General Sir Richard Dannatt, the Chief of Staff of the British Army, called for the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq, soon. He stated that the original plan, to establish a liberal democracy, was not going to be possible and we should decide on a lower ambition. He stated that foreign intervention was no longer welcome within Iraqi society and the consequences of continued presence in Iraq, by British troops, would not improve the situation within the country. He was not as negative in his outlook for continued British presence in Afghanistan. He also had some pretty grim opinions on the effects of the Iraq War on British domestic society.
Will this, do you think, cause George Bush and his advisers to rethink their position of staying in Iraq,"As long as it takes"?
How will this effect the status of the "Coalition Forces", that, George Bush tells us, are fighting with us in Iraq?
Will even more Republican politicians break with Bush's Iraq policy?
Will Bush's poll numbers go even lower, signifying the erosion of his heretofore impervious "fundamentalist" base?
Will the active duty military community, which has, up until this point, maintained solidarity with the President, begin to splinter?
Will he be able to refocus the countries attention on the GWOT, as an extranational, rather than a State to State, conflict?
Will this effect Bush's ability to deal effectively with Iran and North Korea, the other two hubs on his tricycle of evil?
Will he now focus his efforts on transforming Afghanistan into a liberal democracy in the Western style?
I am breathless in anticipation.
1 comment:
Good post. My own take on this is that you can't go into a fight with one hand tied behind your back and expect to win. We've been using kid gloves over there, probably as a result of our cultural "white guilt" that inhibits any response to someone of a different race. We should take off those gloves, get the job done and let the chips fall where they may. Our military deserves no less.
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