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Get them out of Iraq before this thing completely blows up.

From In Iraq, frontline patience wears thin by Charles Levinson Christian Science Monitor 03/30/06:

For US soldiers who don't grasp the language or the culture here, a central part of their mission - generating goodwill and support - remains far more difficult than capturing insurgent leaders. While their officers remain largely on message and outwardly optimistic, many of the front-line men like Clevenger, who patrol "outside the wire" twice daily, say that their patience is wearing thin.

"I don't want to stay here too much longer. The Iraqi Army is getting to where they can get a hold of things now," says Clevenger. "The longer we're here and the more times they attack us, the more they're going to figure out how to better their attacks."

More than a few soldiers of the US Army's 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team stationed in this Sunni-Kurdish city in northern Iraq, shuddered last week when President Bush said total withdrawal of US troops "will be decided by future presidents and future governments of Iraq." Three years after the invasion, many soldiers say it's time to hand over control to Iraqis. Most of those interviewed echoed a recentZogby poll of 944 military respondents throughout Iraq, that found that 72 percent of US troops favor withdrawal within the next year.

"I think we're doing good things here, but I think we need to start pulling it out," Spc. Mathew Merced, a jovial infantryman from Mcinnville, Ore., says, scanning Mosul's al-Karama neighborhood from a trash-strewn rooftop.

Yeah, Bush and Rummy keep telling us about how many Iraqi soldiers and police are trained and ready to go. So let's start withdrawing American soldiers now. Obviously, they're no longer needed thanks to the administration's brilliant training of Iraqis.

And in the "did he really mean to say that?" category...

We get this:

To these soldiers, they are bending over backward to keep the peace, and they are confounded that Iraqis don't seem to appreciate that.

"Why do they blame us?" wonders US Army Spc. Brandon Beard, of Arkadelphia, Ark. "The terrorists are wreaking more havoc on this city than we are."

"I don't hate all Arabs just because a few of them blew up the World Trade Center, so why should they hate all US soldiers just because one shot their father?" asks US Army Cpl. Joshua Hedges, of Warrensburg, Mo., a father of three. (my emphasis)

We are just so [Cheney]ed in Iraq. It's time to cut our losses and leave.

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