I'm a soldier, and I can tell you I'm a pretty hard up gung-ho as they come. I think Iraq is a mess, and will continue to be. Thats my opinion, chose to think what you want, but I feel Iraq is lost and has been lost for sometime. Our politicians and the CIA are 100% at fault.
When you treat a "war" like a peace keeping mission or police action and you constantly change the soldiers on the ground rules of engagement, and dont let them defend themselves against clear threats stemming from mosques and foreign fighters shooting and running back over the border with syria you have a clear problem. There is a reason why we haven't won a real "war" since ww2.
I don't see Iraq as lost. A mess certainly. But not lost. If it was lost, we would have seen civil war after the Golden Mosque bombing, or at the very least the necessity of the US forces to be used in mass to prevent one. Neither happened. No, Iraq is not lost. Their parlement will meet on the 16th (ahead of the 19th date) and they will pick a government, and they will move forward. Our troops will continue to train the Iraqi Police and Army and more and more FOBs will be transferred to the Iraqis. In a few months many of our forces will be out of Iraq.
No, Iraq is not lost, not by a long shot.