Iraq can't defend itself fully before 2020: general

Iraq's defense chief has said his military will not be fully ready to defend Iraq from external threats until 2020 to 2024, according to a U.S. inspector's report released on Sunday.

Lieutenant General Babakir Zebari has repeatedly warned that Iraq's security forces, rebuilt after the 2003 invasion that ousted strongman Saddam Hussein, would not be ready for years.

President Barack Obama announced on October 21 that American troops would fully withdraw from Iraq by year-end, as scheduled under a 2008 security pact between the two countries.

Both Iraqi and U.S. military leaders have said the army and police are capable of containing internal threats from Sunni insurgents and Shi'ite militias that launch scores of attacks monthly, but that they lag in external defense. …

Zebari said the air force would not be able to defend Iraqi airspace until 2020 and is not capable of supporting ground combat operations, citing a long-delayed deal to buy F-16 warplanes from the United States, the SIGIR report said. "An army without an air force is exposed," the report quoted Zebari as saying. …

I guess maybe they should have allowed the militias to lace the roads with IED’s - Allowed Mahdi Militia to run around and cause havoc while targeting US Forces - I guess they should have taken advantage of the situation to make a united nation that could with stand the Persians...but no - Mahdi Militia was allowed to attack unopposed - gain weapon systems - target US troops - make deals with the Persians - bring in EFP’s - conduct IDF against the Green Zone and other US bases south of Baghdad - allowed their petty little differences in government and their stupid belief in Islam to get in the way — now what men and women I knew died for - will be for nothing - because IRAQ will have new masters that won’t play so nice...payback is a b*tch!

Can’t wait to see that whole country get torn apart — maybe Emperor Zero can take the credit for that as well...

If Wall Street bankers did not act recklessly and spread toxic assets all over the financial system and made it unable to survive the financial meltdown, the US would not be broke and we would be able to afford to stick around to help Iraq. Ironically Bin Laden, AQ and other terrorist groups could not stop US power, it took politicians and bankers to achieve that result. Maybe the US needs to pullback, concentrate on eliminating the structural weaknesses and threats that our current crony capitalism and Wall Street poses to our financial well being before we are in position financially to foray beyond our shores again. We have no one to blame except ourselves as citizens and voters for not paying attention and letting the few on Wall Street lobby Congress to eliminate regs, and pull string in fed agencies to ignore existing regs to act recklessly to the point of threatening the world economy.

If Wall Street bankers did not act recklessly and spread toxic assets all over the financial system and made it unable to survive the financial meltdown, the US would not be broke and we would be able to afford to stick around to help Iraq

There's a bit more to it than that. On top of the clearly toxic assets, the USA left itself exposed to the European Central Bank and its continual raising of interest rates, which made money flow out of the USA and into that bank specifically (the other banks in Europe couldn't even withstand it). And on top of that, the liberal politicians have no will to fight a war that they clearly know has to be fought, because even they cannot ignore forever what our intelligence agencies tell them, though they'll keep trying to the bitter end (and that'll make such an end more bitter rather than less).

Maybe the US needs to pullback, concentrate on eliminating the structural weaknesses and threats that our current crony capitalism and Wall Street poses to our financial well being before we are in position financially to foray beyond our shores again

That'll play into our enemies' hands. It already has, too. Crony "capitalism", as people call it (it's not really a form of capitalism at all), stretches far beyond the US' shores and truly is globalized; right now, the only ones that can wield significant control over it are the USA and the European Union, and the USA is actually relinquishing control over it voluntarily, which is folly.

I don’t agree. We had regs and laws on the books that segregated savings and speculation. Glass Spiegel was repealed after bankers lobbied Congress. Regs that were available in the 1980’s to prosecute Savings and Loans officers for fraud no longer exists. Guess what Congress (both Dem and GOP) did what the banking lobbyists wanted. That is why today no major bank CEO, CFO, CFA is facing fed prosecution like the S&L crisis, because the laws for prosecuting them no longer exists. Besides the CRA program created subprime mortgages (which are economically unsound) that are marked and the investor who buys them know of its existance/risks. CRA does not mandate liar loans made by people with good income who buy expensive homes as speculation. Vast majority of liar loans involve jumbo loans (no common with poor people). If bankers did not collude with borrower on liar loans, the banking system could survive the meltdown in subprime because people paid the proper buying price for subprime loans and know the risks. However investors paid high prices for liar loans marked AAA by rating agencies who decided to placate the bankers paying for their services and assigned highest ratings without proper review of the mortgage portfolio data. I recommend looking up William Black on youtube. He was the fed regulator that closed Lincoln S&L during the S&L crisis of the 1980’s. At least back then the federal bank regulators had laws to use, its ranks were filled with full time civil service and not people who joined to embellish their resume for future jobs on Wall Street, or worst a Wall Street banking employee who joined to represent the interest of the banks to curry favor for post government career back on Wall Street.
Bankers have infiltrated our agencies, Federal Reserves and brought Congress via donations and lobbyists. If we do not break up these Wall Street bankers into smaller banks that cannot destroy the economy when one of them fail. Furthermore if we do not purge these agents of Wall Street from our fed agencies, we will continue with bankers practicing free markets when they make money and socialism when they lose money.
Remember one judges the severity of the threat by the amount of damage they inflict. Bin Laden cost us 10 billion over a year in cleaning up WTC after attack. Within two years our economy rebounded. Wall Street bankers destroyed 100 billion of wealth in one month in 2008. Three years later we are still in a recession.
We have more law to track and limit the movement/actions of terrorists and very little to rein in the bigger terrorist threat, Wall Street bankers.

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