Friday, March 17, 2006
Opinion RhetIraq: Max Boot
Who: Max Boot, Opinion Writer & self-proclaimed Neoconservative
Source: The American Interest via History News Network
Quotes: From March 8, 2006 article titled, "Guess What? We're Winning"
To listen to the critics, you would think that the Iraq war was the biggest blunder in U.S. history and George W. Bush the worst president ever. Comparisons with Vietnam have already become a cliché, but that's not going far enough for the respected Israeli military historian Martin van Creveld. In a November 2005 article in The Forward, he called the invasion of Iraq "the most foolish war since Emperor Augustus in 9 B.C. sent his legions into Germany and lost them." Most Americans are more judicious, but polls indicate that a majority doesn't trust Bush's handling of Iraq and now thinks the invasion was a mistake. Although only a minority favors an immediate pullout, ever more Americans seem to agree with Democratic chairman Howard Dean, who said on December 5 that "the idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea that unfortunately is just plain wrong."
As we mark the war's third anniversary, it is worth asking whether such sentiments are justified or whether they represent an emotional overreaction to the sorts of temporary setbacks that occur in every major conflict. The answer is, of course, unknowable until we see how the war turns out. It won't be clear for years whether Iraq becomes a stable democracy or whether, as critics expect, it becomes mired in despotism or internecine conflict. It is entirely possible that the naysayers will be proven right and the invasion will go down as a fiasco. This might be a self-fulfilling prophecy, however, for the more opposition there is on the home front, the less chance there is for our troops to prevail.
... we can see that although the Administration has made plenty of mistakes, their consequences are not irredeemably calamitous. To his credit, President Bush has not made the most critical mistake of all: He has not lost his nerve in difficult times, as have so many Democrats who initially supported the invasion. Thanks to the President's fortitude, the Iraqi people's resilience and, above all, the skill and bravery of Coalition armed forces, victory is still the most likely outcome. But due at least in part to Administration missteps, that victory will be a good deal harder to achieve than it needed to be.
... In Iraq, we are losing an average of two soldiers a day, a pace that would require another 76 years for U.S. deaths in Iraq to match those in Vietnam.
... if, decades from now, Iraq emerges as a stable democracy and the Middle East becomes a better place, future historians may well marvel at how cheaply and skillfully this transformation was achieved. It's good that we as a nation are hard on ourselves, that we expect a lot from our leaders and have little patience for incompetence. It's not so good that we sometimes set our expectations unrealistically high. If we took our own history more seriously, we might learn to temper our expectations with humility and to find a greater capacity for patience. We surely need more of both.
Source: The American Interest via History News Network
Quotes: From March 8, 2006 article titled, "Guess What? We're Winning"
To listen to the critics, you would think that the Iraq war was the biggest blunder in U.S. history and George W. Bush the worst president ever. Comparisons with Vietnam have already become a cliché, but that's not going far enough for the respected Israeli military historian Martin van Creveld. In a November 2005 article in The Forward, he called the invasion of Iraq "the most foolish war since Emperor Augustus in 9 B.C. sent his legions into Germany and lost them." Most Americans are more judicious, but polls indicate that a majority doesn't trust Bush's handling of Iraq and now thinks the invasion was a mistake. Although only a minority favors an immediate pullout, ever more Americans seem to agree with Democratic chairman Howard Dean, who said on December 5 that "the idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea that unfortunately is just plain wrong."
As we mark the war's third anniversary, it is worth asking whether such sentiments are justified or whether they represent an emotional overreaction to the sorts of temporary setbacks that occur in every major conflict. The answer is, of course, unknowable until we see how the war turns out. It won't be clear for years whether Iraq becomes a stable democracy or whether, as critics expect, it becomes mired in despotism or internecine conflict. It is entirely possible that the naysayers will be proven right and the invasion will go down as a fiasco. This might be a self-fulfilling prophecy, however, for the more opposition there is on the home front, the less chance there is for our troops to prevail.
... we can see that although the Administration has made plenty of mistakes, their consequences are not irredeemably calamitous. To his credit, President Bush has not made the most critical mistake of all: He has not lost his nerve in difficult times, as have so many Democrats who initially supported the invasion. Thanks to the President's fortitude, the Iraqi people's resilience and, above all, the skill and bravery of Coalition armed forces, victory is still the most likely outcome. But due at least in part to Administration missteps, that victory will be a good deal harder to achieve than it needed to be.
... In Iraq, we are losing an average of two soldiers a day, a pace that would require another 76 years for U.S. deaths in Iraq to match those in Vietnam.
... if, decades from now, Iraq emerges as a stable democracy and the Middle East becomes a better place, future historians may well marvel at how cheaply and skillfully this transformation was achieved. It's good that we as a nation are hard on ourselves, that we expect a lot from our leaders and have little patience for incompetence. It's not so good that we sometimes set our expectations unrealistically high. If we took our own history more seriously, we might learn to temper our expectations with humility and to find a greater capacity for patience. We surely need more of both.
