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About This Page: This is a discussion on Politics within the LetsGoKings.com forums, at Los Angeles Kings Hockey Fan Forum. The additional troops and change of tactics didn't cause the reduction in violence in Iraq, it just coincided with other events that did. New geographical analysis of what has happened.
The additional troops and change of tactics didn't cause the reduction in violence in Iraq, it just coincided with other events that did. New geographical analysis of what has happened.
1. "Ethnic" (religious) cleansing. All of Baghdad walled off by neighborhoods and street barriers.
2. Anbar "Awakening." The well documented "jobs program" for Sunni insurrectionists. Payoffs to clan leaders and $10 bucks a day to Sunni and Sh'ia fighters to man "checkpoints." Side money from shakedowns of those passing through their streets. This reinforces the segregation of districts.
3. Nearly all the educated Sunni with any skills and money have fled the country. Nobody worth kidnapping still lives there.
4. The al-Sadr ordered cease fire. Also known as, "let's wait them out." Oops, somebody has been reading Ho Chi Minh.
McCain calls it "victory"...but wants to put permanent bases into Iraq instead of pulling out. Won't leave because the phony victory will turn into "defeat," i.e. be shown to be phony once the Shi'a start up on the remaining Sunni and also ally themselves formally with Iran when we leave. As long as we stay put we don't have to admit we've secured an ally for Iran in the mideast...And if Obama wins the election we'll just blame what will eventually happen anyway on him.
__________________
"For if once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination." Thomas DeQuincey, 1700's
Last edited by Leonidas; September 20th, 2008 at 10:46 PM.
T i.e. be shown to be phony once the Shi'a start up on the remaining Sunni and also ally themselves formally with Iran when we leave. As long as we stay put we don't have to admit we've secured an ally for Iran in the mideast...And if Obama wins the election we'll just blame what will eventually happen anyway on him.
I never understood why it is such a big deal they "align" themselves with Iran. It is INEVITABLE. The population in Iraq is majority Shi'a. Frankly, it's far better than having a 10 year war that kills a million people. It's also something that the US should have known BEFORE invading. Even then, the US should have put aside some of the differences they've had with Terhan, which could have made this war a bit easier.
jom
__________________ Old men's room wall saying: Flush hard, it's a long way to Washington
I'm sure he is more in tune with the goings on in Iraq than the troops on the ground. Don't knock how much can be told by satellite images taken at night.
Anything to discount the success of the military, eh guys?
Yep. Absolutely had nothing to do with the troops.
Don't you think this is a stretch, Leo?
__________________ "America didn't become the greatest nation on earth by redistributing wealth; we became the greatest nation by creating new wealth."
If you truely believe this. Then this should prove to you that Obama does not know what he is talking about when it comes to Iraq and by extension, foreign policy.
OBAMA: If you listen to what I've said, and I'll repeat it right here on this show, I think that there’s no doubt that the violence is down. I believe that that is a testimony to the troops that were sent and General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker. I think that the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated, by the way, including President Bush and the other supporters. It has gone very well, partly because of the Anbar situation and the Sunni awakening, partly because of the Shia military. Look…
Surge success or not, oversimplification of complicated issues is a recipe for disaster. McCain basically said from the start we're going in too light, not sending enough people to do the giant job. Obama basically said we should not go in at all. Supporting the "surge" is trying to correct an earlier error no matter how one looks at it. Obama's opposing the surge is consistent with his belief we should not go in at all.
Woodward's novel State of Denial discusses how Rumsfeld sold Bush on the idea they could go in light: the pentagon planners thought they needed 500,000 people for the war and the retrenchment (so Bush fired the general who went before congress and told them that); Rumsfeld claimed and sold Bush on the idea they could do it with less than 200,000. It is a classic military blunder to use enough troops to take the land but not send enough to hold it (which takes more and takes longer).
This error was followed up by multiple instances of general incompetence, something McCain and Obama agreed upon. The first two years after Buch declared victory reads like a keystone cops story--blunder after blunder followed up by lying about it.
General Franks, the original troop leader, apparently saw the FUBAR coming because he quit his job almost immediately after Bush announced victory May 1. (his famous aircraft carrier "mission accomplished" lie). FUBAR Rumsfeld eventually got fired after multiple generals called publically for his resignation. (my friend a die hard right wing marine agreed they should take for rumsfeld's head long before they finally did)
Getting back to the surge, there is an earlier post on these boards by someone who is a soldier in Iraq. He is on the ground and not an administation apologist. He follows the same analysis that the surge may have helped but it was other factors that drove the peace, namely that the Kurds, Sunnis and Shiates decided to hold off killing one another for the nonce, or at least limited the killings to a lower levels.
Those in LA might recall how the drive by killings--which at one time reached like 30 per weekend--cooled down after the LA riots. They did put more police on the streets I thnk, but it was the shooters themselves who cooled things down, or maybe the riots let out enought blood--but it was not the extra cops. Did they hurt? Well no.
How one defines "success" is a big issue here as in other situations. When one says the surge "suceeded" I would say yes, its purpose was to bring the violence down and by luck or not it managed that. But is that really "success?" Bush has carefully avoided defining success in iraq. That way no one can really say his war failed, or the surge failed (or say it suceeded for that matter).
Some things do seem clear. This war is costing a fortune in money lives and blood. Apparently all most of the Iraqis agree upon is they want us to leave.
Go kings. Play good hockey so we can forget these more serious problems
Basically, we should not have invaded in the first place. We won the war, but lost the peace. This has not been a war for a long time. This is an occupation. I think Bush and Rumsfeld wanted to go light so they could bring in more military contractors, as well as using lower troop numbers to sell this war to the Amercian people. But they also sold this war as necessary to protect our homeland from harm. But if this war was necessary to negate the imminent threat that portrayed Iraq to be why did they not insist on invading right away. No, they waited for better weather. That doesn't sound like they were in any hurry. There is no doubt the surge gave us some temporary results. However, the idea behind the surge was to buy some time for the Iraqi government's factions and sign the oil revenue sharing agreement as well as ratifying a new constitution. None of this has happened. How long can we stick around and wait for them to workout their differences. I really don't believe that the Bush Administration gives two s**ts about a new constitution (actually, he doesn't give a s**t about our Constitution either). What he really cares about is the oil sharing agreement and how it will benefit Amercian oil companies. But wasn't oil the big reason for going in anyway? Absolutely.
__________________ Sole member of the Mark Visheau fan club.
Apparently, we're going to be there for a long enough time that it's worth keeping Iraq from taking over a larger role in enforcement until they "agree" to give American troops and American cotractors full immunity for any crimes they might commit in Iraq.
If you truely believe this. Then this should prove to you that Obama does not know what he is talking about when it comes to Iraq and by extension, foreign policy.
Of course I believe it. What does my post about the reasons for the decline in violence in Iraq have to do with Obama? Even if both McCain and Obama want to say the "surge" of troops is responsible that doesn't change the facts; it wasn't. The troops would have been killed just as fast as they were in the years and months up until the escalation if the preconditions described in the OP had not been the context in which the escalation took place.
OBAMA: If you listen to what I've said, and I'll repeat it right here on this show, I think that there’s no doubt that the violence is down. I believe that that is a testimony to the troops that were sent and General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker. I[COLOR=\\\"Red\\\"] think that the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated[/color], by the way, including President Bush and the other supporters. It has gone very well, partly because of the Anbar situation and the Sunni awakening, partly because of the Shia military. Look…
You obviously don't know how to interpret this remark if you think this is an agreement with McCain's absurd idea that the US military brought about the decline in violence on its own.
After the politically obligatory ass kissing of Petraeus, Obama went on to say "the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated." That's the equivalent of saying to someone with terrible clothes who has asked you how she looks, "that outfit is amazing, I'm stunned." He then went on to refer to some of the conditions for the downturn in violence that don't have to do with the tactical decision to send in more troops.
And as for who is out to lunch on foreign policy, it is McCain who chose a vice-presidential candidate with no foreign policy knowledge or experience who quickly suggested that war with Russia is not out of the question.
Last edited by Leonidas; September 21st, 2008 at 10:47 AM.
I'm sure he is more in tune with the goings on in Iraq than the troops on the ground. Don't knock how much can be told by satellite images taken at night.
Anything to discount the success of the military, eh guys?
By this time I think the much overused 'thetroopsonthegroun
More on why the military "surge" didn't work in Iraq. 
salami
??? 
