Trump: If We Don’t Take Iraq’s Oil, U.S. Soldiers ‘Would Have Died In Vain'

[kpete]

Source: Think Progress

Trump: If We Don’t Take Iraq’s Oil, U.S. Soldiers ‘Would Have Died In Vain’

In his quixotic search for attention, likely GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump has added a foreign policy leg to his farcical platform. Revealing his thoughts on the Iraq war to Fox News host Bill O’Reilly last week, the real estate mogul boiled his policy down to an argument of “to the victor belonged the spoils.” Fearing that “15 minutes after we leave,” Iran would tromp into Iraq and “take the oil,” Trump argued the U.S. should “stay and keep the oil,” “take what’s necessary for us and we pay our self back $1.5 trillion or more.”

O’Reilly later mocked Trump’s policy on Fox and Friends: “You’d basically be re-invading the country you already invaded to try and get their oil. Come on, can you imagine the world reaction to that?” Unswayed, Trump doubled-down in a Fox and Friends segment this morning. Still convinced Iran will pounce on the oil fields once the U.S. withdraws, Trump insisted that if we don’t “take the oil,” the 5,885 U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq “would have died in vain“:

TRUMP: I very simply said that Iran is going to takeover Iraq, and if that’s going to happen, we should just stay there and take the oil. They want the oil, and why should we? We de-neutered Iraq, Iran is going to walk in, take it over, take over the second largest oil fields in the world. That’s going to happen. That would mean that all of those soldiers that have died and been wounded and everything else would have died in vain– and I don’t want that to happen. I want their parents and their families to be proud.

Read more: http://thinkprogress.org/2011/04/04/tea-party-and-oil-subsidies/

[wtmusic]

1. "Quixotic" - perfect nt

[Control-Z]

33. It does paint

Trump pretty accurately, doesn't it?

[BanzaiBonnie]

2. What a boob

But he's being honest. This was part of what the invasion in Iraq was about to begin with. We said, it's the oil and they told us, no it's not and we said, you're lying and now there is no doubt they were lying.

And Trump knows people on Wall Street who are lying and stealing from the little guys on Main Street.

[northoftheborder]

10. agree

[gratuitous]

13. Yeah, but you're not supposed to say it out loud

At least, not unless you're wearing a rainbow fright wig or marching with a bunch of other dirty fucking hippies so that the popular media can safely ignore you. On the other hand, if Mr. tRump wants to redeem all those lives so that they won't have died in vain, have him strap on a rifle and a sidearm and show us all how it's done. He has every bit as much experience soldiering as he does politicking, and he's angling for the big chair in politics. Let's see how he'd do as a star-spangled fightin' man.

Send Donald to Kabul!

[Scuba]

3. Those soldiers (and airmen, and sailers and marines - men and women)...

...already died in vain. Someone should tell Trump that to die for the purpose of enriching oil companies is not "patriotism".

[rfranklin]

4. I happen to agree with him...

What was the point otherwise?

[Fearless]

9. War profiteering. n/t

[rfranklin]

12. No, war profiteering is when a supplier to the government gouges the government...

Wars have always been fought for resources. In fact, WWII was, to alarge extent, about oil and other resources for the Japanese. there were other contributing factors but resources were a big motivator.

"The Japanese military faced a particular tactical problem in that certain critical raw materials--especially oil and rubber--were not available within the Japanese sphere of influence. Instead, Japan received most of its oil from the United States and rubber from British Malaya, the very two Western nations trying to restrict Japan's expansion. U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt's embargo of oil exports to Japan pressured the Japanese navy, which had stocks for only about six months of operations."

http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/japan/japanworkbook/modernhist/wwii.html

[Fearless]

15. Haliburton and Company HAVE been gouging the government through the privitization of the military.

Charging exorbitant amounts for commonalities.

[tblue37]

32. And delivering shoddy--even dangerous--goods and work--or not delivering at all. nt

[patrick t. cakes]

35. weapons of mass destruction, remember?

The same weapons that never existed.

That was the "point" based on a lie.

[roguevalley]

36. there is no 'dying in vain' undoing. the dead are dead. I don't

know how this asshat can be more vile. He and his blow up doll gazillionth wife thing.

[Liberal Veteran]

5. Can't he just go away? He was already a detestable asshole.

And he has shitty taste in everything to top it off.

[northoftheborder]

11. agree

[Blue_Tires]

20. no chance

Trump is back in the spotlight, and the media are eating out of his hands...He's going to keep saying increasingly crazy things every few days as long as the gravy train is rollin'

[Keith Bee]

26. He's a classic attention whore

[gateley]

6. Don't we already have Iraq's oil?

[yurbud]

37. nope. we failed. at least at getting it on the terms our oil companies wanted

[thereismore]

7. I think he is confusing Iraq with Iran. nt

[Fearless]

8. They did die in vain. Regardless.

They should still be alive, and if we had a competent president ten years ago, they would be.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

31. Twenty. Twenty years of war.

1991 we went stormin' into Iraq. Twenty years of occupying it like we owned it.

[ck4829]

14. *Sniff* *Sniff* "Why does nobody care about the REAL victims of the Iraq war - the oil companies?"

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

30. Oh, Noes! The oil companies are dead? Not died in vain, I hope.

Wait, no, they're quite healthy, and they thank us for our concern.

[raouldukelives]

16. So..What did the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis die for?

[Terry in Austin]

17. The mystery about The Donald

For somebody that rich, how come he doesn't do something about that hair?

[Proud Liberal Dem]

18. Ah. So it WAS about the oil, after all

Is that what he is saying? He wouldn't be crazy enough to.....well, he DID say it!

:crazy: :silly:

[Solomon]

27. Come on, have a heart. He needs the oil for his hair.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

29. I hadn't thought about THAT!!!

:rofl:

[LynneSin]

19. Shouldn't Donald be shopping for wife #4 right about now

I mean the current wife is 30 years old now, about the age he turns them in for a younger model

:grr:

[ecstatic]

21. Trump would bring back the Columbus days

"explore," "discover," and conquer (for financial gain).

[fascisthunter]

22. You ain't foolin' no one billionaire cream puff

we always knew this war and occupation was for oil and oil companies you probably have stocks in.

[Ganja Ninja]

23. And if we do take Iraq's oil they will have died as henchmen for a crime family.

How's that for dying in vain? And the Bush crime family would reap the profits - all of them! Not a single dime of compensation for the family's of the dead or the injured would ever come from the profits made on Iraq's oil. I can't think of a more pointless death than to die so that already filthy rich people can get even richer.

[LibertyLover]

24. You know, the Bronx Zoo Snake had a tweat about the Donald

that I think would work. It went something like this: "Donald Trump is thinking of running for president? Don't worry, I'll take care of this. Which way to Trump Tower?".

[spanone]

25. fuck trump..i'd rather hear what my dog has to say on any topic

[Hubert Flottz]

28. Sounds like a real PNAC attitude to me.

[Jester Messiah]

34. Trump/Colbert 2012! Because this guy CAN'T be serious! [nt]