How many times is the Iraq War going to ‘end?’

U.S. Army Soldiers run to UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters after conducting a search for weapons caches in Albu Issa, Iraq, March 12, 2008 (US Army / Flickr)

You can take the yellow ribbon off that old oak tree, folks. The troops are coming home! Or at least that’s the impression created by the Biden Administration’s latest announcement. The United States recently inked an agreement with the government of Iraq to formally end “combat operations” in that country. The White House put out a press release calling it a “significant evolution” in the US mission.

But we’ve heard this song and dance before.

In 2003, George Bush too announced an end to “major combat operations” in Iraq. Dressed in a flight suit, he famously stood on an aircraft carrier and declared that US forces had “prevailed.” Behind him was an oversized banner that read “Mission Accomplished.”

As they so often do, the gods punished this colossal act of hubris.

The ostensible end of “combat operations” was followed by a long and bloody insurgency that left hundreds of thousands dead. The United States spent trillions maintaining an occupation force of between 120,000 to 160,000 troops in Iraq until 2010, when Barack Obama “ended” the war again.

George W. Bush on the USS Abraham Lincoln ahead of his “Mission Accomplished” speech (White House / Public Domain)