Last night President Bush, with what looked like fear on his face, gave a speech to a skeptical public and a defiant Congress–trying to convince them that applying a little band-aid of 20,000+ troops to Iraq is actually going to make a difference. He failed. Instead, he ended up looking like an ignoramus by standing in the presidential library in an attempt to invoke images of FDR’s fireside chats, where one couldn’t help wondering if Dubya had ever read a single book on the shelves behind him.
His proposal is too little, too late…and appears to be the last gasp out of a president who is tired and out of ideas on how to fix the monumental disaster he created. Twenty thousand troops may impose martial law and quell some violence in Baghdad, yes. But Iraq is a big country. The western Anbar province is overrun by Al-Qaida, who aims to make that a base for its vision of a new Islamic Caliphate, and despite Bush’s optimistic rhetoric about that province it has already been declared lost by military analysts. No military band-aid is going to fix that fact, and that is a tremendous problem that goes far beyond the violence in the neighborhoods of Baghdad.
Nor did Bush say what would happen if his new “strategy” doesn’t work, just like none of his previous strategies have worked. What do we do if the violence isn’t quelled? How do we prevent the violence from coming back the minute we re-deploy troops to Anbar or withdraw them altogether? The problem is far more intractable than Bush would have us believe–but maybe he’s just not capable of thinking that far ahead.
He also blundered by continuing his saber-rattling against neighboring countries at a time when they hold all the cards (especially Iran) and we hold precious few of them. A poker face can be a good thing, but not when everyone knows that every card in your hand is a dud. Like it or not we need Iran’s, Syria’s and the others’ cooperation to help stabilize the situation, and they all benefit from a stable Iraq. Rather than appealing to their sensibilities and realizing that nothing is lost simply by talking with them, he instead prefers to hiss and threaten them instead like a cornered pussycat. Pathetic.
Bush did get a couple of things right in his speech. He put Iraqis on notice that our patience has run out and that they need to step up to the plate right now to secure their own country–essentially telling them to grow up and stop acting like a bunch of street thugs. Their insistence on killing each other over an obscure split in Islam about who should have been the first caliph is ridiculous on its face and an affront to civilized society everywhere.
He also got right the best line in his speech: that mistakes were made in Iraq, and that he bears responsibility for them. Yes he does, and he should therefore resign for his extreme incompetence. Sun Tzu once said words to the effect that you should never launch a war unless you are assured of a crushing victory through overwhelming force. Bush ignored that wisdom, and as a result we will never have anything that looks like a victory in Iraq. It will either devolve into civil war, or our soldiers will continue to die. In either case our energy markets will be in constant jeopardy, and Iraq will be used as a springboard for terrorists–both of which we will be powerless to prevent. By refusing to resign and continuing on his ineffectual plodding course, he is simply reinforcing his own legacy as quite possibly the worst president in US history.
Let’s hope that whoever is elected in 2008 has the wisdom and grace necessary to fix this bloody mess.
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{ 3 comments }
The problem is how to get rid of him before too much more damage is done. He can do a lot of damage in the next two years, being “commander in chief” and all. I doubt we could get the Senate to convict him in an impeachment, so what’s left? What can you and I, individual citizens do? I feel so powerless to affect the situation and am actually quite afraid of the eventual consequences for me, my loved ones, and any future generation.
JOhn.
Joe, I’m usually with you, but the fact of the matter is that al anbar is not yet overrun by al-queda and if people like you keep saying that, it will become a self fulfilling prophecy. Without additional US troops in western Iraq, al anbar will become analogous to afghanistan pre 9/11 or somalia in the 90s. If we de-escalate in Iraq right now they will be emboldened and I promise you they will follow us home. This is not Vietnam. I hate Bush just as much as you do, but I’ve wanted to see more troops for years now and he has finally finally finally come around. For the first time in years I am right in line with the president.
Hope you had a nice new years…let’s get drinks one of these days.
It’s ok to agree to disagree.
I can only go by what the military analysts are saying…and the one cited in the Post that I linked to seemed pretty dire about the situation in Anbar.
The problem I have is that 20,000 troops is just a band-aid. It will not, I believe, keep Al-Qaida out of Anbar–besides which most of them are slated for Baghdad anyway.
If it’s that important, it should have been that important from the start, and we should have devoted every last soldier available in the US military to obtain a stable Iraq from the beginning. Instead, Rumsfeld decided to run the Pentagon and the war like a corporation, with stupid buzz words like “leaner, meaner”, doing more with less, and all that rubbish. You don’t win a war without boots on the ground, period.
Furthermore, Bush should long ago have stopped limiting reconstruction contracts to just the US and the so-called coalition that sent a few troops of their own to Iraq. I don’t see a practical way out of this morass other than through help from other nations. If we had let any country bid competitively for reconstruction contracts they would all have serious financial stakes they would seek to protect in the country, presumably with police/military forces. But that didn’t happen, and so we’re stuck there alone..with no good options left.
A drink sounds good to me.
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