SUNNIS? SHIITES? NOT OUR PROBLEM …
The U.S. government fabricated the basis for its 2003 invasion of Iraq – a conflict that cost thousands of American lives and trillions of our tax dollars. Now faced with the abject failure of this intervention – notably the emergence of an al-Qaeda rebellion against the U.S.-backed “democratic” government in Baghdad – our politicians are once again beating the war drums.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is even urging the formation of a U.S. military alliance with Iran – the nation warmongering Lindsey Graham said less than a year ago would nuke the city of Charleston, S.C. in the event America didn’t invade Syria.
Everybody keeping track of all this interventionist nonsense?
Good … because it gets very confusing (and very, very expensive).
“The same foreign policy ‘experts’ who lied us into the Iraq war are now telling us we must re-invade Iraq to deal with the disaster caused by their invasion!” former U.S. Rep. Ron Paul wrote this week. “They cannot admit they were wrong about the invasion being a ‘cakewalk’ that would pay for itself, so they want to blame last week’s events on the 2011 U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. But the trouble started with the 2003 invasion itself, not the 2011 troop withdrawal. Anyone who understands cause and effect should understand this.”
Sadly such common sense is lost on most people … especially those in power.
In response to the rapidly deteriorating situation in Iraq, U.S. President Barack Obama has ordered 275 American troops to Baghdad to shore up security at the U.S. Embassy there (a.k.a. asking for a fight).
Make no mistake … this is a provocation in search of an escalation, a move Obama hopes will spark a confrontation capable of rallying a war-weary America behind yet another failed, costly intervention.
Meanwhile headlines blare in American media about 9/11-style attacks being planned by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) – with Lindsey Graham once again waxing apocalyptic about terrorist attacks he and his fellow warmongers are doing everything within their power to encourage.
“The seeds of 9/11s are being planted all over Iraq and Syria,” Graham said on CBS’ Face the Nation Sunday. “They plan to drive us out of the Mideast by attacking us here at home.”
Which leads us to the question …
Why are we in the Middle East in the first place?
Seriously … in the battle between Sunnis and Shiites for control of Iraq, what do we care?
And please don’t say “because we have to fight al-Qaeda” because the last time we checked Graham was urging America to fight alongside al-Qaeda in Syria.
According to U.S. Speaker John Boehner’s office, “too many Americans sacrificed too much to allow Iraq to slip back into chaos.”
Really? So more Americans should lose their lives and our country should waste even more money as a consequence?
Continuing to militarily engage in Iraq is madness … pure madness. It is nothing but a sop to the nation’s military industrial complex, and has no bearing on America’s core national interests. As such, not another drop of American blood … nor another dime of Americans’ tax money … should be spent on Iraq.
74 comments
I’m sick of this shit too, but what are we gonna do? Give these head slicing savages their own country, military infrastructure and the worlds 4th largest oil reserves? Last time we effectively destroyed a fanatical religious based enemy, we cut no corners. I say we back off and nuke them from orbit..it’s the only way to be sure.
Except for the minor fact that the U.S. caused many of the problems there when it launched an illegal assault on the country. Just a small detail.
Dude, the US surely screwed up on the Iraq invasion, but we no more “created” the millennium-old Sunni-Shia rift (and the kajillion problems stemming from that) than Thomas Ravenel invented using powder to get into young girls’ pants…
I think it’s fair to say that blowing up a dam that floods a city below is causing a problem – without having to claim that those who blew it up created gravity.
Not valid logic, friend. Those waters weren’t peacefully coexisting before we went over there and somehow screwed everything up- that place was a powder keg. Saddam kept the Shiite majority beaten down (literally and figuratively) with the occasional hit squad, torture chamber, mass killing, etc. Those places eventually blow up.
Saddam kept the Shiite majority beaten down (literally and figuratively) with the occasional hit squad, torture chamber, mass killing, etc. Those places eventually blow up
——-
Like when the west relieves them of their dictator.
You’re using bad logic again. I already agreed that we screwed it up, but the current “troubles” have less to do with that than most folks who haven’t spent time there understand. Believe me when I say that I’m no hyperactive interventionist. I catch hell for saying it, but I don’t think their broken-ass 14th Century culture in that region is capable of democracy. However, it’s gross oversimplification to posit that the US Neocon v. Progressive construct is how we should view Iraq now. It’s screwed up for 99 reasons (including the US).
When you whack a wasps nest, you just might be setting things in motion that were being held in check for 70 years… Maybe you don’t like wasps, or the way the wasps are being treated, but when you get stung – you were the one who went all the way over there… and whacked the nest.
Maybe you love wasps.
Maybe you thought wasp nests have honey.
You can say it was the stinger, not the wasp.
You can say it was the beehive behind the wasp nest with the oil in it… you can say it was the evil beekeeper… you can say it was 70 years of someone else whacking the same nest all the time…and you were afraid the wasps would make it impossible to get the honey.
but you can’t blame anyone but yourself for putting the process of getting stung in motion… and staying around to get the honey.
If it were real wasps.. you could just “kill them all”
I GET YOUR METAPHORS! I get it, I do. I promise. I simply disagree with your logic, whether it’s dams, hornets’ nests, or any other reference to causality versus responsibility. My very straightforward point remains: The current problems in Iraq are not 100% the fault, responsibility, result of…choose your own wording here…the US intervention. The same could be said (obviously to a lesser degree) about Syria, Egypt, Ukraine, etc. That region of the world (much like 80% of the African continent) is simply fucked up like a chicken wing We just disagree. It’s alright…
I’m not going to let you off that easily. ;)
“The current problems in Iraq are not 100% the fault…of the US intervention”
If the US had not intervened in Iraq, tell me what “the current problems” in Iraq would be.
Let me off?! Brother, it is I who spares you on this…I could bore you until your ears bleed. I spent years in that part of the world, and debate this stuff with the actors on the ground (Muslim, infidel, and jihadist alike). I still teach it (or try to) to mushy-headed undergrads. Would that it be so simple that a catchy little metaphor or analogy like a hornets’ nest could sum it up- that’s why the troubles there seem so intractable to most Western folks. Things just aren’t that simple.
People can rehash the mistakes we made in the Iraq War forever (and many seem content to do so), but we are where we are. The lastest mistake was leaving in such a manner that let al-Malaki revert to his silly, thuggish ways. He’s a buffoon. ISIS in its Iraqi manifestation is no more a creation of US policy than it is in Syria (that is to say, it’s only very slightly so). Did we cause the collapse in Syria, too? The re-emergence of the Talis in the Waziristan / Tribal areas along the Af-Pak border? How about AQAP in Yemen? The African continent’s getting dicier by the day; our fault as well? AQ in the Islamic Maghgreb is rocking in Mali, Algeria, and parts of Libya- did we invade there and I missed it? Even sorry-ass Nigeria’s getting into the act with the Boko Haram, and the clowns who can’t shoot straight in Somalia (the al-Shabab) are actually starting to consolidate themselves and settle down a bit into an actual organization. Only the kookiest of the neocons ever called for military intervention in Egypt, yet Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis emerged nonetheless. Our fault again in your view, I’m sure.
Iraq is a complex problem, and will require a complex solution. Jingoistic anti-W chanting won’t fix it, nor will Obama bashing. W should have skipped it (or “hit it and split it”) and likewise skipped the nation-building piece, and BHO should have finished it properly with a taper, not a lop. Both screwed up, so let’s fix it without sticking to old political chanting. The Mideast (and the larger issue of jihadism) is much broader than than that. As I said initially, we simply agree. I’m at peace with that.
W should have skipped it
——–
I don’t think you’re catching my drift – I’m not as concerned with “the troubles in Iraq” as I am “the troubles that Iraq is causing us,” because we didn’t skip it.
You’re not reading me either- that was 2003- at some point you have to let it go and fix the problems in front of you, especially since we might have ended up here (or worse) anyway. No one on either side can know what history would have done. What if Chamberlain had told Hitler to fuck off in 1938? Things probably would have worked out better, but not necessarily so. We’ll never know… America whined a little about ol’ Neville, but got over it, built a war machine, and beat the problem at hand. That’s what we need to do now- work the problem (as opposed to letting it work us).
We are talking past each other. I’m intent on making the point that colonization doesn’t work, and you’re intent on focusing on the present, to solve the problems as if we’ve learned the lesson, or better, as if the lesson is beside the point… you are more the “let the dead bury the dead,” while I’m more “lessons of history.”
In my book, this is yet another imperialist overreach, with yet another message for the “we’re the policeman of the world, and everything that happens is our business… we must control everything.” people.
Whatever we do, however we dumb it down – and we agree on this – we should realize that it is not only complex, but spiraling out of control because of the insistence on “quick, forceful solutions with ever bigger hammers.”
You’ve predictably gone off the deep end…we simply disagree on the extent to which we should be crying about screwups in which occurred in 2003. The Ronbot “World Policeman” thing is tired; I never implied or stated that we should go dancing across every border that interests John McCain, but there has to be a point at which rational people acknowledge that the world’s interests are shared by the US. For example (on an only tangentially related note), do we let Iran get a real, deliverable nuke? I would advise against that if you own property in Tel Aviv. What if Putin starts snapping up former republics? That would have sounded funny a few years ago, but today, not so much. We had Iraq under control and were on track to cut our losses and get the hell out of there. We blew that. OK. I got that, and it is part of the history of the Iraq problem. My only point was that continued wailing about “colonialism” and the poor decisions made in 2003 are barely related to what we’re facing today. As fate would have it, former UK PM Tony Blair was obviously reading our little debate (surely no one else was), so he penned a pretty good op-ed in today’s Financial Times:
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/4c288d8c-f898-11e3-815f-00144feabdc0.html#axzz35PzmfN20
I’ll leave you with that, and an agreement to disagree. Namaste.
Let me off?! Brother, it is I who spares you on this
———
Your sincerity is accepted.
… but what are we gonna do? Give these head slicing savages their own country, military infrastructure and the worlds 4th largest oil reserves?
Who died and left you boss?
Nobody left me “boss”…..I’m just not stupid enough to not see the threat….It’s obvious these maniacs see this as a generations long battle of conquest of Western Civilization. Sticking your pacifist head in the sand until you have to end up shooting these monkeys in your own subdivision one day would play hell with property values, I’d think.
TBG’s point was that Iraq is not *ours* to *give* to Iraqis.
TBG doesn’t live in a subdivision, Chief.
You seriously see a threat of Arab Jihadis invading and conquering the United States???
No, that would be as silly as thinking they could commandeer airplanes and fly them into buildings. And no, I don’t foresee any mass invasion anytime soon, but I do see an empowered resourced Al Quieda/ ISS/whoever launching more attacks in this country, and quislings like you clamoring for the Govt to keep us safer by enlarging the Police State. Yep and I’m a little chauvinistic, jingoistic, and xenophobic. Before I’m willing to get used to TSA delays, domestic spying and CommandoCops with M4s at every shopping mall, I’d rather us kill every Muslim on the planet.
quislings like you clamoring for the Govt to keep us safer by enlarging the Police State.
I know all of us Native American/Scots-Irish/Jewish guys *look alike* to you….but you’ve seriously got TBG confused with someone else.
… that would be as silly as thinking they could commandeer airplanes and fly them into buildings.
D B Cooper = Eisenhower, Allied militaries and industry, etc?
Omigod….he’s a 9/11 truther….. yup, Halliburton and General Dynamics wuz flyin them plames..although what the hell “Dan (not DB) Cooper” has to do with anything is beyond me.
You missed TBG’s point.
Pulling of a successful amphibious invasion and subsequent occupation of a major country (D-Day – VE-Day) is an exponentially larger task than hijacking an airplane (alias “Dan Cooper”).
“I’d rather us kill every Muslim on the planet”
Great Idea! We could put you in charge of killing all the infants and toddlers. You could do like the Japanese did in Nanking. They didn’t waste bullets on the little tykes. They just impaled them on their bayonets and marched around in circles sporting toothy grins and taking pictures to send to Mom back home.
You either have a short memory or are ignorant of history. In WWII we killed hundreds of thousands of German and Japanese “toddlers and infants” to prosecute a total war and win unconditional victory……why was it ok then but it’s not ok now?
…why was it ok then but it’s not ok now?
Valid question.
TBG would argue that it wasn’t ok then, either.
I have neither a short memory nor am I “ignorant” of history. I fully understand and have read extensively about the indiscriminate and unnecessary bombings of Dresden, Tokyo and a number of other Axis cities. I have even read imaginative, first person accounts such as Slaughter House Five by Kurt Vonnegut.
The point I was trying to make was that idiots like yourself are always jumping up and down demanding that we drop atomic bombs every time some other country farts in our general direction.
I have heard this dribble countless times from thoughtless rednecks who gleefully imagine the initial destruction resulting from such an action…but fail to take into consideration the aftermath. I am fairly certain that most other countries would object to nuclear clouds floating around the atmosphere…not to mention the effect on the oil fields.
As to your last inference…NO…emphatically NO…It is NOT okay now. Two wrongs do not make a right.
If you enter into a war with preset ideas about
“morals and values” and institute suicidal ” rules of engagement”, against an enemy who has no such compunctions, you will LOSE……every time. See Korea, Vietnam etc etc. You don’t have to kill every one of them, but you have to convince them with certainty that you are WILLING to kill every one of them. Even the fanatical Imperial Japanese realized that. Of course, Fat Man and Little Boy helped them come to that epiphany.
We kill for markets but we are told it’s for mom, apple pie, and the flag. Absorb the following by General Smedley Butler, two time winner of the medal of honor.
http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.html
If you enter into a war with preset ideas about
“morals and values”…
Three questions for you, cityfush :
1) Why do we enter these wars?
2) What do we fight for?
3) What makes us different from those that we fight?
*urbancrickets chirping*
If you enter into a war with preset ideas about
“morals and values” and institute suicidal ” rules of engagement”, against an enemy who has no such compunctions, you will LOSE……every time.
——-
Sociopaths alone have earned the right to rule.
look, man – you’re harshing his mellow!
YES. Next question.
You are expecting the same folks that have been trying to drive Israel into the sea for the last 60 years to suddenly develop the wherewithal to cross the effing Atlantic (or Pacific) Ocean and successfully invade and occupy the USA???
I think it was super chicken who first said…”Quick, Fred, to the ‘Super Coop’, Arabs are notoriously strong swimmers.”
(You knew the job was dangerous when you took it)
Nobody left me “boss”…..I’m just not stupid enough to not see the threat….It’s obvious these maniacs see this as a generations long battle of conquest of Western Civilization. Sticking your pacifist head in the sand until you have to end up shooting these monkeys in your own subdivision one day would play hell with property values, I’d think.
Who died and left you boss?
——-
Reagan?
Maybe we should rename him “Regain” or “Ragain” or “Rogueain”
So what’s the plan, trout? Chase the boogey-man with more military hardware and lives? Because obviously that has worked so well so far.
Gee, good old boy, I guess youre right….the only thing we can do is submit to Islam
…the only thing we can do is submit to Islam
OK, cityfush, calm down.
FITS has got this all under control. To the world…he was *vacationing in Pawley’s Island*…
In reality he was setting up a perimeter and training coastwatchers to keep an eye out for the jihadi dhow LSTs that are bound to show up if we don’t fight them over there.
Cached at various points along the coast are literally millions of rounds of ammo soaking in pig blood.
We are rapidly resewing our Gadsen Flags, replacing the rattlesnake with a silhouette of Charles Martel and the “Don’t Tread on Me” with
“STOP!…..Hammertime”.
Feel better, now?
Does that mean we get to eat Mediterranean food a lot more when we submit?
I think I can be down with that.
… but what are we gonna do? Give these head slicing savages their own country, military infrastructure and the worlds 4th largest oil reserves?
——————
You should get out more – ever hear of Saudi Arabia? 15 of the 19 hijackers were citizens of Saudi Arabia. The 345 executions between 2007 and 2010 were all carried out by public beheading.
The head slicing savages have their own country already.
I say we back off and nuke them from orbit..
Yessir!!!
That will show them savages how civilized people roll!!!!
/sarcasm
Am I missing something? On the front page today:
“Americans Need To Stay Out of Iraq”
“Ron Paul: Haven’t We Already Done Enough Damage In Iraq?”
“Down the Drain”
“We shouldn’t have gone, we should be out of the country, we shouldn’t go back, but hey, let’s say all of this stuff happening now is Obama’s fault!”
What is ALG trying to prove with this comic? That we should’ve stayed? That we should still be putting hundreds of billions in deficit spending in propping up Iraq to avoid “wasting” sacrifices that really never would have created a stable, democratic country in the Middle East?
Wouldn’t warmongerers place Ron Paul right there pouring that blood down the toilet if he were in the White House?
Shouldn’t the one pouring the blood down the drain be the people who lied to get us to invade those countries in the first place?
Am I the only one to notice this? I happen to agree we shouldn’t have gone to Iraq, we should be out of there, and whatever happens is something we are powerless to stop without putting our own county in fiscal jeopardy. If we’re going to blame Obama it should be for bullshit like drone warfare, making domestic spying worse, or trying to continue Afghanistan’s occupation, etc. Not this. Those lives were poured down the drain the moment we invaded Iraq.
I expect this shit from John McCain and Lindsey Graham. I expect it from Fox News. However, I’m surprised to see it here.
It is Obama’s fault. He hates America. Educated and trained to destroy America by a Marxist daddy and mommy, communist professors and a American hating preacher that taught him that America is evil and needs to pay for its past sins.
Obama is a ‘closet’ muslim and seeks to install radical Islamists into power in the middle east. If he would have left just a small force in Iraq we would not have this chaos.Obama loathes the military and disregards the advice they give him so he can pursue his agenda of empowering the likes of Al Queda and the Muslim Brotherhood.
Poor Israel.Obama has finally found a way to get em nuked by teaming with Iran.
BOMB!BOMB!BOMB!BOMB!BOMB!
“If he would have left just a small force in Iraq we would not have this chaos.”
Are you serious or a troll poster? Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between a conservative (or liberal) reactionary and a troll. Both often espouse ridiculous positions.
You’re a fucking moron. In fact, you’re so fucking stupid, you’re too fucking stupid to realize just how fucking stupid you really are. You should really just STFU because you’re so fucking stupid.
Republicons love Iraq, Sandi says !
As much as I dislike sectarian violence (secular government run by secular and the non-secular does work), rape, pillage and burn every Shiite in Iraq if they do not take advantage of the “ultimatum” yet to be given to leave Iraq and go back to Iran. Support Sunnism in Iraq and else where in the Middle East and forge secular governing to include Sunnys, Christians, Jews, and Secularists. Isolate Shi’ism to Iran only. Problem solved. Think Occam’s Razor.
forge secular governing to include Sunnys, Christians, Jews, and Secularists. Isolate Shi’ism to Iran only. Problem solved. Think Occam’s Razor.
*Noise from the Ouija board*
Saddaam Hussein’s disembodied ghostly voice:
“HELLO?”
Saddam Hussein: “I testify that Mohammed is the Messenger of God.”
Saddam Hussein: “Oh God.” [saying this in preparation, as is Middle Eastern custom, as the noose is put around his neck]
One voice leads customary Muslim prayer (called a salvat): “May God’s blessings be upon Mohammed and his companions/household [family].”
All Voices, including Saddam Hussein, repeat the customary prayer: “May God’s blessings be upon Mohammed and his companions/household [family].”
A group of voices: “Moqtada…Moqtada …Moqtada.” [Meaning the young Shiite cleric Moqtada Al-Sadr] …
Saddam with amusement: “Moqtada…Moqtada! “Is this your manhood?”]
Several individuals say several times: “Go to Hell!”
Saddam Hussein mockingly replies/asks: “To the hell that is Iraq!?”
Others voices: “Long live Mohammed Baqir Al-Sadr.”
We should meet the Mexicans at the border, hand them uniforms and boots, a parachute and a gun. Drop them in Iraq and tell them we will be back in 6 months to collect them. If they have 30 scalps they get amnesty and a plane ride. Otherwise we drop them outside of Oaxcoa or whatever the fucking spelling is,, a sort of repatriation program.
“They plan to drive us out of the Mideast by attacking us here at home.”
Gee, Miss Lindsey….what could we possibly do that would prevent an “attacck on the homeland”?
Hint.
outlaw water wings and fishing boats in Iraq?
….and intercontinental hydrofoil dhows utilizing stolen stealth technology…
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, January 21, 2014: “Our
last message is to the Americans. Soon we will be in direct confrontation, and
the sons of Islam have prepared for such a day,” so watch, for we are with you, watching.”
Abdullah Shishani, a Chechen ISIS fighter: “there is only one global jihad and
only one Ummah (nation or community)”
ISIS has made common cause with the Chechens, and promised also to send fighter’s back to Russia. They also promised to take Mosul and Baghdad, and their one for two.
How long before they make common cause with the Taliban in Pakistan, and wrestle control of some of their arms, including a poorly locked & secured ‘special weapon?’ I respect that you didn’t want to get into Iraq, I was dubious we could ever win the peace there. But to these guys vaporizing themselves is just a quicker way to their promised virgins.
So Abe, what should we do. How many men do you want to send? How much money do you want to pay? At least give us a hint of what you think we should do. We can’t just let Arm Chair Quarterbacks and Chicken Hawks call the shots without even telling us what the shots are.
1. When served lemons, sometimes the only thing to do is make tactical lemonade. One possible option was a modified Pincer Movement, with local troupes and US air support.
a. Get our people to secure locations (occurring as we speak), Iran will naturally will cut off ISIS to the East at their border, and the Kurds will do the same to the North.
b. Use US Air and Iraqi ground forces (Which will be Shea and moderate Sunnis) to the West and North to push ISUS into a Pincer Movement.
i. Really it’s a Northern (Kurdish border) and Eastern/Southern (Iranian border & Iraqi troupes) Flanking, with an escape route West into a waiting closure of the encirclement by US Air Support cutting off the route to Syria.
c. Think! We cannot separate civilians very well from ISIS (this is always a weakness when your not on home territory), but we could support Iraqi and Iranian troops with air cover & Intel (F/A 18,
Predator, Grey Eagle)
i. This is likely to become a street fight in the cities with the Iraqi’s, with or without us. With the Kurds also fighting to keep Mosul and, wither we like it or not, Iran supporting the Iraqi’s. So if you want to give the Iraqi’s the best chance of success and fewer losses in-city fighting, assist with close air support. Our air support would be a force multiplier. The Kurds, who have a major stake in keeping out ISIS out, could assist in filtering close in targets to help avoid score settling.
ii. Push ISIS back toward the Western less populated Iraq region they came through.
iii. ISIS is limited from northern escape by Kurdish territory.
iv. Once they are far enough out of the cities, cut off their retreat into Syria.
v. Push for a surrender, and find out MORE ABOUT HOW THIS GROUP CAME TO POWER, their FUNDERS, arms dealers, etc.
d. This requires we:
i. Protect our people in Baghdad and other cities. Which we already have support ships there to do.
ii. Assist any Allied governments caught up in this: Including Turkey with their people.
iii. Maintain possible Ospreys and support for evac.
1. Maintain any refueling support; The Persian Gulf for example is just at the fuel limits to Baghdad with a safety margin for some aircraft.
2. Emergency helo’s for rescue could be based in near counties and/or off the USS George Bush.
iv. Maintain close air support.
1. Unfortunately F/A 18’s in the Navy don’t have rails for 3 Maverick missiles per hard point, but the best close support load out we can muster on the F/A 18’s
2. Use the Predator’s and Grey Eagles multiple 6 or more Hellfire missile load outs to close support advantage.
3. (Optional but useful) Use the Cell Phone and Radio Intel capabilities (Drones and/or F/A 18 Growlers) to target and record data from fighters, so we can assist close in ground troops, and later break out any Intel missed in the heat of battle.
a. This would require either improved Intel pods to assist in separating signals, or down links to human intelligence support.
4. Possibly keep an up to 2 AC-130J available for assistance and to cut off their retreat. (There look like 2 routes west
for possibly 2 groups that would retreat, from Mosul and Fallujah). 2 AC-130J could be cycled from Jordan, Turkey, or even Israel.
a. As usual MANPADS are possible, but the new load outs for AC-130J’s allows for standoff munitions.
i. GBU44 Viper Strike
ii. AGM-144Hellfire
iii. GBU-39 small diameter bombs
b. Mission planners load out preference, with MANPADs in mind.
5. Once you have them in retreat in the open, the F/A 18’s load outs could change to standard guided gravity bombs.
6. It looks like ISIS could break up into 2 retreating groups, the group near Mosul could retreat due west the110 kilometers to the Syrian border, and the groups near Fallujah west the 320 kilometers to the Syrian border.
a. Cutting off the retreat might take 2 air groups on the western routes, and the Kurds naturally cutting off northern egress at their border.
i. Depends on how far forces are stretched, it might be good to plan on two air groups for cutting off egress.
7. Eventually someone on the ground must be prepared to manage the encircled fighters.
a. It might be best to use some of the Osprey support for moving Iraqi personnel with some limited special forces professional support in to do this.
One possible option was a modified Pincer Movement, with local troupes…
Either you “ain’ from ’round heyah”, or this “gays in the military” thing has really gotten out of hand….
LMAO… spell check spelling in the browser choose that.
The laughable part of this article is that we never left Iraq. As late as May of last year when I left the theater we had 3,000+ DoD employees of one category or another (soldiers, civilians and contactors) hard at work in Iraq, I spent a significant amount of time working evac plans for that group.
Working evac appears to be time well spent, unfortunately. Thanks for planning ahead.
“Not our problem” is exactly what everyone like you said after we helped Afghanistan drive out the Soviets. How’d that work out for us? It’ll be our problem if we don’t finish it the right way.
Whether you think we should’ve gone in to begin with is completely irrelevant. It happened and we have to deal with it now.
So again, o great leader. What do you want us to do? How many men do we send? How much money do we allocate? You are now in control. Tell us what you would do if you were President.
I think the prescription is to nuke Medina… with the surrender terms to sell Playboy, whiskey, and satellite dishes to the public, not require coverings on women, allow co-ed colleges and thong bikinis…. or we nuke Mecca.
How old are you? Will you volunteer to fight, if we go back? Do you have children? Will you encourage them to volunteer to fight if we go back? Are you a real hawk or a chicken hawk?
“Not our problem” is exactly what everyone like you said after we helped Afghanistan drive out the Soviets.
?
We drove out the Soviets? You mean if we had let *them* fight the Taliban, they wouldn’t have attacked us on 9/11?
we don’t finish it the right way.
——-
What an innocent – there is no right way. Colonization is doomed to failure.
Let the members of the Cult of Death kill each other. We need to stay out. Besides by killing each other they are doing us a favor.
We need to stay out
——-
I think Carter had the right idea – leave them alone until they hold the oil hostage. Then we take it.