Was The War A Mistake?
Jonah Goldberg is ready to say so:
THERE’S A STRICT taboo in the column-writing business against recycling ideas. So let me start with something fresh.The Iraq war was a mistake.I know, I know. But I’ve never said it before. And I don’t enjoy saying it now. I’m sure that to the antiwar crowd this is too little, too late, and that’s fine because I’m not joining their ranks anyway.In the dumbed-down debate we’re having, there are only two sides: Pro-war and antiwar. This is silly. First, very few folks who favored the Iraq invasion are abstractly pro-war. Second, the antiwar types aren’t really pacifists. They favor military intervention when it comes to stopping genocide in Darfur or starvation in Somalia or doing whatever that was President Clinton did in Haiti. In other words, their objection isn’t to war per se. It’s to wars that advance U.S. interests (or, allegedly, President Bush’s or Israel’s or ExxonMobil’s interests). I must confess that one of the things that made me reluctant to conclude that the Iraq war was a mistake was my general distaste for the shabbiness of the arguments on the antiwar side.But that’s no excuse. Truth is truth. And the Iraq war was a mistake by the most obvious criteria: If we had known then what we know now, we would never have gone to war with Iraq in 2003. I do think that Congress (including Democrats Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Jay Rockefeller and John Murtha) was right to vote for the war given what was known — or what was believed to have been known — in 2003. And the claims from Democrats who voted for the war that they were lied to strikes me as nothing more than cowardly buck-passing.
The failure to find weapons of mass destruction is a side issue. The WMD fiasco was a global intelligence failure, but calling Saddam Hussein’s bluff after 9/11 was the right thing to do. Washington’s more important intelligence failure lay in underestimating what would be required to rebuild and restore post-Hussein Iraq. The White House did not anticipate a low-intensity civil war in Iraq, never planned for it and would not have deemed it in the U.S. interest to pay this high a price in prestige, treasure and, of course, lives.
I’ve got a problem with that, though much of it is certainly true…but first Goldberg’s solution (are you paying attention, Peter?):
According to the conventional script, if I’m not saying “bug out” of Iraq, I’m supposed to say “stay the course.” But there’s a third option, and, funnily enough, I found it in an old column of mine (journalistic taboos be damned!). I think we should ask the Iraqis to vote on whether U.S. troops should stay.Polling suggests that they want us to go. But polling absent consequences is a form of protest. With accountability, minds may change and appreciation for the U.S. presence might grow.If Iraqis voted “stay,” we’d have a mandate to do what’s necessary to win, and our ideals would be reaffirmed. If they voted “go,” our values would also be reaffirmed, and we could leave with honor. And pretty much everyone would have to accept democracy as the only legitimate expression of national will.Finishing the job is better than leaving a mess. And if we can finish the job, the war won’t be remembered as a mistake.
Now, my problem…I still don’t think the war itself was a mistake, and despite his own words, I don’t think Goldberg does, either. He seems to be confusing execution with necessity. If it was necessary to call Saddam’s bluff, it was necessary to go to war: we already had sanctions. Military action was the only ‘escalation’ possible, and I don’t think anyone would argue that we should have engaged in meaningless air strikes just to say we did something.
Goldberg says if we knew then what we know now…but you never know then what you know now. That’s an absurd argument. Hindsight is not a policy. Either it was right to invade or it wasn’t. My ‘looking back’ argument, reinforced by such recent accounts as Woodward’s, is that we made some terrible, terrible decisions at the beginning of the post-war occupation that have been impossible, to date, to overcome:
1. Not enough boots on the ground for post-war security.
2. Speaking of (1), disbanding existing sources of security such as the Iraq army during the de-Baathification stage was probably a giant blunder.
3. We should have declared martial law in Baghdad immediately, and kept it going for at least weeks, and possibly months.
4. We should have never, ever listened to a word said by Henry Kissinger or any of his cronies, much less installed one at the head of the post-war efforts.
All this is secondary to what we do now…I eagerly await November 8th, not only to get what might be a long night for Republicans over with, but to see how the fallout affects our plans for Iraq…I’m not optimistic that we’ll make the right decisions then, either, but clearly some changes are afoot, and I think by the beginning of 2007 we’ll have some indication of where we’re going to try to steer this…
Comrade Mark,
Well, I raq is far from failing, and the only thing even remotely in common between Iraq and Vietnam is the wqillingness of those on the left to sacrifice the lives of untold thousands to punish Republicans.
I would offer some ideas to “jumpstart” the situation in Iraq, as it were…
1.) Kill Al Sadr. He is to Bagdhad what Capone was to Chicago. A gangster with no regard for anyone but himself. While we’re at it, kill everyone in his immiediate power/advisor circle.
2.) Prohibit the establishment and/or maintenance of the private Militias.
3.) Prohibit the private ownership of firearms. I know, I know…. it sticks in my craw to say this, but firearms ownership requires the moral respect that many there simply do not have. Unless and until the Iraqies can establish a demonstrated respect for secular law and human life, and the acceptance of the legal and morale responsibilities which fireams ownership entails, they should be denied that right.
4.) Mass confiscation of all firearms, explosives, etc in private hands. Raid the mosques if need be. Jail or execute any Islamist leader whose mosque is found to have weapons, ammunition, or anti-government materials within it’s walls.
5.) Redeploy US Forces into blocking positions on the Syrian and Iranian borders, perhaps on the Afghan as well. Stop and search EVERY vehicle and/or person that attempts to cross, going either way. We keep at it until the Islamists decide that it’s not worth their time to try and cross. Jail or execute every adult male in every vehicle found to be carrying arms, ammunition or explosives. It’s WAR damnit, and if they are not wearing uniforms or are a part of a national army or recognised combatant force, then they are sabotuers, partisans, and deserve no mercy. Time to play hardball.
That’s all for now. I’ve got lot’s more suggestions, but these ought to generate enough discourse for the time being.
Respects,
Gwedd
I agree that the ‘mea culpa’ is lame.
If we knew in 03, what we do now…
of course Syria would still be in Lebanon. AQ khan would still be selling nuke tech(and our intel services would not have known), as Lybia would not have given up on the wmds. Israel would still be holding the land it gave back. As a nation, we would have obsessed even more over the next ‘9/11′, becoming even more isolated.
I grew up watching the same science fiction that Goldberg did…incidents where the death of a mosquito at the hands of a time traveler leads to the death of the human race. Change one tile in a mosaic, changes the whole mosaic. If there are any other historical changes that goldberg might produce that would change the outcome of world hisotry for the better, I’d love to hear them.
“Second, the antiwar types aren’t really pacifists.”
I was expecting the sentence following this one to be something more like . . . “They believe in violence when it targets Western politicians with whose policies they disagree (i.e., assassination of George Bush and/or Tony Blair), when its aim is to kill US and Coalition servicemen and -women, when it succeeds in silencing views contrary to their own, or when its goal is the destruction of a sovreign democratoc state and the murder of as many Jews as possible.”
[...] Mark Coffey’s take here. [...]
“It’s WAR damnit .. Time to play hardball.” OK …
Would Gwedd be so kind as to estimate the number of troops necessary to enforce his proposals? And where they would come from?
Comrade,
Pretty much the same troops we have now. There are a large number of Iraqi troops capable of handling many duties in many of the provinces, even in Bagdhad. In fact, I’d give them Bagdhad to secure and let them have at it. It’s THEIR capitol, after all.
Additionally, we don’t have to have a solid line like Hadrian’s wall there. Small outposts, linked together with comms and supporting battery fire would be ideal, and having large quick reaction forces deployed within 20 minutes would be, I believe, an ideal situation. Border patrol by airborne drones, cameras, land-based sensors, etc. I mean, it’s exactly what we are condiering for our own borders.
In other words, it’s time to tell our good Iragi froends that they need to take over a HUGE chunk of their defense and policing functions. We’ll help out where we can, but we’re gonna be busy cutting the supply lines for the terrorists and they can go after the snakes lurking around them. Seems fair to me. If they really want self-determination, and democratic rights, a strong secular government, then it’s time to put up or shut up and slink away.
The Iraqi army had some good soldiers. They had damned poor leaders under Saddam. Now they don’t have to worry about him, but it’s time they stood up and showed their real mettle. They can fight, they have the physical tools, but they need to develop those long-term leadership tools, the NCO’s and Officers that will provide the leadership the will need in the days to come. The best way to develop that is through battle, through strife. It’s their turn now. We can support, and lend a hand here and there, but we’re needed for other things in Iraq just now, and probably elsewhere in a year or two.
Respects,
Gwedd
I go back in time and kill Hitler as a child.
The nationalistic movement in germany is replaced by socialism/communism. WW II never occurs, but country by country, communism continues-violent overthrow and deaths of moderates contained within countries, so no one bothers to interfere, becuase they are not involved.
global apathy, regardless of your political convictions, is the greatest danger we face. If our actions made the world more apathetic to helping fledgling democracies, it is as much their mistake as the one goldberg alludes we made.
the truth is that the world has not changed in their commitment ot action, but Iraq has further cemented the belief of isolation. Sooner or later there will be another hitler, with bio/chem/ and nukes. The world will answer for its apathy on that day.
This is a world that after Rwanda, is accepting Darfur. The greatest problem is the lack of an international force. A dem could argue it is just punishment for the Bush admin’s policy, but who is really paying the price? Iraq.
Thier non-involvement will teach Bush, becuase he will need this knowledge for his two years left in office, and the Iraqis are irelevant.
What a noble world we have offended.
I have a problem with the idea of growing militias that is being put out in the news:
they simply cannot gather en masse. That is the next evolutionary step they must take if they are to succeed in having a more significant role in destabilzation.
His problem doesn’t seem to be with what we knew ex ante, but what we should have known ex ante: namely, that the region would erupt, and make our larger goals (democracy & stability) sufficiently difficult that we shouldn’t have embarked on that path.
He’s vague enough that your reading is just as plausible as mine, though. Perhaps he should’ve thought a little harder, since his lack of clarity strikes me as a failure of thought, rather than a failure of articulation.
I think the problem is using the military as a police force. That’s where we failed. Our military exists to drive tanks in, fly planes in, march troops in, and KILL as many people as possible until the enemy surrenders or is eliminated. Once we captured Saddam, the military should’ve withdrawn. Their roll was over. They are now doing something they are not meant to do, and they’re not doing it well. No surprise there, right?
After Saddam was captured, the UN should’ve stepped in with a peace keeping force until the Iraqis could build and train their own police force.
End of story. Hindsight is beautiful!