The war in Iraq is over! American troops will be home for Christmas! Nearly nine years of nonsense is coming to an end!
In case you can’t tell by the exclamation points, I’m excited about the end of the war in Iraq. President Barack Obama announced one week ago today the war is over and all U.S. soldiers will be home by the end of the year.
I’m sure it was with great restraint Obama resisted the urge to don a full flight suit, land on an aircraft carrier, and display a large banner that said, “Mission Accomplished.” The Iraq War should more aptly be named “Mission Enough Already.”
I was discussing the end of the war earlier in the week with a local resident who wasn’t at all impressed. Said this person in condescending fashion, “Well I guess that will earn Obama a bunch of votes when the election gets here.”
I don’t know if it will earn him a bunch of votes, but I can tell you it will very likely earn him my vote. Sure I’m not crazy about Obamacare, but I love the president’s decision to bring our soldiers home. Coupled with the killing of Osama bin Laden, and our embattled president is on a roll lately.
It probably won’t do him a bit of good come election time as a recent Southern Standard online poll showed 78 percent of people would not vote for Obama in the 2012 election.
That may be, and I’m fine with that philosophy. But that doesn’t mean I can’t trumpet the end to the Iraq War.
I’m not passionate about many things in politics, but one of them is America needs to do a better job of minding our own business. We have enough problems in our own country without trying to rule the world.
Iraq was a doomed war from the start with nuclear inspectors insisting there were no nuclear plants there, but with the U.S. invading anyway. After initial confusion, we finally settled on a mission to liberate the people of Iraq from their ruthless dictator, despite the fact there are about 40 other countries ruled by ruthless dictators we care nothing about.
Obama’s announcement to end the war should be given two thumbs up. It should be greeted with cheers. Somewhere there should be a parade.
There were about 140,000 American soldiers in Iraq when Obama took office. It should be fully noted the Dec. 31 deadline for full troop withdrawal was negotiated by none other than W. himself, but Obama was the one who pulled the proverbial trigger and brought our soldiers home. He could have delayed the situation, could have lobbied for more time, but instead he made the right choice.
In the end, the Iraq War will go down in history as costing more than 4,400 American troops their lives and costing the country right at $1 trillion over nearly nine years. In addition, many more soldiers were horribly injured, some losing both legs in explosions.
The war cost the United States about $300 million a day at a time when concerns over our national deficit have never been greater.
Perhaps American leaders should study the death of Moammar Gadhafi in Libya and use that as a better model for handling future international conflicts. The Libyans showed they were fully capable of handing their own problem last week when Gadhafi, a brutal dictator and known terrorist, was killed by rebels.
Gee, maybe America doesn’t have to interfere in every world conflict. Maybe other countries can fend for themselves. They could if we let them.
James Clark is editor of the Standard. He can be reached at 473-2191.