Should America Pull out of Iraq?

Answer 1

Of course - we shouldn't have been there in the first place.

Answer 2

This question has been asked so often even just in Yahoo! Answers and the horse pulling this cart beaten to death for so long that I wonder why people bother re-asking this question over and over again.

There is a point where the American military presence faces diminishing returns. On one hand, our presence moderates the excesses of the various paramilitaries and the Iraqi security forces when we're on the scene and on the ground (anyone who has worked with Iraqi Police or Iraqi Army units can tell you about the sort of over-zealousness with which they approach, say, detention and interrogation), and on the other, it opens the nascent Iraqi government to charges of collusion, and it makes those Arab League states allied to us (Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, for instance) highly unpopular with their people.

The biggest danger in Iraq is the civil war that is being waged daily at very low intensity becoming a full-blown Lebanon scenario, where the Iraqi security forces split along ethnic and sectarian lines, carve out fiefdoms, and proceed to slug each other back through prehistoric times. Whether you like it or not, the American military presence is literally the biggest bulwark against the collapse of Iraq into warring states.

The diminishing returns occur when the central government in Baghdad is no longer able to assert any sort of authority because frustration with the occupation somehow reaches a fever pitch amongst the local populace. Abu Ghraib and Mahmoudiyah scenarios are exactly what drive Iraqis to this sort of consensus, undoing thousands of man-hours of hard work repairing Iraq's infrastructure, economy, and government. When the cost of being present in Iraq means the central government, even if it is functional and able to maintain security in Iraq, cannot sustain itself in the face of hostility from the Iraqi people, that is the time that American troops should withdraw.

Any withdrawal must be due to bilateral consensus, not a unilateral "pack up and leave" influenced by cowards and hypocrites amongst the American public or elsewhere. A unilateral withdrawal will create a power vacuum that will be filled by kidnap gangs, paramilitaries, and criminals, and create even more bloodshed - bloodshed which will invariably be blamed on the Americans, even though the overwhelming majority of Iraqis killed today are the victims of Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence. These selfsame cowards and hypocrites want the American military presence gone, but will no doubt blame the lack of the American military presence for any future violence. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

In the end, any consensus on troop withdrawal from Iraq must be based on rational policy and bilateral agreements between Washington and Baghdad, never mind consultations with the regional allies most impaced by such a change in policy. It is one thing to be judged by twelve or carried by six, it is another thing entirely to be sentenced by someone on their duff watching FOX or CNN.

The 2010 timetable sounds rational. Anyone who believes that it's excessive should study the British success in dealing with the communist insurgency in Malaya, and how long THAT took. You can either have slow measured steps towards success, or you can have rapid collapse of order and total failure. You cannot have both.

Answer 3

I think that we should only leave after the situation there is resolved. All pulling out now will do is make us look weak and severely weaken the ties with our allies. Then there is the fact that if we pull out now we will only bring the fight home with us. Then what, we will have all of our major cities attacked and we will be worse off than if we had just stayed to finish the job.

Answer 4

Yes but probably not for the reasons you are thinking... I support all the troops and want them all to come home safely..but the reason I think we should pull out of Iraq is because at some point a country has to fight for what they want themselves... we have given them an excellent start now it's up to them to decide what they want out of their country. We had a lot of help in our past to get up where we are today, but we mostly did it on our own.. we had a vision of what we wanted and fought for it.. at some point Iraq has to do that for themselves - we can't always hold their hand.

Answer 5

I think before we pull out of Iraq, we ought a pull out of Bosnia/Kosovo, etc. We've been there eleven years, even though Slick Willie said we'd be out by the following Christmas.

Answer 6

it seems pointless and futile, at this point the damage is done and war is not won, nobody lost money bigtime in the process and it very much happens like they were allowed by their neighboors. America should attend to their internal aspects and own democracy and expect less income reductions to internal revenue, or perhaps reduce the army to regroup and form some peace corps, as in Japan, to create certain peace sensation to alleviate the international pressure on this affair and help oil price and transport fees, which is to be considered the payment overdue to receive Iraq for his troubles as a sitting duck during this fatidic showdown. Bye.

Answer 7

not yet. they still need us over there. if we pull out too early, then everything we have done over there will have been a waste. iraq cant handle it on their own yet (and thats not my opinion. that came directly from the mouth of the president of iraq).

Answer 8

Eventually, yes. But we have NO reason to let our enemies know when. Think about it. Would we have given Imperial Japan a timetable for the end of our occupation at the end of WWII?

Answer 9

LOL no, we don't want to get her pregnant. That's hot!

I think the US should pull out and every other nation that is there that shouldn't be. Let Iraq handle the issues themselves.

Answer 10

No. Keep the badguys busy and dying in that neck of the woods instead of trying to keep them from doing something in the US, EU or elsewhere ..

Answer 11

The problem with that is they're going to invade us when we leave to give us a taste of our own medicine.

You don't think they're going to let us get away with having our troops there for a few years do you?