They Want the U.S. Out - NOW

Parent Cafe
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<p>My conclusion after reading the latest poll and data is most Iraqis people are losing their faith of the US occupation forces. In their mind, we tried and failed. To make it worse, there is NOTHING on the table that instills their and our confidence. Perhaps, it’s time we listen to them. </p>

<p>I happen to believe the US Ways don’t always work abroad and sometime, as painful as it may sound, we just have to keep our egos in check and respect others’ way of resolving their conflicts. Take Thailand for example. Last week, the Thais just had their democratic (but corrupted) government overthrown by a military coup that fired no shot and shred no blood. This is in no way resemble the American Way. But, it worked for them! This week, they opened the largest airport in SE Asia. Granted, the US and Thailand don’t get all twisted in complicated and dirty oil interest like our relationship with Iraq. Perhaps, that’s why we need to “stay the course” and unfortunately the Iraqis are starting to see that.</p>

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<p>

No, you present conclusions based on a filtering of the facts to serve your pre-determined viewpoint. The current facts are:</p>

<ul>
<li>a state dept. poll shows a large number of citizens want us out now. (SOURCE: Wash. Post)</li>
<li>a Univ. of Maryland led poll (also quoted in the Post article) shows that roughly a third of Iraqis want us out within 6 months with the majority wanting us out in a year. (SOURCE: Univ of Maryland)</li>
<li>a basic underlying belief behind these numbers is that the US is instigating the chaos for ulterior motives. (Since this notion is false, how valid are the results of the above polls?) (SOURCE: Wash. Post)</li>
<li>the majority of elected Iraqi leaders realize the truth of the situation - that there would be a massive spilling of blood if we leave and do not want us to leave. (SOURCE: Wash. Post)</li>
<li>if we leave now, more terrorists will be spawned. (SOURCE: NIE)</li>
<li>a key weapon in actually ** winning<a href=“versus%20continued%20toleration%20of”>/b</a> the war against Islamic fundamentalist is via democratic reform which is what the US is pursuing. (SOURCE: NIE)</li>
</ul>

<p>To me, reading these facts, the concusion should be to see this through. The Dem approach of withdrawing will result in additional bloodshed and more terrorism.</p>

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<p>if we stay more terrorists will be spawned, but then we made this giant mess and are stuck with the consequences, because we had not plan B</p>

<p>and what is WINNING> please tell me, cause even our President doesn’t tell us</p>

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<p>I wish the Dems DID have a strategy for withdrawing, but I see no evidence for it.</p>

<p>One of the things especially interesting about the State Dept. poll is that it is one of a continuing series.</p>

<p>In a poll published January 6, 2004, 2/3rds of Iraqis said that the continuing attacks emphasized the need for the continuing presence of Coalition troops. (and, at that time, nonetheless, a majority said Coalition troops should leave once a permanent government is elected.)</p>

<p>Now that those attacks have quadrupled, 2/3rds of Iraqis want the U.S. out IMMEDIATELY. In January 2004, 31% said that attacks on U.S. troops are “helpful”. Now (in the UMD poll), that number has more than doubled.</p>

<p>They believe it is the presence of Occupation troops that is aiding and abetting the bloodbath. They know what they are seeing on a day-to-day basis, and it has formed the basis of their changed opinions.</p>

<p>But the Dems are too pigheaded to pick up on it.</p>

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<p>Bush didn’t read the NIE report…surprise</p>

<p>FF, Barrons, etc all talk about who is in power, well, they need to fix this mess, but seem to be doing little, much less acknowledging what a mess it is</p>

<p>Guess making more propoganda films to try and sway Iraqis is the solution</p>

<p>And while some were talking about a civil war a year ago, others were saying, no way…well, where are we at NOW</p>

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<p>

They me know what they are seeing, but they are wrong in their attribution of the problem to being a conspiracy of the Americans to cause the problems. So, from a fundamentally flawed viewpoint, it is hard to conclude that their desired solution is indeed the correct one.</p>

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<p>Why do you keep seeing a “conspiracy”? I don’t see one. I don’t believe most Iraqis see one. They are smart folks. They don’t believe bloodshed would disappear immediately if the U.S. withdrew. There was indeed a time (January 2004) that, according to the State Department, Iraqis saw the occupiers as an answer to the attacks.</p>

<p>Their opinions have changed based on their experience. They just want the occupiers out - IMMEDIATELY. And the majority - not terrorists, not followers of Al-Qaeda, people who voted, people who, according to official U.S. policy are our friends - believe it okay to kill them if they don’t.</p>

<p>Winning hearts and minds…</p>

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<p>If you read the Post report, an underlying reason for their belief that things would be better if the US left is that they have been led to allow themselves to believe that the US is actually proactively instigating the sectarian turmoil. While this notion is false, I can see that if you actually held this belief that you would think that removal of the troops would remove the sectarian violence. However, knowing it is false as both we and the Iraqi leaders do, it would be irresponsible and cold hearted on our part to leave. It would also result in increased terrorism. So, where’s the upside in our leaving?</p>

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<p>I don’t know ANYONE - Iraqi or American - who believes that having the occupiers leave would remove sectarian violence, so I have no clue who this straw man is you are talking about. The occupiers have set up the situation there in such a way that sectarian violence will continue until accommodations are reached. The U.S. could rather easily have reached these accommodations more than two years ago - control of the gov’t to Sistani, autonomy for the Kurds (without Kirkuk), human rights protections for the Sunnis, permanent U.S. military bases, protection of the pipelines. And, in January 2004, the majority of Iraqis would have gone along. Sistani’s people would have wiped up Al-Qaeda. (Remember, there IS one Islamic country in the Middle East where Al-Qaeda has no toehold, no sleeper cells, and no support among the population.)</p>

<p>Not any more. Now they just want the occupiers out - IMMEDIATELY. And the occupiers WILL leave - it’s just a matter of when, and how many come home in bodybags. Upside for whom, Kimosabe? It’s not a matter of whether there is an “upside” to leaving - the realpolitik is that the occupiers WILL leave.</p>

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<p>Of course the Americans will leave, and I repeat…was this adventure in nation building worth the expense: the squandering of our national blood and treasure? What was gained? Surely not a “democratic Iraq”, which is amenable to US interests. Certainly not a reduction in terrorist activity. </p>

<p>Just a lot of wasted money and lost lives. It is beyond a pity.</p>

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<p>Mini, I’m afraid that you are setting up a straw man by claiming that the premise is that Iraqis believe that violence would end if the US pulled out. No one has set that forth as a premise. </p>

<p>However, there is a clear view in Iraq (as indicated in the quotes in the Wash. Post) that a major contributing fact to the sectarian violence is a proactive instigation of this from the US troops. Hence, while the people may not be so naive as to believe it will stop if the US goes home they do believe that if you remove the source which is intentionally fanning the flames that the level of violence will naturally go down. Of course, the truth is that the US is not only not fanning the flames but is the only thing keeping the flames from becoming an all-encompassing inferno. The leaders see this while the people continue to buy into the conspiracy theory. So, do you go with the democratically elected leaders or do you allow anarchy to rule via polls?</p>

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<p>61% of Iraqis approve of attacking and killing Americans. Mothers with babies on their hips, old men drinking tea after their tea shops have been destroyed, would-be students who can’t go to universities, young women who can’t go out of the house, men caught in the crossfire when they are just trying to go to work, schoolteachers and police, soldiers and garbage men, doctors and nurses, government workers and farmers and sellers of old tin strips. 61% of them approve of attacks on Americans.</p>

<p>They not only want the U.S. to leave IMMEDIATELY. They think that if the Americans don’t, they approve of KILLING them (good works and all).</p>

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<p>If I lived there and was subjected to being captured, tortured and killed by a member of an opposing sect and if I thought that the Americans were behind this by intentionally instigating this behavior, I would probably feel the same way. I would think that if the Americans left that things would improve. I would think that perhaps by killing some Americans I could help expedite their exit.</p>

<p>The problem with this logic is that the Americans are NOT behind this and if they left there would be nothing to prevent that same sectarian violence from escalating even more. So, I will repeat … a proposed solution based on flawed information/perceptions is not a solution to a problem which has an entirely different root cause. I’m sure that you are smart enough to see this.</p>

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<p>um, we have captured innocent people, we have killed innocent people, we have destroyed homes, we have tortured, and RIGHT now we are trying to pass a bill saying we want to be able to “interogate” in more aggressive ways</p>

<p>See, we have done some of what you say would make you angry, and even if it was done with the best of intentions, when you have been jalled for no reason, your son killed, your house gone, the reason doesn’t seem so important</p>

<p>when you have been promised your electricty would be back on, when you were promised safety, when you see and hear about so much money being spent to rebuild your destroyed country, yet little is happening, you get tired of it all</p>

<p>and when you see a huge embassy, permement military bases, read about no plan to ever leave, well, gosh, I can’t imagine why they have the wrong “perception”</p>

<p>FF they are LIVING IT , you are not…so how do you think you have the right to tell them how to think…</p>

<p>And even with government propoganda news they Iraqi’s STILL believe what they do…</p>

<p>So no matter what our motives are for being there, what the Iraqi’s see is reallity of their day to day lives, and FF father saying, but your realiity of death destruction, no follow through, no plan, well don’t worry about, I know better because our motives are all pure and clean, means nothing</p>

<p>IF we had done what we went in to do, and had any kind of occupation plan, maybe this wouldn’t be such a fiacso</p>

<p>IF our President actually knew anything about the people of the country he invaded, they wouldn’t be so frustrated</p>

<p>IF Rumsfield actually listened to the generals, the people who know what they are doing, maybe we would have some control</p>

<p>IF the Congress would do some oversite into the money spent, the waste, the fraud, maybe some actual work and rebuilding might be getting done</p>

<p>Is is interesting that NOW its a fire hell hole, something which many of us said it was and was going to be…while some before said, Yeah we killed a big insurgent leader…a big step forward…and see how much better it will get>></p>

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<p>And please don’t ask for what I would suggest NOW, as this mess isn’t of my creation, but the creation of poor leadership, planning, budgeting, and ingorance</p>

<p>and I still have no idea what Victory is supposed to be and Winning? What will victory look like, and what is defeating the enemy…an enemy what is just getting more in number, not less</p>

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<p>

Ahhh … you have succinctly captured the campaign slogan for the Dems.</p>

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<p>Hey, no defense of the Dems from me. I find most of them insufferable, and intellectually dishonest.</p>

<p>The Iraqis are dynamic. They have seen the U.S. deeds up close and personal. They’ve seen firsthand all the good turns done for them by American soldiers and Halliburton. Two-and-a-half years ago, less than a third approved of attacks on Americans. Now it’s over 60%. No one tortured or threatened to torture the woman with a baby because she fails to express her belief that killing Americans is a good thing to do. It’s just that she happens to think, based on her experience, that it would be just fine.</p>

<p>Winning hearts and minds…</p>

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<p>Trent Lott:</p>

<p>“It’s hard for Americans, all of us, including me, to understand what’s wrong with these people,” he said. “Why do they kill people of other religions because of religion? Why do they hate the Israeli’s and despise their right to exist? Why do they hate each other? Why do Sunnis kill Shiites? How do they tell the difference? They all look the same to me.“</p>

<p>Gee Can’t IMAGINE why the Iraqi’s might have some issues with our leaders and want us out…</p>

<p>And FF nice try, but your friends made this mess, and sometimes mess are so effed up, that unless errors are admitted, mistakes admitted, and a change of course undertaken, will the mess ever get cleaned up</p>

<p>you would expect more from your D if she were dating to see what mistakes she is making with guys than you expect from our elected leaders</p>

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<p>Its not hard to understand, in this country we fought a civil war…so I think we kind of get it, but if Trent Lott doesn’t, explains ALOT of the mess over there, doesn’t it</p>

<p>and to this day, we stil have people in the south, yes I will use that generalization of in the south who wish they had won the war, wish civil rights laws had never been passed, and didn’t find the old ways in the south bad at all, they aren’t killing each other NOW, but their relatives did…but some still wave that confederate flag up with the American flag, and isn’t that descrating OUR flag in a way…so for an elected leader to say he doesn’t understand, hasn’t even looked at American history too much, they don’t see what is really going on over there in Iraq, and ignored what many people said was going to happen, a civil war…</p>

<p>how many here denied it was possible and that a civil war wasn’t actually going on, and NOW say, well, we can’t leave because there might be or is the beginning of a civil war…</p>

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<p>Why dont u babbling idiots read the actuall chapter of the report that was released instead of reading articles about the 4 page outdated report.</p>