Mr. President: Add Iraq to the U.S. troop withdrawal list

U.S. media is focused on Biden’s proposed end to the Afghan war after 20 years, scheduled to be completed by September 11. Optimism over the withdrawal is somewhat dampened by plans for U.S. to camp out across the border and bomb Afghanistan at will if bad guys emerge. Some withdrawal.

But they have largely ignored the deteriorating situation in Iraq that puts U.S. troops and their Iraqi hosts in peril by our refusal to withdraw them.

The Iraqi Parliament kicked us out in January, 2020, after we assassinated Iranian General Soleimani, four other Iranian officials and five Iraqi military personnel at the Baghdad Airport.

Iraqi Shi’ite groups, possibly aligned with Iran, stepped up attacks on Iraqi military facilities to encourage more effort to eject the hated Yankees.

Last October it got so bad Trump bellowed about closing the U.S. embassy and resort to massive bombing in Iraq and neighboring Syria to stem the violence.

The Biden administration, sees the futility of continued U.S. presence in Iraq. It is cooperating in negotiations for a possible timetable for withdrawal similar to that negotiated by Trump for Afghanistan.

Unlike Trump, who didn’t have the time or the will to accomplish the targeted May 1, 2021 withdrawal date, Biden has both the time and hopefully the will. He needs some of the trillions squandered in 18 years of senseless, criminal war in Iraq to pay for infrastructure, environmental renewal, health care for all; indeed all the benefits denied by endless war.

For Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, an end to the relentless attacks by paramilitaries seeking the U.S. exit is critical to his efforts to keep his government in power.

With luck, perseverance and common sense, Biden will pull a Trump and announce a timetable for leaving Iraq with a deadline not based on ‘conditions on the ground.’ That is merely perpetual war party speak for never ending…our never ending wars.