Why aren't more Americans fighting the terrorists over in Iraq before they can attack US soil again?

Question

2 million US troops on the ground in Iraq would very quickly win the war in Iraq & defeat Al Qaeda terrorists in Iraq. Iraq wouldn't become a terror state & Democracy would flourish. And don't forget all that Iraq oil that would begin to flow freely again bring down US gas prices.

But it seems that most Americans are satisfied with an undermanned US army/marines in Iraq who are only big enough to create a stalemate in Iraq & help Al Qaeda recruit new terrorists.

Americans weren't afraid to take on the Nazis or the Japanese in WW2 but for some reason they don't have the balls to take on the terrorists? Why is that?

Answer 1

Uh oh, I sense a problem.

Iraq did not attack American soil, my friend. That was Al-Quadea, remember, the planes, buildings, Bin Laden, etc.?

Anyway, I agree with you. We need to send troops over there and annihilate them. Do whatever it takes. Kill the savages.

Answer 2

Good question.

1. Clinton cut the size of the Army by 50% - we are overextended now.

2. Even with the war, only 4% of the GNP is being sent to the military. The Reagan administration "surge" was only 6%. Kennedy used 9%. Eisenhower 11%. Experts have been saying that it needs to be about 8% for about 20 years to repair the damage done by Carter, HW Bush, Clinton, and W Bush.

3. The Air Force is being required to cut its size even more - NOW - while several small-scale wars are going on and even though they too are over extended.

4. Emergency troops - the Guard and Reserve - are being used like active duty troops endangering the whole system. Employers can not be expected to hire people that will be gone 50% of the time.

5. Radical Islam is a war where the winner decides what civilization is like - just like WWII and the Cold War.

We hav the means even if entitlements are using in excess of 50% of the GNP - what is lacking is the political and domestic will. I think people are deluded by the good times and just cannot see the danger.

Answer 3

Where do those figures come from? How does anyone know there's a 30-50% chance? Or that it will happen in the next 10 years. Did you just make that up? Any kind of nuclear attack would have to be a dirty bomb type. If ICBMs were launched at us we have Star Wars type satellites that will shoot them down. Chemical or biological attacks are possible and could happen any time. Hopefully everyone involved in gathering intelligence on terrorists is doing their job and catching them before they attack. Realistically there is bound to be an intelligence failure at some point. Then we will have another '9/11'.

Answer 4

You seem to believe that all the terrorists in the world are right there in Iraq. What's most absurd is that you also believe there is a war going on in Iraq. Any celebrity or wealthy person could safely travel to Iraq right now. Michael Moore did that a few years ago when he made that movie Fahrenheit 911. I agree with Mitchell. This is a total joke. This is the reason why Republicans lost control of Congress in 2006. They didn't want to do anything for Americans at home. So, they simply kept talking about Iraq and spending taxpayers' money on their own pet projects. Now, the liberals want to make Americans less reliant on oil. This is something the neocons talked about, but they never invested any money into alternative sources of energy. And they still don't want to do anything about the price of oil because they have been making so much money by investing in oil stocks. The neocons have done a great job of making empty promises to the American people, and that's why Republicans lost control of Congress in 2006. This is infuriating to me because I am a Republican. The U.S. national debt is $9 trillion dollars right now. It was about $4 trillion dollars before Bush became President in 2000. Republican voters thought the Republicans in Congress would spend conservatively, but they spent liberally. I think it's going to be very difficult for a Republican to become President in 2008. What will be his platform for getting elected? What is he going to tell the American people? Is he going to tell them that terrorists will come to America if the situation in Iraq does not improve? Terrorists could do that right now. The Iraqis have to keep the terrorists out of their country by killing them. That's what any democracy on earth has to do in order to survive. The Iraqis have already went to the polls and voted. They are not being ruled by Saddam Hussein or Adolf Hitler.

Answer 5

Because the terrorists are sneaky......they hide from us and then they surprise ambush. They set up roadside bombs hoping to kill us, and in fact killing many of there own people in doing so. Then they go and hide and repeat the process again and again. Other countries at least stand up and fight without running and hiding and only popping their heads up to toss a bomb our way.
Standing up and FIGHTING for your cause is respectable, no matter what side you are on, and we can respect that because we would do the same.
If you haven't already figured it out, terrorists do not fight fairly.......they are dressed as ordinary people with no uniforms. They do not care who falls in their wake and even have been known to strap dynamite to there childrens bodies under their clothing and make seemingly harmless contact with the soldiers only to blow them up by means of remote detonation.
Yes, it's true that we could totaly enilate the country if we really wanted to, but I assure you that we wouldn't. We dismantled their military AND government within a matter of days when we first invaded. We only want to take care of the problems and leave the innocent alone.
THEY believe that we all should die, and WE believe only the guilty ones should die.
The balls are here my freind, it's just that we're fighting a different kind of war than what Earth's history has seen before.
We don't want to kill everyone in hopes of killing the terrorists. If we can't distinguish between ordinary citezin, and terrorist, how do you suggest we root out the problem ones?? It's a tough question to answer, and if there was an easy solution, it would have been done already.

Answer 6

First of all, get the facts straight. It was Rumsfeld and the DOD that decided to wage a war using a small than needed force and trying to budgetize everything, including armor and man power. It was also them who repeatedly refused to acknowledge that their strategy was not going to work and that they underestimated the possibility of resistance.

They also decided to wage a war in which most of America and the world were unsure of whether this war should have been fought. Then they tried to sell it to a skeptical audience by using ridiculous scare tactics of WMD's and terrorists.

As for al Qeada in Iraq, they had no footing in Iraq under Saddam's regime because he feared and despised them as much as America. Al Qeada in Iraq appeared after the regime was toppled and war lords in Iraq realized that there was a growning resentment in Iraq at America's unwillingness to leave and allow them to govern themselves.

Also, most Americans feel that they have been lied to so many times by the Bush Administration that they are unwilling to follow him any longer. Most Americans and Congressional leaders have a sentiment that we only have to wait out the remaining 1 1/2 years and then get someone else.

And besides, sending more troops to the region would not help. As more destruction and deaths occur in Iraq, the international community and the citizens look at America as the ultimate cause of it. They expect anything that gets destroyed to be rebuilt by America. So sending in extra troops to create more damage would only lead to a bigger mess to clean up.

This would have all been avoided had the administration presented a clear cut reason to go to war without any skepticism. Also, if this administration had finished the war in Afghanistan with the capture of al Qeada's top leaders, people would have felt more confidence in them to wage war on another country.

As for the Nazi's and Jap's in WW2, that was a different story. America was viewed differently by the rest of the world and the government treated the American public with a different level of respect. The Axis was clearly out to destroy America and its allies and the government had tried every diplomatic solution possible before pulling the trigger. WIth the terrorists, American officials seem to be doing more to create more anti-American sentiment rather than trying to alienate the terrorists from the rest of the world so that they cannot function. I hate to say it, but because of America's previous foreign policy foul-ups, America appears to be the bad guys in this war.

Answer 7

2 million US troops on the ground in Iraq would be a conquering imperial army that is hated just as they are now with 150,000..

And I'm not sure what you think they would "win" in Iraq. The place is a civil war now. Most Iraqis wish the US would go home.

Terriorists? Hello! Any terriorists who are planning to attack US soil are doing it in the US and whatever the US army is doing in the war in Iraq has nothing to do with it.

THINK!

Answer 8

not most, but some are satisfied with that number. there is a lot of flag waving, but not as much feeling of taking a part in it yourself.

2 million is a huge number. they would have to re-institute the draft to be able to raise that many trained troops. to implement the draft, train and equip that number would take several years. sometimes congress can't agree to adjourn for several hours.

maybe, just maybe, the administration wanted this type of limited war. didn't rumsfeld say that you don't go to war with the army that you want, rather you go to war with the army that you have? poor planning, poorly equipped forces caused lots of unnecessary death and injuries. because they couldn't wait and do it right.

Answer 9

You may be right , but i doubt it. I have a question for you. What is stopping terrorists from attacking the US now? If they could get here don't you think they would, esp since we have so many big fat juicy unguard targets? It is exrtremely difficult for them to get here now and that would be the case if we left Iraq tomorrow.

Answer 10

Amerians are not going to volunteer for Bush's war. The terrorists are not--and never were--in Iraq. They are in Afghanistan and Pakistan-where Bush has deliberately allowed them to regroup and rebuild.

We don't need "2 million troops" in Iraq--we need an end to Bush's attempt to conquer a country that was not a threat and never attacked us. And we need an end to the sacrifice of American lives to feed the sik egos of Bsuh and the unpatriotic neocons who continue to support his policy of killing Amricans while giving safe haven to al-Qaida.

Answer 11

It's not a matter of having "balls"; Americans don't believe in this war, or that it even is a war.

It's a contrived conflict designed to control the public through fear to secure their positions in government and help those that got them elected to profiteer.

We aren't even going after the people that attacked us; we're going after the new group of insurgents that we created.

They tried to make Jessica Lynchout to be this courageous hero, that turned out to be a lie (she exposed it herself).

They tried to make Pat Tillman out to be this courageous hero and that turned out to be a lie (to cover up the fact that he was murdered).

It's really pathetic.