The Journal

Issue date: 4/5/07 Section: Opinion/Editorial

Anthony Sodd.

On March 27 the United States Senate voted 50 to 48 in favor of beginning to draw down troop levels in Iraq in the next four months. Nothing short of the abolishment of taxes could have appeased an uneasy American public more. In 2002, the Senate had another vote that followed the same appeasement strategy. That vote, which passed by a wide margin of 77 to 23, was in favor of attacking Iraq and is something of a taboo today.


The 2002 vote allowed America to ruthlessly bomb Iraq, arrest its leadership and disband its military. Several years later, Saddam and most of the others in the infamous deck of cards are dead and still the violence continues unabated. America came to spread democracy and stop terrorism. They are leaving, broken and dispirited in the hope that if they just leave now, everything will be all right. But, when American troops leave, the violence won't stop, the dead won't come back to life and the bombings will only increase.


War isn't fun, war isn't easy and war isn't cheap. I don't recommend getting involved in one, but America started this war. It ruined the stability that millions of Iraqis counted on for a basic standard of life, and now America has decided it's not in its current best interest to fix it. Apparently Americans are so selfish they can't see they owe it to the Iraqi people to keep their forces on the ground until stability is regained. Our representatives' votes in 2002 made us responsible for the current situation in Iraq. Around 3240 American deaths later, and America has conveniently forgotten that it has the blood of 655,000 Iraqis on its hands.


Any American death, or Iraqi for that matter, is unacceptable. When put into contrast of other American wars, however, the American death toll in Iraq is relatively small. When the 58,209 American deaths that occurred during the Vietnam War are taken into account, it may explain the lack of widespread protests the Iraq war has spawned. America's own civil war took the lives of over 3 million in just under four years. Maybe we should be more patient and understanding with the Iraqis.


A new, stable government may not have formed as quickly as we hoped. However, in their defense, they had a working government before the American troops removed it. The old government may not have been in Americas liking, but it was undeniably there and keeping order.

Continued...

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