What reason do we have to still have our military in Iraq?

We removed Hussien.

They elected a new government.

Any good reason why our troops shouldn't start coming home on Jan 31? Leaving enough of them there to help train whatever armed forces that the Iraqi government assembles?

I think we need to stick around, at least long enough for the new Iraqi government to have enough of a force that they can defend themselves. Considering the level of violence right now, with our troops being there, removing them now would just leave a crippled country at the mercy of these ass holes. They are currently targeting other Iraqi's more then US troops at this point anyway. I think once the elections are done, we can substantially decrease our troop presence, but we need a lot of people around to at least defend the new government.

My idea would be to take the Iraqi troops in training, to a place like Kuwait, where they can train with less fear of being attacked, then when they were ready, bring them back in.

*dances into thread*

stupid america

*dances out*

that should do it...

If you fuck it up, you stay there until you've fixed it.

Now, strictly speaking, it's the US forces that are fucking things up now, but the fuck up happened on their watch, and they have the responsibility to stay there until the place is clean.

Responsibilty and all those vague ideas aside, there simply is no answer. Like I've said before,

You leave, you're fucked. You stay, you're still fucked. Leave now, and the previous efforts would have been in vain. Stay, and keep getting killed in a war that seems to have no end.

The elections won't mean anything if insurgents start killing all the elected officials. Forces will probably needed for quite some time to make sure things are stablized.

Peep this...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6878892/

Bush: U.S. troops will leave Iraq if asked
President says he doesn't expect that request, though

Reuters
Updated: 12:24 a.m. ET Jan. 28, 2005

WASHINGTON - U.S. President George W. Bush says Iraqi leaders chosen in next week’s election will probably want U.S. troops to stay, but the forces will be pulled out if the new government asks, The New York Times reported on Friday.

“I’ve heard the voices of the people that presumably will be in positions of responsibility after these elections, though you never know,” Bush said in an interview with the newspaper. “But it seems that most of the leadership there understands that there will be a need for coalition troops at least until the Iraqis are able to fight.”

Asked whether the United States would pull its troops from Iraq at the request of a new government, Bush reiterated a position expressed by other administration officials: “Yes, absolutely. This is a sovereign government - they’re on their feet.”

There was, he said, “a certain realism among the (Iraqi) leadership, at least the ones I’ve talked to, that say, ’Look there’s more work to do before we are ready to move out on our own.”’

Iraqi forces needed not only more training and equipment, but also a command structure, which Bush called “the spine of any military capacity.”

The U.S. Army said Monday that at least 120,000 troops, out of the 150,000 U.S. forces now in Iraq, would stay for the next two years to train and fight with Iraqi forces against insurgents.

It was important that “we make sure the Iraqi citizens view U.S. troops as helpers, not as occupiers,” Bush said. But he acknowledged that many saw the United States as an occupying force.

“To the extent that a coalition presence is viewed as an occupying force, it enables the insurgents, the radicals, to continue to impress people that the government really is not their government, and that the government is complicit in having their country occupied,” Bush said.

The newspaper said Bush stopped short of endorsing the view of a growing number of Republicans that the sheer size of the American presence in Iraq made the violence worse by presenting insurgents with a large target.

Bush also said a proposal by British Prime Minister Tony Blair to put calmer parts of Iraq entirely in the hands of Iraqi troops was “certainly one option,” but he told the newspaper he had not yet discussed the proposal with his close ally.

At what point is it "fixed" though?

Does anyone really think that in 5 years Iraq will be a peaceful, wonderful place to live? 10 years? 100?

Dubya will never stop until he forces US-like democracy into every country of the planet, and then, to the infinite and beyond, a galaxy quest for a US-like democratic universe!

Your opinion has been invaluable.

5 to 1 the new government will want us to stay. Puppets usually don't like being without their masters.

Fixed is when you're no longer wanted.

A 3rd invasion maybe warranted then.

Maybe not, but Iraq hasn't ever been particually peaceful, even before Hussein. Fundamentalism does come from povery typically though, and I would imagine that if the trillions in oil money finally starts going to the people instead of the war machine over there, fundamentalism will die down. I will venture to guess that ten years from now things will be better off then they were during Saddhams regime, and considering one of his dick ass sons would be probably ruling then, much better. The problem with Iraq was that it wasn't getting any better. There was no real hope for these people under Hussein, or his sons, and that would equal another 50 years of oppression. It may not be any better now with the Iranians and Syrians surging in, but at least it is a shake up. There is an oppurtunity there, unfortunatly it is the ass holes who like to blow themselves up and take out 20 of their country men and not the good guys.