SoCo would've done whatever sounds good but can't be proven because it wasn't done.

Bush and Rumsfeld don't have to be military strategists. That's why they have generals. And yes, I think this administration has done an admirable job. Could it have been better? No doubt. But war is a series of decisions made with the info at hand -- and there are a lot of armchair quarterbacks that forget that when looking back years later.

Had I been in charge , but hey seriously, one I wouldn't have invaded a country that posed no real threat to us.

I would have continued to use embargos and possibly CIA influence for an Iraqi stimulated regime change from within.

Bottom line is he wasn't a threat and we committed American lives and trillions of dollars which have stretched out and weakened and tired our forces while letting Bin Laden (the guy who attacked us) get away and the Taliban and Al Qaeda gain ground again. Not a smart move in my book.

Now, if I wasn't the head honcho and couldn't stop the invasion, but was in an influential position regarding strategy after the invasion such as in Paul Bremmers role, I wouldn't have disbanded the Iraqi Army and instead used them in a role of securing the country. When we disbanded them and sent em packing with no jobs and or pay and families to support we created the seeds for the insurgency to be sewn.

I also wouldn't have used Bush loyalists in civilian positions to rebuild infrastructure. The admin used people fresh out of college with little to no experience in these roles, but were loyal repubs and discarded many veterans who had expertise in these areas, but weren't loyal neocons. This whole side of the house was filled with incompetence and corruption.

It was a military action based on deception to begin with and once carried out it was hamstrung by incompetent neocon influenced pseudo leadership.

In regard to terrorism and Al Qaeda, I would have concentrated our forces in Afghanistan and along the Pakistan border fully eliminating any and all pockets of Al Qaeda and Taliban.

I would have used Special Ops to carry out operations similar to the Isreali Mossad to kill terrorist cells throughout Europe and the Middle East covertly wherever 'legitimate' intelligence pinpointed them.

Some of those trillions of dollars saved by not going into Iraq would have been used to actually secure our borders and beef up security at vulnerable points for terrorist attacks in the US.

Anyhoo, those are the actions that I think would have offered positive results in the fight against terrorism.

Wow. I really don't know where to start with all of that -- your lack of understanding about counterinsurgency, Al Qaeda's structure, reconstruction, the intelligence process, and employing various elements of national power is only matched by your naiivete. Thank heavens you aren't in charge.

I don't have time to even start answering this one right now -- I'll have to come back.

In my opinion you are the naive one believing in jingoistic slogans instead of relying on facts and reality. You are too high on patriotic machismo and hero worship (Bush) to see any other solution then the horrid one this admin took America on a ride for.

I know you were in the military, what was your MOS? I was in Naval Intelligence for four years 89 to 93 during the first Gulf War. Went in as an E-1 and came out an IS2 E-5 during that time. My specialty was Imagery intelligence and my area was South East Asia up until Iraq invaded Kuwait. I was then put into a CEST (crisis exploitation support team) working with Air Force, Marine, and Army intell troops. I identified plenty of targets through satellite imagery that were subsequently bombed during that war.

I have a bit of knowledge in this area and have followed events in the Middle East since that time.

Does anyone remember the old twilght zone episode where two countries put a solider on an island and they had to fight it out instead of the countries going to war?

I don't know, maybe its just me, but I'm thinking it would make a good made for tv movie to have SoCo and Expat on an island together. They could have a base with internet access and trade verbal attacks. Finally, they could meet mano a mano when the verbal attacks failed to decide "RIGHT."

Two internet bloggers, only one leaves....coming to a theater in your neighborhood.

I'm so headed to that Island....... You coming Expat???

It'll be like Capt. Kirk and that damn Lizard Captain. Or Lee Marvin and that Japanese actor.

Forgot about Kirk and the Lizard

SoCo, you're already on an island. Say "Hi" to Tattoo for me.

I don't think I need to recite my life story here, but I'm a Lt Col that's been in 19 years. Aside from my Master of Public Administration degree, I have a Master's Degree in Military Operational Art and Science. My thesis for the first degree studied intergovernmental relations between Okinawa's prefectural government and the Central government in Tokyo. My second studied 4th Generation Warfare and how its principles are being applied in today's asymmetric conflicts, focusing specifically on Bin Laden's ideology and methodology, as well as Saddam's efforts on the international scene prior to the Iraq war. I haven't been to Iraq yet, but I've been to Afghanistan.

I know what I'm talking about.

Just to start off, embargos do little or no good and are just for show, second of all the orginal iraqi army was corrupt and untrust worthy sometimes you have to start from scratch. I would be interested to know what information you have that says that we would have caught osama if we would have stayed in afganistan. Also Ive noticed you like to throw around neocon but i doubt you actually know the true meaning of the word. You say you would use special ops to neutralize targets covertly using legitamate intel, who deems it legit the same people that said there were wmds in iraq probably. Also do you really think congress would have approved that amount to secure our borders, I seriously doubt it. They dont even want to do anything about our immigration problem, why because it takes away from their voting base.

OK, SoCo, here we go:

For one thing, we were using embargos and CIA influence in Iraq -- for years. It wasn't working, largely because of the lack of UN resolve and other nations cheating via things like a corrupt Oil for Food program. As for them being no real threat to us, I don't think you could find a country in the world in 2003 that wanted to inflict pain on the US the way Iraq wanted to. And once again, the intel was there -- discovering it was wrong after the fact doesn't mean that believing it was a lie.

Al Qaeda isn't a monolithic entity that relies on Bin Laden for everything. It's a confederation. Killing Bin Laden would be significant, but it's not like AQ would collapse. He's already been reduced to the point where his ability to influence AQ's activities is questionable, and it hasn't hurt AQ. What's hurt them is the steady interdiction of its supplies, increasing willingness of Iraqis to turn on them, and deaths or capture of key leaders.

As far as the Taliban gaining ground goes, they do it every year. It's called a summer offensive. Winters in Afghanistan are brutal, so they husband their resources until summer. Increased summer activity is he norm. But if you hadn't noticed, when they try to mass and do something significant, they die. You ought to see what an A-10 does to a mud building full of Taliban.

As for the Iraqi Army, it' not like we could ask an organization full of Saddam loyalists and fanatics to work on our behalf. It had also already been decimated by our initial invasion. The whole thing had to be rebuilt, and that takes time. As we've done so, they've been taking on an increasing share of the burden.

As for "Bush loyalists", I'm not sure what you're talking about there. It's no like we pulled the Young Republican clubs off of college campuses and sent them over to rebuild a nation. You're painting with a pretty broad brush, here, and I don't think it's legitimate. Rebuilding a nation that had been through Iraq's experience required rebuilding a lot of infrastructure, restoring services, maintaining order, rebuilding a government from scratch, keeping a lid on ethnic tensions no longer constrained by Saddam's brutality, and rebuilding an economy. Trust me -- the people doing it weren't a bunch of college kids. I will admit, however, that the lion's share of the work to restore security was done by recent high school graduates.

As far as special operations forces and covert ops go, I would think that somewhere in your intel training you'd have learned that "covert" means it's not something you hear about on the nightly news. Just because you don't see it on CNN doesn't mean that it's not happening. But here's a key point -- unless you have the host government's permission, conducting offensive operations within a sovereign nation is an act of war. That's not something you do with allies.

As far as securing the borders and beefing up security goes, if you keep the enemy far away, you don't need walls. Nevertheless, we've tried to secure the border with fences, better border security, etc. The Democrats freaked. Similarly, we put provisions in place via the Patriot Act that would improve our ability to detect, track, and interdict terrrorists. The Democrats freaked about that, too. So your assertion that you'd do more in these areas is hollow.