Iraq: Be careful what you wish for

SFGate: The Ross Report ^ | 9/19/7 | Andrew S. Ross

[SmithL]

In 'Planning for Defeat,' the New Yorker's George Packer, one of the first journalists to expose the extent of America's disaster in Iraq, assesses the various options, all unpalatable, now facing the U.S. -- including Democratic calls for a fast, virtually complete withdrawal, beginning now.

On the latter, Packer writes:

Predictions that a departure will actually strengthen America's position are not so different from the wishful thinking of the Bush Administration. They see only the benefits of withdrawal; they refuse to face the brutal trade-offs that either staying or leaving would impose. A more honest argument says that it's simply not a core American interest to prevent Iraqis from being massacred: the result of a withdrawal may be a humanitarian tragedy but a strategic footnote. (Obama's statement implied as much.)

This viewpoint has recently brought together hard-nosed realists, antiwar progressives, and isolationist conservatives. Even in narrow strategic terms, though, American interests would be harmed by large-scale slaughter in Iraq. The spectacle, televised around the world, would deepen the feeling that America is indifferent to human, especially Muslim, life. It would brand the U.S. as untrustworthy to potential allies and feckless to potential enemies. And it would destroy what's left of American prestige.

Packer goes on to cite one who might be considered an "antiwar progressive," Toby Dodge, a U.K.-based Iraq expert, described America's seeming defeat, largely at the hands of "a bunch of radicals with nothing more sophisticated than re-engineered artillery shells and rocket-propelled grenades," as a "loss of cataclysmic proportions."

Dodge, Packer continues, comes out of the British left and vehemently opposed the war. But this summer, when we met at his London office, he spoke of withdrawal as a prelude to catastrophe.

[SmithL]

Sens. Reid, Obama, MoveOn.org., et al: Have you considered this at all?

[DoughtyOne]

Of course they have. And they have carfully triangulated their plans to drive toward the worst possible scenario for the U.S. and it’s global standing. Capitalism evil! Communism... now there’s an idea.