Until this "empirical evidence" is provided to me in a government document, I'm going to be skeptical.

And I'm basing that statement on emails from friends, family, and coworkers who are currently deployed... I'm very happy that security has improved, but security is at most half of what needs to be secured in Iraq. And at what point do the benefits outweigh the costs? The surge is over and we still haven't seen significant political or economic gains...

and don't even get me started on Afghanistan :|

I was a McCain supporter going into this debate tonight, but after McCain's weak, confused, and milquetoast performance, I've decided to switch sides and vote for the man who demonstrated confidence, knowledge, and humility -- Barack Obama. Millions of other people feel the same way and I don't want my vote to not be thrown away into the loser pile like with Bush the last eight years.


/sorry

JQPublic: Ooops. Iraq is Sunni, Iran is Shia.

Iraq is majority Shiite. That is why we supported Saddam way back when as he was Sunni and so would repress the Shiite majority.

JQPublic: Ooops. Iraq is Sunni, Iran is Shia.

Really?

JQPublic: Ooops. Iraq is Sunni, Iran is Shia.

You might want to rethink that statement.

sonnyboy11: I don't want my vote to not be thrown away into the loser pile like with Bush the last eight years.

Wait... what?

JQPublic: Ooops. Iraq is Sunni, Iran is Shia.

Iraq is about 60% Shia, 35% Sunni. Sorry.

As to the article's question, "empirical evidence" is compounded by "multiple independent variables". How much does the fact that we're paying hundreds of millions of dollars in Danegeld to various warlords affect violence rates. Can we separate that effect from the effect of the surge?

Um, we haven't tried to leave yet. So what empirical evidence?

*facepalm* on me. I thought because Saddam was Sunni, that the country was mostly Sunni.

Does it really matter anymore? We will never completely leave Iraq. we didn't build a embassy in Iraq bigger than the Vatican for nothing.

i guarantee you no matter who is pres we will keep boots on the ground in iraq like korea and japan.

NewportBarGuy: Iran has played the role of China and Russia: point to follow. Remember how supporters claimed Iraq was not Vietnam because they did not have a Big Brother? Ludicrous. Iran has played their hand brilliantly. U.S. forces have not only been killed by Irainian-trained forces, they have been killed by Iranian forces directly.

Getting rid of Saddam and creating a power vacuum that Iraqi Shi'ites could easily vie for was the very best thing the USA has done for the Iranian government in well over a half a century.

fark'em... what happened to Country First, John?

JQPublic: *facepalm* on me. I thought because Saddam was Sunni, that the country was mostly Sunni.

While it is majority-Shia, the more important fact is that it is unstably both, not overwhelmingly one or the other. This goes to the fact that "Iraq" is a geographical construct drawn up by some guys in wigs in London, never connected to the reality of the tribes on the ground. We're no more keeping the fiction going without a brutal strongman than we were to keep the fiction of Yugoslavia going without Tito.

JQPublic: *facepalm* on me. I thought because Saddam was Sunni, that the country was mostly Sunni.

*MEMO* Attach this to your action-item list... Leave JQPublic alone.

Facts are hard. Give him a pass on this.

mesohorny: Does it really matter anymore?

really?

Team Pancakes McPalin wants us to move our troops across the Iraq border into Pakistan!

The Surge isn't why violence dropped, I wish that point could get made in the media. Violence dropped because the Sunnis stopped supporting the terrorists and started working with our forces, for which they expected to be given amnesty for past actions. The Shiite dominated government didn't do that and they started arresting the Sunni leaders to settle old scores. The Sunnis are probably going to start feeling betrayed by our side so they'll probably go back to being allied to Al-Qaeda and stop being cooperative.

The surge is a tactic.. not a strategy

/just saying

NewportBarGuy: JQPublic: *facepalm* on me. I thought because Saddam was Sunni, that the country was mostly Sunni.

*MEMO* Attach this to your action-item list... Leave JQPublic alone.

Facts are hard. Give him a pass on this.

LOL. I distributed my mea culpa now can you use the secret liberal backchannel to have my imageshack account "unhacked"?

NewportBarGuy: Uhhhh... Even the Iraqi government wants a timetable for withdrawal of U.S. combat forces.

Iraq is kind of in between the Bush and the Obama position. They don't want a quick pullout that ignores conditions like Obama wants. But they do want a quicker pullout than Bush seems to want.

Maybe you're thinking of the Der Spiegel interview? It turns out that Der Spiegel editied a key phrase after the fact to make it look like Iraq supported Obama's position.

The "empirical evidence" also fails to point out that ethnic cleansing of neighborhoods/towns by militias was actually the cause of stability.

"The surge didn't work...violence can't be reduced by anything we did...it just CAN'T!"

dervish16108: Getting rid of Saddam and creating a power vacuum that Iraqi Shi'ites could easily vie for was the very best thing the USA has done for the Iranian government in well over a half a century.

Well, anyone with a brain knows that. The hard part is, what do we do now?

Is it any wonder the mullahs have grown brass balls? We'd better engage them now, or we face serious consequences. We should offer to build refineries for them, a net importer of refined petroleum products.

OMG appeasement, to follow.

NewportBarGuy: Iran has played the role of China and Russia: point to follow. Remember how supporters claimed Iraq was not Vietnam because they did not have a Big Brother? Ludicrous. Iran has played their hand brilliantly. U.S. forces have not only been killed by Irainian-trained forces, they have been killed by Iranian forces directly.

I think it was the obvious thing for the Iranians to do really. Bush all but committed to invading Iran next. Moreso given the way he went about invading Iraq (i.e. he made the descision to do it well in advance and then set about finding an excuse) they really had no choice in the matter.

If the US succeeded in Iraq, then they had good reason to believe that they were next regardless of whether of whether they actually posed a threat to the US.

The smart thing to do in that situation is was to bog the US down in Iraq.

Befuddled: The Surge isn't why violence dropped, I wish that point could get made in the media. Violence dropped because the Sunnis stopped supporting the terrorists and started working with our forces, for which they expected to be given amnesty for past actions

That is part of the surge. The surge was a change in strategy (i.e. "The New Way Forward in Iraq") and a troop increase was just one part of that.

JQPublic: *facepalm* on me. I thought because Saddam was Sunni, that the country was mostly Sunni.

NewportBarGuy: Facts are hard. Give him a pass on this.

And I thought I was being polite...

helix400: That is part of the surge. The surge was a change in strategy (i.e. "The New Way Forward in Iraq") and a troop increase was just one part of that.

As was "large monthly cash payments to warlords".

/ Or was that a tactic?

Lawnchair: As was "large monthly cash payments to warlords".

/ Or was that a tactic?

Probably both, as I understand it, the twrms have somewhat overlapping meanings.

helix400: NewportBarGuy: Uhhhh... Even the Iraqi government wants a timetable for withdrawal of U.S. combat forces.

Iraq is kind of in between the Bush and the Obama position. They don't want a quick pullout that ignores conditions like Obama wants. But they do want a quicker pullout than Bush seems to want.

Maybe you're thinking of the Der Spiegel interview? It turns out that Der Spiegel editied a key phrase after the fact to make it look like Iraq supported Obama's position.

The "empirical evidence" also fails to point out that ethnic cleansing of neighborhoods/towns by militias was actually the cause of stability.

"The surge didn't work...violence can't be reduced by anything we did...it just CAN'T!"

yeah. iraqi violence is down not due to the us military, but due to the iraqis realizin' we're not the major power brokers there any longer. theyre biding their time till the imperialists are gone. the US didn't make anything "work" or "solve" anything; they quit of their own accord.

not to say we're not trying our best and all, but, well, we're 130k guys in a country of millions. we can bring down a curtain of death on any one place at a time, but when there are 300 places needing it at once, well, it doesnt matter.

the iraqis are doing it themselves.

Perhaps if even one Republican could answer the questions "Why are we in Iraq in the first place?", or "What exactly constitutes 'Victory' in Iraq", I'd be more impressed by their constant whining that we absolutely MUST sacrifice more innocent lives in pursuit of convincing Republicans that America has a really big penis.

NewportBarGuy: dervish16108: Getting rid of Saddam and creating a power vacuum that Iraqi Shi'ites could easily vie for was the very best thing the USA has done for the Iranian government in well over a half a century.

Well, anyone with a brain knows that. The hard part is, what do we do now?

Is it any wonder the mullahs have grown brass balls? We'd better engage them now, or we face serious consequences. We should offer to build refineries for them, a net importer of refined petroleum products.

OMG appeasement, to follow.

Or, as a more bloody alternative, we allow the genocide to continue, "supporting" multiple sides out and letting them cleanse each other until neither side has politically or militarily capable leaders left.

We gradually lower our troop levels until we have a force sufficient to supply arms in a controller manner but insufficient to police the country. We call such a force an "honor guard" to help "protect" Iraqi sovereignty until they have a "fully" formed military. We then supply the Shia and Sunni death squads with simple weaponry and allow them to take pot shots at each other.

Then, when or if a Kurdish insurgency begins due to the ham-fisted mangling of the Iraqi government, we play the sympathy card and move the majority of our forces to northern Iraq to "defend" Kurdish autonomy.

sonnyboy11 I was a McCain supporter going into this debate tonight, but after McCain's weak, confused, and milquetoast performance, I've decided to switch sides and vote for the man who demonstrated confidence, knowledge, and humility -- Barack Obama. Millions of other people feel the same way and I don't want my vote to not be thrown away into the loser pile like with Bush the last eight years.


/sorry

You must be popular. I wish I knew millions of people.

Does this mean we won?

helix400: That is part of the surge. The surge was a change in strategy (i.e. "The New Way Forward in Iraq") and a troop increase was just one part of that.

It would seem that Obama isn't the only one that doesn't know the difference between a tactic and a strategy ;)

PainSorrowLoss:
Or, as a more bloody alternative, we allow the genocide to continue, "supporting" multiple sides out and letting them cleanse each other until neither side has politically or militarily capable leaders left.

We gradually lower our troop levels until we have a force sufficient to supply arms in a controller manner but insufficient to police the country. We call such a force an "honor guard" to help "protect" Iraqi sovereignty until they have a "fully" formed military. We then supply the Shia and Sunni death squads with simple weaponry and allow them to take pot shots at each other.

Then, when or if a Kurdish insurgency begins due to the ham-fisted mangling of the Iraqi government, we play the sympathy card and move the majority of our forces to northern Iraq to "defend" Kurdish autonomy.

Yay! then we'll have brought freedom and democracy to Iraq! We can sure as hell be proud of ourselves then as having kept to our national ideals.

listen to what you're saying.

you're a sick asshole. those are human beings upon which you're wishing misery and death.

sonnyboy11: I was a McCain supporter going into this debate tonight, but after McCain's weak, confused, and milquetoast performance, I've decided to switch sides and vote for the man who demonstrated confidence, knowledge, and humility -- Barack Obama. Millions of other people feel the same way and I don't want my vote to not be thrown away into the loser pile like with Bush the last eight years.


/sorry

Man if you are so weak of mind that this debate caused you to completely switch sides, then yea, you belong with the Obama hoard.

I highly doubt a word you uttered but figured I'd get my dig in at the Brainless among the Obama Flock. (Not counting all supporters of his brainless - just some Farkers I've seen :P)

helix400: That is part of the surge. The surge was a change in strategy (i.e. "The New Way Forward in Iraq") and a troop increase was just one part of that.

Not when the term was coined, it wasn't. With surge being short for "troop surge" and all.

Father_Jack: you're a sick asshole. those are human beings upon which you're wishing misery and death.

Give him a pass. Psychopaths are often misunderstood.

helix400: Maybe you're thinking of the Der Spiegel interview? It turns out that Der Spiegel editied a key phrase after the fact to make it look like Iraq supported Obama's position.

[citation needed]

ayenull:
really?

watermelon flavored chicken