re: Was the War in Iraq a "Big Fat Mistake" or Was President Trump Wrong?

He could have made a case for war. He didn't. He could have demonstrated his "intelligence" on Iran's nuclear weapon technology. He didn't. He could have acknowledged his own criticism of forever war in the middle east and his turn away from that philosophy. Instead, he called critics names as usual. After decades of Bush's wars and the lies that sold them, he should have known better, but Trump's ego will always be his worst enemy. This will likely go down as the most glaring example of that.

INEVITABLE whether to win or lose!

Iran and its neighbors learned from Vietnam and have been wanting a fight for more than 50 years. It's Iran's turn again. After each fight they lick their wounds, accept losses and help the next in line plan to better twist the tiger's tail. It was inevitable that some US administration would knowingly take the bait with the assumption that our newest military tech would win the fight without boots on the ground. It seldom plays out that way.

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did. We arent even in a War with Iran

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Seriously?!

Yes we are.

How are we not at war with Iran?

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We have a retrospective on the War in Afghanistan. It was a mistake

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In what fairy tale land do you live in where the US wasn't going to war in Afghanistan after 9/11? There was no mistake in going there regardless of how it ended.

.....so something that sits right in your comfort zone?

Yeah nuts. He doesn't remember almost every Dim demanding action?

Going in was correct. Staying was the big mistake.

If the War in Iraq was a mistake, it was rooted in the destruction of our intelligence gathering capability by the 1975 Frank Church Select Committee. The legislation that ensued tied the hands of our intelligence gathering resources. Resources like the FBI, CIA, and the NSA.

Fast forward to the Iraq War 2003 - there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. George W. Bush rubber stamped the Iraq War based on faulty intelligence.

Just like the fake Gulf of Tonkin incident Lyndon Johnson used to justify committing thousands of American boots on the ground in Viet Nam. The War Powers Resolution of 1973, was an attempt to prevent another Viet Nam.

IMO centralization of power at the Federal Level - a trend that started after the Civil War contributed to the abuse of power.

Representative government is finicky labor intensive institution. Those who ride herd on the beast walk a thin line.

The war in Iraq was a mistake. Iran today is not a mistake. Israel was going to end up Nuking Iran and most likely kicking off WW3 if we did not try and take them out the way we have. In my opinion.

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Look at Mister hindsight go!

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How else can you judge the Iraq War in 2026?
Are you calling Trump in 2016 "Mister hindsight?"

You don't think it's useful to evaluate whether or not 2,675 American KIA (plus thousands of related American deaths) and a million Iraqi deaths ...plus almost $3 trillion...were worth the results we achieved in the Iraq War?