Don't Forget About Iraq!

Outside the Green Zone Lies Bush's West Bank and Gaza Strip.

If it hadn't have been for George Bush's un-provoked, unnecessary, largely unilateral invasion and unplanned occupation of Iraq (UULUIUOI), the Global War on Terror (GWOT) would have amounted to a little more than the 21st century's version of the 19th century's conflict with the Barbary Pirates. But thanks to Bush's UULUIUOI and his benign neglect of the world's two-state project for Palestine, the GWOT has the capability of morphing into a regional war in southwest Asia.

But don't forget about Iraq! George Bush wants you to. That's why we aren't getting an early demand for a ceasefire in Lebanon: all the more to distract from the "West Bank" and "Gaza Strip" he has purchased for the American people at the Price of $300 billion and thousands of U.S. military casualties.

Things in Iraq are swirling into the toilet as the MSM concentrates on the "brink" [!] of war in Lebanon. The U.N. reports that 3,000 Iraqi Civilians Were Killed in June, a documenting dramatic darkening of the tunnel we're all trying to see through.

The Ramblings of a Lexington Parrothead has drawn my attention to a piece in Newsweek by Col. Mike Turner (24-year Air Force veteran and former fighter pilot and air rescue helicopter pilot. He is a military analyst and commentator who spent seven years serving in U.S. Central Command and the Pentagon as a Middle East/Africa planner). Turner says it's Time to Get Out. He says staying the course is not based on facts but mythology. And he says the three myths are:

U.S. forces will be withdrawn when military commanders determine the Iraqis are capable of maintaining their own security.

There are now 260,000 trained Iraqi troops.

Our only options are "stay the course" or "cut and run."

Click through the links and read about this soldier's arguments. Turner's conclusions:

There can be no doubt that a likely outcome of an immediate U.S. withdrawal from Iraq might be a complete collapse of that country into chaos. Yet remaining in Iraq and trusting the future conduct of the war to an administration that badly bungled this operation from the beginning and has no coherent plan for remaining is irresponsible. I believe there is a way to mount an effective war in Iraq that greatly reduces the risk to U.S. forces and U.S. national security while retaining a reasonable possibility for a measure of success. However, I do not think that the present administration is capable of either acknowledging its failures or rethinking its strategy to the extent necessary to achieve such a limited victory. For that reason, I'm left with a simple solution—let's save as many U.S. lives as possible and get out now.

Let the chuch say, "Amen".