Wrong on Timetables

Let's give congressional Democrats the benefit of the doubt: Assume some of them earnestly think they're doing the right thing to insist on adding to the supplemental appropriation for the Iraq war benchmarks and timetables for withdrawal. Still, their own arguments--taken at face value--don't hold up.

Democrats in Congress have made three superficially plausible claims: (1) Benchmarks and timetables will "incentivize" the Maliki government to take necessary steps it would prefer to avoid. (2) We can gradually withdraw over the next year so as to step out of sectarian conflict in Iraq while still remaining to fight al Qaeda. (3) Defeat in Iraq is inevitable, so our primary goal really has to be to get out of there. But the situation in Iraq is moving rapidly away from the assumptions underlying these propositions, and their falseness is easier to show with each passing day.

(1) The Iraqi government will not act responsibly unless the imminent departure of American forces compels it to do so. Those who sincerely believe this argument were horrified by the president's decision in January to increase the American military presence in Iraq. It has now been more than ten weeks since that announcement--long enough to judge whether the Maliki government is more or less likely to behave well when U.S. support seems robust and reliable.

In fact, since January 11, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has permitted U.S. forces to sweep the major Shiite strongholds in Baghdad, including Sadr City, which he had ordered American troops away from during operations in 2006. He has allowed U.S. forces to capture and kill senior leaders of Moktada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army--terrifying Sadr into fleeing to Iran. He fired the deputy health minister--one of Sadr's close allies--and turned a deaf ear to Sadr's complaints. He oversaw a clearing-out of the Interior Ministry, a Sadrist stronghold that was corrupting the Iraqi police. He has worked with coalition leaders to deploy all of the Iraqi Army units required by the Baghdad Security Plan. In perhaps the most dramatic move of all, Maliki visited Sunni sheikhs in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province and formerly the base of al Qaeda fighters and other Sunni Arab insurgents against his government. The visit was made possible because Anbar's sheikhs have turned against al Qaeda and are now reaching out to the government they had been fighting. Maliki is reaching back. U.S. strength has given him the confidence to take all these important steps.

(2) American forces would be able to fight al Qaeda at least as well, if not better, if they were not also engaged in a sectarian civil war in Iraq. The idea of separating the fight against al Qaeda from the sectarian fighting in Iraq is a delusion. Since early 2004, al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) has sought to plunge Iraq into sectarian civil war, so as to critically weaken the government, which is fighting it. AQI endeavors to clear Shiites out of mixed areas, terrorize local Sunnis into tolerating and supporting AQI, and thereby establish safe havens surrounded by innocent people it then dragoons into the struggle. Now, heartened by the U.S. commitment to stay, Sunni sheikhs in Anbar have turned on AQI. In response, AQI has begun to move toward Baghdad and mixed areas in Diyala, attempting to terrorize the locals and establish new bases in the resulting chaos. The enemy understands that chaos is al Qaeda's friend. The notion that we can pull our troops back into fortresses in a climate of chaos--but still move selectively against al Qaeda--is fanciful. There can be no hope of defeating or controlling al Qaeda in Iraq without controlling the sectarian violence that it spawns and relies upon.

(3) Isn't it too late? Even if we now have the right strategy and the right general, can we prevail? If there were no hope left, if the Iraqis were determined to wage full-scale civil war, if the Maliki government were weak or dominated by violent extremists, if Iran really controlled the Shiites in Iraq--if these things were true, then the new strategy would have borne no fruit at all. Maliki would have resisted or remained limp as before. Sadr's forces would have attacked. Coalition casualties would be up, and so would sectarian killings. But none of these things has happened. Sectarian killings are lower. And despite dramatically increased operations in more exposed settings, so are American casualties. This does not look like hopelessness.

Hope is not victory, of course. The surge has just begun, our enemies are adapting, and fighting is likely to intensify as U.S. and Iraqi forces begin the main clear-and-hold phase. The Maliki government could falter. But it need not, if we do not. Unfortunately, four years of setbacks have conditioned Americans to believe that any progress must be ephemeral. If the Democrats get their way and Gen. Petraeus is undermined in Congress, the progress may indeed prove short-lived. But it's time to stop thinking so hard about how to lose, and to think instead about how to reinforce and exploit the success we have begun to achieve. The debate in Washington hasn't caught up to the realities in Baghdad. Until it does, a resolute president will need to prevent defeatists in Congress from losing a winnable war in Iraq.

Just think for a moment the joy we would all feel (from the private in Baghdad to the man in the Oval Office)if tomorrow, al queida announced that "If we haven't driven the Americans out of Iraq by the end of '08, we will quit."

THAT is how you know withdrawal timetables are a bad idea.

What's so outrageous is the outlook in Iraq right now is most likely the complete opposite from what the DBM/dems want us to beleive. They are liars and deceivers and are invested wholly in America's defeat!

If the Repubs had the slightest inkling of nads they would combat these thugs every waking hour of the day with facts. They say they can't do it because the media would tear them apart, but at this point what do they have to lose?

It just STUPID to sit back and let the media define things!!!

It's a shame Bush didn't adopt this new strategy shortly after invasion, just glad he finally did. It is further a shame that so many Americans were stupid enough to put these bunch of losers in Congress.

Well McCain, who I dislike in so many ways as a Senator and Pres. candidate, is on Bill Bennett's show saying all the right things about the Dems' actions, and what withdrawal would mean.

NO! That's not at ALL what I mean! BB is a conservative, it's easy for any repub to go on a pro-conservative radio show and say those things. I'm talking "Drive By Media" types and all repubs in unison calling this defeat America, impeach-Bush crowd what they are, UNPATRIOTIC LOSERS! Any repub rino that steps outta line, berate to oblivion, especially including McPainintheass who is cheif amomg rino's...of course, at HIS convience.

Repubs need to really start listening to their base, we will not stand for spineless, gutless, wrongheaded rino's taking over the repub party.

Act accordingly or be gone!

Let's give congressional Democrats the benefit of the doubt: Assume some of them earnestly think they're doing the right thing...

I used to subscribe to TWS. This is an example of why I am not missing it a whole lot. Democrats do not have victory in mind; they are driven by pork and a desire to make the President look bad. Period.

Whatever number of Democrat reps in the House really hope for victory, that number is dwarfed by the number of Democrats who want Iraq to be Vietnam Redux.

So quit talking about "benefit of the doubt", Mr. Kristol--and start calling a spade a spade.

Look at what we have done:

1-We freed 26 million people from the grip of a tyrant.
2-We killed his two sons who might have succeeded him.
3-We enabled a functioning judicial system through which the Iraqi people have now executed their former dictator.
4-There is now a constitution, a sitting legislature in place, and an executive branch now reaching out to minorities.
5-We killed one insurgent leader (Zarqawi) and ran another from the country (al-Sadr is now in Iran).

So NO WONDER the Democrats want to get out NOW before something else GOOD happens.

It's a shame Bush didn't adopt this new strategy shortly after invasion, just glad he finally did.

Would it have worked then? Certain things only work when other things are in place. Part of the goal then was to convince the "common people" that we weren't there to colonize the place. The confirmation of that perception, as well as the contradiction of that perception both create different circumstances from a state where people aren't sure.

That's part of the problem with the kibbitzing on the war - like citing the current events as proof that we needed more troops during the invasion, and using that fallacious leap to say that the generals who espoused it were right, and Bush was wrong for not listening. When in a war, the circumstances continually change. We've changed how we're fighting the war every few months - not neccessarily in every aspect, but quite significantly. They change, we change. The thing that hasn't much changed, especially since late 2004, is the Democrat demand for defeat has been pretty open - though even that changed, since early on they were trying to hide it.

Part of the goal then was to convince the "common people" that we weren't there to colonize the place.

I agree that is what we were trying to do, however, I disagree that that is what we should have been doing. We should have locked Iraq down tighter than a drum. Indeed I would have acted not only like a conqueror but exerted our military strength, for that is what these people understand the best. Once they realized that we owned them then we could have eased them into freedom much like we did in Germany and Japan after WWII. I wouldn't have cared what the world thought, I would have been more concerned with results.

O.K. But that would have been even more expensive than what we have now, likely cost more American lives, and probably cost more Iraqi lives.

Really, for that, considering that they are a completely different culture, and not one that has the quirk of Japan's Emperor, I wouldn't be surprised if it required several million Americans to translocate...and at the end it'd be a colony. Germany at least had the tradition of gentleman's agreements with war and accepting defeat, and no external sponsor nations.

Really, a better step would probably be to just get it over and invade Iran, and perhaps Syria.

Well we can agree that we disagree on what the best tactic would have been in Iraq, however, we are in total agreement about moving on to Iran. Syria will fall in place once we have destroyed Iran (by that I mean kill every last Mullah and their staunchest supporters). We should not worry about world condemnation nor should we concern oursleves about innocent Iranian deaths, because those deaths will be the fault of the Mullahs, not America's. But that must be our plan, destroy Iran, not go in trying to make friends. In my opinion what we did in Iraq has cost more American servicemen/women lives than going in as conquers. If you are going to ask your countries young men and women to do battle then let them do battle. As for the expenses, we could have repaid ourselves with their oil, and we can repay ourselves with Iranian oil for that excursion.

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