America to pull out of Iraq...

amacachi wrote: »

They're pulling out but leaving 50k troops there

The combat mission in Iraq will finish on the 31st of August. In other words, the war will be over. The 50k will remain in order to train the Iraqi police force to ensure the country doesn't plunge into a vacuum of power.

When Obama announced his plans for Iraq well over a year ago, this is exactly what he said would happen... that the war will end on the 31st of August, with a force of 50k staying behind to train the Iraqis. The 50k troops also have a deadline, too.

Here's an article from February 2009:

http://www.smh.com.au/world/obamas-iraq-deadline-20090228-8krf.html

"Let me say this as plainly as I can: by August 31, 2010 our combat mission in Iraq will end," Obama said, laying out a new war strategy at a Marines base in North Carolina.

"I intend to remove all US troops from Iraq by the end of 2011," Obama said, adding the post-2010 interim force would number between 35,000 and 50,000 troops.

As for more troops being sent into Afghanistan... well, that's exactly what he said he'd do during his Presidential campaign. The troops in Afghanistan also have a deadline. They will begin to withdraw in July 2011.

The withdrawal in Iraq is not a knee-jerk reaction that was decided yesterday by the American Government. It is a campaign promise that Obama announced the details to 17 months ago (four weeks after becoming president), and it's only hitting the news again now because he gave a speech yesterday stating that the plan is on target.

The exact same people that are clamouring for America to pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan asap are the same people who will go nuts when all the people that joined the police forces and worked together in the new government are targeted once the Americans pull out. Afghanistan is far too precarious for the US to let fall fully back into the Taliban's hands but if it did, the same people decrying the occupation will decry when innocent people are killed after the US - and blame them for both.

I don't support the Iraq War (I support the Afghanistan one though) but I don't think the country is in the position to fully pull out of either. And I find it strange that people joke about 'Iran/North Korea next...' - would you not support a unilateral, NATO approved regime change in some of these places? Or should we just let them to their devices, like we did with Rwanda?

So the Iraquies have won the war.

Mark200 wrote: »

The 50k will remain in order to train the Iraqi police force to ensure the country doesn't plunge into a vacuum of power.

If wikileaks is anything to go by, when the US leaves, they'll be swimming up sh|t creek killing each other with the paddles.

Mark200 wrote: »

Wikileaks didn't publish anything that wasn't already known by the public.

Also, what they released was related to the Afghan war, not the Iraq war. My statement that you were replying to was clearly about the Iraq war.

Hrm, I see what you mean. I suppose I meant that in Afgan, for the past while, they are doing a good job, but the police are not liked. In Iraq, The Shi'ites are being trained to be Police and Military, and the Sunni have been trained as Police and Military. Once the US go, I can't see anything holding the Shi'ites back from dealing out whoop-ass, and the Sunni's from dealing serious whoop-ass, now that the US might has gone. I'll re-read this tomorrow to make sense of what I'm trying to say, as the mind is tired atm.