Reply #77: The middle east in general is saturated with troops, yes, [View All]

[Lone Pawn]

but each day anti-Americanism grows. US troops were in SA at the request of the Saudi government. They're in Iraq as an occupying power. Whereas once it was officially-recognized US presence, now it's an illegal display of power. We're possibly on the way to Westernizing the ME. But we're possibly on the way to creating a backlash the likes of which have never been seen before, and we're quite possibly on the way to creating the cataclysmic World War IV out of which a new, revitalized religious phoenix-states rise.

Bin Laden held as much to gain as the Bushes did--more, even. He was hoping that Afghanistan and Iraq would embroil us in a decade-long war as it happened with the Soviets. He talked repeatedly of that happening. And even if we can make the case that Bush benefitted from 9/11 MORE than OBL did, OBL certainly had reason to believe making the attack would be in his best interest.

And Afghanistan did not greatly change with US presence. Afghanistan was a warlord-held nation when we invaded. It still is. We just own Kabul.