[Mr. Nobody]

My cousin is a tank commander with the 4ID. He loves the military, his country, and his leaders, but he finds that we are giving far more to Iraq in the way of support. While he supported and participated with the effort to drive out Saddam, he believes the Iraqis should be doing far more to help themselves already.

His brother is in the AF and doesn't want to go to Iraq because he feels it is to no end, no exit strategy. His wife is also in the AF and believes the same. She is in the reserves, but knows that she will probably do a year in the sandbox.

My nephew is AF an believes that while good is happening in Iraq, it is simply a cost we shouldn't pay. As he puts it, "There are lots of people we could be helping out, so do we help them, too? We can't afford it economically and at the high costs to our own families."

All four understand the need to educated and train the Iraqi people to understand freedom and democracy, but all four feel the costs are just getting way too high. All four believe we have our own problems at home we are not addressing. As my cousin put it last week , "They want me in Iraq for a year, but no one is doing squat about the issues we have right here at home. MY wife got felt up at the airport two years ago by a grinning nerdy TSA agent only to find an illegal had broken into our apartment while we were away on active duty." The police caught the illegal trying to pawn their wide screen TV.

[Mr Rogers]

Sounds like your cousin got all the brains. How did he end up in the Army?

We have an exit strategy. It is called letting the Iraqis take over.

We are there in OUR interests. The radical Islamists won't change easily, but a democracy in their midst is the only thing I've heard of that has a chance. That is why the radicals are going there to die - they must win Iraq, or lose the war.

They are smart enough to figure it out - wish others were.

[Jim Robinson]

Mr. Nobody aka shellshocked, nugnut, PatrioticAmerican, DeathAngel, cibersnot, et al, banned again.

[The Phantom FReeper]

Well, thank goodness none of those folks you created for the sake of this post were in the military during WWII, or else we'd be flying a flag with a swastika on it.

[Libloather]

"They want me in Iraq for a year, but no one is doing squat about the issues we have right here at home."

During the Big One, a neighbor of mine used to live on the Carolina coast. She, along with many others, night after night - with ALL lights, lamps and candles extinguished - watched for incoming enemy aircraft.

How about a huge sigh of relief that none of us has to do that again - yet...

[Travis McGee]

This is a great discussion, but I have another concern with our no end in sight Iraq mission. While our fighting military is tied down in the ME, we are opening a window of opportunity for our other enemies: China, North Korea etc.