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US Military Defiant on Key Terms of Iraqi Pact
The scheme to engage in chicanery in labeling U.S. troops represents both open defiance of an agreement which the U.S. military has never accepted and a way of blocking President-elect Barack Obama's proposed plan for withdrawal of all U.S. combat troops from Iraq within 16 months of his taking office.
A man holds his child as US soldiers walk past, during a routine patrol in the predominantly Sunni neighborhood of Fadhil, in Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2008.
(AP Photo/Karim Kadim) By redesignating tens of thousands of combat troops as support troops, those officials apparently hope to make it difficult, if not impossible, for Obama to insist on getting all combat troops of the country by mid-2010.
Gen. David Petraeus, now commander of CENTCOM, and Gen. Ray Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, who opposed Obama's 16-month withdrawal plan during the election campaign, have drawn up their own alternative withdrawal plan rejecting that timeline, as the New York Times reported Thursday. That plan was communicated to Obama in general terms by Secretary of Defense Robert M.Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen when he met with his national security team in Chicago on Dec. 15, according to the Times.
The determination of the military leadership to ignore the U.S.-Iraq agreement and to pressure Obama on his withdrawal policy was clear from remarks made by Mullen in a news conference on Nov. 17 -- after U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker had signed the agreement in Baghdad.
Mullen declared that he considered it "important" that withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq "be conditions-based". That position directly contradicted the terms of the agreement, and Mullen was asked whether the agreement required all U.S. troops to leave Iraq by the end of 2011, regardless of the security conditions. He answered "Yes," but then added, "Three years is a long time. Conditions could change in that period of time..."
Mullen said U.S. officials would "continue to have discussions with them over time, as conditions continue to evolve", and said that reversing the outcome of the negotiations was "theoretically possible".
Obama's decision to keep Gates, who was known to be opposed to Obama's withdrawal timetable, as defense secretary confirmed the belief of the Pentagon leadership that Obama would not resist the military effort to push back against his Iraq withdrawal plan. A source close to the Obama transition team has told IPS that Obama had made the decision for a frankly political reason. Obama and his advisers believed the administration would be politically vulnerable on national security and viewed the Gates nomination as a way of blunting political criticism of its policies.
The Gates decision was followed immediately by the leak of a major element in the military plan to push back against a 16-month withdrawal plan -- a scheme to keep U.S. combat troops in Iraqi cities after mid-2009, in defiance of the terms of the withdrawal agreement.
The New York Times first revealed that "Pentagon planners" were proposing the "relabeling" of U.S. combat units as "training and support" units in a Dec. 4 story. The Times story also revealed that Pentagon planners were projecting that as many as 70,000 U.S. troops would be maintained in Iraq "for a substantial time even beyond 2011", despite the agreement's explicit requirement that all U.S. troops would have to be withdrawn by then.
Odierno provided a further hint Dec. 13 that the U.S. military intends to ignore the provision of the agreement requiring withdrawal of all U.S. combat troops from cities and towns by the end of May 2009. Odierno told reporters flatly that U.S. troops would not move from numerous security posts in cities beyond next summer's deadline for their removal, saying "We believe that's part of our transition teams."
His spokesman, Lt. Col. James Hutton, explained that these "transition teams" would consist of "enablers" rather than "combat forces", and that this would be consistent with the withdrawal agreement.
But both Odierno's and Hutton's remarks were clearly based on the Pentagon plan for the "relabeling" of U.S. combat forces as support forces in order to evade a key constraint in the pact that the Times had reported earlier. In an article in The New Republic dated Dec. 24, Eli Lake writes that three military sources told him that the U.S. "Military Transition Teams", which who have been fighting alongside Iraqi units, as well as force-protection units and "quick-reaction forces", are all being redesignated as "support units", despite their obvious combat functions, "in order to skirt the language of the SOFA [status of forces agreement]".
U.S. commanders have not bothered to claim that this is anything but a semantic trick, since the redesignated units would continue to participate in combat patrols, as confirmed by New York Times reporters Elisabeth Bumiller and Thom Shanker Thursday.
The question of whether Iraqis would permit such "relabeled" combat forces to remain after next June was discussed with Obama on Monday, according to the Times report. One participant reportedly said Gates and Mullen "did not rule out the idea that Iraqis might permit such troops..."
Despite Odierno's assertion of the U.S. military's prerogative to unilaterally determine what U.S. troops may remain Iraqi cities, the Iraqi government has already made it clear that the U.S. military has no such right. Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Mohammed al Askari, responded to Odierno's and Hutton's statements by saying that U.S. commanders would have to get permission from the Iraqi government to station any non-combat troops in cities beyond the deadline.
The signals from Odierno of U.S. military defiance of the withdrawal agreement suggest that the Pentagon and military leadership still do not take seriously the views of the Iraqi public as having any role in determining the matter of foreign troops in their country. Nevertheless, the withdrawal agreement is still subject to a popular referendum next July, and Iraqi politicians have already warned that evidence of U.S. refusal to abide by its terms will affect the outcome of that vote.
Washington Post reporters quoted Sunni legislator Shata al-Obusi as saying that Iraqis "will see this procrastination and they will vote no against the agreement, and after that the government should cancel it according to its provision".
Beyond the aim of getting Obama to abandon his 16-month plan, the military and Pentagon group still hopes to pressure Obama to agree to a long-term U.S. military presence in Iraq.
Further evidence emerged last week that Gates is a central figure in that effort. In a Washington Post column Dec. 11, George Will quoted Gates as saying that there is bipartisan congressional support for "a long-term residual presence" of as many as 40,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, and such a presence for "decades" has been the standard practice following "major U.S. military operations" since the beginning of the Cold War.
Those statements evidently represent part of the case Gates, Mullen and the military commanders are already making behind the scenes to get Obama to acquiesce in the subversion of the intent of the U.S.-Iraq agreement.
Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specializing in U.S. national security policy. The paperback edition of his latest book, "Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam", was published in 2006.
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113 Comments so far
Show AllCan't members of the military be shot for insubordination? I know, I know. Obama doesn't have the guts.
i would have thought that military men would be the first to recommend withdrawal of all troops from this immoral, illegal war and internationally condemned occupation.
It makes sense to listen to our commanders on the ground. We do not want Iraq to spiral into civil war. Consider what Prof. Juan Cole wrote in 2005:
"Personally, I think "US out now" as a simple mantra neglects to consider the full range of possible disasters that could ensue. For one thing, there would be an Iraq civil war. Iraq wasn't having a civil war in 2002. And although you could argue that what is going on now is a subterranean, unconventional civil war, it is not characterized by set piece battles and hundreds of people killed in a single battle, as was true in Lebanon in 1975-76, e.g. People often allege that the US military isn't doing any good in Iraq and there is already a civil war. These people have never actually seen a civil war and do not appreciate the lid the US military is keeping on what could be a volcano.
All it would take would be for Sunni Arab guerrillas to assassinate Grand Ayatollah Sistani. And, boom. If there is a civil war now that kills a million people, with ethnic cleansing and millions of displaced persons, it will be our fault, or at least the fault of the 75% of Americans who supported the war. (Such a scenario is entirely plausible. Look at Afghanistan. It was a similar-sized country with similar ethnic and ideological divisions. One million died 1979-1992, and five million were displaced. Moreover, all this helped get New York and the Pentagon blown up.)
I mean, we are always complaining, and rightly so, about the genocide in Darfur and the inattention to genocides in Rwanda and the Congo earlier. Can we really live with ourselves if we cast Iraqis into such a maelstrom deliberately?
And as I have argued before, an Iraq civil war will likely become a regional war, drawing in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Turkey. If a regional guerrilla war breaks out among Kurds, Turks, Shiites and Sunni Arabs, the guerrillas could well apply the technique of oil pipeline sabotage to Iran and Saudi Arabia, just as they do now to the Kirkuk pipeline in Iraq. If 20% of the world's petroleum production were taken off-line by such sabotage, the poor of the world would be badly hurt, and the whole world would risk another Great Depression.
People on the left often don't like it when I bring this scenario up, because they dislike oil; they read it as a variant of the "war for oil" thesis and reject it. But working people, whom we on the left are supposed to be supporting, get to work on buses, and buses burn gasoline. If the bus ticket doubles or triples, people who make $10,000 a year feel it. Moreover, if there is a depression, the janitors and other workers will be the first to be fired. As for the poor of the global South, this scenario would mean they are stuck in dire poverty for an extra generation. Do you know how expensive everything would be for Jamaicans, who import much of what they use and therefore are sensitive to the price of shipping fuel? It would be highly irresponsible to walk away from Iraq and let it fall into a genocidal civil war that left the Oil Gulf in flames." - Juan Cole 2005
.It seems a violation of the rules of courteous debate to neglect a link to such as you attribute here.
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
My apologies,
http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/ten-things-congress-could-demand-from.html
The Iraquis have made it very clear they do not want the US there to protect them from a civil war.
I cannot believe that in 2008 anyone can still believe that US troops are in Iraq for humanitarian reasons. So I must assume that you are perfectly OK with a war for oil and the rest is slime.
“The scheme to engage in chicanery in labeling U.S. troops”
Who says Americans aren’t predictable. Way to go there! Champion way to erase the memory of the Bush years by breaking another international agreement.
Anyone else notice America’s trouble understanding the meaning of such words as: “democracy, torture, combat”. Was it Clinton who got the ball rolling by redefining “sexual relations”?
It all depends on what the definition of 'definition' is...
This is simple: Bush refused to put thise STATUS OF FORCES AGREEMENT before Congress, as it should have been because it constitutes a TREATY, which by law, should be first ratified by the Legislative Branch. By doing this he 1) eliminates any possibility of opposition and/or oversight, 2) the arrangement cannot be halted, and 3) gives unlimited ability for executive branch to use military in any fashion it sees fit - with collusion of military. HOW DO YOU SAY FASCISM . . . .
Given the first two posts in this page, what they say, I suggest going to youtube, say, and searching the website for the longest video clips available there on what Ms 'Kay Griggs' has to say about U.S. military "men". There's also a website specifically for a very long interview with her and it can be found by searching for 'kaygriggstalks'. I haven't obtained the DVD from that website, but have listened to a video clip or two and read some articles about what she's been exposing, which is about matters that are certainly dark, but also supported even if indirectly by other people, such as former USMC Major General Smedely Butler and his book, 'War is a Racket'(!), and others who didn't necessary speak specifically of the U.S. military, but nonetheless spoke of how the ruling U.S. elites operate and why, which does, often anyway, come to be related to why the U.S. military is put into action, overtly and covertly.
As for the title of the article by Gareth Porter, "US Military Defiant on Key Terms of Iraqi Pact", this is no surprise and another resource person to consider reading from or about is John Perkins, author of 'Confessions of an Economic Hit Man' and who did an interview with DemocracyNow.org I believe earlier this year, perhaps in January. What he says fits strongly with what former USMC Maj. Gen. Butler wrote. It also fits well with respect to what happened in Rwanda in 1994, including the preceding and related history there, as well as since 1994, with this latter aspect including Rwanda's President sending dogs of war into the DRC, Congo, etcetera. I posted links to a few resource articles and one website a little while ago on an article here at CD yesterday on Rwanda.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2008/12/18#comment-1095631
The fit also happens to exist with respect to Zbigniew Brzezinski's book, "The Grand Chessboard: ...", which is wholly or else very much about gaining dominance over Asia and, "of course", its natural resources; the "march" for U.S. world dominance or domination, through, "of course", conquests, which in turn require, stratetically speaking, wars of aggression, aka against peace, for it's the sole way the U.S. ruling elites, the real ones, have for gaining broad control over planet Earth.
When we consider even half of all that's been written in exposing the extreme rogueness of the U.S. internationally, then it is not surprising at all ... what the above article by Gareth Porter is about. NOT at all surprising. It has been "to be expected" with certainty ever since the criminal war was launched in March 2003, although also as soon as it become publicly known that the Bush or Bush-Cheney administration wanted Congress to authorize war on Iraq. As of the second that that became publicly known, the rest could be understood for what to definitely expect.
What would be surprising is if those expectations everyone should've head as of fall 2002 didn't happen. Now that would'be been surprising; definitely. After all, the U.S. govt is the very most rogue state in the world of planet Earth.
Also to be expected is that they have to keep most troops ignorant of and fooled about why they're being called to follow orders that are wholly and extremely criminal.
To those of you old enough to remember Eisenhower's warning about the MIC, this should not come as a surprise.
They have ruled us for their own power and profit for several decades, to the detriment of many countries and millions of people. Apparently they now feel powerful enough to just say "f**k you" to anybody who objects to their rule or attempts to deflect a tiny bit of their acquired power.
In more honest societies, it is called a military dictatorship.
I wondered the same -- how much is to promote "security" and how much is to keep the contract money coming for highly paid non-enlisted players. Cynical thought but, sadly, no one wants to give up a high-paying gig.
Indeed. Who honestly thinks the MIC is going to end such a profitable venture? Billions are at stake. Those people who are paying off the politicians are making a killing off of all this killing.
No one really expected U.S. forces to completely withdraw from Iraq - did they?
Not a snowball's chance in hell will all U.S. forces withdraw, they will be in Iraq for many, many years to come. The "homeland" better get used to this.
It's all part of the privatization of our complete military. In the future we won't be the boots on the ground. That will be done by poor people. We will be the faceless killer from above, or behind a computer screen. General Butler showed us how our military is used so it's only logical for corporate America do to the military what they did to the country. Brainwash it.
Hoa binh
What poor people? Isn't it already done by poor people?
"Nyah, nobody tells me where to get off. See, mug? Nyah. I'm General Ray Odierno and I'm the big man with an iron. And if that punk Obama calls me in for a talk, I'll shove a grapefruit in his face. Nyah, see?"
If the military "leadership" balks at carrying out lawful orders from the commander-in-chief, then it is time for a redux of history; that's when Truman fired McArthur. What remains to be seen is if Obama has the gonads to do so.
www.wunderman-comics.com
Don't you just love the double speak. The troops will not leave now because they have been reclassified as support troops. By whom? Surely not the Iraqi's. I think they would reclassify them as the support thugs!
I thought Blackwater was the support thugs.
Fort Laramie Treaty 1851, the US guarantees ownership of The Great Plains to the Cheyenne, Arapaho, Lakota, Shoshone, etc. "For as long as the rivers flow and the eagles fly."
Fort Laramie Treaty, 1868, US treaty with the Lakota and Arapahoe Nations guaranteeing the Black Hills to the Lakota and banning whites from the Powder River Region.
Fort Laramie, Iraq, 2008.......................................
Would making US forces "support troops" mean they are now Illegal Combatants having no legal rights whatsoever?
More of the crumbling of empire. This can't go on indefinitely. Overextending of resources, implosion from within.
I'm glad that this cabal of warmongers showed their hand so early before Obama takes office. It's now clear that Gen. Petraeus, Gen. Odierno, and Adm. Mullen need to be removed from the equation if we are going to end the occupation within any practical time frame. The whole idea behind a "conditioned" based withdrawal is gold for the MIC because 'conditions' will never be "perfect" enough to leave and these generals know it. Obama's appointment of Gates could also turn out to be a disasterous mistake should things get ugly between the military and the White House.
The Military Industrial Complex that "Ike" warned about is and has been a reality since the colonial era in the USA and goes back in recorded History even to the Babylonians. It is and must be part of the "beasts existence". When Napoleon stated that an "Army travels on its stomach" he knew very well of which he spoke. The individual who "invented" the process for "desiccated vegetables" (the name escapes me, it has been many years since this was a study subject for me), made himself and his heirs wealthy by supplying the Napoleonic campaigns, and the same applies now to companies who supply the present U.S. campaigns.
The "MIC" and the Military however have but a few times taken over the government that initiates their existence. In the case with the US Military they are not following any other orders except those given by the Present Commander In Chief, and his administration. They will resist the Iraqi governments dictates; because the Commander in Chief has given them the open door, and even most likely, spoke directly with the high command concerning the matter, but only as long as they (the Military) think that they can escape responsibility. As long as the Bush administration escapes 'responsibility', their "followers" will continue to act in the present manner.
These "International criminals" have been found to have violated the Laws of the US, its Constitution, and International Law and standards. The VP, recently, and very arrogantly admitted, rather foolishly* to having been aware of very serious crimes being committed under his and the Presidents Command, and even admitted to having approved of them.
The only answer would be to follow through with the legal process, charge the Bush administration, using Mr. Cheney's own admissions as evidence for convictions. Then the Military Command will fall into lock step with the "new Commander in Chief", who hopefully is not the criminal that the present one has admitted to being.
The truth is the American people have all of the power they need to assure themselves and the world that these criminals, (the Bush administration) have no more control over the MIC, or the Military. The "people" either can allow these atrocities to continue or they can take control and put the world at large at ease, and show the world at the same time that they are not the slaves but he masters. It is up to them. It is up to the progressive thinkers, the readers of Common Dreams and others, to take the necessary steps. The conservative thinkers are unfortunately in most cases, followers. Their philosophy and mind set would never allow them to even consider taking the control that is needed.
Life being what most people will admit, "a series of challenges" from birth to death. It is the free thinkers and the progressives that rise to the challenges.
The others simply seem to accept the challenges with defeatism and offer little or no solutions.
Confucius is credited with having stated "A journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step", it was precisely in situations like this that the wisdom applies.
* The people have all of the evidence they need to achieve the convictions the Criminals deserve, they have convicted themselves already. The only thing awaiting them should be "jail cells", not "retirement".
Which ever foot you choose, "take the first step".
Your silence will be your consent. The silent will share the guilt.
I for one, will not be one of them to share the guilt; will you?
nurembergrevisited@gmail.com
Perhaps the military sees the Obama administration as an "interim" U.S. government?
> The Military Industrial Complex that "Ike" warned about is and has been a reality since the colonial era in the USA and goes back in recorded History even to the Babylonians.
The USA had not much of an army at the start of WWII.
Wait a cotton picking second !
After Jan.200, 2009, Obama will be the 'Commander in Chief', and all he has to do is:
Order to the Defense Secretary that all Combat, Support, Administrative, and any other classification of troops be out by whichever date he so chooses. (period)
Anyone failing to follow his command, will be guilty of disobeying a direct order and subject to immediate dismissal from the Armed Forces or cabinet posts.
Wow, countcoup, below, has the right reference.....Eisenhower warned us of the growrh of the Military Industrial Complex.....Generals,themselves, become "Power Lords". They are untouched by scnadals. They destroy evidence. They develop policies like: collateral damage is the result of war not murder, immunize soldiers from crimes like murder and rape so that you do not have to investigate or punish, dehumanize the enemy and call him insurgent, terrorist, radical, militant not Iraqi Citizen defending his country against an "Invasion Force".
Obama was told that he would have to retain CIA Man Gates as Secretary of Defense. Obama just announced that he would close Guantanamo within two years. Wait a second,many of those men were: kidnapped, secuestered, tortured, brainwashed for over six years without a hearing, trial etc.......Obama is not making decisions he is now being controlled and knows what happens if he does not follow orders.
The War on Terrorism is a "Made up War" for Generals and "The Power Elite".
Once again, the American People have been screwed.
.One would think, wouldn't one? Perhaps the military became emboldened by the retention of warhawk Gates, perhaps we need more facts?
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
Then again. With the steep drop in the price of oil, it may turn out that it's no longer a "worthwile endeavor" for the military industrial corpofascists to insist on keeping the military there. It's "On to the next 'Windmill', Sancho."
The empire strikes back.
hahaha!!! clever !!
===============
this sounds familiar.....a USA pattern really.
didn't the US government RENEGE on "treaties" pushed to the native indians? how many countries has the US - backed by BIG MUSCLES US military , covert and overt, - renege or twist treaties or have treaties that TWIST things against other countries?
it's amazing that the US MIC NEVER breaks stride in that pattern of UNTRUSTWORTHINESS. that seems to be its number ONE EXPORT and "industry"...untrustworthiness.
And the perfect quote from that movie for this article . . .
Darth Vader: "I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further."
In the absence of strong leadership from atop, militaries tend to run amok (say, has anyone yet accepted responsibility for launching that attack into Syria? do I see a hand raised? no?).
The whole situation is really very simple. The US military is fighting a '(global) war on terror'. The only way to militarily stop terrorists is to control territory. As long as the US stays mired in this insane and unwinnable war to 'prevent future terrorism', the military will work and fight to control all territory where future terrorists can be found (since it is a global war, that means the whole world, including the Homeland itself - which is why there's now an active Army unit within the US of A).
If America was again a nation at peace, then Mr. Change Obama would be talking to the military in time of peace and not during war. It would make all the difference in the world.
We need to bring light on the 'war on terror', the War on Terror, War on Terrorism, and all the other names it goes by. We must dissipate the fog of wars that the Bush gang has confused America with while they looted the bank. It's been seven years and nobody yet has ever stated what victory in a war to 'prevent future terrorism' means. Without victory, the war will go on until we're all in cages and incapable of being future terrorists.
Take America back to peace and it's a whole lot easier getting the military to co-operate, since there is no 'enemy' anymore for them to fight.
I think I'll wait for someone else than the NYT's to bring out more before believing this stuff.
What I read seems stuck together with bubble gum.
Not saying its not possible, I'd just like a source with a bit more veracity.
.While our news media is deteriorating rapidly, especially in the area of investigative journalism, and while they are closing foreign offices rapidly, choosing instead to get their news from the wire services, two things must be stated:
Thing One...The NYTimes is still, far and away the best newspaper in the nation.
Thing Two....This article does not originate with the TImes, simply cites an article it claims comes from the Times as a reference:
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45167
Can you tell me which newspaper you favor? I used to use the Washington Times as a bird cage liner, but I had to stop. The damn bird would only fly using its right wing!
.
We see things, not as they are, but as we are.
Anais Nin
ardee
"Thing One...The NYTimes is still, far and away the best newspaper in the nation."
Boy are we in trouble!
"Can you tell me which newspaper you favor?
The Guardian usually. And the Dallas Morning News.
"I used to use the Washington Times as a bird cage liner, but I had to stop. The damn bird would only fly using its right wing!"
I am still laughing. The best so far!! So gopod I'll steal it!
mmmmmmmmm, I do love the smell of bloody oil.
Don't worry my fellow Americanoes --soon we go broke and no US troops anywhere in the world. No more invasions and torture and we become--post-empire! We become kindly, somewhat socialized like Sweden. And Carolyn Kennedy is the new face of the country-quiet, smart and no sharp elbows.
Dr Wu, the last of the big-time thinkers
Nice image. However, I picture the reaction in the US when we're "broke" to be more akin to the holiday trample at WalMart than quiet and smart and socialized.
THANK YOU CommonDreams for bringing this article out. To those who said that I should shut up and trust Gates and Jones to withdraw any of these troops from Iraq, you're WRONG WRONG WRONG ! Oh, and Obama will be just like the "Three Buddy Bears" who preach go-along-get-along !
Lets hope you are wrong instead. I certainly hope so.
I don't think anyone said you should shut up, I hope not!
"Lets hope you are wrong instead. I certainly hope so."
Well, I hope I'm wrong too but I'm not getting a good feeling so far unless I'm too pessimistic or something.
"I don't think anyone said you should shut up, I hope not!"
You know, you're right. It just felt like it. Sorry.
Lets hope for the best. You know how the other way works out. And we don't want to go that way again.
Here's hoping!
The MIC is the only sector of the US economy that continues to grow even as it enters further into depression. It grows because of the ongoing failed wars and the new ones to start (Iran, Syria, Pakistan,...?). We can bet that the better part of that $700bn+ bankers bailout has gone rapidly into the MIC; more wars more profits. In the case of Iraq, now that the International Energy Agency has admitted that oil reserves are some 30 o 40% less than previous claimed, the MIC needs Iraqi oil to keep growing. The question is how are they going to pay for all this warfare when any profits gained from it only go into corrupt private pockets?
the pentagon probably thinks that with its Star wars tech - troops decked out in superwarrior uniform and fancy bombs and guns and nifty , clever planning - that the iraqis are GOING TO LET them stay. they think that they can do vietnam one BETTER and STAY and be VICTORIOUS. they are dreaming!
if the US military wants to stay in iraq -- they should go ahead until they are swallowed up in the sands of mesopotamia and WISH they could get out. lol.
as the conservative Patrick Buchanan correctly says:
"we should get out of this business of empire....we should get out of those lands .......BEFORE THEY KICK US OUT".
July 25, 2008
Honorable Exit From Empire
by Patrick J. Buchanan
As any military historian will testify, among the most difficult of maneuvers is the strategic retreat. Napoleon's retreat from Moscow, Lee's retreat to Appomattox and MacArthur's retreat from the Yalu come to mind. The British Empire abandoned India in 1947 – and a Muslim-Hindu bloodbath ensued.
France's departure from Indochina was ignominious, and her abandonment of hundreds of thousands of faithful Algerians to the FALN disgraceful. Few Americans can forget the humiliation of Saigon '75, or the boat people, or the Cambodian holocaust.
Strategic retreats that turn into routs are often the result of what Lord Salisbury called "the commonest error in politics ... sticking to the carcass of dead policies."
From 1989 to 1991, with the collapse of the Soviet Empire and breakup of the U.S.S.R., America had an opportunity to lay down its global burden and become again what Jeane Kirkpatrick called "a normal country in a normal time."
We let the opportunity pass by, opting instead to use our wealth and power to convert the world to democratic capitalism. And we have reaped the reward of all the other empires that went before: A sinking currency, relative decline, universal enmity, a series of what Rudyard Kipling called "the savage wars of peace."
Yet, opportunity has come anew for America to shed its imperial burden and become again the republic of our fathers.
The chairman of Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang Party has just been hosted for six days by Beijing. Commercial flights have begun between Taipei and the mainland. Is not the time ripe for America to declare our job done, that the relationship between China and Taiwan is no longer a vital interest of the United States?
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government wants a status of forces agreement with a timetable for full withdrawal of U.S. troops. Is it not time to say yes, to declare that full withdrawal is our goal as well, that the United States seeks no permanent bases in Iraq?
On July 4, Reuters, in a story headlined "Poland Rejects U.S. Missile Offer," reported from Warsaw: "Poland spurned as insufficient on Friday a U.S. offer to boost its air defenses in return for basing anti-missile interceptors on its soil. ...
"'We have not reached a satisfactory result on the issue of increasing the level of Polish security,' Prime Minister Donald Tusk told a news conference after studying the latest U.S. proposal."
Tusk is demanding that America "provide billions of dollars worth of U.S. investment to upgrade Polish air defenses in return for hosting 10 two-stage missile interceptors," said Reuters.
Reflect if you will on what is going on here.
By bringing Poland into NATO, we agreed to defend her against the world's largest nation, Russia, with thousands of nuclear weapons. Now the Polish regime is refusing us permission to site 10 anti-missile missiles on Polish soil, unless we pay Poland billions for the privilege.
Has Uncle Sam gone senile?
No. Tusk has Sam figured out. The old boy is so desperate to continue in his Cold War role as the world's Defender of Democracy he will even pay the Europeans – to defend Europe.
Why not tell Tusk that if he wants an air defense system, he can buy it; that we Americans are no longer willing to pay Poland for the privilege of defending Poland; that the anti-missile missile deal is off. And use cancelation of the missile shield to repair relations with a far larger and more important power, Vladimir Putin's Russia.
Consider, too, the opening South Korea is giving us to end our 60-year commitment to defend her against the North. For weeks, Seoul hosted anti-American protests against a trade deal that allows U.S. beef into South Korea. Koreans say they fear mad-cow disease.
Yet, when a new deal was cut to limit imports to U.S. beef from cattle less than 30 months old, that too was rejected by the protesters. Behind the demonstrations lies a sediment of anti-Americanism.
In 2002, a Pew Research Center survey of 42 nations found 44 percent of South Koreans, second highest number of any country, holding an unfavorable view of the United States. A Korean survey put the figure at 53 percent, with 80 percent of youth holding a negative view. By 39 percent to 35 percent, South Koreans saw the United States as a greater threat than North Korea.
Can someone explain why we keep 30,000 troops on the DMZ of a nation whose people do not even like us?
The raison d'etre for NATO was the Red Army on the Elbe. It disappeared two decades ago. The Chinese army left North Korea 50 years ago. Yet NATO endures and the U.S. Army stands on the DMZ. Why?
Because, if all U.S. troops were brought home from Europe and Korea, 10,000 rice bowls would be broken. They are the rice bowls of politicians, diplomats, generals, journalists and think tanks who would all have to find another line of work.
And that is why the Empire will endure until disaster befalls it, as it did all the others.
COPYRIGHT CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
what will happen to the US military and Empire is the same that happened to the British Empire and all western empires that tried to meddle in the East:
the USA and pentagon just think they can get out of the bane of history on all empires, but as Rudyard Kipling - "the Poet of Empire" - the empire that created the artificial borders that is now Iraq that the USA is sinking in and being bled by in its own arrogance - said:
:"HERE LIES A MAN THAT TRIED TO HUSTLE THE EAST".
the same will happen with the pentagon's , MIC's, wonderful , fancy plans of domination....if not yet in WHOLE...they are ALREADY being swallowed up in the sands of mesopotamia...and soon....with obama's war in afghanistan in the mountains and passes of afghanistan.
and THEN americans will see in FULL the FOLLY of an empire gone MAD!