3 years? Why only 3 years Joe? Seems pretty gutless to cut and run after 3 years in exchange for getting your school paid for. Why this genius a PE teacher then? Also, the facts on the ground demonstrate the assumptions and conclusions utter nonsense. This is just another example of how the Neo-Isolationist Right is little different from the Hysteric Left. They simply refuse to evolve and cling desperately to their established dogma no matter how many times reality smashes them in the face. The facts on the ground show this fool to be a fraud and a liar. If the Iraqis are so incompetent why are we truing over more and more of the day to day operations to them? Why are we planning to draw down our forces? I have contacts in the 172 Strykers on the ground in Iraq. They tell a vastly different story. Who am I suppose to believe, multiple on the ground witnesses or some guy that just confidently verifies every editorial position the Neo-Isolationists at the ACU have taken on Iraq?
Rather then simply moving on the Hard Right, like the hysteric left simply keeps screaming the same lies and bile in the hope that some how that will prevent them from having to admit they were utterly wrong about Iraq.
Sorry, friend, but this young former author's account has a ring of authenticity to me. Having served six years as an army officer, I know how goofball and bureaucratic our army is in attempting to run civil affairs. And it's pretty sad that you criticize this fellow for THREE years service as an officer, with a YEAR in a hell-hole like Iraq. That's three years more than most folks, including his critics, ever gave.
It's time to wrap this Iraq affair up and bring it home I think. We kicked out Saddam and rooted out the Baathist party. What else do we really expect to accomplish there?
I am a twenty year veteran and my first time in a combat theater. I am afraid this rings true to my experience there in Baghdad from April 05 to Nov 05. I was right in the middle of the area where the new Iraqi Commando battalion and I.C.T.F. (Iraqi Counter Terrorism Force)are being trained. Army SF guys that are training them would tell all kinds of stories about how hard it is to train the Iraqis. Most of the Iraqi people are thieving, lying, useless pieces of human waste that are dumb as rocks. There were some that were pretty intelligent though. The local contractors doing construction there are way overpaid and get away with shoddy workmanship and our guys that are in charge of paying them for the work are told to pay them from their higher ups regardless of how the work comes out. I am by no means a lefty or have ever voted Dumocrat, but some things that go on in that theater like Joe Guthrie experienced is the natural truth.