Iraq war for ten more years?

This is a video about Barack Obama, before he became United States president, having the courage to oppose George W. Bush on the Iraq war (yes, if one compares Obama to his politician colleagues, including some Democrats, not to rank and file peace activists, then it was courage).

Now that Obama is president, having much more power than then: will he have the courage to oppose the Pentagon people who want to continue Bush’s Iraq war for a decade or longer? I am not really sure.

From British (Conservative) Daily Telegraph:

US Army prepared to stay in Iraq for a decade

The Pentagon is prepared to remain in Iraq for as long as a decade despite an agreement between Washington and Baghdad that would bring all American troops home by 2012, according to the US army chief of staff.

By Alex Spillius and agencies in Washington

Last Updated: 7:49AM BST 27 May 2009

…

The US currently has about 139,000 troops in Iraq and 52,000 in Afghanistan, with a further 16,000 to arrive by the end of this year.

See also here.

This would mean not just escalation of war in Afghanistan, but at least ten more years of Iraq war again. Ten more years of dead Iraqi civilians, as if the present death toll of over a million human beings is not already enough. More dead United States soldiers; some of them, as happened recently in Baghdad, probably at their colleagues hands’ as combat stress will rise … Etc.

MoveOn Remains Silent on Wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan; by Tom Hayden, AlterNet: here. War in Pakistan: here.