No Third Way in Iraq

Weekly Standard ^ | November 13 2006 | Frederick W. Kagan

[jmc1969]

The United States has two options in Iraq: stay and try to win, or cut, run, and lose. Attempts to chart a middle course--partial withdrawal or redeployment, accelerated hand-over to the Iraqis, political deals with Syria or Iran--ignore the realities of the military situation. The real choice we face is this: Is it better to accept defeat than to endure the pain of trying to succeed?

The U.S. military, under the stewardship of CENTCOM Commander General John Abizaid, has worked hard from the outset to avoid creating an Iraqi military that is dependent upon the continued presence of U.S. forces. The fear of such dependency is one of the pillars that has supported U.S. strategy from the outset.

In order to avoid it, the U.S. military has never fully committed to conducting coherent and comprehensive counterinsurgency operations on its own, preferring to wait until the Iraqis are able to undertake them. We are still waiting, and the insurgency is strengthening its organization and inciting chaos through mass murder and sectarian violence.

The Iraqi military, unfortunately, is still a work in progress. Although there are growing numbers of trained Iraqi soldiers formed into increasingly competent tactical units, those units remain highly dependent on American logistical support for food, shelter, ammunition, and transportation.

Baghdad can still be pacified, but it will require a change of approach and more troops--probably on the order of 50,000, most of them deployed to the capital. The aim would be to clear and hold the Sunni Arab neighborhoods, in the first instance, both to prevent violence within them and to protect them from attacks from their Shiite neighbors. After each operation, we would need to leave behind significant numbers of U.S. troops to preserve the gains, along with such Iraqis as are available.

[attiladhun2]

The N. Viets were defeated in Vietnam. It was a Democrat-controlled Congress led by the Cape Cod Orca, aka Ted "the Swimmer" Kennedy who pulled the rug out from under the S. Viets by refusing to back the Paris Accords of 1973 or even to give the ARVNs ammo and fuel. The timeline of Islamotarianism leads like an arrow directly from there right through to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 and the eventual Taliban takeover of the country in 1995. So if you think the consequences of the lose in Vietnam were only local, think again. If any of you out there think we can just wrap up Iraq like a bow and set it back on the shelf, you'd better think about that again. I cannot even imagine the disasterous consequences that will ensue.

[jeltz25]

I didn't say anything like that.

I agree with you about the consequences of withdrawal in Iraq.

My point was that if you're fighting an enemy who has the unimpeded outside support, as the the NVA/VC did in Vietnam from the USSR/PRC and outside bases in Cambodia/Laos taht were largely off limits and untouched, it's very difficult to achieve victory.

And yes, the dems did pull the plug but even the Paris Peace Accords can't really be defined as "victory". At best, it achieved a Korea like cease-fire. But again, as long as they kept getting resupplied and supported by Russia and China, it was unlikely to hold.

Similarly, in Iraq, as long as Iran and Syria continue to support and supply the insurgency, and provide safe havens and training grounds in their territory for the insurgency, and as long as we do nothing to stop them from continuing to do so, it will be very difficult to achieve stability.

[nitzy]

I don't know if you were directing the moron comment at me but in reply I would say it is equally moronic to compare the cowardly neutral Swiss to the hatefull agressive Iraqi muslims. The difference between Iraq and Switzerland is that the Swiss don't blow each other up on a daily basis for political and religious domination.