How long should we stay in Iraq?

Question

It is now more then 4 years since Bush intentionally invaded Iraq.....Keep in mind he didn't make any serious diplomatic effort to resolve it peacably once he got authorization from congress to act.......Proven by his ordering UN inspectors out before they finished their inspections......The Iraqis have had 4 years to form a government..........4 years to institute an army and police force to secure its own security.......How much longer should we stay?

Answer 1

Until Iran and Syria stop sending arms in and Iraq's governance is stable.

Answer 2

The fact is, ending the threat of jihadist terrorist attacks against the US and its allies would be easy enough. You just need to do what Ron Paul has done, and pay attention to the actual motivations of the jihadist terrorists. Every serious analysis has concluded that their hatred of the US is motivated by actions that the US government has undertaken in their part of the world -- harmful interventions against Muslim populations. These include backing Israeli attacks on Palestinians, the destruction of the civilian infrastructure of Iraq and sanctions that killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians, support for various dictators in countries like Saudi Arabia, etc.

In order to eventually halt the jihadist terrorists from making these attacks, the US should stop committing these harmful interventions and thus remove the motivation for the jihadist terrorists (whose attacks on civilians they by no means justify) in the first place. Ending these harmful interventions would in any case be the right thing to do from a moral standpoint.

This should of course be combined with a strong law-enforcement effort to go after the jihadist terrorists who undertake such attacks.

Instead, though, the Bush administration has chosen to deny reality, misrepresent the terrorists' motivations, and to engage in even more of these harmful interventions (the invasion/occupation of Iraq, Ethiopia's proxy invasion/occupation of Somalia, etc.). This simply makes the problem worse, motivating more and more Muslims to join the jihadists, and landing the US in the Iraqi quagmire -- much to the delight of al-Qaida, as they state in their internal documents.

A caveat is in order, though. This strategy would take some time to eliminate the motivations of the jihadists -- that kind of hatred and fanaticism does not end in a day.

Another helpful thing to do would be to aid the good groups in the region, such as:

http://www.rawa.org/
http://www.ifcongress.com/english/index.htm
http://www.equalityiniraq.com/english.htm
http://www.awalls.org/

News & Views for Anarchists & Activists:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo/

Answer 3

Since we are supposedly promoting democracy in Iraq, I suggest that we open this question as a public referendum to be voted upon by the citizens of Iraq. Based upon surveys, I think that the population would ask us to leave ASAP.

The multinational oil companies have other ideas.

Answer 4

are you insane?

13 years of failed diplomatic efforts, with 16 ignored U.N. mandates!!!!!

Yes, he "intentionally" overthrew Saddam, it was no accident.