What Bush (and Kerry) fail to explain in their exit strategies. . .

is how the military is expected to do all of the things they want them to do before they can leave.

There will not be anything at all resembling a democracy after the next 'election' there or beyond in the power-sharing constructs of the constitution they have drafted. Further, there will almost certainly be a Shiite-dominated authority holding most of the power, with the Kurds holding on to some measure of autonomy in the north, and the Sunnis struggling to regain some sort of control over their own destiny in the face of their utter defeat and removal from decades of power under Saddam. And there is the prospect that the U.S. will have to engineer some sort of propping up of the Sunnis to prevent the emergence of a theocratic rule that will almost certainly come from within the newly formed Shiite-influenced government.

Our military can prop up on faction or the other in Iraq, but our soldiers can't create the political stability that Bush and Kerry seek as a price for their return home. Any U.S. plan that relies on the military to achieve any of these political goals that Bush or Kerry want at this point is an invitation for a widening war as we saw in Cambodia at the end of the Vietnam war. One more shifting of a political line on the map, at the expense of more of our soldier's lives, before they claim whatever victory they imagine there.

The Iraq invasion and occupation has been an utter failure. The Iraqis have managed to form loose coalitions around a constitution guaranteed, for the most part, by the heavy hand of our military. Our U.S. military is guided by the rules and constructs of our democracy. It's amazing to me that our politicians are still tolerating our troops being asked to fight and die at the behest of one faction or the other in this completely un-democratic process. The Iraqis will ultimately pit themselves violently against each other in their perpetual struggle for dominance and power. Our troops shouldn't be left to stand between them.

Like Murtha said - right now WE are the targets. Guess our politicians weren't listening to him.

today and before. They want to get our troops out of going on 'search and destroy' missions and out of routine policing and pull them back to do other things.

They have also stated clearly that they do not want permanent bases in Iraq. This is critical.

pack?

done politically. That's why he said we need to withdraw significant nyumbers of troops with every political benchmark - like the elections. Point being that positive REAL ACTIONS must accompany those efforts. He and Murtha were on the same page in emphasizing that point.

It requires INTENSE political maneuvering and diplomacy and allowing all the many countries who offered help to give the help they offered.

Bush will never do what's required and needed - if he had any sense he'd let Clinton implement Kerry's withdrawal plan and take credit for it.

There will be no 'success' in Iraq. The entire escapade has been a national disgrace that has hurt us worldwide and made us less secure here at home. All of this talk of elections and victory there may be politically in tune with getting our troops out of there, but I still don't think you can get any reality into our stance there without the truth. Bush doesn't intend to pull out any more than he is forced to, politically. I don't think any approach short of withdrawal is compatible with the political goals stated by both Bush and Kerry. Our military is being drawn deeper and deeper into the internal politics of Iraqis.

Outside help? I don't see it. Listen, I don't think it will make a positive difference in Iraq if we leave now or at a later date, except in lives lost, both American and Iraqi lives lost. The heavy hand of our occupation can only serve to further destabilize the situation on the ground and undermine any true reconciliation between parties that may or may not materialize from the recent power sharing agreements or future elections.

Do you actually believe that they will achieve any of these 'benchmarks' that have been presented as conditions for our withdrawal? There's gonna have to be some kind of creative accounting there.

offered alot of training help for Iraqis and Bush turned them down. That's something that most people have never even heard and the media never discusses.

Kerry's plan could work politically, but only when certain steps are taken earnestly.


Step one would be to declare no permanent bases and turn those already built over to Iraqis.

Step two is to withdraw a significant number of troops immediately after Dec 15 vote.

Step three is make sure that ALL countries who offered help are taken up on their offer.

Step four is cancel all construction contracts with US firms - the Iraqis built their country before and they can build it again and benefit from the profits.

That could all be done in an immediate way to change the Iraqi perspective of the US as occupiers so the political challenges could be easier met.

They are sound steps that have been expressed by Kerry all along.

My concern is that we haven't loaded the political slingshot with enough to counter Bush's feet dragging. Talk of achieving 'success' gives Bush cover to claim that he's not finished there. I favor any call for a quick, unconditional exit. I'm not so convinced that the benchmark strategy is enough to move Bush politically.

What we need to be told is, specifically, what the role of our soldiers there is. I appreciate that Kerry went so far as to call for an end to the 'search and destroy missions, but Bush has just launched an anti-insurgency campaign reminicent of Nixon's desperate attempt to achieve some kind of victory before we turned tail and came home from Vietnam. How do you halt that with calls for 'success' there? Bush still uses defeat of terrorists as a 'benchmark'.

What I wanted from Kerry, probably unrealistically, was an attitude that acknowledged the complete failure of our 'mission' that he claims the soldiers there support, and a humility about the aftermath that doesn't include any celebrating of our 'mission' What I saw was a man who still holds some justification in his mind for our occupation. I think I know better than the picture he paints of our involvement and it's impact. I don't need sugar coating on the war to bring the soldiers home.

It's not that I think that John doesn't get it. I just think he knows better than the political cover that he couches his well-founded criticisms of Bush's Iraq policy in. He just thinks this is the best political strategy, given the party in power. But, no matter how they dress this thing up, it stinks. Top to bottom. No talk of success, victory, or hoo rah will wipe away the impact and the stain of this horrible imperialism. I want our troops home, but I also want to be told the truth about our involvement there. I don't think I'm alone in that. And I don't think we will come far enough out of Iraq until we start hearing that whole truth from our politicians.

Murtha's plan got turned into the "Dems want to cut and run" only because the media piled on by defining it that way.

It never was, his plan was way more provisional, but the media all piled on to give Bush his needed straw man.

But, I'm not in the incrementalist camp these days. Murtha, Kerry . . . more power to 'em on an Iraq withdrawal . . . but, they've got more plans for our military than I can stomach these days.

Perfect will never happen because it doesn't exist, so we have to support what's DOABLE.

and he always moved the ball . . .

implement Kerry's plan, and then grab all credit for it, as if he and Clinton had been working on it together through their newly forged cooperation.

IF Bush was truly smart.

Seems to me that all Bush is saying (and all he has ever said) is that we will "stay the course" "until the job is done".

He never mentions what the "job" is, what defines "done", or why we are still there fighting and dying.

He won't even discuss the idea of leaving.

He has no plan. At all.

He wants to keep fighting his war on terror there. Settin them up and barely knocking them down, creating more than he can put down. Classic quagmire. There will never be a victory, or 'success' as John Kerry says he wants, though Bush will likely declare one if he wants to actually pull us out of Iraq at some point.

There's nothing for the soldiers to do there now. They've become nothing more than a political prop for Bush until he can weasel out of this looking like anything more than a pathetic loser.

I just don't see any chance that any of these milestones or benchmarks or whatever they want to call their definition of progress, will ever materialize. Bush will either be forced to leave, or he will stay, using whatever rationale he can invent, but it's clear that this 'plan' was presented in response and anticipation of a wave of pressure in front of the 2006 elections, in and outside of his own party, to be seen a moving out of Iraq. I don't think that pressure should include any escape hatches like benchmarks, victories, or milestones that can be used to prolong our involvement there. I think we need an unambiguous call for an exit, now. Anything short of that becomes a weak echo of whatever Bush says still needs to be done by our troops.

media and others aren't HEARING because it's easier to say cut and run or no different than Bush depending on what scenario enables your side of the debate.

He has to get folks to believe that at the price of 2500+ deaths, facillitating a Shiite majority to replace Saddam represents a success for our military. Sounds like Bush, without all of the layers of bull about WMDs and fighting terrorists. If it brings them home, I'm all for it. I just think any prescription for success there at this point is a license for Bush to justify prolonging the occupation, no matter what Sen. Kerry intends with his words.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-hayden/support-for-kerry-speech_b_9632.html

After Hayden wrote this piece, Kerry did, in fact, submit his plan on the floor of the senate as a bill a few days before Murtha made his announcement.

gimme a link to TH . . . please?

.

I hope he's right about the 'ice breaking' effect of a re-deployment strategy. I think the benchmarks cut both ways. They can easily be used to justify foot dragging. "Even Sen. Kerry agreed that we needed to achieve such-and-such . . . we'll be postponing the withdrawal . . ."

I see the milestones as Bush's game, and we don't play the bluff well. We're not as destructive. Bush tends to wing it. There will be a need, as Hayden says, to prepare Americans for the failure of our democratic experiment. Better now than later. To carry Bush's water by touting some nebulous notion of success seems folly. I'm for nailing him down as soon as possible: "You've failed to set things right, we're pulling out. There's nothing more for our military to do.

plan offered with any details. Murtha's plan came about 3 weeks after. And other senators have offered variations on Kerry's since then, but fewer details.

Kerry includes political and diplomatic components.

In Bush's plan, the military does it all, or at least he doesn't spell out the other components.

Kerry does not expect the military to do everything. In fact he expects the Iraqi military to start taking over much of what our troops do now.

why do they need to continue to do it?