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Contributors
J.F. Kelly, Jr. - Contributor
J.F.
Kelly, Jr. is a retired Navy Captain and bank executive who
writes on current events and military subjects. He is a resident
of Coronado, California. [go to Kelly index]
 A
Timetable for Iraq
The Vietnam Syndrome...
[J. F. Kelly, Jr.] 7/8/05
The war
in Iraq has become so politicized that objective discourse
on the topic is now all but impossible.
It has been labeled “Bush’s
war” by the president’s detractors, notwithstanding
the fact that there was broad initial support among most them
on the need for military action in Iraq. Opposition to the war
and hatred for President Bush are now so related that they go
together like wine and cheese.
Critics
of the war insist that they were misled by the administration
about weapons of mass destruction but
the facts are that Saddam
Hussein did possess them long enough, at least, to use them to
kill thousands of his countrymen after the first Gulf War. While
it is admittedly true that no WMD were found after the 2003 invasion,
the widespread perception had been that he still possessed them
and was attempting to acquire others. It is often asserted that
we should have insisted upon absolute proof before waging war
but in a post-9/11 world you don’t risk waiting for absolute
proof if you have reasonable cause to suspect that a belligerent
regime like Saddam’s means do you harm. Saddam could have
prevented the invasion had he simply complied with sanctions,
cooperated fully with inspectors and explained what had become
of the chemical weapons he once possessed. By his continued defiance
and threats, he brought the war upon himself. The world, not
to mention Iraq and its neighbors, is better off without his
terrorist regime.
But today,
in a manner sadly reminiscent of Vietnam, the American public
is tiring of the war and support
for it is waning along
with support for Mr. Bush. Americans, the terrorists know, no
longer have the stomach for protracted, undeclared wars and lose
patience quickly once the exciting, televised invasion phase
has ended. It’s sort of a national attention deficit disorder.
So as the suicide bombers grab all the headlines, the public
looks for signs of progress and finding few in the media, concludes
that things are going poorly and that we are mired in a quagmire.
The Vietnam syndrome settles in and critics demand an exit
strategy, some means for measuring progress and a timetable for
withdrawal. A resolute commander-in-chief insists that victory
is the only acceptable exit strategy and that there will be no
timetable because providing one would only encourage the insurgents
to wait us out.
Let’s
explore these demands of the anti-Bush, anti-war people whose
numbers are clearly rising in the polls.
First,
consider the demand for an exit strategy. Could ours be any plainer?
It is to establish a reasonably stable democracy in Iraq of Iraqi
design and structure, not ours, so that we can leave, confident
that we have provided the Iraqis the best opportunity that they
are ever going to get to choose their own leaders and to govern
themselves in an environment as free from terror and intimidation
as we and they, working together, could achieve in the time available.
Overthrowing Saddam was the easy part, which is not to trivialize
the sacrifices made in doing it. Establishing security for the
Iraqis is the more difficult task, one that could have benefited
greatly from more security forces on the ground from the very
beginning.
With respect
to the seeming lack of a metric for measuring progress, consider
these data. An elected Iraqi
government is
already in place, employing well over a million people. Millions
of brave Iraqis defied violence and death threats to vote in
that election. Forty-seven countries have reestablished embassies
in Baghdad so far. Iraq’s armed forces are being rebuilt
with the expert assistance of our military. They have an anti-terrorist
unit and a commando battalion. There are over 50,000 trained
and equipped police officers with many more voluntarily undergoing
training in new police academies.
Over 3,000 schools have been repaired or renovated and hundreds
more under construction. There are over a thousand other building
projects ongoing including hospitals, clinics and utility and
transportation facilities. Iraq now has plenty of independent
radio and television stations and newspapers.
So why is it that data like these do not serve as a metric for
measuring progress? Well, because the media, in their preoccupation
with suicide bombings, don’t report these things. They
aren’t exciting enough and besides, they’re not really
what the Bush haters want to hear or read or what the predominantly
liberal journalists want to write about.
Lastly,
war critics demand a timetable for withdrawal. Mr. Bush says
there will be none on his watch but there must
be.
As Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer pointed out
recently, we do, in fact, already have one. The president’s
term is up in 2008. With support for the war evaporating, it
is unreasonable to expect that there will be much left by the
2008 elections. The aim of the insurgents, therefore, will be
to wait us out just as the North Vietnamese did. Ours must be
to establish much better security in Iraq soon by whatever means
it takes and to be essentially out of there by 2008, for better
or for worse. It will be largely up to the Iraqis themselves
as to which of these conditions will apply. tOR
copyright
2005 J. F. Kelly, Jr.
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