War in Iraq Declared Officially Over – Did You Even Notice?

Part of the tiny amount of coverage of the end of the war in Iraq:

 BAGHDAD — The United States military officially declared an end to its mission in Iraq on Thursday even as violence continues to plague the country and the Muslim world remains distrustful of American power.

Although Thursday’s ceremony marked the end of the war, the military still has two bases in Iraq and roughly 4,000 troops, including several hundred who attended the ceremony. At the height of the war in 2007, there were 505 bases and more than 170,000 troops.

According to military officials, the remaining troops are still being attacked on a daily basis, mainly by indirect fire attacks on the bases and road side bomb explosions against convoys heading south through Iraq to bases in Kuwait.

Even after the last two bases are closed and the final American combat troops withdraw from Iraq by Dec. 31, under rules of an agreement with the government in Baghdad, a few hundred military personnel and Pentagon civilians will remain, working within the American Embassy as part of an Office of Security Cooperation to assist in arms sales and training.

But negotiations could resume next year on whether additional American military personnel can return to further assist their Iraqi counterparts.

Senior American military officers have made no secret that they see crucial gaps in Iraq’s ability to defend its sovereign soil and even to secure its oil platforms offshore in the Persian Gulf. Air defenses are seen as a critical gap in Iraqi capabilities, but American military officers also see significant shortcomings in Iraq’s ability to sustain a military, whether moving food and fuel or servicing the armored vehicles it is inheriting from Americans or the fighter jets it is buying, and has shortfalls in military engineers, artillery and intelligence, as well.

via U.S. War in Iraq Declared Officially Over – NYTimes.com.

I wonder if the shocking lack of coverage is due to the near blackout of right-wing discussion; it’s hard to show it and not link it to Obama, and Obama has never done a good thing.

Still, as thrilled as I am to have these troops out of harms way, it’s a hollow victory. Many of them will likely be sent to Afghanistan or another flare-up where we silently send in troops. In the age of the Global War On Terror, war is never over, even if we want it.

Related articles

• Last US Troops Leave Iraq (huffingtonpost.com)