"Situation in Iraq ia still TENSE.
Oh really. Get out into the real world. This is a mess. Watch the news as we the people do and then ask yourself if this is just TENSE.
This the the reason us the people question you. What world do you live in?

when bush says he will only listen to people directly involved in the military and not take the advice of politicians here in the u.s. - then who is running the show- remember this is a professional volunteer military- if 51% of them suddenly decide that they want out do the troops come home- it's another easy out for bush to say that his focus on listening is with the troops,they volunteered to be there in the first place- iraqi's ready to take over- mission accomplished? no way

being in a unit with deploying soldiers i get to see the havoc that is played with soldiers/jobs/families and for what? for bush to support a country that has been fighting for eons and then turn his back on his own country? New Orleans will not get more support because the govt. "ran out of money" but we can support the powers that be in Iraq??? our own govt. is weak. what can we expect from Iraq? not much if theyre paying attention to our faults.

I am not a fan of President Bush, however, the Iraq war is not all his fault. I saw this 13 years ago and was one of the main reason I retired. As a company first sergeant, I was very frustrated with Sergeant Majors at all levels of commands and Battalion and above commanders. These yes men attitudes and they're unwillingness and lack of courage of not telling the next hirer that he or she is wrong or there is a better way. The I don't want to rock the boat over the past 20 years has created a breed of weak knees senior officers and senior NCO's who are afarid to tell the boss's what they need to know and stick to there guns. When the Rumfeld fired the Chief of Staff of the Army, Generals should have sent a message by retiring. As the generals did in 1975, when Rumfeld jump Al Haig over serior generals from LTC to four stars and made him SHAPE commander, 19 gererals retired in protest. The president was not served well by his generals all because of Rambo Rumfeld and a Bunch of weak knees, and now we are repping from it in Iraq.

The word Democracy does not have the same meaning in the Middle-East as it has here. What do we mean by Shiites are infiltrating into the army?. They are the majority. They will be the army!!!! And if anyone thinks Iran and specially Turkey will be sitting around and let the Kurds create a country then I have a bridge for sale in New York.
May God help us with this big big mess.
Reza

I am not a fan of President Bush, however, the Iraq war is not all his fault. I saw this 13 years ago and was one of the main reason I retired. As a company first sergeant, I was very frustrated with Sergeant Majors at all levels of commands and Battalion and above commanders. These yes men attitudes and they're unwillingness and lack of courage of not telling the next hirer that he or she is wrong or there is a better way. The I don't want to rock the boat over the past 20 years has created a breed of weak knees senior officers and senior NCO's who are afarid to tell the boss's what they need to know and stick to there guns. When the Rumfeld fired the Chief of Staff of the Army, Generals should have sent a message by retiring. As the generals did in 1975, when Rumfeld jump Al Haig over serior generals from LTC to four stars and made him SHAPE commander, 19 gererals retired in protest. The president was not served well by his generals all because of Rambo Rumfeld and a Bunch of weak knees, and now we are repping from it in Iraq.

Bush has continually stated that U.S. troops will withdraw as Iraqi forces take the lead against the insurgency. However, if the best trained military force in the world, the U.S.military, has not been able to end the insurgency in three years, is it logical to believe the Bush withdrawal plan? The U.S. military is not going anywhere for many years to come. It would be a great service to the U.S. public if the major media would analyze and publish information relating to this issue. It would also be great if the media would report on the four "super" bases being built in Iraq. The fact that these bases are being built is evidence that the U.S. military will never leave Iraq.

Vietnam deja-vu all over again...unless we get our people out before the civil war starts in earnest (and it will) look for us to be making the kind of frenzied escape from Iraq we made a generation ago from Vietnam, when the Vietnamese army was supposedly able to hold its own.

I don't believe a darn thing he says. Why has it taken 3 years for us to train their troops? Our basic training lasts 8-10 weeks. We send our own troops over there with little training and they figure it out. Bush just says the same thing over and over and over. We shouldn't be there. We created the havoc that is now exisiting. We can't protect or rebuild our OWN cities (New Orleans and the Gulf Coast) with tax dollars but he wants us to support protecting and rebuilding there. I'm disgusted by this whole administration.

None of the Iraq forces can be trusted to keep pase due to the infiltration from the extreemists

How can anyone listen to Bush with a straight face and trust anything he's saying about Iraqi readiness. Last i heard there was ONE battalion prepared to operate independently (without US backing and support.)