Date Set to Leave Iraq
| By Ralph T - Nov 17th, 2008 at 10:47 am EST |
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Categories: Economic Fairness & Security, Effective & Ethical Government, Budget Priorities, All Network Posts: Front Page
Categories: Economic Fairness & Security, Effective & Ethical Government, Budget Priorities, All Network Posts: Front Page
The American Ambassador to Iraq and the Iraqi Foreign Minister have signed an agreement requiring US Forces to leave Iraq. No, this isn't another predictive "dream" story of the pending Obama Administration; the Bushies did (or, allowed) this.
So much for all of the GOP talking points and faux news air-time devoted to "...no arbitrary deadlines." The current news sound-bites are full of controversy and contradiction from inside Iraq. But, the American conservatives are being surprisingly quiet.
From a public policy viewpoint this is a wonderfully positive development. For too long America has enflamed the Iraqi insurgency by providing easy accusations of practicing a permanent occupation. Now, the next Administration and Congress must accomplish delivering that message to Halliburton and the other Bush donors who were expecting a lucrative permanent occupation.
Examining the National Security and military implications is more problematic. There has never been any depiction of national military strategy, either contemporary or historic, that relies on an administratively mandated deadline. The strategic and tactical factors that convince a military commander that the time is right for any operation are monumentally more complex that a number circled on a calendar.
What this agreement does do is satisfy domestic critics who have rightly objected to any unnecessary continuation of the current occupant of the White House's military adventure in Iraq. Saddam Hussein is dead, as are his male descendants, and regime change has been accomplished. Still, the longest military campaign in American history will continue for a year, or longer.
The departure of the last US combat soldier from Iraq will not, and must not, run like a published train or airline schedule. The security and accountability requirements are too severe. Those who still wish to harm or kill Americans will not allow us to leave Iraq as if we were driving away from a theater after seeing the current holiday blockbuster.
So much for all of the GOP talking points and faux news air-time devoted to "...no arbitrary deadlines." The current news sound-bites are full of controversy and contradiction from inside Iraq. But, the American conservatives are being surprisingly quiet.
From a public policy viewpoint this is a wonderfully positive development. For too long America has enflamed the Iraqi insurgency by providing easy accusations of practicing a permanent occupation. Now, the next Administration and Congress must accomplish delivering that message to Halliburton and the other Bush donors who were expecting a lucrative permanent occupation.
Examining the National Security and military implications is more problematic. There has never been any depiction of national military strategy, either contemporary or historic, that relies on an administratively mandated deadline. The strategic and tactical factors that convince a military commander that the time is right for any operation are monumentally more complex that a number circled on a calendar.
What this agreement does do is satisfy domestic critics who have rightly objected to any unnecessary continuation of the current occupant of the White House's military adventure in Iraq. Saddam Hussein is dead, as are his male descendants, and regime change has been accomplished. Still, the longest military campaign in American history will continue for a year, or longer.
The departure of the last US combat soldier from Iraq will not, and must not, run like a published train or airline schedule. The security and accountability requirements are too severe. Those who still wish to harm or kill Americans will not allow us to leave Iraq as if we were driving away from a theater after seeing the current holiday blockbuster.
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Non-embedded journalists in Iraq have written that the real reasons for the success of the escalation of the war by 30,000 plus U.S. troops had more to do with the ethnic cleansing that has occurred in Baghdad via the partitioning of neighborhoods and removal of people from parts of the city plus the fact that Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr declared a unilateral cease fire on occupation forces.
It is hubris to believe that a people who lived on that land for thousands of years and developed "Western" civilization cannot govern themselves. It is hubris to believe that we can impose a form of government through military force. It is hubris to believe that Mr. Bush could make Iraq into a mini-USA "free market" society in order to conform to the delusions of the neo-conservatives like Richard Perle.
The people who live in the region now called "Iraq" can govern themselves and have done so for the last four thousand years. The people of Iraq made their choice a long time ago and the American soldier has paid dearly.