Wednesday, March 19, 2008

 

This Day in the History of Second Wars

On this day in 2003, Operation Iraqi Freedom was launched with "shock & awe" air strikes on Baghdad, beginning Gulf War II. It's still going on even though liberation of Iraq from the tyrant Saddam Hussein was accomplished before May of that year. What has kept it going is not our mistakes, so much as, to quote Winston Churchill, the volcano of ingratitude that is Iraq. All in all a good thing and at amazingly low casualty rates historically. The Mexican War was far more unpopular.

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Rog,

The War against Mexico was concluded by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which, inter alia, resulted in the annexation by th eUnited Sates of what is now the sates of AZ, NM, UT, and CA. Not bad.

On the other hand, other than the Fraley Troika, what has the invasion of Iraq netted us? Other than the deaths of close to 4000 servicemen; the wounding of tens of thousands of servicemen; the deaths of tens if not hundreds of thousands of Iraqis; the internal and external displacement of millions of Iraqis; a major humanitarian crisis; the ultimate expenditure of trillions of dollars; the empowerment of Iran; increases in the price of petroleum way beyond what was likely to occur; and the degradation of American military forces--by this I mean the failure of junior and mid rank officers to re up togther w/ the failure of highly trained sargents to re up.

Christopher Hitchens notwithsatnding.

T
 
wow Tony, this exact same thing could have been said towards the end of world war 2, supplant Iran with Russia, and American GI Casulaties / deaths in the millions, and the fact that a military draft was in place.....

You and I are still paying off the debt from WW 2. Did you know that ?

Harry Truman, notwithstanding.
 
Tony, I would have thought the lefty dogma on the Mexican War would be that conquest of another country's land is a bad thing. Welcome to the realpolitik party, Pal. You continue to raise the same talking points without acknowledging the truth of Hitchens' good things. I have answered some of your points above re Paul Campos. You are nothing if not consistent. The cost is indeed troubling, but it appears we buy very low casualties with the expenditure of vast sums of money. OK with me. What price do you put on the liberation of any nation from a tyrant? A certain price, a certain number of American dead and wounded and it's screw you all oppressed nation, suffer. It's too costly for us. Give me a link about a scary non retention of officers and non-coms, if you would. I have not heard that.
Mark, I'm laying off the WWII analogies. Apparently what was true in the 1940s is no longer true, according to the left.
 
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