Allan,

Even though I am against the war and remain against it as it was sold to us based on false intelligence I also realise that to leave without a detailed exit strategy would also be wrong. Can we ever trust intelligence delivered to us by a politician again?

As a country who is a member of the so called "coalition of the willing" we must take responsibility and attempt to solve the onging problems that this war has created. We also must stay supportive of our soldiers who have been ordered into harms way based on this faulty intelligence.

It would be wrong of us to leave the Iraqi civilian population at the hands of the insergents and war lords in what will probably develop into a civil war. The only strategy I can think of is to continue to train Iraqi's to defend Iraq and then to pull back to a distance where we can deploy our troups at short notice for a time until we know things are under control. None of this however was considered by our Govt before we said yes to the war.

I don't know where you get your statistics but I suspect that there have been more deaths from the wars than Suddams tyranical rule, if you know otherwise I'd like to know them. Remember regime change was never the reason for the war - our politicians assured us of this!

To label debate "cowardess" just because it disagrees with your thoughts is a little perplexing. Fighting for improved principles is hardly cowardess it might just be the most patriotic thing we can do.

"The pen is mightier than the sword and the keypad is like the pen"

Were Aussie digger lives saved by bringing them home from Vietnam.... Yes! Was it cowardly to bring them home?

Read this article.... http://www.channel4.com/news/special-reports/special-reports-storypage.jsp?id=1661

and this article ... http://www.downingstreetmemo.com/publishednews.html

By saying "we" must set to rights the wrongs "we" have caused in Iraq, "we" are still guilty of interference in Arab affairs.
I am quite sure that whatever procedure is installed in their countries, it will be uninstalled if it suits them.
Coalition troops should be withdrawn immediately and the Arabs left to sort their affairs out to their own satisfaction.
They are going to do it anyway so why waste time, money and more lives on a useless struggle.

All wars are a battle of resources. For people like Bush, Blair, Hussien, Howard, terrorists' manipulaters (supposedly leaders)- people are just another resource to be used to further their own agendas. Choosing from US appointed stooges is not true democracy. And who says that the Iraqi culture even wants democracy? Is Kuwait really democratic? When Iraq is "democratic" can it legitmately invade Kuwait to spread the great good of US style "democracy". Give these grubs a four x two with a four inch nail in the end, put them in a paddock and let them make their warfare a little more personal and real and we will see how keen they are to go to war.

Hanging around car parks and colleges coercing eighteen year old boys and girls to go to war is more criminal than anything Peter Hicks has done. For every boy or girl who comes home in a body bag the person who enlisted them should be held accountable. War is wrong. The world cannot afford to waste lives and resource on this stupidity. War is wrong. Always has been always will be. Fight,fight you'll never win. (Bubbles)

To the post that said Iran has 18 million troops, are you serious?

Iran is a very weak nation, the planes they have are trashy French jets from the 1970's. They, like all middle-eastern nations, are all talk.

Weak, unwilling to fight, cowards. Remember all the marches of old women, threatening to die for Saddam?

Same thing. Special surveys are done in Iran regularly by western military powers, all show that around 80% absolutely detest the Iranian government.

Wouldn't you? They are people too, you know.

They want freedom like the rest of us, there are underground Christians who can't practice because the Islamic lunatics who run Iran are arseholes.

When Israel attacks the nuclear sites, in about six months at most I believe, Iran will crumble.

They won't even strike back!

Their new president is a fool who will destroy his nation, and if you listen to the backroom guys who talk at the U.N, they all want to assasinate him.

The only problem, and in typical Muslim style, the Iranians have put their nuclear bases in built up areas so that the attackers look evil for killing kids.

Really, does anybody but the despicable lovers John Pilger & Noam Chomsky buy that?

Oh, for all you Chomsky lovers out there, I hope you are real fans, who actually read his books instead of just holding them at UNI so your trendy!

He actually defended the war crimes of the Pol-Pot regime, and even leftists turned their backs on him. So you're all following a fraud!

Benjamin,
On Chomsky, I had not heard of until you mentioned, has his critics also, as I do learn a little on these friendly chats. I used the best of search engines, Google, and found the fans, and the critics., of this aged sage. He has at least one critic in the name of Keith Windschuttle, another Academic that I was quiet ignorant of, at least I have learned a little from tonight’s reading. To me, the UN. Is just another Bill my government subscribes too, with taxpayers money.

I agree with Opinionated2 that a disorderly pullout from Iraq would be disastrous. This would accelerate the move into full-blown civil war.

The Iraqi security forces (including the army) have proven themselves enthusiastic killers of their own people. Thus handing over security duties to the Iraqis would be an abrogation of the Coalition's responsibility for starting the Iraqi conflict in the first place.

So a negotiated peace between the warring sides should be the priority.

As other posters have said, a partition of the country seems to be the only long term "solution".

Pet