At the Iraq war's end, a shrug of uncertainty

[Jeffersons Ghost]

At the Iraq war's end, a shrug of uncertainty
By David Ignatius
Thursday, September 2, 2010

BAGHDAD

The images for ending America's war in Iraq were appropriately tentative rather than triumphal: The president spoke in Washington of turning a page; the vice president talked here of starting a new chapter; the defense secretary said it was too early even to judge whether the war was worth it.

But the politicians and generals who gathered here Wednesday for a transition ceremony agreed on the fact that matters most to the Iraqi and American people, which is that the U.S. combat phase of the war is indeed over -- after more than seven years of fighting, a trillion dollars and more than 4,000 American combat deaths. An invasion that began in 2003 with a false rationale ended with a shrug of uncertainty.

The guarded language used to mark the end of combat was appropriate, for Iraq is in many ways an unfinished war. Its ultimate success or failure won't be clear for some years, when we can see whether Iraq has sustained its new democracy or plunged back into sectarian strife and political chaos.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/01/AR2010090104810.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

[MadHound]

1. Umm, the war is not over,

We still have troops over there, going on combat missions(despite what the administration and press are calling them), still fighting and dying.

Was the war worth it? FUCK NO! What world are these idiots living in? There can be no claim of success for this stupidity, only failure. We wasted hundreds of millions of dollars, thousands of soldiers of lives to kill millions of innocents in order to secure the country and its resources for our own use and the use of our creditors.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

2. I totally agree