Doing The Wrong Thing Again
Frederick Kagan writes an op-ed in the Washington Post that clearly points to mistakes made in Iraq. He also clearly points out the fallacies of those who argue for a precipitous withdrawal. There are dark parallels to Vietnam, but not the ones the left and the media are trying to sell to the American public..
A rapid U.S. withdrawal would lead to catastrophe in Iraq. The presence of American troops is vital to restraining Iraqi soldiers — the Iraqis know not to participate in death squad activities when Americans are around. The fact that large numbers of U.S. troops are not embedded with the Iraqi police is a main reason for the participation of those forces in the killings. When the U.S. troops go, the Iraqi army will probably go the same way.
Nor is there any likelihood that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki will be able to simultaneously accomplish all the tasks now demanded of him, especially without American help. These include reforming the Interior Ministry and the police, disarming Shiite militias, fighting Sunni Arab insurgents, establishing functioning local and regional governments connected to the central government, and rooting out corruption. What are his chances if U.S. forces leave, sectarian violence rises and Iraqis grow ever more pessimistic about the success of their democratic experiment?
Americans believe that all problems are soluble and therefore that people who aren't solving their problems must not be trying. They need to be "incentivized," either through promises or threats. Many on the left have long been advocating a withdrawal of U.S. forces, or the threat of it, as just such an incentive for the Iraqis. But what if even then Iraqis cannot accomplish the goals we have set for them? Can we then declare that, by establishing the Iraqi army and helping Iraq elect and establish its government, we have done all that honor requires?
No, we can't. Both honor and our vital national interest require establishing conditions in Iraq that will allow the government to consolidate and maintain civil peace and good governance. It doesn't matter how many "trained and ready" Iraqi soldiers there are, nor how many provinces are nominally under Iraqi control. If America withdraws its forces before setting the conditions for the success of the Iraqi government, we will have failed in our mission and been defeated in the eyes of our enemies. We will have dishonored ourselves.
Have there been mistakes? Sure. Does that justify making another, bigger mistake? No, it does not. The fact of the matter is that abandoning the Iraqis will be a defeat for America, not for George Bush alone. The fact is that if we leave a disaster behind us, we'll end up having to clean up much worse disasters in the future.
The comparison is often made between Iraq and Vietnam. One implication is that just as it was possible to lose Vietnam and still win the Cold War, so it is acceptable to lose Iraq. But in the Cold War, Vietnam was a sideshow. Iraq is in the heart of the Muslim world and at the center of the struggle against radical Islamism.
It is also worth keeping in mind that as indirect consequences of America's defeat in Vietnam, the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, the Sandinistas seized power in Nicaragua and Ayatollah Khomeini seized Tehran and American hostages. The "decent interval" between our withdrawal and the collapse of South Vietnam didn't help. Neither will the implausible deniability the Pentagon is now trying to establish in Iraq.
Kagan reminds people that past mistakes are not justification for making another, more serious mistake. He's right.
