Biden: Troops Should Come Home in Summer

Big surprise... this is our (USA) track record. We go in, F up the place, then head home.

So it seems that everyone who has a stake in the 2006 or 2008 elections are taking up arms, solidifying a stance on what they think about topics. I just got finished reading the 80 some-odd comments on the article for censuring Bush (more power to you RF), but all this noise simply is being made to attract media attention and start getting people's names out there. Looks to be an interesting time.

As for this topic, I never supported the war in the first place but I think that just yanking out the only form of control in this region would be a horrible event. Leaving a destroyed country in the hands of rivaling ethnic/religious groups and walking away seems to me to be a silly idea. That's just asking for a problem bigger than what we have on our hands in five or ten years, after corruption and oppression fills our place.

I agree we can't "cut and run" we got those people into this mess and just leaving them now would be brutal. I wonder though why we can't swallow our pride and attempt to turn control over to an international peace keeping force. We would still be involved but in much lower numbers.

Good old Joe Biden. We can always count on you to say something stupid. But you have it backwards, Joe. If the political situation doesn't improve in Iraq, we have to stay, not leave! Your comment is tantamount to saying to the militants, "Hey guys, keep up the killing and you win!"

PS: Tell us about hair transplants, Joe. At least you know something about that subject.

Heh, heh. OK, I confess, that was a snide remark.

I also agree that "cutting and running" is a horrible idea. There would be total anarchy if the US left Iraq without the Iraqis being able to defend the fragile "peace" (peace being defined as a lack of open civil war). Even the Sunni's agree that the US leaving would be the end for Iraq. It would be everyone against their neighbour. The only force able to accomplish this "peace-keeping" is the US military at this time. The only people would who profit from civil war are the Islamic insurgent groups so see it as vital the US stay until the Iraqi army can fight the insurgents themselves.

For as much as the Bush administration got wrong, I have to agree that setting a time table to leave is a horrible idea and that posting deadlines is merely a cop-out. What I'd like to see is a set of clearly defined goals for withdrawing major combat troops that doesn't leave the Iraqi military to crumble with the absence of US military units.

I'm eager to see what kind of "positive spin" will get put on this, if in fact the U.S. does pull out of Iraq before everything is stable. As with mateoutah, I wasn't exactly pro-war, but since we are over there already, we can't just back out before Iraq can be considered safe.

I too was against the war (funny how many of us can say that... and yet it still happened), though I too agree that we shouldn't be running from what we've caused. The US has too long of a history of doing just that, and its left us with the exact situation we are supposedly fighting today. Afghanistan is a perfect example, if you ignore the obvious oil/gas/energy politics involved in the nation, we're having to clean up that mess because of how we left it when the USSR withdrew. Do your history, the US had promised to help support a democratic and peaceful transition when/if the USSR retreated from their invasion. We did nothing to support that nation as soon as the USSR pulled out...

Withdrawing from Iraq today would cause the same chaos, and perpetuate the violence and fractured cultures we see there today... The inter-ethnic rivalries will just be left to further fester and infect, and the proud rich nations of that region will continue to destroy them selves.

No, we're not the most popular kids on the block, but it's our own fault. This being said, we do have the power and ability to do something about it for the better. Needless to say, it will require a massive adjustment of our foreign affairs policy, something I don't see happening with our current administration, but it is possible.

Open Iraq up for international investment, and invite other nations in to support the peace process while allowing international corporations to invest in the nation to support its re-development.

Stop allowing no bid contracts to win the day, and god forbid, treat our troops properly so that as they do a difficult job, they can do it knowing we as a nation are treating them as they deserve to be treated. (you know, stop cutting veteran benefits, and get them the armor they need.)

The politics for the next presidential election are just starting, and I hope that the noise were starting to see will become signal, and someone will rise to the plate to offer REAL goals and PLANS for cleaning up the mess we're in, in Iraq, and in the many other pots we've got on the stove.

Lincoln had a gift for summing things up in a way that could turn disappointment into an opportunity for learning.

When asked how the latest setback effected him he said:

"Somewhat like that boy in Kentucky, who stubbed his toe while running to see his sweetheart. The boy said he was too big to cry, and far too badly hurt to laugh."

Now, role the clock forward 150 years and the political leader of the G.O.P. says, "To retreat before victory would be a reckless act." What are we to suppose this means when the mission mutates more than a recombinant virus? No WMDs? Let's get Saddam. Saddam is gone? We are winning the war against terror. You can't defeat a noun? We are building a beacon of democracy. There is no federism, only ethnic division? Let's stand down only when the Iraqi people stand up. There are no Iraqi batallions we trust to act independently? This is not going to end with people who think truth is something that can be manufactured and propageted like confetti. Now they are calling it "the long war".

Does anybody believe the notion that we are a superpower? It is not only nonsensical, but potentially disastrous to think that a lot of advanced weapons can force people act the way you want them to. Superpower status does not carry presidential infallibility. Those who cannot admit making errors will become more deeply mired in the swamp. It's not because our military wasn't given sufficient numbers to occupy the country. It's because invading other countries to force them to adopt your political system is impossible. We are all human beings, even the Iraqi insurgents. Many of us would do everything in our power to wip an invader. Many of us would do anything we could to cooperate with invaders. Each one of us is wired in to act in our own way under stress. Trying to stamp out the last vestige of the insurgency provokes more people to give up normalcy to take the place of the fallen. What started out as an effort to replace dictatorship with democracy has ended up making us a little more like a dictatorship and the Iraqi's a little bit more like those fanatics who threw out King George. In fact, it is a collision of cultures and a battle of wills and it is not going to end soon. Let's declare a limited victory, strike a Mutha-like positioning of the troops, and let the Iraqis figure their own future. After recognizing that we cannot force a people to bend to our will, we only need the courage to disengage.

Joe Biden never said that US troops should come back this summer. He said that if no progress is made by summer, a new arrangement must be made.

I think it's bold on his part to suggest this. Some decisiveness is in order on this issue.

At some point, a change in policy direction would be necessary.

I think it's bold on his part to suggest this. Some decisiveness is in order on this issue.

At some point, a change in policy direction would be necessary.

It IS a bold move to suggest this. It's rather apparent that the current course isn't working terribly well, and pretty much everyone on the Hill are sitting quietly by pretending things are fine.

You should change "change in policy direction would be necessary" to "change in policy direction will be necessary". Other than that I agree completely!

Oluseye Bassir writes:
Joe Biden never said that US troops should come back this summer. He said that if no progress is made by summer, a new arrangement must be made.

That's true. He spoke of plan B, containing rather than building. If you can stand watching Biden, try the video.

But he also said later that "... if they don't step up to the ball, we are going to be gone." If they don't have a Constitution in place [he meant a new, Constitutional "unity" government] by this Summer, ... it's game over." Paraphrasing, he then said: how you pull them out, where you pull them to, is another matter. He implied they might be moved "over the horizon" to assure regional peace with a containment policy. So his plan B really is to pull out of Iraq as soon a possible.

He also went on to claim it isn't a just matter of terrorists in Iraq, it's insurgents. If we suddenly killed all the terrorists, we still have a problem. Then he suddenly re-iterated his old claims that the problem is that we didn't put enough troops into Iraq in the first place.

Biden can't have it both ways. Do we need more troops or do we need to pull out? As usual, he makes very little sense, but people inclined to agree with any one of his statements will agree with them all.

If the political situation doesn't improve in Iraq, we have to stay, not leave! Your comment is tantamount to saying to the militants, "Hey guys, keep up the killing and you win!"

I think part of the problem with our involvement in Iraq from the beginning has been that we went in with a desired outcome that was completely divorced from our actions. We have created this war with the insurgents because of our own incompetence. The Bush Administration blatantly ignored the hard-won wisdom of the US military, NGOs, and our international allies during the build-up to the war.

Imagining that Iraq would somehow miraculously maintain territorial sovereignty, develop a thriving economy, and avoid religious conflict was a disavowal of the geopolitical and historical realities of the situation. We presumed that the interests of Iraqi citizens would somehow align with American interests in the Middle East. As the recent elections have shown, Iraqis have a far different understanding of the term "democracy" than we do, and the notion of separation of church and state is not something they're willing to embrace at this time.

If we stay, what is the end goal if an American-style republic is not in the cards? Although the goal seems to have shifted a few times over the past few years, as I understand it now, the goal is for us to stay until Iraq has a stable elected government that can exercise control over the whole of Iraq. The problem with that goal is that the longer we stay, the more the Iraqis resent our presence. The more resentment of our presence, the easier it is for the militants to recruit. We don't have enough forces in-country to defeat the militants and seal the borders, but we do have enough to serve as bullet magnets.

Framing the argument is the key, and so far the Bush Administration has been very good at doing just that. The term "cut and run" for example, conjures up the image of a scared America, defeated by militants. Withdrawal from Iraq could also be termed, "encouraging self-determination." If we really want the Iraqi people to exercise their own political power, we should let them do so. Staying in service to an unattainable goal, in a war that is really just a stability operation of potentially infinite length, shows resoluteness. I'm not sure it demonstrates clarity of strategic thinking.

We had a small window of opportunity in Iraq, and it appears we've squandered it by not brining in enough troops initially, not keeping the Iraqi army intact, and not getting Iraq's infrastructure problems fixed in short order. Military action at this point can't change the minds of Iraqis, the vast majority of whom want us gone.

We have become fixated on this notion of winning the war in Iraq, when we should be focused on the larger goal of defeating militant Islam. Creating an enormous recruiting advertisement and training ground for al Qaeda doesn't seem like something that will help us win that war.

Perhaps we should ask the Iraqi people, who have indicated that they want a timetable for US withdrawal.

At times I take an opinion that I stated earlier. The mess left after we leave will be a bigger problem than one we can solve/deal with now. And then a few hours later (like now) I take on an entirely different opinion. Why not leave and let them deal with it. Iraq was a nation made after WWII that lumped entirely different ethnic groups together for the ease of Western society. If we leave today it most certainly would split up (although in a very bloody manner) and time would let the region heal. @!$%# if I know what to do. If the nation would have taken the path I desired, we would be spending 200$ Billion a year on education and renewable energy. But thats just what the terra-rists (in Dubya speak) want us to do, or some propaganda would have us believe.

In 2050, the US will still be in Iraq. Don't believe me? I point to Germany, Japan, Italy and South Korea, four countries the US fostered democracies in. The US is still in Germany, Japan, Italy and South Korea and the US started working on these countries sixty years ago.

Iraq will take time and patience. History has proven that the US has huge amounts of patience. Don't hold your breath Senator Biden, the troops won't be coming home any time soon.

The US is still in Germany, Japan, Italy and South Korea and the US started working on these countries sixty years ago.

In the 20th Century, the US has also intervened in Haiti multiple times, Grenada, Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Somalia, Kosovo, Bosnia, Macedonia, the UK, France, the Netherlands, and Belgium, just to name a few. Sometimes we stayed for a long time, sometimes we didn't.

The four you named above were occupied in the context of the Cold War, as bulwharks against a monolithic, state-bound enemy completely different in form and substance from the enemy we are now combatting. We are fighting a war when we should be engaged in long-term, coordinated international police activity, not the invasion of countries that are at best tangentially related to our true enemy.

Look at how the Germans took down the Baader-Meinhof Gang, or how the Italians conquered the Red Brigades if you want to see an example of how to contain and ultimately destroy terrorist organizations. Instead of applying constant pressure and keeping our enemies off-guard, we have ceded the initiative to the Islamic militants and are providing propaganda fodder for them, creating a vast training ground for the next generation of Islamic terrorists, and turning the people we saved from Saddam into our enemies.

You see patience in the Administration's approach. I see stubborn refusal to correct course.

Infonaut writes:

Look at how the Germans took down the Baader-Meinhof Gang, or how the Italians conquered the Red Brigades if you want to see an example of how to contain and ultimately destroy terrorist organizations.

Baader-Meinhof Gang and the Red Brigade fell after the Soviet Union lost the Cold War. The US fought the Cold War from 1945 until 1989. The US won the Cold War so it follows that the US defeated Baader-Meinhof Gang and the Red Brigade. You are helping me make my point, Infonaut.

Well put Greg.

The US won the Cold War so it follows that the US defeated Baader-Meinhof Gang and the Red Brigade.

I see your point, that the fight against these European terrorists was part of the larger struggle of the Cold War, but I find it difficult to believe that the German and Italian governments defeated home-grown terrorists because American troops were on their soil defending against Soviet attack. The German and Italian governments defeated those terrorists through use of their own laws and cooperation among European police organizations, not because of the US 7th Army's presence. They, not we, defeated European terrorists.

We deployed conventional military forces in Europe, nuclear weapons stationed in the US, and economic pressure to force the capitulation of the Soviet Union. Note also that during the entire period of the Cold War, we never unilaterally invaded and occupied a nation for any substantive period of time.

Simultaneously, the capitalist democracies of the West combatted home-grown Communist sympathizers through coordinated police activity. There were two different types of enemies, and two different strategies for dealing with them.

Given that we now have a situation where the threat from non-state actors is far bigger than the threat from hostile states, it doesn't make sense to me that we should be relying on the same strategies that we used to keep the Soviet military at bay.

Did the Soviet Union capitulate or did it simply implode. I do not recall a declaration of capitulation.

Did the Soviet Union capitulate or did it simply implode.

I'd say it imploded with assistance from without. The Soviets were locked in a struggle for military supremacy with the United States, which did nothing to help their domestic economy.

I do not recall a declaration of capitulation.

My take on it is that since the USSR ceased to exist in 1991, nobody was around to capitulate. The political entity that had been fighting the Cold War against America had disappeared. The West won the Cold War by keeping the Soviets from expanding, which allowed the inherent fatal flaws of the Soviet system to lead to its demise.

A government stooge at the state department drew up the plans for defeating the Soviet Union in 1947.

long telegram

.

The Cold War was fought in over a hundred nations. Vietnam, Korea and Afghanistan are the three most well know battles of the Cold War. Chile, El Salvador, Peru, South Africa, Angola, Greece, Turkey are a few of the lesser known battles.

mateoutah writes:
.....
Iraq was a nation made after WWII that lumped entirely different ethnic groups together for the ease of Western society. If we leave today it most certainly would split up (although in a very bloody manner) and time would let the region heal....

Actually WWI, and there was to be a Kurdistan but Turkey would not allow it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan

Before World War I, most Kurds lived within the boundaries of the Ottoman Empire in the province of Kurdistan. After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the Allies created several countries within its former boundaries. Originally, Kurdistan along with Armenia was to be one of them, according to the never-ratified Treaty of Sèvres. However, the reconquest of these areas by Kemal Atatürk and other pressing issues caused the Allies to accept the renegotiated Treaty of Lausanne, giving this territory to Turkey and leaving the Kurds without a self-ruled region. Other Kurdish areas were assigned to the new British and French mandated states of Iraq and Syria under both treaties. These boundaries were drawn with more concern for the division of oil resources and influence between different colonial powers and for rewarding pro-Allied Arab leaders than with ethnic distribution.

Some British history in Iraq from a fairly biased source but the historical facts in it our accepted truths.
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/history/2002/0802blood.htm

At the end of World War I, the victorious British and French fell like wolves on the rotting carcass of the defeated Ottoman Empire. After promising Arabs independence, Britain betrayed them, dividing the ex-Ottoman Mideast into weak states run from London. Oil had recently been discovered at either end of the Fertile Crescent: in the north around Mosul in Kurdish tribal territory; and in southern marshes bordering Iran. To secure oil for the Royal Navy, Britain created Iraq and put a puppet king, Faisal, on its throne. Faisal was to have been made king of Syria, but France managed to snatch Syria away from Britain.

To form Iraq, Britain knitted together three utterly disparate, mutually hostile regions: Kurdish tribal lands: the Sunni Muslim region around Baghdad, then a small city with a predominantly Jewish and Christian population: and the Shia south. The result was an unstable, artificial Frankenstein state Ð a Mideast Yugoslavia.

In 1920, Iraqis rose in revolt against Britain but were crushed. The British RAF routinely bombed, strafed, and even used poison gas against rebellious Kurdish and Shia tribesmen. Nineteen years later, King Ghazi I threatened to invade Kuwait Ð part of historic Iraq until detached by British oil imperialists. He died soon after in a mysterious car crash, the work of Iraqis said, of British intelligence.

In 1941, Iraqis again rebelled against their British masters, but were crushed by RAF bombers. After the war, London put a new king, Faisal II, on the throne. But real power was wielded by Britain's man in Baghdad, Prime Minister Nouri as-Said. The US and Britain forced Iraq to join the anti-Soviet Baghdad Pact and sell its oil at give-away prices to the west.

To prevent a coup, the small Iraqi Army was denied ammunition. British troops and the RAF kept Faisal in power. But in July, 1958, a colonel named Kassem convinced Nouri to allow his men a few rounds of ammunition for training. Kassem marched out of Baghdad, turned around, marched back, and stormed the Palace. King Faisal was executed. Nouri as-Said tried to escape, disguised as a woman. He was captured by a mob, castrated, and hanged from a lamppost. Kassem ordered British troops out of Iraq, and withdrew from the hated Baghdad Pact.

Col. Kassem turned out to be a murderous lunatic, executing thousands of Iraqis and bombing the Kurds. He threatened to invade Kuwait and was only stopped when Britain massed troops in its protectorate.

Five years later, Kassem was overthrown by Nasserite officers and machine-gunned on national TV. Col. Abdul Salam Aref took power, with discreet help from CIA and British Intelligence, MI6.

I supported the war in Iraq, Saddam had to be removed, but when do we get to the point and realize that nothing can keep (At least)3 distinct cultures, that hate each other, together in a peaceful way. A nation such as this can only survive in a non-democratic dictatorship type of system.
It's not about not having enough troops early on in the war or having enough of them now. Some cultures / peoples are not capable of living together in peace. (Yugoslavia, Israel - Palestine)

My apologies... I hit the I button one too many times... A small error with huge differences.