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Iraq is now lost, and it's Obama's fault
The Charlotte Observer ^ | 11/5/2011 | Charles Krauthammer

Posted on 11/05/2011 7:29:03 PM PDT by boatbums

Barack Obama was a principled opponent of the Iraq War from its beginning. But when he became president in January 2009, he was handed a war that was won. The surge had succeeded. Al-Qaida in Iraq had been routed, driven to humiliating defeat by an Anbar Awakening of Sunnis fighting side-by-side with the infidel Americans. Even more remarkably, the Shiite militias had been taken down, with American backing, by the forces of Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. They crushed the Sadr militias from Basra to Sadr City.

Al-Qaida decimated. A Shiite prime minister taking a decisively nationalist line. Iraqi Sunnis ready to integrate into a new national government. U.S. casualties at their lowest ebb in the entire war. Elections approaching. Obama was left with but a single task: Negotiate a new status-of-forces agreement (SOFA) to reinforce these gains and create a strategic partnership with the Arab world's only democracy.

He blew it. Negotiations, such as they were, collapsed last month. There is no agreement, no partnership. As of Dec. 31, the American military presence in Iraq will end.

Read more: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2011/11/05/2748329/iraq-is-now-lost-and-its-obamas.html#ixzz1ct71BT8w


TOPICS: Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Government; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: charleskrauthammer; iraq; iraqwar; krauthammer; obamafailure; obamaswar
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Add this to the list of Obama failures. Though, he will more than likely hype it as another fulfillment of a campaign promise.
1 posted on 11/05/2011 7:29:05 PM PDT by boatbums
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To: boatbums

Cut -N- Run


2 posted on 11/05/2011 7:32:02 PM PDT by DainBramage
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To: boatbums

And George W. Bush will remain politely silent.


3 posted on 11/05/2011 7:32:05 PM PDT by unkus (Silence Is Consent)
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To: boatbums

What a disgusting POS this man is.

I could just cry at this turn of events. After all that...Once again the Libs Snatch Defeat from the Jaws of Victory...VN Redux!


4 posted on 11/05/2011 7:33:09 PM PDT by Recovering Ex-hippie (Rick Perry 2012)
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To: boatbums

obama lied, the free world died.


5 posted on 11/05/2011 7:34:52 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand (Hail to the Thief)
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To: DainBramage

Is Syria next¿


6 posted on 11/05/2011 7:34:55 PM PDT by rovenstinez
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To: boatbums

Iraq

http://icasualties.org/Iraq/index.aspx

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/iraq_casualties.htm

http://www.duckdaotsu.org/valor.html


7 posted on 11/05/2011 7:40:53 PM PDT by combat_boots (The Lion of Judah cometh. Hallelujah. Gloria Patri, Filio et Spiritui Sancto.)
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To: boatbums

The traitor Rats deliberately lost Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, Iran,...... the list goes on and Americans are so stupid they can’t see consistency.


8 posted on 11/05/2011 7:47:59 PM PDT by Navy Patriot (Join the Democrats, it's not Fascism when WE do it. (plagiarized))
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To: unkus
Yeah, but it probably was baked in by Bush's foolish vacillation about nation building and "sovereignty" versus crushing the enemy.

Bush was the one who weakly mused that if "a sovereign Iraq" wanted us to leave we would have to leave. Can you imagine Truman saying that about postwar Japan?

9 posted on 11/05/2011 7:48:14 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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To: boatbums

Oh, don’t place all the blame on 0bama.

Iraq has pretty much been lost since the Parthians were defeated.

Obama just made sure that they won’t have a chance to thrive like they did two thousand years ago.


10 posted on 11/05/2011 7:51:30 PM PDT by LegendHasIt
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To: hinckley buzzard

You’re right.

Bush hardly defended himself when in office so why say much now?

It’s all “New World Order” as Bush 41 said many times.


11 posted on 11/05/2011 7:52:07 PM PDT by unkus (Silence Is Consent)
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To: boatbums

Iraq was destined to be lost the moment we left, unless you want to stay there forever, there is nothing we can do about it.


12 posted on 11/05/2011 7:58:43 PM PDT by Husker24
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To: boatbums

But I bet Krauthammer would still vote for him.


13 posted on 11/05/2011 8:20:14 PM PDT by ClearCase_guy (I won't vote for Romney. I won't vote for Perry.)
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To: AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Berosus; bigheadfred; Bockscar; ColdOne; Convert from ECUSA; ...

Thanks boatbums.
Obama was left with but a single task: Negotiate a new status-of-forces agreement (SOFA) to reinforce these gains and create a strategic partnership with the Arab world's only democracy. He blew it. Negotiations, such as they were, collapsed last month. There is no agreement, no partnership.

14 posted on 11/05/2011 8:21:43 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (It's never a bad time to FReep this link -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: ClearCase_guy

Krauthammer endorsed and voted for McCain.


15 posted on 11/05/2011 8:29:08 PM PDT by FredZarguna (The Clinton long-knives: a better barometer than Intrade.)
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To: boatbums
Since Beck left, I don't watch Baier. I'm thankful to miss the pretentious bloviations of the so smawht Kraut.

Remember, Kraut thinks precious One is eloquent and elegant.

16 posted on 11/05/2011 8:41:30 PM PDT by Mamzelle
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To: boatbums

We should have stated pulling out when they had their first free election...after that they should have won or lost freedom on their own...purple fingers and we have done our job..


17 posted on 11/05/2011 8:58:00 PM PDT by goat granny
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To: boatbums

Let those ingrates take care of themselves.


18 posted on 11/05/2011 9:24:58 PM PDT by Impy (Don't call me red.)
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To: boatbums

Krauthammer nails it.


19 posted on 11/05/2011 9:59:39 PM PDT by death2tyrants
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To: All

From the rest of the article:

And it’s not as if that deadline snuck up on Obama. He had three years to prepare for it. Everyone involved, Iraqi and American, knew that the 2008 SOFA calling for full U.S. withdrawal was meant to be renegotiated. And all major parties but one (the Sadr faction) had an interest in some residual stabilizing U.S. force.

Three years, two abject failures. The first was the administration’s inability, at the height of American post-surge power, to broker a centrist nationalist coalition governed by the major blocs - one predominantly Shiite (Maliki’s), one predominantly Sunni (Ayad Allawi’s), one Kurdish - that among them won a large majority (69 percent) of seats in the 2010 election.

Vice President Joe Biden was given the job. He failed utterly. The government ended up effectively being run by a narrow sectarian coalition where the balance of power is held by the relatively small (12 percent) Iranian-client Sadr faction.

The second failure was the SOFA itself. The military recommended nearly 20,000 troops, considerably fewer than our 28,500 in Korea, 40,000 in Japan and 54,000 in Germany. The president rejected those proposals, choosing instead 3,000 to 5,000 troops.

A deployment so risibly small would have to expend all its energies simply protecting itself - the fate of our tragic, missionless 1982 Lebanon deployment - with no real capability to train the Iraqis, build their U.S.-equipped air force, mediate ethnic disputes, operate surveillance, and establish the kind of close military-to-military relations that undergird our strongest alliances.

The Obama proposal was an unmistakable signal of unseriousness. It became clear that he simply wanted out, leaving any Iraqi foolish enough to maintain a pro-American orientation exposed to Iranian influence. Message received. Just this past week, Massoud Barzani, leader of the Kurds - for two decades the staunchest of U.S. allies - visited Tehran to bend a knee to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

It didn’t have to be this way. Our friends did not have to be left out in the cold to seek Iranian protection. Three years and a won war had given Obama the opportunity to establish a lasting strategic alliance with the Arab world’s second most important power. He failed, though he didn’t try very hard. The excuse is Iraqi refusal to grant legal immunity to U.S. forces. But the Bush administration encountered the same problem, and overcame it. Obama had little desire to. Indeed, he portrays the evacuation as the fulfillment of a campaign promise.

But surely the obligation to defend the security and the interests of the nation supersede personal vindication. Obama opposed the war, but when he became commander in chief the terrible price had already been paid in blood and treasure. His obligation was to make something of that sacrifice, to secure the strategic gains that sacrifice had already achieved.

He did not. After years of allegedly clumsy brutish force, Obama was to usher in an era of not hard power, not soft power, but smart power.

Which turns out in Iraq to be ... no power. Years from now we will be asking not “Who lost Iraq?” - that already is clear - but “Why?”


20 posted on 11/05/2011 10:16:12 PM PDT by boatbums ( Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us. Titus 3:5)
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