what does that accomplish?  It sounds all simple and easy on paper (just fly them all home and the world will be at peace), but knowing Clark's background, I believe he has a little more insight that I do as to how to come up with the least bad solution at this point.

That would take a bit under three years.  

Or come up with a phased and orderly withdrawal.

And as we fly out and march away a thousand or so at a time what becomes of the ones who are left behind?

What happens when we're down to, oh say, the final 5000 who are left to defend themselves against those in the country who would love nothing more than to blow them to smithereens and who would outnumber them by a few thousand to one?

There is no simplistic answer to the mess. It's going to take a lot more than just "flying them out", which is why it's going to take someone with strategic experience to accomplish it.

One thing for sure, the safest route for our troops will never be formulated on DKos.

We can fly people out sure, but what about those tanks, APC howietzers, computers, radars and tons and tons of ammunition.

We just leave it there right?

You know full well if we do that it would be like kids in a candy store, and all those weapons will fall into the hands of Iran, Al Qaeda and worst of all the militias who will use it to settle their own scores in a genocide that will make what the Nazi's did to the jews look pretty.

Sorry but we got into this war by making a rash judgment and commiting to it with no plan to succeed and assuming the best instead of being prepared for the worst.

When someone comes up with a solid plan to leave Iraq, get all our equipment out and prevent the sunni and shia from going into an all out genocide and bringing Iran in on one side and the sunni state like the saudi's on the other let me know.

But what it sounds like you are advocating is a disorganized partion of Iraq with our troops dodging bullets as they flee to the north and trying to get on the last airplane before the insurgents overrun the airport.

I want the troops out two, but I don't want to start a genocide worse than Darfur in the process, a genocide that will certainly lead to a regional war. Do you doubt that, are you really willing to having the blood of millions of arabs on our hands because we were not patient enough to withdraw the right way and instead made a six month long mad dash for the exits?

No offensive but I find that very optimistic and extremely unrealistic.

Plan it, and for goodness sake plan it well.

when the real genocide starts like in Darfur? And when foreign militia enter with their US and western weapons?

It will be a bloodbath beyond anything it is now.

It's a mess we have made and there is no easy fix.

...on the assumption that we own the world, or, further, that a nation that commits illegal aggression still has a choice in when, or even if, it withdraws its troops.  And don't use the canard that the Iraqi government wants us there.  The government was formed out of a process imposed by the invaders, whether or not elections were held.  Imagine the reaction to someone claiming Iraq had the right to determine the conditions of its withdrawal from Kuwait, or even whether it would withdraw, even if it had overseen elections in which a government emerged that "invited" Iraqi troops to stay.

As for your "what ifs," what if we stay, trash the place until no hope of a viable society exists and are forced out because of the unmanageable chaos and it becomes a free-for-all for Iraq's neighbors?  That game can be played any way you want it.  Bottom line, though, is that the country using force has the burden of persuasion that (a) the use of force is legal and (b) is the only option available.  "What ifs" don't get you to (a) or (b).