Go Means Go
Progressives think the United States should set a timeline for withdrawal from Iraq. Iraqi politicians uniformly want this. And the Iraqi public is overwhelmingly on board. But conservative analysts have been labeling this policy irresponsible forever. How do they react? If you’re Michael O’Hanlon, through mind-reading:
Clearly, it would be neither practical nor desirable for the entire U.S. military presence in Iraq to simply vanish on Friday. But nobody’s proposing that. Rather, the proposal on the table is to set an end-point for American withdrawal and then begin redeploying forces out in an organized, safe manner. But rather than concede the point that the progressive solution is in line with the desires of the Iraqi people and the main Iraqi political leaders, we get this weird dance of dismissing Iraq’s desire to be free of a foreign occupying army as “political,” assertions that O’Hanlon has secret mind-reading powers to know what people really think, and a kind of straw man focus on the extremely short-term. Ostensibly, however, since 2003 we’ve been looking to create a situation in Iraq where a new government will be stable enough to get along without us. The new government says they’re reaching that point, and want to set a schedule for our departure. Why not take “yes” for an answer?
24 Responses to “Go Means Go”
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August 26th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Matt do you really think that the Iraqi government is going to be stable when we leave? This isn’t something to paper over.
August 26th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
The new government will reach the point of self-sustainability faster if we set a timetable, and not just because it will create a sense of urgency among Iraqi leaders. A timetable will also create a sense of urgency among US leaders. Once the US makes the commitment to leave, it will realize it has to make a full economic an security assistance commitment to the legitimately elected Iraqi government, and will stop messing around with all sorts of long-shot schemes for political “reconciliation” based on forcing the government to accept insurgents, Saudi proxies and other untrustworthy Sunni Arab militia elements in the state security forces.
August 26th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
Craig McGillivary Says:
August 26th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Matt do you really think that the Iraqi government is going to be stable when we leave? This isn’t something to paper over.
Guess we have to stay forever, in that case.
August 26th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
Why not take “yes” for an answer?
Because that means admitting they were wrong. We’re finally at a point where everybody should more or less agree on what needs to be done, and everyone seems to be disagreeing simply because they don’t know how not to.
Additionally, if they agree to a withdrawal timeline, what would right-wingers do with all of those bumper stickers they’ve put on their cars over the years?
August 26th, 2008 at 12:57 pm
They don’t want to take “yes” for an answer because all of their explanations for the war have been a smokescreen. They want an American empire, and they won’t easily give it up.
See such extreme leftist figures as Patrick Buchanan on this issue.
August 26th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
Don’t forget that victory at one point was defined as leaving behind a stable and safe ally. How you could mandate Iraq being a friend of the US is beyond me. Iraq has just made oil deals with Russia and China. Maybe, as a sovereign nation they feel they can pick their own friends.
August 26th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
Just admit them into NATO, that’ll solve everything.
August 27th, 2008 at 5:48 am
If Matt can’t figure out why the neocons and the military-industrial complex and the oil companies are not going to “take ‘yes’ for an answer”, he should get the fuck out of the pontificating business.
It really is pathetic the way he insists on treating all these assholes as some kind of “reasonable men” who might actually have serious geopolitical and philosophical points in mind, instead of the simple desire to steal the fucking oil and make a profit in the next quarter.
Which makes them smart and Matt an idiot.
As for whether the Iraqi government will be “stable” when we leave, WHO GIVES A FLYING FUCK? The reality is that the Shia have beaten the Sunni in the sectarian conflict, and Iran will support the government if the US leaves. As long as the US is kicked out, al-Sadr will be partially satisfied and will probably manage to get himself a piece of the government pie, as he did before. The moderate Sunnis will also do so, and the insurgents will continue on blowing things up until they get some, too. For the US, all of that is absolutely irrelevant to our national security or the price of oil – especially since Iraq was conquered precisely to make sure the price of oil from Iraq stayed in line with OPEC.
Only if your view of the proper order of things is that the US must maintain a vast military presence on top of the Iraqi oil fields for the next fifty years, as well as being able to launch a military attack on Iran from Iraqi soil, is the issue of whether the Iraqi government is “stable” relevant.
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