(This cartoon image is by Matt Bors and was found at Daily Kos.)A few days ago President Obama told Americans that he would not send American troops back into Iraq. It took him less than a week to break that promise. He is now saying that he will be sending up to 300 "special forces" type troops into Iraq to act as "advisors".
The president tells us this does not mean American combat troops will have "boots on the ground" in Iraq. That is a lie. These "advisors" are American troops, they will be armed to defend themselves, and they definitely have their "boots on the ground" in Iraq. And while the president says they won't be involved in combat, they will undoubtably be fired upon by the enemy and they will return fire to defend themselves -- and that is combat, whether our leaders want to admit it or not.
The president also said he will probably also be using bombing raids in Iraq. This sending of troops and bombing certain targets means we have picked sides in this conflict, even though neither side can by any stretch of imagination be considered an American ally. If ISIS wins, they will create an extremist Sunni muslim state. If Maliki wins, the extremist Shia state backed by Iran will continue. In fact, any bombing campaign will put the U.S. in the awkward position of using our military to support Iranian troops (who are already in Iraq).
War apologists have been appearing on the Tv news in recent days, and telling us that the situation in Iraq is "serious" and requires an American response. Why? Why must we respond to a conflict in which we have no friends? Some have said it is to prevent "terrorists" from having a safe haven. That's silly. There are already plenty of other safe havens for terrorists -- and anyway, terrorists have never really needed any safe haven to carry out their nefarious acts.
Many politicians, including the president, are telling us that it is in the interests of the American people to re-engage in the Iraqi conflict. But while it may benefit Halliburton and other giant corporations in the military-industrial complex, it certainly doesn't benefit the American people. It will just cost more lives of Americans and Iraqi civilians (creating new enemies), and it will cost the country billions more dollars -- dollars that could be used to fix our own economy, create new jobs, and help hurting Americans.
Sending "advisors" to Iraq (and bombing in that country) is a bad mistake. I'm old enough to remember when we sent a few "advisors to Vietnam, and wound up with many thousands of troops involved. Is that going to happen again? The president says it won't, but we were told the same thing about Vietnam. What's going to happen when those "advisors" are shot at and some of them killed? Will we send more to protect them, and thus start the "mission creep"?
Let me be blunt. Helping the Maliki government survive means Iraq will continue to have a corrupt government that is ruled by only one religious faction -- and it will insure that the conflict will continue in the future. The situation is serious in Iraq, but there is nothing the United States can (or should) do to solve it. It is a problem the Iraqis must solve themselves.
