Does anyone on this board believe America will ever completely leave Iraq?

[Toots]

We are building the largest Embassy on earth there, plus fourteen permanentmilitary bases. What about the word "permanent" is not understood? We have "interests" there and will never relinquish those "interests". We may withdraw a majority of our Combat troops but will Never withdraw all our military from there. That IMO is a fact we need to get used to..We are in Iraq just as we are in Europe. There to stay...

[BayCityProgressive]

1. nope it is ours

it is the new Puerto Rico, Hawaii, California..oh wait..we stole almost everything in this country. No we aren't leaving and never will. All your oil is belong to us.

[paparush]

2. Permanent Bases ..... Permanent Bases......

[liberal N proud]

3. There will never be peace with the mid-east until we do

If we were to leave next year 10 years or 1000 years. There will be no peace between the US and the Islamic nations as long as the US occupies a middle eastern nation.

[BayCityProgressive]

8. who in the US government wants peace?

silly liberal, you can't make money off PEACE!

[INdemo]

20. Throughout history there has never been total peace in the middle east

going all the back to biblical times

[theoldman]

25. There has never been peace in Europe or Asia going back

100,000 years. No different from the Middle East.

[madokie]

4. I have only a question, are we still in Vietnam

all this building we are doing in Iraq will ultimately be destroyed because of the memories associated with them by the Iraqi, IMO

[Toots]

6. Does Vietnam have oil?

And as a matter of fact American companies are back in Vietnam. People want to compare Iraq with Vietnam on these boards all the time and they are just as comparable as WW II is to "War on Terror" Are we still in Europe?

[madokie]

21. In Vietnam today we are not occupiers as we are in Iraq and it does look like plans to be

there, in Iraq, for a long time is being layed.

[madrchsod]

11. we will be back in nam soon...but this time nam will be

allied with us in containing china expansion. yes the exact opposite of the reason for the Vietnam war

[dogday]

5. The Pottery Barn Rule

We own it now....

[TwilightGardener]

7. No--which is why it's unrealistic to choose your Dem candidate

based SOLELY on their "purity" on this issue--even the ones who may call for total withdrawal won't be able to deliver on that. We are still in Bosnia, we are still in Germany, we are still in Korea. Get used to it, folks.

[rfranklin]

19. Military occupation is the U.S. style...

We have bases all over the world--in 63 countries, as a matter of fact. Troops in 156 countries.

[mike_c]

9. WE must make the politicians give up their imperialist ambitions...

...by forcing the issue and voting out EVERYONE-- regardless of party-- who refuses to do the right thing and get out of Iraq.

[slackmaster]

10. It will take a whole generation

:argh:

[TheCowsCameHome]

12. Nope. Maybe we'll make it a state.

We're there forever, thanks to IdiotSon.

[Jacobin]

13. Yes. Because we will have no choice.

Britain's experience in Iraq after World War I offers a cautionary tale for the United States and its forces in the country. Like the United States, Britain promised to "liberate" Iraq, not to "occupy" it. As with U.S. forces, British troops were attacked by Iraqis not long after the occupation began. And British forces in Iraq were stretched too thin. NPR's Mike Shuster reports on these and other parallels between then and now.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1323691

The British occupation of Iraq, in the first half of the twentieth century, may be instructive. The British faced several uprisings and coups. The Iraqi government, then as now, was unable to suppress the rebels on its own and relied on the occupying military. In 1958, when the government the British helped install finally fell, those who had collaborated with them could find no popular support; some, including the former prime minister Nuri Said, were murdered and mutilated. Said had once been a respected figure, but he became tainted by his collaboration with the British. That year, when revolutionary officers overthrew the government, Said disguised himself as a woman and tried to escape. He was discovered, shot in the head, and buried. The next day a mob dug up his corpse and dragged it through the street—an act that would be repeated so often in Iraq that it earned its own word: sahil. With the British-sponsored government gone, both Sunni and Shiite Arabs embraced the Iraqi identity. The Kurds still resent the British perfidy that made them part of Iraq.

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200512/iraq-withdrawal/2


See also: Maginot Line

Fixed, fortified military bases in a hostile land are strategic blunders doomed to failure. They cannot be defended indefinitely.

Time treats few things more cruelly than the futuristic fantasies of past generations, particularly when they are actually realised in concrete and steel. Hindsight makes it abundantly clear that the Maginot Line was a foolish misdirection of energy when it was conceived, a dangerous distraction of time and money when it was built, and a pitiful irrelevance when the German invasion did come in 1940. Most glaringly, it concentrated on the Rhineland and left France's 400-kilometer border with Belgium unfortified." (Ousby, Occupation: The Ordeal of France, Pimlico, 1997, p. 14)

I will concede that it is the intent of the US to have permanent bases in Iraq. I submit that that intention will fail miserably and catastrophically.

[ricochetastroman]

14. No, because...

Only WE know how to make things right for people.
Only WE can spread democracy which gives EVERYBODY and equal voice, right?
Only WE can teach them that their religion is WRONG.
Only WE can give them all equal health care like we have here.
Only WE have George Bush who is a RIGHTEOUS MAN and got rid of their dictator.
Only WE are ignoring Darfur, oops.
Only WE have the power and the glory.
Only WE can make a great TV movie out of it when it is over. :patriot:
God Bless America

[MikeNearMcChord]

15. I wonder if the collapse of the economy might do the trick?

Empires go broke. Hell maybe Iraq may use it as museum of America's shame

[porphyrian]

16. Nothing in our universe is permanent. - n/t

[Donald Ian Rankin]

17. I think it far more likely than not.

Although obviously you'll probably always have an embassy and the like there, for some value of "always".

But "never" is a very long time. People always massively overestimate the importance of the times they are living in. I would be very surprised indeed if at no point in entire future did America or the political entity(s) descended from it not have military forces stationed in what is currently Iraq (or would be, except I'll be dead).

[Marie26]

18. Maybe in twenty years... nt

[LiberalEsto]

22. Only when the oil runs out

then it's bye-bye Baghdad

[NNN0LHI]

23. No comparisons to Europe or Japan here. They all surrendered. The Iraqis never did

The Iraqis will keep killing Americans as long as we are there. And as they have proved they will become more efficient at doing it as time goes by and they will bleed us dry financially.

Vietnam never surrendered and we don't have any troops there any more either.

Don

[nadinbrzezinski]

24. When the empire collapses

and it will happen, suddenly and without any warnings... unless you pay attention

The signs of that collapse are all around you.

[Rydz777]

26. Embassy

We are building an embassy in Baghdad that is the equivalent of the Great Pyramid of Cheops, so clearly we plan to stay. What we can do, however, is bring our troops home - and if we keep up this insanity of getting them killed and maimed, the voters will see to that.

[Marr]

27. I do. I think we'll be completely out of the country in a few years.

But not by choice. The oil is going to be controlled by someone else, most likely the Iranians. There's not a damn thing we can do about it at this point, and the only question left is how many lives and dollars we're willing to sacrifice to protect GW Bush's ego.

[zonmoy]

28. I agree

we will have to leave when the iraqis force us out. although I suspect the cabal will probably use biological or nuclear weapons before being forced out.