It’s Hard to Continue to Support the War in Iraq after Obama Lost It

Townhall.com ^ | May 19, 2015 | John Hawkins

[C210N]

Barack Obama lost Iraq after a Republican won it, just like the Democrats did in Vietnam and knowing THAT, I can no longer say it was a good idea to go into Iraq.

150 years of 'Rat segregation and losing the war on poverty after the Republican Lincoln won it.

Knowing THAT, I can no longer say it was a good idea to win the Civil War.

[cripplecreek]

I’m so disgusted. I want our guys out of the middle east but Obama has made such a mess it will take decades to clean up.

The white house acts like letting ISIS take Ramhadi was some kind of brilliant military strategy. We could have at least made it painful for them by bombing the miles long column heading into the city.

[odawg]

Not that I would ever defend George W Bush, but a soldier just back from the Iraqi war at the time told me his unit was attacked with mustard gas.

[Jim Noble]

Neither Vietnam nor Iraq were ever won, because of inadequate grand strategy.

Saying Obama "lost" Iraq (or that the Congress of 1974 "lost" Vietnam) mistakes the footprint for the shoe.

The catastrophic military-strategic malpractice in Vietnam and Iraq was the CAUSE of the 1974 Congress and of "Obama".

As long as Americans get to vote, the only wars we can fight to a successful conclusion are massive multi-divisional wars of conquest (against powerful enemies) and colonial-type constabulary actions (like Granada and Panama).

[Old Sarge]

Yes, Iraq did actually have WMD's – but, they were old weapons from before the Gulf War.

THAT is only because Saddam shipped all the newer materials to Syria in 2002, just before the kickoff.

One long truck convoy on sattelite imagery, headed over al-Anbar Province's best hardball road to the Syrian border.

[Old Teufel Hunden]

"Saying Obama "lost" Iraq (or that the Congress of 1974 "lost" Vietnam) mistakes the footprint for the shoe."

Curious, are you saying that if Obama had hammered out a deal where 15,000 troops remained in Iraq that ISIS would have still conquered Al Anbar province?

Are you also saying that after the 1973 peace treaty with North Vietnam if we would have kept the funding up in 1974 for military supplies, troops and training of South Vietnam the North Vietnamese would have still invaded?

[Sherman Logan]

We, of course, are entirely sure what was in those trucks.

[Nextrush]

The more interesting question is should we have gone into Iraq in the first place back in 2003 under the leadership of a Bush or am I reading a post designed to get me to like the name “Bush” for some reason....Sarc....

Iran had the drive and determination going from the moment W Bush became president until he left office in its nuclear program. What was done about Iran? When our troops were in Iraq Iranian IED’s killed our soldiers and President Bush did nothing about the Iranians.

The Taliban in Afghanistan that were driven from power and went to the country that created them, Pakistan. What did Bush do about Pakistan?

Saudi Arabia was also overlooked after 9/11, the heartland of the terrorist ideology and the homeland of its leader Bin-Laden.

[Timber Rattler]

Yes, and I said it then, the Bush Administration should not have hung their hats on Saddam and WMDs, but his direct sponsorship of terrorism, not necessarily Al Qaeda, but Hamas, Fatah, PLO, PFLP, etc. which had killed many Americans over the years and was then blowing up Israelis with suicide bomb attacks. I remember our troops finding several suicide bomb vest "factories" once Baghdad fell, but those stories soon went down the memory hole as the search for WMDs took center stage.

Bush also failed when he let the Turks block the 4th ID, which gave Saddam and many terrorists an escape route to the north. Finally, after briefly resting, regrouping, repairing, and reloading, the military should have right wheeled straight for Tehran---the Iranians were terrified at the time that they were next, now not so much.

All of this was authorized under Congress' GWOT resolution, but Bush and Rumsfeld lost their nerve at critical moments during the campaign and ended up in the old nation building trap he had long criticized himself, with a full blown "dead end" insurgency on his hands, backed by Al Qaeda in the north and the Iranians in the south.

[Jim Noble]

Not that I would ever defend George W Bush, but a soldier just back from the Iraqi war at the time told me his unit was attacked with mustard gas

I mean, honestly, so what?

Stipulate that Saddam Hussein's army had mustard gas, or sarin. Stipulate that they had mobile germ warfare labs. OK, go all the way and stipulate that they had guys in a bunker somewhere playing with U-235.

THAT DID NOT MEAN WE SHOULD REFIGHT THE VIETNAM WAR IN SOUTH ASIA.

The existence, or non-existence, of "WMDs in Iraq" does not excuse the failure to plan for war and occupation, even if you grant (which I do not) that Iraq as such had any strategic value in the war against the Wahabi/Deobandist Islam which attacked us on 9/11/01.

The main enemy remains, and sleeps securely in his beds in Riyadh and Islamabad.

[cripplecreek]

All of this was authorized under Congress' GWOT resolution, but Bush and Rumsfeld lost their nerve at critical moments during the campaign and ended up in the old nation building trap he had long criticized himself, with a full blown "dead end" insurgency on his hands, backed by Al Qaeda in the north and the Iranians in the south.

The way I see it, if we are going to be building nations, we get to pick the puppet dictator because the idea of muslim democracy is pure fantasy.

[NicknamedBob]

Those who ignore the lessons of history are condemned to be suborned and betrayed by democrats; the blacks by LBJ, and the rest of the world by Barack 0bama.

[Jim Noble]

are you saying that if Obama had hammered out a deal...Are you also saying that after the 1973 peace treaty with North Vietnam if we would have kept the funding up...

Not exactly.

I'm saying that the failure to do those things is not explained by "Obama" or by "Democrats", because both of those things are EFFECTS, not CAUSES.

The cause is giving the voters a say in the way their armed forces are deployed and used.

As I predicted right here on 9/13/01, George W. Bush chose to fight a Vietnam war in South Asia, IOW, a war to make a point, to demonstrate that we were tough, and serious, but that, at its foundation would demonstrate that were were a friendly and a generous people who meant the enemy no lasting harm.

This stupidity, of course, produced a catastrophe even worse than the radical Congress of 1974, which itself was caused by similar geostrategic incompetence.

The American people will not tolerate wars like Vietnam and Iraq. That's all.

Scenarios where we elect a government that actually STAYS in a place like Vietnam or Iraq without crushing the enemy to the point that they willingly, even eagerly, submit to our will are just mental you-know-what, because that never will happen.

[ThePatriotsFlag]

If I were one who lost a family member in Ramadi...right now I would be thinking insurrection.

[zzwhale]

HERE IS WHAT I WANT TO SEE
strategic airstrikes, no boots on the gorund
FOR EXAMPLE
today ISIS is holding a big parade in Ramadi, where 228 Amerians DIED....our blood in the sand
WHY NOT BOMB THE BEJESUS OUT OF THEM....
we know they are parading, a perfect opportunity to kill them
And tell me how they are able to OCCUPY such large areas of real estate with such a small number of troops.... BECAUSE THEY CANT.. they are always concentrated in one area giving us the opportunity to KILL THEM ON THE MOVE...FROM THE AIR.... that woudl weaken them to the point that the local Iraqi forces could finish them off...
OBAMA AND HILARY SHOULD PAY THE PRICE FOR SUPPORTING ISIS AND SHIPPING WEAPONS FROM BENGHAZI AND KILLING THE AMBASSADOR..... we had 10 days prior notice of the pending attack AND THEY DID NOTHING..... THEY SET HIM UP
WHAT WAS THE SECRET DEAL...????

[cripplecreek]

today ISIS is holding a big parade in Ramadi, where 228 Amerians DIED....our blood in the sand WHY NOT BOMB THE BEJESUS OUT OF THEM....

Public opinion. The world was horrified by the highway of death in gulf war 1. All the world's bed wetters cried that it was unfair, it was a turkey shoot, they were retreating.

So freakin what. You go to war to kill the enemy and destroy his will and ability to fight. If it means killing him while he's retreating, so be it.

[Old Teufel Hunden]

Interesting, but I disagree with you about the reason we went. I don’t think it was to show we were tough or to make a point. I believe there were a lot of valid reasons to go which have been hashed and rehashed in posts like this ad infinitum. I won’t go into them in this post.

I do want to elaborate on your point about the American people and their backlash which produced the radical 1974 congress and also allowed Obama to come to power in 2008. Perhaps that is the Bush’s administrations biggest failure. That is to say, to not pin so much on the WMDs (there were a number of other valid reasons) and also to better prepare the American people for the task at hand. The other huge mistake was Bremmer and his de-Bathification of the whole country. When we de-Nazified Germany after WWII we did not simply dismiss all former Nazis from power. We got rid of the worst, but the beauracrats underneath we kept to keep a somewhat functioning country. This should have been done in Iraq, especially the military part. We let that Army disintigrate and that is why we have a lot of the problems in the Iraqi army even today.

[cripplecreek]

I always thought Tony Blair made the better case for war based on humanitarian reasons.

I do think we should have used more of Saddam’s government to keep things functioning and we should have imposed someone of our choosing at the top.

I’m reminded of a recording of a radio broadcast to all of Germany at the end of WWII. Something along the lines of “We aren’t here to be your friends or rebuild your nation. We’re here to impose civil society because you started this war and lost.”

[odawg]

About the mustard gas attack, I was merely pointing out an event that was never reported nationally. I am not sure the comparison of Iraq with the Viet Name war (domino effect) is valid. The Iraq war was won, and Iraq was successfully pacified. The destruction of Iraq, and the Isis horror, results from the fact that Obama withdrew American troops from Iraq. Couple that fact with today’s headline news, that American Intelligence was warning about Isis, and the withdrawal seems to have been deliberate, to allow the Isis takeover. And, as it has been pointed out many times on this site, Isis moved in through the desert in convoy and could have been obliterated, but Obama would not allow it.