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April 9th 2006
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President Bush |
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“Yesterday I spoke about an important example of the gains we and the
Iraqis have made, and that is in the northern city of Tal Afar. The city
was once under al Qaeda control, and thanks to coalition and Iraqi
forces, the terrorists have now been driven out of that city. Iraqi
security forces are maintaining law and order. We see the outlines of a
free and secure Iraq that we and the Iraqi people have been fighting
for. As we mark the third anniversary of the launch of Operation Iraqi
Freedom, the success we're seeing in Tal Afar gives me confidence in the
future of Iraq.”
President Bush during his March 21 press conference.
“As the chorus saying 'sweeps are useless' grows, inside as well as
outside the military, the U.S. military in Iraq continues its sweeps.
The latest Iraqi city to get swept is Tal Afar. Predictably, the Iraqi
guerillas did what they should and got out, escaping through exactly the
sort of tunnel system John Poole describes in his excellent books. We
stand holding an empty bag, in a city whose population we have
thoroughly alienated.”
Director of the Center for Cultural Conservatism at the Free Congress
Foundation, William Lind in a September 19, 2005 review of Iraqi
operations.
Every day that passes, Americans will be less welcomed in Iraq, and I
wouldn't take lightly the warning of an Iraqi cleric who said, "You
should leave before we force you out....An army that won't fight is one
thing. Twenty million people willing to stab you in the back, cut your
throat or toss a grenade in your soup are quite another. Our Army is
trained and equipped to fight set battles against other armies. It is
not trained to cope with a hostile civilian population. It will not do
well, and if we insist on staying, the Iraqis will force us out, just as
the Lebanese forced the Israeli army out.”
Columnist Charlie Reese in a May 2003 criticism of the invasion of Iraq.
So who is telling the truth regarding America's occupation of Iraq? Is
it President Bush, who has taken up a national campaign to tell the
country all is well in Iraq, or is it the ilk of Lind and Reese who see
and have seen problems with the operation since before it began? Is the
president's new PR offensive driven by opinion polls that suggest his
party might suffer electoral losses due to public perception of the
occupation of Iraq? What could motivate Lind and Reese to make clear,
critical statements criticizing the occupation when doing so is often
criticized as hateful or even treasonous by the administration and its
supporters?
Furthermore, if all was proceeding in Iraq as the President claims,
that, “...the
Iraqi people and our coalition continue to work together to build a
stable and free and prosperous Iraq,”
then why the need for a political campaign to inform everyone of the
obvious? Wouldn't the facts of progress speak for themselves?
Such a wide discrepancy between views respecting America's occupation of
Iraq does no service to public debate or to understanding the issue. It
is at this point that the side which is exaggerating its position is
either committing treachery for political gain or treason with an aim to
subvert the nation. Leveling a charge of treason against such as Reese
and Lind is rather incredible at best and patently absurd on its face.
Reese is a retired journalist who has gained a modest amount of acclaim
for his forthrightness and plainly articulated views of the world. Lind
has, among other things, served as legislative aide for Senators Robert
Taft, Jr., and Gary Hart. He has written extensively on Fourth
Generation warfare and was co-author with Paul M. Weyrich of the
monograph: "Why Islam is a Threat to America and The West." His is
hardly the resume of an insurrectionist.
Nor are Reese and Lind alone with their well-reasoned critiques of
America's occupation of Iraq. Unfortunately the most reasonable
investigations of the invasion of Iraq and its consequences to the
country are ignored by the Limbaughs, Hannity's, and O'Reilly's of
America's political culture. They direct their audiences to obsess over
the horrors of Hillary Clinton and the irrelevance of Alec Baldwin.
Even the lofty platitudes given by the Bush Administration to
rationalize the Iraqi operation cannot escape scrutiny. For instance his
repeated claims that, “one
way you spread peace is spread democracy,” was recently challenged
by Matthew White in
Democracies Do Not Make War on One Another...or Do They? White not
only made a record of all the wars between democracies dating back to
the Greek and Punic wars of the ancient world, but mathematically
calculated the odds of democracies making war against each other at 19.8
percent.
The president has frequently claimed that free societies do not make war
with each other, but as his claims continue to be so diametrically
opposed to well-reasoned analysis, he runs the risk of leading this free
society to make war against itself.
Comment on this article at our Forum
By
Bob Strodtbeck
Columnist
Bob Strodtbeck has been writing editorial
commentaries since 1993. He has professional experiences in
pharmaceuticals, radio, and education. He has also served as a church
elder in an Orlando congregation where he has made his home since 1986.rvstrodtbeck@peoplepc.com
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