Letters to the Editor
-
Zinni said we have to stay...
He is one of the left's prophets is he not? I caught him on one of the Sunday talk shows yesterday.
-
No, shooter, Zinni said the same thing that Sheehan said
Namely that the surge proponents do not recognize the difference between strategy and tactics. Kagan says: "One could be excused for thinking that in the fall of 2006, when sectarian violence seemed to be cycling out of control against the backdrop of a wrong-headed U.S. strategy. But President Bush has adopted a new strategy".
The surge is a tactic, not a strategy, that is being pursued by this administration in the complete absence of a broader middle east strategy and which is therefore destined to fail whether we have 170,000 troops in Iraq or 0.
-
But what if it works?!!!!
Glenn, you are being unfair. What if the Glorious Surge works and everything turns out hunky dory and there is a wonderful new baby democracy in the Middle East and the bad guys in Syria and Iran fall down and die and Hamas acts like Chief Joseph and fights no more forever and glorious angels come and put the Crown of Deservenitude on our leader's (George W. Bush, for those who have forgotten) fair and balanced head? What about that? Then won't you be sorry you and the defeatocrats tried to mock the Wonderful Victory? Won't you?!!! It's a question that deserves answers.
-
What if it works
I hate the 'what if it works' question.
It's a hypothetical question meant to change the course of the argument. What if it works is a nasty curveball, whose only real answer is another question, "what if it doesn't", but it takes the argument to the level of a 10-year old.
If someone asks 'what if it works', they are out of options in the debate. Chances are good, it's because they didn't really have any to begin with.
It reminds me of the Christians who go to see a Richard Dawkins speech and then ask him, incredulously, "What if you're wrong?"
-
Bogus Civil War Analogy
The notion that war results are in doubt until close to the end is complete nonsense. By this point in the American Civil War, it was over. By this point in WWII, the we had been occupying Germany for almost a year and Japan for more than half a year.
The Civil War outcome was not militarily in doubt after July 4, 1863, when the Union had captured Vicksburg, clearing the MIssissippi and cutting the Confederacy in twain. The Father of Waters, said Lincoln, flows unvexed to the sea. At the same time, Lee was forced to retreat from Gettysburg, with ruinious losses. By the end of 1863, all but a sliver of Tennessee had been restored to Union control and Lee was increasingly pinned against Richmond by Grant. The naval blockade was strangling the Confederate economy.
By September 1943, there was no doubt about the outcome of the Second World War. The Russians had crushed the Germans in the biggest tank battle in history at Kursk. The Americans and British had captured as many troops as the Nazis had lost at Stalingrad in Tunisia, crossed into Sicily, taken it and landed on the mainland, defeated a fierce German counter-attack at Salerno and were moving north for Naples. Mussolini had been thrown out. The U-Boats have been defeated and men and munitions were flowing unimpeded into Britain for the Normandy landings. In the Pacific, MacArthur was advancing westward through New Guinea and the Navy had neutralized Rabaul and was moving to seize the Gilberts and Marshalls (done by the end of 1943).
Nor were the American forces in 1943 in any sense "broken." The Navy was adding an aircraft carrier a week and a destroyer or destroyer escort a day. 96,000 aircraft would be built in 1943. A comparable number would be built in 1944. Newly formed divisions by the dozen were completing training and shipping out for the battle fronts.
Even the lines in the stalemated war in Korea were essentially fixed by summer of 1951, although there would not be a truce for another two years.
All of these wars went on for much longer, almost two years in the case of WWII in the Pacific, but their outcomes were not in doubt. There is simply no comparison to Iraq.
-
why the surge ultimately won't work
Gen. John Sheehan has described why the surge ultimately won’t work and why any benefits of it will be temporary at best – it’s because the surge is a short-term operation which we cannot continue indefinitely, and it’s not tied to any long term effort, because that would require a serious dialogue with Syria and Iran which the neo-cons have already ruled out as what “girly men” do.
That’s why he turned down the job. There’s no possibility of ultimate success as long as the neo-cons are limiting what needs to be done to assure that - a serious dialogue with other countries in the region.
Additionally, as Krugman pointed out, all Republican candidates are trapped into this position because their base is “living in the past” with these views which are no more than macho posturing and platitudes. The public has already moved on, and it’s only the serious Beltway pundits and the base of the Republican Party who don’t yet realize that.
-
Well, the Surge certainly has become CW
Bush, the Republicans, the media and the wingnuts finally did it. They turned an idea that the public and the military thought was stupid into a "viable" option for addressing a problem. This is definitely an example of them creating their own reality, at least for the time being. We witnessed the creation of the Surge and watched it turn into conventional wisdom. Amazing. Yes, the "surge" will fail. The military knew it, the public knew it, but the president and the Neocons will never recognize it. The Neocons fail because their ideas are preposterous. They seem to think that if they can keep up the ruse, they will never face the consequences. It's not going to work. People are dying for nothing. The failure of this occupation and the deaths of 3,300 American soldiers will be blamed on the Neocons and their followers. Their treading water now. Eventually, they'll sink.