5 Comments

1. 

   acilius

    /  February 27, 2009

   It puzzles me why leaving gradually is supposed to be a more cautious course than leaving all at once. If there’s a mission that American troops ought to be performing in Iraq, why would 35,000 troops be better able to perform that mission than would 140,000 troops?

   And what about security? After all, the troops support and protect each other. So the more troops are there, the safer each is and feels. Reduce troop numbers by 70% and not only will those who stay behind be more exposed to attack, but they will likely be much more violent in their dealings with the Iraqis. The more vulnerable you feel, the less likely you are to risk your own safety in any given encounter, the more likely you are to shoot first and ask questions later. And the more often you go on patrol the more likely you are to be tired, irritable, even psychotic. So a smaller force would both take more casualties among themselves and inflict more casualties on Iraqi civilians than would a larger force.

2. 

   lefalcon

    /  February 27, 2009

   I believe we can all rest assured that everything Obama is doing with regard to his inherited M.E. wars — pulling out of Iraq in Aug of next year; leaving behind a scaled-down “non-combat” US mil presence; sending more forces to Afghanistan — all of this is based on certain thought processes. I don’t have the smallest clue what those thought processes may be.

3. 

   acilius

    /  February 28, 2009

   I wish I could suppress the suspicion that the thought processes were exclusively concerned with matters in and around official Washington. Paying homage to all the people who have power there, not anything to do with Iraq or with the USA in general.

4. 

   lefalcon

    /  February 28, 2009

   Good lord .. yeah it’s hard to resist suspecting that.

   I think that was basically what I was trying to express:

   these are almost arbitrary decisions .. the result of wheeling-and-dealing’s among the USA power elite.

5. 

   acilius

    /  February 28, 2009

   I’m afraid you’re probably right.