Emma Sky: Why Iraq is the 'worst strategic failure since the foundation of the United States'

At one point, Sky recounts in the book, Donald Rumsfeld showed up for a military briefing in northern Iraq, and didn't know where neighbouring Iran was on the map.

She also stated the biggest fuckup was in 2010 when they backed Maliki when he wouldn't give up power, when Obama was running the show. Plenty of blame for everyone according to her.

The Americans got so wrapped up in their own "Founding Fathers of Iraq" bullshit that it was impossible to pull the pin on Maliki until it was far too late. The prick was 100% Shiite sectarian and the support of the pissed off Sunnis that went to ISIS is completely on him. This happens when the Americans get pinned down by their own myths and propaganda. Just like in Egypt, where the first real election those twats ever had resulted in the Muslim Brotherhood winning the government until the military had to step in again. Doubtful that any American adventures in that awful part of the world will ever have a good result, at least not until they start to recognize actual reality instead of the wishful thinking and outright fantasies those neo-con think tanks in DC keep dreaming up. "Muslim Democracies", my ass.

The biggest mistake in the Iraq War was the disbanding of the Iraqi Military which fed the insurgency.

Word too is that a lot of the commanders in ISIS are ex-Baath military. Maliki fucked things up so badly that there was no opportunity at all to get the ex-Baath out of the underground and into mainstream society. All they saw was the Sunnis getting screwed by the Shiite majority so they're now in permanent war mode until they win or get killed.

ISIS was bound to happen as Al Qaeda couldn't be the top kid on the block forever because there was always going to be someone looking to unseat them.

No surprise either that ISIS came so close to winning it all in their first big campaign a couple of years ago. That joke of a government in Baghdad, those "Founding Fathers of Iraq" as the American propaganda went, was almost as ridiculous a non-entity as the one the installed in Saigon back in the 1960's. Like Bill Maher said recently, it'd be nice one day if the US ended up backing someone who was actually competent instead of just another cardboard cut-out that collapses almost as soon as American backing is withdrawn.

Hindsight is 20/20. The big failure is the same as it always is--the leaders of a country whipping everyone up into a war frenzy, compounded by a dismal failure of a complicit media to question authority.

That said, it is eminently possible that without the invasion of Iraq, the region would be in the same state anyways. These conflicts have been simmering since the Shia/Sunni schism and the gunpowder was laid in the divvying up of the region by European powers after WWI. Above all this is a Muslim civil war and we are just trying to put out the fire with gasoline.

If Saddam Hussein were still in power and Iraq hadn't been turned into a Somalia-like failed state, there would be no ISIS.

Yes. And invading Iraq was pure bullshit politics to get the population riled up and deflect from Saudi Arabia/911.

But, how long could Saddam stay in power? Dictatorships tend to go south all of a sudden. Of course in that case the US would not be wearing the mess, certainly not to the same degree.

That's the worst? Really?

I can think of a few that trump this one.

* Allowing the Soviet Union to seize half of Europe after a war the USSR helped to start went poorly for the USSR.

* Not nuking North Vietnam when they violated the Paris Peace accords.

* Not nuking China when China entered the Korean War.

* Not asking for Canada as the price of the US entry into WW1.

I don't think there was any "allowing", the allies didn't have any choice or means of stopping it.

These are all just crazy. And do you really imagine that Great Britain would just "give" the second largest country to another one, especially since America's contributions in waning years of WW1 was not so valuable?

But, how long could Saddam stay in power? Dictatorships tend to go south all of a sudden. Of course in that case the US would not be wearing the mess, certainly not to the same degree.

Well there were no signs he was about to leave anytime soon and anyway it's not a foregone conclusion that ISIS would have come along had Saddam departed office at a different time under different circumstances

There had been a proposal discussed by Britain to offer Canada to the US for $1bn during WW1 and the Asquith government rejected the idea but not before the US got wind of it. There are no authoritative documents on the idea but several anecdotal references from the period not to mention references in the media and popular culture over the past century. Meaning it was probably at least a matter of discussion but it never became an actual plan.

I'd guess that the idea was somewhat tenable in the early years of the war when US involvement was in question but when the US joined the fray for its own reasons the idea was no longer needed.

But as a strategic blunder on the part of the US I'd say this was bigger than Iraq simply for Canada's proximity to the USA.