Britain bows out of a five-year war it could never have won

[cal04]

By Patrick Cockburn
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article3258008.ece

Britain handed over security in Basra province yesterday, bringing a formal end to its ill-starred attempt over almost five years to control southern Iraq.

The transfer of power was marked by a parade of thousands of Iraqi soldiers and police beside the Shatt al-Arab waterway, which runs past Basra. As helicopters roared overhead it was the biggest show of strength by the Iraqi army forces since the fall of Saddam Hussein.

The great majority of people in Basra were glad to see the British go. " You can see the happiness on the faces of everyone," said Adel Jassam, a teacher. "It feels like a heavy burden has been lifted off our chests. "

(snip)
Britain stumbled into a small war in southern Iraq which it did not expect to fight and where its aims were always unclear. It is now stumbling out with very little achieved and its military reputation dented, after a conflict in which a victory could never have been won.

[defendandprotect]

1. Does that wrap it up, or do they have other forces in Iraq?

[bleever]

2. Tony Blair applied a perfectly sound idea,

that Britain should be at the vanguard of world leadership with the United States, at exactly the wrong time in history: this presidency.

Like hitting the "Bankrupt" slice when spinning the wheel on "Wheel of Fortune".

[babylonsister]

3. How odd. Downing Street Minutes anyone? Was winning an option? nt

[Vincardog]

4. "Winning" was never the point. How else knows what Permanent War means?

The USA has two industries left prisons and WAR.