Discussion on Iraq / Guard

[PaulS]

Originally Posted by Squid kids Dad

Eben...You dont think the terrosists started this and in turn led us to Iraq ? Why do you think we are there ? Oh for oil???

What revisionism! I thought we were looking for WMDs? What terrorists? There has never been ANY link btw Assama and 9/11. Bush wanted to go to war to finish something his father didn't. He morphed the pursuit of Al Qaeda into a war w/Saddam. Helen Thomas, who has been a white house correspondent as long as anyone has said that Bush was the only president she has covered who wanted to go to war - sad. But hey, don't worry, according to Cheney the insurgency is in its "last throes".

[likwid]

Originally Posted by PaulS

Bush wanted to go to war to finish something his father didn't. He morphed the pursuit of Al Qaeda into a war w/Saddam.

Oh yeah, remove the dude the US gov put in power.
Not a single "replaced" gov put in power by the US has survived.

But hey, don't worry, according to Cheney the insurgency is in its "last throes".

"What about all those people pouring over the borders INTO Iraq Mr. Cheney?"
Oh thats just a bunch of folks.

[Fishpart]

The reserve component is more than 50% of th emilitary at 10% of the price of the active force. Need to spend teh defense money for expensive weapons system development to keep the congressional pork barrels full....

[MakoMike]

Disregarding the reasons or lack thereof, for going to war.

There has never been a war in recent history that we have won and where we have not had to leave substantial amounts of troops behind to restore the damage. We still have troops in Germany and Japan fifty yeasr after we defeated them. And right after the surrenders things weren't much different in Japan and Germany than they are in Iraq right now. But no one wants to point out that piece of history.

We still have troops in Korea almost fifty years after that war. The only place we don't have troops is Vietnam, and that's only because we lost that war.

IMHO short attention span is waay to generous for the American Public's patience with any kind of long term project.

Secondy, think about this. All of the Deocrats and some of the Republican are screaming that Iraq's borders are "porous" and there are thousands of islamic militants coming in every day to fight us. If they are right, then I'm really glad that we are fighting them over there and not in NY and Boston!

[likwid]

Name a single country we helped overthrow in the past 25 years that has stuck together.

[MakoMike]

Nicaragua and Panama

[likwid]

Why did we keep sending troops to Nicaragua then?

1912: U.S. Marines invade Nicaragua and occupy the country almost continuously until 1933.
1933: U.S. Marines finally leave Nicaragua, but are replaced by a well-trained and well-armed National Guard under the control of Anastasio Somoza.
1981: The Reagan Administration begins the war against Nicaragua.
1990: The U.S. intervenes in the Nicaraguan election process through covert and overt means.

That dosen't seem very stable to me.

And the best part:
The economy received a boost in 2004 when the World Bank (International Bank for Reconstruction and Development) agreed to wipe out 80 percent of Nicaragua's debt to the organization.

If Argentina and Chile are an example, looks like all hell is about to break loose again.

note to John, et al: I'm being friendly and refuse to respond to any baiting/name calling/etc, thats for SOL/TT, not here.

[MakoMike]

Liikwid,
Nicaragua has been stable since the mid 1980s, and you did specify the last 25 years. If you want to back further, say 50 years, I'll add the big ones, Japan and Germany!