Iraqi Progress?

[weaver]

On Thurs, May 24 2007 - Iraqi Prime Minister al-Maliki submitted to Iraq’s legislature a list of six ministers to fill the vacancies left after radical Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr’s political bloc pulled out of the Cabinet. Al-Maliki also announced that additional changes to his Cabinet are in the works. The Cabinet changes are small compared to the shifts in the Iraqi political system that will result from negotiations between the United States and Iran, prospective changes that motivated al-Sadr’s pullout from the al-Maliki government.

What we are seeing is a temporary shift.. cosmetic.. within the cabinet of Iraq. The REAL work going on is the detente between the US and IRAN. I believe we are beginning to see a shift towards a real government in Iraq that has a middle ground between Iranian objectives and a US pullout on our terms.

[Raven]

I think progress IS being made in Iraq yes.

It may be slllooooooowwwwww but it is happening.

The UK forces have given 3 sectors over to the Iraqi government and are looking to give Basra back soon too.

From a personal point of view the sooner BOTH the UK and US forces have left the better. There's not a week goes by without some poor sod being killed / kidnapped or blown to bits in a war we really cannot win.

Look at Chechnia and how badly the Soviet Union fared against a determined resistance force

Rob

[weaver]

ya.. and look how good they did in Afghan...

We are not the Soviets.

[Raven]

No we shoot friendlies.........they don't :P

Iraq is a war we can NEVER win Weaver. We are fighting against an opponent who are from Iraq and no matter how many die fighting for "their" cause others will join!

It'll be never ending..........

I sincerely hope that when / if our government changes at the next elections we pull ALL our troops out. We were wrong to get involved in the first place and are currently wrong for being there at the moment.

Sorry, but thats the general concensus amongst UK residents.

Rob

[weaver]

So.. the general consensus of the population of the UK is..

"Better to leave a brutal murderous bastard in power then to try to remove him.. "

Or perhaps the consensus is "We don't really need oil, so lets go ahead and let the Middle-East fall apart.."

Things that make you go.. hmmmm.

[fallen1]

Originally Posted by weaver

So.. the general consensus of the population of the UK is..

"Better to leave a brutal murderous bastard in power then to try to remove him.. "

I thought that's what the general consensus of the US population was when Bush won in 2004...

[weaver]

ooooooohhh Fallen just got on my 'shi% list'

[theTurkey]

If the removal of a brutal dictator was the only goal, why are we still there? The "brutal dictator" was removed years ago, and he has subsequently been tried and executed. I am going to resist the urge to climb on my soapbox, but I will say that "progress" will have to be more narrowly defined before I can say yes or no. Progress towards what? IMHO there is a lot of death, destruction, and despair in the Iraq I read about....maybe too much to label it with a positive term like progress

[Nikki]

Yes - we removed Saddam from power - I guess in some ways we can chalk that up to progress. Not for us, but hopefully, someday for the people of Iraq.

That being said...when you have suicide bombings, kidnappings and other terrorists attrocities going on every day, how do you possibly classify that as progress. Aside from the U.S and Ally Service men and women that are killed just about daily at this point, the Iraqi casualities are too numerous to count.

Unfortunately there is no good solution. Even if the new government in Iraq is able to stablize itself, then we have Iran rumbling around about nukes. Then there's all the unrest in Africa.

There's all this talk about oil prices...what about the human cost of all this mess?

[Raven]

Originally Posted by weaver

Or perhaps the consensus is "We don't really need oil, so lets go ahead and let the Middle-East fall apart.."

Things that make you go.. hmmmm.

Major oil production is no longer from the Middle East Dude.

Also the US produces almost enough oil to be "self sufficient" and if the UK (or scotland now that we have our own government) held on to it's North sea oil rather (than selling it) would have all the oil and gas we required

Saddam has gone and, unforunately, I was against us joining the conflict and following the US to war.

We're entitled to our opinion and, whilst i agree that getting rid of Saddam was a priority, we've done that so why are we still there? (we being the UK)

Rob

[weaver]

We don't produce enough gas / oil to be self sufficient - we produce 40% only. Now, 40% happens to be one of the largest producing oil sources in the world but we do eat an awful lot of oil.

Lets forget the niceties and philosophy of why we went to war and why we are still there. Lets forget 'democracy' and 'brutal dictators'. Lets go back to the basics of economics.

1) Middle-East has oil - A lot of it still.
2) we still receive 25% of our oil from the ME
3) a good chunk of the pacific rim depends on ME oil.

In 1973 the ME OPEC decided.. hmm.. we don't like the US and their support for Israel, so let's SCREW them and stop selling oil to the US. What happened? We got screwed. For 18 months, people were lining up for VERY expensive gasoline only to find it rationed by the federal and state government. Why didn't the US do anything about this? We couldn't. We had a small contingent of marines in Lebanon and that was it. The Russians backed Iran and Syria. We could not move troops into the region.

Guess what - THAT won't be a problem any time soon. Like it or not, for whatever reason you want to accept, the US has now extreme MILITARY and ECONOMIC pressure to bring against OPEC if it decided to try to deny US oil. We are practicing RealPolitic (not the first nor last time you will hear that from me).

Don't start whining to me next about "what right do we have to make them sell our oil.." get with the program. Its not about "right" - it's about economic necessity. We NEED oil to keep our economic gears running. We will ENSURE that this remains a possibility until we get our butts OFF of the black tar.

Rant over. Vote for Fred Thomson or Mitt Romney. I will.

[cpnichol]

Sounds like a very good reason to start using less oil and try to become energy self sufficient.

[White-Pinnacle]

If removing a brutal dictator from power is the goal, then why hasn't the U.S. removed Kim Jong Il from North Korea. How about the government of Myamar (ex-Burma)? Or how about the government of Sudan?

The Bush administration saw Saddam as a threat it took the unprecedented step of invading a legitimate government. Yes, yes . . . an unfriendly government; however, still a legitimate government. After the invasion, a lot of hope and expectation that the Iraqi's will step up to the plate and take care of themselves. Unfortunately, their loyalties to their family/tribe/religion was more important than Nationalism. The U.S. and the rest of the western countries do not understand the mind set in the Middle East. Just take a look at the Palestinians. They're more interested in fighting among themselves Fatah vs Hamas than the Israelis. In Iraq, you have the Sunni, Shiites, Al-Qaeda, weak U.S. back government (corruption), the U.S., and the Kurds. Unfortunately, it's a free for all. Plus you have the Saudi's backing up the Sunnis and the Iranians supporting the Shiites.

Basically, the U.S. is screwed. Can't leave and can't stay. Leave and the Iraqi government will fall and the Iranians will be calling the shots in Iraq . . . the Iraqi country if you call it will be fragmented. Al Qaeda will have an example to the world that the U.S. can be defeated and the smaller Persian Gulf states will be next as well as the moderate Muslim countries like Jordan and Egypt. Moderate Muslim countries need a strong man (dictator) to keep things in order . . . they don't understand or want democracy.

The U.S. invaded Iraq because of oil. Plain is simple. I already posted prior but 40% of world's oil goes through the Persian Gulf via the Strait of Hormuz. Two channels inbound/outbound 2 miles wide each. If we screw with Iran, couple of mines in the channels will jack up the price of oil it won't be funny. Talk about oil self sufficiency . . . that doesn't exist in the West. It's a single world market.

The Western Civilization does not understand the mind set of the Muslim world. Self sacrifice . . . being a suicide bomber. We cannot fathom such an act of defiance in our culture; however, it's a normal for the Muslim culture.

I personally don't see any type of successful closure unless the Iraqi's themselves can unite and get all non-Iraq's out of their country.

OPREP

P.S. I'm pro-military and hope I'm not on Weaver's S*** List.

[jonybvo]

Let me introduce myself, I am Jony,
I'm 25 years old and I am student.

I am happy I can join to this Forum Family.
I am sure I will find on this forum many intresting posts.



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