Decius wrote:
I'm not sure how Obama would reconcile 50,000 troops on the ground with the words "complete withdrawl." I'm willing to reserve judgement pending a reference, but you haven't really countered my point that this isn't driven by the situation on the ground.

We'll start with Obama's blathering here. His actual numbers are nebulous but given the prior statements from other camps, 30-50,000 troops is still in the right ballpark.

And your improving security situation is a mirage.

How long do the actual number of casualties need to be down before you will accept that the tactics change was successful?

The point of "the surge" was to but time for a unified government to come into existence.

The phony political requirements set by Congress have absolutely no relationship to the history of the development of the present set of tactics other than that the Democrats insisted on the former in order to authorize the latter. I'm not impressed with the left wing insistance that the fact that Iraq has, for example, failed to sign over most of the oil in the country to foreign investors is an example of why the current tactics aren't working and the troops must be immediately withdrawn. Are you sure you're REALLY uncomfortable with their failure to meet the milestones?

Oh those "phoney requirements set by Congress"? Those were stated by the WHITE HOUSE. That's not Congress setting anything. Congress has either been complicit in, or done an Olga Korbut level of spinal flexibility on Iraq at every turn. I am not quite as appalled with Congress as I am with W, but I am exceedingly displeased with the spineless wonders currently holding seats over there. Let's get the facts straight. It was W who said we're buying time for the Iragi government, not Congress. And the Iraqi theft machine is stonewalling full speed into their own pockets.

I'm actually impressed that the Iraqi's have stonewalled the shitty oil deals, that's a point in their favor, but they haven't done anything else either, and that more than offsets the one good call there.

Leaving may start a bloodbath, but staying keeps the pot at boiling, and if leaving at any point starts the bloodbath, then we've committed ourselves to staying in Iraq forever?

1. We're still in Germany.
2. We're still in Japan.
3. We're still in South Korea.
4. We're still in South Central Los Angeles.

This is war. You don't get to quit just 'cause you're sick of it.

No, and none of those situations are similar to Iraq. We did not face a guerrilla war in Germany, Japan, or Korea, and South Central is a part of this country just as the south side of Chicago and Detroit are parts of this country, and those are places we're fail ing as well, but are parts of THIS country, that we should figure out how to get straight.

You're right, this is war, but if we want to quit this one we can, just as we quit the disaster that was Vietnam. Not only can we not "win" this, we don't have a clue as to what winning would constitute. An operating democratic Iraq? We already have that in Venezuela, and that's going just ducky. Or maybe a democracy along the lines of Algeria, a fundamentalist Islamic theocracy. Gee, that's worked out SO well.

The stupidity of going there in the first place cannot go on to infinity.

How will withdrawing now undo the stupidity of going in there in the first place? The damage caused by going in there in the first place has already been done. Leaving is an unrelated decision. Leaving will result in a lot of iraqi people dieing and the rise of an authoritarian anti-western regime that will threaten our interests for decades and destabalize the region. Staying will result in less people dieing and the hope for an eventually stable non-threatening government. The cost of the later is American money and lives. The cost of the former is more American money and more American lives over a longer period of time. These are your choices. You cannot undue the past.

Leaving is a questionable enterprise, but based on military appraisals the resultant outcome may be perfectly managable.

Pushing ourselves and the Iraqis into the meatgrinder an inch at a time is not an option, and that's what you seem to be advocating here.

I don't understand how a substantial tactics change that has resulted in considerable reductions in casualties on both sides consistitutes "pushing ourselves and the Iraqis into the meatgrinder."

Leaving pushes the Iraqis into a meatgrinder. The option you have that results in the least number of dead Iraqis is to continue the present strategy.

The assesment of Ricks and others is that the focal point of the Iraq war is forcing the US out. We are an occupying force and one that the Iraqi populace dislikes/despises. An immediate drawdown and withdrawl from occupation exercises to one of border control, training, and limited engagement, pushes the Iraqi government into extracting their collective thumbs from their collective anuses, limits US casualties, and maybe, just maybe, gets either a government, or group of governments, that actually function, unlike the current kleptocracy.

What exists now has not, does not, and will never function as a government, and clinging to that fantasy is about as useful as clinging to the fantasy that Frodo can keep the ring and do good with it. The story is done, Frodo threw the ring in the volcano, the Iraqi government has failed and the whole mess is done. It's time to extract our craniums from the posterior terminus of our alimentary canals, move on with that reality based stuff, and do something that is potentially productive. The current course is a train wreck, and the engineer is still throwing coal into the furnace.

Great, casualties appear to be down. That was dealt with earlier, along with why, and has zero bearing on where we go next.

RE: The meaning of the NIE...