Tenth anniversary of Iraq invasion noted--

[Anonymous]

 

[Whitewing]

I'll gladly debate anyone who wishes on the logic of invading Iraq in the aftermath of 9-11.



Yup, they were primarilly Saudi's, hiding in Afghanistan---gotta hit either Iraq or possibly New Jersey, for starters.

quote--"And I'll say it again (last time I said this the old man about had a coronary :lol: ), the actual invasion and defeat of Saddam's forces went about as well as could be expected.

Yup, the most powerful militiary nation the world has ever known had little trouble with the 'invade and defeat' of a 4th class power--I'll second that.

Trouble is---remember the dumbass flying backseat in his flight suit---held up returning carrier--for "mission accomplished" horseshit?---Said dumbass had no second act, thought it was done deal.

Might want to look up how many lives--and TRILLIONS of dollars---this ill conceived and mismanaged abortion has cost the U.S, afore you git your hair all slickumed back and debatin suit ironed.

1) most powerful military nation the world has ever known had little trouble with the invade and defeat of a 4th class power

2) dumbass flying backseat in his flight suit....mission accomplished etc

3) how many lives and TRILLIONS of dollars spent

4) before I git my hair (don't have hair) all slickumed back and debatin suit ironed

Three significant debating points indeed, but none of which I was trying to make. You do seem to feel very passionately about the issues though, and that's a good thing.

As for the personal, childish insults about my challenge to debate the logic of the invasion in the light of the events of 9-11, I honestly don't understand them. I've never insulted you or your posting style in any way. Having said that, I'll assume you'd rather not debate my main point, and that's fine too.

If I'm incorrect, please accept my apology and feel free to lay out your logic of why it would have been wrong at the time to have contemplated the invasion of Iraq.

 

[kolanuraven]

And the fact of the matter is that, irregardless, the war was won when Bush left office and all the chosen one had to do was to sustain. He's f***ed that up just like most everything else. What a tribute to those that made the ultimate sacrifice.

How is the war " won"? We are still there and things are getting worse, not better. Look at the series of car bombings just the other day...........

Tell me how are things better for the Iraqi people?

We'll be paying for this war, in various ways, for a 100 yrs.

There are still payments made to this day to the relatives of Civil war veterans, over 100 yrs later!!!

 

[Whitewing]

On the issue of the now-infamous "Mission Accomplished" sign, from wiki:

The banner stating "Mission Accomplished" was a focal point of controversy and criticism. Navy Commander and Pentagon spokesman Conrad Chun said the banner referred specifically to the aircraft carrier's 10-month deployment (which was the longest deployment of a carrier since the Vietnam War) and not the war itself, saying "It truly did signify a mission accomplished for the crew."

The White House claimed that the banner was requested by the crew of the ship, who did not have the facilities for producing such a banner. Afterward, the administration and naval sources stated that the banner was the Navy's idea, White House staff members made the banner, and it was hung by the U.S. Navy personnel. White House spokesman Scott McClellan told CNN, "We took care of the production of it. We have people to do those things. But the Navy actually put it up."[8] According to John Dickerson of Time magazine, the White House later conceded that they hung the banner but still insists it had been done at the request of the crew members.

Whether meant for the crew or not, the general impression created by the image of Bush under the banner has been criticized as premature, especially later as the guerrilla war began. Subsequently, the White House released a statement saying that the sign and Bush's visit referred to the initial invasion of Iraq.

Bush's speech noted:

"We have difficult work to do in Iraq. We are bringing order to parts of that country that remain dangerous." "Our mission continues...The War on Terror continues, yet it is not endless. We do not know the day of final victory, but we have seen the turning of the tide."

The speech also said that:

"In the Battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed."

When he received an advance copy of the speech, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld took care to remove any use of the phrase "Mission Accomplished" in the speech itself. Later, when journalist Bob Woodward asked him about his changes to the speech, Rumsfeld responded: "I was in Baghdad, and I was given a draft of that thing to look at. And I just died, and I said my God, it's too conclusive. And I fixed it and sent it back... they fixed the speech, but not the sign.

 

[kolanuraven]

How is it better?

YOU answer me, not some cut and paste piece you found.

 

[Whitewing]

And the fact of the matter is that, irregardless, the war was won when Bush left office and all the chosen one had to do was to sustain. He's f***ed that up just like most everything else. What a tribute to those that made the ultimate sacrifice.

How is the war " won"? We are still there and things are getting worse, not better. Look at the series of car bombings just the other day...........

Tell me how are things better for the Iraqi people?

We'll be paying for this war, in various ways, for a 100 yrs.

There are still payments made to this day to the relatives of Civil war veterans, over 100 yrs later!!!

Last Convoy of American Troops Leaves Iraq

18 December 2011

BAGHDAD — The last convoy of American troops drove into Kuwait on Sunday morning, punctuating the end of the nearly nine-year war in Iraq.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/19/world/middleeast/last-convoy-of-american-troops-leaves-iraq.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

 

[Whitewing]

How is it better?

YOU answer me, not some cut and paste piece you found.

Kurdish kids living under Saddam Hussein

Kurds today:

Since the American occupation of Iraq began, the Kurdistan Regional Government has enjoyed an unprecedented degree of autonomy. Kurdistan's economy has benefited from improvements in Iraq's domestic security situation, and international observers have suggested that this "quasi-state" is more prosperous and independent than ever before.

11 March 2003

This advice has been reviewed and reissued with an amendment to the Terrorism section (need for adequate documentation). The overall level of the advice has not changed; we advise against all but essential travel to the whole of Iraq, with the exception of the Kurdistan region, where there are no travel restrictions in place in our travel advice.

http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/travel-and-living-abroad/travel-advice-by-country/middle-east-north-africa/iraq[/img]

 

[Whitewing]

There are actually only two recipients of Civil War benefits, both children of veterans and receiving $876 per year.

Although their names are being kept private, the AP estimates that they were both born between 1920 and 1930, meaning their parents were themselves upwards of 80-years-old when their children were born. :shock:

Juanita Tudor Lowrey, 86, received Civil War benefits tied to her late father from the age 2 until her 18th birthday.

Former Republican senator and military veteran Alan Simpson said the government should consider means testing veterans as the burden on the federal debt continues to grow.

"Without question, I would affluence-test all of those people," Simpson told the AP.

Simpson co-chaired President Obama's deficit reduction committee in 2010, which offered a number of recommendations for reducing the federal budget defecit.

And while it would be natural to assume the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are the most costly, the payments to Vietnam War veterans nearly doubles the cost of our two current wars, $22 billion to $12 billion, respectively.

Amazingly, $20 million is still being paid each year to 2,289 veteran family members from World War I, many of whom are over 100-years-old. But perhaps even stranger, 47 benefit recipients were not even born until after the war ended.

http://us.m.yahoo.com/w/legobpengine/news/blogs/sideshow/u-still-making-payments-relatives-civil-war-veterans-014627748.html?.b=index&.cf3=Odd+News&.cf4=1&.cf5=The+Sideshow&.cf6=%2F&.ts=1363757941&.intl=us&.lang=en&.ysid=ccqXrXMUGJtt41q6DFShRmN_

 

[Whitewing]

The invasion of Iraq was the trigger point for all the unrest in the Middle East...all of it.

:lol:

 

[flounder]

The Last Letter


A Message to George W. Bush and Dick Cheney From a Dying Veteran


To: George W. Bush and Dick Cheney


From: Tomas Young


I write this letter on the 10th anniversary of the Iraq War on behalf of my fellow Iraq War veterans. I write this letter on behalf of the 4,488 soldiers and Marines who died in Iraq. I write this letter on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of veterans who have been wounded and on behalf of those whose wounds, physical and psychological, have destroyed their lives. I am one of those gravely wounded. I was paralyzed in an insurgent ambush in 2004 in Sadr City. My life is coming to an end. I am living under hospice care.


I write this letter on behalf of husbands and wives who have lost spouses, on behalf of children who have lost a parent, on behalf of the fathers and mothers who have lost sons and daughters and on behalf of those who care for the many thousands of my fellow veterans who have brain injuries. I write this letter on behalf of those veterans whose trauma and self-revulsion for what they have witnessed, endured and done in Iraq have led to suicide and on behalf of the active-duty soldiers and Marines who commit, on average, a suicide a day. I write this letter on behalf of the some 1 million Iraqi dead and on behalf of the countless Iraqi wounded. I write this letter on behalf of us all—the human detritus your war has left behind, those who will spend their lives in unending pain and grief.


I write this letter, my last letter, to you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. I write not because I think you grasp the terrible human and moral consequences of your lies, manipulation and thirst for wealth and power. I write this letter because, before my own death, I want to make it clear that I, and hundreds of thousands of my fellow veterans, along with millions of my fellow citizens, along with hundreds of millions more in Iraq and the Middle East, know fully who you are and what you have done. You may evade justice but in our eyes you are each guilty of egregious war crimes, of plunder and, finally, of murder, including the murder of thousands of young Americans—my fellow veterans—whose future you stole.


Your positions of authority, your millions of dollars of personal wealth, your public relations consultants, your privilege and your power cannot mask the hollowness of your character. You sent us to fight and die in Iraq after you, Mr. Cheney, dodged the draft in Vietnam, and you, Mr. Bush, went AWOL from your National Guard unit. Your cowardice and selfishness were established decades ago. You were not willing to risk yourselves for our nation but you sent hundreds of thousands of young men and women to be sacrificed in a senseless war with no more thought than it takes to put out the garbage.


I joined the Army two days after the 9/11 attacks. I joined the Army because our country had been attacked. I wanted to strike back at those who had killed some 3,000 of my fellow citizens. I did not join the Army to go to Iraq, a country that had no part in the September 2001 attacks and did not pose a threat to its neighbors, much less to the United States. I did not join the Army to "liberate" Iraqis or to shut down mythical weapons-of-mass-destruction facilities or to implant what you cynically called "democracy" in Baghdad and the Middle East. I did not join the Army to rebuild Iraq, which at the time you told us could be paid for by Iraq's oil revenues. Instead, this war has cost the United States over $3 trillion. I especially did not join the Army to carry out pre-emptive war. Pre-emptive war is illegal under international law. And as a soldier in Iraq I was, I now know, abetting your idiocy and your crimes. The Iraq War is the largest strategic blunder in U.S. history. It obliterated the balance of power in the Middle East. It installed a corrupt and brutal pro-Iranian government in Baghdad, one cemented in power through the use of torture, death squads and terror. And it has left Iran as the dominant force in the region. On every level—moral, strategic, military and economic—Iraq was a failure. And it was you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney, who started this war. It is you who should pay the consequences.


I would not be writing this letter if I had been wounded fighting in Afghanistan against those forces that carried out the attacks of 9/11. Had I been wounded there I would still be miserable because of my physical deterioration and imminent death, but I would at least have the comfort of knowing that my injuries were a consequence of my own decision to defend the country I love. I would not have to lie in my bed, my body filled with painkillers, my life ebbing away, and deal with the fact that hundreds of thousands of human beings, including children, including myself, were sacrificed by you for little more than the greed of oil companies, for your alliance with the oil sheiks in Saudi Arabia, and your insane visions of empire.


I have, like many other disabled veterans, suffered from the inadequate and often inept care provided by the Veterans Administration. I have, like many other disabled veterans, come to realize that our mental and physical wounds are of no interest to you, perhaps of no interest to any politician. We were used. We were betrayed. And we have been abandoned. You, Mr. Bush, make much pretense of being a Christian. But isn't lying a sin? Isn't murder a sin? Aren't theft and selfish ambition sins? I am not a Christian. But I believe in the Christian ideal. I believe that what you do to the least of your brothers you finally do to yourself, to your own soul.


My day of reckoning is upon me. Yours will come. I hope you will be put on trial. But mostly I hope, for your sakes, that you find the moral courage to face what you have done to me and to many, many others who deserved to live. I hope that before your time on earth ends, as mine is now ending, you will find the strength of character to stand before the American public and the world, and in particular the Iraqi people, and beg for forgiveness.





http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/19/tomas-young-letter-iraq_n_2908335.html

 

[Whitewing]

I joined the Army two days after the 9/11 attacks. I joined the Army because our country had been attacked. I wanted to strike back at those who had killed some 3,000 of my fellow citizens. I did not join the Army to go to Iraq....

In the words of the immortal George Trahan, "I'll show them, I'll join the army".

Flounder, a question. Did you support the invasion of Iraq? If not, why not?

 

[Mike]

Ten years on, soldier recalls Iraq invasion
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Boston Herald Staff
On March 19, 2003, Brockton native Luke Devlin, now 32, was a 22-year-old 2nd lieutenant, a 7th Cavalry tank platoon leader camped on the Iraqi border, about to cross what the Army called the Line of Departure as part of the 3rd Infantry Division's historic move north to take Baghdad and topple Saddam Hussein. Devlin later served in Iraq at the height of the insurgency in 2005. He recalled the start of the war yesterday with Herald editor Jules Crittenden, who rode with the 3rd ID as an embedded reporter:

Everybody was ready for it. We had been sitting in the desert for quite some time. At that point, it was getting kind of old. Everybody was ready to go home. It felt like the fastest way to go home was north. Through Baghdad ... moving into hostile territory.

As we crossed the LD, it was surreal. If I saw someone, I could open fire.

Devlin's platoon was ambushed en route to An Najaf, forcing the Air Force spotter to call in bombs "danger close," within 400 meters of their own position. Later, in a dust storm, there was a brief, desperate exchange of machine-gun fire when an Iraqi force stumbled into them. Outside Baghdad, they encountered 16 dug-in T-72 tanks. Six U.S. tanks took them out "in about eight minutes." By the end of the initial invasion, they found themselves at Abu Ghraib, at the Baathist regime's notorious prison.

I think I was just lucky a lot of times. ... We felt better about what we were doing when we saw the torture chambers and the mass graves there. There were exposed body parts, only partially buried. ... After the heavy combat was over, I can't remember one conversation where everyone wasn't happy to see us, wasn't happy that Saddam was gone. That made us feel good about what we had done.

In 2003, our squadron must have had an angel — 1,241 men in, 1,241 out. In the second deployment in 2005, we lost five. One was Sgt. 1st Class Ronnie Parsons, who had earned a Silver Star in 2003, and later served as my platoon sergeant.

He was hit by a 170 mm rocket that embedded in his body, and he fell down into his Bradley. His Bradley crew turned around to take him back to the FOB (Forward Operating Base) for medical care. He came to, and yelled at them, angry that they didn't go back to return fire. He was a hard man. But he succumbed to his wound. It was a tough loss to take.

In 2003, we came away with a great feeling. In 2005, it was just a mess. They were giving us the cold shoulder. There was a lot of mistrust. It was on edge. You thought, 'How are we ever going to win this war?' I didn't have an answer. It felt unwinnable.

Devlin was serving as an ROTC instructor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology when the surge strategy stabilized Iraq. Today, he said, despite the losses and the hard times of the insurgency, he has no regrets about the war he served in. Devlin noted the explosion of democratic movements in the Middle East that began after Arabs elsewhere saw Iraqis and Afghans voting freely after the Americans removed murderous regimes.

I would absolutely do it again. I wouldn't change a thing. I am very proud of it. The birth of democracy is always bloody. The Bush administration believed that democracy is contagious ... there was a lot of momentum. ... It will be a while before democracy fully takes hold. But it is still early.

 

[Yanuck]

I joined the Army two days after the 9/11 attacks. I joined the Army because our country had been attacked. I wanted to strike back at those who had killed some 3,000 of my fellow citizens. I did not join the Army to go to Iraq....

In the words of the immortal George Trahan, "I'll show them, I'll join the army".

Flounder, a question. Did you support the invasion of Iraq? If not, why not?

and are all soldiers in the US Forces there because they volunteered or not...last time I looked, there wasn't a draft, they volunteered for duty, or at least my nephew who did several tours of Iraq and Afhanistan did!

 

[Whitewing]

I joined the Army two days after the 9/11 attacks. I joined the Army because our country had been attacked. I wanted to strike back at those who had killed some 3,000 of my fellow citizens. I did not join the Army to go to Iraq....

In the words of the immortal George Trahan, "I'll show them, I'll join the army".

Flounder, a question. Did you support the invasion of Iraq? If not, why not?

and are all soldiers in the US Forces there because they volunteered or not...last time I looked, there wasn't a draft, they volunteered for duty, or at least my nephew who did several tours of Iraq and Afhanistan did!

My point, of course. As to Mr. Young, hat's off to your nephew who served his country in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

[kolanuraven]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/19/tomas-young-letter-iraq_n_2908335.html


From Young's letter, published on TruthDig:

I write this letter, my last letter, to you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. I write not because I think you grasp the terrible human and moral consequences of your lies, manipulation and thirst for wealth and power. I write this letter because, before my own death, I want to make it clear that I, and hundreds of thousands of my fellow veterans, along with millions of my fellow citizens, along with hundreds of millions more in Iraq and the Middle East, know fully who you are and what you have done. You may evade justice but in our eyes you are each guilty of egregious war crimes, of plunder and, finally, of murder, including the murder of thousands of young Americans—my fellow veterans—whose future you stole.

 

[Whitewing]

Ten years on, soldier recalls Iraq invasion
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Boston Herald Staff
On March 19, 2003, Brockton native Luke Devlin, now 32, was a 22-year-old 2nd lieutenant, a 7th Cavalry tank platoon leader camped on the Iraqi border, about to cross what the Army called the Line of Departure as part of the 3rd Infantry Division's historic move north to take Baghdad and topple Saddam Hussein. Devlin later served in Iraq at the height of the insurgency in 2005. He recalled the start of the war yesterday with Herald editor Jules Crittenden, who rode with the 3rd ID as an embedded reporter:

Everybody was ready for it. We had been sitting in the desert for quite some time. At that point, it was getting kind of old. Everybody was ready to go home. It felt like the fastest way to go home was north. Through Baghdad ... moving into hostile territory.

As we crossed the LD, it was surreal. If I saw someone, I could open fire.

Devlin's platoon was ambushed en route to An Najaf, forcing the Air Force spotter to call in bombs "danger close," within 400 meters of their own position. Later, in a dust storm, there was a brief, desperate exchange of machine-gun fire when an Iraqi force stumbled into them. Outside Baghdad, they encountered 16 dug-in T-72 tanks. Six U.S. tanks took them out "in about eight minutes." By the end of the initial invasion, they found themselves at Abu Ghraib, at the Baathist regime's notorious prison.

I think I was just lucky a lot of times. ... We felt better about what we were doing when we saw the torture chambers and the mass graves there. There were exposed body parts, only partially buried. ... After the heavy combat was over, I can't remember one conversation where everyone wasn't happy to see us, wasn't happy that Saddam was gone. That made us feel good about what we had done.

In 2003, our squadron must have had an angel — 1,241 men in, 1,241 out. In the second deployment in 2005, we lost five. One was Sgt. 1st Class Ronnie Parsons, who had earned a Silver Star in 2003, and later served as my platoon sergeant.

He was hit by a 170 mm rocket that embedded in his body, and he fell down into his Bradley. His Bradley crew turned around to take him back to the FOB (Forward Operating Base) for medical care. He came to, and yelled at them, angry that they didn't go back to return fire. He was a hard man. But he succumbed to his wound. It was a tough loss to take.

In 2003, we came away with a great feeling. In 2005, it was just a mess. They were giving us the cold shoulder. There was a lot of mistrust. It was on edge. You thought, 'How are we ever going to win this war?' I didn't have an answer. It felt unwinnable.

Devlin was serving as an ROTC instructor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology when the surge strategy stabilized Iraq. Today, he said, despite the losses and the hard times of the insurgency, he has no regrets about the war he served in. Devlin noted the explosion of democratic movements in the Middle East that began after Arabs elsewhere saw Iraqis and Afghans voting freely after the Americans removed murderous regimes.

I would absolutely do it again. I wouldn't change a thing. I am very proud of it. The birth of democracy is always bloody. The Bush administration believed that democracy is contagious ... there was a lot of momentum. ... It will be a while before democracy fully takes hold. But it is still early.

Saddam was just practicing true government leadership, that's all.

 

[Tam]

From what I read Young heard Bush at the rubble of the Twin Towers, got caught up in the heat of the moment and went out and ENLISTED. He was sent to fight a battle he VOLUNTEERED to fight and was wounded only a few days in. He likely never saw the eyes of those freed from the grip of Saddam or the death chambers Sabbam was using on his people. All he saw was his own pain and what the left bias media was and is filling our and his head with. I'm betting he is another one of those that will deny any knowledge of the Clinton and Democrat quotes about the dangers of Saddam and his WMD and still thinks Bush was the one that lied.

I realize this article is a year and a half old but What happen in Iraq ended before this article was written so one has to wonder if Young is really writing on behalf of the majority or MINORITY of those soldiers that faught in Iraq as he, Huffington Post and Flounder would have us believe.

Recent Veterans More Likely to Support Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, But Networks Tout Anti-War Sentiment


Both ABC and NBC on Wednesday used a new Pew Research Center poll of military veterans to claim that, as ABC news reader Josh Elliot put it, "one-third of those who've served in Afghanistan and Iraq now say the wars were not worth fighting," while NBC's Tamron Hall told viewers "one-third of U.S. veterans believe the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were not worth fighting."

But that's not really what the poll found. Pew surveyed 1,853 veterans, including 712 whose service took place after September 11, 2001. They found 50% of the post 9/11 veterans thought the war in Afghanistan was worth it, and 44% who supported the war in Iraq — percentages significantly higher than both the general public and veterans who served in earlier conflicts or pre-9/11.

Pew did not break out the opinions of the 336 veterans who actually saw service in Iraq and Afghanistan, but they accounted for only about half (47%) of the "post 9/11" group, so ABC was just incorrect in claiming this was the sentiment of those "who've served in Afghanistan and Iraq."

Asked to rate the wars together, 34% of post 9/11 veterans said they were both "worth it," vs. 33% who said they were both "not worth it." As might be expected, 24% of this group were split, either saying Iraq was worth it but Afghanistan was not, or vice versa.

One finding in the poll that did not make it onto either morning news show: While a majority of the general public still approves of Barack Obama as commander-in-chief, a majority of these veterans do not. Pew reported:


Post-9/11 veterans give lower ratings than Americans overall to the way Obama is handling his duties as commander in chief — 44% of those veterans approve and 47% disapprove, compared with a 53%-39% positive tilt among the general public. The views of pre-9/11 veterans are similar to those of post-9/11 veterans: 40% approve and 51% disapprove of the way the president is handling this aspect of his job.

Here's how ABC's Good Morning America and NBC's Today handled the poll in their 7am news updates, followed by more of what Pew actually reported:


JOSH ELLIOT (Good Morning America): Friday now marks ten years since the start of the war in Afghanistan and a new poll this morning shows the toll on veterans. One-third of those who've served in Afghanistan and Iraq now say the wars were not worth fighting. And a majority say the U.S. should focus less on foreign affairs and more on domestic issues.

TAMRON HALL (Today): One-third of U.S. veterans believe the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were not worth fighting, according to a Pew Research opinion poll out today. The nonpartisan group surveyed veterans who served after 9/11 and also found 37% say they suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. But 96% say they're proud of their service.


From the Pew Research Center's poll of veterans:


50% of post-9/11 veterans say the decade-old war in Afghanistan has been worth fighting and 44% view the 8 1/2-year-old conflict in Iraq the same way — approval levels that are nine and eight percentage points higher, respectively, than among the general public. Post-9/11 veterans also assess these wars somewhat more favorably than do veterans who served prior to the terrorist attacks a decade ago.

Post-9/11 veterans are more apt than the general public to say the military operates efficiently — 67% vs. 58%. A majority (54%) of post-9/11 veterans think people generally get ahead in the military based on their hard work and ability, though veterans who served before 9/11 are more likely to say this (63%). By comparison, Americans overall are split 48%-48% on whether people generally get ahead in their job or career on the basis of hard work and ability.

Patriotic sentiment runs far stronger among post-9/11 veterans, 61% of whom say they are more patriotic than most other people in the country, than it does among the general public (37%). Among pre-9/11 veterans, 55% say they are more patriotic than most other Americans.

Those who have served since 9/11 — for whom a part of their mission has been to try to rebuild social, political and economic institutions in Afghanistan and Iraq—are much more likely than the general public (by 59% to 45%) and veterans who served in earlier eras (also 45%) to view such noncombat "nation building" as an appropriate role for U.S. armed forces....

Post-9/11 veterans give lower ratings than Americans overall to the way Obama is handling his duties as commander in chief — 44% of those veterans approve and 47% disapprove, compared with a 53%-39% positive tilt among the general public. The views of pre-9/11 veterans are similar to those of post-9/11 veterans: 40% approve and 51% disapprove of the way the president is handling this aspect of his job.

Read more: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/rich-noyes/2011/10/05/recent-veterans-more-likely-support-iraq-and-afghanistan-wars-networks-t#ixzz2O5tOkll7

 

[Whitewing]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/19/tomas-young-letter-iraq_n_2908335.html


From Young's letter, published on TruthDig:

I write this letter, my last letter, to you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. I write not because I think you grasp the terrible human and moral consequences of your lies, manipulation and thirst for wealth and power. I write this letter because, before my own death, I want to make it clear that I, and hundreds of thousands of my fellow veterans, along with millions of my fellow citizens, along with hundreds of millions more in Iraq and the Middle East, know fully who you are and what you have done. You may evade justice but in our eyes you are each guilty of egregious war crimes, of plunder and, finally, of murder, including the murder of thousands of young Americans—my fellow veterans—whose future you stole.

Kola, you might try actually reading the entire thread. Mr. Young's letter was posted earlier in the thread in its entirety by huff-mate Flounder. :roll:

 

[littlejoe]

I'll gladly debate anyone who wishes on the logic of invading Iraq in the aftermath of 9-11.



Yup, they were primarilly Saudi's, hiding in Afghanistan---gotta hit either Iraq or possibly New Jersey, for starters.

quote--"And I'll say it again (last time I said this the old man about had a coronary :lol: ), the actual invasion and defeat of Saddam's forces went about as well as could be expected.

Yup, the most powerful militiary nation the world has ever known had little trouble with the 'invade and defeat' of a 4th class power--I'll second that.

Trouble is---remember the dumbass flying backseat in his flight suit---held up returning carrier--for "mission accomplished" horseshit?---Said dumbass had no second act, thought it was done deal.

Might want to look up how many lives--and TRILLIONS of dollars---this ill conceived and mismanaged abortion has cost the U.S, afore you git your hair all slickumed back and debatin suit ironed.

1) most powerful military nation the world has ever known had little trouble with the invade and defeat of a 4th class power

2) dumbass flying backseat in his flight suit....mission accomplished etc

3) how many lives and TRILLIONS of dollars spent

4) before I git my hair (don't have hair) all slickumed back and debatin suit ironed

Three significant debating points indeed, but none of which I was trying to make. You do seem to feel very passionately about the issues though, and that's a good thing.

As for the personal, childish insults about my challenge to debate the logic of the invasion in the light of the events of 9-11, I honestly don't understand them. I've never insulted you or your posting style in any way. Having said that, I'll assume you'd rather not debate my main point, and that's fine too.

If I'm incorrect, please accept my apology and feel free to lay out your logic of why it would have been wrong at the time to have contemplated the invasion of Iraq.

No personal insults intended. Sin Loi.

 

[Anonymous]

I was talking with a young fellow that spent two tours in Iraq... I mentioned it looked like there might end up being a civil war there soon... He said he had no doubt that would happen- as you will never get the Kurds, the Shiites, and the Sunnis to agree on anything and stop killing each other...

It was his contention that would have been the best thing that happened back after the first gulf war- when civil war broke out in both the south and north... He thought GHW should have backed the minority sects- and let them do the dying (instead of US/British troops) to oust Saddam-- and then fight the almost certain civil war that will eventually decide who/how Iraq is ruled...

But that didn't happen and instead GW decided to play John Wayne and be a nation builder- and in doing so getting thousands of young folks killed and maimed and running up about 5-7 Trillion $ in long term debt...