To yield or not to yield. That is the question

As the war in Iraq looks no closer to stopping than Derby County winning the Premiership this year, perhaps one family should be thanking their lucky stars and the 5 poor US soldiers, who were brothers, who died in 1942. Since 1942, the US army has adopted the “sole survivor” policy, which prevents a family from losing all of their children to war. Sergeant Jason Hubbard had his brother, Marine Lance Corporal Jared Hubbard die in a roadside bomb, as well as another brother, Nathan Hubbard who died in a helicopter crash. As the Hubbards mourned and rejoiced at the same time at the deaths of their sons, as well as the safe return of the other and another torn family, there is yet another war that involves the US. This time, the battlefield is not on the under-developed cities of Iraq. This time, there will be no tyrannies to target and kill. This time, the war takes place in the United States of America. On one side, we have the incumbent President of the USA, George Washington Bush and his fellow military commanders who would prefer a slow reduction and a slow handing over of power to the Iraqi Government. On the other side, we have lawmakers and the general public, who voted Mr Bush into power in 2004 rather than John Kerry.
Mr Bush’s argument for a slow reduction is that he believes that the Iraqi government, as stated in a report earlier this week, would be thrown into chaos if the US troops were to pull out. While military commanders believe that the Iraqi forces were not ready to assume full control of the situation and Iraq might go into civil war again. Also, they believed that the current Iraqi government is not yet ready to take over as they have not shown themselves capable of controlling the violence as of now. Mr Bush even likened the Iraq war to that of the Vietnam War to justify his actions of not reducing the troops and even sending in more troops. He feels that if the US were to reduce their troops now heavily, this will embolden the enemy as the US has in a way yield to their violent behavior. The counter argument is that too many lives and too many families have been torn apart from this war. The earlier the US troops pull out of Iraq, the better it is for the US as their military costs will go down exponentially and fewer lives would be lost. Also, if the US does not pull out now, then they might never do so as they will never really give the Iraqi forces a chance to show their abilities.
I feel that both sides have their points that are logical. It is true that if the US were to pull out now, terrorist forces might see this as a weakness in the US policies and there will be more terrorist attacks to force US troops out of the Middle East altogether. Then, instability will kick in as the terrorists attempt to seize control of the whole Middle East, which will put the economies and the safety of many countries at risk. However, the US has already spent too much money and lives in this war. No country likes to see itself being controlled by an external force. That may be the reason behind all the violence. If the US were to withdraw now, then there might be a chance of peace in the Middle East. The terrorists did not ask for much at first. They just wanted an Arab Empire to be controlled by Muslims only. Yet, we did not give them the chance to do so and to control their countries themselves. If there were not US troops in the Middle East, then Sep 11th might not have happened. What the terrorists are demanding is just a Middle East controlled by Muslims, and not a Middle East controlled by some guy sitting on Air Force One. If we try to let them have their way, then peace is guaranteed. However, if they go beyond this agreement, and continue their attacks to ensure that the world becomes a Muslim world, then I think that we have the justification to attack them hard. Remember, they attacked us because we are on their homeland. If we didn’t do so, innocent people would not have died. Hence, the problem rests in us, not them. If not for us, they might not have committed those insane acts to get us out of there. Hence, it is our problem, not theirs.