[tom406]

First off, a thank you to Bill/427TJ. I kind of urged him to share his opinion in this thread, and I got busy and let him do all the heavy lifting. I always enjoy his well thought out posts and appreciate him taking the time to type them out.

As I stated during the run up to the war, the events of 9/11 were mostly separate from Iraq. As Bill pointed out, there are many other examples of more brutal leaders around the world, and none of them were as well contained as Saddam. This was a war of choice, brought about by a mixture of post 9/11 vengence, wounded pride by some neo-cons who felt the Gulf war was an unfinished job rather than a tactical decision, and a desire to really have control of an oil-rich part of the middle East. Not a simple grab for a bunch of barrels, but a misguided dream to think that we could just end up with our own little private Texas in the middle of a region we cannot control and resent having to try and manage. I believe this war was lost before it ever started, but even if it wasn't, come on, the administration had no real political or media opposition from 9/11 thru Cindy Sheehan. If it was winnable, they had the time and materials to do it. The management of the war was as flawed as the justification of it, so no "win" is attainable. Why keep sending soldiers and money into the hole? Support our troops-YES- demand that they be given a good plan and the tools and numbers to carry it out. That didn't happen in Iraq.

TOM