[Skybird]

I have to agree. We all know now that there were no WMD. But, and this is the point, Saddam was a major threat to the stability in the region. He had attacked every single neighbour he had including ethnic groups WITHIN his own country. Therefore, after Kuwait one could not simply leave things be.

At the time of 2003, Saddam was a beast with all his teeth already having been pulled. He was no thread beyond the borders of Iraq.

Maybe the first big mistake was not to take out Saddam in the first Gulf War with the least amount of collateral damage to the country and its citizens. Not having achieved that but merely pushing him back accross the border it was always going to be a festering wound needing lancing at some later stage and at a much larger cost.

On this I agree, 1991 was a job not finished - but intentionally not finished. But again, between 1991 and 2003 Saddam had been limited to be a teethles beast, or better: an irritation. He could roar, but he could not bite. Considering the massive cost in money, in lives being claimed, instability spread, growing of Iranian influence, weakening of amweria'S strategic psotion, removing him was not worth it - not at these ridiculously high costs. And why removing this dicatator, if america happily made business and supported so many other tryranies to it's intersts in South america, Africa and Asia in the years since WWII? Becasue "he may have been a bloddy bastard, but his doom was that he no longer was our bloody bastard?"

So far there has been no compensation and no payoff for America for Iraq 2003-2005. Even the desired control of the oil flow has only partially been acchieved, and does not compare to the orioginal intentions. Not to mention that the war helped to decrease global security and has motivated the breeding of more terrorists than would be there today without the Iraq war.

The truthfulness of leaders in war is judged by wether they were successful or not, and by their reasons they gave in advance for going to war. Bush scores a perfect, huge, shining Zero by these standards.

and I think America cannot start thinking about a healing process for itself, and about learning from this desaster and leaving it behind, as long as it does not accept ultimate and total responsibility for the mess that was created without need, and parts of its people still waste time with wishing to see something positive from it and trying to avoid this grim respnsibility to accept. The events in Somalia 1993 have formed the future military doctri´ne of the army, by having become more cuatuous and hesitent, quick in quick out patterns, the way the Afghanistan war was fought in 2001 was a direct rrsult from trying to avoid losses being created in the way they took place in Somalia. Vietnam also led to a total reconstruction of the army, and major parts of the doctrines. And iraq will be a massive burden for the future face of the army as well. It already is to be seen: the army starts to run low on captains which form a very vtial rank in the hierarchy, after having been sent on the same mission several times, many have started to turn their back on the army in frustration, and now use their leadership skills in private business, for their own benefit. This will have an impact in some years, when these ranks would have been expected to have risen to high command ranks - these ranks then will have to be filled with other personell, obviously. The costs of the war, the costs of wear and tear, also massively affect the military budget plannings for the next years to come. Other projects had to step back, or were even cancelled. It is difficult to overestimate the longterm consequences of Iraq for the armed forces. It also will affect how future wars are being fought, which is a mixed bag: it could lead to needed aggressiveness not being an option,l but it also could lead to a US leadership being less gung-ho to launch another stupid war. but I think the negative consequences outweighs the positive.