22 Comments

• 1. Arctic Fox  |  April 5th, 2008 at 11:29 pm

  Impressive.

  But therein lies the problem. Whilever US troops are better trained, better equipped, better armored and better disciplined then anything anyone else has got, they are going to be A) Invaluable, and therefore unable to leave without the local forces ending up in trouble and B) called in whenever something tough needs doing.

  All of which costs US lives. Not to mention anyone who engages such a force in direct conflict isn’t going to last long, which means the only way to inflict casualties is to break all the rules that are normally applied in conventional warfare.

  The question is, when will we realize than whenever we end up doing the tough stuff, the Iraqis never will be ready to take over, and they’ll always be using OUR troops as cannon fodder to settle THEIR territorial disputes.

  How long are we prepared to let that happen?

• 2. kimberly4victory  |  April 5th, 2008 at 11:33 pm

  God bless all our troops!

  Arctic: First, how do you know the Iraqi troops will never be ready to take over? Second, what do you think will happen if we leave before they are ready to take over?

• 3. Arctic Fox  |  April 5th, 2008 at 11:39 pm

  Kimberly,

  Who in their right mind would go out and fight themselves, when they have the best equipped, best armored, best disciplined, biggest fighting force in the world on call to do it for them? They won’t ever WANT to be ready because they are quite content to put OUR soldiers lives on the line rather than fight themselves. So they’ll never be “ready” whilever we are prepared to stay and fight for them.

  It will be turmoil whenever we leave. That is unavoidable. The only way to avoid that would be to kill every last “enemy” and as we don’t know who some of them are, that is an impossible task.

  So we’re stuck with either accomplishing an impossible task or withdrawing at some point. My question still stands: How many of our lives are we prepared to sacrifice before that point comes?

• 4. Kahn  |  April 6th, 2008 at 12:13 am

  The video show Iraqi forces doing the fighting. Pay attention Arctic. Iraqi special ops guys blow the door and go in followed by out guys. Get it? The battles in Basra were Iraqi with us advising and supporting. It is exactly what Democrats have been crying for. But you’re all so ignorant of military affairs that you can’t tell when someone is speaking English or not?

  Give me a break.

• 5. Arctic Fox  |  April 6th, 2008 at 12:35 am

  And you can tell exactly who is US Special Forces and who is Iraqi among the babble of voices in a nightvision video? I don’t believe it. Not for one second.

  A grenade goes off. An American accent yells “go go go” and Kahn can immediately tell who is US forces and who isn’t? I don’t think so. You’re a liar, and not a very convincing one at that, and you STILL ignored my main question even though you tried to divert it.

  WE had to bail Maliki’s operation out. WE had to carry out airstrikes, OUR troops lives got put on the lines. Very convenient that you still are prepared to risk our troops with an unverifiable claim that they were only there to “support and advise.”

• 6. kimberly4victory  |  April 6th, 2008 at 12:40 am

  OT … RIP Charlton Heston.

  God bless you Charlton and all your family.

• 7. Arctic Fox  |  April 6th, 2008 at 12:50 am

  From the BBC:

  Charlton Heston, who won a best actor Oscar for his starring role in the epic Ben Hur has died, aged 84, a spokesman for the star’s family has said.

  Heston died on Saturday at his home in Beverly Hills with his wife Lydia, whom he married in 1944, at his side.

  Our thoughts and prayers are with Lydia and their family at this time, I’m sure all will agree.

• 8. GOP4ME  |  April 6th, 2008 at 1:40 am

  Dang, two words…

  GET

  SOME

• 9. Joe  |  April 6th, 2008 at 8:47 am

  kahn:
  The video show Iraqi forces doing the fighting. Pay attention Arctic.

  Mark’s headline:
  Video of Our Soldiers Fighting in Sadr City

  So which is it kahn?

  And if it IS the Iraqis fighting, then they’ve “stepped up” now let’s stand the hell down.

  You can’t have it both ways man. It is the Iraqis fighting, but we need to stay and fight?

• 10. Darva Conger  |  April 6th, 2008 at 10:02 am

  NBC reported on Saturday that of the 200K Iraqis trained in 2007, 15% have already quit.

  Also that 1000 Iraqis fled their posts during the fighting in Basra.

  Got any video about that?

  The problem is not the U.S. Army or our Marines. They are the best on the planet and can kick anyone’s ass. The problem is we’ve tied ourselves to a military not worthy of our support. The Iraqis. We did the same in South Vietnam. Sure there were good ARVN units, but many were corrupt and inept. Don’t forget during the fall of Saigon, it was some South Vietnamese air force units that bombed their own capital.

• 11. InDaVa  |  April 6th, 2008 at 11:35 am

  There are tons of videos out there of Americans fighting in Iraq. This isn’t anything new. There are Iraqis fighting side by side American troops, as it should be. Excellent!

• 12. jerry  |  April 6th, 2008 at 1:19 pm

  Looks like more fighting erupting in Sadr city today. Hopefully Kahn’s buddies those Iraqi special forces can handle it without our help. I wouldn’t hold my breath though.

• 13. Christian Wright  |  April 6th, 2008 at 1:29 pm

  Deleted - off topic.

• 14. Kahn  |  April 6th, 2008 at 6:02 pm

  Arctic -yes, actually I can. They wear different uniforms and are not speaking English. The parts out in the cars and vehicles, no I can’t.

  Basra was Iraqi. This is what you asked for, hell it’s the point of your post. It IS happening. Pay attention.

  Can’t you even be happy when you get what you want?

• 15. Kahn  |  April 6th, 2008 at 8:34 pm

  jerry,

  Think Germany could have stopped the USSR without our help? Or that South Korea could stop the North and China? You do realize that we are still in the Balkans right?

  Even when things are developing just the way you’ve said you want, your side still whines. It is way past getting old. I wonder what you goals actually are? I see a disconnect between what you claim (when pressed and you finally actually answer) as a group and the constant hand-wringing and complaining make me wonder.

  Victory is OK right? Losing isn’t your actual goal, is it?

• 16. kimberly4victory  |  April 6th, 2008 at 9:02 pm

  Yeah, way to support the troops, Jerry.

  If you don’t support the mission, you don’t support our troops. Plain and simple.

  I’m not saying you can’t disagree with the war because that is your right, but calling our troops murderers, blocking recruitment centers, and having doubts about the capability of our troops, as you did, is uncalled for.

  DarVa: It would be interesting to see why the Iraqi soldiers are quitting. No pay? Low pay? Scared to fight? Tired of fighting? Problems/issues at home? Etc. I’m sure there are similar reasons to why any soldier, in any country, in any war quits.

  Regardless of their reason to quit, I am disappointed. :-(

  Arctic: I’ve heard different adjectives to describe what will happen if we leave before Iraq is ready. Catastrophic is one that comes to mind.

  I am the glass is half-full kind of girl. I don’t think it’s unavoidable as I believe most Iraqis desire a safe and free Iraq.

  If a country came in to save me from a dictator (who poisoned his own people, threw live people down a woodchipper, had sons that raped and murdered children, murdered hundreds of thousands) and religious nutjobs came in to interrupt the peace process, I would fight those nutjobs to the death for my country.

• 17. kimberly4victory  |  April 6th, 2008 at 9:07 pm

  FORWARD OPERATING BASE KALSU, Iraq – A tip led Iraqi Security Forces to the largest explosively-formed penetrator cache found to date in Multi-National Division – Center’s area of operation, April 2. The munitions were discovered in a 6-ton truck in a garage in al Qasim.

  The cache contained more than 1000 EFP components, more than 3000 pounds of explosives and 45 Katusha 107 mm rockets and stands. Also included in the cache were more than 10 devices used to detonate improvised explosive devices, 250 PKC rounds, 10 60 mm mortar shells and one 60 mm stand. The rockets are believed to have been manufactured in Iran.

  Way to go, Iraqi Security Forces!!

  Rockets from Iran? Anyone surprised?

• 18. jerry  |  April 6th, 2008 at 9:08 pm

  My goal Kahn is to get our troops out of Iraq safely and responsibly. Victory has already been secured. We defeated Saddam, no weapons, a government was formed. We need to allow the Iaqi’s to handle their own country. As I have said before the Maliki government is our welfare queen we keep giving $ without them actually have to really do anything. We need to provide tough love and they need to excercise personal responsibility.

  Your German, Korean, and Balkan models aren’t analogous. After victories in those places were there different sects within those countries fighting each other for control of the country and in the process killing our troops? No, I didn’t think so. At this point I agree with John Bolton, we should give the Iraqis a copy of the federalist papers and get the f*ck out.

• 19. jerry  |  April 6th, 2008 at 9:12 pm

  Kimberly when did I call our troops murderers, block a recruitment center or doubted our troops ability? You are thinking of someone else I guess.

• 20. kimberly4victory  |  April 6th, 2008 at 9:27 pm

  Jerry: I am so sorry and apologize … I read your post wrong.

  And, you were right. There is still fighting going on in Sadr. And, Iraqi forces and our men and women are giving Mahdi a whoop-ass.

  (Love the photo of the Iraqi protestors!!)
  While there has been few press reports from Diwaniyah, several hundred residents felt the security situation was good enough to hold a rally in the center of the city. More than 200 demonstrators marched in support for Maliki’s operation to uproot the Mahdi Army in Basra. Police and tribal militias were also seen patrolling the streets.

  Iraqi security forces appear to have uprooted two large Mahdi Army networks in the city of Karbala and in Babil province. Iraqi police launched a major operation in Karbala on Friday night. Twelve Mahdi Army fighters were killed, 50 were wounded, and another 30 surrendered, Major General Raed Shakir Jawdat, the operations commander for Karbala told Voices of Iraq. Police also seized 25 missile launchers, 60 rifles, five mortars and a large amount of ammunition, Raed said.

  http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2008/03/mahdi_army_taking_si.php

• 21. Kahn  |  April 7th, 2008 at 12:13 am

  jerry, then why does NATO exist? Why are we in Germany, Italy, and aal over Europe? Why are we in Korea, and Japan?

  Victory has been secured right? Is it your view then that we should withdraw forces from Europe, Korea, Japan, and everywhere else? Is this the view of the Democrat Party? (Do you believe that this is the view of the Democrat Party?)

  Expalin yourself sir. How do you see us disengaging? And explain the outcomes of your plan. Dead Iranian and Iraqi babied are OK? Not Americans, so who cares? Just trying to determine the depth of your callousness, you understand. Nothing personal.

• 22. David B. Schmidt  |  April 7th, 2008 at 7:11 pm

  AFTER we (Americans) successfully kicked the ass of Nazi Germany it still took almost 10 years to rout out the die hards. BTW, Why did we go to Europe in the first place– after all it was Japan that attacked us?

  AFTER complete destruction of two cities — it still took almost 8 years to rout the Shintoists in Japan but hey–we have victory (signed and everything) so lets haul ass– right?

  Korea, and Viet Nam– still in one and the even though we have normalized relations with the other — I still have problems with leaving the estimated millions to die in the killing fields because of the likes of those who want to surrender today.

  President Clinton said we would be out of the Balkans by Christmas–just never said which year. Then again, I thought we were only going to bomb the snot outta them evil people without any collateral damage of course.