Chuck Hagel: Iraq And Afghanistan Aren't Ours To Win Or Lose

The Washington Post:

These wars have cost more than 5,100 American lives; more than 35,000 have been wounded; a trillion dollars has been spent, with billions more departing our Treasury each month. We forgot all the lessons of Vietnam and the preceding history.

Read the whole story: The Washington Post

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[TomZart]

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WHERE WARS ARE WON OR LOST


Wars are waged by older men
In battle rooms in countries apart.
Who call for greater firepower
And troops for the combat chart.

While out among the shattered flesh
The dreams of all have turned gray.
So young and determined their faces were
Till on the battlefield they lay.

Unable to overcome their pride
The politicians cast their vote.
For this or that or something else
As the rage of war sounds its note.

Wherever wars are won or lost
The soldiers fall like toys.
Down through history it remains the same
Most who die are hardly more than boys.

Like monkeys in a revolving cage
Man squabbles for the peanuts of power.
When will we rise above our greed
And become as a beautiful flower?

Death to death, dust to dust
The wrath of war is a horrible crime.
It’s the beast within that still prevails
As it has through the torments of time.



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[NCAV2]

Excellent read. Hagel is one of the few reasonable Republicans out there.

[thislittlepeggy]

You know... I 'd like to think the same thing, however I've been disappointed to many times.
For instance, once they are railed in by "conservative talk", reason is forgotten.
My defenition of a reasonable republican congress member,(i'm sad to say) is one who doesn't depend on conservative right wing talk radio for their information.... thier party needs a grown up,

[Roxanna]

Chuck Hagel is absolutely right...!
More and more people wherever they come from left or right need to speak up..

[thepoliticalcat]

And where were you, Chuck, when your good buddy, Gee Dumb? Yeah! was setting up these wars? Where was your voice then?

[ByersL]

While he did vote for the original authorization for the wars, he was one of only 2 repubs to vote for funding with a timetable, and also has been a strong critic of the Iraq war for years. Many are to blame for these messes, but that's beside the point. It's time to get out.

[unwashedmasses]

Bless you, Chuck Hagel. You are an honest man.

[christopherflynn]

I totally agree with your comment...I served in vietnam (68-69) and after leaving the military, joined VVAW which had a great poster that I wish I still possessed... It read, "The Vietnam War is not something to be won or lost...It's a mistake to be corrected..." Seems appropriate to substitute either Iraq or Afghanistan for a similar poster...

[SmolderingRuin]

NOW, he says "Iraq and Afghanistan are not America's to win or lose." That's nice. Too bad he voted to give the liar bush authority to illegally invade the sovereign nation of Iraq back in 2002. I guess he didn't expect us to win anything by doing so. Strange reasoning there.

[countfloyd]

So did a lot of Democrats.

[sloLes]

LBJ hung on long enough to let Nixon turn it into his war. So, they both lost. Bush has lost three or four wars, depending upon how we count. Iraq is one, after the mission was accomplished. Afghanistan is two. Lebanon is three, although the Israelis dropped the bombs, fired the rockets, and killed the civilians. But we approved the plan and supplied the weapons. And the war on terroism is four.

Isn't it bizarre that we actually won initially in both Iraq and Afghanistan? But we hung on to give it all back. Now, Obama is turning into his war. And just like Vietnam, we are revamping failed strategies and methods nine years into the cakewalk. But we're NOT losing!

And just like Vietnam, no one has any use for our puppet govenment in Afghanistan. None of the Above won the election.

[RobertHenryEller]

"We forgot all the lessons of Vietnam and the preceding history."

What you mean "We," Paleface? (No offense, Senator Hagel, just Nickelodeon TV-Talk.)

McCain never learned them.

The Swift Boaters denied them.

I think a few million of us did get the message.

But I hear President Obama thinks Vietnam's old news.

I have news for President Obama.

He was fighting the Vietnam War the whole time he was running against McCain.

Whatever war he thinks (and I hope at least he knows he's fighting a war, although I'm can't see any evidence of it) he's fighting next Wednesday before the Joint Session of Congress, in many ways he's still fighting the Vietnam War.

He's fighting it in Iraq. He's fighting it in Afghanistan.

And he's not fighting ideology in Congress. He's fighting militancy. It's just another side of Vietnam thinking.

Except it's going to be a lot harder to end this Vietnam. Because you can't bring the troops home when they're already home. And you can't get them out of the war zone when home is the war zone.

[MarsAmbassador]

I like Hagel, or at least I think I do. Maybe it's Luger. I can't remember now. But anyway, why are all these GOP guys crawling out of the woodwork to decry the war and call for the troops to come home now? A year ago they were calling Obama a coward and a dangerous threat to American security for daring to suggest we need to set a timetable for doing just that. They truly are the kings of 180. Anything they were for during Bush they are against under Obama, just because. Back during the Bush Years, anything critical said of the government was tantamount to treason. He was to be followed, no questions asked. The gubment was the embodiment of the greatness of America. Now it's the problem and represents everything wrong with America. And treasonous calls of secession, assassination and revolution are tossed around like footballs at a family reunion. Will these people please make up their mind? Or have they lost that too?

[wadenelson1]

The United States should set a goal of going 25 years without war.

[Meggie]

No, some of us didn't forget any of it Chuck.
But Repubs remembered better than anyone. They got us into this one without a draft. They brought in their for-profit buds. And THEN they left the mess.
A pity you QUIT rather than hanging around to try to help fix it.

[robadeaux]

Not all of us forgot them... of course some of your neocon pals never learned anything to forget in the first place.

[Azor]

Hagel is as far from being a neocon a the bluest of blue dems.

[beauwulff]

If this guy had run against Obama, I might have voted for him. At the very least, it would have been a contest focused on issues, not trash talk.

[Tidyus]

Hagel has always been against the war and I woukd have voted for him too

[CaptRuby]

Why didn't you tell this to your buddy Bush and Cheney, Republican used to daemonize and mock folks from left who used to say the same thing, these are unnecessary wars, and are not needed.

But, Cheney is still around and listening.

[Azor]

He did. That's why Cheney said a few years ago that it is very hard to apply Reagan's 10th commandment to Hagel. The commandment says that you should never say something bad about another republican