Why are US soldiers still in Iraq?

It is now June 2011 and in spite of promises made by then Presidential candidate Barack Obama in 2008 that he would end the war in Iraq responsibly, the exact opposite has occurred. US soldiers are still in Iraq and the Obama Administration has made only a partial withdrawal of these troops. There are currently 47,000 US soldiers still in Iraq with no end in sight. Just yesterday, the Department of Defense announced that two US soldiers were killed in Southern Iraq while “conducting operations” (Griffis).

Also, an attorney was shot to death by unknown gunmen. The attorney was working for the Baghdad provincial council. Two Iraqi soldiers and an Iraqi army lieutenant general were killed. Gunmen also were responsible for killing four family members in a home. In the city of Mosul in Northern Iraq, a soldier was killed. A former Iraqi army officer lost his life in Kirkuk. In addition to all these incidents a US patrol in the city of Kut was targeted with a roadside bomb (Griffis).

All of these events occurred in just one day. And these are only the incidents that are actually reported. There are most probably many other things happening inside Iraq that are not reported. With the death of those two US service members that means that there will be at least two more American families that will be upset because their sons or daughters lost their lives in a war that has been determined by all the true military experts to be lost. If the war is lost, then people in America should be asking themselves why US soldiers are still stuck in Iraq. The news about Iraq seems to have been put to the side as not as many people are debating what should be debated. Why are US forces still in Iraq after eight years? That is eight years too long.

Saddam Hussein is no longer alive. There were and still are absolutely no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and this was confirmed long ago by the IAEA or the International Atomic Energy Agency. There was no terrorism in Iraq until the United States military invaded Iraq, destabilized the country and made a mess over there. It is a mess that they are not able to clean up. There was no chance of Iraq ever becoming a stable democracy. Iraq is now under the control of Shiite political parities that have a close relationship with the government of Iran. And lastly, Saddam Hussein’s government was never responsible for September 11^th. So why is President Obama still keeping these service members in a country that they don’t even belong in?

The other thing that people should be asking themselves is why is the US media not telling the public everything they should know? What happened to America having a free press? Our press is certainly not as free as many people think.

US soldiers have no business being in Iraq. They need to be at home protecting US borders and preparing to assist people in case of a natural disaster. US forces need to be withdrawn from Iraq and brought home now before more soldiers lose their lives.

Works Cited

Griffis, Margaret. 14 June 2011. 15 June 2011 <http://original.antiwar.com/updates/2011/06/14/tuesday-2-u-s-soldiers-21-iraqis-killed-40-iraqis-wounded/>.