Quote:
Originally Posted by spence
You're making the assumption the President didn't want to leave a residual force. By Obama's own words we did but the Iraqi's didn't.
"By Obama's own words" is not a convincing reason to base any assumptions on. He has gone back and forth, contradicted, lied, about so much that his words are, at best, meaningless. Publicly (for mass political consumption and influence on outcomes of elections) he campaigned on complete withdrawal of forces. Behind closed doors, or for select public, private, or political groups, he dithered about some forces, or no forces, or maybe this or that.
At this point, as Hillary might say, what difference does it make. Except for some who want to make his position, whatever that is or was, right, it is obvious that American military presence was necessary to protect the so-called democracy and sovereignty or the newly formed Iraq. There was no truly broad democratic basis for how the country was ruled. Religious and ethnic factions would oppose democratic rights for opposing factions or groups. And there certainly was no guaranty of individual liberties--oh, that's right, those are no longer possible in the progressive 21st century view. Centralized power is necessary rather than frictional democratic or individualistic "rights."
People need to look at the constraints in the decision and not just fall back on what's now a talking point.
And yet you must keep falling back on Obama's and his administration's talking points. The "constraints," in the decision, foremost, should have considered the security of the United States. It is that security, I presume, which constrains us to repel ISIS. That would have been easier with a security force in place rather than having to start all over again.
I'm not sure having troops there would have been a magic fix anyway. ISIS would still have likely crossed the border and dragged us right back into a large scale confrontation even faster. We'd quite likely be in it mostly alone versus the global action that's forming.
Except in movies, there is no magic fix in war. The fix is victory. The annihilation of the enemy. Finishing and securing the victories that had been accomplished would have prevented us going back to a "large scale confrontation" and allowed us to continue the war against jihadism on a stronger footing. Peculiar as it may seem, rather than dissuading others from joining you, being victorious and powerful actually attracts others to partner with you.
Yes, I'm sure the Iraqi Muslims who openly thanked Jim were just repressed savages.
The monsters I referred to (and assumed you were also referring to) were the "militant" Islamists (the true believers or "good Muslims" who followed the actual commands of Mohammed and his scriptures, of the Koran and the hadiths). They have been present since the beginning of Islam, and rulers who wished to include a wider range of citizens had to depress that original edict to do jihad of the sword to those who do not convert.
Didn't the first Islamic Caliphate bring about great advances in mathematics, astronomy and medicine while their western counterparts were sacking neighboring villages and fending off Vikings?
You're mixing things up here. When Islamic rule was "enlightened," it was at the expense of orthodox Islam. Again, the rulers had to oppose that orthodoxy. To suppress it. That has always been so when "wise" rulers or tyrants needed or wanted to include a broader scope of culture, whether social, economic, or religious in their society. The "great advances" under Islamic rule to which you refer were in conjunction and association with nascent Western ideas. And the Western counterparts to whom you refer who were sacking and fending were not a part of the new and expanding Western philosophies.
The dictatorships associated with the Middle East today are as much a product of Western conquest and geopolitics as they are self determination. It's a lens that's convenient to drop...
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That is a "talking point" of anti-western commentators--apologists for some new world order which requires the hegemony of progressive utopianism. If the "conquests" were Western in philosophical terms, the middle East would have been transformed and the present day conflicts would not exist. The "conquests" had various motivations whose primary interests were not to westernize, but to exploit. Exploitation, war, conquest, and such things, predate westernism and will continue, possibly, to outdate it, as primordial human "instincts" of sorts.
And, certainly, some of those "conquests" and "geopolitics" were in response to Middle Eastern and Islamic conquests and geopolitics. The crusades were a response to Islamic conquests. Much of the wars with Islamic countries during the past 7 centuries or more have been in response to Islamic "conquests" and invasions of Europe.
It depends on the "lens" through which you look. And which lens you wish to drop. The enlightened Muslims are not the original Muslims. The current "radical" Islamists actually are the original Muslims. And they will, as did the original ones, conquer you by war, deception, or whatever means necessary to instill some original notion of a "caliphate."
And they will not negotiate or compromise. Destroy and defeat them or let them have their way. If we withdraw militarily from the Middle East, they will have their way. If that is what we wish, or if we don't care, then at least arm our military to the teeth and see to it that our homeland is secure.