By Alan Caruba
As I watched the last of the U.S. active military force pull out of Iraq on August 19, I could not help but notice the famed “Indianhead” patch that unit was wearing on their uniforms because long, long ago, I wore that patch, the emblem of the Second Infantry Division.
Most people are likely unaware that 30,000 of the Division are in South Korea, some sixty years after the truce was declared, ready to repulse the first wave of attack if North Korea is crazy enough to try again.
Let’s just say it. George W. Bush was right!
He was right to invade Iraq and remove a psychopathic dictator from control of that nation, a man who had spent eight years at war with Iran, who had invaded Kuwait, and who, if the Israelis had not blown up a nuclear reactor being built there, would have had a nuclear weapon with which to threaten the entire region.
When Saddam Hussein wasn’t busy gassing hundreds of Kurds to death, his prisons were filled with hundreds of Iraqis and he happily filled mass graves during his thirty years of appalling tyranny. When they held “elections” there, he got 99.9% of the vote. Iraq was as good a definition of Hell as present day Iran.
It’s true that no weapons of mass destruction were found after the 2003 invasion, but even Saddam admitted that he purposely made sure that everyone thought he had them. The intelligence community believed he did and George W. Bush believed he did.
Bush could read a map. Smack dab in the middle of the Middle East is Iraq. It borders Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, Syria, and a small part of Turkey. You don’t have to be a general to know that, strategically, Iraq militarily holds the key to the Middle East.
An Iraq in the hands of Saddam Hussein, his two vile sons, and the rest of the criminals around him needed “regime change” and George W. Bush provided it. He held firm and he believed his “surge” would work. He was right.
As wars go, the casualties sustained were modest. You can do comparisons with other modern conflicts and history will bear out that our troops inflicted a lot more hurt on the enemy than they did on us. We lost troops to the lowest form of guerrilla warfare, roadside bombs.
We demonstrated that a robust democracy, set upon the goal of removing a cancerous, threatening regime in an unstable region, could make history the way it has always been made; by sending in the troops.
The troops that left Iraq did so because, during his final years in office, George W. Bush negotiated their withdrawal with the Iraq government, one that had been democratically elected by the people of Iraq. Well before Barack Hussein Obama arrived in the Oval Office, their departure had been put in motion.
All through the 2008 election campaign Obama could not bring himself to admit that George W. Bush was right about the decision to invade, to remain, and to surge troops in to quell the insurgency.
For eighteen months we have had to listen to Obama blame Bush for everything and the voters have concluded that George W. Bush was right.
The only thing Barack Hussein Obama wants to do is run away. He wanted to get out of Iraq. He wants to get out of Afghanistan.
The American military, though, will remain in Iraq for years to come. Some 50,000 troops are there to “train” the Iraqi army and police forces. The American military is still in Europe sixty-five years after the end of World War Two. The American military is still in South Korea. It has missions all over the world and the world is a safer place because of it.
George H.W. Bush who fought in World War II knows that. George W. Bush who served in the Texas National Guard knows that.
Barack Hussein Obama who was a Boy Scout in Indonesia does not.
© Alan Caruba
10 comments:
Alan, not only did Bush think that Saddam was a mortal enemy to the free world, and not only the CIA. All intelligence agencies of the free world thought that. Most members of Congress thought that too.
Before "Gulf War II" began, Saddam flew his significant military aircraft to Iran for safe hiding. No one knows what else Saddam had shipped to Iran.
As far as I am concerned, there were a good many problems which could have been avoided after Iran was quickly conquered. Some were due to a far too "gentle" treatment of conquered Iraqis. Many of those roadside bombing deaths could have been prevented.
I have always not understood why Bush had such faith that the Iraqis could quickly come to agreement on a constitution. It took our own founders 11 years from the Declaration of Independence to a final constitution in 1787. About 5 years of bloody battle from 1776 to 1781 took place, and after the victory of the Colonial Army it took about 6 more years to achieve our Constitution. After that war, no one was voting with bombs, as in Iraq.
It takes, with our own fine military training, a minimum of 3 1/2 years to produce a Major, first field grade rank officer, and an additional 9 years to produce a general, and this is for the most qualified. No one should have thought that the Iraqis could have done far better. Train and promote in haste, repent at leisure.
But you are certainly right in that it was imperative that Saddam be removed by military force, and that was done rapidly. Unfortunately,the clowns and monkeys of the main stream media circus deeply desired that President Bush be made in the media to look as bad as possible, and blew the losses of our fine military personnel and Iraqi civilians, those who were not actually our enemy, far, far out of proportion. Which should demonstrate exactly what one of the most dangerous of US enemies was then and is now, and it is the main stream media circus, along with its ringmasters and owners.
Alan, not only did Bush think that Saddam was a mortal enemy to the free world, and not only the CIA. All intelligence agencies of the free world thought that. Most members of Congress thought that too.
Before "Gulf War II" began, Saddam flew his significant military aircraft to Iran for safe hiding. No one knows what else Saddam had shipped to Iran.
As far as I am concerned, there were a good many problems which could have been avoided after Iran was quickly conquered. Some were due to a far too "gentle" treatment of conquered Iraqis. Many of those roadside bombing deaths could have been prevented.
I have always not understood why Bush had such faith that the Iraqis could quickly come to agreement on a constitution. It took our own founders 11 years from the Declaration of Independence to a final constitution in 1787. About 5 years of bloody battle from 1776 to 1781 took place, and after the victory of the Colonial Army it took about 6 more years to achieve our Constitution. After that war, no one was voting with bombs, as in Iraq.
It takes, with our own fine military training, a minimum of 3 1/2 years to produce a Major, first field grade rank officer, and an additional 9 years to produce a general, and this is for the most qualified. No one should have thought that the Iraqis could have done far better. Train and promote in haste, repent at leisure.
But you are certainly right in that it was imperative that Saddam be removed by military force, and that was done rapidly. Unfortunately,the clowns and monkeys of the main stream media circus deeply desired that President Bush be made in the media to look as bad as possible, and blew the losses of our fine military personnel and Iraqi civilians, those who were not actually our enemy, far, far out of proportion. Which should demonstrate exactly what one of the most dangerous of US enemies was then and is now, and it is the main stream media circus, along with its ringmasters and owners.
Larry - main stream media circus deeply desired that President Bush be made in the media to look as bad as possible
That is so true and obviously the converse applies with Obama.
BTW I was reading a very interesting report (sorry can't find the link) on renewed interest being shown by 'several' intelligence agencies in, and of 'repeated satelite overflights', an area in Syria that had extensive earthworks done at the time preceeding the Iraq invasion and which has now has surburban housing built over it. There are also reports of massive Soviet assistance, in those days building up to the Gulf War 2, in moving some large objects from Iraq to Syria.
I'm not so sure that the WMD don't exist. Maybe they have been stockpiled and are sitting there waiting to 'sucker punch' the US at a later time.
There is little doubt that Isreal will be dropping in on Iran soon to end their nuclear plans. They have done it once before. History repeats itself. Whether or not we follow in decides if World War 111 begins. And World War 11 began with the assasination of some rich putz prince; why shouldn't this one begin with the ousting of a putz dictator.
Thank you for your service to the Republic, Alan.
I served with many former members of the Second Infantry Division while a member of the U.S. Army Security Agency and heard many stories about "Cold-Rea" and the patrols along the DMZ.
If Korea,Germany and Japan are the model for Iraq we'll have troops stationed there for decades.
Loplop: Sorry, but World War I began with an assassination in Serbia and WWII began with the German invasion of Poland in 1938. The US didn't get into it until 1941 when it was attacked by Japan at Pearl Harbor.
Loplop: Sorry, but World War I began with an assassination in Serbia and WWII began with the German invasion of Poland in 1938. The US didn't get into it until 1941 when it was attacked by Japan at Pearl Harbor.
You know history well, Alan. A rare bird in our modern world.
Havent been to this site in awhile and now I remember why:its a freak show.
'Bush was right to invade Iraq'? What Hussein did was none of our business, and our illegal invasion had everything to do with oil. Americas geopolitical problems stem from not having a comprehensive, workable energy policy.
Iraq/Afghan are continuing examples of Pentagon/CIA's stranglehold on American foreign policy. They'll do anything to get and keep us at war perpetually because it keeps the global military empire funded.
Not sure why you dont get that.
What Saddam did was everybody's business and it was not for nothing that the UN published numerous resolutions against his regime (and revealed its own huge corruption with the Oil-for-Food program it managed.)
Your "answers" to why the U.S. invaded are the typical knee-jerk response that ignores the world's dependence on the flow of oil.
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