After Tet, the Army argued that it was a military defeat and at the same time said it needed 202,000 more troops. Though conservatives are convinced now, that persuaded nobody at the time that the enemy was defeated.
Not that I think Iraq is becoming a success. I don't. I really don't think it matters if we increase or decrease troops. The real problem is, our success is out of our hands. We're depending on the Iraqi government to get its act together and for the Iraqi army and people to act like they are part of the same country. That's the victory condition Bush has chosen and it's the underpinning of all other goals.
It will likely never happen, and has a nothing to do with our troop levels, how good they do in the field, or how well we train the Iraqi Army.
As Colonal Kurtz said: "kill them all." That's the only way a military can win.
Kurtz's dying words were "The horror. The horror." I think that's pretty much all that's left to say re this fiasco. On every side.
But a Carthagian Peace does have one thing to recommend it -- no one's been troubled by the Carthagians for a good 2200 years.
"They made a desert and called it a peace" quipped one ancient Roamn contempo to the last Punic War. Dubya will have to make a desert and call it a success. Or, better still "Mission Accomplished." No, wait up, my bad, that's already been used.
The troops Bush is bringing home were already scheduled for return long ago. Bush is only giving into a written requirement; but claiming it as a victory and a gift to the soldiers and their families.
From here on I'm consciously making effort to call Shrub's fiasco for what it truly is legally and by definition; an "Imperial Occupation"
-- Modified on 9/14/2007 6:34:49 PM
We gotta stay we gotta stay. We kicked Al-Qaueda's butt in Anbar province!!! The Sunni's are on our side now. YEEEEEEEAAAAAAAH!!! We're winning! Tribes in other provinces are kicking Al-Aaeda's butt too. The Shitties and Sunni dudes are uniting and kicking out the foreigners.
It doesn't matter what Maliki does cause he is not really bad. National Review says so.
I have a plan that I thought up myself that I think we should use. I think we should bitch slap Iran and bitch slap Syria.
That would teach those dirty rotten terrorist rag-heads a lesson that they would never forget!
I'll leave the bitch slapping up to your imagination!! hehehehe.. But we could really hurt them with just teenie weenie bombs that kill very few civilians.
"The Sunnis are on our side now." How comforting, but what about next week? And if the Sunnis are with us, now, take a quick guess as to where the Shiites decide to position themselves. Ah, not to worry, soon enough the sides will have changed, again.
"The Shitties and Sunnis are uniting and kicking out the foreigners." Pray tell, Geezer, General Petraeus, Ambassador Crocker [now that's an unfortunate name, given everything] and company aren't indigenous to Iraq, are they, or did I miss something really important in the last 4 1/2 years?
"It doesn't matter what Maliki does..." Yeah, what the hell, he's head honcho by our sufferance, so he's content let the Americans un-fubar the whole bloody mess they've brought about. Possibly he imagines he's the only game in town. [Big mistake on Nuri's part.] Now, that's some inspired political leadership. No wonder Dubya likes him so much. Maliki makes Dubya look as sharp as a newly-honed Ginzu knife.
I could go on, but i'm reminded of one of the reasons i've been posting less and lurking more. And even lurking has gotten painful after this one.
A very well-know personality on this board, some months earlier, sent me an impassioned PM in which he chided me for "...facilitating pathetic losers by taking them seriously..." I'm sure he remembers who he is. At the time, it was very amusing. Much less so now, and much less so with each passing day. That fellow sure hit the bullseye.
Paraphrasing a line from "The Godfather" -- it's not personal Geezer, just business.
I must state a vital point. Sunni's are the most secular muslims there are. They are just a little bit different from the rest of those muslim lunatics. In a better way.
Now, in order to win this war, we must think outside the box. We have to do a kind of cost benefit analysis thing. We have to push as hard as we can without causing a world crisis. Thus, the teenie weenie bombs. One bomb must be for Al Sadr and a couple dozen bombs for the Iranians. Oh yeah, a few teenie weenie bombs for Syria too.
Damaging the oil refinery {the one and only oil refinery} in Iran will scare the crap out of them. Amadijohn will rattle his sword and talk tough but do nothing else that he isn't already doing. And he deserves it cause he's supplying bombs and bullets to the Al Queda stooges in Iraq and they're killing us. So we get to kill Iranians.
Lobbing a few teenie bombs into Syria just might get Assad assassinated by his brother in law. [And I don't know if that would be good or bad]
-- Modified on 9/15/2007 2:54:35 PM