Posted on 11/29/2006 9:48:42 AM PST by jamese777
In N.H., says Bush must admit that to regain trust
BEDFORD, N.H. -- Former House speaker Newt Gingrich told a New Hampshire audience yesterday that unless the Bush administration admits that the war in Iraq is a "failure," it will never develop a strategy to leave the country successfully.
Gingrich, who has been laying the groundwork for a presidential run, said the Bush administration needs to plan a "third stage" in Iraq, following the military takeover stage and the recent democracy-building stage. But he says a third stage can come about only if officials admit they must change course.
"If the military, White House, and State Department continue to avoid the word 'failure,' how can you bring about a third stage?" Gingrich said.
Gingrich was in New Hampshire for three campaign-style events Monday night and yesterday. While the former speaker has expressed interest in a presidential run, he said yesterday that he is more interested in injecting ideas in to the 2008 campaign than in putting his name on the ballot. He said he will not seriously entertain a presidential campaign until September.
Gingrich, who served on a key Pentagon board that advised Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in the runup to the Iraq war, was eager to distance himself from the Bush administration's handling of the war.
He said a show of contrition by the White House would help the president regain the trust of the American people and avoid a quick pullout, which would be disastrous.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
I just heard Newt on Rush's show, and that isn't what he said. He called the first campaign of the war a success and the second campaign, to establish a free gov't, a failure, starting with installing an American to run the interim gov't.
Newt is right about Iraq being a failure.
Amazing how the anti-military, anti-war pseudo-cons have been embolded to say even more absurd things since they won the election in November, isn't it?
You want to stand face to face with our troops and say that?
Et tu, NEWTus?
"Take any two major cities in this country, say Detroit and Washington, D.C. More americans are murdered here every month than in the Iraq."
"That is not even remotely true"
Yeah I am not too sure what reality that person is living. Detroit and Washington don't have Sunni's and Shiites driving down the street with AK 47's shotting people at will.
Does that really have anything to do with the fact? We go to a country full of prisons, we open the doors and bring the people out into freedom and they kill us and run straight back for the prisons. It's not rational it's Islam.
Did you realize that they selected the Islamic Al-Dawa party. What type of democracy were you hoping for over there and American version. (Sigh)
The US won the "WAR" portion of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Decisively is an understatement of monumental porportions.
- Saddam ousted from power and captured.
- Democratic Constitution written, voted on and approved.
- Freely elected government installed.
The portion of Operation Iraqi Freedom making sure the new government is strong enough to survive has been ROYALLY botched.
- Did not recognize, and deal with, the Militant Islamic Movement.
- Did not seal the borders with Syria and Iran.
What 'fact?'
It's your ill-informed opinion, and I want you to say you've got the guts to go face to face with our troops and tell them that the mission they know is just and right, and the mission that they know the are winning is a 'failure.'
It is just beginning. Now the task will be to undermine anyone with a chance of defeating Hillary by claiming they aren't "conservative" enough while pumping up those without a chance of winning.
But I'm in for the long haul so they won't get away with it without some opposition.
So what? As long as they abide by their own Constitution, there won't be a problem.
The Party that won the most seats in the Dec 2005 elections with 128 seats [41%] out of 275 was the United Iraqi Alliance. The alliance formed in the lead up to the January 2005 elections from mainly Shi'ite groups most importantly the Islamic Al-Da'wa Party and Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. Other important members included the secular Iraqi National Congress led by Ahmed Chalabi, which has since left the coalition, and nuclear physicist Hussain Shahristani. It also included supporters of radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr who preferred not to back his National Independent Cadres and Elites party, and a number of independent Sunni representatives.
The coalition was widely believed to have been supported by senior Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the most widely respected religious figure in Iraq, and although the Ayatollah has offered no official endorsement, many in Iraq understand the UIA to be "al-Sistani's list."
I will not let this love affair between so-called conservative 'purists' and the left go unchallenged.
The incessant attacks on the War in Iraq going on here on FR since their joint victory in November are proof positive that those of us who are conservatives are fighting both ends of the political spectrum who have joined hands to defeat us.
They won this election, but we must do our best to keep them from electing Hillary in '08. Shoulder to shoulder......
See my post #152. The Iraqi Constitution is the governing document and the parameters under which the parliament and the government operates. The Al-Dawa party is part of the coalition that formed the UIA party. The UIA does not hold a majority of total seats in the parliament, just a plurality. You can't exclude Islamic based parties from running and governing. Approximately 60% of the population are Shi'a.
well, all I can say is that I heard him give the same talk on H&C the other night - and this was not how he phrased it.
He said the the 2nd phase of the iraq war, the post-saddam phase, has not succeeded. It hasn't failed, but it hasn't succeeded either. It has left us in this "limbo" - with an iraqi democracy that cannot sustain itself, and US force which cannot be applied acutely to reach a military endgame.
he is correct about this.
the issue at hand is whether there is a phase 3 that involves a fight, or a deal brokered by James Baker.
"So what? As long as they abide by their own Constitution, there won't be a problem.
The Party that won the most seats in the Dec 2005 elections with 128 seats [41%] out of 275 was the United Iraqi Alliance. The alliance formed in the lead up to the January 2005 elections from mainly Shi'ite groups most importantly the Islamic Al-Da'wa Party and Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. Other important members included the secular Iraqi National Congress led by Ahmed Chalabi, which has since left the coalition, and nuclear physicist Hussain Shahristani. It also included supporters of radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr who preferred not to back his National Independent Cadres and Elites party, and a number of independent Sunni representatives.
The coalition was widely believed to have been supported by senior Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the most widely respected religious figure in Iraq, and although the Ayatollah has offered no official endorsement, many in Iraq understand the UIA to be "al-Sistani's list."
Thanks for proving my point. The government of Iraq is now Shiite dominated and religious fundamentalist dominated in alliance with Iran's fondest hopes. That's why there was an Iran-Iraq summit meeting this week. That's why Iran and Iraq have signed a mutual defense pact and that's why Iran is offering foreign aid to Iraq.
The answer to that is a resounding NO. We haven't had the will to persevere and win a war since 1945.
Because of political pressure from Americans who were tired of reading or hearing about casualty reports we settled for a cease fire in Korea that left North Korea still entirely in communist hands and still a threat to South Korea after 3 years of war and almost 54,000 American dead. We pulled out of Vietnam because of public pressure after 9 years and 58,000 American dead plus 300,000 wounded. We can celebrate and hi-five each other when we slap down a tiny nation like Granada or Panama in a couple of days while sustaining only a handful of casualties. But the generations following the WWII generation simply haven't had and still don't have the stomach or the will to endure and win a long war of attrition and heavy casualties such as WWII was.
Here are a few stats that may give some perspective to the Iraq casualty figures. Approximately 700 MORE Americans are killed EVERY MONTH in traffic accidents here at home than have been killed in Iraq since day one of the invasion. Over 1/2 as many American servicemen were killed on D-Day alone as have died in Iraq since the invasion began. Almost 5 times as many French civilians were killed by Allied bombs, shells, and bullets in the D-Day invasion than Americans who have died in Iraq from the beginning of the war. The combined casualties sustained by the French and German armies during the WWI battle for Verdun ALONE totalled almost 1,000,000 men.
And now the majority of Americans are anxious to cut and run and declare victory after 2800 American deaths from all causes when everyone on the planet knows that most of Iraq is still in chaos, that it's government is still weak, incompetent, and dangerously divided by religious sectarianism, and that the Iraqi people will be totally engulfed in a vicious, bloody, civil/religious war the same day our troops leave. And what then will we have gained by the deaths of American servicemen and women when we bug out of Iraq? Since the Shiite PM Maliki and the Shiite cleric Al Sadr are already making overtures to predominantly Shiite Iran, I will not be surprised if the Iraqi government is officially allied with Iran and possibly Syria within months or even weeks after our departure.
Small wonder that we have so much trouble winning the hearts and minds of the ordinary people in every place where we try to install a democratic government. They all know by now that after a certain number of American casualties are incurred we will pull out and leave them to the tender mercies of the same kind of murderous tyrants, or worse, that we came in to rid them of in the first place. Maybe it would be better if in the future we just refrained from attempting to help oppressed people or from deposing hostile dictators since we obviously don't have the stomach to follow through when our people begin to die in that attempt.
Well said.
I think that you have things a bit backwards. While Gingrich may not be completely Conservative on all issues, he is far closer to Goldwater and Reagan than to Rockefeller. On the other hand, Bush has taken the Republican Party back to the "Me-To" days of the Dewey and Rockefeller Republican era.
Gingrich has simply grasped the fact that Karl Rove was not able to understand in the recent campaign; and that is the 'sea change' in public perception of our prolonged occupation of Iraq. What Gingrich is saying is precisely what needs to be said if the Republican party is not going to slip a whole lot further.
And, frankly, despite what many are posting in this thread, the recent election made Gingrich one of the more logical alternatives for 2008. He does understand how to lead public opinion--and demonstrated that very clearly in 1994. That is a subject on which Karl Rove has no clue. (See Conservative Dilemma, for my analysis of the problem.)
William Flax
That I will oppose to my last breath with the knowledge that my sons will continue even afterwards.
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