In Baghdad, Closing a 5-Star Retreat

[cory777]

Source: New York Times

CAMP VICTORY, Iraq — If the combat zone in Iraq were not so completely dry, some soldier on the staff of the palatial J.V.B. would be ringing last call.

Formally known as the Joint Visitors Bureau — no one ever came up with a name to better capture its peculiar ambiance — it will be taking down the welcome sign on Sept. 29, as the continuing withdrawal of American forces from Iraq makes it unnecessary to maintain the closest thing to a five-star hotel that any four-star command can boast of in a war zone.

After the conquest of Baghdad in 2003, the J.V.B., created out of a palace complex where Saddam Hussein’s cronies once hunted captive gazelles and entertained their mistresses, has evolved to offer hospitality, hot coffee and a decorous gathering spot for official guests of the American military in Iraq.

Every conflict creates its own hangout. The J.V.B. became Rick’s Café in Iraq, a magnet drawing defense secretaries in search of progress, embedded combat correspondents conducting interviews, Congressional delegations glad-handing their local counterparts and movie stars or stand-up comics breezing through, Bob Hope style.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/09/world/middleeast/09military.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

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So this the way the Military plans to cut it's budget?

Breaking Activist News http://activistnews.blogspot.com/

[Lasher]

1. Drawdown, ya say?

We had 47,000 soldiers there at the end of January this year. Now, according to the latest report at the end of June, we have 46,000 there. If I didn't know better I'd suspect we were pretending to get out while we're actually not.

http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/Centers/Saban/Iraq%20Index/index.pdf (scroll to page 13)

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. Oh, no. We could never do anything as sneaky as that.

[Javaman]

3. And the best part is, the DOD in now entertaining the idea of

staying after the required Dec 31st pull out.

Of course, this isn't because the DOD is wanting to stay, oh no, it's because the puppet iraq government is requesting us to stay.

yeah, right.

[No Elephants]

5. "We can't see our way clear to giving Iraq $ if Iraq does not invite us to stay."

Getting that messsage across, in typical diplomatic round about ways, should make our presence seem indispensable.

[Lasher]

8. Where's the part where Americans get to vote if we want to perpetuate this clusterfuck even longer?

Rhetorical question of course. We, the unwashed masses, cannot be trusted with such an important decision.

[No Elephants]

4. If we don't really leave, it will be a lot easier to stay when they invite us to stay.

I read reasoning along those very lines from some general.

Okay, I purposely flipped the phrasing. He said it would be a lot harder for us to stay if they invited us after we had gotten far along in our withdrawal.

[No Elephants]

6. But too bad for poor people who need medical care, right?

[snooper2]

7. So this the way the Military plans to cut it's budget?

So you want us to continue to fund this?

[The Roux Comes First]

9. Unless There is Some Actual History to This "Palace," Razing Might Be a Good Idea

Fine to keep it around if we still had anything resembling a collective sense of shame and thus some merit in being reminded of the heinous business of our unilaterally making war on Iraq (leading to failing on mission of anti-terrorism in Afghanistan, if there was ever a chance of success)

But, lacking that, ditch the bastard.