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I wonder why they chose to leave now.
They've been ignoring public opinion on the topic for a decade, they went in under false pretenses in the first place.
I'm just kinda surprised that they would give up one of their colonies. I am left to wonder if perhaps the necessary people and systems have been put in place so that iraq will remain a "ally" of the U.S.
( I know the american PEOPLE are not directly responsible, as your politicians did some serious lying after 9/11. But don't try to discard all of the blame, the idiocies that led to the iraq invasion came to light way before 2011. )
I love my neighbors to the south, with all my heart I do. But these wars, all wars to be frank, are just relics of the past. It's time for a little progress.
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On October 22 2011 05:54 OsoVega wrote:Show nested quote +On October 22 2011 04:32 jdseemoreglass wrote:
Before departing we were treated to the excessive hospitality of the USO crew. Tables of items free for the taking were set up; snacks and food, cards, toothpaste, and various assorted novelties to appease the occasionally suspended fear and reluctance of soldiers preparing for war. We were given a quick briefing. They collected all lighters and knives before allowing us to board the plane with our semi-automatic rifles in hand. On the way to the plane we were ambushed by eagerly patriotic Americans handing out and waving American flags, and chanting the feel-good cliché mantras of "Thank you, Good luck, Thank you for serving, Take care..." As though the enlistment bonus were not sufficient compensation.
Life on a cot in a large tent with three inches of personal space in every direction is surprisingly palatable contrasted with the vicious heat outside. Some soldiers even quit smoking to avoid standing in the heat. What for years tobacco cessation campaigns, classes, and laws failed to do, the Kuwaiti sun accomplished in less than a week. While in the grasp of the heat, all desires are leveled and replaced with a singular purpose: to escape it.
We flew over the Iraqi desert. Upon first sight, a landscape devoid of mountains or trees, only plumes of black smoke rising from a barren, yellow wasteland. This is a land forsaken by God. An inhospitable and tortured land, who returns the suffering it has received upon its inhabitants. Upon first sight of this wasteland, extremism did not appear so extreme. Here, extremes are the norm. Extreme temperatures, disparity between worthless dust and black gold, religious and political civil war.
The FOB was a world of dust, concrete, and machinery, a constant hum of generators and the percussion of rotor blades chopping through the air. My only connection to the past was the cloudless blue sky. I walked into the first portable toilet I found and saw graffiti and words scrawled across the walls. “I hate this place!” It was a warm welcome. As I walked back to the tent, a soldier spoke to me.
“Welcome to Kalsu. Hey, it could be worse man. Just keep lying to yourself everyday and tell yourself you are doing great things.”
Who the hell is this guy talking to me? I just ignored him and walked on.
The next day we rested in the tent. One of the air conditioners was broken, and we lay on our bunks sweating, the noon sun beating down on the heavy tarps above us. Finally, the stereotypically recourseful Gutierrez managed to get the air working again, and we had a few minutes of cool air, until the power went out and we had to sweat it out again.
This is going to be rough, I thought. This is going to be a very long deployment. We walked to chow and counted the craters in the ground where mortars had struck. Back in the tent, the silence of the night was periodically broken by the loud crack of artillery. Bright red flares lit up the sky and slowly floated down, faded away and returned the darkness for only a moment.
You didn't admit things were bad. You were an inferior person if you ever complained. If you were macho-tough, nothing bothered you, and you never thought bad thoughts. It was a brilliant system of self-deception. It was a cliché to repeat over and over again; “When something needs to be done, I don’t complain, I just do it. Because complaining doesn’t change anything.”
The first time I was shot at, it was by British soldiers. As their convoy rode by in the distance, someone on the FOB did a test fire. Apparently they didn't know the FOB was there, so they fired back. The military was like any other goverment institution: it exemplified incompetence.
The Iraqis hit us at noon every day. It was like clockwork. They were trying to hit the dining facility at lunch time, killing as many of us as they could. Luckily, they were a horrible shot. And still, we lined up every day and crowded into the building, playing russian roulette in exchange for a meal. It wasn't like we could go to McDonalds instead. You hear the whistling crescendo, and wait for the dart to hit the board. We know when and where they plan to attack every day, and yet we can't stop them? What the fuck is this?
Finally they succeeded. You walk into the DFAC, and a huge gaping hole sits where the wall and roof used to be. Sunlight pours in, the flourescent lights flicker, and the tiles on the ceiling hang down in disarray. The mirrors in the gym next door were all shattered. But of course, it wasn't the loss of infrastructure we cared about.
The West lives in a bubble. A stable, calm, bubble, green with well-watered lawns. A convenient bubble, where they can be free to make laws and rules and worry themselves with moral indignation at all they see wrong with the world. All values and morals and ethics had been drilled into me since birth, but in truth such things were nothing more than wishful thinking, human delusions to contrast reality. At bottom, life is survival, and nothing more. That is part of growing up, in a way, parting with all of the well intentioned bullshit that society stuffs into the youth. They all want their children to believe in Santa Claus. But here, I was seeing life and the world as it truly was outside of the bubbles: imperfect, messy, violent, ruthless, dirty, poor. It was almost liberating. How is life survival and nothing more? I would say that life is about much more than survival, namely happiness. In order to best achieve happiness, you have to live your life by a code that will make you as happy as possible, i.e. a code of ethics and morals. How is the West a bubble just because it is better off than other places? It seems to me that it is just different and better.
Yes, it is different and in many ways better. But people think that a life that's filled with safety and comfort and wealth and plenty of time for entertainment is the normal state of life. They think war and struggle and poverty is the unnatural state, when in fact the opposite is true. A code to live by is a luxury when survival is a given.
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On October 22 2011 06:06 jdseemoreglass wrote:Show nested quote +On October 22 2011 05:54 OsoVega wrote:On October 22 2011 04:32 jdseemoreglass wrote:
Before departing we were treated to the excessive hospitality of the USO crew. Tables of items free for the taking were set up; snacks and food, cards, toothpaste, and various assorted novelties to appease the occasionally suspended fear and reluctance of soldiers preparing for war. We were given a quick briefing. They collected all lighters and knives before allowing us to board the plane with our semi-automatic rifles in hand. On the way to the plane we were ambushed by eagerly patriotic Americans handing out and waving American flags, and chanting the feel-good cliché mantras of "Thank you, Good luck, Thank you for serving, Take care..." As though the enlistment bonus were not sufficient compensation.
Life on a cot in a large tent with three inches of personal space in every direction is surprisingly palatable contrasted with the vicious heat outside. Some soldiers even quit smoking to avoid standing in the heat. What for years tobacco cessation campaigns, classes, and laws failed to do, the Kuwaiti sun accomplished in less than a week. While in the grasp of the heat, all desires are leveled and replaced with a singular purpose: to escape it.
We flew over the Iraqi desert. Upon first sight, a landscape devoid of mountains or trees, only plumes of black smoke rising from a barren, yellow wasteland. This is a land forsaken by God. An inhospitable and tortured land, who returns the suffering it has received upon its inhabitants. Upon first sight of this wasteland, extremism did not appear so extreme. Here, extremes are the norm. Extreme temperatures, disparity between worthless dust and black gold, religious and political civil war.
The FOB was a world of dust, concrete, and machinery, a constant hum of generators and the percussion of rotor blades chopping through the air. My only connection to the past was the cloudless blue sky. I walked into the first portable toilet I found and saw graffiti and words scrawled across the walls. “I hate this place!” It was a warm welcome. As I walked back to the tent, a soldier spoke to me.
“Welcome to Kalsu. Hey, it could be worse man. Just keep lying to yourself everyday and tell yourself you are doing great things.”
Who the hell is this guy talking to me? I just ignored him and walked on.
The next day we rested in the tent. One of the air conditioners was broken, and we lay on our bunks sweating, the noon sun beating down on the heavy tarps above us. Finally, the stereotypically recourseful Gutierrez managed to get the air working again, and we had a few minutes of cool air, until the power went out and we had to sweat it out again.
This is going to be rough, I thought. This is going to be a very long deployment. We walked to chow and counted the craters in the ground where mortars had struck. Back in the tent, the silence of the night was periodically broken by the loud crack of artillery. Bright red flares lit up the sky and slowly floated down, faded away and returned the darkness for only a moment.
You didn't admit things were bad. You were an inferior person if you ever complained. If you were macho-tough, nothing bothered you, and you never thought bad thoughts. It was a brilliant system of self-deception. It was a cliché to repeat over and over again; “When something needs to be done, I don’t complain, I just do it. Because complaining doesn’t change anything.”
The first time I was shot at, it was by British soldiers. As their convoy rode by in the distance, someone on the FOB did a test fire. Apparently they didn't know the FOB was there, so they fired back. The military was like any other goverment institution: it exemplified incompetence.
The Iraqis hit us at noon every day. It was like clockwork. They were trying to hit the dining facility at lunch time, killing as many of us as they could. Luckily, they were a horrible shot. And still, we lined up every day and crowded into the building, playing russian roulette in exchange for a meal. It wasn't like we could go to McDonalds instead. You hear the whistling crescendo, and wait for the dart to hit the board. We know when and where they plan to attack every day, and yet we can't stop them? What the fuck is this?
Finally they succeeded. You walk into the DFAC, and a huge gaping hole sits where the wall and roof used to be. Sunlight pours in, the flourescent lights flicker, and the tiles on the ceiling hang down in disarray. The mirrors in the gym next door were all shattered. But of course, it wasn't the loss of infrastructure we cared about.
The West lives in a bubble. A stable, calm, bubble, green with well-watered lawns. A convenient bubble, where they can be free to make laws and rules and worry themselves with moral indignation at all they see wrong with the world. All values and morals and ethics had been drilled into me since birth, but in truth such things were nothing more than wishful thinking, human delusions to contrast reality. At bottom, life is survival, and nothing more. That is part of growing up, in a way, parting with all of the well intentioned bullshit that society stuffs into the youth. They all want their children to believe in Santa Claus. But here, I was seeing life and the world as it truly was outside of the bubbles: imperfect, messy, violent, ruthless, dirty, poor. It was almost liberating. How is life survival and nothing more? I would say that life is about much more than survival, namely happiness. In order to best achieve happiness, you have to live your life by a code that will make you as happy as possible, i.e. a code of ethics and morals. How is the West a bubble just because it is better off than other places? It seems to me that it is just different and better. Yes, it is different and in many ways better. But people think that a life that's filled with safety and comfort and wealth and plenty of time for entertainment is the normal state of life. They think war and struggle and poverty is the unnatural state, when in fact the opposite is true. A code to live by is a luxury when survival is a given.
War, poverty and strugle are the signs of flawed ideologies on massive scale. Only few parts of the world have began to realize that our tribal ways of dealing with things cannot solve our problems. What you can see in midle east is only small part of the misery on our planet. Im not saying that we are there yet: we are still arguing about religions, gays, etc... but we dont want war amongst our selves, we are less superstitious and slavery is almost completely gone. That is great cultural achievement.
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On October 22 2011 06:06 jdseemoreglass wrote:Show nested quote +On October 22 2011 05:54 OsoVega wrote:On October 22 2011 04:32 jdseemoreglass wrote:
Before departing we were treated to the excessive hospitality of the USO crew. Tables of items free for the taking were set up; snacks and food, cards, toothpaste, and various assorted novelties to appease the occasionally suspended fear and reluctance of soldiers preparing for war. We were given a quick briefing. They collected all lighters and knives before allowing us to board the plane with our semi-automatic rifles in hand. On the way to the plane we were ambushed by eagerly patriotic Americans handing out and waving American flags, and chanting the feel-good cliché mantras of "Thank you, Good luck, Thank you for serving, Take care..." As though the enlistment bonus were not sufficient compensation.
Life on a cot in a large tent with three inches of personal space in every direction is surprisingly palatable contrasted with the vicious heat outside. Some soldiers even quit smoking to avoid standing in the heat. What for years tobacco cessation campaigns, classes, and laws failed to do, the Kuwaiti sun accomplished in less than a week. While in the grasp of the heat, all desires are leveled and replaced with a singular purpose: to escape it.
We flew over the Iraqi desert. Upon first sight, a landscape devoid of mountains or trees, only plumes of black smoke rising from a barren, yellow wasteland. This is a land forsaken by God. An inhospitable and tortured land, who returns the suffering it has received upon its inhabitants. Upon first sight of this wasteland, extremism did not appear so extreme. Here, extremes are the norm. Extreme temperatures, disparity between worthless dust and black gold, religious and political civil war.
The FOB was a world of dust, concrete, and machinery, a constant hum of generators and the percussion of rotor blades chopping through the air. My only connection to the past was the cloudless blue sky. I walked into the first portable toilet I found and saw graffiti and words scrawled across the walls. “I hate this place!” It was a warm welcome. As I walked back to the tent, a soldier spoke to me.
“Welcome to Kalsu. Hey, it could be worse man. Just keep lying to yourself everyday and tell yourself you are doing great things.”
Who the hell is this guy talking to me? I just ignored him and walked on.
The next day we rested in the tent. One of the air conditioners was broken, and we lay on our bunks sweating, the noon sun beating down on the heavy tarps above us. Finally, the stereotypically recourseful Gutierrez managed to get the air working again, and we had a few minutes of cool air, until the power went out and we had to sweat it out again.
This is going to be rough, I thought. This is going to be a very long deployment. We walked to chow and counted the craters in the ground where mortars had struck. Back in the tent, the silence of the night was periodically broken by the loud crack of artillery. Bright red flares lit up the sky and slowly floated down, faded away and returned the darkness for only a moment.
You didn't admit things were bad. You were an inferior person if you ever complained. If you were macho-tough, nothing bothered you, and you never thought bad thoughts. It was a brilliant system of self-deception. It was a cliché to repeat over and over again; “When something needs to be done, I don’t complain, I just do it. Because complaining doesn’t change anything.”
The first time I was shot at, it was by British soldiers. As their convoy rode by in the distance, someone on the FOB did a test fire. Apparently they didn't know the FOB was there, so they fired back. The military was like any other goverment institution: it exemplified incompetence.
The Iraqis hit us at noon every day. It was like clockwork. They were trying to hit the dining facility at lunch time, killing as many of us as they could. Luckily, they were a horrible shot. And still, we lined up every day and crowded into the building, playing russian roulette in exchange for a meal. It wasn't like we could go to McDonalds instead. You hear the whistling crescendo, and wait for the dart to hit the board. We know when and where they plan to attack every day, and yet we can't stop them? What the fuck is this?
Finally they succeeded. You walk into the DFAC, and a huge gaping hole sits where the wall and roof used to be. Sunlight pours in, the flourescent lights flicker, and the tiles on the ceiling hang down in disarray. The mirrors in the gym next door were all shattered. But of course, it wasn't the loss of infrastructure we cared about.
The West lives in a bubble. A stable, calm, bubble, green with well-watered lawns. A convenient bubble, where they can be free to make laws and rules and worry themselves with moral indignation at all they see wrong with the world. All values and morals and ethics had been drilled into me since birth, but in truth such things were nothing more than wishful thinking, human delusions to contrast reality. At bottom, life is survival, and nothing more. That is part of growing up, in a way, parting with all of the well intentioned bullshit that society stuffs into the youth. They all want their children to believe in Santa Claus. But here, I was seeing life and the world as it truly was outside of the bubbles: imperfect, messy, violent, ruthless, dirty, poor. It was almost liberating. How is life survival and nothing more? I would say that life is about much more than survival, namely happiness. In order to best achieve happiness, you have to live your life by a code that will make you as happy as possible, i.e. a code of ethics and morals. How is the West a bubble just because it is better off than other places? It seems to me that it is just different and better. Yes, it is different and in many ways better. But people think that a life that's filled with safety and comfort and wealth and plenty of time for entertainment is the normal state of life. They think war and struggle and poverty is the unnatural state, when in fact the opposite is true. A code to live by is a luxury when survival is a given.
Survival is never a given, not in this universe. "Morality is a code of values to guide man’s choices and actions—the choices and actions that determine the purpose and the course of his life" (1.). "It is for the purpose of self-preservation that man needs a code of morality. The only man who desires to be moral is the man who desires to live" (2.). "To live, man must hold three things as the supreme and ruling values of his life: Reason—Purpose—Self-esteem. Reason, as his only tool of knowledge—Purpose, as his choice of the happiness which that tool must proceed to achieve—Self-esteem, as his inviolate certainty that his mind is competent to think and his person is worthy of happiness, which means: is worthy of living" (3.). It is when survival is precarious that this code of values is most important.
1. “The Objectivist Ethics,”
The Virtue of Selfishness, 13
2. Galt’s Speech,
For the New Intellectual, 123
3. Galt’s Speech,
For the New Intellectual, 128
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Obama trying to save face? Its very convenient timing for him...
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On October 22 2011 07:47 Ksquared wrote:
Obama trying to save face? Its very convenient timing for him...
yea its pretty obv ;( standard america
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Not good. Another failure from Obama. He is going from hero to zero.
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On October 22 2011 08:12 QurtStarcraft wrote:
Not good. Another failure from Obama. He is going from hero to zero.
he was a hero at some point? when was that pray tell?
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I don't think Obama is gonna get as many votes come next election
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On October 22 2011 08:14 Mortal wrote:Show nested quote +On October 22 2011 08:12 QurtStarcraft wrote:
Not good. Another failure from Obama. He is going from hero to zero. he was a hero at some point? when was that pray tell?
When he won the Nobel Peace Prize, obv.
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On October 22 2011 02:09 AcuWill wrote:
Trying to win an election.
This still makes Obama a liar to his base. He ran on the ticket of getting out and outlined how he was going to do it and never once proceeded with what he said.
I love how people interpret "pulling out of Iraq" as something that can be done over the weekend. It may have taken 4 years but they are leaving Iraq in a much more stable, safer state than if they had left earlier.
Starting the war unnecessarily was wrong, leaving it in a state of ruin and chaos would have been even worse.
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Now if only it was Afghanistan too. Don't want my friend going over there in March 
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On October 22 2011 08:18 Engore wrote:Now if only it was Afghanistan too. Don't want my friend going over there in March
But he probably does considering he volunteered to join the military. To wish that him not to go is to wish against his own will. I understand people who are against the war for humanitarian reasons or who think it's not a good use of tax payer dollars but to be against it for the sake of our soldiers is to say that they know better for our soldiers than our soldiers know for themselves. Every single one of them is a volunteer and a lot of people would be surprised by the amount of people who really do want to fight.
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Finally ! After 9 years of occupation !
It was one of the longest war ever, glad it ended 
happy me
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On October 22 2011 08:31 Diks wrote:Finally ! After 9 years of occupation ! It was one of the longest war ever, glad it ended happy me
It ended a while ago.
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time to send them to iran...
same old crap.
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It's easy to criticize and blame Obama without knowing Washington bureaucracy and corporate interest, it's an uphill battle. I'm just glad its winding down and finally Obama is getting control of his presidency.
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On October 22 2011 08:34 svi wrote:
time to send them to iran...
same old crap.
Except that would actually be a self-interested and wise action unlike the war in Iraq.
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That's great that they're coming back.... however, this should've happened a long time ago. The only reason they are coming back end of year is so that this act will stay fresh in your mind when it comes time to vote early next year. Kind of BS that it took so long.
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I remember when I deployed back in 2009 as a machine gunner for the USMC. No one ever shot at me, and I never had to fire a shot.
The war over there has been over for a while now
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EPT
