Posted on 08/18/2007 6:46:11 AM PDT by Aristotelian
Max Boot has an in-depth essay dissecting the various exit strategies proposed by critics of administration policy and of the current "surge."
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The current build-up of American forces in Iraq—universally known as the “surge”—was unveiled by President Bush on January 10. The earliest units shipped out in the middle of February, and the full complement of roughly 160,000 troops arrived only in June. Yet, by then, a vociferous chorus of voices back home—consisting mainly of Democrats but also of a growing number of middle-of-the-road Republicans—was already pronouncing the entire operation a failure and demanding a “change of course,” a “new strategy,” a “Plan B.”
Such a new strategy would of course involve not more troops on the ground but fewer, in response to the overwhelming impetus of public opinion to start bringing soldiers home. Nevertheless, while increasingly eager for an end to American involvement in the Iraq war, most legislators have continued to endorse what Senator Richard Lugar, in a much-heralded June speech, declared to be “four primary objectives” in Iraq. These are: “preventing Iraq or any piece of its territory from being used as a safe haven or training ground for terrorists or as a repository or assembly point for weapons of mass destruction”; “preventing the disorder and sectarian violence in Iraq from upsetting wider regional stability”; “preventing Iranian domination of the region”; and “limiting the loss of U.S. credibility.”
That is a very tall order. And so, all summer long, and even as reports surfaced attesting to initial successes of the surge, the search has been on for a plan that could accomplish these goals with a smaller commitment of resources. Does such a plan exist? It is worth surveying the major proposals to see if any of them offers a credible way forward.
(Excerpt) Read more at commentarymagazine.com ...
That right there is the key. It's the biggest rpoblem in Iraq right now.
Al Qaeda is about done. Oh, they still pull the occasional nasty stunt, but they know they're defeated. One only has to look at Ramadi and Fallujah these days to see that.
Iran is in the government and Iran needs to be removed from Iraq. Completely.
Mail.
Yup, we have to take care of Iran...and possibly Syria, and Iraq will solve itself.
Very good article by Max Boot. Thanks for posting.
Pull out of Iraq 1991 - War in Iraq 2003
Pull out of Somalia 1993 - War in Somalia 2006
Pull out of Iraq 2008 - War in Iraq 2010 ?
So????
Ah NO, there were NOT "Middle of the Road Republicans". They were RINOS and senile old Senate Dino-cons who never wanted to do anything about Iraq in the 1st place. They wanted to hide their head in their little DC bubble world and cling to their cold war era "realist" dogmas. They were only dragged kicking and screaming to the table on Iraq because in the aftermath of 09-11-01 they knew they had no choice but to be seen doing something about Islamofacism. The second they though they had the political cover they simply reverted to their "run-away-and-hide-under-the-bed-until-the-bad-men -go-way" play-book.
War in Iraq AND, War IN Israel as it is attacked from Lebanon, Syria, the Gaza Strip and Egypt. The Taliban would reinvade Afghanistan, Iran would achieve hegemony over the Gulf States, and harass the transport of oil, driving up prices still further.
The Kurds will go to war with Turkey AND Iraq.
All this chain of negative events would come about as a direct result of US withdrawl from Iraq. It would take a blind man to NOT see these eventualities.
So the name of the game is to keep America ignorant of these things through the misreporting of events through the MSM. All is set for disaster UNLESS we win in Iraq. The stakes are pretty high.
He certainly makes all the alternatives to stay-the-course look foolish or worse.
“He certainly makes all the alternatives to stay-the-course look foolish or worse.”
Yes. But stay the course ain’t lookin’ too appealing, either. Here are a few snips that gave me pause while reading Boots thoughtful and wide-angle assessment:
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For the most part, these “ways forward” are not mutually exclusive. All are predicated on a substantial reduction in American troop levels.
we repeatedly tried to implement a strategy of “as the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down,” and just as repeatedly we learned that the Iraqis on their own were incapable of standing up.
However ineffectual the Maliki government may be, we would be foolish to repeat the mistake we made in South Vietnam, where the American-sanctioned overthrow of Ngo Dinh Diem in 1963 resulted in a succession of rulers who proved even less satisfactory.
[[[[[[[actually, Diem was assassinated, not “overthrown”, which seems worth noting even if it is a distinction with little difference]]]]]]]
“Can we really expect sizable numbers of U.S. troops to remain in Iraq and do nothing while, a few miles away, ethnic cleansing and possibly even genocide are occurring? The “CNN effect”—the impact of lurid pictures of violence being broadcast continually around the world”......”we would assume a measure of moral complicity in whatever atrocities they might commit.”
thanks, bfl
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