Coincidence or Karma?

The first real blemish on the so-called American Century was the war in Vietnam, where the greatest military force the world had ever known was bogged down for years fighting an army of indigenous insurgents who could blend in with the local population at will.

The current version of the greatest military force the world has ever known has been bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan for years, fighting armies of (largely) indigenous insurgents who can blend in with the local population at will.

The American Revolution was begun when indigenous insurgents who could blend in with the local population at will bogged down and harassed the greatest military force the world had ever known.

The parallels can’t be pushed too far. The Viet Cong won because American public opinion turned against the war; they were routinely hammered on the battlefield. The American colonies were eventually able to build an Army that gave the British enough of a beating for them to go away. We’re likely going to be able to declare victory and leave Iraq and Afghanistan on more or less our own terms, though who—or what—will fill the vacuum is unknown and worrisome.

Still, it’s a little disconcerting, and worth noting to anyone who complains because these rag heads won’t fight fair.

Fair is Fair

Iraqi Shiites celebrated the sixth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad to American troops yesterday by burning effigies of George W. Bush.

Is it any wonder the rest of the world looks at these guys like a dim-witteduncle? George W. Bush s responsible for a lot of things Iraqis can be justifiably angry about, but getting rid of Saddam Hussein isn’t one of them, certainly not from a Shiite perspective. If there’s one day a year they should be grateful for Dubya, this was it.

Iraq and Roll Politics

Before I had a blog, I used to torment personal friends only with my rants. Most of them are, thankfully, lost to history. In cleaning off my hard drive in preparation of getting a new computer, I found this one, originally written March 15, 2003, just a few days before shock and awe.

Okay, so the email petition against the war was a fake. Big deal. The point is still well taken.

The Bush Administration has not made the case for doing whatever the hell it wants to do. Colin Powell’s evidence was not a smoking gun, it wasn’t even a sputtering candle. The follow-up evidence of the medical attention provided to what’s-his-name isn’t worth talking about, either. Seems Iraq got rid of him as quickly as practically possible.

Sure, Saddam Hussein is the worst thing to happen to the world since reality television. The Bushies’ argument for his removal, once you wade through the raisons du jour, seems to be that Iraq is a rogue state who can’t be trusted to live respectably in the community of nations.

They’re right. He can’t. Unfortunately, Bush has squandered so much hard earned American prestige that we may be destined to be the losers here, whether Saddam survives or not.

This Administration has pulled us out of the Kyoto Greenhouse Accords. We refuse to accept the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court in the Hague, lest any American’s be tried as war criminals. (I wonder what the reaction would be from Don Rumsfeld is another country had done that.) We have made mention more than once that we are willing to use nuclear weapons in Iraq.

A few weeks ago Rumsfeld went to Congress to ask that the Missile Defense System, better and more appropriately known as “Star Wars,” be excluded from operational testing before being deployed. He says we need it right now. The fact that there hasn’t been a single successful test doesn’t enter into the equation.

John Ashcroft makes daily forays into new and creative interpretations of the Constitution. The Orwellian-named Patriot Act essentially makes possession of a library card probable cause for a warrant. There is now a database to determine your “threat level” as an airline passenger. A red listing will deny you access to your plane, whether it’s accurate or not. Even the current poodle Congress finally has its hackles up at the proposed Defense Department database to track and cross-reference every financial transaction we make.

Are these the acts of an administration reacting to an overwhelming electoral mandate? Hardly. Let’s think back a couple of years. The votes finally got counted and Bush won, but more people voted for Gore. The fairness of the victory is not in dispute here, just the size of the mandate.

We said we didn’t need the UN, which we probably don’t, then went in for a resolution, anyway. We said we didn’t need another resolution, but we’re still fooling around getting one, unless it’s one of those days where we don’t think we have the votes. All compromises not suggested by us are deemed to be non-starters.

The rhetoric coming from our side has been so harsh as to alienate many of our regular supporters. (Screw the French, no one cares what they think. They have been irrelevant for many years and are just now figuring it out.) We have no place left to negotiate to. Over 150,000 troops can’t be kept in the field indefinitely. They either have to come home or get to work soon, and there’s no way they can come home now without Bush getting more egg on his face than Bill Clinton when they found Monica’s dress.

What has us in this situation? Reduced to its simplest form, it’s because George W. Bush thinks he is God’s instrument on Earth. His fundamentalist Christian beliefs have given him the moral certainty that he is right and anyone who opposes him is wrong. That explains much of what passes for diplomatic communication coming from Washington these days: You’re either for us, or against us. Anyone who disagrees must be wrong, and is therefore either the enemy, or sleeping with him.

I’m no bible scholar, but I don’t remember hearing a lot of that kind of attitude attributed to the man from whom Christianity has taken its name. It sounds a whole lot more like what we would hear from our current sworn enemies, where everything is in absolutes and annihilation of the infidels is the only recourse.

The Bush Administration has told us that the removal of Saddam Hussein will take care of everything from terrorism to Mid East peace to the common cold. Running amuck like a longshoreman on a three-day drunk will remove Saddam, but it is more likely to create more terrorists of those currently on the fence than it is to lessen the danger.

Then again, no matter what is said, lessening the danger isn’t the primary objective here anymore. All that’s matters now is that Bush is Right. And he is. God is on our side.

I hope God remembers that when we’re through there.

The Truth Hurts

The mainstream media may finally have a clue. Read Frank Rich's dead-on column about our conduct in Iraq and at home. I will gleefully debate anyone who disagrees, so long as you don't do it anonymously.

He Who Hesitates is Lost

I've been thinking just about exactly this for several days, but several distractions like work and family obligations Kept me from getting to it. Many thinks to the New York Times for writing almost exactly what I would have said, if a little dryer.

Dogs and Ponies

It wouldn’t be so bad for George Bush to lie every time he opens his mouth if it wasn’t so obvious that he doesn’t care that you know he’s lying. Last week’s clumsily choreographed events in Washington are another episode in the continuing saga of the Bush Administartion’s remake of The Man Who Would Be King.

General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker spent Monday and Tuesday on Capitol Hill, testifying under oath their “reports” were not vetted or aided by the White House. This might have played better had Bush not announced his agreement with Petraeus’s recommendation to draw down our forces in Iraq before the general was even finished talking about it.

Salient fact: there’s no drawdown. The “surge” was supposed to be temporary. The troops coming are coming out on almost exactly the same timeline they would have originally. Extending them wasn’t really an option, as the Joint Chiefs of Staff are near mutiny now over the tattered state that passes for military readiness. Claiming credit for bringing them out without replacing them is a hollow truth; there are no troops to replace them with.

Much of Petraeus’s testimony alludes to improved conditions that allow him to send troops home, contradicting a recent audit by the Government Accountability Office. Ah, but, the GAO data is five to nine weeks older than what Petraeus brought forward. Things are completely different now, wink wink, nudge nudge.

On Thursday, Bush made a televised address to announce his new “return on success,” initiative, touting accomplishments that contradicted his own recent statements. Petraeus set him up nicely – if, of course, coincidentally, since no coordination was taking place – by stating in a media interview hours earlier that Iraq should reach a state of “sustainable security” by June 2009. Was this something he came up with on Wednesday? It must be, since he said nothing positive about the prospect of “sustainable security” while on Capitol Hill, unless he mentioned it to Larry Craig in the men’s room.

The parallels between Iraq and Vietnam grow greater by the day. Petraeus occupied a seat eerily similar to one William Westmoreland sat in forty years ago, being asked the same questions. “How long?” “Are we winning?” And the answers, while phrased with forty years of marketing savvy behind them, served the same purpose: to buy time. Keep the money coming. Keep the war more alive than the thirty-eight hundred who have come home in boxes.

We support a regime no more legitimate than the Diem government in South Vietnam. Bush has spoken of the bloodbath that resulted when we left Vietnam, and how he will avoid the same result here. Left unsaid was how much of that bloodbath was the result of our own actions: destabilizing the Cambodian government, allowing the Khmer Rouge to take over and slaughter millions of their own citizens, until the Vietnamese came in and took over themselves. Had we actually used Bush’s standard in Vietnam, we’d still be there, with over 100,000 names on The Wall.

The analogy to look at is Yugoslavia, where another strong dictator (Tito) kept bitter ethnic hatreds submerged through his own iron hand, and by providing a common enemy to the various factions. Yugoslavia fell apart into civil war, ethnic cleansing, and more new countries than anyone outside the State Department can keep track of. Things got sorted out there, but only after much violence that had been repressed found its way to the surface, and with the support and disinterested supervision of the United Nations and NATO.

Bush’s pronounced intention of buying time for the Iraqi government to get its act together is disingenuous to the point of perjury. He’s buying time to get his own ass out, to allow someone to make the inevitable departure so he can claim they “lost” Iraq. As for his alleged desire to avoid another Vietnam, it’s too late. Better to avoid another Yugoslavia, which can best be done by eliminating the factions’ current common enemy: us.

Heroism in Government

Somewhere there must be a more craven, spineless, and detestable job than member of the United States House of Representatives. If so, it occupies a rung so low illegal immigrants won’t do it. Only lawyers and MBAs need apply.

General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker made the rounds of the House and Senate this week to deliver their much anticipated “report” on the status of Iraq. There were few surprises, as they painted a picture optimistic enough to allow hawks to roll out the predictable “stay the course” rhetoric, while staying on the safe side of what can be said under oath.

My day job prevented me from listening during the day, so I caught as much as I could stand in the car after work. Fortunately, the drive took only about an hour. Fully half of the “questioners” I heard – regardless of which side of the aisle they occupied – failed to ask a question. Ass coverings in the form of speeches abounded. Democrats, sensitive to charges they do not sufficiently support the troops, praised Petraeus as though he was Eisenhower, Grant, and MacArthur reincarnated in one package. Republicans – who really don’t support the troops except with verbiage, but are impervious to criticism – lobbed him softballs all day. Petraeus’s contention that he had not vetted or coordinated his testimony would have been more convincing had he not answered several Republican questions before they were asked.

The Senate was better: less overt partisanship, more probing questions. It doesn’t matter; nothing will change, except the level of vitriol directed at Democrats by those who don’t think they’re moving fast enough. They’re not moving fast enough, but it’s not because they think the war is accomplishing anything. It’s because they’re Democrats, who live their lives afraid that anything they say, do, or think will offend someone, somewhere, even if that person was no more likely to vote Democratic than George Bush is to win the Nobel Peace prize.

Republicans, good for so long at framing any political discussion, have missed the boat one hundred eighty degrees. It’s not that the Democrats lack the courage to stay in Iraq. The Democrats lack the courage to leave.

Be Careful What You Ask For

We've all heard about the "General Betray Us" ad put out by MoveOn.org. I've been on their mailing list for some time, until tonight, when they asked those of us on the list what we thought of the ad, and provided a link with which we could email directly to their president Eli Pariser.

Most of you already know better than to do something stupid and then dare The Home Office to say something about it. Below is my letter to Mr. Pariser:

Dear Mr. Pariser,

It pains me to write this, as I agree with virtually all of MoveOn’s positions. I have also told my significant other that, while I’m not a marcher, I’d love to find an organization for which I could do some writing. I see you’re currently looking for people to do just that, Unfortunately, I am so disgusted with your organization right now, I have to pass.

The timing of the Petraeus ad was abominable. Taking a decorated and respected member of the armed services to task in such a disrespectful and sophomoric manner on the eve of this week’s hearings served no purpose other than to give Republicans a diversion to taunt the Democrats with, when all attention should have been on his testimony. Petraeus is not the architect of this failed policy; your ad merely shot the messenger, doing his job as he saw fit. Like you, I strongly disagree with him, and I feel the Bush Administration has used him shamelessly. Still, to vilify the tactician for the mistakes of the strategist is to blame the quarterback for calling the wrong play when the coach’s faulty game plan already has the team down by forty points.

Shame on MoveOn for sinking to the level of Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, taking the cheap and gratuitous shot when more focused action was demanded. I’ll be removing myself from your email list tonight.

Bush, Iraq and Vietnam

Our Fearless Leader, the great and powerful George Dubya “Bring it On” Bush, has reached another low in puzzling and scary statements. This week he said we need to stay in Iraq because it’s like Vietnam, and "One unmistakable legacy of Vietnam is that the price of America's withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens…”

Gee, Dubya, we’ve only been telling you Iraq is like Vietnam for three years now. Nice to see you’re finally with the program. Except, he’s not. Read his statement again. In Bushland, our biggest mistake in Vietnam was not staying long enough.

Let’s not forget, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney combined spent no more time in Vietnam than I did. Only difference was, I was only twelve years old at the time of the Tet Offensive. The saddest part is that we’ve reached a point where it’s no longer disappointing for either of them to such statements. It’s just business as usual.

Pat Tillman

Over 3,600 American servicemen and women have died in Iraq and Afghanistan since September 11, 2001. All of their sacrifices are significant and equal; none are more indicative of our involvement than that of Pat Tillman.

Tillman enlisted at the height of the greatest outburst of patriotism since December 8, 1941. Everyone who enlisted then, or since, gave up whatever life they might have had otherwise. Only Tillman walked away from a millions dollar career that would not be there when he returned.

His enlistment alone should have been enough to shame the Young (and Old) Republicans who beat the drums and waved the flag from the safety of this country. Tillman wasn’t finished; he joined Special Forces and went to Afghanistan.

He died there, a victim of friendly fire, much as the American effort to bring Osama bin Laden to justice died short of Tora Bora due to misguided priorities of the same leaders who swore so sincerely to protect the troops and ensure that no American casualty would be in vain. He was used even more cynically than his fallen comrades by those who promoted the war, as his presence was routinely trumpeted as symbolic of the best and the brightest this country had to offer, stepping up to shoulder a reasonable and justifiable burden.

The Bush Administration is no more forthcoming about what really happened to Tillman than it is about the true roots of the war. All that is left to his family are broken promises and lies, and a feeling that, no matter what the government admits to, the reality is worse. When what passes for truth dribbles out over months, each revelation more dismaying than before, how can anyone know which is the last, or if any can be believed past a certain point?

We’re no more likely to get answers about the larger questions than we are about Pat Tillman’s final moments, unless Congress finds the will to exert its Constitutional responsibilities and provide some effective checks and balances to the unitary executive. It won’t repay the debt we owe for the 3,600 lives this nation bilked from their rightful owners, but it’s a place to start.