House Democrat calls for immediate troop withdrawal

So now rational people making suggestions on how to proceed in this cluster**** are now "scared into submission?"

 

One man saying it doesn't make it true. Or are we listening to Bin Laden now?

 

Ummm, well if one was talking about emboldening Al Queda then the words of the leader of AQ might provide relevant insight into their decisionmaking. Further, as I indicated this is not a phenomenon isolated to AQ, as diplomats and others have pointed to this as a result of Lebanon and Somalia. Seriously, I wouldn't have continuously made this point in several threads without having seen the literature. In fact I am sure I've quoted such several times. I don't think you'd have to look past page one on a google search to see the quotes yourself and the only people you'll see denying it are CATO isolationist wackies.

 

Are you really suggesting policy decisions on American lives should be based on what bin Laden might think of us? And that it would be better to continue a war - no matter the situation - just for the sake of not emboldening bin laden? Because that's what your argument sounds like to me.

 

Not no matter what the situation, but the situation is not so bad as to leave immediately. We've lost relatively few lives, some cash but there are still huge benefits possible to gain.

Timing is key in leaving Iraq

Steven C. Miller

Too many people debating when the United States should withdraw from Iraq are allowing their feelings about the propriety of the war to influence their views on withdrawal. Its timing and manner must be decided dispassionately, because this decision will have a ripple effect in Iraq and in the region.
Those who demand an immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq should know that such a course could give credence to Osama bin Laden in the eyes of the world Muslim community and further embolden the jihadi movement in acts of violence against the United States and its allies.

Staying too long, in contrast, could give our enemies fodder for the argument that the U.S. is trying to "colonize" Iraq. The Balkanization of Iraq is also a real possibility. The country is populated by three different and distinct groups, whose interests are rarely the same.

Bin Laden granted a face-to-face interview to John Miller of ABC News in May 1998. Bin Laden stressed that the "lesson" of the Muslim victory over the Soviet Union in Afghanistan was that the supposed invincibility of the superpowers was false, that God wanted the Muslims to win and that after its defeat the Soviet Union was "gone forever." The victory of religious Muslims over a superpower has become a recurrent and important theme for bin Laden.

In August 1992, the United States sent troops to Somalia to stabilize the country and to alleviate wholesale starvation caused by a civil war. Subsequent to the famous "Blackhawk Down" engagement, and after viewing scenes of dead American soldiers being dragged through the streets, the U.S. left Somalia.

Not known here at the time, there was another outside presence in Somalia -- al-Qaeda. In the ABC interview, bin Laden advised that al-Qaeda went there preparing for a long war against the U.S., but was surprised to discover that America was unable to endure "strikes" and "fled after a few blows," rushing out "in shame and disgrace, dragging the bodies of its soldiers."

Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda's second-ranking leader, in a July 2005 communication with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the top al-Qaeda operative in Iraq, laid out a detailed strategy in Iraq: 1) drive out U.S. forces, 2) establish an Islamic state, 3) extend the jihad wave to secular countries neighboring Iraq and 4) destroy Israel.

While it is true that regardless of how or when we disengage from Iraq, bin Laden and those who agree with him will continue to attack the U.S. and its allies, we must never give any indication that our will and patience is less than the will and patience of those who would do us harm. If our actions in Iraq give credence to bin Laden's past statements that the U.S. will retreat when faced with resistance, he and the greater jihadi community will be further emboldened to launch attacks, and their ability to recruit will increase.

• • •

About 90 percent of all Muslims in the world are Sunni; fewer than 10 percent are Shiite. In Iraq, Sunnis are a minority (about 32 percent); the majority are Shiite Muslims (about 65 percent). The only other country with a Shiite majority is Iran. Northern Iraq is primarily populated by Kurds, a distinct non-Arab people of Indo-European descent who originally occupied the region known as Kurdistan, now divided among Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Syria and Armenia. Each of these groups wants to control Iraq and each has its own armed forces.

If the U.S. leaves Iraq without even a vestige of a government recognized by a majority of the Iraqi people, a civil war will most certainly occur. It could easily set off wider violent conflicts within the region. The Sunni area of Iraq could become a haven for terrorist training camps, like Afghanistan under the Taliban.

The current power vacuum means the U.S. cannot immediately withdraw. Nor can an exact timetable for withdrawal be established, because such timetables are always wishful thinking. This is no time for wishful thinking.

The U.S. can withdraw only when the Iraqi people have established some sort of coalition government with a chance of holding the country together. This is not an open-ended strategy but a realistic one that gains some ground almost every day. December's parliamentary elections are critical and could be the sign to begin troop withdrawals. Sunni factions have begun to form coalitions and actively engage in the electoral process.

Whether we should have set upon this course to begin with is a legitimate question, but must be examined separately from our exit. For now, our only sensible action is to stay the course.

(Stephen C. Miller is retired as a special agent with the U.S. Department of Defense. He was assigned to the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force in Raleigh from September 2001 until earlier this year.)

http://www.newsobserver.com/559/story/362922.html

 

A War of Resolve

BY BERNARD LEWIS
Friday, April 26, 2002 12:01 a.m. EDT

When Osama bin Laden launched his attack on the U.S. on Sept. 11, he was proceeding on an assumption of the weakness of American resolve. It is a point he made clear in many of his previous statements, notably in his interview with John Miller of ABC, on May 28, 1998:

"We have seen in the last decade the decline of the American government and the weakness of the American soldier, who is ready to wage cold wars and unprepared to fight long wars," he said. "This was proven in Beirut when the Marines fled after two explosions. It also proves they can run in less than 24 hours and this was also repeated in Somalia. . . . [Our] youth were surprised at the low morale of the American soldiers. . . . After a few blows, they ran in defeat . . . they forgot about being the world leader and the leader of the new world order. They left, dragging their corpses and their shameful defeat."

As they saw it, the Islamic fighters in Afghanistan had defeated and destroyed the mighty Soviet Union. Dealing with the U.S. would be a much easier task.

This was his belief and the source of his resolve. The same message appears in several other statements--that Americans had become soft and pampered, unable or unwilling to stand up and fight. It was a lesson bin Laden extracted from our responses to previous attacks: He expected more of the same. There would be fierce words and perhaps the U.S. would launch a missile or two to some remote places, but there would be little else in terms of retaliation.

It was a natural error. Nothing in his background or his experience would enable him to understand that a major policy change could result from an election.

As we now know, it was also a deadly error. What in fact followed--the campaign in Afghanistan, the overthrow of the Taliban, the declaration of war against the "axis of evil"--must have come as a shock to him and to his various sponsors and helpers. The assault of Sept. 11 was surely intended as the opening salvo of a war of terror that would continue until its objectives were obtained--that is, the eviction of the United States from the world of Islam and, most important, the overthrow of the Arab regimes seen by us as friendly, and by al Qaeda and many of their own subjects as renegades from Islam and puppets of America.

That was the plan, anyway. It was the shock of America's rapid and sharp reaction that made bin Laden blink. After the U.S.'s initial response, he halted his campaign and adopted a more cautious attitude. But some recent American actions and utterances may bring a reconsideration of this judgement and the halt to which it gave rise. Our anxious pleading with the fragile and frightened regimes of the region to join--or at least to tolerate--a campaign against terrorism and its sponsors has put the U.S. in a corner where it seems to be asking permission for actions that are its own prerogative to take.

Likewise, the exemptions accorded to some terrorist leaders, movements and actions not immediately directed against us have undermined the strong moral position which must be the foundation of our global war on terrorism. The submission to being scolded and slighted, as Secretary of State Colin Powell did in his recent meeting with the king of Morocco, and his failure to meet with the president of Egypt, make the U.S. seem it is reverting to bad habits. That only further contributes to a perceived posture of irresolution and uncertainty on the part of the U.S. administration.

This irresolution on our part has brought a corresponding uncertainty on the part of our nervous and hesitant allies, not without reason. Their fears have deep roots in the memory of what happened after the Gulf War when we called on the people of Iraq to rebel against Saddam Hussein and then abandoned them. Having granted Saddam a cease-fire, we sat and watched as he destroyed the rebels, group by group and region by region, using the helicopters we had thoughtfully allowed him to retain.

The leaders of al Qaeda launched their war against the U.S. in the belief that they were attacking a soft and demoralized enemy. They thought they could proceed with impunity. It would be wise not to let that misapprehension creep back.

Mr. Lewis, professor emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton, is the author, most recently, of "What Went Wrong? Western Impact and Middle Eastern Response" (Oxford University Press, 2002),

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=105001985

 

It's very sad Hayes that you feel that way. I guess Bin Laden really has won if your and basso's opinion is the majority in America.

 

Don't be dismissive - it's irritating, unwarranted and non-responsive. I don't understand your point. It's sad that I see the disadvantage of immediate withdraw? That I understand that will embolden AQ and jihadists to escalate attacks against us? That doesn't even cover the benefits achieved and those still possible in Iraq. It is a REASON why immediate withdraw is undesirable. There is nothing sad about having a REASON for your opinion.

 

We can go around in circles on this (more fun when I was a kid!), but bin Laden, in my opinion, was far more threatened, and his network disrupted, when we were fully engaged in Afghanistan and, covertly, I believe, in Pakistan's tribal regions in the northwest of the country. He was constantly on the run. We had done terrible damage to his Taliban allies, who were likewise on the run, as well as damaging AQ.

What have we reaped with the invasion and occupation of Iraq? The finest recruiting tool bin Laden could have dreamed of. It's just churning out terrorists, and has been disastrous to our relations with our allies, the countries in the region, and with the rest of the world, not to mention the Iraqi people, who have died in the tens of thousands, when one includes the war with the insurgency. Invading Iraq, in my opinion, was a dream come true for bin Laden, and a nightmare for Hamid Karzai, the President of Afghanistan, who saw significant US assets removed from that theatre, and a loss of focus from not only the United States, but the rest of the sympathetic world as well.

A legitimate argument can be made regarding staying in Iraq to attempt to prevent even more fighting, murder and chaos than exists already, but that it was a monumental mistake, given the context that existed at the time, is without question, in my opinion.



Keep D&D Civil.

 

What's sad is that you've let one man in a cave dictate the debate. And you use it to justify a paranoid reality that you want to project to a proud, strong nation.

Right out of the Rove playbook

 

Uhh..Hagel didn't advocate immediate withdraw. What he said was that the Admin. shouldn't be calling who criticize the war unpatriotic. So you're saying if we don't call critics of the war unpatriotic that will embolden our enemies?

 

I agree that immediate withdrawal is still not the right solution - and its worth having a real discussion to figure out if we can do this right. My comment to basso was because he hasn't budged one bit on the issue, no matter how circumstances have changed in Iraq. He always goes back to "we shouldn't leave because bin Laden wants that". I guess a better question would be, at what point do we say it's the right decision to withdraw? Are there specific criteria (not specific numbers, but goals/objectives/etc) that we should be looking at? If so, what are they?

As far as the emboldening part - I'm not sure I even agree with that. I don't think bin Laden stops attacking if he fears retaliation at this point. I think that may have been the case pre 9/11 when they had territory to protect, but at this point, I think if AQ has the resources to attack, they will. If they don't, they won't. They've got little to nothing to lose. I'm not sure what we do in Iraq has much of an impact on them as far their operations go outside of Iraq.

 

You know Hayes I've enjoyed our debates and respect your POV but I've lost all respect for you after starting off a post with such a blatant double negative.

 

as far as i know, this is the first time i've ever cited bin laden's comments in this regard. true, i believe you and others have allowed your ambivalence about how the war began to cloud your judegement on whether leaving is the right thing to do, and i do believe it will emboldem our enemies.

 

And there is no indication bin laden has been in Afghanistan since we kicked the crap out of the Taliban, nor that we would have caught him had we not gone into Iraq. We dismantled their safe haven.

Recent developments suggest that the impression you have was shared by AQ, but the worm has turned. Iraq has provided a public stage where even the most die hard anti-american Muslims are rejecting AQ's brand of solution. So the gains could be quite substantial - a total delegitimization of AQ and radical terrorism. Plus democratic reform in Egypt and Lebanon, ending of sanctions in Iraq, removal of genocidal dictator, end of troops in SA issue, etc etc.

Please explain your charge of paranoia. IF withdraw in fact emboldens radical jihadists then how is it a 'paranoid reality.' Don't marginalize yourself by making warrantless claims. That's a classic Rovian tactic.

DOH! I surrender.

Yeah, ok. That's reasonable enough. The whole 'embolden' issue is only part of the reason to stay, IMO - not the totality of it.

Understood. Even if you don't agree with that, consider the recruiting prospects of fighting a 'paper tiger' vs not, and the possibility of the same phenomenon spurring other groups to act just as it has AQ. That certainly wouldn't be desirable.

 

and staying doesn't embolden AQ et al?

I say f*ck AQ. The US does whatever it wants when it wants. We are The Big Dog.

 

No, it doesn't have the same effect. We know withdrawing because of casualties emboldens them. Escalating doesn't. Further they are now LOSING both recruiting and operational advantages because of their continued targeting of Muslims in Iraq and subsequently in Jordan, Morocco, Saudi Arabia et al.

OK, then let's stay and finish the job.

 

Although it was a mistake to go into Iraq - it's a bigger mistake to leave right now.

The Sunnis have to first become active participants in the government, and the armed forces have to gain control of the country.

To leave before then would allow the country to fall into full-out civil war and perhaps make Iraq a place where Al Qaeda can set-up shop even further.

We should stay - we owe it to the Iraqi people to leave them in a better state then when we came.

 

Hate to break it to you NewYorker (love the name! I'm in Astoria) but Iraq has already broken out into civil war.

 

HERE HERE !!!

Sink or swim time for Iraq.

DD