@joshtpm - BREAKING: Pres to announce within the hour departure of all US troops from Iraq by end of 2011 #endofiraqwar

Excellent. Get. Them. Home.

ABCNews-

A White House official says that at approximately 11:30am today, President Obama convened a secure video conference with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to talk with him about this news.

Someone's going to say it, so it might as well be an Obama supporter, this is at least partially a political/reelection move.

Just in time for the re-election campaign. How convenient.

Just in time for the re-election campaign. How convenient.

To be fair its not like its coming out of left field. This was part of his platform when he was first elected.

To be fair its not like its coming out of left field. This was part of his platform when he was first elected.

 

Meh. Why the 3 year delay? This should have happened in year one of his presidency. This looks purely political in my eyes.

Meh. Why the 3 year delay? This should have happened in year one of his presidency. This looks purely political in my eyes.

It probably would have been very bad for the region to just yank troops out and say "good luck!"

Obama is turning into Ozzie and his apologists seem like Marty, greg, and Cowley to me.

Meh. Why the 3 year delay? This should have happened in year one of his presidency. This looks purely political in my eyes.

I dont think it was a "delay" as much as unrest in the general region. It's nice to bring the troops home regardless of the motivation behind it.

 

And FYI, I am not an apologist nor did I or will I vote for Obama.

how dare good ideas be politically motivated. I surely hope, for honesty sake, that we NEVEr end the war in afghanistan out of politics!

Other thing worth noting about why this is happening now...the U.S. agreement with Iraq to have troops there expires on December 31. Without a new forces present agreement...the U.S. would technically be declaring war on Iraq again to keep troops there. Despite the best efforts of a substantial fraction of the military leadership and others...the Iraqis have said "Absolutely not" to additional U.S. troop presence. That date was decided under Bush, I believe, when the government originally negotiated the forces agreement.

Obama is turning into Ozzie and his apologists seem like Marty, greg, and Cowley to me.

Look at all the facts you included to support this post.

I read somewhere else today that the 12/31/11 exit date was originally announced as a target by W in the press conference where he got the shoe thrown at him. Somebody had that in their avvy for awhile.

I read somewhere else today that the 12/31/11 exit date was originally announced as a target by W in the press conference where he got the shoe thrown at him. Somebody had that in their avvy for awhile.

That was me. President Bush ducking Scorpion's spear

Obama was trying to negotiate keeping 3,000 advisers and trainers in the country but Iraq would not shield them from any prosecution, so he said bye bye. I really don't see this as politically motivated, it is a campaign promise finally kept.

War is politics at a very fundamental level. No s*** it's politically motivated. Everything is.

It probably would have been very bad for the region to just yank troops out and say "good luck!"

 

It will be very bad for the region anyway. So I have to agree with BS on this, it's a political play.

 

Also, I'd love to see how many actually come "home" vs how many are simply redeployed elsewhere in that "zone".

It will be very bad for the region anyway. So I have to agree with BS on this, it's a political play.

 

Also, I'd love to see how many actually come "home" vs how many are simply redeployed elsewhere in that "zone".

 

That's what I am waiting to see. With the way it is going, I wonder if we will see many just sent to Afghanistan or whatever Baracks war of the day is...

That's what I am waiting to see. With the way it is going, I wonder if we will see many just sent to Afghanistan or whatever Baracks war of the day is...

 

I just want to make sure it's not the same math Rham used put "hundreds of police additional" officers on the streets of Chicago. When all he really did was move them from tactical/special units to 'beat'...which is an actual net gain of 0.

 

I'm tired of this country funding wars it cannot afford, and has no business being involved in. With Saddam and Kadafi gone, that place will STILL continue being a bastion of crap...and more people such as bad (if not worse) will rise up and take over...and round and round we go.

That's what I am waiting to see. With the way it is going, I wonder if we will see many just sent to Afghanistan or whatever Baracks war of the day is...

 

 

How many wars the size of Bush's wars have been started since Barack has been in office? Is the current levels greater or smaller under Obama? I'm not giving Obama that much credit, this seemed like the natural arc of the war, but I sure can't give him blame for the current levels of fighting.

How many wars the size of Bush's wars have been started since Barack has been in office? Is the current levels greater or smaller under Obama? I'm not giving Obama that much credit, this seemed like the natural arc of the war, but I sure can't give him blame for the current levels of fighting.

 

Is this what you do now? Compare bad to worse in order to make it sound good?

 

What happened to having standards?

 

Comparing anyone/anything to "Bush" means you've set the bar so low, you may as well not bother.

Comparing Iraq to Libya is just... lazy. It's not comparing bad to worse, it's more like comparing Wasilla to New York City. I didn't agree with intervening in Libya and I'm not going to hypocritically pretend like I supported it the whole time now that it's been a successful operation, but terms of time, cost, and resources, Iraq was several orders of magnitude bigger than Libya. Iraq took over 8 years, took 3000+ American lives and far more than that permanently disabled, overall cost hundreds of billions of dollars, and had strategic consequences that would take too long to detail here, whereas Libya took a few months, took 0 US lives, and cost like a billion dollars. Also the US did almost everything in Iraq alone with the Brits helping out as much as they could and others lending token help while Libya had the French and British doing a lot of the heavy lifting.