How Are Things In Iraq ?

In March of 2003, the United States (and Great Britain) invaded the country of Iraq. The lame excuse for the invasion was self-defense -- that Iraq supposedly had weapons of mass destruction that made them a threat. Of course, no weapons of mass destruction were ever discovered.

Then Bush tried another lie. He told Americans that the invasion was necessary to win the "war on terrorism". But their were no islamic terrorists in Iraq before the invasion. Saddam Hussein knew the islamic terrorists were a threat to his power, and made sure they had no foothold in his country. He made sure Iraq had a secular rather than an islamic government.

But the invasion did accomplish two things. It created an anarchic situation that allowed islamic terrorists to come in and begin operations there, and it re-ignited a long simmering hatred between religious factions in the country kicking off a religious civil war. Outside elements (like al-Queda) began killing innocent civilians and the Iraqi religious factions (Sunnis and Shiites) joined in the killing of innocent civilians, each trying to gain the upper hand.

The occupation forces then installed a puppet government -- a government in which only candidates approved by the United States could run for office. After installing this "democratic" government, the occupation forces then set out to quell the violence in Iraq (or as they called it, "defeat the terrorists"). Years passed and the violence continued unabated.

In early 2009, the occupation forces decided the violence had subsided enough that the fight could be turned over to the Iraqi puppet government. In April 2009, Great Britain withdrew all of their forces and while the the United States stayed in Iraq, they stopped most agressive actions and let the Iraqi assume the bulk of peacekeeping efforts.

If one were to go by the newspaper and other media reports, it could be assumed this was a successful tactic. Since there are seldom any media reports about Iraq, the violence must have stopped -- right? Wrong! Even though the American media is no longer interested in Iraq, innocent civilians are still being killed there by the thousands -- over 4,500 in 2009 (or about 13 people killed every single day).

But surely it has gotten better in 2010. Wrong again! Let's look at the numbers for this year. In January, 135 innocent civilians were killed in addition to 61 Iraqi police and soldiers. About 782 people were wounded (620 were innocent civilians). And the violence continues:

February 1st..........56 killed and 160 wounded

February 3rd..........24 killed and 122 wounded

February 10th..........2 killed and 4 wounded (and an oil pipeline destroyed)

February 16th..........4 killed

February 17th..........4 killed

February 18th..........13 killed and 48 wounded

In addition, six Americans have been killed in Iraq this year so far. Is this what the United States government defines as success? While the actions of the United States has been instrumental in kicking off the seemingly perpetual violence in Iraq, the U.S. military is powerless to control or quell that violence even after nearly seven years of occupation.

We destroyed the country rather easily, but we've not been able to fix it at all. This does not mean we should keep our troops there though (or send more troops). Surely after seven years it is clear that the United States cannot fix what it broke. All we can do at this point is withdraw our troops and hope the Iraqis are able to find a solution sooner rather than later.

It does make me wonder though, are we doing the same thing in Afghanistan?