http://www.csis.org/media/csis/pubs/areweready2…

http://www.csis.org/media/csis/pubs/iraqtrip.pdf

http://www.csis.org/media/csis/pubs/0410_progre…

The disclaimer of 'if the Americans aren't taking casualties' is rather futuristic, since it is not applicable to Iraq now, nor will it be during the foreseeable fututre.
We might as well talk about the days when terrorism will have ceased to be.

You can analyze Japan from every angle you want, but the important fact at the heart of the matter is that the country was unified, while Iraq was much more like the former Yugoslavei, which stayed unified under the common yoke of a dictator, but as soon as the yoke was removed, old ethnic resentments bubbled up .to the surface.

As a result, Yugoslavia broke up into many separate countres,, while Iraq is trying to hold itself together even as the infighting goes on. We are shepherding a type of civil war. That is not a role we've played in any other of the countries mentioned.
As to Kosovo vs Serbia, the militarey forces are NATO forces, commanded by Europeans.

I think Jazz is right: This is like comparing apples to aardvarks.

I will grant that McCain's '50-100 years' was grabbed up before he had a chance to explain his meaning. The explanation he did give later is so fuzzy and inapplicable that the explanation now needs further explatnaion-that is, if he recognizes the need for one;

Should he return to this subject, I'll listen. Fair is fair.
In the meantime, all we have is what he has said so far.

“China was ready, willing and able to wipe Japan off the face of the Earth and America was the only force standing in the way of that.”

This is false. At the end of WWII China was weakened by colonialism, and deeply divided between Nationalists and Communists. Japan was still happily in occupation of huge swathes of China. The Japanese were worried about Russia…never about China, whom they regarded with utter contempt. China has not been a threat to Japan since the days of Kublai Khan…quite the reverse. Note, for example, that modern China has NEVER demanded the US withdraw its bases from Japan and Asia. The US is widely regarded in Asia as the only restraining force preventing another potential Japanese breakout. Consider the fact that Japan's constitutionally restricted “Defense” air force is the most advanced in Asia, and can blow the PLA from the sky.

There are actually striking similarities between Iraq and Japan. For example, there was no Japanese insurgency because the Emperor and the ruling classes were largely protected by the occupation. Because the Emperor decreed it, the Japanese accepted occupation.

Similarly, in Iraq, al-Sistani has cooperated with the “big guest” as the Shi'a refer to the US. The Shi'a, under al-Sistani's spiritual guidance, have been generally peaceable…with even al-Sadr's rebelliousness being in check. The insurgency has been largely limited to the Arab Sunni; a distinct minority in the country after the Shi'a and Kurds.

McCain was making a point about long-term American presences overseas…he reference the Balkans and South Korea as well…and ALL of these situations are very different.

The differences are not relevant to the McCain's point: as long as the US is not taking casualities, the US could have a presence there.

The Shi'a will not accept a long-term occupation, of course. Al-Sistani's “big guest” remains a “guest”. If al-Sistani gave the word, the US occupation would end tomorrow. The occupation is useful to him and the Shi'a, as it was useful to the Emperor, the Japanese keiretsus, and the ruling elite.

I would be more cautious about so robustly embracing the role of occupier, though. .
The societes of Japan and Germany were so vastly diffrent from Iraq (the former two also haivng been beaten to a bloody pulp BEFORE the occupation), that I don't think you can transplant wholesale the experience from society to society. Certainly there was always a need to keep order,but I'm not sure what degree of 'shut up, and do as you're told' would work best in Iraq.

My other thought is that saying 50-100 years is likely to be a repellelnt idea to the Iraqis. For the alQaeda types, it could make a fine recruitment tool.

Just not a good thing to say, all around.,