Another former US Commander speaks out.

Originally Posted by Ishmael

My question is simply this. Why can't we leave? Ultimately it is for the Iraqi people to figure out for themselves. Whether they live in peace or slaughter each other is ultimately their business and their responsibility. If all our troops are doing there is being targets for both sides of a religious civil war, what purpose are they serving there other than to protect oil. We need to remove our troops from Iraq and go back to hunting bin-laden and al-zuahiri in Waziristan, where our troops should have been concentrating the last four years.

But Bush won't do that. His plan is, and always was, to bankrupt the nation, break the military and dump this war off on the next administration so they can blame the next guy for "losing" Iraq.

Here's a clue. Iraq was lost the minute Bush,Cheney, Rumsfeld and their little friends didn;t send enough troops to maintain civil order. If you read Naomi Klein's new book, "The Shock Doctrine", It's hard to escape the realization that chaos in Iraq was their plan all along.

It isn't quite a simple as 'Why can't we leave'? It goes much deeper than that.

Iran has said it would fill the vacuum created by the US military withdrawal. This is the same Iran whose leader has a belief in the apocalyptic end to man in order to bring about the reign of Allah. This is the same Iran whose leader regularly espouses the destruction of another nation, that nation being Israel. Iran's threats are not idle. The summer of 2006 when Iranian surrogates battled with Israel using Lebanon as the battlefield is a prime example.

If you can't see the US using its blood and treasure for Israel I have another situation to contemplate. Russia. The EU is already concerned about the Russian use of natural gas as a weapon against the EU. Russia has made no secret of its alliance with Iran, albeit an alliance of convenience. Now the US leaves the vacuum in Iraq for Iran, and Russia has an uneasy relationship with the EU regarding energy, what do we have? Does the EU really want the US to withdraw from Iraq at this point? Probably not. Is the world more stable if Iran controls that much of the Mid-East (think HMS Cornwall), not likely.

The scenrio(s) goes even deeper. So no, 'Why can't we leave'?, isn't a realistic option. And any responsible person sees that.