Another City Falls in Iraq - Tikrit falls to militants

Hmmmm. I suppose because of the US's involvement in overthrowing Saddam, a new group will be overthrowing the government that we had elected. The situation will get worse for the people of Iraq and they will learn to hate Americans more than ever.

originally posted by: Evanzsayz
a reply to: buni11687

LMAO great job Bush, Cheney, Clinton and Obama...you caused more problems then you solved. You made Iraq unstable and you made the rest of the world hate us. Put all their brains together you wouldn't have enough intelligence to blow your nose.

Small factions warring over small localized regions is a far cry from what previously was a top 10 world standing army that invaded Kuwait.

Mission accomplished, let them fight over scraps of dirt.

People act as if nothing short of the US leaving a state of Utopia in their wake, justifies any military action. Newsflash, there is no such utopian place on earth, and backed by historical evidence there never will be.

originally posted by: rickymouse
Hmmmm. I suppose because of the US's involvement in overthrowing Saddam, a new group will be overthrowing the government that we had elected. The situation will get worse for the people of Iraq and they will learn to hate Americans more than ever.

And the defense-industry lobbyists are lining up outside of our Congressmen's doors as we speak (opinion)

Wow, unbelievable. Thanks to all the men and women who served and did time there much appreciation.

Can't say I'm too shocked about this, we all knew it was coming looks like we need a third go round

a reply to: buni11687
Should have left Saddam Hussein alone, he kept a certain balance in the region that stabilized the area!
Saddam was a true dictator and destroy terrorist who tried to move in. The balance is gone and the region is becoming more unstable. Soon it will become a Mad Max world over there!!!

Maybe the west will learn that you can't force western ideologies onto eastern countries, as hard as you try.
People have another cultural background and our systems might not work for them. You can see it in every country that has been forced to become a western style democracy.

originally posted by: TinfoilTP

originally posted by: Evanzsayz
a reply to: buni11687

LMAO great job Bush, Cheney, Clinton and Obama...you caused more problems then you solved. You made Iraq unstable and you made the rest of the world hate us. Put all their brains together you wouldn't have enough intelligence to blow your nose.

Small factions warring over small localized regions is a far cry from what previously was a top 10 world standing army that invaded Kuwait.

Mission accomplished, let them fight over scraps of dirt.

People act as if nothing short of the US leaving a state of Utopia in their wake, justifies any military action. Newsflash, there is no such utopian place on earth, and backed by historical evidence there never will be.

The problem is that these little turf wars don't burn out - they just burn and burn and spread. This is right next to Turkey's border who historically have been the front-line between Christian Europe and Islam for many centuries. Around 80 Turkish nationals have been kidnapped.

a reply to: stormcell

It's always Turkey to watch. I'm not to worried yet but once something huge happens in Turkey than I will be on alert.

I was there twice for a total of 21 months...I'm livid. The things I want to say...

a reply to: buni11687

Get our soldiers out, let those barbarians kill each other. They have been killing each other for thousands of years and it seems to be a natural cycle for that part of the world. Save the women and children, they need to change religions.

Wasn't this the precise argument used by the people that wanted to avoid going into Iraq in the first place? Once we take out the country we're stuck there. Pulling out will just make the country fracture and fall. Or worse it ends up in the hands of our enemies rather than as a sovereign entity.

Growing up I had friends from Iraq, one day they had to go back to the country. I looked them up one day to find they had been killed in the violence of our invasion. I had friends join the military and serve in Iraq only to learn that they were also killed. After all the killing on both sides what did we get? Billions of dollars worth of debt, thousands and perhaps millions of recruits to our enemies, and a nation delivered to our enemies.

But, Bush got his revenge and Cheney's company made a lot of money.

I wish I could be smug here with a "We told you so" moment but I can't. There's just rage. Rage at the policies that started this, rage at improper handling of the invasion, and rage at the people who sent our soldiers to die for nothing. Above all there's a deep feeling of sadness for the hell all the surviving Iraqi's now get to live under, and we did that to them.

originally posted by: MCL1150
a reply to: buni11687
Should have left Saddam Hussein alone, he kept a certain balance in the region that stabilized the area!
Saddam was a true dictator and destroy terrorist who tried to move in. The balance is gone and the region is becoming more unstable. Soon it will become a Mad Max world over there!!!

same with mubarak and gaddahfy.

at least that wasn't gw's fault.

well...so much for "Mission Accomplished", 'eh boys?

we had no real reason to go there in the first place, lots of our people died to "liberate and secure" the country, and now it seems it was all for naught.....

what a joke.

will a lesson be learned from this? probably not.

originally posted by: Aazadan

But, Bush got his revenge and Cheney's company made a lot of money.

I wish I could be smug here with a "We told you so" moment but I can't. There's just rage. Rage at the policies that started this, rage at improper handling of the invasion, and rage at the people who sent our soldiers to die for nothing. Above all there's a deep feeling of sadness for the hell all the surviving Iraqi's now get to live under, and we did that to them.

iraq has been in obama's hands for 6 yrs.

it's his call to exit in any dumb way he wants, which he is doing.

if he didn't open his mouth about when we were jumping ship, things might be more stable.

besides, everything obama has done, just gives incentives to the terrorists, no matter what their name is.

from running guns to the mexican cartels to the taliban 5.

originally posted by: tsingtao
iraq has been in obama's hands for 6 yrs.

it's his call to exit in any dumb way he wants, which he is doing.

if he didn't open his mouth about when we were jumping ship, things might be more stable.

besides, everything obama has done, just gives incentives to the terrorists, no matter what their name is.

from running guns to the mexican cartels to the taliban 5.

You're right it is Obama's call as to when to leave. It doesn't matter when we leave though, whenever we pulled out this was going to happen unless there was a strong government in place and that is something Iraq doesn't know how to do. They've lived under a dictator for a very long time, and as far as dictators go he was among the more benevolent and entrenched in the world. They had a strong military, fought off radical Islam, were stable, kept Iran in line... all were good things. Saddam had his bad side too but we don't live in a world where governments live up to our ideals. Whether we left 8 years ago, today, or 8 years in the future this same thing was going to happen.

The only real long term solution would have been to annex Iraq to give us a permanent presence there but that wasn't going to happen. It was an unwinnable war from the start and everyone knew that going in. I think Obama made the right move in pulling out, it means all the money and lives spent there were wasted but it prevents more waste in the future. The problem is that we shouldn't have gone in in the first place. There was no scenario where we could pull out and have a strong functioning government in Iraq and staying there forever is no solution either.

Obama inherited a no win situation with Iraq, he should have pulled out sooner in my opinion. I like to fault Bush for the whole thing but really it's not even his fault. It's the fault of his generals for not preventing this situation in the first place. I guarantee you they saw this scenario unfolding.

a reply to: Glassbender777

I sorta wonder whether the west is letting Iraq become taken over by militants. because they know, that the only thing keeping Iran in check is a unified Iraq. Saddam may have been a bad person but he sure kept his population under control. Their Western powers may want another type of Saddam in power

"Keeping Iran in check" from what, exactly?
Saddam was lobbing scud missiles into the so-called Israel, which is kept quiet in the controlled media, hoping people will have forgotten that episode, and thus never making the real connection for why there seems to be a scorched earth policy for the ME from the US.

a reply to: MCL1150

Should have left Saddam Hussein alone, he kept a certain balance in the region that stabilized the area!
Saddam was a true dictator and destroy terrorist who tried to move in. The balance is gone and the region is becoming more unstable.

Agreed. Saddam was a brutal dictator, but he kept the jihadists that are our actual enemy in check. This wouldn't be happening if he was still there.

We shouldn't have gone into Iraq in 2003. If these ISIL take control of the country, I don't really know what to expect, other than it will be very bad for everyone.

a reply to: buni11687

IMO, we did the right thing by taking out Saddam. If you leave a dictator in power, then they can become much more dangerous by allying themselves with Russia and China and build nukes, not to mention gassing his own people in the process. If we had left him in power, the death count would probably be up to 2 million by now, and he probably would have kept going, or assign another dictator in place.

What we should have done is left after taking out Hussein. We can still help the Iraqis and redeem ourselves by selling them weapons to fight back. The key is to teach them that they need to fight back themselves, because often times, all it takes is a little communication to change the whole thing.

a reply to: buni11687

. . . the jihadists that are our actual enemy . . .

By "our" do you mean, the US?
Do you think "the jihadists" did 911?
If you do, I feel sorry for you.
Those (never actually officially accused) were dupes who had no idea that there was going to be an attack.
Our real enemy is within, funding the actual jihadists to do their dirty work to provide endless war to make the so-called Israel seem like paradise in comparison, meanwhile keeping it a secret where the real source of chaos is.

In reality, the Sunni and US were screwed by al-Maliki. Just as we "enabled" the Taliban in Afghanistan, we now unleashed our pitbull Sunni "allies" on the govts who rejected us. Iraqis govt asked us to leave, and now is asking for airstrikes to stop the revolutionaries. Just like Karzai, who was a sort of turncoat, undermining the US at every opportunity and flexing corrupt policies through his family...ultimately SUING the USA (over Seal Team VI or something), this is our final farewell to them.