Weighing More Troops, Other Options for Iraq

Re “U.S. Military Weighs Troop Increase for Iraq,” April 6:

Well, it looks like we are going to have to commit more troops in Iraq, regardless of a power transfer on June 30. The only way to handle that fairly is going to be bringing back the draft. The stress being put on the current units is too great; many face continual redeployment to Iraq.

If 57% of the American people favor the U.S. going to war in Iraq in the so-called war on terrorism, then they should also be willing to contribute their sons in the same proportion. Since 1973, military service in this country has been shouldered disproportionately in American society. It is time the upper and middle classes share this burden and take the accompanying risks.

John Hunady

Montebello

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It is a distortion to describe what is beginning now in Iraq as “civil war.” History teaches us that nations occupied by foreign powers do not engage in civil war. First they unite to drive out the invader. Then they have their civil war.

Victoria Brago

Los Angeles

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Thank you for the uncommon good sense in balancing Robert Scheer’s blabber with Michael Ramirez’s consistent truth-telling (Commentary, April 6).

As Scheer slapped us with the leftist wishful thinking that we’re witnessing the doomed beginning of the end in Iraq, Ramirez beautifully explained the truth with the drawing of our soldiers being bombed in the back by politics from home -- Scheer’s politics. What the aged Leninist never gets is that this president doesn’t cut and run. Wars are messy. So, too, freedom.

Michael Stevens

Montrose

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It is an exercise in futility to make a negative comment about Ramirez’s politics; however, there might be some comfort to comment about those people who agree with him -- especially someone who would say “amen” to his cartoon depicting a lobbed “political” shell heading for unsuspecting American soldiers.

One of my nephews is now in Iraq facing danger because of this president’s shortsighted international “politics.” The Ramirez cartoon’s political shell is metaphorical; President Bush’s shell is very, very real. From what is my nephew in greatest danger: my protests against Bush’s political hubris, or the political hubris that put him in Iraq?

Those who support Bush need to ask themselves why they are willing to reward an incompetent, political commander in chief.

Gene Touchet

Cathedral City

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The names of Steve Blackwelder (letter, April 6) and Scheer should be added to the “friendly fire” rocket aimed at the backs of our troops in Ramirez’s political cartoon.

Charles Jenner

Los Alamitos

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Re “Fallouja: No Good Options,” April 4: I found it ironic that the American military is forced to employ governing tactics increasingly similar to Saddam Hussein’s: “overwhelming ground forces, house searches and mass arrests.”

I do not want to draw any conclusions from this observation, because every conclusion I attempt is problematic. Does the Iraqi culture only respond to violence, meaning that Hussein himself was an appropriate leader? I find that hard to believe. Is there something wrong with our American “Chicken Soup for the Soul” mentality of universal goodwill? Possibly.

Charis Rippe

Norwalk

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Iraq has fewer trees than Vietnam and the Euphrates River less water than the Mekong, but the dreadful similarities can be summed in a few words:

No way out.

Arthur M. Cohen

Los Angeles

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Regarding “12 Marines Are Killed as Violence Spreads in Iraq,” April 6:

Bring them home. Now.

Mark Srednicki

Santa Barbara

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Very effective photo you have on Wednesday’s front page of the Marine carrying the body of his comrade. But how did your caption writer miss the dead, barefoot Iraqi lying in the background?

Jurgen Vsych

Los Angeles

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Another seven American soldiers are killed in Iraq (April 5) and the next day their commander in chief pitches out the first ball.

Oh, how long till November!

George F. Fisher

La Mirada