Who do you think is responsible for our failure in Iraq?

I believe this result can be blamed on the currant administration ,advertising when out troops were leaving, pulling all troops out .not having a SOF agreement in place .the troops won the war , the politicians lost the war.to get the SOF they could have used the price of the war as the bargaining chip ,seams to me the State department needs to hold joint blame with the President

Lt Generals do what they are paid for. No nation building. The are exists to break things and kill people. We do not have an obligation to make other countries develop the same ideal and beliefs that we do. Help them yes, do it for them, no.

Sorry for the misprints . I meant Let generals do what they are paid to do and Armies break things and kill people. Same principles our enemies pursue

Simply put and correct!

Another thought... By my understanding, the US Military is charged with destroying governments, not building them. How did we get in this business? Is it because the Department of State is so inept that we are the default organization? The only federal department that can actually accomplish a mission?

I feel we have wasted lives in Korea, Vietnam. Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan because our job is to defeat an enemy but our government in Washington who has not been to military training chooses to tell the military how to fight instead of giving us a clear mission order and allowing the department of defense to plan and execute. Any country that we fight for should pay the total cost and if they are to poor to pay their way ( oil money) then after we win the war we annex the country or let one of our allies to annex it.

The president did not negotiate the SOFA, he just used it as an excuse. The local governments always try to screw us on SOFA and we negotiate a deal to fix. The CIC was looking for an excuse to cover his failure.

The President and Congress decide what needs done and where, Issues the mission or request an estimate of time and money needed and Congress and POTUS approves and issues DOD orders, DOD calls together Department heads plans mission and gives orders to subordinates to execute, Host Country and Politicians left out at this time until completion of mission. Then DOD a would be looking out for mission and people while managing $$ anything different has unqualified people telling Qualified people how to do their job. = Failure

They lacked tenacity.

SSgt (Join to see) We didn't "leave to quickly". We didn't just call it quits, and give up. We were forced to withdraw when the current administration chose not to renew a SOFA that would have protected and furthered our presence there. The president cant be held responsible for the state of affairs when we left the country in a good position. All the Iraqi government had to do was maintain itself, the infrastructure that we put in place, and its people/security.

"The Boss" is one man..., and cant be held fully responsible for ANYTHING that happens in our own nation since we have an entire government at work, let alone what happens in another nation with its own government structure.

Right, now I remember the SOFA agreement. There wasn't a final positive choice made for out SMs so we got out. Maybe that was the President's plan. I am very thankful to be out of Iraq though, and I don't want to go back, and but I hate what Iraq is becoming now though.

I agree with a lot of what the SSG from Bliss but a lot of it is what a man feels is worth dying for. For many Iraqis, it wasn't the country but the family. But the Inshalla attitude is pervasive in the Mideast.