Religions > Atheism > Tom Freidman on Iraq: this Bush team can't get us there, and may have so messed things up that no one can
| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"Bill Case" |
| Date: |
03 Oct 2004 11:44:37 AM |
| Object: |
Tom Freidman on Iraq: this Bush team can't get us there, and may have so messed things up that no one can |
Tom Friedman is a middle east expert, has been a supporter of the Iraq war,
and here discusses his views on on the state of things presently.
Iraq: Politics or Policy? By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
NY Times October 3, 2004
Sorry, I've been away writing a book. I'm back, so let's get right down to
business: We're in trouble in Iraq.
I don't know what is salvageable there anymore. I hope it is something
decent and I am certain we have to try our best to bring about elections and
rebuild the Iraqi Army to give every chance for decency to emerge there. But
here is the cold, hard truth: This war has been hugely mismanaged by this
administration, in the face of clear advice to the contrary at every stage,
and as a result the range of decent outcomes in Iraq has been narrowed and
the tools we have to bring even those about are more limited than ever.
What happened? The Bush team got its doctrines mixed up: it applied the
Powell Doctrine to the campaign against John Kerry - "overwhelming force"
without mercy, based on a strategy of shock and awe at the Republican
convention, followed by a propaganda blitz that got its message across in
every possible way, including through distortion. If only the Bush team had
gone after the remnants of Saddam's army in the Sunni Triangle with the
brutal efficiency it has gone after Senator Kerry in the Iowa-Ohio-Michigan
triangle. If only the Bush team had spoken to Iraqis and Arabs with as clear
a message as it did to the Republican base. No, alas, while the Bush people
applied the Powell Doctrine in the Midwest, they applied the Rumsfeld
Doctrine in the Middle East. And the Rumsfeld Doctrine is: "Just enough
troops to lose." Donald Rumsfeld tried to prove that a small, mobile army
was all that was needed to topple Saddam, without realizing that such a
limited force could never stabilize Iraq. He never thought it would have to.
He thought his Iraqi pals would do it. He was wrong.
For all of President Bush's vaunted talk about being consistent and
resolute, the fact is he never established U.S. authority in Iraq. Never.
This has been the source of all our troubles. We have never controlled all
the borders, we have never even consistently controlled the road from
Baghdad airport into town, because we never had enough troops to do it.
Being away has not changed my belief one iota in the importance of producing
a decent outcome in Iraq, to help move the Arab-Muslim world off its steady
slide toward increased authoritarianism, unemployment, overpopulation,
suicidal terrorism and religious obscurantism. But my time off has clarified
for me, even more, that this Bush team can't get us there, and may have so
messed things up that no one can. Why? Because each time the Bush team had
to choose between doing the right thing in the war on terrorism or siding
with its political base and ideology, it chose its base and ideology. More
troops or radically lower taxes? Lower taxes. Fire an evangelical Christian
U.S. general who smears Islam in a speech while wearing the uniform of the
U.S. Army or not fire him so as not to anger the Christian right? Don't fire
him. Apologize to the U.N. for not finding the W.M.D., and then make the
case for why our allies should still join us in Iraq to establish a decent
government there? Don't apologize - for anything - because Karl Rove says
the "base" won't like it. Impose a "Patriot Tax" of 50 cents a gallon on
gasoline to help pay for the war, shrink the deficit and reduce the amount
of oil we consume so we send less money to Saudi Arabia? Never. Just tell
Americans to go on guzzling. Fire the secretary of defense for the abuses at
Abu Ghraib, to show the world how seriously we take this outrage - or do
nothing? Do nothing. Firing Mr. Rumsfeld might upset conservatives. Listen
to the C.I.A.? Only when it can confirm your ideology. When it disagrees -
impugn it or ignore it.
What I resent so much is that some of us actually put our personal politics
aside in thinking about this war and about why it is so important to produce
a different Iraq. This administration never did. Mr. Kerry's own views on
Iraq have been intensely political and for a long time not well thought
through. But Mr. Kerry is a politician running for office. Mr. Bush is
president, charged with protecting the national interest, and yet from the
beginning he has run Iraq policy as an extension of his political campaign.
Friends, I return to where I started: We're in trouble in Iraq. We have to
immediately get the Democratic and Republican politics out of this policy
and start honestly reassessing what is the maximum we can still achieve
there and what every American is going to have to do to make it happen. If
we do not, we'll end up not only with a fractured Iraq, but with a fractured
America, at war with itself and isolated from the world.
xx
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