The Iraq War is Ending

[BlackWidower]

Contractors are staying eh? Not impressed Obama.

Also, while we're at it: Ahem...Where's your source on that!?

Yahoo for the quote I posted above, and CNN TV for the part about contractors. Sorry if I made any mistakes, the last thing I want to do is misinform people.

Oh, great. Let's see...huh, I click on your sources and I get nothing. It's as if they aren't actually links.

Look, sorry to be a pain or anything, but when one asks for sources, they don't want a vague description of the book, they want the vanilla frosting page number!

 

[ReservoirAngel]

I wonder how Fox News will try to spin this as being a total disaster for America. Also how the people who post comments on the Fox News site will slam Obama about this decision.

 

[Robert Ewing]

Erm, I've heard of nothing about going into Iran... Afghanistan yes, oh god yes. I think they're getting slightly worse than Iraq was in the day.

But this is good news, Iraq is starting to pull itself together now.

 

[tg851]

Or we could just sit on our defunct nuclear arsenal and keep paying lots of young men to stand around with guns and look scary. Cause that makes SENSE.

you DO relise most of the nukes are in inactive reserve, approximately 50%(active within 2 weeks)
30% are in the "hedge stockpile"(meaning deployments within 12 hours)
the rest are armed and ready.

But it doesn't matter at all, does it. Even if Iraq turns into a post-apocalyptic hellhole once the Americans are out of there noone will give a flying fuck cause the western media will "Forget" about the whole situation.

don't they always?

Or, you know, we can just sit back and stop reporting on it. Like we did throughout the 20th century. Or perhaps we can continue betraying what allies we have in the area (I am talking to YOU Britain and France)

thank bush of that,and when Obama tries and fix the screw-ups he causes he gets pissed on for "trying to turn the us into Canada"

Yeah. Long the the USA! Land of the not at all free, Home of the not that brave!

that's why I'm Canadian.looks like manifest destiny will happen,just not the way the u.s. expected.

 

[McMullen]

Like it matters.

The Coalition should stay until the situation is stable. Anything less is allowing innocent people to die. Soldiers sign up to get shot at so let them do their job, let them keep getting shot at. Or hell, you can pay them to sit around on their very, very expensive guns in military bases throughout the western world until the Russians or the Chinese take a pop at them cause yeah, THATS GOING TO FUCKING HAPPEN.

Seriously, in my opinion the only reason the west should have armies is to act as the worlds goddam police force. And if they dont then what is the fucking point? We have the power to change the world and fuck it, with power comes responsibility. I say back into Iraq with more numbers, More boots on the ground in Afghanistan and lets invade Somalia and the DRC whilst we are at it.

Or we could just sit on our defunct nuclear arsenal and keep paying lots of young men to stand around with guns and look scary. Cause that makes SENSE.

But it doesn't matter at all, does it. Even if Iraq turns into a post-apocalyptic hellhole once the Americans are out of there noone will give a flying fuck cause the western media will "Forget" about the whole situation. We barely ever get real reports on the horror, the suicide bombings and the general state of mass murder as it is.

Speaking as someone who grew up in the Arab world I have always been pro war. I think we got into both Iraq and Afghanistan for the wrong reasons but in the end the world is a better place thanks to the intervention of the west. I no longer care if it sounds imperialistic, It is our DUTY to look after those that cannot look after themselves, our DUTY to get rid of the psychotic dictators that have control over incredibly large populations.

Or, you know, we can just sit back and stop reporting on it. Like we did throughout the 20th century. Or perhaps we can continue betraying what allies we have in the area (I am talking to YOU Britain and France) and then wondering why the world hates us as we arm up an increasingly psychotic genocidal power and then go "Whoops" as they invade the Lebanon over a few missiles almost hitting people. Cause that is justification for invading a sovereign state and then retreating and leaving landmines behind yourself.

Yeah. Long the the USA! Land of the not at all free, Home of the not that brave!

Wow, I thought the crypto-Templars of Assassin's Creed were fictional, but we appear to have one among us right here on the Escapist.

 

[I Have No Idea]

Contractors are staying eh? Not impressed Obama.

Also, while we're at it: Ahem...Where's your source on that!?

Yahoo for the quote I posted above, and CNN TV for the part about contractors. Sorry if I made any mistakes, the last thing I want to do is misinform people.

Oh, great. Let's see...huh, I click on your sources and I get nothing. It's as if they aren't actually links.

Look, sorry to be a pain or anything, but when one asks for sources, they don't want a vague description of the book, they want the vanilla frosting page number!

Here's the frosting article! http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/21/world/meast/iraq-us-troops/index.html

OP edited for future generations

 

[Mekado]

That's somewhat funny considering the "we've won!" mission accomplished speech was back in 2003.

Anyone thinks the Americans won ? I mean yeah Hussein is dead, but the country is probably just as dangerous if not more than it was before.Sometimes the only way to keep crazies in check is with someone even more crazy than they are.

The USA has no problem winning a straight-up fight (they wiped the iraqi army in what ? not even a week?) but it seems occupation and guerilla warfare is much more complicated than that...

 

[Orks da best]

Ah yes "Iraq", home of the now dead terrorist Saddam Hussein and allegedly in possession of civilization destroying nuclear warheads.

We have dismissed those claims.

I love you.

aye, that works so well, he wins the tread!, someone give that guy a prize, cause i would only give him a um, nvm.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Yay! The US has won the war in Iraq...again. Everyone will be home by Christmas, and the people of Iraq will be just fine.

On the other hand, can't blame Obama for wanting to get out of a politically awkward and very expensive war, given the way things are. Elections coming up, time to look useful.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

So the Iraq War isn't actually ending, the US is just ending it's involvement.

 

[StBishop]

Out of Iraq, yes, but right into Iran.

Nope. Obama said "I can report that, as promised, the rest of our troops in Iraq will come home by the end of the year,".

Unless our new home is Iran, then our soldiers will be back on US soil.

The ones in Iraq will come home. The others will go to Iran.

Also, American occupation of Iraq =/= Iraq War.

 

[Singularly Datarific]

However, since the CIA is in control of our drone fleet, Predators will continue to hum in the skies of Iraq for quite some time. :\
http://gizmodo.com/5852228/drones-mean-the-iraq-war-is-never-over

 

[Fieldy409_v1legacy]

If iraq now devolves into a worse hellhole it will be the fault of all those anti war people.

 

[srm79]

Obama has said that American troops will be out by the end of the year. Contractors will stay, but all US military forces will have gone. Thoughts?

Personally, I'm just glad our boys can come back home after this 10 year ordeal.

10 years only? I thought the Iraq-war started in the 80ties, ah well probably we just "officially" sent weapons and less cannon fodder back then.

I'm happy for those American soldiers too. In fact I'm happy for America, most countries will respect her a little more because Obama is finally pulling the army out of that mess.

Nope. Iran & Iraq spent most of the 80's at war with each other. Both sides had managed to piss the west off by then, so both sides were largely armed by the Soviets. I think the French were still selling stuff to Iraq but by and large nobody wanted to do business with Iran after they deposed the Shah and put the Imams in charge, and doing business with Iraq went out the window when Sadaam gassed his own people.

We (the West) went to war against Iraq in the early 90's, along with a coalition of Arab nations after Iraq invaded Kuwait but the sole objective was to drive the Iraqis out of Kuwait. Not a single Allied ground asset ever (officially) entered Iraq - not including Special Forces who were tracking down SCUD missile launchers as well as looking for Saddam Hussein. The war was over in a matter of weeks.

For the rest of the 90's there was a token ground presence of US forces in the area but mostly the Allies deployed aircraft to enforce the "No Fly Zones" imposed over Iraq.

The current war kicked off after the Bush administration used the "war on terror" as a pathetically weak pretext to conclude "Daddy's unfinished business".

 

[Exterminas]

If iraq now devolves into a worse hellhole it will be the fault of all those anti war people.

Yeah, It will totally not be the fault of the pro-war people who wanted to invade Iraq to look for magical WMD and destoryed the functioning though opressive local regime.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

If iraq now devolves into a worse hellhole it will be the fault of all those anti war people.

Yeah, It will totally not be the fault of the pro-war people who wanted to invade Iraq to look for magical WMD and destoryed the functioning though opressive local regime.

They should take the idiots who came up with the 'deBaathification' program and put a bullet in the back of each one's head. Yeah, sure, sacking anyone who'd been a member of the Baathist Party from any government job probably looked good on paper except that you had to sign up to the party to have any government job... so overnight all the police and all the people who kept Iraq's infrastructure (such as, oh, it's basic fucking utilities) operational were shitcanned... gee, can't think how THAT could lead to an epic ratfuck.

 

[McMullen]

Like it matters.

*SNIP*

Yeah. Long the the USA! Land of the not at all free, Home of the not that brave!

Wow, I thought the crypto-Templars of Assassin's Creed were fictional, but we appear to have one among us right here on the Escapist.

Was I just called a crazy conspiracy theorist? Your comment totally confused me. Then again, I could never be bothered to finish Ass Creed Brotherhood so perhaps I am just behind on the plot. So my opinions might not be welcome, at all, but they are still logical.

Perhaps it is my general anger at the USA and its policies... But whatever.

Please explain?

You were saying that you believe those with power should control everyone else, even those outside their jurisdiction. I think that's a cynical and somewhat tyrannical viewpoint.

 

[ReservoirAngel]

If iraq now devolves into a worse hellhole it will be the fault of all those anti war people.

Yeah, it would be clearly the anti-war people's fault if Iraq devolved into a horrible place after the US army barged in and trashed their shit for a decade.

 

[SidingWithTheEnemy]

[...] Iran & Iraq spent most of the 80's at war with each other. Both sides had managed to piss the west off by then, so both sides were largely armed by the Soviets. I think the French were still selling stuff to Iraq but by and large nobody wanted to do business with Iran after they deposed the Shah and put the Imams in charge, and doing business with Iraq went out the window when Sadaam gassed his own people.
[...]

No, sorry, my sources say otherwise. We did support the Irak and the Iran back in the 80s by selling weapons, equipment and intelligence to them. (Maybe even Anthrax but that's another story)
I do agree we (as the western first world countries) officially weren't involved in the Irak-Iran war in the 80s.
But I have to disagree that we didn't sell weapons to them back then!
We sold both parties "toys" to kill each other. I don't think this counts politically as "being part of the war" yet sending weapons and ammunition doesn't really much help in reducing the bloodshet there.
I'm sorry I don't want to start a discussion here but when I read facts I think are interpreted the wrong way I point out my findings. You can check if the sources are trustworthy or not but here is what I meant:

Spoiler: Beware! Long Quote ahead

Irak supported by the U.S. in the 80s.

[T]he United States actively supported the Iraqi war effort by supplying the Iraqis with billions of dollars of credits, by providing U.S. military intelligence and advice to the Iraqis, and by closely monitoring third country arms sales to Iraq to make sure that Iraq had the military weaponry required. The United States also provided strategic operational advice to the Iraqis to better use their assets in combat... The CIA, including both CIA Director Casey and Deputy Director Gates, knew of, approved of, and assisted in the sale of non-U.S. origin military weapons, ammunition and vehicles to Iraq. My notes, memoranda and other documents in my NSC files show or tend to show that the CIA knew of, approved of, and assisted in the sale of non-U.S. origin military weapons, munitions and vehicles to Iraq.

Ironically the U.S. also sponsered the IRAN the other party, which is either extrodinary stupid or quite brilliant (let's just pretend we don't want to think about morality and human rights at all)
I found this sources here showing that:

The Iran-Contra affair [...], also referred to as Irangate, Contragate or Iran-Contra-Gate, was a political scandal in the United States that came to light in November 1986. During the Reagan administration, senior Reagan administration officials and President Reagan secretly facilitated the sale of arms to Iran, the subject of an arms embargo.

Check wikipedia and other lexicons for more interesting facts of the involvement back in the 80s.

I'm not citing any more sources but as you can guess the rest of us (Europeans and other first world countries) sold our military gear to those two war parties, too. I just pick the American example because they have most of the soldiers in that hell hole and suffered most of the casulties right now.

Now here comes the scary part:
It is not unlikely that the brave american soldiers who died in Iraq this war were killed by (old but still usable) weapons from the 80s. Weapons that have been provided by their very own country they died for.

 

[Furioso]

Obama has said that American troops will be out by the end of the year. Contractors will stay, but all US military forces will have gone. Thoughts?

Personally, I'm just glad our boys can come back home after this 10 year ordeal.

10 years only? I thought the Iraq-war started in the 80ties, ah well probably we just "officially" sent weapons and less cannon fodder back then.

I'm happy for those American soldiers too. In fact I'm happy for America, most countries will respect her a little more because Obama is finally pulling the army out of that mess.

No that was a different conflict, this one started after 9/11