Another bet for you, Sam

it of course assumes you're not fundamentally dishonest.

[rquoter]My Bet With Francis Fukuyama
August 5, 2008

No matter what happens in November, the war in Iraq will not be brought to an end by either Barack Obama or John McCain. The war in Iraq is over. We've won.

Exhibit A for my claim: Francis Fukuyama has agreed to write me a check for $100.

In March 2006, I wrote a blistering review of "America at the Crossroads," Mr. Fukuyama's sensational repudiation both of the war in Iraq as well as the neoconservative movement of which he was once a leading light.

The book was widely praised. I called its arguments weak, its policy prescriptions weaker, and its manner disingenuous, since Mr. Fukuyama -- an early advocate of regime change in Iraq who claimed to have changed his mind several months before the war began -- had given no unequivocal indication of his opposition when his views might have made a real difference.

There followed between us an exchange of emails, in which Mr. Fukuyama pointed to various pieces he had published prior to the war indicating some concerns about how the U.S. would go in, and some foreboding about what might follow. He also mentioned a $100 bet he had made in May 2003 with a friend -- a supporter of the war -- that Iraq would be a mess five years after the invasion, the definition of a mess being "you'd know one if you saw it." We agreed to make the same bet.

I nearly forgot about the bet until last Friday, when the Washington Post reported U.S. combat fatalities in Iraq for the month of July. The total came to five. Six other soldiers were killed in noncombat situations.

The rate of combat fatalities may again inch higher. For all the progress made in the last year, Iraq remains a dangerous (if no longer terrifying) place. But to speak of Iraq as a "war" no longer accurately characterizes the nature of the situation: For purposes of comparison, U.S. combat deaths in Vietnam in 1971, when America's involvement was winding down and U.S. troop levels stood roughly where they are today in Iraq, averaged 115 a month.

Speaking of "war" also confuses our understanding of what the U.S. should do next. Put simply, and pace Barack Obama, "getting out of Iraq" and "ending the war" are no longer synonymous.

With this in mind, I wrote Mr. Fukuyama to suggest that he owed me $100. He conceded, albeit strictly on "the narrow terms" of the bet itself.

Mr. Fukuyama insists, however, that he has been vindicated on the broader issue: "We've spent a trillion or so dollars, 30,000 dead or wounded, a large loss in international influence and prestige, all for the sake of disarming a country with no WMDs."

He adds that "my concern right from the beginning was that the war wouldn't be worth the effort it would require, and that the American people don't have a good record in supporting long, costly struggles in developing countries." And he asks for "public recognition" that he was no latecomer to opposing the war.

I'll grant that Mr. Fukuyama had decided the war was a mistake -- if only in a whisper -- before it was begun. Where does that leave us now? Perhaps it's worth considering what we have gained now that Iraq looks like a winner.

Here's a partial list: Saddam is dead. Had he remained in power, we would likely still believe he had WMD. He would have been sitting on an oil bonanza priced at $140 a barrel. He would almost certainly have broken free from an already crumbling sanctions regime. The U.S. would be faced with not one, but two, major adversaries in the Persian Gulf. Iraqis would be living under a regime that, in an average year, was at least as murderous as the sectarian violence that followed its collapse. And the U.S. would have seemed powerless to shape events.

Instead, we now have a government that does not threaten its neighbors, does not sponsor terrorism, and is unlikely to again seek WMD. We have a democratic government, a first for the Arab world, and one that is increasingly capable of defending its people and asserting its interests.

We have a defeat for al Qaeda. Critics carp that had there been no invasion, there never would have been al Qaeda in Iraq. Maybe. As it is, thousands of jihadists are dead, al Qaeda has been defeated on its self-declared "central battlefield," and the movement is largely discredited on the Arab street and even within Islamist circles.

We also have -- if still only prospectively -- an Arab bulwark against Iran's encroachments in the region. But that depends on whether we simply withdraw from Iraq, or join it in a lasting security partnership.

None of these are achievements to sneer at, all the more so because they were won through so much sacrifice. Mr. Fukuyama has now granted the "narrow" point of our bet in the form of a personal check. Here's betting him $100 back that he will come around to conceding the broader case for the war in Iraq -- shall we say, on the 10th anniversary of its liberation?[/rquoter]

 

Obamanation: Committed to Defeat

 

that's McCain's plan, but according to MuckMark, we've already lost.

 

most of the jihadi, as distinct from the militias, are foreigners. it's not their land.