*Sigh*
One of my notorious little birdies informed me last week that one of the purposes of UK PM Gordon Brown's visit to President Bush was to tell him that the full withdrawal of British troops from Basra was a done deal, would be announced in early October of this year and would be completed within 30 days. The British troops are reportedly hunkered down in a fortified compound near Basra's airport and already preparing to leave.
I've held off on this in hopes that it was a tad overblown, but it appears that Gordon Brown has pretty much confirmed that Britain will take it's troops out of Iraq regardless of the US if you read between the lines,and that he will announce it in the House of Commons in October.
Significantly, Brown avoided referring to the phrase "war on terror," or even mentioning the context of a war at all. Instead PM Brown appears to have put things in the context of a criminal justice problem, saying "Terrorism is not a cause but a crime - a crime against humanity."
As you know, the British Navy withdrew completely after the hostage dustup with Iran and has not returned, as I predicted, even though that stretched the US Navy's mission responsibility in the Persian Gulf.
I'd like to be wrong about this one, but I think Brits are history well before years' end, no matter what.
As an epilogue, here's a recent poem from my pal Canker entitled ` For Art's Sake' that ties in pretty well...
2 comments:
The US withdrawl will not be far behind. The US will likely begin withdrawing sometime around the end of September and the withdrawl will likely be completed by the end od July of 2008. In other words, by the 7/31/08 there will not be a single US soldier or military advisor any where in Iraq.
Of course there will likely be long range consequences to the US, Britain, and the West for allowing Iraq to become a terrorist haven. It is not known for certain that Iraq will become a terrorist have after the US withdraws from Iraq but this seems to be the most probable outcome.
In any event there are elections that need to be won and there is a President who needs to be destroyed. Political types can worry about long range conseqences later.
Btw, I am not a Bush supporter. I think he should be impeached. The Democrats could do this any time they wish, however, they seem to think that if they time impeachment to coincide with the November elections this will enhance their electoral chances.
Iraq's electric power grid is very near collapse. According to Aziz al Shimari a spokesman with the electricity ministry for Iraq every time they fix a power line insurgents destroy it the next day.
The US and its allies have never had enough troops to establish basic security for the Iraqis. To do this properly will probably require 500,000 or more troops. We are not going to get these troops. As such, I see no point in continuing the nation building. We should withdraw to defensible positions. This includes the following: 1.) Remove all troops from Iraq. 2.)Position these troops on the Southern and Northern borders of the US. 3.) Place a moratorium on immigration from Muslim countries. 4.) Cloesely monitor the mosques.
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