"the nearly decade-old Iraq war."

I make it two decades.

Tom Hayden the Toady says "But the war is as over as a war can be, and the peace movement should celebrate."

Yeah, right, Tom, we should "celebrate".

Where the hell is my bucket of nails? I need something to chew on.

Ha ha ha! This is a sad, sad joke, imo. We'll still have mercenary troops and US contracts in Iraq, and innocent Iraqis will still get killed as a consequence of what we've done and are still doing.

Panetta officially called it a “War” and signed it.

Now the prospect of war crimes trials of the liars responsible is on higher ground and there is plenty of public records of that.

Judge Jim

Only time will tell if the withdrawal is for real or just window dressing before the 2012 election. The fact that American corporations are now operating in Iraq with oil, agriculture, and other enterprises, it is looking like a very long corporate occupation.

The total number of private contractors in Iraq is difficult to pin down. At the peak there were an estimated 170,000 private contractors feeding on our tax dollars. Both Washington and the corporate media rarely mention the private contractor situation and give the impression that our involvement is over and that the "heroes" who have killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis will be home for Christmas.

Additional contractors are also being hired to protect supply convoys from Kuwait.

About 5,000 more mercenaries will be used just to protect the fortified Green Zone with the largest U.S. embassy on earth, although one nearly as big is being built in Afghanistan, or rather Pipelineistan.

And most current reporting indicates that there will be 3,000 U.S. military "advisers" (not unlike Vietnam advisers) and or trainers remaining in Iraq who will be involved in "joint exercises".

Air support and drone operations will also be active and new combat troop facilities are being built just across the border in Kuwait for potentially quick deployment.

One example of the corporate colonization of Iraq is that Halliburton is now very active in Iraq's oil fields. And what a surprise, Dick Cheney who played a major role in initiating the illegal invasion (a war crime) has become very wealthy through his Halliburton holdings. Imagine that, a Vice President starts a war and then profits from that war via no-bid contracts and including fraudulent billing.

"http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories…

"Vice President Dick Cheney’s stock options in Halliburton rose from $241,498 in 2004 to over $8 million in 2005, an increase of more than 3,000 percent, as Halliburton continues to rake in billions of dollars from no-bid/no-audit government contracts."

The current $5 Trillion in public debt for the corporate imperial invasion of Iraq is not the end of the exploitation of the American taxpayer, but just the beginning. And Iraq has paid a much higher price.

Do not be surprised if Iran puts out a bounty on the mercenaries remaining in Iraq and deploys the same computer hacking that downed the drone they recently captured in the east of that country.

Another aspect of the post-withdrawal occupation of Iraq is there will be a substantial CIA (corporate intelligence agency) presence. But the CIA appears to have problems of their own.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/216399.html

"A report says that Iran not only cracked communications system of the RQ-170 stealth drone and forced it to land inside the country, but also broke into CIA's secret drone command center.

According to an article published by DEBKAfile military intelligence website, Iranians not only unlocked the Sentinel's secret software but also penetrated the command and control center running the drones from CIA Headquarters at Langley in McClean, Virginia. They then delved into the satellite connection between Langley and the drone.

The article pointed out that Iranian electronic experts subsequently reprogrammed the directives guiding the satellite and the RQ-170 stealth drone by falsifying the images appearing on the screens at Langley."

Lies, Lies, and more Lies. The troops coming home all have to one degree or another, post traumatic syndrome, due to the horrors of combat. The US American public all have a form of PTS called cognitive dissonance, From constant massive in your face MENDACITY. All Lies all the time. Just another "mission accomplished" for the US MIC. I bet they are already building the USS (CVN) ObamaKhan. The ships motto will read, " The USS ObamaKhan bringing peace and freedom to Islam all over the world, in the name of democracy and human rights for all".

Oh no, Al Jazeera didn't just MASSIVELY underestimate the number of Iraqi dead!

"the withdrawal ends a war that left tens of thousands of Iraqis... dead."

That should be "over a million Iraqis dead."

How can this be? There never was a declaration of war. The Congress authorized expenditures for OIL over and over. That's it. Panetta's words are just more propaganda.

Now, the operation is simply moving into its next stage. Most US citizens have no idea what the next stage involves. Guaranteed, though, it will require more of their tax dollars.

This is occuring after 20 years of US militaristic operations in and against Iraq. While a little relieved that the troops are leaving there, I fear what the future will bring because of the unfinished US operations in the Middle East.

The sickness is worse than any sane person can imagine.
I didn't watch the video. The words hurt enough.
Enter at your own risk.

http://www.truth-out.org/new-documents-released-2007-iraq-atrocity-troops/1324191717

"Mission accomplished!"

Ha! Not while one drop of oil remains in Iraq unstolen by the Oilogarchy.

People who are paid to kill are called "mercenaries," not "contractors."