November 3, 2007- The Big Five-O

   From the very beginning, the Bush Administration warned everyone that the incursion and resulting war in Iraq was not going to be something that was wrapped up very quickly, like the first Gulf War was back in 1991, that was all said and done in less than thirty days. It was understandable how the American people might think that, after all, the current President's father was behind that one, and the theater of war was in the same country, so if America was able to wipe out the Iraqi military in such a short time then, it seemed logical that they were going to be able to do it again, which was what everyone was hoping, including George W. Bush himself. You may recall how America tried to wipe Saddam out right at the beginning with that strike aimed at him, the thinking being that if they assassinated the fucker right off the bat, things might be easy this time around too. However, the intelligence that Washington had on his whereabouts was flawed or some such shit, or Saddam heard they were coming for him, and he split the scene right before the bomb hit and walked away safe and sound that time. That meant that things were not going to be so easy this time around, but anyone that expected them to be was off their rocker, because there were fundamental differences in the way that the two wars were waged, even if it was a father-and-son team waging them. To begin with, in the first Gulf war, Bush Sr. decided not to pursue the retreating Iraqi army back into baghdad, because he thought that America had weakened them so severely that they could not protect Saddam's government any longer and that those that hated the guy from within Iraq were going to be able to overthrow him themselves. The problem with that was that Bush Sr. miscalculated badly, that Saddam was nowhere near as weak as he thought and he was able to fight off any and all attempts at overthrowing him and stayed in power until Bush Jr. went after him in 2003. So when he started up the current conflict in Iraq, he warned everyone that this one was not going to be quick and easy because he wanted to get the job done thoroughly this time. The American people seemed not to hear him though, as they all thought that this war was going to be a quick and easy affair too. However, as history has shown, they were wrong, and Bush was right, the current Iraq conflict has become anything but a quick and easy affair. It has dragged on until the present day with no clear end in sight, and people all across America are getting sick and tired of the entire fucking thing. They want it over and soon at that, but there is not an easy solution to something like this, and that is not forthcoming. It has become such a mess that it has become a major political point for all thjose running for President in 2008, with the likes of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama saying that one of their top priorities should they be elected will be to put a stop to this war. That is the main reason why these two are riding so high in he polls and look like very good candidates to be the next President and Vice-President of America because the American people are so tired of the war and want it to end now or at least as soon as possible. Even the Bush Administration has been making noises about ending the thing, however, the sincerity of those noises is questionable at best, but just the fact that they are even saying that shows what a hot-button issue this has become in today's America. No one seems to like the war at all any more and the way for politicians to get to the people's hearts seems to be by saying that they'll end this thing as quickly as they possibly can.

   That all sounds very good on the campaign trail, but there are serious flies in that ointment, big flies at that too. The biggest one is that the people that are in charge of fighting the war, the Pentagon Generals and shit, are not echoing the rhetoric of the Administration and the Presidential candidates, not by a long shot. In fact, there was some seriously disturbing news on that front from one General John Abazaid, one of the dudes that wass in charge of the whole thing, and is now  retired. General Abazaid was talking to some media types or another and brought up the subject of the war's possible length as far as he was concerned, and the viewpoint that he had was not good at all. He came right out and said that he seriously thinks that the American troops will be in Iraq for up to the next fifty years before this thing can be ended. He bases that on what he calls the "strategic situation" in Iraq, which is how things have become there ever since the war started. he specifically spoke of the rise in Islamic extremism and the world's dependence on oil as the main reasons behind his gloomy prognostications. He says that over time, the emphasis will have to be shifted from the American forces to regional forces, meaning that the Iraqi forces will have to take over the main fighting, but that the American troops will have to play what he calls "an indirect role" in things. That means that the Americans will have to stick around in Iraq to make sure that the Iraqis fight against each other and not against them any more, because the allegiances there change as often as the winds shift, so America has to watch out, as today's friend is tomorrow's foe. He also said that the American dependence on foreign oil is playing a big part in all of this, because America needs to get so much of its oil from the Middle East, that means that they have to have troops there to fight for it when necessary, which is most of the time over there. He said that if America does what Richard Nixon wanted it to back in the day, that is, reduce its dependencies on that Middle Eastern oil, that then the war could end and the troops come home. Otherwise, according to Abazaid, the troops could be staying in Iraq for the next half century because they would just have to. Taking them out and then  bringing them back again time after time would be a very inefficient way to go about things, because they would have to set things up over and over again, so the only practical solution is to stay there for however  long it takes, and that could be until like 2060 or so. This is exactly what not only the Bush Administration but every Presidential candidate stumping for votes does not want to hear, because that would be political suicide and homicide for them in many ways. But you cannot just dismiss this as the babblings of an uneducated man that knows zero about the situation in Iraq, as Abazaid was in charge of it all until  just a few short moinths ago and should know what he is talking about. That is what makes this  all so disturbing, that someone that was Bush's right hand man in Iraq is saying something so stark like this because you know that it is not campaign trail rhetoric of any kind, as Abazaid is now retired and has no stake in any of it anymore, his retirement is guaranteed and he cares not who is President or any of that shit, his life is set from now on.  He no longer has to take orders from anyone or give them either, so he can speak his mind freely, something that he has not been able to do ever since he started his military career back in the day, and he has a very ominous viewpoint of it  all. He has reasons for that too, reasons that are every bit as ominous as what he has to say.

   The main reason for this all is what America has created since they  went into Iraq, and that is not the free society that they said they were after when they started. What they have done is create a monster of epic proportions that they cannot control and probably never will be able to either. They unleashed every motherfucker that had any kind of axe to grind with anyone over anything, and they are all out of control now. In a land wheer fanatics and  zealots are everywhere, it is just tioo easy for some asswipes to get themselves all stirred up and take up arms for some stupid bullshit reasons and cause mayhem. There are no shortages of fuckwads that will take advantage of these people and get them all stirred up and shit, and practically every single one of them is in Iraq nowadays. America does not even have a clue as to who many of these fuckers are let alone what to do about them, as they pop up out of nowhere like roaches every day it seems. As soon as they put down one faction of them, another pops up to replace them, and that cycle is unbroken and wil be for a long time to come. The only thing that all these zealots and such have in common is that they hate America and want to kill Americans for this reason and that, so they'll always be fighting them as long as they are alive. No government of any kind is going to be able to do jackshit about this, as these people's allegiances are to some fucked up causes, not any politics of any kind, so there will always be new ones attacking and fighting America no matter what. This can easily go on for fifty years, even one hundred as there is no  way to stop this, short of exterminating everyone in the country.  There is also no way that America is going to reduce its dependencies on Middle Eastern oil either, because it is and always has been just too fucking easy to do it that way. It is just too hard to get the shit domestically, even though there is  an awful lot of oil underneath American soil. Anytime that you woul dtrty to do that, there would be all sorts of shit and red tape that you would have to go through, the environmentalists would  raise hell and get in your way, as they have been doing in Alaska for decades now, as they would put their agendas against that of the country and fuck things up and slow them down. By the time you would be able to get any oil, decades would have passed, and a crisis would hav eensued by then. There are just too many fucking lawyers here in America that would be glad to stick themselves right  into the middle oif this and fuck things up, not caring what they did, as long as they made money off of it and got publicity as well. This wa strue back inb the days of Nixon, and it is even  truer nowadays, as lawyers have multiplied like rabbits in that time and are stronger and more numerous than ever. Their shit would make the costs of domestic oil spiral sky-high, making it  much more expensive than what is done now. There are no environmental lawyers in the Middle East, at least none that make any difference, so they do not get in the way and drive prices and overheads up. As much as America might like to be self-sufficient as far as oil goes, these lawyers in America fuck everything up and that makes it much more profitable and easy for them to go to the Middle East and do what they have been doing in order to get oil. If these fucking lawyers would lay off a bit, maybe that would change, but they will never do that, lawyers never do, so that means that America is stuck in Iraq for a long time to come until they can get that straightened out. All that easily adds up to fifty years, maybe more, and that is why General Abazaid is saying what he is.

   However, we cannot forget that there are those in America that love what the General said, staying in Iraq for the next fifty years is music to their ears. To the war profiteers, that means that they'll get even richer than they ever though possible and that is what they are all about. They set this whole war up to begin with so that it would not be done easily and quickly like in 1991, but fifty years out of it exceeds even their expectations. But we can be sure that they'll try as hard as they fucking can to make that goal, because they care not about the human cost of such a debacle, just how much it brings into their financial coffers. Making this last that long is not going to be an easy thing at all, America has never been in a war of that duration, not even the Cold War lasted that long, but since General Abazaid threw that figure out, that is now their new goal for it all. In that amount of time, not only could America completely re-shape Iraq in ewvery way, but they could set records for war profiteering that would never be broken. The General knew all about these fuckers when he made that statement too, he knows that they are the ones that want it to last thatlong, and  since they have such major influence in the Pentagon and such, they have a good shot of doing  just that. The only way that this fifty year time frame could be avoided is for the American people to rise up against this big time, demanding that it stops sooner than all that, and make it politically unfeasible for anyone to say or do otherwise. If they consistently vote out and remove each and every politician at every level that says otherwsie, the politicians would go to the war profiteers and tell them that the party is over now, because it is the politicians that are in charge here, not Mr. Businessman. The problem with that is that the American people probably will never do such a thing, as they are brainwashed and cowed into submission by those politricians greatly, and would be told that doing so is unamerican, and nothing scares the shit out of a good American like being threatened with that label. That tactic will surely be used for as long  as it works, and that could be a long time, making that fifty years look very realistic. This war was all about money from the get-go, nothing else, and those that are making the immense piles of it are not about to let go that easily. The American people have now been comnditioned to accept a state of continual war of some kind or another, and the trick is going to be to make sure that some parts of this war are not that bad as far as American losses go so that the people focus their attentions elsewhere. If they can make this thing ebb and flow over the decades, they have a real shot at making fifty years and these fuckers will die trying to do just that. They know how easily American are conditioned to forget  about things in favor of another issue, and that trait will be manipulated continuously to make that big five-o a reality. This may very well work too, and that is what General Abazaid is warning everyone about. The whole thing has been set up to work exactly that way, it is now just a matter of if it can continue to be manipulated and such so that this continues for that length of time. Abazaid was incharge of doing that  but now that he is retired, he gets brass balls and  starts warning against it, just as President Eisenhower warned against the military/industrial complex in his retirement speech after that very complex got him to the top and a cushy retirement too. What Eisenhower warned against is still alive and  well almost fifty years later, so it stands to reason that what Abazaid warned about wil be around for that long as well. This war will drag on for decades on end, because stopping it is in no one interests, that is, no one deemed important.

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