And the Winner Is...

[Lemur]

When our primary objective for the occupation is complete we have "won". If fatalities are down in Iraq and we can scale down forces while the Iraqi government runs itself in a just and responsible manner...

And you have just demonstrated the rather arbitrary nature of declaring a win in the current occupation. What, exactly is our "primary objective"? Is it to create a stable democracy? Is it to create an environment with a certail level of violence? Is it to improve the standard of living in Iraq? Is it to heal the differences between Sunni, Shia and Kurd?

Iraq is a bottomless hole that would happily swallow all of our good intentions. As I said, we won the war already, five years ago. If you feel that we've passed some golden mark that allows you to declare victory again, then by all means, do so. I'll spring for confetti if you'll buy the champagne.

It seems the word "war" has a more expansive meaning link

Too funny! From your link: