This is why Operation Iraqi Liberation failed!

[Sublime]

They told the Iraqi soldiers to go home without pay, instead of paying them to help keep the peace. The Iraqi's wanted to help.

Could you imagine how much more effective the U.S. Forces would be there if they had that much more help, estimated personnel was in the range of 150,000 bare figures.

Iraqi's new exactly where the stock piles of guns, ammo, mines, RPG's and other arms were located, especialy the Officers who were willing to HELP!

And of coarse letting them go home without pay to feed there families might have pissed them off and turned them into Opposition Forces themselves!

 

[gerryh]

and of course paying them to be "opposition forces" would have been so much smarter.

 

[Sublime]

Only a small group was actuly loyal to Saddam the rest were just scared into it(death to family).

 

[ironsides]

They told the Iraqi soldiers to go home without pay, instead of paying them to help keep the peace. The Iraqi's wanted to help.

Could you imagine how much more effective the U.S. Forces would be there if they had that much more help, estimated personnel was in the range of 150,000 bare figures.

Iraqi's new exactly where the stock piles of guns, ammo, mines, RPG's and other arms were located, especialy the Officers who were willing to HELP!

And of coarse letting them go home without pay to feed there families might have pissed them off and turned them into Opposition Forces themselves!

Would you want to rearm an army you just crushed? I won't say it would not have worked, but it would have been taking a bigger chance than what we did. General Patton wanted to do just that in WW-II, rearm the Germans to fight the Russians. Would that have worked?

 

[Sublime]

Would you want to rearm an army you just crushed? I won't say it would not have worked, but it would have been taking a bigger chance than what we did. General Patton wanted to do just that in WW-II, rearm the Germans to fight the Russians. Would that have worked?

Big Gamble, Big Payoff,
Crush the head of the Communist Snake, no Berlin wall, no cold war.
He was thinking ten steps ahead like all great Generals.

 

[ironsides]

Big Gamble, Big Payoff,
Crush the head of the Communist Snake, no Berlin wall, no cold war.
He was thinking ten steps ahead like all great Generals.

Good thinking, you will do good in the Army. Best of luck.

 

[Sublime]

Is that sarcasm?:angry3:

 

[EagleSmack]

Is that sarcasm?:angry3:

No... going after the Soviets in 1945 would have been a great idea. The world could have used another 5 years of war. :roll:

 

[darkbeaver]

Big Gamble, Big Payoff,
Crush the head of the Communist Snake, no Berlin wall, no cold war.
He was thinking ten steps ahead like all great Generals.

That is good thinking but not deep enough, I think. Ask yourself why they didn't crush the communist threat right then.

 

[#juan]

Oh yes, "Operation Iraq Freedom". Sounds great except the top generals were publicly bragging about "Shock and Awe" bombing and that must have impressed the hell out of the Iraqis. Bombing the hell out of the infrastructure of just about every city in Iraq must have really won the hearts and minds of the Iraqis. Tell me. How many Iraqis have electricity and running water even now? 20%....40%? A really well thought out "Liberation". :roll::roll:

 

[ironsides]

Is that sarcasm?:angry3:

No sarcasm, really mean it.

 

[Just the Facts]

Tell me. How many Iraqis have electricity and running water even now? 20%....40%? A really well thought out "Liberation". :roll::roll:

Exactly. And that's directly attributable to American bombing.

Oh, wait......

Water supply has been hit by power failures. The central pumping station has been running short of electricity supply over the last two years.
The pumping station is located between two districts in conflict -- Hwaider, which is predominantly Shia, and Jupenat, mostly Sunni. For two years now, fighting between Sunnis and Shias here has led to reduced water supply.

Baquba Running Out of Water in Rising Heat

 

[Scott Free]

The OP is an over simplification.

 

[earth_as_one]

The Iraq war should never have happened. It was completely unjustified.

2001 - Rice/Powell: Hussein no threat
Both Colin Powell, US Secretary of State, and Condoleezza Rice, President Bush's closest adviser, made clear before September 11 2001 that Saddam Hussein was no threat - to America, Europe or the Middle East.

March 2003 - UNMOVIC: Iraq has no WMDS
Security Council 7 March 2003

A few weeks later - The Bush regime claims they are invading Iraq because they are a threat and possess WMDS
President Bush Addresses the Nation

Three years after the invasion, American justifications for war with Iraq had been thoroughly exposed as lies and misinformation:
BBC NEWS | Americas | Iraq war justifications laid bare



Human Rights Watch

War in Iraq: Not a Humanitarian Intervention
By Ken Roth

...the United States-led coalition forces justified the invasion of Iraq on a variety of grounds, only one of which—a comparatively minor one—was humanitarian. The Security Council did not approve the invasion, and the Iraqi government, its existence on the line, violently opposed it...

...The result is that at a time of renewed interest in humanitarian intervention, the Iraq war and the effort to justify it even in part in humanitarian terms risk giving humanitarian intervention a bad name....

...Because the Iraq war was not mainly about saving the Iraqi people from mass slaughter, and because no such slaughter was then ongoing or imminent, Human Rights Watch at the time took no position for or against the war. A humanitarian rationale was occasionally offered for the war, but it was so plainly subsidiary to other reasons that we felt no need to address it....

...Over time, the principal justifications originally given for the Iraq war lost much of their force. More than seven months after the declared end of major hostilities, weapons of mass destruction have not been found. No significant prewar link between Saddam Hussein and international terrorism has been discovered. The difficulty of establishing stable institutions in Iraq is making the country an increasingly unlikely staging ground for promoting democracy in the Middle East. As time elapses, the Bush administration’s dominant remaining justification for the war is that Saddam Hussein was a tyrant who deserved to be overthrown—an argument of humanitarian intervention. The administration is now citing this rationale not simply as a side benefit of the war but also as a prime justification for it...

...We conclude that, despite the horrors of Saddam Hussein’s rule, the invasion of Iraq cannot be justified as a humanitarian intervention...

Human Rights Watch World Report 2004: War in Iraq: Not a Humanitarian Intervention

How the US led invasion has changed Iraq:
Iraq's humanitarian crisis worsens: U.N. official | U.S. | Reuters

Torture in Iraq is worse than under Hussein:
BBC NEWS | Middle East | Iraq torture 'worse after Saddam'

The Iraq war was about oil and killed over a million Iraqis:
Greenspan admits Iraq was about oil, as deaths put at 1.2m | World news | The Observer

Which makes Bush and Hussein about equals as far as mass murderers and torturers go.

 

[CDNBear]

The Iraq war should never have happened. It was completely unjustified.

2001 - Rice/Powell: Hussein no threat
Both Colin Powell, US Secretary of State, and Condoleezza Rice, President Bush's closest adviser, made clear before September 11 2001 that Saddam Hussein was no threat - to America, Europe or the Middle East.

March 2003 - UNMOVIC: Iraq has no WMDS
Security Council 7 March 2003

A few weeks later - The Bush regime claims they are invading Iraq because they are a threat and possess WMDS
President Bush Addresses the Nation

Three years after the invasion, American justifications for war with Iraq had been thoroughly exposed as lies and misinformation:
BBC NEWS | Americas | Iraq war justifications laid bare



Human Rights Watch


How the US led invasion has changed Iraq:
Iraq's humanitarian crisis worsens: U.N. official | U.S. | Reuters

Torture in Iraq is worse than under Hussein:
BBC NEWS | Middle East | Iraq torture 'worse after Saddam'

The Iraq war was about oil and killed over a million Iraqis:
Greenspan admits Iraq was about oil, as deaths put at 1.2m | World news | The Observer

Which makes Bush and Hussein about equals as far as mass murderers and torturers go.

As much as it pains me to say it, eao, I couldn't agree with you more.

 

[#juan]

Exactly. And that's directly attributable to American bombing.

Oh, wait......

Water supply has been hit by power failures. The central pumping station has been running short of electricity supply over the last two years.
The pumping station is located between two districts in conflict -- Hwaider, which is predominantly Shia, and Jupenat, mostly Sunni. For two years now, fighting between Sunnis and Shias here has led to reduced water supply.

Baquba Running Out of Water in Rising Heat

I don't know how many power stations were bombed during "Operation Iraq Freedom" but I could probably find out. Water treatment plants and sewer treatment plants were also bombed. From the looks of it, Saddam Hussein did a better job of running that country than the Americans.

 

[L Gilbert]

Sometimes I wonder if the American admin can run its own country. I think part of the reason why they go to war is to distract the American public from internal problems.

 

[Cliffy]

Sometimes I wonder if the American admin can run its own country. I think part of the reason why they go to war is to distract the American public from internal problems.

Only sometimes?!!

 

[Just the Facts]

I don't know how many power stations were bombed during "Operation Iraq Freedom" but I could probably find out. Water treatment plants and sewer treatment plants were also bombed.

Of course. But that's not at issue. What's keeping them from being rebuilt is the issue. What part of "they blow them up as fast as we can repair them" gives you difficulty?

 

[ironsides]

I don't know how many power stations were bombed during "Operation Iraq Freedom" but I could probably find out. Water treatment plants and sewer treatment plants were also bombed. From the looks of it, Saddam Hussein did a better job of running that country than the Americans.

Of course he did, he didn't have internal factions blowing it up everytime they were repaired. replacing the water pumping stations was one of the first things we did after Saddam was defeated. Power plants took longer but most were fixed also. Now there pretty much down again. The good thing is they are not blowing them up as fast not.