Oh What a Lovely War!
There have been six American strategies in the four-plus years of the Mess in Mesopotamia.
We are now in the midst of what Iraq war veteran Phillip Carter calls Plan F, the sixth and penultimate strategy, which is known as the Surge. But as sure as Muslims face Mecca when they pray, there will be a seventh and final strategy — Plan G as in Get The Hell Out. And because the surge is failing, there is the nagging question of when that retreat might ensue and what Iraq’s fate will be when it does.
En route to Iraq last Friday, Robert Gates told reporters that “The clock is ticking,” that it’s time for the Baghdad government to get its act together and that President Bush’s patience is finite.
Perhaps the defense secretary was getting a little overbaked from the sun as he stood on the tarmac, because the last thing Bush wants is for the clock to begin ticking — the very prescription for getting the hell out in the Democrat-crafted spending bills now before Congress that he vows to veto — because that would mean that his Forever War won’t be forever.
Under the Bush administration’s perverse calculus, there is no alternative to a Forever War because the notion that the Americans can only stand down when the Iraqs stand up remains paramount, if threadbare. This is the small beer version of what once was unabashedly defined by the White House as “victory.”
The alternative, the selfsame White House tells us, would be to pack up the old unarmored Humvee and head home, leaving Iraq in the hands of sectarian wackjobs, terrorists, gangsters, black marketeers and preverts of every stripe.
Most notable of these reprobates is Al Qaeda, the deadliest of the Sunni insurgent groups, which has been making Swiss cheese of Plan F with 11 suicide bomb attacks last week inside the vaunted Baghdad surge perimeter. A close second is Moqtada Al-Sadr, the virulently anti-American Shiite cleric.
This Sunni-on-Shiite carnage has gone on as U.S. troops supervise a hitherto unpublicized aspect of Plan F — the feverish construction of a three-mile long admission of failure in the form of a Berlin Wall-esque barricade right through the heart of the capital in a desperate effort to try to keep the Sunni Hatfields and Shiite McCoys apart. Wait! There’s more. It turns out that the Stand Up-Stand Down plan has undergone an undisclosed downsizing. Training the Iraqi Army to stand up is no longer a priority, meaning that it will still be unable to do much more than wipe its ass with or without the Americans.
Yet staying the course becomes more unappealing every day, and it’s not because of a toilet paper shortage.
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10 Responses to “Oh What a Lovely War!”
Our response involves far more than instant retaliation and isolated strikes. Americans should not expect one battle, but a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we have ever seen. It may include dramatic strikes, visible on TV, and covert operations, secret even in success. We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place to place, until there is no refuge or no rest. And we will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists. (Applause.) From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.
Nobody- I guess no one told you but we’re no longer using the Bush unilateralist foreign policy from 2002- it was an abject failure.
This ain’t WWII and you ain’t Winston Churchill.
BUT your comment did bring back Churchills way with words… I don’t think you’re right in the here-and-now world but thanks for the Churchillian Smile.
While Bin Laden reconstitutes his terror camps and Iraq collapses further and further into civil war and outright chaos, the Bush speech quoted by nobody is full of unintended truths- it is invaluable social programmes rather than the terrorist networks that are being starved of funding and it is Americans who are being turned one against the other, not our enemies.
But Nobody… the US supports the PKK and MEK whom are terrorists, and so I need to ask… “Were we with us, before we were against us?” and “How do we treat ourselves hostily?”
Nobody- I guess no one told you but we’re no longer using the Bush unilateralist foreign policy from 2002- it was an abject failure.
Yeah I can see how we are Unilateralist.
As of August 23, 2006, there were 21 non-U.S. military forces contributing armed forces to the Coalition in Iraq. These 21 countries were: Albania, Armenia, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, El Salvador, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Poland, Romania, South Korea, and the United Kingdom.
Countries which had troops in or supported operations in Iraq at one point but have pulled out since: Nicaragua (Feb. 2004); Spain (late-Apr. 2004); Dominican Republic (early-May 2004); Honduras (late-May 2004); Philippines (~Jul. 19, 2004); Thailand (late-Aug. 2004); New Zealand (late Sep. 2004); Tonga (mid-Dec. 2004) Portugal (mid-Feb. 2005); The Netherlands (Mar. 2005); Hungary (Mar. 2005); Singapore (Mar. 2005); Norway (Oct. 2005); Ukraine (Dec. 2005); Japan (July 17, 2006); Italy (Nov. 2006); Slovakia (Jan 2007)
Forces in Afghanistan.
Belgium
Bulgaria
Canada
Czech Republic
Denmark
Estonia
France
Germany
Greece
Hungary
Iceland
Italy
Latvia
Lithuania
Luxemburg
Netherlands
Norway
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Slovakia
Slovenia
Spain
Turkey
United Kingdom
United States
Partner Nations
Albania
Austria
Azerbaijan
Croatia
Finland
former Yougoslov Republic of Macedonia
Ireland
Sweden
Switzerland
New Zealand
Yes, of course the coalition of the willing- Afghanistan was a justified war which has been taken over by NATO forces- but in Iraq- What percentage is left of the allied forces- 5%?
Basically every nation on earth sided with the USA in George Bush’s “Unilateralist” War. Many countries accepted small contingents of special forces to train them in counter insurgency and to hunt down and kill terrorist groups.
Hell even Somalia has been turning over Al Queida to us and allowing us to go interrogate them in their prisions. I read an article the other day where much of our intell is coming out of Africa these days as that is where the Jihadi have turned as they are being forced out of their own countries such as Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Egpyt and Saudi Arabia because of the drying up of funds imposed on them by not only the world but by the countries that used to turn blind eyes to their presence.
Yes, 100 combat engineers from Holland is a grand coalition. Just like the 500K coalition, with troops from even Egypt and Syria, from GW1 and the payments from Japan and Germany that funded our first war. Nobody, please supply the link from the RNC, I want to read more.
You’re a wonderful writer and cognizant of current events but with all due respect, I couldn’t disagree with you more. War is not a business plan or a football strategy. We must act and react to things as they happen. You simply can not expect a war to go as planned…you can only plan, do your best, and hope it works and if not…adjust fire.
Respectfully,
Sergeant S.W. Foster
http://www.Iraq-War-Veteran.com
http://www.IraqfromtheWindow.com