Odierno: ISIS could have been prevented

[dragon53]

Link: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/07 ... prevented/

[dannyc]

go figure

[Dauntless]

What he fails to mention (because it's Fox News) is the Iraqi government we helped set up had an option to keep us there, but they threw us out and wanted a complete withdrawal.

[dannyc]

yes but obama was told by senior US Military officials to not set a departure date for Iraq because they were not finished in the country and he still did. I saw this while watching a documentary on netflix. i also believe that the whole soft hand approach on detainees after the whole abu graib incident occured is to blame look up camp bucca and how after abu graib it was pretty much a breeding ground for ISIS after we were forced to doing that IMHO those detainees didnt deserve the good treatment they were not soldiers they were terrorists also to blame in my opinion is the use of drones so much to hit targets in the middle east

[Dauntless]

Danny, don't know what you are watching, there's a lot of rewriting of history or bending the truth out there. Especially by people who have some political gain, but the facts are history.

President George Bush signed with the Iraqi government the State of Forces Agreement or SOFA in 2008 for a complete withdrawal of all US forces by a 'set date' of December 31st 2011.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Withdrawa ... _from_Iraq

President Obama tried to renegotiate the SOF agreement to leave a contingent of troops to help maintain stability after this date. The Iraqi government only agreed if they could prosecute US soldiers under Iraqi law for any infractions they the Iraqi government decided.
This was unacceptable, in order to protect our troops from being under Iraqi law, which could be anything they saw fit given it's instability and possible grudges the original agreement and set date of December 2011 signed by George Bush was held to and all troops were out by December 2011.


Iraq was by then run by a Shi-ite dominated government. The Sunni we took out of power with Saddam had no say anymore, were disenfranchised by the Shi-ites, lots of payback going on, hence many radicalized and started their own organization called ISIS, and here we are.

[dannyc]

dauntless i hate to say it but Wikipedia is editable by everyone so you shouldnt trust everything it says. but here from the NY TIMES. "At the end of the Bush administration, when the Status of Forces Agreement, or SOFA, was negotiated, setting 2011 as the end of the United States’ military role, officials had said the deadline was set for political reasons, to put a symbolic end to the occupation and establish Iraq’s sovereignty. But there was an understanding, a senior official here said, that a sizable American force would stay in Iraq beyond that date." he set the framework he didnt set it for a full withdrawal there still would have been a big US force
the doccumentary i watched was called losing iraq or the rise of isis

[Dauntless]

I forgot Danny, you don't trust Wiki.
How about Time magazine?
http://world.time.com/2011/10/21/iraq-n ... -presence/

To be fair, Bush didn't want to sign any agreement to set a date for withdrawal, but was mandated by the UN to make a State of Forces Agreement with Iraq. It was not a symbolic agreement no matter what the "experts" say. The fact is he signed it, it was a set date of December 31st 2011. To say Obama set a date is not the facts.

Perhaps an understanding to leave troops was anticipated, with these terms which were laid out in the agreement could be renegotiated before that mandated date.
The renegotiated terms were unacceptable to put our troops under Iraqi law. It's as simple as that. To ignore these terms is going against a democratically elected sovereign government we set up and the UN. Maybe Obama should have put the thumb screws to the Iranian backed Shi-ite government to get a better agreement?
They wanted us out of there and fixed it so we would leave.

Commanders on the ground and military experts can say we shouldn't have withdrawn which is probably right, but they are not the ones who sign the agreements, to abide by international law. So yeah it's political reasons. The politicians make the laws and sign the agreements. It's sour grapes to blame the current Prez for the mess and unintended or intended consequences for this misadventure. Anyone can make a biased film and bend some facts.

Look at Iraq now, they want us back to fight a beast we with some help from them created.

[[CAT]CplSlade]

Anyone can make a biased film and bend some facts.

It's true, dannyc. Anyone can make a documentary just like anyone can edit Wikipedia. You should never trust a single source for anything - try to see if there is a consensus of opinion AND EVEN THEN make sure that consensus doesn't have a deeper motive.

It's really getting hard to trust anyone or anything these days IMO.

[Dauntless]

Anyone can make a biased film and bend some facts.

It's true, dannyc. Anyone can make a documentary just like anyone can edit Wikipedia. You should never trust a single source for anything - try to see if there is a consensus of opinion AND EVEN THEN make sure that consensus doesn't have a deeper motive.

It's really getting hard to trust anyone or anything these days IMO.

True that.

You have to dig for the truth, and even sometimes there's a undercurrent of real truth underneath or between the lines of lies or half-truths. With most media owned by corporations who have agendas and stockholders to please, even by foreign governments ( Saudi's ) stories can be slanted in their favor. Yes even Time Magazine. A lot of them hope people have short memories or no recollection at all, so it's easy to rewrite history, and they are free to do so because this is freedom of speech, freedom to lie America.


I followed this story from the beginning as it unfolded in real time. Didn't a lot of us?

A mandated withdrawal date and afterwards a SOFA agreement was successfully negotiated with Afghanistan and we get to leave troops there to help maintain order unlike Iraq.
I don't think for one second that our President didn't desire to leave troops in Iraq (up to 30,000 I do believe) to help maintain order if the terms would have been acceptable. To put our troops under possible Islamic law is not, those were the terms.

[[CAT]CplSlade]

Yeah, there is no way I would ever accept being under Sharia law.

[dannyc]

Funny I try to read all sources but try my hardest to steer clear of cnn msnbc abc and time due to their left leaning ways I try to find unbiased news unlike one of my friends who uses social media to get his news and trusts it as fact

[PanzerArm]

Funny I try to read all sources but try my hardest to steer clear of cnn msnbc abc and time due to their left leaning ways I try to find unbiased news unlike one of my friends who uses social media to get his news and trusts it as fact

The problem with that statement is you took a FOx News article posted by Dragon at the top of this thread as gospel as soon as it seemingly aligned with your beliefs. You absolutely have to avoid that in order to stay a well-informed, non-biased, and rationally thinking citizen of this country. Every media source has its bias. Fox News caters to the" 'Muricans " and is steep with Conservative bias. Not as bad as some of these web sites like Red Flag News etc. etc., but still most certainly catering to those who vote Republican. CNN is a liberal media source, and serves up news to the college liberal arts majors that think they know anything about politics or life in general. This is also why CNN seems to focus on the trivial B.S. going on instead of the events that actually matter because they know their audience. No, I don't give two f*cks about what Kim Kardashian is doing, thanks. MSNBC is known to be the most liberal with hosts like Rachel Maddow making it abundantly clear. They are aiming for that inner-city intellectual type that has had such a privileged and sheltered upbringing there isn't any reason why everyone should get free everything and wars should never happen. Those are the main ones. Now there is PBS, which IMO is probably the least biased and fair of the bunch, but unfortunately it has the least viewership because in comparison to the others it is bland. There are no scrolling tickers all over the damn place, or loud boisterous anchors who make a point to berate and yell at their guests who don't have views that align with their's or their target audience. There are just older people have civilized discourse about a relevant topic pertaining to news in the U.S. and little else.

Now I know I have made some sweeping generalizations, but I want it to be clear that I did so intentionally to get the point across is that these news channels are companies and they do the same thing. They make generalizations that they try and turn a profit off of and they are damn good at it. So damn good in fact that they have a large portion of their audience buying into their nonsense and coming back for more.

So where does that leave us? Well the trick I have learned is to believe none of them and only believe what you can prove to yourself. Never take any source at its word unless undeniable and clear proof is offered, and that there is no doubt. If there is doubt, look for the information that could confirm or refute said point and do so of your own volition, don't let Wolf Blitzer or Shepperd Smith spoon feed it to you. You can get the general premise of a story from these sights, basically by reading the title, but leave it up to your own logical and rational thought to make the judgement, not on what these jilted and phony web sites and news channels try and shove down your throat.

-Kevin

P.S. Sorry if I sound a bit jaded, but being in the military and having two Liberal Art degrees I have seen the full spectrum of American political affiliation and I have very small tolerance for propaganda, nor misleading media, and I try and take any chance I can to get those buy into it to reconsider.

[dannyc]

Funny I try to read all sources but try my hardest to steer clear of cnn msnbc abc and time due to their left leaning ways I try to find unbiased news unlike one of my friends who uses social media to get his news and trusts it as fact

The problem with that statement is you took a FOx News article posted by Dragon at the top of this thread as gospel as soon as it seemingly aligned with your beliefs. You absolutely have to avoid that in order to stay a well-informed, non-biased, and rationally thinking citizen of this country. Every media source has its bias. Fox News caters to the" 'Muricans " and is steep with Conservative bias. Not as bad as some of these web sites like Red Flag News etc. etc., but still most certainly catering to those who vote Republican. CNN is a liberal media source, and serves up news to the college liberal arts majors that think they know anything about politics or life in general. This is also why CNN seems to focus on the trivial B.S. going on instead of the events that actually matter because they know their audience. No, I don't give two f*cks about what Kim Kardashian is doing, thanks. MSNBC is known to be the most liberal with hosts like Rachel Maddow making it abundantly clear. They are aiming for that inner-city intellectual type that has had such a privileged and sheltered upbringing there isn't any reason why everyone should get free everything and wars should never happen. Those are the main ones. Now there is PBS, which IMO is probably the least biased and fair of the bunch, but unfortunately it has the least viewership because in comparison to the others it is bland. There are no scrolling tickers all over the damn place, or loud boisterous anchors who make a point to berate and yell at their guests who don't have views that align with their's or their target audience. There are just older people have civilized discourse about a relevant topic pertaining to news in the U.S. and little else.

Now I know I have made some sweeping generalizations, but I want it to be clear that I did so intentionally to get the point across is that these news channels are companies and they do the same thing. They make generalizations that they try and turn a profit off of and they are damn good at it. So damn good in fact that they have a large portion of their audience buying into their nonsense and coming back for more.

So where does that leave us? Well the trick I have learned is to believe none of them and only believe what you can prove to yourself. Never take any source at its word unless undeniable and clear proof is offered, and that there is no doubt. If there is doubt, look for the information that could confirm or refute said point and do so of your own volition, don't let Wolf Blitzer or Shepperd Smith spoon feed it to you. You can get the general premise of a story from these sights, basically by reading the title, but leave it up to your own logical and rational thought to make the judgement, not on what these jilted and phony web sites and news channels try and shove down your throat.

-Kevin

P.S. Sorry if I sound a bit jaded, but being in the military and having two Liberal Art degrees I have seen the full spectrum of American political affiliation and I have very small tolerance for propaganda, nor misleading media, and I try and take any chance I can to get those buy into it to reconsider.

like I said I have seen a documentary about this and generals basically said exactly that four first battle for fallujah should've been a red flag for the rise of a new terror group they used media to their advantage and were able to use it to get marines out and leave till the black water ambush we left that wound festering and it was the wrong call

[PanzerArm]

like I said I have seen a documentary about this and generals basically said exactly that four first battle for fallujah should've been a red flag for the rise of a new terror group they used media to their advantage and were able to use it to get marines out and leave till the black water ambush we left that wound festering and it was the wrong call

This is what we call Monday morning quarterbacking. It is quite easy to call something the wrong call when you have 5-10 years between you and the decisions made.

For the record, that interview was a joke. The framing of the questions, which comes as no surprise, were biased as all hell. "So pulling out of Iraq was a mistake?" Odierno did not mention the word mistake one time, and the rest of that interviewers questions were just laden with negative connotations. As an officer and leader in the U.S. armed forces you are often called upon to make tough choices. The same can be said for anyone higher on that chain of command that may not necessarily be in the military (i.e. Secretary of the Army, Commander in Chief). You make those calls based on the intelligence provided and weighing out the benefit/cost of the different COAs. You may not make the perfect call every time, but barring gross negligence, you do not call the choices made mistakes. Thinking that anyone, including those currently running ISIS, back in 2011 would think ISIS would be as big of an issue as it is now is ridiculous. When we left the weak motivation and general uncertainty of the Iraqi people regarding their government left a vacuum that ISIS was all too happy to fill. And like I said the Iraqi government did little to actually earn any of this themselves so what motivation do they have to defend it? If they want ISIS gone bad enough, they will get rid of them.

Here are the facts, pulling out of Iraq ultimately was not our decision. It was a Iraq's leaderships', as it damn well should have been. They don't want us there, fine, we'll stop sending billions of dollars of war materiel and many thousands of personnel and end that pointless debacle. The U.S.'s agreement to the terms of withdrawal, on top of the SOFA issues with Sharia Law, there was also growing discontent back home with a protracted and unrewarding conflict, and the growing realization that we had some sh*t back home that needed sorting out and maybe we should take care of that. Between all that, there was plenty of reason to get out of Iraq. How do the whispers of a rising ISIS stack up against those reasons? Not very well.

My opinion is that if you think we were ever going to have a positive outcome in that country you are mistaken. Look up the term "blowback" as it relates to the Middle East and you will get a real feel for what the overwhelming mindset is with respect to the U.S. They do not like us. All the misbegotten covert actions, installations of puppet governments, wars we initiated; it should come as no surprise that that part of the world does not think fondly of us. You can try to "liberate" people from a cruel dictator, and subsequently build infrastructure and help people to vote all you want, but ultimately if they deep down feel your presence is unwanted, they are going to either directly or indirectly try and get you out. This of course does not apply to everyone, like people we directly assisted in some overt way, or someone who's very existence is attached to us (interpreters etc). It does apply to the people who have family/friends/neighbors killed in any action either caused by the U.S. or caused by insurgency. It does affect the people who can't get to work when a U.S. convoy blocks their route and they risk certain death if approaching too close. It does affect the people that see what few bad apples can do to their countrymen (Abu Ghraib). All the good we did means nothing when the already biased media and people of that part of the world only focus on the negatives. I like to analogize countries like Iraq to an angsty teenager. You can tell them good advice and even force certain behaviors upon them through strict rules, but ultimately if they don't want to do (or not do) something, they aren't going to do it. They may learn later on down the road that you had their best interests at heart, but they will have made a bunch of mistakes in the interim. The point is they have to to do and learn things for themselves to truly get an appreciation for it. If we hand Iraq a democracy and a semi-functioning government what is thereto say they will ever be able to maintain it on there own without our oversight? We can't stay there indefinitely. Seems like a bunch of blowhards on TV want more time here would have done this, and more time here could have done that. Ok jackasses, you go over there and deploy as an E4 MRAP driver on Route Clearance missions for 10-14 months and you tell me what you think of our involvement there. Political pundits make me sick. Consistent talk out their ass and the content is what you would expect coming from there.

Our precedent for actions like Iraq was ever since the conclusion of WWII, the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan initiated a long change of actions where basically the U.S. was trying to influence any nations it could to best the Soviets. Some of those actions were successful (S. Korea), and some were not (Middle East).

I could go on, but these resort of discussions wind me up, and wear me out. I tell myself not to do this, but this topic hits close to home.

-Kevin

[Dauntless]

I don't think the point could have been articulated any better than that PanzerArm.

[[CAT]CplSlade]

Yeah, that was a good viewpoint summary.

And seriously, dannyc, I work in a high school so I know they still teach basic punctuation. You present your argument better if people can understand what you have to say.

[dannyc]

Yeah, that was a good viewpoint summary.

And seriously, dannyc, I work in a high school so I know they still teach basic punctuation. You present your argument better if people can understand what you have to say.

I'm sorry I forget punctuation a lot since I get into discussions a lot