Iraq War: 20 Years On

**WillBrink** · 03-19-23, 16:38

A good but unsatisfying article from NYT. I think it lets the Bush II admin off too easy, and the NeoCons took advantage of a totally feckless Clinton admin, so a lose lose there. We should have focused on Afg and nothing else and going to Iraq took away much needed resources and cost US lives and staggering $:

"...neoconservatives portrayed Iraq as a proving ground for their larger mission. A pro-American democracy would, they argued, naturally arise in Mr. Hussein’s place, and other countries in the Middle East would quickly follow, transforming the region."

How do you get to their position and understand that little about the ME?

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/18/w...mid=tw-nytimes

**FromMyColdDeadHand** · 03-19-23, 17:54

By believing in humanity and for people to act rationally.

The oddest thing is young people think that Bush and the US 'broke' the ME. Like it was this awesome place circa 1999. We gave them the opportunity to cast off the 7th for the 21st century and they bit the hand.

F'em. As said in The Godfather "They are animals, let them lose their souls".

Maybe they'll finally get it in the next century, or the next millenia.

**SteyrAUG** · 03-19-23, 18:32

Everybody forgets.

Saddam had chemical weapons, ask the Kurds.

9-11 demonstrated he didn't need a missile system to deliver them to us, just had to give them to bad guys and he knew a few. Saddam was behind the Iranian Embassy hostage crisis so he's not above working with terrorists.

Our choices were: Wait until a chemical weapons attack happens in LA OR personally determine Iraq's current NBC capacity because the UN sure as shit isn't able to accomplish anything definitive.

So we did the right thing.

The PROBLEM was, after we determined any chemical weapon capacity or neutralized any terrorist plan to deliver said weapons to the US we should have CONCLUDED our operations, gone down the list of senior people in charge, picked somebody and said "You are now President...do NOT make us come back and do this crap again."

Instead Bush 43 (because he is pretty much the D student everyone claims he was) decided he could "fix" Iraq and the resulting democracy would be so grateful they'd build statues of him and sell us oil really cheap. He didn't seem to understand if they really wanted democracy in Iraq, they would already have it and true to form when given the vote, the result was another Islamic government.

Saddam already presided over the closest thing to a secular democracy in the region, Bush 41 screwed the pooch when he sided with Kuwait over allegations of oil theft (another time the UN failed to find a resolution to a problem that ended in war) and rat****ed an alliance Reagan took years to build.

**ABNAK** · 03-19-23, 19:09

In 2023 Iraq is more viable than Afghanistan, so there's that.

**ZGXtreme** · 03-19-23, 20:20

Cannot believe it’s been 20 years since we crossed the LOD. So much pain and loss since that day and it’s passed so quickly.

**B52U** · 03-19-23, 22:02

Originally Posted by ABNAK

In 2023 Iraq is more viable than Afghanistan, so there's that.

I'm an OIF vet (2004-2005) and always felt I was in the wrong place and that the "right" war was over in Afghanistan. I also had a bunch of pessimism about the iraqi forces we were training.

When ISIS rolled over Mosul I figured I was right, but when they finally rallied and took back their lands it was a surprise. I knew the Kurds were rockstars and would do good work but the arabs finally getting some balls and turning things around was a big deal.

Afghanistan collapsing first while Iraq clung onto their fledgling democracy which we helped establish at gunpoint was unimaginable to me back then. The world takes strange turns sometimes.

**C-grunt** · 03-20-23, 02:15

Kinda funny story.

20 years ago I was a young Private fresh out of Basic. Graduated highschool about 9 months prior. We had been training in Kuwait since January. My platoon sergeant was a crusty old SFC that had been in the first Gulf War.

March 18th/19th we were all lined up in the desert just south of the border with Iraq. My platoon sergeant was adamant that we were about to invade. Everyone else thought it was a bunch of saber rattling. He said "watch. When they tell us to put on the MOPP gear, we will be in Iraq within 12 hours". The orders come down to put on the MOPP gear. I remember thinking "that's a lot of money for bluffing". Right around the time we finishing putting on the gear I hear a low rumble. Someone yelled "what the **** is that" and points up in the air. We all look up and see a missile flying through the air. It took us all about a second or two to realize that it was flying south. We all ran to our vehicles as the Patriot systems further south started launching.

We all get in our Bradleys and adrenaline was pumping. A few minutes later there was a pounding on the back hatch. We open the door and my platoon sergeant sticks his head in. "Welcome to war boys! Now lets get some!" and slammed the door. Shit was like a movie.

Our first mission of the war was to take Tallil Airfield in Nasiriyah. The fighting was pretty light for most of us. A few platoons were sent to help with the main attack force into the city itself. They had a hard fight there.

This picture was taken of my platoon by our imbedded Time reporter and featured in the book "21 Days to Baghdad". Im the guy on the right.

FB_IMG_1679235106524 by chase, on Flickr

This is a picture of my company before we left Nasiriyah.

FB_IMG_1679279056384 by chase, on Flickr

This picture is again from the Time reporter. We were sent to this factory to check it as it was a suspected chemical weapons factory. As we fought our way to it the Iraqis demo'd the factory. There were huge pools of this liquid that were flowing around the factory and on fire. The fire was a bright purple in color. The guy in the picture is our NBC guy who tested it and found it to be some sort of chlorine concoction.

FB_IMG_1679279092143 by chase, on Flickr

The last picture was taken during the battle for Baghdad. We had been fighting block by block all day and were hunkering down for the night. We chose this house as a central command for the area we were covering. I found a case of glass bottled Pepsis in the house. We stopped for a soda break. Im second from the left.

FB_IMG_1679279044753 by chase, on Flickr

**Todd.K** · 03-20-23, 14:28

Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

Everybody forgets.
...
So we did the right thing.
...

This is probably the most realistic and honest assessment I’ve seen.

We will never know how much the CIA exaggerated to get us into a war vs CYA of troubling but poorly verified intel. I think it is probably some combination of both.

**Pacific5th** · 03-20-23, 14:53

I was a 21 year old Lance Corporal, I drove a Hummve through the Berm right behind the grunts with the rest of Echo Battery 2/11 on a very dark night not made any better from the dust. It was crazy to think what we were doing. The only thing that really scarred me was the thought of getting gassed. I have to many memories and story’s of the next few months but I’m proud of what I did and what the rest of the troops did regardless of the questionable reasons we went in. I’m just glad at this point Iraq is still somewhat of a stable country that I think has a chance.