Reality Check: "we changed nothing of significance inside Iraq.”

[another saigon]

Why Moqtada Haunts the White House

Posted By Kelley B. Vlahos On August 30, 2010 @ 11:00 pm

There will be plenty spirits of Iraq policy past, present and future crowding the dais tonight as the President announces a “successful” transition and “a promise kept” for the drawdown of American troops from Iraq.

-snip-

The “Promised Day Brigade” will “prepare quietly to launch qualitative attacks against the occupiers (U.S. forces) if they stay beyond 2011,” said Sadr spokesman Salah al-Obeidi, to the Associated Press, in May. “It will have a big role to play to drive them out of Iraq.”

Sadr is of course, an awkward subject for an administration attempting to project the best, most optimistic image in the rear-view. This was Bush’s war, and Obama seems eager to keep it that way, more so, to move on and to focus on his mess in Afghanistan. But he is having a hard time fully extricating – Odierno has already suggested scenarios in which the U.S combat mission might have to resume – and the fact that there is no government, and may not be any government without Sadr’s say-so, must be very difficult to stomach back in Washington.

Says writer Babak Dehghanpisheh, in his August Foreign Policy piece, “The King of Iraq“:

“The Sadrists … aren’t going anywhere – which puts Washington, among others, in a bind. Sadr’s supporters are more than just a political party. The cleric is clearly following the Hezbollah model, creating populist political movement backed by a battle-hardened militia. The language Sadr uses when discussing the U.S. presence in Iraq – resistance, occupation, martyrdom – could easily have been taken from a speech by Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah. All this has discouraged U.S. officials from holding talks with Sadr – something they’ve never done since 2003. It’s not exactly like Sadr has gone out of his way to open up a dialogue, either. In fact, Sadr and many of his top aides have made it clear that the Mahdi Army won’t disarm as long as there are American troops on Iraqi soil.”


-snip-

The prospect for this should be what tickles the back of Obama’s neck as he takes to the podium this evening.

“The key point,” says Macgregor, “is we spent a trillion dollars, sacrificed and destroyed thousands of US lives and millions of Arab lives with the result that we changed nothing of significance inside Iraq.”


http://original.antiwar.com/vlahos/2010/08/30/why-moqtada-ha

[T Wolf]

1. Yes we did change that country. We murdered hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis and totally

destroyed the most secular, modern country in the Middle East.

A country that was a stabilizing influence in a volatile area.

Whatever Saddam Hussein's faults, he kept a lid on the more-extreme factions in his country.

We are reaping what george and his criminal cronies have sown.

[zbdent]

2. if, by leaving, all those reports of terrorism and violence which will come

is "Obama's fault" ...

then why wasn't all the oppression and terror and torture in Iraq between 1991 and 2003 George W. Bush's fault, since HE didn't support the insurgents against Saddam?

[BridgeTheGap]

3. I don't think changing the balance of power in Iraq was insignificant. While formerly

ruled by the Bathists with an iron hand, there was a semblance of order there, as well as rights for women seen in no other Arabic countries. What is truly insignificant is the amount of positive change resulting from the unwarranted U.S. invasion.

[WinkyDink]

4. Missing the point: TRILLIONS to be had, in oil, treasure, minerals, drugs, war-profiteering, and

our occupation, AKA, world's largest embassy compound.

Bushco wanted to OWN Iraq, not "democratize" it. Human life meant---and means, Bush and Cheney's being criminal psychopaths---less than zero in the drive for ever more personal wealth (including for the money-men behind the scenes). Think of the toll of the dead and maimed, the suicides, the psychologically destroyed since the Illegal Invasion.

And people cannot believe that Bush and Cheney would have balked at causing a mere 3000 dead on 9/11??

As Michael Corleone said, "Now who's being naive, Kay?"

[BridgeTheGap]

6. You're absolutely correct. The neo-cons had blatantly stated in their PNAC paper why they wanted

Iraq: Oil, strategic territory for the placement of U.S. troops. And, oh yeah, they wanted to establish a functioning democracy in the Arab world...how's that work'n out?
Leaving 50,000 troops there is what the neo-cons wanted and why Sadr is making these statements. It's STILL an occupation.

[msongs]

5. all those dead people died to jack up corporate profits thanks to our government nt

[TexasObserver]

7. It's been a money pit that accomplished nothing good.

[Winterblues]

8. Exxon might disagree with you

All the while we have been in Iraq Exxon has made a Net Profit after all expenses have been paid OVER One Hundred MILLION Dollars a Day A Friggin' Day.. Every single day, day in and day out Week after week, Month after Month, Year after Year...A Hundred MILLION Dollars a DAY.. No, Exxon thinks everything is just fine thank you...

[TheKentuckian]

9. Incorrect, we have made matters worse by far.