The Iraqi Upturn
Don't look now, but the U.S.-backed government and army may be winning the war.
Sunday, June 1, 2008; B06

THERE'S BEEN a relative lull in news coverage and debate about Iraq in recent weeks -- which is odd, because May could turn out to have been one of the most important months of the war. While Washington's attention has been fixed elsewhere, military analysts have watched with astonishment as the Iraqi government and army have gained control for the first time of the port city of Basra and the sprawling Baghdad neighborhood of Sadr City, routing the Shiite militias that have ruled them for years and sending key militants scurrying to Iran. At the same time, Iraqi and U.S. forces have pushed forward with a long-promised offensive in Mosul, the last urban refuge of al-Qaeda. So many of its leaders have now been captured or killed that U.S. Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker, renowned for his cautious assessments, said that the terrorists have "never been closer to defeat than they are now."

Iraq passed a turning point last fall when the U.S. counterinsurgency campaign launched in early 2007 produced a dramatic drop in violence and quelled the incipient sectarian war between Sunnis and Shiites. Now, another tipping point may be near, one that sees the Iraqi government and army restoring order in almost all of the country, dispersing both rival militias and the Iranian-trained "special groups" that have used them as cover to wage war against Americans. It is -- of course -- too early to celebrate; though now in disarray, the Mahdi Army of Moqtada al-Sadr could still regroup, and Iran will almost certainly seek to stir up new violence before the U.S. and Iraqi elections this fall. Still, the rapidly improving conditions should allow U.S. commanders to make some welcome adjustments -- and it ought to mandate an already-overdue rethinking by the "this-war-is-lost" caucus in Washington, including Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.).

Gen. David H. Petraeus signaled one adjustment in recent testimony to Congress, saying that he would probably recommend troop reductions in the fall going beyond the ongoing pullback of the five "surge" brigades deployed last year. Gen. Petraeus pointed out that attacks in Iraq hit a four-year low in mid-May and that Iraqi forces were finally taking the lead in combat and on multiple fronts at once -- something that was inconceivable a year ago. As a result the Iraqi government of Nouri al-Maliki now has "unparalleled" public support, as Gen. Petraeus put it, and U.S. casualties are dropping sharply. Eighteen American soldiers died in May, the lowest total of the war and an 86 percent drop from the 126 who died in May 2007.

If the positive trends continue, proponents of withdrawing most U.S. troops, such as Mr. Obama, might be able to responsibly carry out further pullouts next year. Still, the likely Democratic nominee needs a plan for Iraq based on sustaining an improving situation, rather than abandoning a failed enterprise. That will mean tying withdrawals to the evolution of the Iraqi army and government, rather than an arbitrary timetable; Iraq's 2009 elections will be crucial. It also should mean providing enough troops and air power to continue backing up Iraqi army operations such as those in Basra and Sadr City. When Mr. Obama floated his strategy for Iraq last year, the United States appeared doomed to defeat. Now he needs a plan for success.

success isn't what obama want to hear so he will change it to read that it is a lie and we are losing.

__________________

To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.



To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.


You Voted for the wrong team now we all have to suffer for it
Save energy Turn your Lights OFF!
Gun Contol is as simple as hitting your target!


To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.





Spell check. Like I care

You have it all wrong. Iraq was not and is not a threat because of its size. It's just too small to be worth worrying about.

__________________
He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man.
Dr. Samuel Johnson

ROFLMNAO... by this species of reasoning we're also losing in Detroit, Atlanta, Washinton DC, LA, Dallas, St. Louis, Chicago and the other leftist controlled population centers.

But this is typical radical leftist, anti-American, pro-terrorists (pardon the redundancy) propaganda.

To hear them tell it, when the terrorists are killed, the US is slaughtering Innocent civilians and a victory for the terrorists; when a bomb is set off somehwere in the million square miles of Iraq, it's a victory for the terrorists... these people are taking the position of our enemies. There is no right to speak up for the enemy. The enemy is MURDERING INNOCENT PEOPLE! There is no right to murder innocent people and as such there is no right to advocate for the potential success of MASS MURDERERS.

But do not fear friends, at some point the left will fail, as they always do, to live up to their promises and the idioct leftist masses will revolt and at THAT point it will be open season on these people and when the dust settles you won't be able to find a person that ever even THOUGHT about voting for Hussein or ever doubted that Iraq was complict through its overt promotion if international Islamic terrorism, in 9-11.

Just be patient and let them do what they do, they'll start it and we'll finish it.

ROFLMNAO... Oh THIS IS BEAUTIFUL! 19 people murdered 3000 Americans. People that leftist PC policy refused to investigate because the invalid principles such as ethnic diversity declared that investigating Middle Eastern men who were taking FLYING ONLY lessons was PROFILING... 19 MEN detroyed two of the largest skyscrapers in the world, blew up four jumbo jets and nearly destroyed the Pentagon and this GENIUS declares that Iraq was not a threat because it was too small.

Would anyone care to do the math for us here?


We'll need you to break out as a percentage a comparison by size, of 19 men, their volume and scope relevant to sqr ftg and compare that to the nation of Iraq using the same parameters.

I think those of us that can muster a rough mental comparison can see that nothing but foolishness is at the basis of this assertion. But Hussein is a fool and there can be no doubt of that. But compared to the Husseiniacs, he stands EVEREST in his intellectual proportions, above that herd...

At least this troll can spell!

Just be patient and let them do what they do, they'll start it and we'll finish it...

__________________
"All the problems we face in the United States today can be traced to an unenlightened immigration policy on the part of the American Indian."


To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.



OBAMA/PEROT

Let's examine the reasoning here.

My positions advocate for Bed Rock American principles, exposing the left as fools and their ideology as a myth which leaves nothing but catastrophe, calamity and chaos in its wake and I'm a troll?

Golly, I'm reading a fairly pathetic fallacious appeal to popularity (ad populum for the non-moderates) and in the event you missed that class, this means your reasoning is unsound, invalid and above all else, incorrect; that it hopes to appeal to what you feel is a popular majority which will find your words comforting and thus not give them much thought, beyond those words comparing favorably to what they 'feel' to be true; said another way the words 'prop up' the popularly held feelings of that majority.

The problem is, that in appealing to such a majority, you fail to engage the issue, or avoid the issue, and gain approval through your fallacious appeal.

You see, sport, there is no actual correlation between the popularity of a given position and the validity or sound construct if you will, of that position.

You see, simply engaging in discourse and effectively exposing the opposition as a joke is not “trolling.”

Trolling is, for instance, what leftists do when they're asked to provide an example of a "BUSH LIE!" and then failing to support that farce, by returning to offer up some debatable assertion they continuing to declare that "BUSH LIED!" despite there having been conclusively proven to NOT be in possession of ANY evidence on which they can rest that assertion... Meaning they can't support it!

You see that tactic, while a staple of the leftist rhetorical diet, declares a lie, then refuses to acknowledge that the lie was soundly refuted, then continues to project the refuted position as fact... Thus it is analogous to trolling...

The falsehood is the bait; it is not what it is projected to be, which is the unfettered sustenance of truth; it is thrown out over and over to draw to it those who would disagree. This is intentional on the part of the troll, it is the basis of the concept itself, despite their position, statement, claim assertion, declaration, resolution, having been proven to be the “bait of hate” and NOT the fruit of truth, they cast it repeatedly for no other reason than to put it out there so it will draw attention and cause an argument, which it has lost to no end, countless times before.

Understand? (The odds of this getting through are slim. The leftist mind is not one which is conducive to reason. The wise man said it best when he said: You can lead a leftist to Reason, but you can't make him THINK!)

ROFLMNAO... BRILLIANT!

Yep....

You're a troll.

I stopped reading after the first paragraph; yet that was enough.