Marine Sgt. Tracy Reddish of Jesup, Ga., patrols with an Iraqi policeman during a training session Wednesday in embattled Fallujah, in the final training day for Iraqi forces.
Posted on 04/28/2004 7:06:05 PM PDT by anncoulteriscool
We Didn't Dare Wait
By William Raspberry
Monday, April 19, 2004; Page A19
What follows is the speech the president didn't make at his news conference last week. He can use it now, with no further permission from me.
Before I take your questions, I would like to speak plainly for a moment to the American people.
We're having some tough times in Iraq, and many Americans are wondering how we came to be in such a tough spot. Some are asking: Isn't it time to just get out?
These are tough questions, but the people deserve some answers. From your president's point of view, the answers start with Sept. 11. That was the day the world changed. That was the day America changed. And that was the day, my fellow Americans, when your president changed. Up to that nightmarish day, the policy of the United States was to remain strong in the face of a foreign threat but to strike only if that threat became action. It was a policy that guided our nation for most of its history. Don't start anything with anybody, but crush anybody who starts anything with us. We were like the sheriff of the old Western movies, poised and ready, but waiting for the other guy to draw first.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Even when he doesn't get it right, I can still respect him, unlike so many other Axis of Drivel "journalists"
You agree with that?!!
I do. We need to get our fingerprints off the political rule of Iraq. We own Iraq as long as our troops are there. We need to get Iraqis running it.
Well, that's a fine choice of countries and a complete mischaracterization of what I wrote.
But for the slow, WE OWN IRAQ as long as our military is there. What we need to turn over is the political governance.
For example, notice that while we are de-Baathifying Falluja, we are re-Baathifying the Iraqi civil and military infrastructure.
The transition from Bremmer to the caretaker Pres/2 VPs/Prime Minister needs to have international recognition and Negroponte an ambassador. If Negroponte is seen as Garder/Bremmer reincarnated - no change - Iraq will be a dependant and we are in a quagmire.
"Accordingly, we must move as quickly as possible to turn over to the international community both the "keys" to Iraq and the decision of who to hand them to in due course."
Looks to me like it's saying that the "international community" should decide who and what the Iraqi government should be.
But I guess I'm just slow.
That's all great and wonderful but I don't see the Iraqis stepping up to the plate. I see a few looking in the general direction of the plate but none actually standing up and taking responsibility. I also see far too many cutting and running and hiding behind terrorists and twiddling their thumbs as said terrorists destroy their country.
In the end it doesn't matter what the "international community" or we decide who and what the Iraqi government should be. We can't control the governance of 25 million Iraqis. We can only control the power grabs of small groups - by killing them.
Killing violent Islamists and the pan-Arab extremists that sow the seeds of suicidal/homocidal whack jobs is why we're there.
If the international community decides there should be a President with 2 VPs and a Prime Minister, 1000 dancing girls and a partridge in a pear tree it doesn't mean a hill of beans in the war on terror as long as the result is a launching pad for striking at, and a killing ground for AQ and it's ilk.
We could put Attaturk incarnate in charge for all I care. Put the Deaniacs in charge. Put Chirac in charge. We don't like the outcome, we start over. That's what owning Iraq means.
And yes, you are slow.
I think that's the right view, but the timescale for Iraq is generations.
South Korea was an effective military dictatorship for 30 years (into the 80s). They have had a handful of elections at this point.
Attaturk turned Turkey away from the Islamic extremism - he's not remembered as the father of civil rights, he's the father of Turkey and Turkey's stalwart military. It didn't happen overnight.
Korea was a UN action and had all kinds of "international community" fingerprints all over it, but WE OWNED it with 35,000 troops.
Turkey has its own distinct history in developing post-Ottoman governance and avoiding cesspool Islamic extremism.
Iraq will have theirs as well, and it will look different 10 years, 20 years and 30 years from now.
That is the most frustrating aspect of this media propaganda campaign. We're not seeing what is actually going on in Iraq.
First, as an ideological 'must-have' we continue to talk of a democracy in Iraq. What is needed is a secular and in some way representative governing body. A body that is at least relatively balanced and committed to a nation rather than a family or sect. There should be some rewards, from the international community, for their progress and some real threat in the event they backslide.
But 'democracy' is totally alien to the populace of Iraq, it is probably seen as vaguely 'Jewish' and it is certainly 'western' in their insular mind set. If it happens, OK. If not, just aim to keep them in line.
Second, 'international community' is not a synonym for the United Nations! If we actually allow the UN to take a direct role in setting up shop and 'helping' the Iraqi's - we've spent a lot of time and money, and lives, on nothing.
The UN has failed every nation building test offered to it, it has proven to be more corrupt than even those on FR had imagined, and it has shown itself to be utterly opposed to our goals; that's not a good resume for the job.
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