No US Future in Iraq

Open Email to:
Rep. Ed Royce, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. 
Sen. Robert Menendez, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

Dear Rep. Royce and Sen. Menendez,
According to the Washington Times, Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Saleh Mutlaq accused Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki of fomenting sectarian violence to limit the voices of Sunnis in upcoming elections, and he criticized the Obama administration for failing to do more for a country “destroyed” by the United States. He went on to say that without more deeply engaged guidance and pressure from Washington Iraq is at risk for an all-out sectarian meltdown and civil war.
The Deputy Prime Minister is correct in saying that Iraq had been destroyed by the US. Saddam Hussein had Iraq under full control. It is true that he obtained that control by killing probably a few million of what he considered his adversaries. However under his control of Iraq, the Middle East was relatively stabilized. Somehow, George Bush got the impression that Saddam Hussein had "weapons of mass destruction", declared war on Iraq, and invaded the country to eliminate the supposed mass destruction weapons. None were found. It was a big mistake. We took Saddam Hussein out of power and reduced Iraq to shambles at a cost of $800 billion and the deaths of 4500 US soldiers.
The Deputy Prime Minister is saying that the US now has the responsibility of putting the country back together again. But, we can't do that. It is impossible. We "broke" the country as an egg, and we can't put it back together. We meddled in the first place in an area we should not have, and continued meddling will do nothing to alleviate any pain that Iraqi citizens may have, and it would only cost us more money and perhaps more US deaths. The Iraqi citizens had pain under Saddam Hussein, as many of their relatives and friends were killed. They learned to live with that. They can now learn to live with new pain of civil war. There is no way we can help.