Told you so

[theapportioner]

Originally Posted by KevinTheOmnivore

Are you saying Islam is a disease? I'd have to disagree, my Dear Sir.

Uh, obviously no. I do think Buckley's characterization is accurate, in that the Iraq situation is now a chronic condition that can't be treated by our current efforts. Unlike conflicts with centralized command, there isn't a tumor that you can remove and have the problem be solved.

Does that make any sense? This is why I think a great deal of war criticism is actually a political decision, not a military one (anybody get the reference!!?). For example, the Speaker of the House wouldn't attend the briefing on Iraq's status given by the general last week due to "scheduling conflicts." This is the comander of your Iraqi operation, and all your going to do is give him a 30 minute phone call (as was Pelosi's excuse)? How long do you think her meeting with President Assad went?

Look, as far as I'm concerned, the political maneuvers going on now are irrelevant to whether or not the current strategy is going to work. I hardly pay any attention to them.

As far as I can tell, you're asking me to basically have faith in Petraeus, because you haven't convinced me why the surge is going to work. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt (since my opinion doesn't matter anyways), but reading about bombings nearly every day and 100 dead US soldiers in April doesn't inspire much confidence.

And if in six months things aren't really improving, what then? How long before you say enough is enough? Sure maybe if we stay there 50 years, things will improve, but that's never going to happen.

If our mission is truly consistent with stabilizing a truly unstable regime, toppling a dictator, and (now) preventing another radical islamic regime from growing and funding extremism, than we need to stay and finish, despite the opinion on our presence.

There's plenty of extremism already in Iraq, as far as I can tell.

Yeah, we should fix our fucking mess. But to do so is going to require a radical reassessment of our approach to the region. I have no confidence that a direct military solution is the best one. I think Iraq needs to take its destiny into its own hands. It isn't inevitable that Iraq will be a radical Islamic regime.