More Wingnut Propaganda
By Mitch Berg
From today’s Rush Limbaugh show, more talking points from Fox News:
Here is the most important thing Americans need to understand: We are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms. As two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq, we were surprised by the gains we saw and the potential to produce not necessarily “victory” but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with.
After the furnace-like heat, the first thing you notice when you land in Baghdad is the morale of our troops. In previous trips to Iraq we often found American troops angry and frustrated — many sensed they had the wrong strategy, were using the wrong tactics and were risking their lives in pursuit of an approach that could not work.
Today, morale is high. The soldiers and marines told us they feel that they now have a superb commander in Gen. David Petraeus; they are confident in his strategy, they see real results, and they feel now they have the numbers needed to make a real difference.
Well, who cares what Limbaugh thinks. He’s just a neocon tool.
Except that unless you’ve been getting your news from Daily Kos or Minnesota Monitor living under a rock, you know that the article cited came from the NYTimes, and was written by Michael O’Hanlon and Kevin Pollack, fellows at the center-left Brookings Institute.
The coverage is even-handed, and by no means a piece of administration cheerleading:
Outside Baghdad, one of the biggest factors in the progress so far has been the efforts to decentralize power to the provinces and local governments. But more must be done. For example, the Iraqi National Police, which are controlled by the Interior Ministry, remain mostly a disaster. In response, many towns and neighborhoods are standing up local police forces, which generally prove more effective, less corrupt and less sectarian. The coalition has to force the warlords in Baghdad to allow the creation of neutral security forces beyond their control.
In the end, the situation in Iraq remains grave. In particular, we still face huge hurdles on the political front. Iraqi politicians of all stripes continue to dawdle and maneuver for position against one another when major steps towards reconciliation — or at least accommodation — are needed. This cannot continue indefinitely. Otherwise, once we begin to downsize, important communities may not feel committed to the status quo, and Iraqi security forces may splinter along ethnic and religious lines.
How much longer should American troops keep fighting and dying to build a new Iraq while Iraqi leaders fail to do their part? And how much longer can we wear down our forces in this mission? These haunting questions underscore the reality that the surge cannot go on forever. But there is enough good happening on the battlefields of Iraq today that Congress should plan on sustaining the effort at least into 2008.
I, myself, have been quiet about the war for a while because – oddly – I have had little to say. But as a matter of fact I spent a few hours over the weekend working on a piece on the subject (which I’m sure all have awaited with bated breath). I’m going to run it tomorrow or Wednesday.
Until then, though, read the piece. It’s interesting, encouraging (to those of us who don’t lust for a US defeat, anyway) and…
…will probably get zero coverage in the mainstream/lefty media.
July 31st, 2007 at 1:05 pm
The best way for us the get rid of them is to leave and let the Iraqis kill them off.
The “best” way? Really?
Based on what historical precedent?
Name one.
July 31st, 2007 at 1:24 pm
Um, the Bay of Pigs? Ooh, Wrong side. Sorry.
July 31st, 2007 at 2:44 pm
RickDFL seems to be engaged in wishful thinking. He thinks al Qaida can force the US to withdraw but will be defeated by the ragged Iraqi army & intelligence services.
July 31st, 2007 at 2:55 pm
Shame on you, Terry. Don’t forget the pResident is making all kinds of progress turning those “ragged Iraqi army & intelligence services” into Grade A Fightin’ for Freedum Troops. Now go sit in a corner and this time do a better job memorizing your talking points.
July 31st, 2007 at 3:04 pm
“The best way for us the get rid of them is to leave and let the Iraqis kill them off.”
Which is true, but leaving when the Iraqis are more likely to be the ones killed is incredibly and fatally irresponsible.
Rick makes the same mistake that just about everyone on the left does: thinking that the situation in Iraq revolves entirely around us. If we leave, the terrorists won’t go away, the sectarian civil war will get worse, and Iraq will be unable to defend itself. The weight of credible evidence supports that, not the rather naive idea that Iraq will be better off if we leave now.
The whole argument is a way of trying to dodge responsibility for the consequences of the left’s desire for withdrawal — and they shouldn’t be allowed to try to run away from those consequences. If they are wrong, those consequences will be severe, and they are almost certainly wrong.
July 31st, 2007 at 3:12 pm
Kermit:
“are you using your historical researching skills to prognosticate”
I am sure that or invasion will bring about an “an Iranian leaning theocracy” because it has already. The leading powers in the current Shia government are: SCIRI, a party explicitly based on exporting the Iranian revolution to Iraq; Dawa, party funded by Iran a dedicated to a slightly different form of Islamic rule: and Sadr’s movement which has recently reached out to Iran. I do not see any dynamic breaking their hold on power. Currently they all have much better relations with Iran than they do with the U.S. Islamic customs and Shariah law are much more strictly enforced now than they were under Saddam’s rule. There is no reason not to expect these trends to continue, but feel free to suggest one.
If you count as “enemy propaganda” the assertion that al-Qadea was not in Iraq before our invasion and has only grown stronger in Iraq because of it, then the enemy is the Republican party and the Bush administration.
The Republican controlled Senate Intelligence committee concluded that Saddam “not only lacked an operational relationship with al Qaeda, but was hostile toward the terrorist network”.
thinkprogress.org/2006/09/10/phase-ii-report-conclusion
Recently, when asked to confirm al-Qaeda was in Iraq before the invasion Homeland Security Advisor Frances Townsend said “I don’t know”.
thinkprogress.org/2007/07/18/townsend-nie-iraq
July 31st, 2007 at 3:34 pm
Mitch:
“They have been downright depressed about the conduct and prospects for the war on several occasions since the invasion”. Well who does that rule out? Even the President agrees with that. Is Bush a war critic.
That only makes them slightly rational, not war critics. The have never called for an end to the war or a withdrawal of U.S. forces. They not only supported the invasion, they were key spokesmen selling the war to Democrats. They downplayed the initial insurgency. They supported the surge form day one. Their entire professional reputation rests on the success of the Iraq war.
Now to return the favor: BUSTED
“So did most Democrats in Congress”
A small majority of Democratic Senators supported the war – 29 to 21 (plus Jeffords. In the House a clear majority of Democrats opposed the resolution 126 (plus Sanders) to 81. So in Congress a majority of Democrats opposed the war by a vote of 147 (plus Jeffords and Sanders) to 110.
July 31st, 2007 at 3:57 pm
That only makes them slightly rational, not war critics.
Yeah, I guess when RickDFL defines the terms of the debate, really, everything turns out his way…
…oh, wait; RickDFL does not define the terms of the debate!
They are, by all appearances, more rational than most war critics are, inasmuch as they seemingly put a higher premium on facts than dogma.
July 31st, 2007 at 4:03 pm
Al-Qaeda in Iraq one of the smallest groups fighting in Iraq.
Hey look! We have a DFLer admitting
July 31st, 2007 at 4:04 pm
…Al-Qaeda is in Iraq at all!
July 31st, 2007 at 4:10 pm
Jay:
“leaving when the Iraqis are more likely to be the ones killed is incredibly and fatally irresponsible”. I am unaware of any credible source that claims al-Qaeda in Iraq is likely to long survive a U.S. withdrawal. Fighting the occupation has been their sole source of support in Iraq. Without an occupation to fight, they can either leave or stay and get killed off by local Iraqis who have no sympathy for their broader agenda.
“If we leave, the terrorists won’t go away, the sectarian civil war will get worse, and Iraq will be unable to defend itself” All these a possible, but it is more likely that if we stay, more terrorists will come to Iraq (because of the appeal of fighting an occupier), the sectarian civil war will get worse (because we are arming both sides), and Iraq will be less able to defend itself (because neighboring powers have more incentive to intervene with the U.S. as an occupier and we have less ability to deter them).
So, I think that you are the one “trying to dodge responsibility”. You are like a gambler who keeps doubling down because he can not go home and tell the wife he blew his paycheck. You are unwilling to face the disaster your policy generated, so you keep throwing more lives and more money at Iraq, hoping some day it will all turn out OK.
Democrats are willing to make the tough calls to salvage what can be saved, but Republicans are responsible for the disaster.
July 31st, 2007 at 4:16 pm
Mitch
“oh, wait; RickDFL does not define the terms of the debate”. Well under your terms who is not a “war critic”? Your criteria is people who were “downright depressed about the conduct and prospects for the war on several occasions since the invasion”. Irving Kristol, Fred Kagan, and George W. Bush could fit this category, so are they “war critics”?
July 31st, 2007 at 4:24 pm
Paul:
I will buy you a beer for every prominent Democrat on record denying that al-Qaeda has had a presence in Iraq, since shortly after the U.S. invasion. We are pretty much united in blaming the Bush administration for helping al-Qaeda blossom in Iraq.
July 31st, 2007 at 4:56 pm
Them Al Qaedans do blossom quite nicely when split open with .50 cals.
There’s plenty of 72 virgin paradises for everybody, come on down!
July 31st, 2007 at 5:02 pm
I will buy you a beer for every prominent Democrat on record denying that al-Qaeda has had a presence in Iraq, since shortly after the U.S. invasion.
You were all united in denying that presence before the U.S. invasion, which is why you put on that qualifier.
I’m more interested in why House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) thinks a positive report from Gen. Petraeus “would be a problem for us.”
Not good for the country. A problem for the Dems.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/30/AR2007073001380_pf.html
July 31st, 2007 at 5:06 pm
“You were all united in denying that presence before the U.S. invasion, which is why you put on that qualifier”
That is us, telling the truth. We are such sneaky bastards.
July 31st, 2007 at 5:31 pm
That is us, telling the truth. We are such sneaky bastards.
It is sneaky when you all tell the truth, since it is so rare.
July 31st, 2007 at 6:12 pm
Jay Reding wrote:
“Rick makes the same mistake that just about everyone on the left does: thinking that the situation in Iraq revolves entirely around us.”
Too true. They said the same in the 60’s and Early 70’s. Those of us old enough to remember those days will recall that the anti-war types back then were convinced that the US being in Vietnam was the beginning and end of SE Asia’s wars.
After we agreed to a negotiated withdrawal of US forces in ’73 the North Vietnamese Army invaded South Vietnam (illegally) in 1975. The US has accepted over half a million refugees from Vietnam since the war ended. In ’75 Pol Pot took control of Cambodia and North Vietnam engineered a coup in Laos. In 1978 the Vietnamese invaded Cambodia to depose Pol Pot,and that provoked the Chinese into invading Vietnam.
No wonder that the “lessons of Vietnam” ends for the left in 1975.
July 31st, 2007 at 6:55 pm
Lets see, Vietnamese Communists fighting Cambodian Communists and Vietnamese Communists fighting Chinese Communists. Remind me, which one was bad for the United States?
July 31st, 2007 at 7:46 pm
None of it! Yellow Genocide, Rick’s favorite thing! Damn slanty-eyed non Americans.
July 31st, 2007 at 8:58 pm
So, your backing off your “everything will be fine if we leave” story, RickDFL?
Don’t you give a damn about the civilians that make up the bulk of the casualties in a modern war?
August 1st, 2007 at 7:23 am
Yeah, Rick, the wingnuts are so concerned about Iraqi casualties they don’t even count ’em. Probably cause it would make them too sad.
August 1st, 2007 at 8:53 am
Terry:
“So, your backing off your “everything will be fine if we leave” story, RickDFL”
I never said anything like that. I said it will be horrible when we leave. It will just be less horrible than if we stayed.
August 1st, 2007 at 1:35 pm
RickDFL, you joked about the wars & genocide that occurred in SE Asia after the US left that part of the world. You’ve written in this thread:
“However it turns out, it will be better than if we stayed.”
” . . . I believe that Iraqis will be able to make it safer sooner without Americans around.”
“Please note that while the NYT article predicts an increase in violence if the U.S. leaves, it does not predict that there will be less violence than if the U.S. stays.”
And about Iraqi refugees:
“Our presence merely delays the day they can return to a safer Iraq. With the money we save on the war, we could spare some change for refugees.”
And then we have this confused statement:
“Please note that while the NYT article predicts an increase in violence if the U.S. leaves, it does not predict that there will be less violence than if the U.S. stays.”
This ain’t a game of “get Bush and the republicans” to the Iraqis. Real people will die in horrific numbers if we withdraw from Iraq because we’ve decided the fight is too hard and its cost too high. The first to die would be the people that trusted us and supported our mission, just as in SE Asia.
August 1st, 2007 at 1:47 pm
A shame that Bush wrote so many checks he can’t cover.
August 1st, 2007 at 2:26 pm
Terry. I agree that “people will die in horrific numbers if we withdraw from Iraq”. Let me put this is plainly as I can.
1. Either the U.S. will end military efforts in Iraq or the U.S. will continue military efforts in Iraq. [True by definition]
2. The U.S. ought to do what will result in fewer Iraqi deaths. [our agreed moral premise]
3. If the U.S. ends military efforts in Iraq, many Iraqis will die (call this number N). [This is the point of the NYT article and we both agree it is true]
4. If the U.S. continues military efforts in Iraq, Iraqis in numbers greater than N, will die. [No one in the NYT article says this, sorry if I confused you.]
Therefore
5. The U.S. ought to end military efforts in Iraq.
You have to disprove 4. I believe 4 because of the reasons I outlined. Feel free to disprove it. But stop pretending I have any less moral concern for the Iraqis.
As for this:
“The first to die would be the people that trusted us and supported our mission, just as in SE Asia.”
I think this is exactly wrong. The two Kurdish parties closest to the U.S. will likely get exactly what they want, an independent Kurdistan. The major Shia parties (SIIC [the renamed SCIRI], Dawa, and Sadr), that make up the bulk of the elected Iraqi government are best positioned to win a civil war with the Sunni. The Sunni parties that initially boycotted the government and feed the insurgency are in the far weakest position. Yet, they have recently gained enough U.S. support to defeat al-Qaeda efforts to take over the Sunni faction. Now they have a decent basis to negotiate or fight for the best possible deal with the other two factions.
Simply put, those closest to the U.S. have been feeding money and weapons to ‘their’ factional supporters. So the closer to the U.S. they have been, the more support ‘their’ faction will have in the civil war.
August 1st, 2007 at 2:28 pm
Opps
“No one in the NYT article says this, sorry if I confused you”
should be “No one in the NYT article denies this, sorry if I confused you”
August 1st, 2007 at 3:00 pm
RickDFL, you show a typical leftward bias in making assumptions that not everyone else in the body politic shares. Your stipulation #2, “2. The U.S. ought to do what will result in fewer Iraqi deaths. [our agreed moral premise]” is one such case; The US should do whatever we determine to be in our national interests first, and try to achieve these national interest goals while trying to minimize the human costs. Your solution to the Iraq war would do neither. The US would be seen as weak and wavering by our allies as well our enemies and the Iraqi people would suffer a civil war, followed by totalitarianism, either home grown or imposed by Iran or Al Qaida.
There are still people who believe that the fate of SE Asia after 1975 was an improvement over US intervention there. Strangely, though, there rationalizations seem to always center on Kissenger and Nixon, showing, once again, the left’s obsession with the US as the source of all the evil in the world.
August 1st, 2007 at 4:05 pm
Terry:
I thought, for purposes on this discussion, we were simply focusing on the question “What should the U.S. do for the benefit of the Iraqi people”. For the reasons outlined above, I think a withdrawal is clearly in the U.S.’s own national interest (without regard to the Iraqis). You seem worried about the U.S. appearing weak by leaving. I worry more that if we stay, the U.S. actually grow weaker at ever faster rates.
As for the Iraqis, you assert once again “the Iraqi people would suffer a civil war, followed by totalitarianism, either home grown or imposed by Iran or Al Qaida”. But once again you fail to provide any evidence to prove that conditions will be better if the U.S. stays. In fact, reviewing the comments, I do not think you ever come out and actually say that conditions will be better if the U.S. stays. You just keep saying that they will be bad if we leave.
Finally, no one with any realistic knowledge of facts on the ground thinks that an Al-Qaeda based regime is anything but a remote possibility.
As Peter Galbraith says in the NY Review of Book
“Iraq’s Shiite-led government is in no danger of losing the civil war to al-Qaeda, or a more inclusive Sunni front. Iraq’s Shiites are three times as numerous as Iraq’s Sunni Arabs; they dominate Iraq’s military and police and have a powerful ally in neighboring Iran. The Arab states that might support the Sunnis are small, far away (vast deserts separate the inhabited parts of Jordan and Saudi Arabia from the main Iraqi population centers), and can only provide money, something the insurgency has in great amounts already.”
So please, how will a Sunni faction that can not even win an intra-Sunni battle, defeat the large stronger sectarian factions.
August 1st, 2007 at 11:08 pm
RickDFL-
“I thought, for purposes on this discussion, we were simply focusing on the question “What should the U.S. do for the benefit of the Iraqi people”.”
I don’t think so. We went to war to enforce the will of the UN, because the president and the congress found it in our national interest to do so. Obviously after destroying the old regime we need to leave a regime in place that is an improvement, as far as the US is concerned, over Saddam and his fascist gang.
”
Then you write:
“As for the Iraqis, you assert once again “the Iraqi people would suffer a civil war, followed by totalitarianism, either home grown or imposed by Iran or Al Qaida”. But once again you fail to provide any evidence to prove that conditions will be better if the U.S. stays.”
We cannot win without staying. I am for withdrawal of US forces as soon as an Iraqi government is in place that is stable and aligned with the US in our war on terrorism.
“Finally, no one with any realistic knowledge of facts on the ground thinks that an Al-Qaeda based regime is anything but a remote possibility.”
Remote possibility? Howabout a government that is aligned with the goals of Al Qaida? Or Iran? If we withdraw and a faction hostile to US interests takes control of the country, what will we do? Re-invade? Press for UN sanctions when the Russians & Chinese will do anything to get a good price on Iraqi oil?
You quote Peter Galbraith from the NYRB. Persoanally I gave up my NYRB subscription when they declared war on the Iraqi war back in 2003. Galbraith recently published a book that was neutrally titled; “The End of Iraq: How American Incompetence Created a War Without End”.
RickDFL, you cherry pick “experts” who agree with your policy prescriptions. Shall I counter that with some right wing guys — including people more familiar with what’s happening in Iraq then the scion of an old moneyed east coast WASP family?