By Jessica Lewis

and Tyler Murphy

Sun Staff Writers

EDITOR'S NOTE: Sometimes, Evening Sun reporters just like to argue. In this feature, the sides of the argument were chosen arbitrarily; they do not necessarily represent the author's true viewpoints.

Although it is a highly controversial topic right now, increasing the troop level in Iraq is the right thing to do. For nearly four years, the United States has been fighting a war in Iraq, and if things go unchanged, the violence is going to continue for many years to come.

People do not want to see an increase in the number of troops to Iraq, but what real alternatives do we have? We have none. Perhaps our reasons for going to Iraq in the first place were flawed; we have found no weapons of mass destruction and there is no clear link between the terrorists who attacked the World Trade Center and the Iraqi regime, but that is a moot point. The issue now is the instability that has been created in the country. Now that our troops are fighting in Iraq, and we have removed Saddam Hussein from power, we have to continue the work that we started. – JLL

Wow I’m not sure where to start laughing. OK, we’ll first off it’s not a controversial topic or didn’t you vote in the national election where Republicans were ousted out of our legislative branch of government? The president’s approval rating is so low that to find support he has to lower his head. Support for the Iraq war is bouncing off the floor like a tennis ball. America wants out, not in. The controversy is generated by the notion of going against congressional, public and academic opinion (ever heard of a little thing called the Iraq study group, but I’ll get to that in a minute). Since when did sending in more troops ever stop violence? Give me one modern example. Here are some for you, Vietnam, no; Somalia, no; Israel and Lebanon, no; Iraq ... How are you going to deter these fanatics? Hey don’t blow yourself up because we’ll shoot you? I’m sure they’ll welcome the abundance of targets.

So what you’re saying is why fight a war, or rather why we started a war has nothing to do with the idea of continuing that war? Isn’t that exactly what it’s about? Fighting a war because you don’t want to lose is not a military strategy, it’s a political one. – TDM

Oh I’m sorry, I thought the definition of controversial was to give rise to public disagreement (and if you’ve watched or read the news in the last week, you would see that there is definitely public disagreement on this topic), but according to you it has something to do with voting.

Listen, if you want to stick your head in the sand and ignore the facts all around you, that is your choice, but I refuse to do so. Countless generals and military minds – you know, those people with actual military experience and expertise – have admitted that pulling the troops out of Iraq at this juncture would increase the sectarian violence in Iraq.