While today’s House vote on setting a deadline for removing our troops from Iraq is still up in the air, it seems to me the wrong questions, the wrong issues, are being debated at this time.

By virtually all assessments, Iraq is in the midst of a civil war. Civil wars require civil settlements – negotiations – to end them. On the one hand, while a “surge� may tamp down some strife today, it isn’t a long-term solution. On the other hand, pulling out on a certain date in the future does not take into account what the situation might be on that future date. Pulling out prematurely may require the U.S. to jump back into the fray later after a regional war has started in the wake of a power vacuum caused by our previous pullout.

The answer is negotiations. Recently retired Gen. John Abizaid has it right :

“Military power solves about 20 percent of your problem in the region,” he said in a speech at Harvard in November. “The rest of it needs to be diplomatic, economic, political.”

Transcript of his speech.
Video of his speech.

One remembers it was only a few months ago that North Korea was threatening its neighbors and the world with its nuclear testing. Today, that threat has dissipated tremendously because the U.S. decided to negotiate rather than to confront. Will those North Korean talks settle all problems instantaneously? No! Will Iraqi negotiations settle generations of hatred overnight? Again, no.

But whatever the obstacles to a successful settlement are, they have to be a whole lot less painful than the alternatives.

�’Moderate’ is not a 4-letter word.�