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False question Bodhi. There has to be something between "unending" and "today". Given that "today" occured a mere 2.5 years after we invaded (Mar 2003 to Nov 2005), I'm leaning towards "didn't support this long enough".

I'll also take exception with your assessment that it has "in fact worstened as time has gone along". The *only* measurement that matches that assessment is casualty rates. In every single other measurement things were getting better. We had rebuilt the infrastructure in Iraq to higher then pre-war levels. The Iraqi people had successively built and participated in increasing numbers of elections. They'd progressed from having an interim occupying force in control of their governing, to a self elected Iraqi constitutional council, to writing and ratifying their own constitution, to electing their own government leaders within that structure, all within that same 2.5 year time period.

You simply cannot measure the progress of a war simply by looking at the casualty rates. In most military conflicts the violence level escalates over time until a resolution is reached. By your measurement, we should have stoppped fighting WW2 by late 1943 because it had "in fact worstened as time has gone along". Had we done that we would have lost a war that was emminently winnable (and was won). Same deal here.



No. At the time in question (When Murtha publically began calling for withdrawal), it was a mere couple of weeks after the constitution was ratified. That's not long enough to even guess at what would happen as a result. But you certainly could guess what would happen as a result of Murtha's statements. And that's exactly what *did* happen. Increased violence. Factions within Iraq figuring that they'd need to position themselves militarily for when the US soldiers left. He could not have timed his calls for withdrawal at any point *worse* from the standpoint of damaging the chances for Iraq to be successful at building a stable nation.



Yup. How about you do a little research and see *when* those 1.8 million people (mostly the wealthy and influential ones whould could have made Iraq "work")? How much do you want to bet that you'll find that the bulk of them left *after* November of 2005?



The "disaster" in Iraq was created by the anti-war left. It was created deliberately because they'd rather the US fail in Iraq as long as they could use that failure to gain political power. It's not exactly hard to see this. Just open your eyes...

According to this guy 10 years was the average length of an insurgency in the last century.



I would say if nothing else the court has asserted itself.

Edited, May 16th 2007 6:57am by Natdatilgnome

Being reduced to razing the nation (or simply Baghdad) would be a catastrophic failure of Bush's stated goal to build a stable and free democracy out of Iraq.Not for the purpose of maintaining peace and propping up the government.

We did prop up the German government Varus. There were militants in Germany in the immediate post war era, but you're comparing apples to oranges. You attempted to draw a comparison between our continued presence in Germany and Japan and our continued occupation of Iraq. They are not related.

Aye, however if the current plan at hand has failed in the past and has no reasonable expectation of success in the future, and if the president refuses any other course of action (such as involving Iran and Syria for example); does he not force a more immediate action on the opposing side?



However maintenance of that infrastructure has been non existant according to recent auditors (which I mentioned in passing and you can look up yourself if you care too), trained people have been killed or left, facilities have become dilapidated or looted for parts. The iraq gov't is incapable of repair and restaffing meaning all the work in that area has been for naught.



However reactionary Murthas request for withdrawal, it has nothing to do with the current debate. I can see why you would want to muddy the argument though, since you don't really have a leg to stand on.



Not by the dissolution of the republican guard, the failure to maintain public order in the fall of the baathist party, the failed communication of those on the ground and those stateside, rampant corruption in the transitional govt and general inability to contain the insurgency?

I think the argument you should be making is that democratic calls for withdrawal have only exacerbated the problem that Bush (and his administration) created through their many failures.



Edited, May 16th 2007 1:09pm by bodhisattva

Bored them to death with apocryphal stories about General Pershing?

Not without a draft and/or carpet bombing civilian centers in what is supposedly a sovereign and independent state.

So, do we wait for the Iraqi government to grant us permission to level cities or do we declare war on the new Iraqi government?