80 Percent of Iraqi's Strongly Opposed to Presence of Coalition Troops

Conservative Democrat John Murtha cites a private British poll of Iraqi's in August that showed, "82 per cent are "strongly opposed" to the presence of coalition troops."

These numbers are similar to another poll that was commissioned by the U.S.-led coalition in May of last year which indicated, "[f]our out of five Iraqis report holding a negative view of the U.S. occupation authority and of coalition forces" and that "82 percent said they disapprove of the U.S. and allied militaries in Iraq." In the poll, 80 percent of the Iraqis questioned reported a lack of confidence in the Coalition Provisional Authority, and 82 percent said they disapprove of the U.S. and allied militaries in Iraq.

In January 2005, Zogby International released the results of its Iraqi public opinion poll, which was conducted in conjunction with Abu Dhabi Television. It also found that, of the 805 Iraqis interviewed, "[m]ajorities of both Sunni Arabs (82%) and Shiites (69%) ... favor U.S. forces withdrawing either immediately or after an elected government is in place"; 53 percent supported attacks on coalition troops; and only the Iraqi Kurds favored the "continued U.S. presence."

GOI: And let's not forget this major news story from November 22 2005:

By SALAH NASRAWI
Associated Press Writer

CAIRO, Egypt (AP) - Leaders of Iraq's sharply divided Shiites, Kurds and Sunnis called Monday for a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S.-led forces in the country and said Iraq's opposition had a ``legitimate right'' of resistance.

GOI: While polls aren't always accurate these numbers gathered over 3 different polls in 2 years seem to show that an over-whelming amount of Iraqi's want the U.S. troops to leave.

These numbers are just more reasons why I agree with Rep. Murtha's call to pulling out except for a reactionary force located in Kuwait or Qatar.

We've won in Iraq. We found no WMD's, over-threw Saddam, trained Iraqi forces (we can continue to train soldiers from Kuwait where American troops will no longer have a huge target on their backs) created a new government and on December 15th the Iraqi's will have voted in their new parliament.

There is not much more that our military can do now so it is time to institute a gradual withdrawal of American troops and let the Iraqi's fly. We will be there to step back in if Iran tries to invade but we can now longer be a positive presence in the middle of an Iraqi civil war.

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