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So at what point and cost does it not become a failed state? In other words, how much effort and how many lives and how much money is sufficient to secure it? Moreover, what possessed the administration to think that the Iraqi people could simple embrace and then support a viable Democracy? It's not as if they planned for this and revolted on their own, demanding their freedom. So why would we expect viable results?

It becomes a viable state when the insurgency is capable of being squashed by Iraq's own forces, and the democratic processes are entrenched to the point of being unlikely to be reversed.

However, let's address a deeper point by your post. When America fought in Korea, World War II and World War I - people simply did not ask those questions. The point of that war was victory; people did not just think of giving up because a thing was difficult. This latter idea is precisely the implication of what you're saying: because something is long and wearisome and difficult, give up. Such decisions do not lead to successful wars, and furthermore they do not enhance the idea that a country is willing to fight for itself.

Ivan

Sometimes people didn't ask the right questions in WRONG wars either.

I don't think DC Bandita is saying to give up because the war is long and wearisome and difficult, but that the war was wrongly engaged. If we picked the wrong war (and I defintiely think Iraq has drained us and hampered our ability to fight the REAL threat, Iran), the fact that it is long and wearisome and difficult does not detract from its be a colossal mistake.

Ok... then - do you think that a viable state is possible with only 150,000 troops on the ground? I don't. Either beef it up and get it over with or get out. This "stuck-in-the-middle, stay-the-course" thing isn't working. So how do you (or do you) defend the administration's unwillingness to go FULLY to war with all that entails? I would also ask you to consider that the reason the public is not invested in "victory" in Iraq is because they've been asked to give up NOTHING to make it come to fruition. My point is this - you can't have it all ways at once, and that's what the administration has tried to do. And they're failing miserably.

Let's extend this a bit further. We are still embroiled in Clinton's unauthorized war in Bosnia, what, 10 years later ?

DCBandita, Why do you support Clinton's wag the dog war in Bosnia, but not the effort in Iraq ? Why don't you mind that we've still got troops in Bosnia as well ?

BTW I don't call it a war in Iraq,; rather it is a war on Islamofacism which happens to be targeted on Afghanistan and Iraq at the moment, with defensive actions at home and other places around the world.