An End to a War in Iraq that Should Never Have Begun (ContributorNetwork)

COMMENTARY| An eight-and-a-half year war that claimed over 100,000 lives, created a deadly power vacuum that will undoubtedly increase that death toll, and that should never have been started reached its official end Thursday, but this time there will be no American president boldly proclaiming "Mission Accomplished."

That is probably good news to the soldiers stationed in Iraq as roughly 4,000 of the 4,487 Americans who lost their lives in the Iraqi War perished after former President George W. Bush's now infamous 2003 speech.

Eight years after President Bush announced an end to major combat missions in Iraq, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta declared an official end to all facets of the United States' military mission in that country during a ceremony at Iraq's international airport. Iraq will now be responsible for its own security after a high price in "blood and treasure."

At long last America is free of a war whose wide changes of purpose at times seemed to be the work of the memory hole instead of a reaction to circumstances on the ground.

The reasons for war in Iraq morphed from a failed attempt to link Iraq's government to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, to a crucial mission to eradicate weapons of mass destruction that there never was legitimate evidence of, to an endeavor whose objective was simply a goodwill initiative to depose a brutal dictator and give a country a "regime change"-a euphemism for making them suitably like what the American government thinks a country has to be.

Most Americans were in "shock and awe" at the decision to invade Iraq in 2003 and the installment of Saddam Hussein's as America's new public enemy number one, at a time when the alleged architect of the 9/11 attacks, Osama bin Laden, was still managing to avoid detection by the armed forces who had been hunting him for two years in Afghanistan.

The actual end of war is another in a long string of national security successes for President Barack Obama who can go into the 2012 election as the first Democrat since the War on Terror began who can back up a claim to being tough on terrorists.

Not only has President Obama compiled a lengthy terrorist body count (using mostly unmanned aircraft instead of endangering American soldiers) including bin Laden during his tenure as commander-in-chief; he has also ended an aimless war in Iraq and initiated a drawdown of troop levels in Afghanistan at a time when the American public would rather its government focus on domestic economic remedies than nation building and terrorist chasing abroad.

If the White House will not say it then I will venture to. After more than 30,000 casualties and $801.9 billion spent, according to a BBC report, no longer will American soldiers be in danger fighting a war that should never have begun. For me, that is "Mission Accomplished."

Follow Phillip Warlove on Twitter: @WarloveRevolit

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/iraq/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20111216/wl_ac/10689631_an_end_to_a_war_in_iraq_that_should_never_have_begun

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