I was against the Iraq war from day 1, but why are we now not giving the surge time to work?

Question

I think we should give this new plan some time to see if it can succeed. Pulling out now seems to me to be a disastrous idea. I think there are some signs that the "surge" is working (at least in Baghdad). Sure, the Iraqi government is a mess, but what else could we reasonably expect? We created this mess - are we now going to pack up and say "you fix it" to these people? I think the reputation of the US is shot, and that every third rate power is going to see that we're vulnerable. That doesn't make for a safer world.

In my view, the only candidte who is showing any courage during this time is McCain. I didn't agree with him that the US should go after Saddam; however, I have always agreed with him that we didn't put enough troops in there. I also agree with him that we shouldn't pull out now. Unfortunately, I don't think the US population will grow a backbone until we're actually attacked at home.

Answer 1

The Dems are afraid it might work, which is against their interests. They have put their own greed for power and control ahead of the nations best interests. A sad state of affairs I'd say.

Answer 2

#1 We did not create "this mess". On 9-11, remember, thousands died. Where were the terrorists from? Not nessissarily from Iraq. The war was not directly caused by 9-11, but helped push Americans over the edge into a war.

#2 The war was started in Iraq due to the threat of weapons of mass destruction. Of which he had. He used them against his own people as proof. Again weapons of mass destruction includes more than just nuclear weapons. Where did they go? I think we can all figure it out. Sadam sent fighter jets to Iran in order to protect them from destruction. But we never hear anything more about that.

#3 The terrorists... They may not have all been from Iraq, but they are there now. They have chosen to meet us on that battlefield. But where are they coming from?

#4 There is a media agenda here also. They truly dislike (hate is not applicable here) our current president and will do anything to give him a bad rap. If they can not find a jaw dropping story to inflict upon him, they will and do distort what they have.

I agree we need to give the surge a chance. National Guard units from my area have just left here lot long ago and others are preparing for departure from here heading for Iraq. The surge is far from its peak. But you don't hear that in the news.

If we pull out now... They have won. It would clearly be irresponsible to just up and leave without securing some sort of government control and military presence there. The surrounding wolves are awaiting our departure in order to feed on the body of an injured country. We must be patient. This is slow work, managing another countries problems. It cannot be completed in 30 minutes as we Americans observe on the typical popular television sitcom. This is real life and has real problems which can take many years to even come close to solve.

Americans are impatient, but I am. Our soldiers are doing good work there. Another thing we do not hear about. To them I say. Keep up the good work. I await your safe return.

Answer 3

I was thinking we needed to take out Sadaam before 9/11 ever happened. This war is long overdue. When Bush Senior forced Hussein out of Kuwiat in the Gulf War, instead of taking him out then, Bush encouraged the Iraqi people to revolt. They did...and were slaughtered as our fighter jets flew over and watched the massacre. It is no wonder they don't trust us to stay and finish the job this time. Since we started this war, all of the dimocrites that can find their way in front of a mic and/or camera have been calling for us to turn our back on the Iraqi people once again. GW has the right idea. We can't expect the Iraqi's to join the fight unless they are 100% certain that we won't leave them to be slaughtered again. How can they be certain of that when the dems having been calling for surrender ever since they voted for. Combine that with a media will amplify the anti-war voices, while it muffles any voices that support victory, and you can see why they doubt our committment. If you think the reputation of the US is shot now, it will be a hundered times worse if we pull out and leave the iraqi's to be slaughtered, like we did in Vietnam. As far as our rep goes, OBL himself said that he knew we could be defeated when he saw Clinton's reaction to the several attacks during his term in office...which was basically no reaction... . If our enemies think we're cruel they may keep hating us, but if they think we're puss-ies, they'll kill us... We need to come together and defeat these crazy bastards!!!!

Answer 4

I think i agree with your reasoning in that leaving now would be very disastrous. I have been for the war until about a year ago, but i still think we need to stay if we want the lives of thousands of soldiers and tens of billions of dollars to count for something.

As to why "we" are not giving the surge time to work, many people are obviously fed up. We could cut the losses and rebuild. Also, any democrat will be against any possible move Bush makes, which makes for a lot of people who don't want to wait. Plus what progress have we made so far? Very little...it is very doubtful we can start gaining a lot against terrorists there.

Its all opinion though, so you might need a lot of answers lol.

Answer 5

i can see your point of view, but the longer we are there, the more soldiers die senselessly, and the more the rest of the world sees us as terrorists. Once we get Bush's reign of terror out of the oval office, hopefully the needless violence will end, and we can work to restore our own country.

I have an odd position on the war. I dont support the war at all, but i support the soldiers who are doing their jobs, because it was not them that decided to go to war.

I also feel that what makes our country so high and mighty that we have to come to everyone elses rescue. We have enough problems in this country to take care of. we need to focus on restoring our country more than every other country on the planet. We basically act as the "world police" without any reason to. We are not perfect. We have no right to push our beliefs and governmental system on other countries.

Answer 6

Well, if we're vulnerable then we should bring all our troops back home so they can protect us instead of staying in a country where they're not welcome. Besides, we offered to fix the mess we made, or make an effort to and they blew up our boys. They don't want the troops there, we don't want the troops, the few military guys I know don't want to go / be there, so why are we sending more?

If the U.S. reputation is shot anyway, why not make everyone happy and pull the troops out?

Answer 7

If you'll recall, the people calling it a waste, have consistently called for retreat. They are desperately trying to create a perception of loss and it is only for their own political power that they are undermining the national interests of the nation.

The truly frustrating thing is the measure of failure that these politicans and journalists use, which is the number of engagements and body counts. One cannot conduct military operations without losing the lives of some soldiers. When an enemy is desperate, they will commit to more desperate measures such as larger bombs at larger events. (If you have lost 50% of your people but still have 80% of your explosives, you can add 40% to each bombers load.) (If you're being forced out of your bases, you have the option of using up your ammo/explosives or losing it.)

Hence, using the measures of failure those anti war types are using, it is easy to claim that any agressive military action is a failure, particularly in the early stages of it. Using their measures, D-Day was one of the greatest failures in history.

Answer 8

The surge is already a failure. The deaths are mounting on a daily basis and the presence of a mere 30,000 additional American troops will not contain what is now a civil war.

Giving it more time will only further expose our troops to more deaths and result in the unnecessary deaths of innocent Iraqi civilians.

It's a total failure, just like the man who cooked the idea up, George W. Bush.

Answer 9

The last thing the democrats want is for GW to succeed with this.

They have talked down this war from the start (even though they ALL voted for it)

Answer 10

The last thing Democrats want to see is victory in Iraq.

Sad, but true.