Quote:
Originally Posted by Al-Dog
I was thinking we could use an open ended thread to discuss the various aspects of the Middle East situation...
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We're like a football team that's losing 3-0 with 10 minutes to go. Do we go for the win, and risk losing 7-0 as a result of stretching ourselves, or do we grimly hang on and hope the score still looks vaguely respectable when the final whistle blows?
I didn't ever approve of the action against Saddam. But, we're there. Fact. So, dealing with the existing situation:
So far, i've felt that premature withdrawal could cause more problems than it solves. But an open-ended bogged-down state is no use either.
I know "if only's" are no use, but if only the Coalition had behaved sensibly at the start, and prevented the looting, and bust a gut to restore electricity, and a few other things like that, then perhaps we might have been able to win the "hearts and minds" that we've heard so much about.
But we didn't. And those "hearts and minds" now either hate us, or are too busy hating opposing factions in their own district to worry about hating us. Either way, it's a balls-up so far as bringing democracy to Iraq goes.
Really, it's probably gone too far now, for us to turn the game around. Perhaps the debate now needs to be about the mechanics of a dignified withdrawal before a VietNam-type scrambled exodus happens.