Month: January 2007

Portland, Oregon, 8.30 am.

Here’s one enraged response to this post:

I just have to respond to the reader who basically put down most if not all but a handful of the opposition to the war. Sure there were a lots of people on the "left" who were screaming "no blood for oil" or who "associated themselves with vacuous slogans, wanker academics and unreconstructed anti-globalists who fear corporations and hate trade" but by no stretch of the imagination did that encompass all those on the left.

When will you and other conservatives get it though you thick heads, not to confuse the vocal, squeaky wheels with the quiter people like me and many, many others?  At no point did I, and a good number of those I know who didn’t support the war, ever talk in terms that your obtuse reader and even yourself sometimes think. I am sick and tired of this lazy shit. I opposed the war because it was patently obvious that that Bush wanted to go to Iraq for his own reasons and was using 9/11 and WMD as an excuse.

I am not one of those "flaming lefty," pacificifist, whining liberals that Republicans love to label those who don’t reflexively agree with them. I am not against war per se, but war is serious business. There are consequences, unintended and intended. People die and they often come home in boxes. You don’t undertake war by lying, you don’t undertake it without an honest look at what you may be getting into, you don’t undertake it without a look at all the possible outcomes, you don’t go in undermanned and without all the best equipment you can offer to the people who are going to do the fighting and dying. I saw all of this and so did others.

And on another note, I have not had all that much problem with the lack of WMD intelligence as it is as much an art as it is a science – but I have had a problem with them deliberately cherry picking what they know to be bad intel from suspect sources, despite (or in spite of) warnings from those people whose job it is to  make sure intel is as good as can be determined. I have a problem with this administration deliberately making a decision based on their own preconceived notions without an honest look at the facts, and this applies to a whole host of things and not just Iraq.

Point taken. And I agree with almost all of this. But it doesn’t detract from my continued opposition to those Michael Moore elements that dominated the rhetoric of the anti-war forces before the war, many of whom opposed the war in Afghanistan as well. Another reader takes another view:

Your succinct observation of so many of the anti-warriors’ "reflexive hostility to American power, partisan hatred of Bush, and blindness toward Saddam’s atrocities" comforts me insofar as I’ve lately lost any sense of anchoring conviction on your part against the long-term threat of radical Islam.

I honestly believe that a main component of our response to that threat must be dogged, blunt perseverence despite the Bush Administration’s many costly mistakes in conducting this war. That is the message I took from Bush’s "surge" speech: dogged, blunt perseverence. More importantly, I believe it is the message taken by our adversaries both inside and outside Iraq.

It has been said that in all of history’s great campaigns and great battles, there are moments when each side believes it is beaten–and that victory goes to the side that wills itself through these pivotal moments of doubt. Is it possible the current Iraq campaign is at just such a moment? One wonders what is the real state of confidence of Iraq’s insurgents and their supporters? It can only have been diminished by the prospect of an American "surge."

I wish it were diminished. I fear this president has actually given them much of what they were hoping for. In fact, fear bin Laden might have drawn the most solace from the prospect of the U.S. military being poised to alienate both Sunnis and Shia in Iraq – and to inflame global Muslim sentiment even further. But, hey, we’ll see. I should say this, though it goes without saying. I hope I’m wrong and the president is right. I really do.  Nothing would give me more pleasure than the thought of our actually constructing a viable national government in Iraq and turning back the tide of Islamist terror. But I’m not clinically delusional.

John Burns provides, as usual, indispensable analysis. But this paragraph, buried by the NYT, leapt out at me this morning:

A Shiite political leader who has worked closely with the Americans in the past said the Bush benchmarks appeared to have been drawn up in the expectation that Mr. Maliki would not meet them. "He cannot deliver the disarming of the militias," the politician said, asking that he not be named because he did not want to be seen as publicly criticizing the prime minister. "He cannot deliver a good program for the economy and reconstruction. He cannot deliver on services. This is a matter of fact. There is a common understanding on the American side and the Iraqi side."

Views such as these — increasingly common among the political class in Baghdad — are often accompanied by predictions that Mr. Maliki will be forced out as the crisis over the militias builds. The Shiite politician who described him as incapable of disarming militias suggested he might resign; others have pointed to an American effort in recent weeks to line up a “moderate front” of Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish political leaders outside the government, and said that the front might be a vehicle for mounting a parliamentary coup against Mr. Maliki, with behind-the-scenes American support. [My italics.]

If this is the case, this president is lying to us once again. It’s one lie too far. If all of this is a ruse to depose Maliki and attack Iran, the constitutional consequences of a runaway, duplicitous president are profound.

(Photo: John Moore/Getty.)

Yesterday, Corporal Jason Dunham was the second soldier in Iraq to win a Medal of Honor, the highest military honor. He did so posthumously, and died serving his country at the age of 22. Here’s a YouTube tribute to him. It’s heart-breaking and inspiring all at once.

Do men with back hair score higher on IQ tests? I have to say I’m dubious, but intrigued.

Adel Hamad has been detained at Gitmo for three years. Here is a Youtube by his publicly appointed lawyer who can find no evidence that Hamad has any relationship with terrorism at all. Here’s the Wikipedia entry on him. Judge for yourself.

A less condescending reader responds:

Andrew, your reader writes that those who opposed the war from the outset

"understood that the premises of the war did not match the facts on the ground.  In particular, they understood the culture, the people, the economics and the religion(s) of Iraq.  They also understood the American people, who will not, perhaps sadly, ultimately support a war that does not end quickly unless national security is a genuine and clear issue." 

How exactly is this deep and complex understanding expressed in "No Blood for Oil"?

The crux of the problem is that stalwart opponents of the war were, for the most part, nothing like the sophisticated visionaries your reader describes.  The case for war barrelled along in large part precisely because opponents of the war were unable or unwilling to make a persuasive, coherent case for opposing it, and instead associated themselves with vacuous slogans, wanker academics and unreconstructed anti-globalists who fear corporations and hate trade.  This is not a winning formula for shaping American policy.

I agree. A few people – James Fallows, Joe Klein, Brent Scowcroft, for example – opposed the war for sane reasons. They deserve kudos as much as I deserve criticism for not listening to them closely enough. But I went to the pre-war anti-war marches as an observer. I did not hear arguments about the difficulties of managing a sectarian society, nor questions about troop levels, nor worries about the impact of the war on Iran’s status in the region. I heard and saw often reflexive hostility to American power, partisan hatred of Bush, and blindness toward Saddam’s atrocities. I remember what I saw. And I feel as estranged from that reflexive position today as I did then. 

"Frankly, as he has over the past few weeks, Bush looked like a man who is in way over his head, which he is. The man who got the country into this hole, and whose neglect and incompetence dug us deeper into into it, looks like a man who would like nothing more than to get back to Crawford. We’d all be better off if he would," – George Conway, NRO.

Does a consulate count? Maybe it does.

A longtime reader looks on the bright side:

For all the problems, Iraq (and its neighbors) are still better off without Saddam. The danger of a Sunni Jihadi Talibanesqe stronghold are exaggerated, if only by the stark demographics. Sunni Arabs are only 15-20% of the country. If real civil war and ethnic cleansing breaks out, the Sunni Arabs are doomed. Saudis and other Arab countries getting involved in a regional war with Iran?  Other than some financial support and a few thousand lunatic Jihadis, it is not very likely. They will sell out the Saddam loyalists even quicker than they did the Palestinians. Iran need not get overtly involved anyway – Shia forces in Iraq can force their will on the Sunnis without much help.

Pacification of Baghdad makes sense, but it may be too late. The only way it will work if we have the means to take on the Mahdi army and the Shia extremists with Maliki’s backing and force the government to be more open to the Sunnis (something many of us doubt).

We should continue to support Kurdistan and Anbar. Many Sunnis realize that the Shias are a threat, but the Jihadis are no real protection. Interesting that anywhere the radical Muslims gain power they quickly alienate the locals. They are just religious versions of Saddam, holding power by use of terror. We can exploit that in Anbar (our presence keeps the Shias at bay and also gives us opportunity to kill foreign troublemakers). Kurdistan is mostly a success (thanks to them) – all we need to do is give them cover from the Turks.

Hey, here’s hoping.

(Photo of Moqtada al-Sadr by Ali Jarekji/Reuters.)