Assume the war was justified

[Beavis68]

[ QUOTE ]
The insurgency has been worse than anyone imagined because without the U.S. military in Iraq the entire supposed "Iraq government" would collapse and the Sunni's would be fighting to take back military and overall control of Iraq.

The insurgency is fueled by the Sunni resentment of both the current Iraq government and the U.S. presence.

The problem with Iraq is that there are too many factions who have seperate interests and are not willing to concede or use diplomacy without being forced to....the force that is applying the pressure is the U.S. Gov./Military.

There is a reason the majority of the population says that while they are unhappy with the U.S. presence in Iraq, they overwhelmingly DO NOT want them to leave anytime soon. As long as the U.S. is present in Iraq the insurgency will be about as strong as it is now....when we leave...a civil war/or coup is a likely possibilty.

Bush isn't interested in doing everything possible to win the war..he just wants to get by till he can hand it off to the Iraq gov. and wipe his hands clean. If he was told that he needed to flood Iraq with all remaining troops for the next year but then we could pull out completly...he wouldn't do it.
In part because politically he would get killed, but also because the 2006 elections will be coming up and he is not willing to do anything that could chance/aid a Democratic power change within the Senate/House. Thus, his pulling Miers and nominating Alito.

Even if it is the best thing for the country.

There will be a huge push by House/Senate Republicans for Bush to make a significant troop withdrawl( 50 to 90 thousand) from Iraq prior to next year's elections. Bush will most likely concede and make a withdrawl.
It will not be because the troops are no longer needed but simply a political move to keep control of the House/Senate.

Cheney and Co.(note this does not include GWB) have been pushing for an invasion and toppling of Saddam since the mid 90's. The majority of the reasons were and still are economic...there are however several hardcore neo-cons who actually believe the whole "spread democracy thru the middle east by starting in Iraq". The majority do not...it is simply a noble idea that in theory could work but in reality is almost certain to fail.

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually the "insurgency" is largely shiite influenced by Iran.

[andyfox]

Read the article. Fallows names names, dates, studies, hard information. Plus what he says makes sense: Rumsfeld has admitted he doesn't like planning for unexpected contingencies. He admitted he wouldn't allow DOD personnel to attend planning meetings.

My point is that planning was done and willfully ignored by the administration. The article talks about government and non-governmental agencies that studied what would happen in an occupation--they studied what would happen if the army was disbanded; they predicted the looting problem and suggested what could be done about it; they planned for an insurgency; they thought about potential infrastructure problems when the Hussein government collapsed. No administration official has denied any of the information in the article. The Bush administration ignored all the information available to it.

Regards,
Andy

[elwoodblues]

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Quote:
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Assume you need major surgury and the doctor diagnoses you correct. However during the operation he [censored] up badly and causes you to lose your leg. Is he a good doctor?


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Don't forget, you also have to assume that even though everyone agrees with the diagnosis, no doctor from the competing hospital will perform the surgery. [ QUOTE ]


[/ QUOTE ] Great point. To someone who believes that the war was absolutely necessary, Bush is at least a better than average president, because, most past Presidents and presidential candidates would not have ordered this very necessary action.

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I think it's funny that you responded the my post where I was poking fun of the premise that nobody else would have done anything to support your view. Good way to start the day.

[jt1]

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I think it's funny that you responded the my post where I was poking fun of the premise that nobody else would have done anything to support your view. Good way to start the day.


[/ QUOTE ]

Well written! I'm guessing you meant that your post was sarcastic. It's still a logical objective argument. You're getting hung up on the word 'justified.' I think you're implying that if the war was truly justified then Clinton, Gore, Carter, Kerry, Bradley would have probably ordered it. Given our political and cultural whereabouts at the time, you are probably right. But I took a neo-conservaive point of view to guide a discussion. And what is justified from the neo-con point of view isn't justified from a liberal point of view. I asked those that couldn't accept my premise not to respond.

I'm new to this forum and am already dissapointed. Is there an internet forum where most people are committed to logic, willing to change a point of view if it logically becomes untenable and even seeking to challenge their own points of view for the sake of their own growth?

[CORed]

An insurgency was absolutely predictable. During the runup to the war, when I believed that Sadaam had nerve gas, if not nukes or bio-weapons, I thought the war was a bad idea for two reasons.
1. Invading would very likely cause Sadaam to use his WMD, either against our troops, or against Israel.

2. I expected that, while getting rid of Sadaam would probably be pretty easy, after we got rid of him, we would end up in exactly the kind of mess we are in now.
I also remember, early in the war, before Sadaam was gone,I remeber Pat Buchanan, whom I agree with on very little, saying that we should get out quickly once he was gone, or we would have a "big West Bank" on our hands. An insurgency was entirely predictable. Only the idiots in the Bush administration didn't see it coming. I fault them more for failing to plan for this very predictable event than I do for their lie or error about the presence of WMD in Iraq.

[Cyrus]

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Assuming the war was justified based on the intelligence and that no democrat would have gone to Iraq, is Bush a good president?

[/ QUOTE ] This was a nonsensical phrase! It literally does not make sense. Let's proceed with the plain assumption that the war was justified in that Iraq indeed presented a clear and present threat to the security of the United States. This will be (y)our hypothetical.

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1) Does [Bush's] decision to overthrow a potentially very serious threat make up for his failure to plan for an insurgency?

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Yes, absolutely.

When you are faced with a clear and present threat to the security of the United States, you act decisively and you act quickly to annihilate that threat -- and you plan for the aftermath as best as you can. Even if the aftermath turns out to be messy, the action is still justified on account of the clear and present threat to the security of the United States that existed.

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2) How understandable is Bush's failure to plan for the insurgency? Was it an honest mistake that many if not most Presidents would have made, was it inevitable, or is it one of the biggest errors in millitary history?

[/ QUOTE ]
If you accept that Saddam Husseinb's Iraq was indeed a clear and present threat to the security of the United States, the Bush can always claim that the post-occupation planning was secondary and, thus, any mistakes in it are understandable and should be forgiven.

If you do NOT accept that, then Dubya's failure to take into account the almost unanimous recommendations of the military (number of troops, necessity for police work, avoiding chaos by avoiding the bombing of the civilian infrastructure, retaining the help of ex-Baathists, etc etc) is of colossally criminal proportions. It would constitute, at other times, such a serious proof of incompetence that impeachment would be on the agenda.

...For the record, I do not, for a moment, believe that Iraq constituted anything ressembling a clear and present threat to America.

The hypo is false. The policies based on that false hypo have been disastrous for all concerned.