Sunni Radical Insurgency in Iraq. North of Country Overrun.

[JeffreyS]

I agree this was easily predicted and there were two ways to avoid it. 1. not go in  2. The Korea solution spend 50 years and counting there.

[NotNow]

The decision to go in had already been made.  The world has not had a Hussein led Iraq for many years now.  We were committed.  That commitment has been wasted, lost, due to incompetence (at best).   Libya, Egypt, Syria, and antagonizing Israel...this middle east "policy" has been a complete and utter failure.  There are serious dangers building from this and we have never been weaker in the region.  The President is fund raising and playing golf. 

I won't even mention the rest of the world.

[JeffreyS]

The commitment has always been a waste.  Iraq is fighting back and they will succeed or fail. We have oil and as much as people want to paint the President as squandering our importance in the world that is just fantasy. We are still the end all be all of economic and military power.  Whatever happens in the middle east won't change that. Whatever is going to happen isn't worth the life of even one of our young GIs and I don't think a spike in gas prices is worth one of our soldiers lives either.

[NotNow]

Whether one agreed with the initial commitment or not, over four thousand American lives and hundreds of billions of dollars were spent to accomplish a goal in Iraq.  Once accomplished, to ignore all warnings and waste that entire commitment is unforgivable.

While I respect your opinion, Libya being largely a terrorist run country is not a fantasy.  Egypt struggling with the Muslim Brotherhood in essentially a civil war (with us on the wrong side) is not a fantasy.  The Iranian nuclear program continuing unabated is not fantasy.  Russian military expansion, the Crimea, and the ongoing efforts of the Russians in the Ukraine is not a fantasy.  Chinese military expansion and the bullying of their neighbors in the South China Sea is not fantasy.  Russian and Chinese efforts to make the petrodollar a thing of the past is not fantasy.  The rise of Muslim extremism in Africa is not fantasy.  The fall of Northern Iraq to a terrorist group is not fantasy.  The only real fantasy is the idea that our government is capable of dealing with any of this.

In the same vein, it is important to look to the future in this case.  Essentially, Obama has signaled his decision when he delayed any decision and went to California for fund raising and golf.  I pray that this "no-decision" won't come back to haunt us, but every indication is that it will.

http://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/06/isis-chief-to-usa-soon-we-will-be-in-direct-confrontation-and-the-sons-of-islam-have-prepared-for-such-a-day

[finehoe]

I haven't found any reference to any of our allies quoting the fight over 'Bush's Lies.'

You must not have looked very hard.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1348462/Iraq-war-Chilcot-Inquiry-New-evidence-bury-Tony-Blair-lies.html

[NotNow]

The reality is that Northern Iraq has already been lost.  ISIS is a well equipped, well organized force now, thanks largely to our government.  It is "doom", it is the current situation.  I hope the Iraqi government can hold Baghdad.  We are not "teaming" with Iran.  We are giving money and equipment to almost anyone.  Iran is building a new position in Shia Iraq.  The map will look very different soon.  A far cry from the position we were in when President Bush ("oaf" in your lexicon) left office.  Be as crude as you want, spin however you want.  This stands as a major foreign policy disaster in a long line of Obama foreign policy disasters. 

[JeffreyS]

Yes a much different position our troops are no longer dying in Iraq.

[NotNow]

Yes a much different position our troops are no longer dying in Iraq.

Let's see how if works out.  I hope you don't have to regret those words.

[NotNow]

 http://robjonesforpresident.com/

Let's see... the Barbarians at the gate of our billion dollar embassy, bought with not only treasure but the blood of our military... are "freedom fighters" from Syria, which as memory serves were armed by our CIA in violation of law at the president's direction.
They are led by a guy that was in US custody until Obama took office.
Our embassy hasn't been evacuated, because "it is too politically sensitive" (ie – it'd make Obama look bad). Besides, despite the fact this is Iraq, and this takeover has been in progress all year, we apparently didn't have any contingency plans for such an eventuality.
We have no military force in the country to defend them except the embassy guard, because Obama was in a hurry to exit. He sent Biden, a semi-competent on his best day, to secure a status of forces agreement allowing a residual force, and he failed. Obama exited anyway.
But we can't put fresh boots on the ground to protect them because that too would make Obama look bad, since someone claimed we won already the war on terror (ie – bin laden is dead and al qaida is on the run").
So now we are largely left trusting the locals to protect our diplomats for us, because that strategy worked so well in Benghazi.
Our choices if Malaki loses will either look like the fall of Saigon at best... or Benghazi mixed with the Iran Hostage crisis at worst... except this foe is known for sharing vivid execution videos on the net. Did I miss anything?
Meanwhile... the US southern border is under siege and overwhelmed, the IRS is defying subpoenas with excuses that sound like "the dog ate my emails", nobody has been fired despite the VA fraud that has cost lives...
... and the Commander in Chief spent the weekend golfing and fundraising.
Conclusion: This is all the fault of George Bush.


___________________________

[JeffreyS]

Your conclusion is correct.

I agree this was easily predicted and there were two ways to avoid it. 1. not go in  2. The Korea solution spend 50 years and counting there.

Because Bush chose to ignore number 1.

I guess it is Obama's fault that we aren't engaging in number 2.

[NotNow]

Hmmm....are you sure?  I think that we are in number 2 right now. 

[JeffreyS]

You make a good point I am not sure.

[BridgeTroll]

"W" has been silent so far... Here is what Tony Blair has to say... Pretty interesting.

Some excerpts...

However there is also no doubt that a major proximate cause of the takeover of Mosul by Isis is the situation in Syria. To argue otherwise is wilful. The operation in Mosul was planned and organised from Raqqa across the Syria border. The fighters were trained and battle-hardened in the Syrian war. It is true that they originate in Iraq and have shifted focus to Iraq over the past months. But, Islamist extremism in all its different manifestations as a group, rebuilt refinanced and re-armed mainly as a result of its ability to grow and gain experience through the war in Syria.

Is it seriously being said that the revolution sweeping the Arab world would have hit Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Yemen, Bahrain, Syria, to say nothing of the smaller upheavals all over the region, but miraculously Iraq, under the most brutal and tyrannical of all the regimes, would have been an oasis of calm?

The problems of the Middle East are the product of bad systems of politics mixed with a bad abuse of religion going back over a long time. Poor governance, weak institutions, oppressive rule and a failure within parts of Islam to work out a sensible relationship between religion and Government have combined to create countries which are simply unprepared for the modern world. Put into that mix, young populations with no effective job opportunities and education systems that do not correspond to the requirements of the future economy, and you have a toxic, inherently unstable matrix of factors that was always – repeat always - going to lead to a revolution.

This is a generation long struggle. It is not a 'war' which you win or lose in some clear and clean-cut way. There is no easy or painless solution. Intervention is hard. Partial intervention is hard. Non-intervention is hard.

[finehoe]

Boris Johnson denounces Tony Blair as 'unhinged' on Iraq

Johnson said Blair and then-US president George Bush had shown "unbelievable arrogance" to believe toppling Saddam Hussein would not result in instability which resulted directly to the deaths of 100,000 Iraqis and hundreds of British and American troops

He suggested there were "specific and targeted" actions that could be taken by the US and its allies to deal with latest threat – as Barack Obama considers a range of military options short of ground troops.

But he said that by refusing to accept that the 2003 war was "a tragic mistake", "Blair is now undermining the very cause he advocates: the possibility of serious and effective intervention.

"Somebody needs to get on to Tony Blair and tell him to put a sock in it, or at least to accept the reality of the disaster he helped to engender. Then he might be worth hearing," Johnson concluded.

Clare Short, who quit Blair's cabinet in the aftermath of the 2003 invasion, said he had been "absolutely, consistently wrong, wrong, wrong" on the issue, and opposed more strikes.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/jun/15/boris-johnson-unhinged-tony-blair

[BridgeTroll]

Its uncanny... finger pointing and name calling...