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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: stockman_scott who wrote (112619)	8/24/2003 4:10:31 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Respond to of 281500

<Over time, if security in Iraq does not improve, the original occupation force may have to return for another tour of duty, said Phillip Gordon of the Brookings Institution. That could mean thousands of disgruntled military and their families in an election year, experts say. > When a long distance truck driver signs up to drive trucks, he shouldn't moan when he finds himself every other week on the other side of the country. There aren't a lot of enemy combatants in downtown Peoria or even in Hawaii, so military people should expect to spend their days seeing the world from a fox hole in some far off land, far from home. Because conflicts usually last longer than a few months, and typically years, they should expect to spend a LOT of time away from home. Maybe Osama's right and Americans are pussies who will cut and run when the going gets tough. Maybe Osama will win. He has now succeeded in getting Saddam out of Iraq and he didn't need to lift a finger - he got the USA to do it. Now, he just need to send a regular feed of bad news and body bags back to the USA and Americans will get sick of it. "Bringing the troops home" and leaving Iraq to the Iraqis to sort out will become a major political pressure. Osama is fighting American voters' wills, not King George II's. We often hear about the great American armed forces and how their budgests exceed the rest of the world combined, but what isn't reported is that the cost of putting a single American colonel in air-conditioned comfort in Iraq is the same as fielding about 100,0000 North Korean troops near South Korea. One American private would cost the same as 1,000 North Koreans. Okay, I'm making up numbers, but you get the point. One Pentagon-Purchased Toilet Seat or Official Mil Spec Hammer costing $2,000 uses up a lot of money too, but doesn't do a lot more than a regular Made in China $1 hammer. Dollars spent is not a good guide to military outcomes. Mqurice