With regard to what our options were when we were making the decision to invade Iraq, to institute the draft and build up a substantially larger military would have taken ... let's see, how long is it taking to accomplish this within Iraq ... 3 to 4 years.
However, it wasn't anticipated back then that we would need a large ground force in order to reconstruct Iraq while suppressing various insurgent forces. Back then, the argument concerned how large of a force we needed for the invasion. The "old school" said 500,000, and the "new school" said 150,000.
It is only after the fact, when we wound up having to deal with the insurgency that some people are saying, you know, if we had gone the "old school" way, we would have had a large ground force in country, which could have dealt more effectively with the insurgency.
(BTW the "old school" plan anticipated 5,000 fatalities during the invasion.)
If we had a time machine and could go back and re-do what we did, here are just a few of things we would have done differently:
1. Not call off the Persian Gulf War after 100 hours.
2. Not abandon the Marsh Arabs when they rose up against Saddam Huissen, but helped them to establish a semi-autonomous region within Iraq as we did with the Kurds.
3. Not reduce our military from being able to fight and win two wars simultaneously to being able only to fight and win one war at a time.
4. Not go to the U.N. to ask for permission to invade Iraq, allowing Saddam time to prepare for our invasion by having his key people in the military and police infiltrate into the population and continue to resist us by unconventional means.
5. Not invade Iraq at all (since they no longer had WMD).
As it is, none of these options are available to us at this time. Instead, it appears that the only options are (A) win the damn thing, or (B) leave and tell them good luck and, oh, by the way, why don't you partition your country. With an increasingly capable Iraqi army, I'm thinking option (A) sounds pretty good, and thank God for those who are making this option possible.
2. Not abandon the Marsh Arabs when they rose up against Saddam Huissen, but helped them to establish a semi-autonomous region within Iraq as we did with the Kurds.
Concur...another one of "41's" blunders!
3. Not reduce our military from being able to fight and win two wars simultaneously to being able only to fight and win one war at a time.
Agreed...DUH-bee-yew's blunder this time, egged on by Rummy and Wolfowitz who told him it could be done and Cheney cheering them on!
4. Not go to the U.N. to ask for permission to invade Iraq, allowing Saddam time to prepare for our invasion by having his key people in the military and police infiltrate into the population and continue to resist us by unconventional means.
Well, it's a good point but I suppose he had to get some sort of consensus and begin a coalition so I would give him a pass on this.
5. Not invade Iraq at all (since they no longer had WMD).
If you'll recall, he said he would NOT invade if Sadaam, sons and cohorts would all leave...but, IMHO, he would still have had resistance with what was left, and his real plan was to build a model democracy for the rest of the Middle East to emulate...
As it is, none of these options are available to us at this time. Instead, it appears that the only options are (A) win the damn thing, or (B) leave and tell them good luck and, oh, by the way, why don't you partition your country. With an increasingly capable Iraqi army, I'm thinking option (A) sounds pretty good, and thank God for those who are making this option possible.
I, too, want to win but it has become painfully obvious to me that we are letting it slip away as more and more Sunni and Shitte "militias" are gaining strength and numbers.
I hope you don't seriously believe #5.