The New General In Iraq

[Kathianne]

Ralph Peters respects him, but has some doubts:

http://www.nypost.com/seven/01052007...lph_peters.htm

KING DAVID RETURNS

By RALPH PETERS

January 5, 2007 -- IT'S official: Dave Petraeus, one of the U.S. Army's most- impressive leaders, is headed back to Baghdad to take charge. The assignment means a fourth star and the chance to save a desperate situation - or preside over a grim strategic failure.

With back-to-back tours of duty in Iraq behind him and the most-positive image among Iraqis of any U.S. leader, military or civilian, Petraeus is a natural choice. His intelligence, drive, devotion to service and negotiating skill make the lean, young-looking general seem perfect.

The question is whether Gen. Petraeus is the right choice - or if he'll merely be the final executor of a failed policy.

The general has a winning public demeanor - when he led the 101st Airborne Division in northern Iraq in 2003, he proved such a superb diplomat that the Kurds called him "Malik Daoud" - King David - as a mark of respect. He listened patiently, spent money wisely, used force intelligently and truly did win hearts and minds.

He went on to tackle the reconstruction of Iraq's security forces - no easy task, given the ruinous legacy of L. Paul Bremer's term as viceroy. Where others had faltered, Petraeus appeared to succeed.

The Pentagon brought him back to Ft. Leavenworth for a breather - formally to imbue the Army's educational system and doctrine production with knowledge from the front, but also to give him a break before he worked himself to death.

Petraeus is the sort of soldier who would have stayed on indefinitely in Iraq, setting aside all personal concerns in the interests of the mission. President Bush respects him and even the media admire him.

So what could possibly be doubtful about the choice of Gen. Petraeus to take over the leadership of our forces in Iraq? ...

[jillian]

I don't think it much matters who the generals are. Bush isn't going to listen to anyone, anyway.

[stephanie]

I don't think it much matters who the generals are. Bush isn't going to listen to anyone, anyway.

Jilly, for the First time I have to disagree with you..

But seriously, I believe President Bush has been listening to his military in Iraq the whole time..It's just that we're trying to fight this without as much civilian casualties as possible, and that's made this a lot tougher..
That was done I believe so to show the Iraqi people that we are doing this for them, and to give them a chance to get up and stand up and fight for their country..
We'll just have to see if they can do it....
I'm hoping they can and will, soon.
Until then I still stand behind the reasons for going and still stand with our troops who feel they are doing a good thing for the Iraqi people...

Talk of withdrawing Now is not doing anyone, especially our troops or the Iraqi people any damn good....And it's giving the insurgents more energy to continue, whereas they are sensing that they can just hold out and watch the Americans go down in defeat... And if that happens, I believe we will see that 9/11 was nothing compared to what we will see next...

I wish people could get that through their thick skulls....

[Gaffer]

The media may respect him. But they will not support anything done by the military as it would reflect well on Bush and they could never do that.

I'm with you Steph, we need to see it through.

[jillian]

Jilly, for the First time I have to disagree with you..

OMG!!!! No!!! Say it ain't so, Steffie!!

But seriously, I believe President Bush has been listening to his military in Iraq the whole time..It's just that we're trying to fight this without as much civilian casualties as possible, and that's made this a lot tougher..
That was done I believe so to show the Iraqi people that we are doing this for them, and to give them a chance to get up and stand up and fight for their country..
We'll just have to see if they can do it....
I'm hoping they can and will, soon.
Until then I still stand behind the reasons for going and still stand with our troops who feel they are doing a good thing for the Iraqi people...

I don't believe there was ever any good reason to go into Iraq. I think we should have concentrated our efforts on Afghanistan and bringing Bin Laden to justice. But in saying that, any effort in Iraq should have been done with overwhelming force. From everything I've read, the generals begged for more troops at the beginning when it would have made a difference. But Rummy didn't care and Bush didn't understand or listen.

Now, when it no longer matters, Bush is once again not listening and wants to escalate. He's also sending someone in to run the show who's had no relationship to the Iraq war. That may be a good thing or may not... remains to be seen.

I think I'm supporting our troops by not wanting them to be cannon fodder for something I see as essentially useless in terms of our national interest or security.

Talk of withdrawing Now is not doing anyone, especially our troops or the Iraqi people any damn good....

Of course it is... it gets our troops out. As for the Iraqi people, well, they're in the midst of a civil war. It isn't our place to take sides and have our troops die in the cross-fire.

And it's giving the insurgents more energy to continue, whereas they are sensing that they can just hold out and watch the Americans go down in defeat... And if that happens, I believe we will see that 9/11 was nothing compared to what we will see next...

I wish people could get that through their thick skulls....

I don't think that makes any sense at all. And the thing is, Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11... for some reason a small (luckily very small) percentage of this country hasn't gotten *that* through their heads.

I'm shocked we don't agree on this Steffie... shocked I tell ya!

Hope you're doin' ok up there in the cold!!!

[Gaffer]

Ok jilly here goes.

We went into iraq with enough troops to do the job. One division was delayed because of the turks. We had three divisions going up agains 25. Our troops went through them like a hot knife through butter.

They went in to take down saddam because he ignored the un resolutions for 12 years, he kicked out the inspection teams. He had been shooting at our aircraft patroling the no fly zone for 12 years. He had killed at least half a million people that we knew of. It was suspected, due to all countries intelligence agencies, that he had chemical weapons. He supported terrorist organizations like hamas and al queda, he had training camps in the north near the iranian border. He gave refuge to terrorist. He was a general all around bad guy.

Our efforts in Afganhistan have never changed. The searching and fighting have gone on for longer than iraq. Its just that the media wants to turn iraq into and American loss. So that's all that gets covered. There have been some serious battles in Afganhistan that have never been covered by the media here. Why? Because they are successes and the media wants to concentrate on some car bombing in Baghdad. There are 40.000 NATO troops in Afganhistan. And they have never stopped looking for bin laden. He's either in pakistan or iran. My money is on iran.

The troops in iraq have great morale and want to finish the mission, which is to train the iraqi army and turn it all over to them. Bush listened to his Generals and they said more troops weren't needed. I think they were wrong. Just cause they're generals doesn't mean they are always right. More troops means more targets, but it also means more eyes and more fire power.

Iraq is not in a civil war. It is a war of militia thugs of two different sects fighting with each other. Then there are the criminal thugs or ali baba's as the iraqi's call them who are just out for profit and neighborhood control, not much different than a gang in the states. Then there is the al queda forces that are trying to kill Americans and don't care who they kill along with them.They are mostly arab and other foriegners and are for the most part dispised by the iraqis. Then there's the iranian interferance. Its all designed to keep the government of iraq from establishing control and governing the country.

Our enemies are counting on people like you. Bring the troops home before the mission is complete and they win. They will establish a taliban like regime in iraq and threaten the entire gulf region. They use the media to exploit American division on the war. With every news report saying Americans want the troops brought home they are emboldened to make more attacks. Just like Vietnam the more anti war propaganda put out by the media the longer it takes to get things stablized and the more troops that get killed. If it wasn't for the anti-war people here we would probably be getting out now. Instead we will be there a few more years.

iraq had nothing directly to do with 9/11, but they did assist some of the hijackers before hand. And had met with al queda. iraq is now a major front in the war on islamists. The jihadist are streaming into iraq to fight our troops. That's what our troops are there for, to fight. And better that they do it there than over here.

Remember the picture of a fireman handing a flag up to a soldier in the wreckage of the world trade center. The soldier is saying "I'll take it from here". Well they have and its ongoing. If everyone just supports them they can come home a lot sooner.