Petraeus: The Surge is Working, Premature Pull-Out Would Be Devastating

Trader Jorge,

Can you tell me what country is the leading financier to Al Qaeda?

Hint, it's the same country that a vast majority of the 9/11 hijackers came from.

Give up? It's Saudi Arabia! So why did we invade Iraq?

 

bush doesn't have to and won't admit anything. I never understood why people are so bent on trying to get Bush to say he made a mistake. EVERYONE KNOWS HE MADE A MISTAKE!

It's obvious. Bush knows it. You think he doesn't regret it???? I bet he regrets a lot. But he'd do his party a disservice to admit it was a mistake, and he might do the country that too. Because admiting it was a mistake won't make people go, "Oh, now it's ok"...no, what will happen is he will be cruified and made more fun of then ever before.

Don't think the liberals don't play politics either. The one thing I can't stand about the left is that they think they are better than republicans when in reality they are just the same.

 

Your the guy who's too scared to go after the Al-Qaeda leadership. You have no room to talk.

 

we don't even know where the Al Qaeda leadership is. We'd have to occupy western Pakistan and probably would botch it up like we did in Afganistan. They'd probably flee to Iraq.

I love it how you are advocating invading one country and leaving another - despite one being unstable with Al Qaeda (Iraq) and the other at least being an ally and stable.

 

You said the first step was having a plan for withdrawing. I was pointing out the real first step is admitting that Bush's plan for Iraq was a grand failure. The next president will do so. It's too bad it will take that long because it will only cost more lives and degrade our military further.

I'm not advocating a public confession of failure and an apology from Bush. Never have. Actions speak louder than words and he should finally declare partition is going to happen and start getting with the program. Iraq is an unsalvageable country now. He could still claim the invasion was a good thing because Saddam is gone but his foot dragging on starting the end game and pulling the U.S. out of this acid pit is hurting the country. This insistence on 12 more months is like delaying live-saving cancer surgery while the disease continues to spread.

Bush is already humiliated. At this point, he just doesn't have the courage to do the right thing for the country. That is the crux of the matter and it is a shame. Partition and a permanent, much reduced troop presence inside Iraq (away from day to day danger). A time frame of ~18-24 months. That's a very condensed summary of what he should declare.

The one thing I can't stand about the right is that they think they are better than Democrats when in reality they are just the same. It applies both ways, not just one way. When it comes to being sanctimonious, arrogant and condescending, right wingnuts have had lefties beat by a country mile for quite some time. It isn't the 70s or 80s any more.

 

Actually we do know where they are in a general sense. I am not advocating going in nilly willy and turning up everything until we find them.

Neither was Obama, which is why he prefaced the whole thing his comment "if we had actionable intelligence..."

Again I'm not advocating invading anything. I'm advocating going after the leaders of Al-Qaeda.

When Afghanistan harbored them we went in after them. When anyone else does it we shouldn't rule out the option of using targeted strikes to take out the leadership.

I'm for leaving a nation that isn't a threat to us, that is being kept unstable by our presence, and using resources to actually stop al-qaeda.

 

The silence on this is deafening.

I heard Rachael Madow talking about it, and she said it sounds like a conspiracy theory but it is actually the simplest explanation.

 

when i mess up, i apologize. im sure everyone here is a reasonable person. so if they screw up, theyll admit it and move on.

yes the democrats will jump all over bush if he ever admitted he was wrong. but didnt the republicans jump all over the democrats when they questioned the administration about the intelligence on wmd? on the iraq/al qaida connection?......

no one here is rooting for al qaida. no one wants the terrorist groups to win. but poor planning, poor execution, refusal to take advice from experts...

i think bush has it coming to him. he dug his own black hole.

on a side note:
the US may reduce combat troops by next summer but will actually increase the number of support personel. our military is getting stretched thinner and thinner and thinner... maybe theyll start publicizing that if you serve in the military, youll gain citizenship.

gingrich (where the heck has he been?) says the republicans need a clean break from this administration in order to have a chance at the 08 elections. man thats harsh. i didnt think id ever hear that from gingrich.

 

You don't have to bomb an ally to go after Al Qaeda, they are already in Iraq - you seem to keep ignoring this fact when you talk about leaving Iraq to fight Al Qaeda - it really only makes you look like you're just anti-bush vs sincerely wanting to fight Al Qaeda.

Obama is a dem so if he says attack a country, you're cool with it. but think, both countries have al qaeda - to say we should withdrawl from one and attack the other doesn't make any sense. Why destabilize two countries then?

I only say, clean up the mess in Iraq first....and we are putting a dent against Al Qaeda in Iraq....maybe this is a chance to win a battle in the war on terror. No, Iraq didn't have terrorist to begin with, but they are there now, and that's what matters. the present, not the past.

 

this is true.

you never admit though to messing up to your enemies, only those who will forgive you. and the dems are to bush as a pack of hungry wolves are to a rabbit.

first sign of weakness and they will eat you up.

 

Al-Qaeda in Iraq are next to nothing. They aren't the leadership of Al-Qaeda, and have only a very loose affiliation of them.

I'm saying that we can put a bigger dent in Al-Qaeda in Iraq, and Al-Qaeda in general by getting out of Iraq.

Al Qaeda has reagained it's strength to 9/11 levels primarily because of our stay in IRaq. That is according to the CIA. The reason why Al-Qaeda in Iraq has support is because the people want us gone, and they are pursuing that aim. They aren't popular on their own. With us out of there, the people will get rid of them. They are Sunni in a majority Shi'ite nation. They won't be able to take root in Iraq.

It is silly to pretend like they are a great threat to us if we leave there.

Plus we can still leave and have forces nearby to deal with them, support other security forces dealing with them etc.

I would rather go after the real Al-Qaeda's leadership. It has nothing to do with being anti-Bush, except that he isn't taking the real threat as seriously as he should, and he's botched up Iraq, and our troops and IRaqis are dying for no reason.

 

if you get out of Iraq and leave it for lawlessness, then move to Pakistan, Al Qaeda will simply relocate to Iraq. Just as they moved from Afganistan to Pakistan. You can't just go around making one mess and than another - hasn't Iraq taught you anything.

And while it's tempting to think that simply leaving will solve our problems and make them go away - you are leaving an entirely different country behind. First destroy Al Qaeda in Iraq and hand the country over to the Iraq army, or partition the country.

Gates is now saying we could see more troop reductions, another 30K next year to bring us down to 100K. So it's happening....Iraq is winding down a bit. Yet it will never be enough will it? Liberals will always want it sooner - a full withdrawal by election day to show what a mess Bush made.

Sorry - i don't care about that agenda.

 

Al-Qaeda won't relocate to IRaq. Iraq is majority Shi'ite. Al-Qaeda are a Sunni organization. Iraq just isn't fertile ground for them to exist in a major way there. Afghanistan and Pakistan have populations much more sympathetic to Al-Qaeda and were ripe for the plucking. You seem to be lumping all middle-eastern groups into one, and ignoring the existing conflicts that already exist there.

Furthermore I'm advocating leaving, which doesn't mean leaving it to chaos. Strike that. Iraq is already in chaos. It won't make the chaos significantly worse. The troop reduction isn't a real reduction.

I saw someone make the analogy that if you gain 30 lbs. then lose 20 lbs. it is disingenuous to claim that you have lost weight. You're still 10lbs overweight.

Patraeus' own boss is calling for a much larger troop reduction.

 

Yeah, but if that 10lbs is muscle, you're still in better shape.

Iraq has plenty of Sunni dominated areas for Al Qaeda to take refuge. Don't assume that Iraq is a homogenous place - you're making a gross assumption.

 

No, he's not. He knows perfectly well how Iraq is made up of differing ethnic and religious groups. FB could name them for you, if he wanted to. You're just choosing to interpret what he says to suit whatever point you think you're making, in my opinion. I think FB is wrong about some of his positions re Pakistan, but you have been misrepresenting his positions there, regardless. I understand what FB is saying. I just disagree. You either don't understand his position, or choose to ignore it so you can make your "point.".



D&D. Impeach Bush and Cheney, ASAP.

 

I should first thank Deckard for his post which reflected too positively of me.

But that being said, You claimed that if we left Iraq, Al-Qaeda in Iraq could make it like Al-Qaeda did for Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda and their allies were in control of the govt. of Afghanistan, and controlled all but a small portion of the country.

The Sunnis in Iraq aren't particularly friendly with Al-Qaeda in Iraq right now, and a lot of the little friendship that exists between them, is because of the U.S. occupation. Remove that occupation and the reason for their alliance falls apart.

Furthermore, even if it didn't they would be the ones in the smaller chunk of land in Iraq without any real govt. support and aid. It would be almost the exact opposite of Afghanistan.

Fighting "Al Qaeda" in Iraq while allowing the real Al-Qaeda leadership to go free is like swatting at an ant that is biting you, while allowing a Grizzly bear to continue to maul you.

 

I haven't claimed anything about what will happen when we leave Iraq. All I can say is that there is a RISK of what might happen, and I'm very concerned about a withdraw that is politically motivated vs. what's in the best interest of our long term security as a nation.

This is why I was against going into Iraq in the first place, I in fact protested here in nyc against going to war. But once we were in, I let go of that and shifted to make the best of it.

We're in a delicate situation, and we have to really be careful about our next move. I would like to see Iraq be made in some sort of stable place before we leave - whether that means giving the Iraqi army a chance to get up to speed, or parition, it doesn't matter to me.

But considering that partition isn't even being discussed, it leaves us only with remaining and trying to get the army up to speed. It's all we can do. Leaving now is just risky. And yes, American soldier lives are worth sacraficing to prevent the risk of Iraq turning into a place where terrorist groups can hide and be a threat to our national security. It doesn't matter if Bush created the problem or not in the first place. The problem is here. We have to deal with it in the current present context, not the past one.

 

Right, you claimed there was a risk of that happening. I was trying to show I believe the risk isn't very great of that happening, and is actually lessened by our withdraw.

As for withdrawing for political reasons, I don't know too many people who want that.

There are numerous plans out there for withdraw and they almost all take into account post U.S. occupation security.

 

Partition is also being discussed, regardless of what NewYorker says. Biden has been advocating "soft partition" for a long time now. Others have written and talked about it. A federal system, with 3 autonomous regions. I think it certainly merits considering, if sharing the natural resources and political power "country-wide" could be sorted out. I'm not optimistic about it.



D&D. Impeach Bush and Cheney, Quickly. Iran is Next.

 

Yes, and Biden has had his plan for quite some time. It is pretty thorough and detailed.

Trying to characterize it as cut and run leaving Iraq in Chaos is very inaccurate.

New Yorker seems to be mischaracterizing either on purpose or from lack of understanding.