Soldiers: institute a draft or withdraw from Iraq now.

[babylonsister]

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/10/16/soldiers-institute-a-draft-or-withdraw-from-iraq-now/

Soldiers: institute a draft or withdraw from Iraq now.

In the Washington Post today, 12 former Army captains declare that “five years on, Iraq is in shambles,” and that “short” of a military draft, “our best option is to leave Iraq immediately“:

As Army captains who served in Baghdad and beyond, we’ve seen the corruption and the sectarian division. We understand what it’s like to be stretched too thin. And we know when it’s time to get out. {…}

To continue an operation of this intensity and duration, we would have to abandon our volunteer military for compulsory service. Short of that, our best option is to leave Iraq immediately. A scaled withdrawal will not prevent a civil war, and it will spend more blood and treasure on a losing proposition.

America, it has been five years. It’s time to make a choice.

The soldiers’ criticism comes just days after Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the former top commander in Iraq, called the war “a nightmare with no end in sight.”

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

1. The problem is that the "leaders" in DC and the Pentagon don't want to admit, "We Lost".

They are terrified of the prospect that they will be blamed for starting and continuing a war that cannot be "won". One that is only continuing now so that they can "save face" and play the blame game.

The Republicans are blaming the Democrats and the "liberal" media for not supporting the troops and undermining the American people's will to fight.

The Democrats are blaming the Bush administration for not conducting the war the right way and still looking for a sort of "peace with honor".

The Pentagon is blaming both for their lack of support and the insurgents for not fighting fair and demanding more time, money, and troops to prove that they can win an unwinnable war.

While they attempt to affix blame, the catastrophe goes on and the cost continues to rise. The real cost of the great crusade for "democracy" is a whole region that is at the precipice, an America that has lost all credibility throughout the world, an American infrastructure that is crumbling because we cannot invest in it, an economy that is burdened with massive debt, a government that has imposed police state tactics on it's own people, and, hundreds of thousands of needless deaths, millions of refugees, and the destruction of a whole society on Iraq.

They are like somebody digging a deeper hole in an effort to get out of the hole he has dug.

[NNN0LHI]

2. With our trillion dollar military being beat with bombs in Pepsi cans we can expect this

Lot of money on the line here.

No one and I mean no one wants to admit that we have been robbed.

But we have been robbed.

Don

[babylonsister]

3. So will they wait til there are thousands more dead before they pull

the plug on this disaster? History won't look kindly on any of this. I'm just happy many soldiers, active and retired, are starting to speak up.

[bdamomma]

4. oh this just sucks this has to stop ENOUGH. NOW.

[babylonsister]

5. If their speaking out stops this war, I'm all for it. nt

[spanone]

6. bu$h* only listens to those who agree with him....

[bdamomma]

7. did you guys see this article Think Progress

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/10/15/abizaid-middle-east-gas-station/


UPDATE: The Stanford Daily, which originally reported on the round table, incorrectly attributed some of New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman’s comments to Gen. Abizaid. Though Abizaid did say “Of course it’s about oil, we can’t really deny that,” it was Friedman who said “We’ve treated the Arab world as a collection of big gas stations.” The Daily has posted a correction.

During a round table discussion on “the Fight for Oil, Water and a Healthy Planet” at Stanford University on Saturday, Gen. John Abizaid (Ret.), the former CENTCOM Commander, said that “of course” the Iraq war is “about oil“:

“Of course it’s about oil, we can’t really deny that,” Abizaid said of the Iraq campaign early on in the talk.

“We’ve treated the Arab world as a collection of big gas stations,” the retired general said. “Our message to them is: Guys, keep your pumps open, prices low, be nice to the Israelis and you can do whatever you want out back. Osama and 9/11 is the distilled essence that represents everything going on out back.”