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This video is from the live telecast, last night, of the 4-2 Stryker Brigade, the last U.S. combat brigade leaving Iraq. They drove from Baghdad to the Kuwait border. And crossed over – clearing their weapons as they left Iraq.
There are several video clips at the MSNBC site. Their servers weren’t doing a great job of keeping up, last night. If things are keeping up, just let the videos load and run in sequence. Sorry for the occasional commercial between segments; but, the video[s] are worth watching.
I watched it live – last night. They did about 4 hours of uncut, live feeds from Iraq with reporters and guest commentators in Iraq and the MSNBC studios
It took us how many years to take out Japan and Germany (At the same time.)? We’ve been in this war how long? And what do we have to show for it, nothing.
Mission Accomplished!
Aren’t we also doubling the number of “civilian forces” we have there? Nothing to see here…
what a bunch of bullshit.
My unit is still here/there (Iraq) and we have lots of guns, Abrams, Bradleys, mortars, and snipers.
We’re advise and assist…in name alone.
>The ‘surge’ made no difference.
That reads more like ideology and Bush hatred causing you to want something to be true, rather than a look at evidence and analyzing it.
… and there are still over 50,000 U.S. troops in Germany. My friend just came back from a tour over there, he’s 27 years old and has been in the military for 8 years. Supposedly being stationed in Germany is a load of fun. He always tells me his great stories, he gets to go to a different country every year.
He also says that Iraq sucked and it’s the worst place he’s been to. I feel sorry for those guys.
#24 MikeN -
I will restate the sentence that you took out of context, plus your reply:
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>The ‘surge’ made a difference.
That reads more like ideology and being an Bush apologist causing you to want something to be true, rather than a look at evidence and analyzing it.
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The truth is much closer to what I originally said (as written in it’s entirety in #20) when you are more open minded to the truth and better informed about reality rather than propaganda.
Very well put:
http://agonist.org/actor_212/20100819/before_the_memory_holes_gets_filled_in
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Eight years. The longest war in American history. A war of aggression. 4400+ American soldiers dead. One million Iraqis dead. Who knows how many more displaced and chronically, perhaps fatally, un- or underemployed.
America’s first official war of aggression. At least we didn’t bother veiling this one behind an attack on a ship. Kofi Annan.
WMDs. NBCs. “They’re in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat.” Chemical Ali. Baghdad Bob. Spider trap. Embedding. Qatar.
David Bloom: I miss him still. Peter Arnett.
Colin Powell in front of the UN with a vial of “anthrax”. Bush said in a nationally televised White House speech. “Saddam Hussein and his sons must leave Iraq within 48 hours. Their refusal to do so will result in military conflict commenced at a time of our choosing.” “Axis of Evil”. Three million Romans protesting war (there’s an irony), the largest anti-war protest ever. Mohamed ElBaradei. Hans Blix. Scott Ritter. Connection to September 11 attacks. Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda, allies. Muhammad Atta in Prague with high ranking Hussein official. 48% still believe that Hussein was personally involved in the 9/11 attacks.
Yellowcake. Niger. Joe Wilson. Curveball. Valarie Plame. Scooter Libby. Karl Rove. Judith Miller. Ahmed Chalabi. Stephen Hadley. Robert Novak. Tim Russert. George Tenet. “Slam dunk”. Paul Wolfowitz. PNAC. Douglas “The Stupidest Man In America” Feith.
Shock and Awe. Moqtada Al-Sadr. Sadr City. Ali Al-Sistani. Coalition of the “Willing”. Coalition of the Bullied. Shi’a. Sunni. Kurds. Coaltion Provisional Authority. L. Paul Bremer. De-Ba’athification. Basra. Kirkuk. Halliburton. Humvees without armor. Karbala. Najaf. “Mother Of All Bombs”.
Operation Desert Fox (probably never a good idea to name a battleplan after a Nazi). Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL). Then, quickly changed to Operation Iraqi Freedom. Regime change.
General Tommy Franks. General David Petraeus. General Ricardo Sanchez. Linndie England. Abu Ghraib. Guatanamo Bay. Jessica Lynch, saved but not saved.
Abu Al Zarqawi. The statue in Fardus Square, Baghdad. Most Wanted playing cards. Looting. $9 billion dollars vanished in nine months.
“MISSION ACCOMPLISHED” (seven years too early). “Commander Codpiece”. Fedayeen. Insurgency.
Amy Goodman. “Fahrenheit 9/11″. “Michael Moore is fat”. Downing Street memo. John Kerry. Vote irregularities in Ohio. Bush re-elected. Security Moms. Endless war. No war for oil.
“Nothing…. Nobody has ever suggested that the attacks of September the 11th were ordered by Iraq.” “[T]he main reason we went into Iraq at the time was we thought he had weapons of mass destruction. It turns out he didn’t, but he had the capacity to make weapons of mass destruction.”
Operation Option North and Operation Bayonet Lightning in Kirkuk, Operation Desert Thrust, Operation Abilene and Operation All American Tiger throughout Iraq, Operation Iron Hammer in Baghdad and Operation Ivy Blizzard in Samarra – all in 2003; Operation Market Sweep, Operation Vigilant Resolve and Operation Phantom Fury in Fallujah in 2004; Operation Matador in Ambar, Operation Squeeze Play and Operation Lightning in Baghdad, Operation New Market near Haditha, Operation Spear in Karabillah and the Battle of Tal Afar – all in 2005; Operation Swarmer in Samarra and Operation Together Forward in Baghdad in 2006; and Operation Law and Order in Baghdad, Operation Arrowhead Ripper in Baqouba and Operation Phantom Strike throughout Iraq – all in 2007.
Fallujah.
Purple thumbs. Jalal Talibani. Nouri al-Maliki.
And finally…Last U.S. combat convoy has left Iraq
Never forget. Never. We can never do this again. We must not let it happen. Ever.
Awake: “never again!”==you mean after Afghanistan right?
Another job well done.
#28 Bobbo –
There was some initial justification for Afghanistan… too bad that after the first 3 months it was utterly set aside. So here we are, 8 years later, basically starting over. So much good will, progress and opportunity lost. But the difference is that in the case of Afghanistan, it is a fight worth fighting.
Because of the wasted years, the next front may become Pakistan as the Taliban retook southern Afghanistan. Will it be worth fighting there also? Pakistan is much more dangerous than Iran, yet Iran became the next Iraq thanks to the right-wing propaganda. Pakistan already has nukes, it is utterly infiltrated by fundamentalists, yet all the talk until a couple of years ago was “Attack Iran! Attack Iran!”
Abandon Afghanistan, and Pakistan falls. That would be a big big deal.
Awake–so what manner of haruspication do you employ to plot your dominoes?
The “evidence/theory” in support of a war fought 7000 miles away must be overpowering. What facts/goals/probable outcome justify the Afghan war in your mind? You state saving the fall of Pakistan. Foolish. We will never know if “ultimately” our involvement in the ME caused or prevented anything you want to name. Ain’t reality a bitch?
The initial invasion/war/winning that War in Afghan was I agree “somewhat” justified. MEANING there were other options that were even better: like in/decapitation/out. How you get from an arguably start to a war worth fighting now is logically insupportable. You can point to a few good things, and a few potentially good things, but what you got in your face is a goat f*ck. These foreign adventures on our part are BANKRUPTING US!!!
Whatever benefit do you think we get that overcomes that reality?
#31 Bobbo -
>> “The initial invasion/war/winning that War in Afghan was I agree “somewhat” justified. MEANING there were other options that were even better: like in/decapitation/out”
I agree 100%. We should have gone in, focused on the task, finished it quickly and gotten out. We were this “-> <-" close. We had the support of the population, the momentum, the organization, everything. Instead, under the "leadership" of Rumsfeld and Cheney, we abandoned it when we were almost victorious.
And now Afghanistan has become a much worse situation, something that we really need to do something about. A failure there will destabilize the region, and that could have dire consequences. We need a stable Afghanistan. But even more importantly, we need a stable Pakistan, something that is less and less likely with every passing month the way that things are going over there. As is, the top third of Pakistan is basically lost to religious fanatics right now, and in case you forget, we almost had to go into Pakistan and collect the nukes that they have to keep them out of our enemies hands just two years ago.
In the end, Afghanistan is "the graveyard of empires", so we may be just wasting our time, but it is something that can not be ignored.
Thanks Awake.
There is NO EVIDENCE OR RATIONALE that our actions in Afghan or Iraq or Pakistan have anything to do with making the place more stable. Its just a morass we are throwing our money and strength into with the most likely outcome simply being a delay in what would have been anyway: NOT WORTH THE EXPENSE.
The something we need to do is GET OUT!!!!!! Save our money. Rebuild our forces. Learn from it. Powell Doctrine. Israeli type hit squads. In/out. Destroy evil cultures from within: give them soap operas on TV. Fight our enemies by being SMART, not gorillas.
“Yes, with mathematical certainty……..”
Awake…I believe the war with N Korea is the longest war the US has been invovled in. The armistice only ended fighting but a formal surrender has not come yet.
Semantics…perhaps, but it still true.
We do have 50,000 troops on the ground and they are still armed. I’m sure that many a Jihadist would still be more than happy to kill one of them.
We also have a lot of contracted something or other. I’m not sure who they are or how they are equipped. They may be using Russian equipment for all I know.
Success!
“…the U.S. Energy Department reported inventories of 1.1 billion barrels of oil and fuel. That’s the highest since 1990, when this data began to be collected.” Nightly Business Report, 8/18/2010
Great!
Now who do I vote for to get the remaining 50,000 home?