BREAKING NEWS: The last U.S. troops in Iraq have crossed into Kuwait, ending almost nine years of a deadly and divisive war.

 

 

By NICK SCHIFRIN

ABC News

 

BAGHDAD- In the end, there was no decisive battle, no peace treaty. The United States’ bloodiest conflict since Vietnam ended with a border crossing.

 

After nearly nine years, $800 billion, 4,500 American dead and an estimated 100,000 Iraqi dead, the war in Iraq is over — at least for the U.S. military. At just after XX a.m. local, the last U.S. combat troops crossed from Iraq into Kuwait along the same roads the United States used to invade the country in 2003.

 

One and a half million American men and women served in Iraq since that first force arrived, back when the campaign was expected to be quick and greeted warmly. But even today, the legacy of the war is in many ways still unknown: The United States is leaving an Iraq where sectarian, regional, and political groups still show willingness — and sometimes a desire — to resolve their differences violently, and where many of the vital issues created by the invasion are still unsettled.