Over two years ago, our military cruised through Iraq and took over the Iraqi capitol of Baghdad. On May 1, 2003 our glorious leader was flewn onto the USS Abraham Lincoln off the coast of San Diego and, after parading around his stuffed flight suit, he had this to say:
Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed. (Applause.) And now our coalition is engaged in securing and reconstructing that country.
A little over two years and 1,500 or so combat deaths later, Dick Cheney had this to say on Larry King Live:
I think we may well have some kind of presence there over a period of time. The level of activity that we see today from a military standpoint, I think, will clearly decline. I think they’re in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency.
Yesterday, Rumsfeld clarified for us what “a period of time” means:
Insurgencies tend to go on five, six, eight, 10, 12 years. Coalition forces, foreign forces are not going to repress that insurgency. We’re going to create an environment that the Iraqi people and the Iraqi security forces can win against that insurgency.
So, it sounds like we’re going to be in Iraq for the next five to twelve years depending on when the Iraqi security forces are able to hold their own against the insurgents. Thing is, there wasn’t even supposed to be an insurgency, just a bunch of disgruntled Saddam supporters. Before they went in, Bush and his posse assured us that this war wasn’t going to turn out like that long, costly Vietnam War. So just what do our troops have to say about the progress of the Iraqi security forces?
“I know the party line. You know, the Department of Defense, the U.S. Army, five-star generals, four-star generals, President Bush, Donald Rumsfeld: The Iraqis will be ready in whatever time period,” said 1st Lt. Kenrick Cato, 34, of Long Island, N.Y., the executive officer of McGovern’s company, who sold his share in a database firm to join the military full time after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. “But from the ground, I can say with certainty they won’t be ready before I leave. And I know I’ll be back in Iraq, probably in three or four years. And I don’t think they’ll be ready then.”
“I just wish [the Iraqi troops would] start to pull their own weight without us having to come out and baby-sit them all the time,” said Sgt. Joshua Lower, a scout in the Third Brigade of the First Armored Division who has worked with the Iraqis. “Some Iraqi special forces really know what they are doing, but there are some units that scatter like cockroaches with the lights on when there’s an attack.“
Hmmm… sounds to me like we need to send a few more troops over to go help clean things up.
Anyone feel a draft?
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