Thanks Amos. No, it is not a very cheery thought, GUEST. If we have to pull out without there being anything concrete in place, we face a worse humiliation than that of Clinton's when he fired those famous Cruise missiles, at the very least.
In a lot of ways, this was our only shot at gaining a foothold in the Middle East. If we fail in Iraq, it will make the Afghan mission almost irrelevant, and will signal the end of any more excursions into that region for the forseeable future..., and America (and the Coalition) will be weakened as a result.

Jim