We NEVER should have went in there in the first place!!! On Thu, Jun 11, 2015 at 9:56 AM, Travis <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > > > > > > > Cartoon by NetRightDaily.com > <http://netrightdaily.com/2014/08/cartoon-stable-iraq/> > Who Lost Iraq? > > By Thomas Sowell <http://freedomsback.com/author/thomas-sowell/> > > June 9, 2015, 7:05 am > > > > After the pro-Western government of China was forced to flee to the island > of Taiwan in 1949, when the Communists took over mainland China, bitter > recriminations in Washington led to the question: “Who lost China?” China > was, of course, never ours to lose, though it might be legitimate to ask if > a different American policy toward China could have led to a different > outcome. > > In more recent years, however, Iraq was in fact ours to lose, after U.S. > troops vanquished Saddam Hussein’s army and took over the country. Today, > we seem to be in the process of losing Iraq, if not to ISIS, then to Iran, > whose troops are in Iraq fighting ISIS. > > While mistakes were made by both the Bush administration and the Obama > administration, those mistakes were of different kinds and of different > magnitudes in their consequences, though both sets of mistakes are worth > thinking about, so that so much tragic waste of blood and treasure does not > happen again. > > Whether it was a mistake to invade Iraq in the first place is something > that will no doubt be debated by historians and others for years to come. > But, despite things that could have been done differently in Iraq during > the Bush administration, in the end President Bush listened to his generals > and launched the military “surge” that crushed the terrorist insurgents and > made Iraq a viable country. > > The most solid confirmations of the military success in Iraq were the > intercepted messages from Al Qaeda operatives in Iraq to their leaders in > Pakistan that there was no point sending more insurgents, because they now > had no chance of prevailing against American forces. This was the situation > that Barack Obama inherited — and lost. > > Going back to square one, what lessons might we learn from the whole > experience of the Iraq war? If nothing else, we should never again imagine > that we can engage in “nation-building” in the sweeping sense that term > acquired in Iraq — least of all building a democratic Arab nation in a > region of the world that has never had such a thing in a history that goes > back thousands of years. > > Human beings are not inert building blocks, and democracy has > prerequisites that Western nations took centuries to develop. Perhaps the > reshaping of German society and Japanese society under American occupation > after World War II made such a project seem doable in Iraq. > > Had the Bush administration pulled it off, such an achievement in the > Middle East could have been a magnificent gift to the entire world, > bringing peace to a region that has been the spearhead of war and > international terrorism. > > Germany and Japan had been transformed from belligerent military powers > threatening world peace for more than half a century to two of the most > pacifist nations on earth, in both cases after years of American occupation > reshaped these societies. Why not Iraq? > > First of all, Germany and Japan were already nations before the American > occupation. There was no “nation-building” to do. But Iraq was a collection > of bitter rivals — Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds, for example — who had never > resolved their differences to form a nation, but were instead held together > only by an iron dictatorship, as Yugoslavia once was. > > Replacing German and Japanese dictatorships with democracy after World War > II was a challenge. But both countries remained under American military > governments for years, slowly gaining such self-governing powers as the > military overseers chose, and at such a pace as these overseers deemed > prudent in the light of conditions on the ground. > > American authorities did not rush to set up an independent government, > able to operate at cross purposes because it was “democratically elected” > in a country without the prerequisites of a viable democracy. > > Despite the mistakes that were made in Iraq, it was still a viable country > until Barack Obama made the headstrong decision to pull out all the troops, > ignoring his own military advisers, just so he could claim to have restored > “peace,” when in fact he invited chaos and defeat. > > This is only the latest of Obama’s gross misjudgments about Iraq, going > back to his Senate days, when he vehemently opposed the military “surge” > that crushed the terrorist insurgency, as did Senator Hillary Clinton also, > by the way. > > > > > __._,_.___ > ------------------------------ > Posted by: "Beowulf" <[email protected]> > ------------------------------ > > > Visit Your Group > <https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/grendelreport/info;_ylc=X3oDMTJmajM0M251BF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzIwMTk0ODA2BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTMyMzY2NwRzZWMDdnRsBHNsawN2Z2hwBHN0aW1lAzE0MzM5Njk3MTk-> > > > [image: Yahoo! 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