British General Calls for Withdrawal from Iraq

The interview is quite interesting. He sounds to be a fairly intelligent and reasonable commander. The only problem is this:

"History will show that a vacuum was created and into the vacuum malign elements moved. The hope that we might have been able to get out of Iraq in 12, 18, 24 months after the initial start in 2003 has proved fallacious. Now hostile elements have got a hold it has made our life much more difficult in Baghdad and in Basra.

"The original intention was that we put in place a liberal democracy that was an exemplar for the region, was pro-West and might have a beneficial effect on the balance within the Middle East.

"That was the hope. Whether that was a sensible or naive hope, history will judge. I don't think we are going to do that. I think we should aim for a lower ambition."

Sir Richard adds, strongly, that we should "get ourselves out sometime soon because our presence exacerbates the security problems". "We are in a Muslim country and Muslims' views of foreigners in their country are quite clear. "As a foreigner, you can be welcomed by being invited into a country, but we weren't invited, certainly by those in Iraq at the time. Let's face it, the military campaign we fought in 2003 effectively kicked the door in.

"That is a fact. I don't say that the difficulties we are experiencing around the world are caused by our presence in Iraq, but undoubtedly our presence in Iraq exacerbates them."

There's that ugly notion that the Iraqi's can't do democracy. He definitely puts the soft touch on his statements by giving us the "history will judge" line of BS. Maybe that is just the "British" way, but it strikes me as not being completely forthright.

The other side of it is his call to do the right thing by the Military. That includes a lot of parts, but if he's including this withdrawal issue into it, he is missing what his job is. The military is told what to do by the public representatives, the politicians decide what is right in this case. If he believes that the presence of troops exacerbates the security situation, what does he think withdrawal will do? Keep hearing about this low-level civil war in the press, would the General like to make a comment on what will happen if a power void is left when the British and/or US military leaves? Much of the Liberal talking heads say it won't get much worse, but I'm pretty certain that it will get real ugly real fast.

This appears to be another case of western minds not having the patience to complete a task correctly because it got uncomfortable in the process. You don't have to like how the war was initiated, but you have to have the wherewithal to finish it correctly. That will ensure regional stability and progress toward peace and stability, not just in the middle-east, but also in the west.