Posted on 02/04/2007 9:12:57 AM PST by A_perfect_lady
I have just finished reading a Ben Stein column about the recent SOTU adress. It started out very well, but then took what seemed to me an odd turn: Stein, along with several other conservative pundits, has come to the conclusion that the war in Iraq was just a big, huge mistake. I've been hearing this with increasing frequency, from people I did not expect to hear it from. Bill O'Reilly, Francis Fukuyama... even Charles Krauthammer sounds disenchanted.
Here is my question: When did everyone decide to agree that the war in Iraq was a mistake? I still don't think it was a mistake. Stein credits President Bush with the fact that we have not experienced a follow-up terrorist attack since 9/11. Why does he suppose we have not had another major attack here in the States? Because we took the war to them, just exactly as President Bush said we were going to do. We'll fight them on the streets of Baghdad so that we aren't fighting them HERE. Militants from Syria and Iran are streaming into Iraq and that's a pity, but it's especially a pity for them as they would much rather stream into the United States.
Is it a "mistake" because four years after the fall of the Ba'ath regime, we don't have a peaceful Iraq? Did anyone expect the Islamic world to sit idly by while we create something utterly foreign to their experience in the very heart of their world? It's ironic that I should quote Noam Chomsky in a time and place like this, but stopped clocks being right twice a day as they are, he once said something useful: Oppressors cannot bear the threat of a good example. Neither theocracies, monarchies, or pan-Arab socialists want to see a functioning democratic state in the muslim world. It's like teaching slaves to read: you'll never keep them subservient to Allah, the King, or the Dictator after they've seen the alternative. Did anyone anywhere think we were going to do that in four years? Did anyone think that the various powers that be (or would be) in the Middle East would take it lying down?
I still remember President Bush's address before going into Afghanistan: it will not be easy and it will not be quick. He meant it then and he means it now. We are not in Iraq to avenge ourselves for September 11th, or to find Osama bin Laden, or to save the world from WMD, and we never were. We are there to begin the changing of the Middle East. We are addressing the root causes of extremism, parochialism, fanaticism, state-sponsored hatred, and ignorance. It's a huge task. You might feel it was the wrong approach and we should have either wiped out half the muslim world in one fell swoop (an understandable reaction) or just hunkered down, surrounded ourselves with walls, wished Israel good luck, and watched from a safe distance as Islam spreads slowly but surely into Europe and Africa. I suppose we could have done that with the Communists, too, in the 20th century, and just hoped that we could hold out on our huge island when, at last, they came for us.
If this is your view then yes, invading Iraq was a big mistake. But please consider: we are dealing with a force very much like Communism, one that is intent upon spreading and has a great deal of momentum. We can crush the enemy, run from the enemy, or try to change the enemy. President Bush is trying to change the enemy. It's as valid an approach as the other two alternatives. I urge my fellow Americans not to give up on this approach after such a very short time, because if you think this undertaking is expensive in terms of national treasure and human lives, remember all the times countries have used the other two approaches. Remember the retreat from Cambodia and the killing fields that resulted. Remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I am not pointing to them as examples of American mistakes but as examples of the results of retreat or full-scale destruction, both valid but expensive ways of exiting or ending a war. Do we want to do either of those things again, just to claim peace in our time? All I am saying, is give war a chance.
All of which may be true...but doesn't buy a dimes worth of "what to do now". You got any suggestions? Or, like the Demos and Rinos, you just want to complain?
You are my heroine! An essay sweet with truth.
Thats what created the stability. The fear of having your entire neighborhood exterminated, and one mans willingness to do it if you so much as questioned his authority! That was all that was needed to keep everyone in check.
I don't actually agree with FOF about the war 100%--I happen to think it's a winnable war, if only we'd the national will to fight it--but just out of curiosity, Dr. Frank, is your life affected by space travel? Is your life affected by troops stationed in Haiti? Is your life affected by deep-sea ocean mining? Is your life affected by internet data-mining? Is your life affected by illegals who live in east Texas? Ever have an inkling you might want to someday address those issues around here?
The reason I ask is that logic like yours is EXACTLY the same as 'men can't have abortions so they shouldn't get to pass or even vote on laws about it.' So you've proven yourself the philosophical equivalent of Molly Yard. Congratulations! In keeping with your policy, I hereby limit those who can publicly address the republic's national issues of the day to people who understand freedom, and particularly, freedom of speech--so now YOU can kindly shut the hell up.
Dam straight I just want to complain. The administration has screwed up and admitted it ( to the point where President "mission accomplished" Bush has asked the dems for advice. They have lost control of the Senate and the House. They are about to serve up President bubba and the beast, part two. And many here want to cheer them on while they outspend any dem administration in history.
What to do now? Well, to paraphrase Colin Powell, "we broke it, we bought it". So I suppose there is naught else to do but prop up some semblance of a government, leave, and hope for the best.
9/11 happened while the middle-east was far more stable than it is today. Piling more American lives upon the pyre will do litle to prevent a repeat, I suppose.
Facts are not an appropriate response to an emotion-based cult of personality, I'm afraid.
I was and am in favor of the war.
I did not agree with the favored published reason for this part of the war. “Weapons of mass destruction” and “War on terrorism” are great catch phrases and have mass appeal. The reasons I would have stressed was Iraq’s failure to abide by the terms of the cease-fire.
I do not agree with how the war was waged and do not agree with what we are currently doing. If used properly, the planned “surge” will help.
The war conducted from 19 March through 9 April was executed magnificently, with two glaring mistakes as I see it. We did not take into account the culture of the Iraqi People. We ignored Iraqi military formations not involved in the combat or that we had overrun.
Iraqi is a tribal culture. The “Big Man”, the baddest dude in the country is the boss. Saddam was the baddest, most ruthless of the tribal leaders. We assumed that because we want democracy everyone in the world wants democracy. There are a lot of Iraqis who don’t want democracy. Those Iraqi formations that we ignored were simply told to go home. We didn’t even make an effort to disarm them. They became a ready pool of armed and trained recruits for every religious and political militia.
Our answer to the growing insurgency was to go on the defensive. We tried to handle it like cops, not soldiers. We became reactive, not proactive. Training a new Iraqi police and military force helped, but it is no quick solution - again, their culture has to be overcome. Loyalties are to family, sept, clan and tribe. There is no real feeling of nationhood. Iraqis also take their religion far more seriously than we do. I can not imagine widespread armed conflict between Methodists and Baptists.
If the new “surge” is to be successful it has to be offensive. We can not afford to fight a war while doing nothing that an Iraqi may find offensive. We have to be the new “Big Man” on the block. We will be respected by Iraqi militants when they learn to fear us.
"We can crush the enemy, run from the enemy, or try to change the enemy. President Bush is trying to change the enemy. It's as valid an approach as the other two alternatives."
I don't think that the national consensus was ever established to 'change the enemy.' It was to stop Saddam from making and using WMDs on us, or arming terrorists to do so as his proxies. Here Bush has utterly failed, and it seems to be because he did not plan for Russian, Syrian or Iranian intervention aiding the movement of WMDs outside Iraqi territory. To admit 'mistakes were made' is not correcting them, especially when the major mistake that was made was assuming American projection of power alone was enough to cow those who prefer their own regional hegemony. To ask for 20,000 troops compounds that mistake--he should have asked for 100,000, or 200,000, asked for national service, to solve the problem of America's inability to awe these guerrillas and make them fear incursions into their own territory. Bush should be rattling sabers, and instead, he's clinking a butter knife. And across America, we're going to the mall this weekend. Good thing we're fighting that war on the home front, too.
Huh??
Whatever.....
These guys would have bailed out after Normandy, Battle of the Bulge, etc. and we would now all be speaking German, save for Stein and Krauthammer, they'd have long been sent to gas chambers.
Sorry for the confusion--all I'm saying is, I agree with you, but it's even worse than you imagine it. We never really ramped up into a war footing to begin with, and yet the public won't support what little the government has done. The whole of America hasn't ever been asked to sacrifice for the war. We've been told to go to the mall.
Not in a tangible, negative sense. Thus, as you can observe I don't devote a goodly fraction of my waking hours to whining about the fact that there are people engaged in research/development for the purpose of space travel.
Of course, efforts towards space travel may have affected my life in some small ways, mostly positive (i.e. satellites -> cell phones? Tang?), some negative (tax money), but either way, I don't know a lot about it; like most people on the subject of Iraq, I'm just not a hugely informed commentator on the subject of space travel. Of course, if/when the day comes that the existence of space travel-seeking people/institutions represents a significant negative effect on my life/my loved ones in some way, then maybe I'll start whining about half as much as half of America is currently whining about the Iraq occupation which isn't affecting them on any conceivable measurable scale in the slightest. Till then....
Is your life affected by troops stationed in Haiti?
Not that I can perceive. Thus, as you can observe I don't devote a good fraction of my waking hours to whining about the fact that there are U.S. troops stationed in Haiti (which, I'm taking your word for).
Is your life affected by deep-sea ocean mining? Is your life affected by internet data-mining? Is your life affected by illegals who live in east Texas? Ever have an inkling you might want to someday address those issues around here?
"Address", perhaps.
Whine about in the most ill-informed, chicken-little manner out of all proportion to how those things might actually be affecting me, no.
The reason I ask is that logic like yours is EXACTLY the same as 'men can't have abortions so they shouldn't get to pass or even vote on laws about it.'
Men are affected tangibly by abortions, i.e. every aborted fetus was fathered by some man.
Regardless, even among the most devoted, fanatical, shrill anti-abortion activists it is quite rare to find the sort of hysterical, persistent, neverending whining we are subjected to every single day on the subject of Iraq by people who live cushy, wealthy, comfortable lives that are completely untouched by the Iraq endeavor.
In keeping with your policy, I hereby limit those who can publicly address the republic's national issues of the day to people who understand freedom, and particularly, freedom of speech--so now YOU can kindly shut the hell up.
Again, there's a difference between "address" and "shriek hysterically about out of all proportion".
And there's a difference between me asking people to shut the hell up on issues they know nothing about and which don't affect them, and actually infringing upon their freedom of speech (i.e. throwing them in jail for not doing so).
The fact that you equate these things demonstrates your lack of proportion on the subject.
It is futile. It's a bit like stationing your hand in the middle of a swarm of bees.
You don't combat terrorism with an occupation. Putting hundreds of thousands of troops in the middle of the Islamic world doesn't lessen the threat of Islamic terrorism. It increases it. We are now a larger target than we were before 9/11.
A "nation" of Sunni Kurds, Sunni Arabs and Shia Arabs -- all itching to dominate and even kill each other -- cannot function as a stable platform for democracy. The Arabs are Semitic, and the Kurds are Celtic, like the Irish and Welsh. The Kurds view the Arabs as a lower form of life, somewhere between worms and lizards, and would prefer not to share a country with them. Sunni and Shia Arabs have been persecuting each other for 14 centuries and their attitude is, "Why mess with success?"
One question that our soldiers began asking was, "Is Iraq the way it is because of Saddam, or was Saddam the way he was because of Iraq?" At first we thought it was the former, but now it appears to be the latter.
This ties in to something I call the "Trash Can Theory of History". (Maybe I should copyright it.) There are some countries that can only function when a trash can lid is firmly put in place. Remove that lid and all kinds of horrible things slither out.
Occasionally, a trash can lid works a miracle, and the people are ready for self-rule. Spain under Franco is a good example. When the Spanish Civil War ended with a German intervention, half the people of Spain were quite willing to torture and kill the other half. Franco's 36 years of military dictatorship gave the Spanish a cooling-off period for the war generation to die or just get old. Franco was an adept practitioner of Freesmith's Equation (Fear + Hate = Power), and the Spanish hated and feared Franco more than they hated and feared each other. Thus, Franco offered a generation of stability. Once he was gone, the people were ready to rule themselves, and aside from a single hiccup early in King Juan Carlos' rule, they've done quite well.
Iraq and Yugoslavia are textbook examples of trash can lids being removed too soon. Regrettably, I'm coming to believe that only a strongman can hold Iraq together, preferably someone less psychotic than Saddam.
Even if you're right that it's futile, that makes it just another futile government program. The nonstop shrill whining about this one is necessary... because?
You don't combat terrorism with an occupation.
I know some people have voiced the fight-terrorism view in this thread, but as for me, I don't really take the view that the direct purpose of the occupation is to "fight terrorism" per se (I do think it is part of the larger war that is usually called the "War On Terror"). The direct purpose of the occupation is to safeguard a democratic government. "Fighting terrorism" as such only comes into play because, if successful, we'll deny them a haven, as well as the moral/honor victory that would come from kicking us out.
But anyway, I guess I agree with you. However, that doesn't make the occupation a bad idea.
Not all things that "don't combat terrorism" as such are bad ideas. You could I suppose make an opportunity-cost argument, i.e. that having those soldiers "futilely" stationed in Iraq prevents us from using them to do such-and-such thing elsewhere that would actually better combat terrorism.
But what would that thing be? Where would you rather these soldiers be stationed, and to do what? Do tell.
Putting hundreds of thousands of troops in the middle of the Islamic world doesn't lessen the threat of Islamic terrorism. It increases it. We are now a larger target than we were before 9/11.
This is a bunch of hand-waving with no basis. Define "larger target"? Were we a "smaller" target before? how much "smaller"? is that "size" measured in feet? miles? How do you measure the size of a "threat"? or know whether it has "increased" or "decreased"? What's the objective basis for all these claims? There is none. You've decided to assert that Iraq has "increased the threat" because you thought that would make your argument more convincing; in other words, you made all this up.
What is the objective basis for the claim that Iraq has a democratic government, that we are safeguarding it, and that attempting to safeguard it in the manner we are is in the best interest of the United States?
But what would that thing be? Where would you rather these soldiers be stationed, and to do what? Do tell.
I will. On our borders. At our airports, seaports, and critical infrastructure.
Publius,
Thank you for the link to your post. It's very true.
The problem is that the enemy within sees a chance to add to its gains and knock out a fractured Republican Party for a very long time to come. If it were a RAT president in the WH, everything would have been very rosy and there wouldn't have been any talk about withdrawal until they were ready with the "victory" drumbeat even in withdrawal!
Let me tell you a well-known story from Iraqi history to make my point of extreme force even clearer:
Few centuries ago, a Caliph ascended to the thrown and here is a paragraph from his flowery, poetic speech to his subjects, the Iraqi people:
O people of Iraq, O people of deceit and hypocrisy. I see heads in full bloom and ripe for the picking (cutting) and I am the picker (cutter).
The first phrase rhymes as a poetic verse.
Imagine something like this is said to us in a presidential inauguration! We've got to understand what we're dealing with especially oppressed people for thousands of years who are flatly threatened with execution and torture by their very leaders.
.
Or that we are so insipidly stupid that we jail our soldiers for having a little fun with the enemy by putting panties on their heads.
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