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-if you thought that it would cost 10,000 American lives... you were wrong. rejoice.
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Interestingly enough, a massive source of reduced loss of American life is the improved injury survival rate in this war, caused by chest body armor and better medical logistics.
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our losses have been less than i thought there would be and MUCH MUCH less than the predictions of many others.
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I personally estimated higher casualties, based off the use of large amounts of WMD, which the US government swore they had proof Iraq had. That is, before Colin showed the proof...
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Point One: "You're with us or against...." I do believe that the speech came after 9-11, the greatest terrorist attack ever, in the context of it's timing and it's nature, I couldn't agree more. If I'm wrong about the timing, show me to the promised land.
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Point Four: Nobody said this was going to be easy, nor immediate. I'm betting the long term effects will never been known, because that is the nature of the operation. The World is a better place with our presence in Iraq, Iraq is better with our presence, the Middle East will be better. There is nothing but limitless upside if people could just get over the fact that we are there, we're there to stay, and we aren't coming home until the job is done right.
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You are claiming there is no downside to being in Iraq?
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ok... we all know you don't think the post-war situation has been a success. understood. given the difficulty of our mission: what did you expect? what realistic picture of the situation could you conjure that would be much better than what we've achieved? in this discussion, your opposition to the war's genesis is irrelevant. why do you insist that our operations since then have been disastrous? according to what criteria do you make this judgement?
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I could have sworn the Iraqi's would be standing on the side of the road, showering their liberators with flowers, grateful for their freedom?
Oh wait, that was the polmil plan for the invasion.
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how have the results so far compared with your expectations?
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Which expectations?
A while before the war:
I expected to find WMD (Chem+Bio) -- I didn't expect Bush to lie about having convincing evidence of WMD. [worse]
I expected US soldiers to have to fight against chemical and biological weapons, due to the above point. [better]
I feared Iraq would get a missile off at Isreal, containing biological weapons or worse. [better]
I feared Isreal would return fire, destabalizing the region. [better]
I expected the US to face mainly foreign insurgents, as Iraq was a secular society in which the majority didn't like Saddam. [worse]
Shortly before the war:
I expected there to be no WMD. [right] I had a fear that I might be wrong, and US troops would take serious casualties. [better]
My confidence in US popularity in Iraq after the war fell. Researching what the US did after the first war made me think that the locals might .. resent .. the US. [worse]
I expected significant sabotauge by the Iraqi government of things like oil wells. [better]
I expected the main fight to take longer, with Iraqi forces scattered throughout the cities, resulting in large amounts of collateral damage. [better]
I expected the US had insufficient plans to rebuild Iraq afterwards. [accurate]
In my case, the insurgency is far worse than I'd expected it would be. The fact that Bush lied about his evidence for WMD meant that the worst-case scenarioes evaporated.
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if the results are better than you expected (and there were many who expected catastrophic developments), from what vantage point do you continue to label the operation an abject failure if it has exceeded your expectations?
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One's expectations and one's standard for success need not be the same.
If one's standards for success are 'saving more lives than would be lost in the status quo, over the next 5 years', and you examine a solution (nuke the world), where your expectations 'billions of lives lost' do not pass your standards, this does not move your standards of success.
You are holding up a straw man, and claiming he is flimsy.
If someone predicted exactly what happened, would that make the war a success, even if they opposed the war to start?
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RB, i can't make it more clear. MY position isn't what i want to discuss.
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Mr Goose, meet Mrs Gander. Answer your own question. =p