A couple of weeks ago Richard Engel said something so jaw-dropping on Meet the Press, to which no challenge was made, that I had to wonder if it did not represent conventional wisdom inside the beltway:
MR. RUSSERT: Richard Engel, you wrote a book called “Fist in the Hornet’s Nest,” describing the invasion of Iraq. What do you see as Act V?
MR. ENGEL: I think, ultimately, they’re—if they—if we stay on this current plan, you’re going to have a series of governments, eventually American troops are going to get pulled back to bases. They’ll be left there. There’ll be a civil war going on with the—in the country. It will divide naturally up into these three to five mini states, and the American troops will be mostly forgotten about. Because if they’re sitting around on the bases, the debate won’t be so intense here in the U.S., and I think they’ll be there for 10, 15 years.
Granted, the reason we’re in Iraq from day to day seems to change depending on whatever PR spin is coming out of Enron Ed’s war room, but usually it includes some version of defeating Al Qaeda in Iraq and “fighting them over there so we don’t have to fight them over here.” So now that the Democratic front runners are all planning on leaving 40,000 to 60,000 residual troops in Iraq for the next forseeable decade or so, do they really think nobody in Iraq is going to notice, or care?
I don’t seem to remember the US bases in Saudi Arabia going down too well with the Islamic world before 9/11. But what do I know, maybe they’ve all changed their minds.
Related posts:
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- Changing of the Guard: US Troops Withdraw from Iraqi Cities; Maliki Declares “Sovereignty Day”
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- Did US Forces Use White Phosphorus in the Afghan Bombings?
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Jane!
zip?
No, they’re imagining that people here won’t care.
Doin’ the Snoopy Happy Dance! Now to go do the reading. Guess I’ll tell them downstairs, too.
Hi Jane!
those bases are loaded.
Brilliant Jane! Shit we are fucked. (And, you are not even figuring the Iran bombing in the equation.
EPU’d, sorry Jane.
Dodd on KO:
Date certain to start getting troops out and bring them home. Home by April.
He’ll propose it, knowing there will be a veto, and perhaps not enough vote to get to the prez.
It can’t get much more chaotic than it is, and $10 billion per month is too much.
Tomorrow night Bush will buy time to pass this off to the next President.
Are we safer? We’re less safe, secure and have created a petri dish for Islamic jihadists.
Single digits?
Hi, Jane!
zedecile?
Chris Dodd has been eloquent about the “Letters from Nuremberg”.
“There’s a reason now to be standing up. It is to restore the Constitution.”
Keith: Will any of our leaders face a Nuremberg type trial?
Dodd: Hope not. Great setback these days, Habeas Corpus etc.
Dodd has a new book about the trials.
this is the iraq as korea model.
permanent bases …
and permanent flow of dollars into halliburton etc.
So what will they be doing there? What use are they if they are holed up on bases?
I’d been wondering what happened to Richard Engel. I guess he’s out of Iraq now – bureau chief for Lebanon(?).
His time in Iraq cost him his marriage – now I’m wondering about the kid’s sanity.
Loo Hoo. @ 11
His Father was one of the main prosecutors…!!!
I doubt anyone will forget it if our troops are sitting in Iraq. Certainly not the Islamic world, but how could we forget? This has all been such a disaster…It would be like asking us to forget if we still had 50,000 troops in Viet Nam.
There’s a perfectly good reason for having the troops stay: Haliburton, Exxon/Mobil, KBR, etc. need all the available transport to bring the booty home.
Shorter War Profiteers: “When booty calls, we’re first in line.”
I heard it’s anti-semitic to question the official myth about 9/11.
50,000 is about what they are thinking about for these
permanenttemporary bases. It is a very defensible strategy. You see we currently have nearly 170,000 troops in country and they are unable to secure the borders, go after al Qaeda (whatever that means), and train Iraqi troops. If we cut our troops down to 50,000 according to the opinions of some Very Serious People, we will be much better able to accomplish these 3 missions. Hope this helps clear things up.Loo Hoo. @ 11
Why “hope not?” That would be the surest way to get on track to restore the Constitution.
Mad Dogs @ 17
that’s one hell of a booty call, and yes, we are screwed.
Hugh @ 19
Gee thanks, makes me all warm inside.
Grrrrr.
Hugh @ 19
Okay, now I understand completely.
Mad Dogs @ 17
Shorter War Profiteers: “When booty calls, we’re first in line.”
Sounds right to me, even if I’m not a War Profiteer.
Maybe it’s the word “booty”?
Hugh @ 19
Thanks Hugh. Now I understand perfectly.
Whew! Had me going there for a minute.
engels answer is flat out speculation, it’s not this administration’s “plan” or “strategy”, they are morons, they have no plan, they have no strategy and engels scenario, it’s pretty much the only thing that can happen
here’s what really went wrong in Iraq;
the neo cons wanted to prove their rediculous principles of governance…no progressive tax, no public works, collective bargaining outlawed, no labor laws no corporae restrictions
they thought they were going to create a utopia…however as any economist with a brain knows, corporation pillage and plunder without regulation…there is absolutely NO such thing as a “free market”, there MUST be regulation
so their “great experiment” failed, Iraqi’s out of work, no infrastructure and corporate pillage
that’s why there is an insurgency…the brutal truth is the president actually could have succeeded in Iraq IF he gave THEM their country back instead of to corporations
if there were GOVERNANCE istead of government by profit
now let’s don’t forget, they don’t give one flying hoot about the welfare of the Iraqi’s, they want to own the wealth of that country and that’s all that matters
they want their bases and they want Iran
zennurse asks a telling question downstairs
Loo Hoo. @ 11
Hugh @ 19
Heh, I have some vague knowledge of how hermetically sealed those hardened bases are in hostile environs…!!!
CTuttle @ 15
And KO pulled a couple of very nice quotes from the book. The Sr. Mr. Dodd tried Nazis for doing things like indefinite detentions without charges. KO commented that the quote seemed very timely.
Steve-AR @ 20
GordonM @ 29
It is timely, I’m disappointed he didn’t follow-on with Shrub and Cheney facing the same music…!!! 8-(
I think the W people believe that they can simply drop bombs on Iran and leave.
Talk about a recruitment plan for jihadists. Is there anything that could top it?
I mean, if we are not all dead from radiation.
I don’t know which I resent more. That the front runners take my vote for granted. Or that these guys perceive me as a stupid, naive simpleton.
bg @ 32
This is so obvious, why can’t they see?
BTW if it hasn’t been mentioned before, the NYT has a short story up on the two non-coms who helped co-write the op-ed on Iraq and who died in a vehicle accident. Its time stamp is 3:18 PM ET. It would be interesting to know if this is when it first appeared because even around 4 PM ET I had still seen nothing from the NYT. I for one would still like to know the backstory on how they got scooped on their own story.
perris @ 26
We’ve seen any number of times that this administration cannot distinguish goals, strategy and tactics. In his one-dimensional mind, they are all the same.
bg @ 32
yes, they think they can just drop bombs and leave, they are itching to nuke the place, they are itching to “just do it”
they think other countries will cower in our wake, they think they can scare the crap out of the entire world
that’s their real plan you know…”just do it”
CTuttle @ 15
You know, I had the feeling that Dodd misunderstood and took it that Keith was asking if we are abandoning or trying to make legal all the war crimes tried at Nuremberg.
Americans don’t seem to care much where the “troops” are- as long as they aren’t bein butchered.
Elliott @ 34
They are willfully obtuse and elect NOT to see the obvious. That way they get to keep their seats with the kewl kidz beltway VSP club.
Did anyone catch the author’s name that Keith referred to, ending with the quote something like, “some day the White House will be occupied by a total moron.”
Good point, Jane!
I think what they’re hoping for is something like the South Korea model. We’ve had troops stationed there for 50? years, and nobody much cares. Not even the South Koreans. But I don’t think that’s going to work in Iraq.
Bob in HI
Did anyone catch the author’s name that Keith referred to, ending with the quote something like, “some day the White House will be occupied by a total moron.
Mencken
Hugh @ 35
Heh, even the venerable Times is experiencing push back…???
Yeah! Hell Yeah! Glad that FDL, as has often before, is taking the lead on things. Need some big picture thinking to counter a bankrupt, immoral, and fantasy-based foreign policy consensus in this country today, that will continue to produce total failure in terms of practical results, in addition to causing mass killing, destroyed lives, vast econoimc waste around the globe and here at home, and war crimes.
Keep it up. Force these so-called leaders to lead. If this country cannot produce better thinking on this topic than people like Rice, and Friedman, and the usual list of suspect pooh-bahs, that is real bad and real sad.
Swopa (? I think it was swopa, and/or looseheadprop?) had some recent posts along a similar line that I thnk everyone should go back and read, IMHO.
Seems like when I read what these so-called mainstream foregin policy and national security experts are saying, it all comes down to PNAC-lite, or occult PNAC, or smiley-face PNAC. Declare ourselves and “empire,” issue assinine orders, and then kill people and blow stuff up if things don’t go all our way by by quick fast and in a hurry.
Irag is more than a current disaster, it is our future all over the world, our childrens’ future, as long as the current decadent pissant adventure/action flick mentality prevails. I would say grandchildrens’ future, but who knows what will be left by then?
FDL takes on PNAC. I like that idea, since FDL is right and will win.
PS, thanks for the explanation, Hugh.
Ann in AZ @ 41
Did anyone catch the author’s name that Keith referred to, ending with the quote something like, “some day the White House will be occupied by a total moron.”
H.L. Mencken.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.L._Mencken
Prediction- Dubya ain’t gonna do shit to Iran- he’s bluffin.
We’re there for the ‘national interests’, which is what Betrayingus told Sen. Susan Collins the other day when testifying. National interests? Oh yeah. Oil.
Ann in AZ @ 38
I thought he deliberately misunderstood. Imagine the outrage in the press if he had answered in the only way the author of that book could answer. I mean, CNN was in a tizzy this AM over the moveon.org ad.
And Tucker – yes, I watched a bit – was saying that all those “Clinton killed Foster” people hurt the Repubs (as movon is “hurting” the Dems). Mmm. Yeah. That’s why McCain went and kissed Falwell’s ring (who put out a video tape saying the Clintons killed 42 people). That’s why Cheney goes on Limbaugh (a major pusher of the Foster story). That’s why a major contributer to Swift Boat Vets was made a recess appt. ambassador to Belgium. Yeah. Hurt them real bad.
Emptywheel:
Shorter McConnell: “Okay, I lied when I told you we caught the German terrorists using the new program. But the program changes were important. Because I said so, that’s why.” With absolutely no shame at having been caught in a lie.
I can see why our intellectually-impaired President likes this guy.
Link.
OT..
(snip)
(snip)
TPM
snowbird42 @ 43
Thank you!
I have some questions.
If at least 40% of the troops in Iraq are reserves or national guard, and the rotations are every 12 months, and we’ve been there for four years, exactly how many actual military have rotated into Iraq since the invasion and occupation began?
Where is the army? Where are the marines? How many are there? What is their mission?
I’m really bad at math, but this seems out of balance to me.
Steve-AR @ 51
more proof Petraeus wrote it all hisself.
My sister works in the federal government. She doesn’t like bush or the war. She warned me after the 04 election that regardless of any election results of any election, we are going to have our soldiers there for a long time.
Elliott @ 54
He strayed toward the truth, and they spanked him….ha, ha, ha…more “oathtaker” magic.
LS @ 56
heh
The whole war discussion is crippled by the fact that no one can talk about the real reasons that we’re there- oil and military bases..
So it’s pretty hard to keep score- since we won’t admit what game we’re playin- but the troops will be there for a long time- that’s part of the reason we invaded.
LS @ 53
Let’s put it this way: here in Maine we just got back one of our soldiers who was severely injured in Iraq and spent a good amount of time recovering overseas. He’s back now with his head injury and I heard him on our local AM radio station saying that he’ll be home for 30 days and then will go back to the barracks. Guaranteed he’ll be back in Iraq in no time!
Bush is using our soldiers like his own damn work horses for crying out loud. Give these young people a break. Hell…give them all a break! Bring them home.
Elliott @ 57
he’s the oathist with the mostest.
There was a post (perris, I believe) a thread or so ago about why would the Repubs continue to persue absolute executive power in the face of a almost certain Dem victory (with dark implications).
The answer, I think, is that absolute power is an incredible aphrodisiac to these people. And 18 months from now is way out of their planning horizon (hell, next week is, too).
And yes, they will turn around and spout weak-executive, states rights rhetoric the moment they have lost. The 30%ers will be right there with them. It’s the next 30% we have to fight for (and, unfortunately, probably 80% of incumbent Dems are in that second 30%).
rwcole @ 47
Hope you’re right. Many of the young educated Iranians are on the side of involvement with the rest of the world. Every time I think of a bomb leveled in Iran, I think of how many more people would hate America.
I cannot understand the thought of killing people because they have a nutcase for a leader. Imagine…
Is there something about extremely low poll numbers that the Congress doesn’t understand? It means that most Americans don’t think you’re doing your jobs, you fucking idiots.
punaise @ 60
*groan* :P
Well, we know what happened after a bunch of soldiers did an op-ed piece on the war….two of them were in an “accident” in Iraq and are now dead.
Our soldiers are not allowed to use the rights they’re fighting for apparently…or it will cost them their lives.
rwcole @ 58
From C&L Chris Shays had a momentary truth telling episode
Oklahoma kiddo @ 63
I just read that Bush is enjoying a bump in the polls.
Bill Clintons policy of sanctions enforced with air patrols in Iraq allowed Bushco to come in and start this whole nightmare far to easily.. We have to make sure we get every single soldier, aircraft and paid militia out of Iraq this time.
Funny that if we are this great empire, with the most advanced thinking, and our reactionary leaders hold every conceptual, economic and cultural key to everyoe’s future, that our leaders are so inept, or scared or anxious.
Funny if they are the grown-up daddy party who can bring home the bacon and have such a sophisticated understanding of how the world works and the economics andn philosophy of everything, that the only way they can sway, or influence, or maintain alliances, or lead, is to bully and threaten people with some kind of violence.
Some of the reactionary party must be genuinely puzzled. It has worked for them all their lives here in the US. Why is it going belly up with all them foreigners, from the UK all the way to Iraq and beyond? There seems to be some kind of Reality out there that Hates America. That is their dilemma.
Or maybe it is just about money for their oil buddies. That would explain why it is so important to keep the crony capitalist provisions in the Iraqi oil law. Those provisions are what every single Iraqi faction opposes in the oil law. Cheney=bush have spent months trying to force that thing through. Probably doing wonders for the reconciliation process and alliance building in Iraq, huh? Deeds speak louder than words, and that is the main obsession of Cheney-dub in Iraqi politics. I read they have ordered the generals to go hector Iraqi politicians about passing it. That sounds like job number one for the military, don’t it to you? Well, maybe it is, for our great strategic thinkers.
I am far from being an expert on these matters. But it seems I have read or heard somewhere that it is very difficult to predict what a megalomaniac will do.
Eureka Springs @ 68
nah gunna happen
rwcole @ 47
I do believe that one of the reasons The Chimpenfuhrer looked p*ss’d when he met with Putin at Kennebunkport was that Putin warned him what Russia would do if we attacked Iran.
And I think one of the reasons the British have moved some troops close to Iran is the same reason; to block Chimpy. The new guy is NOT Lapdog Tony Blair.
YMMV
Oklahoma kiddo @ 70
the answer is whatever he thinks he can get away with.
when they are cornered they will become even more brazen BECAUSE they are exposed, they no longer have to fly “under the radar
so the answer is a meglamaniac will do whatever they want until they are stopped
KayInMaine @ 59
The (now unavailable) 2nd video on this page was Colbert riffing on Laura Bush’s joke about her husband trying to milk a horse. It was way over the top.
I’m still trying to figure this out…
150,000 troops go to Iraq for 12 months starting in March 2003. They go home, and in 2004 are replaced by 150,000 troops. They go home, in 2005 and are replaced by 150,000 troops. They go home in 2006 and are replaced by 150,000 troops. They go home in 2007, and are replaced by 150,00 troops.
Now, at least 40% of those troops are not regular army/marine. So, 75,000 actual army are deployed 5 times. Some of them are on their 3rd or 4th tour and have been stop lossed.
Hmmmmmm. So, how many actual army/marines have been actually deployed??? How many have been re-cycled?
Have they been recruiting an entirely different bunch of people for other purposes…???? Where are they?
rwcole @ 47
my dad was certain he was bluffing before Iraq I want you to know
my dad said;
“perris, it’s saber rattling, it’s getting him plenty of play”
I of course hoped my dad was right
rwcole, I pray that you are right
KayInMaine @ 65
I think there was another one that died before the piece was even published.
LS @ 75
I think Raven once said one third of our soldiers were the ones being recycled on the battlefield
LS @ 75
Stop loss is a vile back door draft, a signature on the dotted line, today, is literally eight years of servitude, folks…!!! 8-(
jayt @ 46
H.L. Mencken.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.L._Mencken
Thank you, too, especially for the link.
perris @ 76
Yeah, and my Dad thought the Nazis were bluffing when it looked like they might invade the country that he was a government official in. They invaded and occupied for 5 years.
snowbird42 @ 67
I dunno – you’d have to look pretty hard to see a bump here:
Pollkatz bush disapproval
Fern @ 82
He’s enjoyed a few “bumps” in his time ;>
LS @ 75
The number of troops who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan recently passed 1.5 million early this year.
LS @ 75
Just from your numbers: that’s 90,000 regular army & marines. They only get a few weeks off every year (now 15 months?), so you don’t mathematically need much more that 100,000 to keep it up.
earlier today, I was thinking about the rampant sectarian purging and displacement of Sunni in Baghdad despite the Surge or anything else such that before long, there will sizeable decreases in violence and sectarian killing – because it will have already occurred to a devastating end. Such a result would naturally be hailed as a military success by BushCo or the next authoritarian heirs.
How sickeningly ironic that the widespread chaos, displacement, and killing that has been ongoing under Bush’s watch is the very threat neocons use to generate fear when arguing against a withdrawal. Just wait for the devastation to run its course and maybe no one will notice what we’re doing there.
.
Larry Johnson thinks he’ll attack Iran
LS @ 53
If you want the current order of battle you can find it here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I….._of_battle
I liked around at a few places but this is probably the most accessible. It gives units. You can see if they are national guard and you can see where, usually what camp, they are based out of in Iraq. It doesn’t answer all your questions but it may answer some.
I don’t know if this was covered before, but I just found it on HuffPo:
WASHINGTON, Sep 12 (IPS) – In sharp contrast to the lionisation of Gen. David Petraeus by members of the U.S. Congress during his testimony this week, Petraeus’s superior, Admiral William Fallon, chief of the Central Command (CENTCOM), derided Petraeus as a sycophant during their first meeting in Baghdad last March, according to Pentagon sources familiar with reports of the meeting.
Fallon told Petraeus that he considered him to be “an ass-kissing little chickenshit” and added, “I hate people like that”, the sources say….In a highly unusual political role for an officer who had not yet taken command of a war, Petraeus was installed in the office of Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican from Kentucky, in early February just before the Senate debated Bush’s troop increase. According to a report in The Washington Post Feb. 7, senators were then approached on the floor and invited to go McConnell’s office to hear Petraeus make the case for the surge policy.
Fallon was strongly opposed to Petraeus’s role as pitch man for the surge policy in Iraq adopted by Bush in December as putting his own interests ahead of a sound military posture in the Middle East and Southwest Asia — the area for which Fallon’s CENTCOM is responsible.
http://www.ipsnews.net/print.asp?idnews=39235
nonplussed @ 84
Does the math add up??
LS @ 83
I thought most of his “bumps” showed up after his “vacations” in Crawford…
(it’s amazing how inanimate objects jump out and attack drunk guys, huh?)
nonplussed @ 84
Almost, twice the number serving in all services at this juncture in time…!!!
Hugh @ 88
thanks
here’s what the president was able to accomplish with his “surge”
everyone was saying Iraq was a failure, everyone was saying he had to “go long or go home”
so he changed the metric, it is no longer “get them out” it became ‘when does the surge end”
I have to admit, though he is mostly a moron, that bit of manuevering happened to be shear genious
I hate to say that becuase I don’t think rove is a genious of any kind and of course I think bush and cheney are both morons
still, a clock is right twice a day and that “surge” actually did get everyone off his case about getting EVERYONE home
now we are just happy if the surge troops are reduced
this is where we are today
CTuttle @ 92
That is what “they” say, but the math doesn’t add up.
Muzzy @ 86
Present tense. Baghdad is already largely segregated except for a few neighborhoods. And Anbar calmed down because we switched sides, not the Sunnis. And that happened before the surge, anyway.
But our fearless leader’s unbending will is what causes the sun to appear each morning in the East, so all should be thankful.
Are you also counting Air Force, USCG and Navy? You know they are.
The only way to get the troops out of Iraq is to get the Republicans out of Government.
75,000 X 5 = 375,000….many who were deployed several times. That is not counting the Reserve and the Guard.
That is nowhere near 1.anything million.
snowbird42 @ 87
and that will be “the carastrophy” that the president uses to suspend congress
I am telling you, they are making the executive unitary becuase they have no intention of releasing the reigns of power
this is so clear I cannot beleive it is discussed.
they cannot win an election yet they are making the executive all powerfull
sorry, this is not some kind of delusion they are under, they know with no doubt in another election the president will be a democrat
they don’t care which means as far as they are concerned, “that ain’t gonna happen”
congress MUST put an end to this mans reign BEFORE he attacks Iran becuase AFTER he atttacks Iran congress will be no more
The strategy worked perfectly well for Henry II, who wiped out Wales, and then established a system of
basescastles throughout to maintain control thereafter, since he couldn’t properly subdue the entire population…LS @ 95
I hear ya, essentially, every soldier and marine who’ve served at least three years has seen two rotations…!!! 8-(
Steve-AR @ 98
and that’s no guarantee!
LS @ 83
and now it’s just a grind…
nonplussed @ 97
That I was, for poignancy!!!
Fern @ 13
What use were the people that used to be stationed in Saudi Arabia? Or Germany? Or any number of other places around the world for that matter?
nonplussed @ 97
Good point. I’m going by what they use as how many are deployed at any given time.
I’m sure they are using different figures. That is my point to some degree.
punaise @ 104
good one
Fern says: September 12th, 2007 at 6:07 pm
I think there was another one that died before the piece was even published
———–
One of them was wounded in the head and evacuated before the piece was published.
Why do people play with purly specualtive conspiracy theories with no evidence? This stupid and immoral war has killed thousands and thousands of people. We have the goods on them right there. What more do you need?
War is dangerous. I have read about several soldierw who have been the news because they escorted a bigshot, or wrote something that could be interpreted as pro or con Cheney-bush, talked on TV in a news report, who turned up in the news briefly a bit later when they were seriously wounded or killed.
There is a historian who wrote a book about that. You spend enough time as a soldier in war and you either get wounded or killed, and he wrote about what that does to your mind.
I’ve read these troops in Iraq are being exposed to more frontline danger to enemy action that in previous wars. So we should expect to eventually hear about many many of them being killed or wounded. That is the way war is. Maybe if the costs of the war were not so hushed for political purposes, we would not be so surprised.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20748524/
Bush’s Iraq standing improves
bump…bump
wesgpc @ 109
That is utter bullsh*t!!! I Hate This F*cking Illegal War!!! …sorry for yelling…!!!
snowbird42 @ 87
Actually, I’m kind of doubting it. I don’t think Bush thinks he needs Congress’s approval – he believes he already has it (and that’s less of a interpretive stretch than is habitual for Bush). He certainly doesn’t give a shit what the people think (and neither does Congress). Or the rest of the world.
The 2 options left are: he’s working up his nerve; or he’s playing the Nixonian “I’m a total madman” card. The latter makes more political sense (politically, he can get away with anything as long as he doesn’t attack Iran), but the former is more in line with his pathetic pathological personality.
Mad Dogs @ 17
Haliburton and all its affiliate companies, like KBR, should be made “persona non grata” in regard to government contracts in my opinion. They have done way too much bill padding, overcharging, and downright stealing for my taste. “Fool me once; shame on you. Fool me twice; shame on me.” Or “you can’t get fooled again,” unless, of course, you’re the President.
peanutbutter @ 101
I blame this cold. Edward I, of course. Bah!
perris @ 100
Well I discussed it at 61.
Ann in AZ @ 113
we need to federalize every company that profited off of this war
plain and simple, I wouldn’t mind bringing their assets to the level before the war but something has to be done so future corporations realize if they invest in war they will not realize a return
federalize all profits from the Iraq war
done
off to drive home, g’night dogs
perris @ 116
Excellent notion. Won’t happen, but excellent, excellent idea.
BTW various forces in Iraq have different lengths of deployment. It is only the Army (and maybe associated NG units?) that had 12 month deployments increased to 15 months. Marines had deployments of something like 7 months on 7 months off. I don’t know what they are now. Special forces had deployments measured in weeks but had the most redeployments.
snowbird42 @ 87
Well, if our troops were out of Iraq, this wouldn’t be an issue, would it. As Teddy says:
TROOPS
HOME
NOW
CTuttle @ 111
Hold on – I just made a simple (unfactual) statement with absolutely no interpretation.
GordonM @ 112
I’m a little worried that he might announce that the mission is underway when he speaks tomorrow night. All of the major networks have set aside a lot of “extra” time for this “speech” to supposedly announce what he already announced yesterday. Keep an eye open. Iran is about what…12 hours ahead? So tomorrow at 8PM it is 7AM in Iraq, and the damage could be done. I’m most likely completely off base, but I don’t like what I’m seeing, and I don’t like what they are doing. I don’t like that they are announcing the stand down on Friday, and I don’t like the news about the $1 billion put option for 9/21 about the market collapse. I feel like we are in the twilight zone. Then….I walk outside on a beautiful night, and everything seems so normal….WTF? Maybe it is all shiny objects. I sure hope so. I hope that the military says no way. Karen Kwiatkowski is on AirAmerica, and she is alarmed. She is one smart lady.
rwcole @ 47
And Putin and China are two reasons why he can’t . . but, I still worry that BoyKing/Shooter will, anyway. We live for the moment, and in interesting times.
120 Fern says: September 12th, 2007 at 6:33 pm:
My apologies, then. There were lots of instant conspiracy theories about this last night whent the news came out.
And I am edgey too, like some others here. Maybe the full horror of what is happening is coming home to us all, even to those of us who opposed this thing from the beginning.
wesgpc @ 123
I quite understand – I find the conspiracy theories a little wearying myself – sometimes a coincidence is just …. a coincidence.
The author I was referring to was Paul Fussell, and it was an article I was referring to:
My war:
How I got irony in the infantry
by Paul Fussell
http://www.harpers.org/archive/1982
(subscription needed)
I wish I could remember the articles I’ve read that compared the cumulative exposure to enemy fire the US forces are facing in Iraq. If we keep going like this many many people we see on TV, or hear about briefly will be wounded for killed. Anything that puts a face on one of those tragedies bring things home. Imagine what their families, and friends, are going through.
wesgpc @ 123
Fern ‘uff. :~)
wesgpc @ 125
And everything is being done to make sure the public seldom sees that human face – of either soldiers or iraqis.
Changed their minds or lost them?
Hasn’t this been Hillary Clinton’s position all along? Pull the troops back to American bases, pay the Iraqi army protection money to keep our supply lines open, and say “it’s not our problem” as the country goes to hell. That means fewer “combat troops” since troops sitting on bases or guarding our “embassy” don’t count as “combat troops”. The 100,000 private mercenaries will stay in Iraq and may even be increased. The “combat troops” can then be sent to Afghanistan.
It seems to me she has been saying this for at least two years.
rumor has it there’s a new thread.
This is starting to sound like Charles Manson. Hear me out — I am not kidding.
Manson said the reason he killed those people was to make everyone THINK blacks did it. Why? Blacks would take power, not be able to handle it, and then Charlie and his family would emerge from the desert (where they were holing up) and take over.
The GOP (aided by the wimpy Dems) are doing this with Americans troops in Iraq.
Scary.
Steve-AR @ 98
Yep!