Posted on 10/23/2011 4:37:34 AM PDT by newzjunkey
Full title: Strong Words From Newt At Iowa Faith and Freedom: 'After 8 Years, We Will Leave Iraq in Defeat, Don't Kid Yourselves, It Is Defeat'
Newt Gingrich at the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition Dinner tonight gives some straight talk on Obama's decision (yesterday) to withdraw all American troops
Gingrich: "We lost the 3rd Iraq war. This may or may not be popular to say but as a historian I think it needs to be said. We won the first Iraq war in 1991 driving Iraq out of Kuwait in 4 days. We won the second Iraq war to defeat Saddam Hussein in 23 days...After 8 years, thousands of lives, hundreds of billions of dollars, we will leave in defeat, don't kid yourselves"
Let's try this one.
By election time Iraq will be Obama’s loss. All our effort to get US bases there is lost. He should be impeached for incompetence.
the democrats finally figured out a way to really really really make sure that Bush’s war was lost ....
Next, Afghanistan.
And, as unpopular as it is to say here, it's not all Obama's fault. Angelo Codevilla has a great article in CRB called The Lost Decade that is must reading.
Don't know if a subscription is needed, but if it is, you should get one anyway.
The majority of the US voters of the last presidential election should be impeached for incompetence for allowing that scumbag anywhere near the Oval office.
We could stay there another eight years or even 80 years and the Iraqis could still not go at it alone.
It is time for them to man-up and run there own damn country which was won by the blood of our sons and almost a trillion of our tax dollars.
I’ll second that motion.
That misunderstands the lines Newt is drawing.
War one was liberating Kuwait in 1991.
War two was the removal of Saddam in 2003.
War three was against the sectarian violence / Iraqi insurgency over these past eight post-Saddam years.
The voters punished Bush in 2006 and McCain in 2008 for the Iraq disaster, and rightfully so.
Unfortunately, the ruling coalition brooks no dissent and there was no reasonable choice in 2008 other than to stay home.
It's not a bad thing that so may voters are still believers enough to show up to vote. It's a very bad thing, which can lead to our downfall, that there's no one to vote for.
And whether or not Obama "owns" Iraq by November 2012, the role of Bush and his idiot advisers in causing this disaster is not going away.
How long would you like the US to stay in Iraq?
How many more trillions of dollars would you like to spend?
How may more American lives?
War Three (Iraq edition) was an irresponsible adventure that should have been stopped by Congress in 2004.
The fact that neither the Executive or Legislative Branch did the right thing in 2004 is the cause of our present misery.
As a Vietnam vet I am sickened by the loss of our young men, AGAIN! In 2006 I had a bunch of my friends just about disown me for saying that the loss of one of their sons to an Iraqi sniper was a horrible waste of life. This is one case where I truly hate to say... Told you so.
Now, let’s get our guys out of Afghanistan before one more precious drop of blood is spilled on our side, before one more family gets a visit from the Army or the Corp that they will never forget. Bomb the hell out of any nation that dares to threaten our safety or true national interests. But keep our boys out of harms way if you don’t intend to win a truly necessary war. OK, I’m not too rational right now... but this announcement of capitulation is just TOO MUCH!
The Iraq war should have ended by US Special Forces dragging Saddam out of his spider hole and shooting him dead on the spot.
Those calling the Iraq war a failure should imagine what things would be like with Saddam still in power, and all those terrorists who flew there to be killed still around.
Shockingly, it was not a perfectly-run war. It was also, some on the right and Chrissy Matthews notwithstanding, a necessary war.
Obama’s combination of incompetence and political selfishness have made his choice an easy one—pull out now, as was decided long ago, instead of doing a serious analysis of the on-the-ground situation, and then campaign saying he kept a promise. That’s all this is to him, another thing he can add to his stunt with Stimulus 2 to give him SOMETHING to run on.
His administration will have one long-lasting legacy—any idiot will think he, too, can be president if this dope could pull it off.
Voters were not punishing Bush Or Mccain. They were being led by the media, whose reason for existance was/is to place socialist rats in power. They swallowed hook, line and sinker.
Anyone ask our military commanders what they think?
No?
I didn’t think so.
Obama failed to negotiate US bases in Iraq.
We have bases in every other nation that we brought to liberty through our blood and treasure.
Iraq should be no different.
Now, Iraq will fall to the islamists like Egypt, Libya, etc.
Those who support our withdrawl are short-sighted and forget the lessons of history.
It was obvious by 2006 at the latest that the Iraq adventure was for nothing. The impact on a small town of losing the high school basketball coach, or the chief of police, or a boy scout leader for no meaningful purpose other than the retarded notion of implanting "democracy" among a bunch of barbarians in thrall to a savage god was and is profound.
I'll pick this up later after church.
You think we brought Iraq to Liberty? What's wrong with you?
It is vietnam redux.
I am also enraged. Enraged because of the ROE during this and Afghanistan. We never would have won WWII with the current ROE. IF we need to go in, we NEED TO GO ALL OUT.
We leveled German cities, we nuked Japan...to WIN!
I think those that now criticize Bush going in, forget the scenario at the time and the complete world wide agreement on the situation then. Having said that, we WON in Iraq and this jerk that is playing POTUS and Hillary and the Dems refused to move forward with the negotiations needed to set up bases there for the last THREE years! They wanted to “lose” to vindicate themselves politically. Disgusting.
I assume that you are not a military commander and instead an civilian and tax payer and perhaps one who has given a son or daughter to fight for the liberation of Iraq.
How many more trillions of dollars should be spent?
How many more of our sons lost?
The people there have not been able to straighten out their mess for more than a thousand years and we could not do it with a trillion dollars and thousands of lives.
Obama: “The clock was ticking in Iraq and Iran out of time.”
I don't listen to the MSM who keeps telling us how bad it is. Instead, I listen to military commanders who have worked there and tell me the TRUTH.
Maybe you need to check your sources.
Probably the most important negotiation as been lost....by Obama. IIRC, there was an agreement for a base under Bush's withdrawal formula.
Iran is chomping at the bit...
Ironic if you knew
Having been out of the long term strategic-planning business for many years, again, I leave the answers to our current generations of strategic PLANNERs - whose loyalty is to the best LONG TERM interests of the USA, not to the barack obama 2012 reelection campaign
What are they saying? Not much, hmmm.
Now, just think of the money and lives that we’ll save if we pull out of everywhere...like Korea
And let’s eliminate our space program, missile defenses
and our nuke stockpile, too while we’re at it..obama promised that too and it may be his next move.
(Would those who have given a son or daughter to Iraq prefer to see the nation pacified and patrolled by Joint Forces until the job is finished, or abandoned? With Barky’s fast timing, they won’t get to vote)
They've been infuential in steering the Iraq leaddership away from having bases there...majorly so.
No matter how the picture is painted, 'Obama failed' to establish a US presence there....which was more than understood when we went in there.
Iran sees this as thier victory over the US. Calking one more up in their court.
Couple this with all the other "victories" this administration allowed Iran, there is no doubt that radical socialists and islamists are working together.
The socialists give the islamists the Middle East while the islamists create the turmoil and spike required to collapse the Western nations so they can be reorganized under a single UN-like authority.
Yep...and now those pulling the strings meeting again on Monday to attempt to establish a single "Treasury". (drudge has it)
The war of which Newt is talking is not a war that we could ever have won with military force. It is a war that we might, over time, win through economic relations.
It would have been better if our military forces were immediately replace by the blue helmets of the U.N., following our overthrow of Saddam. But, the various criminal, terrorist and foreign elements in the country did not allow that.
It would have been better if we had the capability of putting overwhelming force on the ground. But, we had a downsized military and it was oriented to a different mission than occupation.
Therefore, when Plan A failed, and Plan B was not an option, we went to Plan C, which was mostly a holding action while we reconstructed Iraq’s ability to defend itself.
We succeeded in Plan C, and Newt is wrong to call what we did a defeat. What other country in the world could continue to recruit soldiers while involved in combat halfway around the world, for a decade? Our soldiers are truly undefeated.
But, Plan C involved Iraq taking its place as a sovereign nation in the world. And, we do not control what will be the outcome of that. It is now for the Iraqi people to use well the opportunity we have given them.
With that falsehood as a major philosophical component of the WOT, it should not be a surprise that many other political blunders would follow--trying to move the Muslim world out of the 8th century--but instead putting our troops in that time machine and transporting them back to 1968...
I would like to hope that this has taught everyone that "nation building" cannot happen without first completely crushing the old order--Islam still being present made the task impossible IMO...
I don’t think drawing those lines help in understanding the conflict at all.
History will look at all the of the segments Newt tries to separate out as just a part of a larger conflict which will come to be referred to as the Persian Gulf War, because it is simply a thirty-year-long war between Iraq and Iran for dominance over the region. Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait was a part of that conflict too. It looks like our policy may now be to stop intervening in that battle for regional dominance. I suspect that is because of the development of horizontal drilling and shale fracturing, other worldwide oil and gas supplies, and U.S. government acceptance of hundred-dollar oil. Also, the people of this country do seem to be getting weary of pouring blood and treasure into micromanaging every conflict worldwide with no quantifiable benefit to them.
Thanks for the link to the article. Fascinating summary of what I think so many average Americans know instinctively, but can’t articulate as well.
Saw this on C Spam late last night.
Newt Knocked It Out of the Park!!!!
(even more than Pujols)
Muslims helping Muslims.
Enraged because of the ROE during this and Afghanistan.
I am enraged by the ROE set down by the POS who occupies the white house at the present time.
If that is done, we will no doubt find our ROE is in the hole.
Semper Fi, Sir.
That is where I am. The extended militarism that has been going on for many decades has depleated our military, depleated our economy, depleated our treasury, and depleated our standing in eyes of the world.
It is highly desireable in my opinion to rebuild our defenses, and cease sending money (we don't have) all over the world.
Exactly!
That SOB sold us out!!!!!I hate him. But then who elected him???Maroons! Plenty of non black middle and upper middle class Indpendents and Dems and of course the wealthy Wall St LIbs!!!
We need more Tea Party congressional and senate seats!
It is high time to pull in our horns batten down the hatches and regroup, 60 years of adventurism around the world has left us in one hellava mess. Start following the United States Constitution would be first on my agenda.
Nobody knows why we are in Iraq. Even you do not know. You just blindly support keeping troops in Iraq because Bush was instrumental in that decision. Bush is a Karl Rove Republican (i.e., an opponent of the TEA Party).
“We never would have won WWII with the current ROE.”
The Iraq war ended when Saddam was captured and the war in Germany ended when Hitler died.
The regime in charge of Iraq is a US ally. The war is over and they are saying that they don’t need any more help.
When you consider the fact that any further assistance would have to be paid for with borrowed money, this should be seen as a positive development.
Newt is by far the smartest and most intelligent politically to be POTUS but has too many personal negatives to get the job! Too bad it wasn’t just something like BJ’s in the White House.
You’ve got the wrong guy.
My Iraq plan was find Saddam, shoot him down in cold blood, and get the Hell out.
I believe that almost all of the losses in 2006, and the disaster of 2008, were caused by Bush’s foolish Iraq policy, and I have posted my reasons why on this thread and many times before.
Are you sure you are responding to a post of mine?
Hey Newt - The surge worked.
“Without bases.....we’re scr****.”
Care to explain why?
It would make much more sense to use the money to build space based weapons.
“It is highly desireable in my opinion to rebuild our defenses, and cease sending money (we don’t have) all over the world. “
Sorry, I responded to the wrong message. I actually agree with you that once Saddam was gone, it was time to get out.
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