31
General Misc. / Re: World War IV
« on: August 22, 2017, 06:51:26 am »
And, I've answered this question multiple times already, so excuse my irritation. When Obama pulled out the majority of our troops after him being elected, it caused a vacuum which gave rise to ISIS. Mind you, against the wishes of our highest military officers. It was only done because that's what he ran his campaign on. If those troops weren't pulled out and we have the Iraqi government more time to stabilize and become confident in there military and police force, ISIS wouldn't be what they are today. It was a mistake, a huge one. Iraqi officials felt betrayed because of the pullout and knew and told what was going to happen. Their military wasn't trained enough or established for that matter. Thats why we've sent more troops back over to there and Afghanistan, to try and get back the territory we ceded when we pulled out. ISIS, the Taliban were licking their chops when Obama was announcing the pullout of troops, all they had to do was wait.
ETA: and you keep insisting ISIS is worse, how so? Sadaam killed millions of his own people, mass genocide by chemical weapons over decades. No difference between the two in my mind. And, as I stated above, if we didn't pullout so quickly, ISIS wouldn't be as huge as a problem as they are now.
Fair enough. I disagree with the troop withdrawal leading directly to ISIS; I feel they were inevitable once Hussein was ousted, and our presence merely slowed, not halted, their inception. One thing about Hussein - though his methods were brutal and abhorrent, he was spectacularly good at keeping the religious and cultural tensions within Iraq from boiling over. In his absence, decades-suppressed animosity stretching back centuries was bound to flare up. Whether or not they were inevitable is largely a matter of opinion at this point, though, so we'll have to reconcile ourselves to alternate camps in the future alternative history forum wars.
As to ISIS being worse, my reasons for believing so are their fundamentalist religious doctrine (Hussein was largely a secular ruler), and their much larger tendency toward attacking outside their own borders. Hussein was no saint in this regard either, but didn't have the entire western world and middle east in fear over his next move. Again, a matter of opinion, largely.
My overriding opinion, on this and other post-WW2 military interventions by America, is that they cause more harm than good in the long run. Not because America is inherently evil, but just because culture and politics are insanely complicated, especially in regions of the world which have been pressure points for centuries on, and short-term interests and cultural bias tend to overwhelm long-term strategic thinking in foreign military action (especially when economic incentives take the wheel). We can mean the best, but when we prioritize our economic agenda and demand the situation be, above all else, convenient and easily comprehended, we take embers which have been smoldering for generations and create bonfires of international catastrophe.