Why I changed my mind about Iraq war

Toronto Sun ^ | May 12, 04 | John Derringer

[churchillbuff]

I was wrong. It's that simple.

When the Bush administration announced its plan to invade Iraq early last year, I supported them. I thought, like so many millions of others did, that the American forces would be in and out of there before you could say Grenada.

I truly believed that Saddam would be toppled and a new government set up within a year, with minimal American casualties.

I also thought that in such a quick conflict, Bush could finish the job that his old man couldn't, and that it would send a message about American resolve that needed to be sent. The backing of countries like France, Russia and China means nothing to me in any conflict, and the fact that they, and the United Nations, were not involved was a non-factor. (Actually, that part of my mind hasn't changed. The day that I start thinking that a war's okay because France thinks so is not one I'll wake up to in this lifetime.)

Worst still to come

Unfortunately for everyone involved, the American forces in Iraq have been mired in a hellish combat zone for well over a year, and by many accounts, the worst is yet to come. The Bush administration has blindly stumbled through the minefield that is Iraq for the past 15 months, ignoring advice from the many experts on the subject, including their own military, intelligence agencies and diplomats.

As I heard Senator Joe Biden say on Face the Nation on Sunday, Bush hasn't even listened to his own generals.

With the creepy and shifty Donald Rumsfeld and the downright scary Paul Wolfowitz running the civilian command of the military, it's their way or the highway. It's become quite clear that Bush, both before and after the actual invasion, has tossed aside any advice that doesn't fully and completely support his own foregone conclusions.

The arrogance that seeps from the Bush White House is mind-numbing, and although most American polls show running Bush neck and neck with Democratic challenger John Kerry for this November's presidential election, I think that has a lot more to do with the anemic state of Kerry's campaign than it does with support for the incumbent. One of the many areas in which Bush has really lost my respect is with this ludicrous notion that if you're not behind the War in Iraq, you're soft on terrorism. The Deliverance extras living in Tennessee trailer parks may go for that one, but few others will.

The most recent controversy -- the alleged mistreatment of prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison -- is a pivotal point for the American forces. It shows the frustration that many American soldiers face daily. These soldiers are seeing their friends and fellow servicemen killed or maimed in the most cowardly ways imaginable. Suicide bombings, car bombs, ambushes. There's no blow too low for this enemy. I recall one story last year, before the last links of trust and goodwill had rightfully disappeared from the average American soldier's psyche, when a squad of marines stopped to help an Iraqi cab driver, whose vehicle was disabled at the side of the road. As the soldiers approached, the "cabbie" hit a detonator switch and blew the car, himself and the soldiers to smithereens.

Not playing by rules

How on earth can American soldiers continue to battle with an enemy who doesn't play by any rules at all? The short answer is, they can't.

The frustration oozing from the Abu Ghraib prison won't disappear. It will get worse. And it's no fault of the soldiers.

Damn those who blame this on kids from America's heartland who go halfway across the world to fight an enemy who knows no Geneva Convention, no Marquis of Queensbury rules, no rules of engagement that even approach reason or fair play.

The Iraqi insurgents, like terrorists world-wide, know that the American military has to play by the rules, and it's their goal to turn the American media, and the American people, against their own military.

With the Abu Ghraib prison abuse story hitting North American headlines, and the sickening sanctimony of the North American media, the insurgents have, to use a perfectly American analogy, "hit a home run."

The irony here, of course, is that the atrocities committed at the prison by Americans on Iraqis don't hold a candle to the abuses that Iraqis heaped upon each other, at the very same facility, under Saddam.

Although I've changed my mind on my support for this war, and those politicians who started it, my support for the soldiers who are over there fighting for their lives in the world's most unfair theatre of combat, has not changed a bit. I just hope they make it home alive.

And I'm sure that's the goal that many have set for themselves: Just survive. Because this war is no longer about freedom or terror, it's about one man's political agenda, and dead American soldiers are obviously not about to get in his way. I thought it was about more than that. I was wrong.

[BSunday]

Please STFU. Is that better?

You bet !! Don't mess with Texas !!

[BSunday]

With all "due" respect, your "friend" is full of spit.

[Colonel_Flagg]

Only a Canadian could be brain dead enough to listen to Joe Biden.

But if he heard Joe Biden chances are good he heard someone else saying the same thing first.

[tm22721]

So when would you defend your loved ones ?

When the enemy is in the ME ?

When the enemy is in NJ ?

When the enemy is at your doorstep ?

Never ?

Just when would you finally take up a weapon in defense ?

We should never allow the weak to survive. It just brings more trouble.

BUMP

[churchillbuff]

So when would you defend your loved ones ?

Fighting Iraq -- which wasn't involved in 9-11 and doesn't have WMDs -- isn't "defending my loved ones." Fighting Al Queda and Osama - - the perpetrators of 9-11 -- now THAT'S defending my loved ones. So why don't we finisht that job? Osama is still alive and free, for all we've been told. That means my loved ones and yours are in danger from him.

[CWOJackson]

You're still here. When I saw the new post, "U.S. Soldiers Battle Al-Sadr Supporters" I figured you would be too busy running for your life to post.

Ah, you must be pulling a Peter Arnett and staying at your post despite the fighting around you.

[CWOJackson]

Sorry folks. It appears that the fighting has intensified. Chamberlainbuff will be back to posting his usual defeatist drivel once he has moved to a more secure location.

For those with audio enhancement, we will now play "Oh Canada" for you while we wait for him to resume his normally scheduled posting.

[af_vet_1981]

You're still here. When I saw the new post, "U.S. Soldiers Battle Al-Sadr Supporters" I figured you would be too busy running for your life to post.

ROFL

[CWOJackson]

Have you no sensitivity?

[af_vet_1981]

Have you no sensitivity?

Yes, but LOL, it's just that your series of comments are so apt and funny.

[Trinity_Tx]

"One of the worst aspects of being forced into a war with muslims is that their disgraceful manner of fighting eventually forces you to use dishonorable tactics. For example, firing from behind their women and children."

What you say is so true. I find myself in a continual personal battle between my own sense of justice (collateral damage is abhorrent to me), and my sense of self-preservation and protectiveness of my children.

[MPJackal]

"No, I'm for prosecuting the war against the folks who perpetrated 9-11 -- that's Al Quada and Osama. Iraq was a costly diversion. YOU DO REMEMBER OSAMA? He's still alive and free, for all we've been told, yet our focus is elsewhere - in a country that had nothing to do with 9-11, as even Bush admits."

Are you living in a cave? There is an Iraq and Al Quada link. The Chech police have confirmed that Atta met w/ Iraqi officials prior to 9-11. And I love this "there were no weapons of mass destruction" line. Let's try to be logical here for just one minute. Iraq had them, everyone including the UN knows it. They did not destroy anywhere near all of them. So logic says that they MUST still have them. So where are they? Ask Syria, since 20 tons were recently confiscated in a plot to attack Jordan that came from Syria. Oh yes, Israeli intel says that the stuff was shipped to Syria in the months prior to the war. We also have Satellite photos of many large convoys headed into Syria from Iraq. Do you think Iraq was sending humanitarian aid? So since we know the stuff still exist, what do you think would have happened to it if we did not go to war? I submit it would have been shipped right back to Iraq.
If you Libs and your Lib media succeed in causing us to pull out, that stuff will come back to haunt us.
And what is this crap about our attention focused elsewhere. Just because Dan Rather is not telling you lemmings that we are still busy in Iraq does not make it so. Go ask Pat Tillman.

The below quote is for you!

"War is an ugly thing but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feelings which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.
A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself." - John Stuart Mill

[CWOJackson]

It's been a tense couple of hours at the Soros headquarters since their ace report Chamberlainbuff was last heard from. His last post came shortly after U.S. Marines launched operations against a terrorist stronghold. Chamberlainbuff gave a final defeatist post and hasn't been heard from since.

When question by Soros operatives on whether he had been seen in that area of conflict, one U.S. Marine only chuckled.

[Cold Heat]

almost 100 years of Anglo-American foreign policy

Don't make me choke while I am laughing at your anti-American talking points.

Our foreign policy, both past and present has very little to do with Islamic intolerance and everyone with half a brain understands that issue.

While policy mistakes are often uncovered by time, the fact is that blaming this is but an excuse to justify religious hatred. It plays well with the Eurotrash and the U.N., but is very far from the truth.

[CWOJackson]

The Soros group is glad to announce that their favorite defeatist escaped harm and has no resumed his/her/it's efforts to undermine our resolve.

Oh, well...better luck next time Marines.

[Beenliedto]

Don't make me choke while I am laughing at your anti-American talking points.

Kiss my A**, Jack.

I am one hundred percent American, a veteran and a Patriot.

I disagree with you, and that's my First Amendment right, and you may go F**k yourself.

[Cold Heat]

Why don't ya remind me why I cannot stomach libertarian nonsense............

That was a statement BTW.(reminder for the language challenged)

[WOSG]

"Why I changed my mind about Iraq war"

Wow, for a second there I thought churchillbuff came to his senses.

"Unfortunately for everyone involved, the American forces in Iraq have been mired in a hellish combat zone for well over a year, and by many accounts, the worst is yet to come."

This is utter nonsense. We are right now, today, picking apart the al-Sadr militia. We have deflected and deflated if not totally destroyed the fallujah 'resistance'.

Iraqis are now realizing they have 2 choices: Democracy and peace, or more violence and another Saddam. They are sick of violence. Has nobody noticed: The resistance has stopped. American casualties, so high in early April, are down sharply.

hellish combat??? Most of it has been stability operations and cordoned police actions. April and now has been a new war, based on a planned 'uprising' that TOTALLY FAILED.
Now we are picking apart the remains of that uprising.

If we really wipe the floor with al-Sadr like it looks like we are doing, then between that and a peaceful Fallujah we have managed to deflect the major violent speedbumps on the road to iraqi democracy. The political speedbump is Iraqi leadership. The smart money is betting on Adnan Pachachi as the caretaker, a sunni arab nationalist (Brahimi would like that), and an 'elder statesman figure' and close enough to US (on IGC) to be acceptable to all around.

I'd perfer a kurd but so be it. Either way, Iraq's future is one of greater freedom and a democratic state.

All thanks to the great USA military and the leadership of Bush & Co.

[WOSG]

"I honestly don't agree. I think Churchill would share my frustration over this maddening war"

Then you're an idiot who has no clue of the true nature of Churchill, who said

"never never never never give up".

This was in 1942, 3 years into a war that Britain was fighting, 3 years in which they went from defeat to defeat, in Norway, Dunkirk, North Africa. Losing colonial possessions like Hong Kong and Singapore.

In 1942, allied shipping losses were horrendous and it was not clear Britain could hold out much longer.

Yet Churchill never lost faith or hope.

Even though Churchill failed with his Norway plan, even though Churchill concocted the Gallipoli disaster in WWI, that didnt stop him from wanting to stay the course and win the war.

And these were wars where 700 men would be killed in a single *day* of fighting in a *single* action versus deaths for an entire war. US forces in a single battalion in the Argonne lost 500 men in a small front over a 4 day period. (see 'the lost battalion' on history channel if you want to know the story). Of course, it was worse for the british, they lost 64,000 men in a *single day* at the battle of the Somme.

We on the other hand have lost fewer men than die of suicide in a single week.

You, are our own resident Ted Kennedy - sowing as much negativity despair and denigration you can at a war effort that deserves praise not condemnation. We have done SO MUSCH RIGHT and our success i at this point guaranteed ONLY IF WE HAVE RESOLVE. Even if you dont agree with its premises, you should at least give our military the benefit of doubt in supporting their success.

Whoever said: "Unfortunately [Churchillbuff] sullies the name of an honorable man." was right.

You dont understand the man's character at all if you think acting like Ted Kennedy makes you a hero.

[CWOJackson]

"Whoever said: "Unfortunately [Churchillbuff] sullies the name of an honorable man." was right."

I guess that would be me. To be honest, I'm not even sure Chamberlain would like to be associated with him. I'm thinking more in the lines of Lord Haw-Haw.