ow boy a debate!!!!
tim you are 100% wrong, but i respect your point of view. if the US was not in the region then it would be against the UK, the USSR (yes i know its russia) , turky, the EU, and always isreal.
the idea that if we all (the west) would leave everything would be great is just silly. the radical islam view is that it is there mandate and there duty to distroy, bomb, and kill ALL non beleavers. this thing in iraq is just a side show. the real war is comming down the road.
if you would go and make true friends with any true person that follows islam you would be shaken to the bone at there view of the future. a world that is just one big islamic state. women as property, the church owns everything, no non islamic music, no beer, public killings, homos all killed, anyone with a "stine" in there name murdured, and women having there private parts cut out.
this is there version of heaven.
now you can say that if the US (and everyone else) was not in the middle east things would be great. well the day the west leavs the mid east is the day the oil stops flowing ($20.00 a gal oil anyone?), the suez cannal shuts down (everything 10-50% higher in cost), 8-9 million jews will be killed before the first sunset, turky would have armored and infantry divisions massing at its southern border requireing NATO to deploy its AMF units (the AMF units would be compleatly distroyed 30-40,000 dead german, italian, dutch, polish, and british troops), packastan and india going to war, etc....
so here are options, stay or pull out.
there is no gray area, there are no half messures.
i am not for war, but if you really study the the koran and the islamic extreamest nuts (not all islamic people are nuts) you will see that there is a plan and that people like you and i have no place in the world they want to make. our place would be in a unmarked grave with a 7.62 x 36 round in the back of the head.
it may be harsh but thats what we are facing, so as far as the brave troops on the front line my hat is off to them, and our best chance is to flood the mideast with western ideas, radios, TVs, satalite TV, and modern thoughts, and norms.
i may not agree with you bur i would defend your right to say what you want, in a fanatical islamic wourld you would be killed for desenting.
dave