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Iraq update, worth a read.........

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FOR THOSE WHO MAY BE GETTING DISCOURAGED BY ALL THE NEGATIVE NEWS ABOUT IRAQ:



"Since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1. "



... the first battalion of the new Iraqi Army has graduated and is on active duty



... over 60,000 Iraqis now provide security to their fellow citizens.



... nearly all of Iraq's 400 courts are functioning.



... the Iraqi judiciary is fully independent.



... on Monday, October 6 power generation hit 4,518 megawatts-exceeding the pre-war average.



... all 22 universities and 43 technical institutes and colleges are open, as are nearly all primary and secondary schools.



... by October 1, Coalition forces had rehabbed over 1,500 schools - 500 more than their target.



... teachers earn from 12 to 25 times their former salaries.



... all 240 hospitals and more than 1,200 clinics are open.



... doctors' salaries are at least eight times what they were under Saddam.



... pharmaceutical distribution has gone from essentially nothing to 700 tons in May to a current total of 12,000 tons.



... the Coalition has helped administer over 22 million vaccination doses to Iraq's children.



... a Coalition program has cleared over 14,000 kilometers of Iraq's 27,000 kilometers of weed-choked canals. They now irrigate tens of thousands of farms. This project has created jobs for more than 100,000 Iraqi men and women.



... we have restored over three-quarters of pre-war telephone services and over two-thirds of the potable water production.



... there are 4,900 full-service connections. We expect 50,000 by January first.



... the wheels of commerce are turning. From bicycles to satellite dishes to cars and trucks, businesses are coming to life in all major cities and towns.



... 95 percent of all pre-war bank customers have service and first-time customers are opening accounts daily.



... Iraqi banks are making loans to finance businesses.



... the central bank is fully independent.



... Iraq has one of the world's most growth-oriented investment and banking laws.



... Iraq (has) a single, unified currency for the first time in 15 years.



... satellite dishes are legal.



... foreign journalists aren't on 10-day visas paying mandatory and extortionate fees to the Ministry of Information for "minders" and other government spies.



... there is no Ministry of Information.



... there are more than 170 newspapers.



... you can buy satellite dishes on what seems like every street corner.



... foreign journalists and everyone else are free to come and go.



... a nation that had not one single element--legislative, judicial or executive--of a representative government, does.



... in Baghdad alone residents have selected 88 advisory councils. Baghdad's first democratic transfer of power in 35 years happened when the city council elected its new chairman.



... today in Iraq chambers of commerce, business, school and professional organizations are electing their leaders all over the country.



... 25 ministers, selected by the most representative governing body in Iraq's history, run the day-to-day business of government.



... the Iraqi government regularly participates in international events. Since July the Iraqi government has been represented in over two dozen international meetings, including those of the UN General Assembly, the Arab League, the World Bank and IMF and, today, the Islamic Conference Summit. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs today announced that it is reopening over 30 Iraqi embassies around the world.



... Shia religious festivals that were all but banned, aren't.



... for the first time in 35 years, in Karbala thousands of Shiites celebrate the pilgrimage of the 12th Imam.



... the Coalition has completed over 13,000 reconstruction projects, large and small, as part of (a) strategic plan for the reconstruction of Iraq.



. Uday and Queasy are dead - and no longer feeding innocent Iraqis to his zoo lions, raping the young daughters of local leaders to force cooperation, torturing Iraq's soccer players for losing games... murdering critics.



... children aren't imprisoned or murdered when their parents disagree with the government.



... political opponents aren't imprisoned, tortured, executed, maimed, or are forced to watch their families die for disagreeing with Saddam.



... millions of longsuffering Iraqis no longer live in perpetual terror.



... Saudis will hold municipal elections.



... Qatar is reforming education to give more choices to parents.



. . Jordan is accelerating market economic reforms.



... the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded for the first time to an Iranian -- a Muslim woman who speaks out with courage for human rights, for democracy and for peace.



... he has not faltered or failed.



... Saddam is gone.



Since... Iraq is free.



NOT BAD FOR AN ADMINISTRATION:

WITH NO PLAN

NO DIRECTION

THAT WAS GOING TO BE SLAUGHTERED GOING INTO BAGDAD

THAT WAS ONLY IN THIS FOR THE OIL.

GOD BLESS THE USA & OUR WARRIORS IN HARMS WAY
 
It's funny you mention the satellite dishes. Here in Tikrit as you go out the North part of town there are little neighborhoods all crammed together. There used to be nothing on the roof tops, but now every stinkin' roof has one, and it seems like they almost went up overnight. Things are alot better, the only people upset are the ones that thrived under Saddam, but now the majority are getting the chance to make it.



Scott
 
Yeah Scott, it ticks me off that all we hear on the news is how crappy things are since we got there. But you know how it goes, good news doesn't sell papers. Marty
 
Thanks for posting Sarge. Paul Harvey mentioned a couple days ago that the phone network in Iraq has been restored beyond what they had originally too. Also he mentioned that Saddam was starting to talk and tell US officials where massive funds are stashed in various accounts.



We're getting a bunch done over there and it irritates me when people compare Iraq to the Vietnam quagmire. . . not even close to being similar.



Vaughn
 
Kernel, glad to see you are alive and apparantly well. Must be nice to be in a war zone and have internet access. Times have sure changed since the Nam.



Gary
 
Originally posted by GAmes

Kernel, glad to see you are alive and apparantly well. Must be nice to be in a war zone and have internet access. Times have sure changed since the Nam.



Gary





Yea, after 7months of being here we got the internet, it works about 80% of the time. There is even an internet cafe in Tikrit for the locals to use, just another example of how much better things have gotten. Now if we could only get something on the tube other than AFN :rolleyes: :D .



As for 220 MPs, I have heard of them, but I don't know where they are in relation to us.



Scott
 
Come back down to reality?

A Reuters analysis of US Defense Department statistics showed on Thursday that the Vietnam War, which the Army says officially began on December 11 1961, produced a combined 392 fatal casualties from 1962 through 1964, when American troop levels in Indochina stood at just over 17 000.



By comparison, a roadside bomb attack that killed a soldier in Baghdad on Wednesday brought to 397 the tally of American dead in Iraq, where US forces number about 130 000 troops - the same number reached in Vietnam by October 1965.



The casualty count for Iraq apparently surpassed the Vietnam figure on Sunday a week ago, when a US soldier killed in a rocket-propelled grenade attack south of Baghdad became the conflict's 393rd American casualty since Operation Iraqi Freedom began on March 20.



Larger still is the number of American casualties from the broader US war on terrorism, which has produced 488 military deaths in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Philippines, Southwest Asia and other locations.



Statistics from battle zones outside Iraq show that 91 soldiers have died since October 7 2001, as part of Operation Enduring Freedom, which US President George W Bush launched against Afghanistan's former Taliban regime after the Sept 11 2001, attacks on New York and Washington killed 3 000 people.



The Bush administration has rejected comparisons between Iraq and Vietnam, which traumatised Americans a generation ago with a sad procession of military body bags and television footage of grim wartime cruelty.



Recent opinion polls show public support for the president eroding as he heads toward the 2004 election, partly because of public concern over the deadly cycle of guerrilla attacks and suicide bombings in Iraq.



US COMBAT POWER Because US involvement in Vietnam increased gradually after the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, there is little consensus on when the war in Southeast Asia began.



Some date the war to the late 1950s.



Others say it began on August 5 1964, when Lyndon Johnson announced air strikes against North Vietnam in retaliation for a reported torpedo attack on a US destroyer in the Gulf of Tonkin.



However, the Army's start date for the Vietnam War has been set by its Center of Military History as December 11 1961, when two helicopter companies consisting of 32 aircraft and 400 soldiers arrived in the country, an Army public affairs specialist said.



"It was the first major assemblage of US combat power in Vietnam," explained Army historian Joe Webb.



Vietnam casualties, which amounted to 25 deaths from 1956 through 1961, climbed to 53 in 1962, 123 in 1963 and 216 in 1964, Pentagon statistics show.



At the time, the US presence in Vietnam consisted mainly of military advisers.



President John F Kennedy increased their number from about 960 in 1961 to show Washington's commitment to containing communism.



But not until 1965, after Congress had approved the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, did Washington begin its massive escalation of the war effort.



With a huge influx of soldiers, casualties in Vietnam soared to 1 926 in 1965 and peaked at 16 869 in 1968, the year of the Tet Offensive, data show.



In a major revision of US military history in 1995, former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara said he believed the Gulf of Tonkin torpedo attack never occurred.



More than 58 000 US military personnel died in Vietnam before the war ended in the mid-1970s.



In another comparison, British forces that created Iraq in the aftermath of World War One suffered 2 000 casualties from tribal reprisals, guerrilla attacks and a jihad proclaimed from the Shi'ite holy city of Kerbala, before conditions stabilised in 1921, according to US military scholars.



Reuters included military deaths both on and off the battlefield for Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom, for comparison with Vietnam War statistics that made no distinction between hostile and non-hostile casualties.



On Thursday, US combat deaths totalled 270 for Iraq and 28 for other battle zones, including Afghanistan.

Nampa-Reuters



The death toll now is much higher. And rising daily.





















World News Headlines Of The Last 48 Hours







:( :(
 
CF, I'm confused. Are you trying to say that the percentage of Americans killed per overall military population in Vietnam during 62-64 is 6. 5 times more then in Iraq today? Or are you comparing the Iraq deaths to the 58,000 overall Vietnam deaths. That slanted piece sort of gets muddy there.



Nor does it mention that a fraction of the force that was in Vietnam is also taking care of a country with 44 million more square miles with a fraction of the fatalities.



Perhaps I'm missing your point?
 
CF, I can't remember if you did any time in the U. S. Armed forces? If I am reading this post right, you believe that the US will suffer more than 58,000 deaths over the next 10 years in Iraq? I also suppose you believe the war in Iraq was not worth it? I am just asking here before I say anything else further.



Kernel, thanks for serving our great country, and watch your 6 over there.



Don
 
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Did and do

Did my time, and no I don't think the effort over there is doing anything to lesson the danger from terror. It is just giving the terrorists a chance to kill more Americans without having to travel as far. What really pisses me off is that America did not learn a gaddamn thing from its previous quagmire.



You boys continue to believe in our present fool for a President and his line of bull.



As for the men over there, keep your heads down and come home safe. Some of us will still be around to help you after the flag waving is over.
 
So, "you did your time". Now I understand why you are so bitter. You were drafted when you thought that going and fulfilling your commitment to your country was of a lower order than what you felt about what your country was doing. That explaines alot. Well, CF get over it. Granted you served your country, and no matter how much that sticks in your craw, that gives you a right to bitc# about how the country is run. So instead of flapping your lips, why don't you try to do something about it. Run for office, get involved in politics. But for Gods sake, if your not even going to try to fix the problems, quit your belly aching. Enough is enough.



Sorry for the soap box rant.
 
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Joined and volunteered

Joined the Army in 1967, volunteered for Nam, spent two years in country. Now back to this war in Iraq, it was a bad move, weakening our defense, and giving this country a bad light. Think what you wish, but I for one do not believe in a full scale war based on suspicion and inuendo. You do not fight a small group of religious fanatics with all out conventional warfare, it does not work. It will be another Nam only worse.





Oh the flag waving does stop, and our president is proving it by cutting more vet benefits right now. :(
 
CF, didn't I read a thread where you were leaving?:confused:





Comparing Vietnam to Iraq is just a leftist ploy to make it worse than it is.

of course, I shouldn't be surprised, the leftists insist us attacking Iraq is the same as Japan attacking Pearl Harbor.



Bottom line, we have been attacked by terrorists for years and have done nothing about it. Now, we are.



Killing terrorists in Iraq is a better deal than letting them kill themselves and our citizens over here.

And who knows? Maybe putting that country back together, will create little anti-terrorists.

Better than doing nothing.



Personally, I would have nuked the entire middle east and been done with it.
 
Not in this old boys neck of the woods it doesnt. Not even when that creep Clinton was in office. You see, it's not who is at the helm that is reason to wave old glory, it's to support this great country, remember the men and women that have died for it, and honor those that are in harms way today, so that I may sit here and type on this damn computer in safety. Now i'll get off my soap box. Sorry, Sarge.
 
Here is the future of Iraq

Future Al Queda members.



From: Wendell Steavenson

Subject: The U. S. Army Goes to High School

Tuesday, Dec. 23, 2003, at 1:13 PM PT

Ibrahim Ahmed Hakmet is 16, a cocky, engagingly arrogant kid; slim, with close-cropped hair, a little acne on his temples, and a tendency to giggle at me, because apparently I remind him of his aunt.



A few days after Saddam's capture, he was arrested by the Americans. About a hundred soldiers in armored Humvees and tanks surrounded the Amriyeh High School (a school for boys aged between 16 and 19). With the Iraqi police in attendance, they went from classroom to classroom matching faces to photographs and names to a list. They were looking for boys who had been at a pro-Saddam demonstration the day before.



"It's against the law," explained Lt. Col. Leopoldo Quintas, commander of the 2-70 "Old Ironsides" Armored Battalion, which carried out the operation. "And they were displaying pictures of Saddam. "



"It's subversive," added his public affairs officer.



Ibrahim said he was the first to be caught because he was on his way out of school to get a doctor's note; it was midmorning, and he was the only student on the front entrance path.



"An American officer shouted at me: 'Sit down! Sit down!' and indicated that I should kneel, pointing with his gun. Then he said, 'Get up!' I didn't understand what he wanted me to do, so I put my hands on the wall. He kicked me twice on the leg. He was very big. He checked me roughly, even behind my ears, and threw my English and Arabic books away. He cuffed my hands with wire, roughly. He sprained my wrist. And later, when he was taking the wire off, he cut me when he was cutting it with a knife. "



Ibrahim and several other detained boys (Ibrahim says nine or 10, the Americans say five or six) were put in the back of a truck. The truck broke down and had to be towed by a tank. An outraged crowd had gathered: parents, passers-by, kids from neighborhood schools, shouting and yelling.



Ibrahim was rather enamored of his adventure.



"We were laughing," he said, all tough and unconcerned, wearing his bandaged wrist like a trophy and using a single crutch to support the leg he said was kicked and beaten with a stick. "We knew we hadn't done anything. One of the Americans said in Arabic, 'Incheb!' Shut up!" Ibrahim was full of himself, laughing at the Americans to their faces, getting beaten for his defiance, and then asking for more. "The more I laughed, the more he hit me. It shows what kind of a weak man he was to hit a boy," he sneered.



The Americans, in their efforts at zero tolerance, intimidation, containment, detentions, night arrests, and operations to arrest high-school kids, provoke only frustration, outrage, and distrust.



"The soldiers went through my class," said Mr. Karim, the math teacher, " 'What is your name? What is your name?' The children were afraid. "



"They had no right, no right to come!" Mr. Hamza, the Arabic teacher, was indignant. "Is this American democracy?"



The headmaster, Mr. Fadhil, said he was angry. The boys in the school were angry with him. He had not protected them against the Americans; he had invited the Americans to arrest them. Spray-painted on the wall of the school were slogans: "Saddam's High School!" "Down Down USA!" and "Down With the Informer Principal Fadhil!" They were quickly painted over.



"Do you think Mr. Fadhil can keep his job after this unpleasantness?" I asked.



Ibrahim hid his mouth behind his hand and giggled at such a silly question. "Oh we want him to stay! He's in our pocket now! Who else will pass us this year?"



Ibrahim does not go to school very regularly. He says he has observed that those with an education and those without end up earning the same amount. He has been learning English for five years and cannot speak a word, except to understand some of what the American soldiers shouted at him. School, for him, is more of a place to hang out with friends than an institution of discipline and educational standards. The Amriyeh High School is newly painted and has some old computers. The classrooms are very bare: cheap wooden desks, benches, blackboard, and chalk. The Americans have been refurbishing schools, but it's often just a paint job. It's the state of lassitude and corruption that is the problem. Pay the teachers—a few bribes, threats, whatever—and they will pass you. Ibrahim shrugged, "The principal is a moody guy. Sometimes you can give him some chocolates and he is all right. Other times he wants a million Iraqi dinars. "



Amriyeh is a suburb with Sunni Triangle sensibilities, where a lot of families from Ramadi and Tikrit settled. It's also an area in which Saddam distributed land to Mukhabarat (intelligence) officers.



"These are their sons," explained Mr. Hamza, the Arabic teacher.



"This was a real country to be proud of," said Ibrahim. "I am Iraqi. They are humiliating every Iraqi when they humiliate Saddam. Even if Hitler came here he would not fill our eyes [make us proud] as much as Saddam did. " Ibrahim has read about Hitler.



When the Americans arrested him and his school friends, they took them to their base nearby (a former Republican Guard barracks) and held them in what Ibrahim described as "a cage," and what the colonel called "a temporary holding facility," although he wouldn't let me see it "for security reasons. "



The soldiers let them out to use the washroom and to be questioned. They were fed chicken and macaroni and chocolate bars for lunch. Ibrahim said it was pretty good.



"They are civil in a way," Ibrahim said. "They are afraid of the situation here, and that's why they behave badly. " But he is not intimidated by them. His family has seen plenty of American injustice. His father (something to do with the former government, though exactly what Ibrahim wouldn't say) has been detained three times, his uncle twice. His cousin was shot in the leg at an American checkpoint when he didn't understand what the soldier was shouting. His grandmother had three and a half kilos of gold and an heirloom diamond necklace taken during a nighttime raid on her house. All run-of-the-mill, unverifiable stories of the kind I have heard many times.



"A foreigner will always be the weaker one. " observed Ibrahim. "This is my country: They came by force they will leave by force. "



The Americans questioned Ibrahim and the others and determined that they were just schoolboys protesting; there had been no particular resistance involvement.



"I would have preferred not to have done it," said Lt. Col. Quintas, while acknowledging that the operation at the school had been undertaken on his initiative, "But they need to understand that they are not allowed to do this and that there are consequences. "



The boys were released that evening and driven home. Ibrahim said that was the only time he was scared—he was worried the Humvee he was being taken in might get hit by the resistance.



They rang the doorbell. His father came out.



"It was funny," said Ibrahim. "He didn't know if they were going to return me or take him!"





Something else that does not make it into the nightly news here in the USA... .
 
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