Here's from another soldier who's "been there" as well.

Betrayal Accomplished

Isaiah J. Poole
May 01, 2007

Jonathan Powers remembers well President Bush’s infamous speech four years ago today in front of the “Mission Accomplished” banner on the USS Abraham Lincoln.

At the time, Powers was a captain in the 1st Armored Division and was preparing for a deployment to Baghdad. “I was a believer,” he told me during a brief conversation Monday. “I thought we were going there to defend a nation. I thought we were going there to free an oppressed people. And we had that opportunity in the summer in 2003. We had Baghdad secured. We drove around the streets without doors on our Humvees. We ate dinners in Iraqi homes.

“But because of the failure in the administration to plan for the reconstruction, that is when things began to fall apart.”

It was that falling apart that disillusioned Powers and prompted him to join demonstrators in front of the White House on Monday to call for President Bush to sign, rather than veto, the Iraq war bill that was being sent to him by Congress today. That bill would more than meet President Bush’s funding request for the war effort, but would also mandate the orderly withdrawal of troops supported by a majority of the American public.

Powers spoke briefly but passionately in front of a small crowd of demonstrators about his disillusionment as a veteran who spent 15 months in Baghdad. He spoke of how when he arrived in the Iraqi capital, he saw that his fellow soldiers did not have adequate body armor, and than much of what had been promised to Iraqis as part of the reconstruction effort had either been not delivered or ended up being spoils for American contractors.

“I felt betrayed. I felt as a soldier I had faith in the leadership that had sent me there, and that by betraying us, by not taking care of the plan, it hurt our efforts,” he said.

Powers, who is now a leader of VoteVets.org, said that “on the fourth anniversary of the day that he betrayed so many American soldiers and so many Iraqi people by not planning for what was ahead,” Bush should do the right thing by signing the Iraq supplemental.

But Bush has made it clear that he will not, and so remains stubbornly on a course of continued betrayal of the Americans soldiers and reckless endangerment of America’s security.

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/200...complished.php

Four years ago, AWOL Bush landed on the aircraft Lincoln for a photo op and declared "Mission Accomplished!"

So, now, 48 blood-soaked months later, despite the lapdog corporate media's lapping up and barking U.S. military propaganda spoonfed to the American public (and even repeated to international audiences on CNN) to brainwash the American public and drum up moral and financial support of Bush's war, what exactly has been accomplished?

* Possibly as many as one million Iraqi dead, four million fled or displaced internally. The largest exodus since the establisment of the State of Israel in 1948.

* The erasing of the history, monuments, archeological sites of the Cradle of Civilisation.

* The kidnapping and lynching of the President and members of the legitimate government.

* The slaughter of the President's sons and grandson.

* One hundred journalists and thirty seven support workers killed. A figure in order of magnitude higher than any war zone on earth (shoot the messengers of this illegal disaster?) It seemed to be policy from day one, literally.

* Over three hundred academics assassinated and thousands fled. The education of the next generation snatched from Iraq's youth, in the country that brought near every academic subject to the world.

* Overflowing morgues.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.p...articleId=5535

Well, you can't say we do not allow dissent and anti-war opinions on our site, can you?
There are many reasons I can understand for one to believe that President Bush made mistakes during the Saddam Hussein witch hunt, and the ensuing time leading up to the invasion if Iraq. He undoubtedly will admit to that himself. A decision is only as good as the information on hand at the time of the decision. It appears to me that wasting time placing blame years later is just that. There is little to be gained by such action. Nothing is to be gained by talk of impeachment. Would the Democrats really be happy if Bush is impeached? Cheney would become president.

So why don't the House and Senate Democrats and Republicans start working together and come up with a solution to their differences?

George Tenet, former CIA Director under Clinton, just came out and said that his people had given information to Condelezza Rice just days before 9-11 that an attack was being prepared. He said that the CIA did not withold any information from the president. They gave it through their proper chain of command. What information that was passed directly to the president we do not know. I believe that mistakes were made, but not necessarily mistakes that were printed by the Sunday Times. There are lots of newspapers one can choose to read. I believe that the decision makers tried to make the best decision possible with the information available at the time. So we find out now that some it was false, or misleading. This is now. Too late to matter. Get on with doing the right thing.

We have allowed Kaf to present a lot of opinion based on the Sunday times, which is sort of like one of those papers you see at the grocery store checkout stands, which prints photos of Aliens From Outer Space to sell papers. Perhaps it is time to lay off for a while, and let the situation cool.
No need to start name calling, talk of blood on anyone's hands and all that.
Let's give the system of checks and balances time to work.

Whole heartly agree with Mr. Joe. Plus, this conversation is circular and will keep going around and around because of our "opinions".

__________________
"The Korean Kid"

what do you say, Kaf, can we give it a rest for a while? I think we will have enough to do to keep track of the headlines these days!

As I gathered from the great article Kaf entered in our Forum contest, (And won, by the way!), at that time, He was living in rural Korea and teaching at an institute of higher learning. I don't believe that was fiction.
I hope you and your family are still doing well, and prospering in this great country.
(His fine article can still be read here, if you scroll up to ARTICLES in the light blue area above any page and find the Kafkorea article. I re-read it this week and still enjoy it!) I recommend it.

Mr. Joe,

I think I may have posted one article from the Sunday Times. Maybe two - I don't recollect. Anyway, Mr. Joe, I'm going to go easy on you because I admit that I may have reacted a bit too defensively when you questioned my source at the time. Later, I realized that maybe you were just asking an honest question and wasn't playing the "attack sources" game. So, I will acknowledge my error. However, just for your information, the Sunday Times is considered to be a "mainstream" news outlet. It's owned by Rupert Murdock (the same guy that owns Fox), and it is London's version of the New York Times. Sometimes I do actually refer to sources from the corporate media, and this was one of those times.

However, my perspective is that all writers are propagandists because it's a fact of human nature. It's just that some try harder to not only be a propagandist but to get as close as one can to the truth, for what it's worth, and some believe that it's worth a lot. In order to do this, you have to be free and independent. That means you can't be owned by anyone. That is one good thing I'll say about some Americans. Some of us, at least, try to realize independent thought and think outside of the system. It is an American tradition that perhaps began with Tom Paine. We don't believe in kings, and we don't like it when a President starts to act like he's a king. We rejected a monarchal system of government at the very founding of the U.S. Men gave their blood for that rejection, so it curdles my blood when a President says that the Constitution is just "a piece of paper." That "piece of paper" was hard fought for. Men risked their fortunes and gave their blood for that, and the rights that are enshrined in it are sacred rights that stand out like a beacon of light to all people in the world. Those universal rights are absolute, so even the worst criminal is guaranteed his day in court. It's the way of justice in a civilized and enlightened nation; thus when a president attempts to take away habeus corpus, yeah, I get angry about that. But not only do I get angry - I also get suspicious about real motives. I have to wonder when this attack on fundamental rights will begin to extend to the American citizen as well.

Okay, well, you're right about impeachment. Any motions for impeachment must necessarily include Cheney. If the truth be known, Cheny is more of a central figure than Bush is. However, impeachment must be preceeded by authentic investigations rather than the sham investigations that occurred thus far. Even 911 was not investigated thoroughly, in my opinion. It's all about accountability, Mr. Joe. You can't go forward without accountability or else the same thing will come back to haunt you. This is what history teaches. A great deal of the illegalities, wrong doings and even criminal activities have occurred because many of the players are Iran Contra throwbacks from the Reagan Administration, who think that they are above the law. Because politicians, including Democrats, whitewashed and covered up Iran-Contra, and no one was really punished as a result of what we now know involved serious criminal offences, especially the principal players, then all of it came back in the form of the present Administration of Bush Jr.

Reply to Kafkorea's post # 16

I find it difficult to disagree with anything in this particular post, and I believe it is certainly as honest and straightforward as any you have written. I try not to get emotional but sometimes I get carried away, also. I may have been exaggerating a bit when I compared the Times to a grocery store paper.
You already know you have a tough audience, considering the majority of readers of this forum are in some way employed by or related in some way to the present U.S. government. Timidity is not one of your virtues. Thanks. I appreciate your giving us a look at the other side of the coin, even though you expected, and got, some derisive feedback.

I detect strong British influence in your writing. I wondered how the Prime Minister would fare with his standing by the U.S. in his support of the Iraq war. It looks bad for him at home. Have you followed the Scottish bid to become a separate country? I'll bet the Queen won't want to talk about that on her visit in the U.S. The world is certainly changing.