Posted on 07/10/2007 3:27:42 AM PDT by Kaslin
"America good! Al-Qaida bad!" -- A trader in the Qatana bazaar, Ramadi, Iraq
This is a sentiment that the Iraqi trader felt safe to utter as a visiting U.S. general passed by, according to John Burns of The New York Times, only after a furtive glance "up and down the narrow refuse-strewn street to check who might be listening." In a microcosm, this is the reason why we are finally making progress against al-Qaida in Iraq. The protection afforded by American combat power has made it possible for Iraqis in Sunni areas to turn against the terror group.
In a global struggle against Islamic extremism, it is an incontestably welcome development that ordinary Sunnis in the Arab heartland are spurning al-Qaida. The extremist group has been on a campaign of savagery in Iraq that has discredited its own cause. The grassroots revolt against it means that it is within our reach to deny al-Qaida its most important current geopolitical objective, which is plunging Iraq into a bloody chaos in which it can thrive.
But a group of Republican senators have picked precisely this moment to call for deconstructing the troop surge that has begun to give us the upper hand against al-Qaida. They thus reveal a key dishonesty in the debate over the war. Everyone professes to want to fight al-Qaida in Iraq -- as opposed to policing the sectarian war -- but the number of politicians willing to support the means to that end is ever-dwindling.
Al-Qaida relies on intimidation to impose itself on the Sunni community, and succeeds unless driven back by a stronger force, i.e. the U.S. military. In his report from Anbar province, John Burns notes that the Sunni "sheiks turned only after a prolonged offensive by American and Iraqi forces, starting in November, that put al-Qaida groups on the run." He continues, "Iraqis, bludgeoned for 24 years by Saddam Hussein's terror, are wary of rising against any force however brutal, until it is in retreat."
This experience has been replicated in precincts of Baghdad, Diyala province and other Sunni parts of Iraq, but the Republican senators want American forces, rather than al-Qaida, to do the retreating. Advocates of various forms of withdrawal argue that we can fight al-Qaida from our large bases or from Kurdistan. This is a fantasy that ignores that we are waging a counterinsurgency war against al-Qaida that requires on-the-ground relationships with key players and knowledge of the terrain.
And the main "compromise" proposal -- adopting the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group -- would have all American combat troops out of Iraq by the end of March 2008. It is self-evidently impossible to fight al-Qaida in Iraq without any combat troops to do it. What all those abandoning the surge essentially want is a return to the old failed Rumsfeld strategy of prematurely drawing down and handing over to unprepared Iraqi forces.
The surge has succeeded in reducing sectarian killings in Baghdad and civilian casualties overall, but at the cost of increased U.S. casualties and without the Iraqi legislative accomplishments that were established as "political benchmarks." Those benchmarks shouldn't be fetishized. The reason that they were considered so important is that they were thought necessary to entice Sunnis away from the insurgency. Instead, the Sunnis have swung our way anyway, in reaction to al-Qaida brutality and to our strength.
By any measure, this is significant political progress -- so significant, in fact, that no one even considered making it a "benchmark" at the beginning of the year. The U.S. political argument over benchmarks is shot through with bad faith anyway. Would the advocates of retreat really have a different position if the Iraqi parliament had managed to pass an oil-revenue-sharing law already? Unlikely.
Once again, all depends on President Bush. Senators of his party are ready to quit Iraq with al-Qaida undefeated. Is he?
Our warriors down range need our base to cover their flanks. Allow them to continue to be successful and see this mission through.
Call GOP Representatives today.
bttt
Here's one source to use in order to do it. If anyone has others, please post them in this thread. bttt
I agree... and anyone that does not back our mission there should be banned from FR. What good are they anyway, if they side with al qaeda and the dims???
LLS
I'm afraid the bottom line is that the movers and shakers in talk radio and the blogosphere just don't care as much about our warriors downrange as they do about immigration, and neither do their audiences, or what you are calling for would be in progress at this moment.
"Our base" is too fragmented to cover anybody's flanks.
I'm winning my part of the war. Everybody around me is winning their part. Great things are being done out here, but few of our countrymen know about them, and fewer care, and way too many think it is "helpful" to hate on the Commander-in-Chief and think of us as "victims" who need to be "rescued" by being brought home before the job is finished.
I'd be depressed, but I just came back from a great R&R.
Abandoning the fight against al-Qaeda?
You might as well try to get rid of flies while ignoring the garbage and piles of manure that draw them in.
I heard this on NPR this morning coming to work. The RATS want us to only fight al-Qaida (apparently not the Sunni or Shia insurgents). We are supposed to do that Murtha style by “redeploying” to Kuwait or the Kurdish region, or with a reduced number of troops! However, as the surge has shown, more troops are better, were are able to go into areas previously sanctuaries for terrorists, and the locals are helping our troops to ferret out al-Qaida. They want a stop to roadside and suicide bombs. How are we to do this from Kuwait?
It seems that the biggest mistake Bush made was adopting Rummy’s concept of a small footprint, based on the Afghan model that the people would hail us as liberators. Redeployment is another name for surrender, not a change in strategy!
I often think he “changed his meds” over the past 2-3 years. He has seemed so off and adrift.
He needs to create a “faces of victory” series and tell Americans each week about one freed Iraqi, one brave soldier, one rescued town, one new school, — IF this is the truth on the ground and IF he can get off the dime.
And if we drive terrorists from towns only to have them reappear once our troops leave, then he needs to face that fact and call for the forces/strategies necessary to get the job done. He needs to, if necessary, remember his own bold “Bush Doctrine” and its stance vis-a-vis “any state that supports terrorists...”
The US will not, I think, support an open-ended tit-for-tat war; I will not support one. But if Bush can lose the hyperbole and communicate success and progress AND define exit criteria, he will do himself a service.
PS - I suspect several Arab states are more than a little off-put by the idea of an empowered Iran and Al-Quaida, boasting of having chased off the one super-power and great Satan. It is time they share the load. We are not Hessian mercenaries for the timid royalty of the Arab world.
If Bush knew what he was getting into with this war, this wading into the centuries-old ME turmoil, now would be a good time to tell folks.
Yep, it’s a complicated issue. Bush opened a can of worms with a sledgehammer.
Back stateside I'm going to do all I can to light a fire under peoples as$s and make them care - Our base better d*mn well stand firm and keep the same intensity on DC....Or they are shameful (fragmented or not, shameful if we don't rally at this point and time)..
Best regards,
No excuses. Each person on FR should be doing all they can to contact as many members of Congress to stand firm behind CinC GWB / Iraq.
We are making tremendous progress. We have won phase I & II in Iraq. We need to start demanding backbone from our representatives on the WOT/Iraq.
Have our warriors flanks & backs - Do not allow Congress to stick them from where they can't defend themselves.
Again, keep the intensity.
Pelosi: "The jihadists (are) in Iraq. But that doesn't mean we stay there. They'll stay there as long as we're there."
Battered-Left Syndrome by Ted Lapkin
The antiwar Left is severely afflicted by the political equivalent of battered-wife syndrome. With each new beating, the scarred and bruised victims of spousal abuse tend to excuse and rationalize the actions of their tormentors. A stubborn unwillingness to accept the proposition that their partners are violent louts plunges these woeful women into a morass of self-deception that spawns only further violence...
After each al Qaeda outrage, leftist ideologues are quick to castigate their own countrymen for a catalogue of sins, both real and imagined. With a perverse combination of self-loathing and adoration of the enemy, the radical Leftist mantra preaches that if only we were nicer, the jihadists could not fail to love us. It’s our own fault if Osama bin Laden doesn’t realize what good people we are.
Bears repeating. Bears copying Jim on it as well.
I SUPPORT that idea 100%!!
Well said! And I have gotten so VERY tired of it. There are times I honestly wonder if I have accidentally taken a left on the information highway and ended up at DU.
We on our mission are winning our part of the war. I don't know one single military member over here who supports that cut-and-run crap.
We do not want the wobbly, the uninformed, the agenda-driven and the terrorist supporters speaking for us. We'd rather they get out of our way and let us finish this thing.
I appreciate that... it would make a statement that even Brit Hume would have to report!
LLS
Traitors
I swear, Allegra, I had not read this when I posted this entry on my blog.
Tons of FR patriots were banned for supporting a man who wants to fight AQ, so I don’t see FR actually helping to produce a victory against the Islamic cults in Iraq, or the MSM in America.
But I did make some phone calls today, and those offices have been getting calls, so there are still some Americans who have not been infected with BDS.
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