Iraq: we won, now let's leave

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Montana's Jon Tester ranks dead last in seniority in the U.S. Senate. In fact, he wears No. 100 on his jersey when he pitches for his office softball team. So agenda-setting for the Democrat caucus does not fall naturally into his portfolio.

But Tester was elected to the Senate by fewer than 3,500 votes in one of the reddest of the Red States, and largely on the issue of Iraq. And on this issue, which demands increasingly more precise political calibrations, Tester may be among the more reliable gauges of the options available to Democrats.

In a speech Tuesday, Tester offered what seems an entirely new formulation on the war in Iraq that may prove particularly attractive to Democrats looking for a way to get around the president's stubbornness and veto pen to end the war in Iraq.

He begins with the idea that the war in Iraq is won, not lost, and that we should pat ourselves firmly on the back and get the hell out. Clearly, with casualties rising and the situation increasingly hopeless, it requires a high quality conceit declare victory in Iraq. But if the aim is to get out, a little rationalizing may be a small price to pay. In Tester's frame, to the extent that there were declared goals for the Operation Iraqi Freedom, they've been met.

Ticking off the three main reasons he believes we went to Iraq -- to search for weapons of mass destruction, to get rid of Saddam Hussein and to give the Iraqis a chances at free and fair elections -- the freshman from Big Sky country sees blue skies and rates the operation a success.

"Our work in Iraq is done... It's time for American troops to stop refereeing a centuries-old civil war and come home after a job well done," he said. It's not hard to see how that rosy view of things can be seductive to Democrats looking for a way to end the war while at the same time not appearing chicken or defeatist.

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Sounds like a strategy even GW could agree with -

Just declare victory and hang out a banner...

If it wasn't for that pesky black stuff they pump out of the ground it would be so easy.

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"The armies separated; and, it is said, Pyrrhus replied to one that gave him joy of his victory that one more such victory would utterly undo him. For he had lost a great part of the forces he brought with him, and almost all his particular friends and principal commanders; there were no others there to make recruits, and he found the confederates in Italy backward. On the other hand, as from a fountain continually flowing out of the city, the Roman camp was quickly and plentifully filled up with fresh men, not at all abating in courage for the loss they sustained, but even from their very anger gaining new force and resolution to go on with the war."

Plutarch (trans. John Dryden) Pyrrhus @ The Internet Classics Archive

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Military Analyst: West Needs More Terror To Save Doomed Foreign Policy
Only attacks on scale of 9/11, 7/7 can save bolster resolve according to war studies head
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet
Tuesday, July 10, 2007

The West needs more terror attacks on the scale of 9/11 and 7/7 in order to save a failing foreign policy, according to Lt.-Col. Doug Delaney, chair of the war studies program at the Royal Military College in Kingston, Ontario.

This alarming admission can be found right at the end of a long and academic Toronto Star article about the history of conflict and why the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq are doomed.

"The Royal Military College of Canada (RMC), is the military academy of the Canadian Forces and is a full degree-granting university," according to Wikipedia.

The Star article discusses a new study which surmises that military invasions since World War 2 that require cooperation of the population of a country to succeed hold only a 17% chance of success.

In a paraphrased quote attributed to Delaney, he concludes that "The key to bolstering Western resolve is another terrorist attack like 9/11 or the London transit bombings of two years ago."

"If nothing happens, it will be harder still to say this is necessary," adds Delaney.

"Londoners pull together outside a subway station during the bombings of July 7, 2005. Could such terrorist attacks actually bolster Western resolve?" - reads the caption accompanying the photo in the Toronto Star piece.

By this logic, if terrorist attacks only boost the geopolitical agenda of Western governments then how is it in their interest to prevent them, and of what benefit are they to the actual terrorists - unless the terrorists occupy positions of power?

Delaney's comments are in a similar vein to former Republican Senator Rick Santorum's statements to a radio show this past weekend, in which he said that "unfortunate events" would occur along the lines of the recent car bomb attempts in the UK, that will change American's views of the war.

Last month, the new chairman of the Arkansas Republican Party Dennis Milligan said that there needed to be more attacks on American soil for President Bush to regain popular approval.

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Sure. We won Vietnam and got out. Now, it's time to get out of Iraq.

Now it's time to say good-bye
To all our company
M_I_C
Leavin ya real soon
K_E_Y
Why? Because we beat ya
M_O_U_S_E

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Our version of winning: Kill hundreds of thousands, destroy entire towns, destroy the economy, eliminate their health care and schools, put a puppet government into office, allow Al Qaeda to go from non-existent to a threat to humanity. Let's raise the Stars and Stripes!

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NickFun wrote:

Our version of winning: Kill hundreds of thousands, destroy entire towns, destroy the economy, eliminate their health care and schools, put a puppet government into office, allow Al Qaeda to go from non-existent to a threat to humanity. Let's raise the Stars and Stripes!

Most of that destruction is because of the insurgents, people we are trying to stop. The government was elected by the Iraqi people, and anyone could run in the election, so how do you figure it's a puppet government?

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Brandon9000 wrote:

NickFun wrote:
Our version of winning: Kill hundreds of thousands, destroy entire towns, destroy the economy, eliminate their health care and schools, put a puppet government into office, allow Al Qaeda to go from non-existent to a threat to humanity. Let's raise the Stars and Stripes!

Most of that destruction is because of the insurgents, people we are trying to stop. The government was elected by the Iraqi people, and anyone could run in the election, so how do you figure it's a puppet government?

That's what people like him do. They see the negative in everything. I figure it's from a traumatic childhood experience.

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Yeah. Where's the negative in fighting a needless war, with thousands getting maimed and killed?

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McGentrix wrote:

Brandon9000 wrote:
NickFun wrote:
Our version of winning: Kill hundreds of thousands, destroy entire towns, destroy the economy, eliminate their health care and schools, put a puppet government into office, allow Al Qaeda to go from non-existent to a threat to humanity. Let's raise the Stars and Stripes!

Most of that destruction is because of the insurgents, people we are trying to stop. The government was elected by the Iraqi people, and anyone could run in the election, so how do you figure it's a puppet government?

That's what people like him do. They see the negative in everything. I figure it's from a traumatic childhood experience.

Seriously. You really have to be a Negative Nancy to see the bad in fighting an illegal war that gets bloodier and bloodier each month.

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Brandon9000 wrote:

NickFun wrote:
Our version of winning: Kill hundreds of thousands, destroy entire towns, destroy the economy, eliminate their health care and schools, put a puppet government into office, allow Al Qaeda to go from non-existent to a threat to humanity. Let's raise the Stars and Stripes!

Most of that destruction is because of the insurgents, people we are trying to stop. The government was elected by the Iraqi people, and anyone could run in the election, so how do you figure it's a puppet government?

Saddam, as evil as he was, kept the insurgents under control. We tend to look at things from the way WE are taught totally disregarding the way THEY were taught. We brought the insurgents in! We created this civil war! We have caused countless lives to be lost. But you may feel free to continue your deluded "we are better than them" attitude. In this country you have the right to be wrong!

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I can talk to my buddies down at protest headquarters and get them to admit how shamefull we are for protesting a war war we have now won.

VICTORY!!! ok somebody sweep up let's get the hell out of here.

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NickFun wrote:

Brandon9000 wrote:
NickFun wrote:
Our version of winning: Kill hundreds of thousands, destroy entire towns, destroy the economy, eliminate their health care and schools, put a puppet government into office, allow Al Qaeda to go from non-existent to a threat to humanity. Let's raise the Stars and Stripes!

Most of that destruction is because of the insurgents, people we are trying to stop. The government was elected by the Iraqi people, and anyone could run in the election, so how do you figure it's a puppet government?

Saddam, as evil as he was, kept the insurgents under control. We tend to look at things from the way WE are taught totally disregarding the way THEY were taught. We brought the insurgents in! We created this civil war! We have caused countless lives to be lost. But you may feel free to continue your deluded "we are better than them" attitude. In this country you have the right to be wrong!

I love how time makes people forget things. Things like the millions killed under Saddam's rule... now turns out the left thinks he was one heck of a guy! We didn't have to watch Saddam's killing on the news and heck! No Americans died so that makes it all better! Isn't that right Nick? You are only concerned about American lives? Screw the millions of Iraqi's not involved in the insurgency, screw the millions of Iraqi's that would like to have a normal life, screw the million's of Iraqi's that actually desire a future free from tyranny.

To hell with all of them, right Nick? Americans are dying and that far outweighs any lowly Iraqi life?

It sickens me that you would utter some garbage like "Saddam, as evil as he was, kept the insurgents under control." Scumbag.

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Yes, and we really should be glad that only 1,227 Iraqi civilians were killed in June: hurrah! The civilan death toll is going down!

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Walter Hinteler wrote:

Yes, and we really should be glad that only 1,227 Iraqi civilians were killed in June: hurrah! The civilan death toll is going down!

Wishing they were Jews are you Walter?

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McGentrix wrote:

Walter Hinteler wrote:
Yes, and we really should be glad that only 1,227 Iraqi civilians were killed in June: hurrah! The civilan death toll is going down!

Wishing they were Jews are you Walter?

And this guy is calling people scumbags. Jeesus.

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McGentrix wrote:

Wishing they were Jews are you Walter?

Okay, McG. Since you obviously can't stop these insults - YOU ARE AN A

HOLE.

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Walter Hinteler wrote:

McGentrix wrote:

Wishing they were Jews are you Walter?

Okay, McG. Since you obviously can't stop these insults - YOU ARE AN AHOLE.

You decided to play your usual game Walter. I figured to give you what you were fishing for. Why else would you write that sarcastic drivel if not to bait me?

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edgarblythe wrote:

McGentrix wrote:
Walter Hinteler wrote:
Yes, and we really should be glad that only 1,227 Iraqi civilians were killed in June: hurrah! The civilan death toll is going down!

Wishing they were Jews are you Walter?

And this guy is calling people scumbags. Jeesus.

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Iraq: we won, now let's leave

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