Quote:
Originally Posted by Gozer
You're talking like we can stop this travesty now. If America cut & ran, they would lose less troops, true. But the entire mid-east would be plunged into a chaotic battle for power, where the most ruthless murderers would take control of the gov't, implement martial law, and flourish with Iraqi oil money. Leaving would result in many more Iraqis having their homes, families and lives destroyed.
Why don't they count?
Bang on.
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So let me get this straight: your argument is that although the Iraq war is an unmitigated disaster, the U.S. should not create a timeline for withdrawal under any circumstances, because to do so
might plunge the entire middle east into a chaotic battle for power? The U.S. should continue to occupy Iraq--an open-ended occupation--because even though they will not achieve their objectives through occupation, the potential outcomes of withdrawal could be really, really bad?
I guess we disagree on the hypothetical future, then. Let me just suggest that the situation in the middle east is complex and is affected by more than just U.S. military power.
But more importantly, aren't we talking about sticking your thumb in the dike at this point? To me it's not enough to say that American troops are preventing civil war in Iraq--especially since it's not clear that they are. If the occupation has no objective, and no endpoint--then the lives of all the Americans and allied forces that have been killed AND all of those Iraqis that you claim I'm forgetting to consider have been sacrificed in vain. There has to be a rationale that isn't just sticking your thumb in the dike. There has to be a real, tangible objective, otherwise this whole thing really is senseless.
Just leaving troops there at any cost to prevent some hypothetical future disaster is not an acceptable rationale.