By the time the 2008 election arrived, we had finally won the Iraq War, or we were on the road to winning it. We won starting in the summer of 2007 going into late 2011.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
If everybody that voted in 2008 shows up in 2010, we will win this election. We will win this election.
We won the war, but we are losing the occupation and reconstruction of Iraq. It is past time for a new approach, one that relies on accountability, responsibility, and phasing down the scope of our military commitment.
Before the surge started, frankly, after I left Iraq towards the end of 2006, I was worried that we were losing the war. But after the surge, I felt that we succeeded.
We were succeeding. When you looked at specifics, this became a war of attrition. We were winning.
Well, we won the war. You know what that means. In twenty years, we'll all be driving Iraqi cars.
Last month, the Iraqi people went to the polls, voting in their first free election in more than 50 years.
In just three years, Iraq has achieved immense progress. It has had three successful elections in which 80% of their citizens voted, even while being threatened with death.
It took us years to get into the mess that we got ourselves in at the end of 2008, and it's going to take a while to get us out. We lost eight million jobs, we saw a financial system near collapse, we have a continuing housing crisis that we're making progress on dealing with.
The U.K. military role in Iraq ended a very long way from success.
I went seven years between 2002 and 2009 without winning. Then I did win in '09.