The conflicts in the Middle-East have been on going since the end of world war I. In the
generations of millennials it is a war they grew up with that sparked off of 9/11 a “war of
terror” America set charge for. In total length of the combat campaigns the U.S endured
13.3 years; one that outlasts both World Wars combined and Vietnam in single comparison.
The Question of “why we (the US) are still in Iraq and Afghanistan?” It was made clear
that boots are to be brought home in December 2014. Yet with radical groups such as the
Islamic State (ISIS, ISIL) provoke terror on global platforms, holding western influence as
a mortal enemy. America is in the state again of possible reoccupation of these regions.
Should one ask the american citizen on the street as to why the US is there, answers would
answer more of the “What and How” and not “Who and Why.” The attacks on the world
trade centers on September 11, 2001 answers “What and How” we got into the invasion of
Iraq and later Afghanistan. The current presidential administration at the time set way for a
“War on Terrorism” with no clear enemy other than 19 radical zealots and no clear country
to strategically target other than middle east as a joint.
Now retired, Lieutenant General Daniel Bolger feels that the US Lost in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Almost as if he was placed in a war to lose, the retired general feels too that
we had a true lack of “why and who” that made the war endure as long as it did. Speaking