The Iraq Effect

Johns Hopkins Professor Fouad Ajami takes stock of the war in Iraq and its larger effects in the war on terror as he ponders why anyone would think that anything from 2003 is relevant to the question of what we should do in the reality of 2008?
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This from Faoud Ajami in todays WSJ:

Of all that has been written about the play of things in Iraq, nothing that I have seen approximates the truth of what our ambassador to Baghdad, Ryan Crocker, recently said of this war: "In the end, how we leave and what we leave behind will be more important than how we came."

It is odd, then, that critics have launched a new attack on the origins of the war at precisely the time a new order in Iraq is taking hold. But American liberal opinion is obsessive today. . . .

Mr. McClellan wades into the deep question of whether this war was a war of "necessity" or a war of "choice." He does so in the sixth year of the war, at a time when many have forgotten what was thought and said before its onset. The nation was gripped by legitimate concern over gathering dangers in the aftermath of 9/11. Kabul and the war against the Taliban had not sufficed, for those were Arabs who struck America on 9/11. A war of deterrence had to be waged against Arab radicalism, and Saddam Hussein had drawn the short straw. He had not ducked, he had not scurried for cover. He openly mocked America's grief, taunted its power.

We don't need to overwork the stereotype that Arabs understand and respond to the logic of force, but this is a region sensitive to the wind, and to the will of outside powers. Before America struck into Iraq, a mere 18 months after 9/11, there had been glee in the Arab world, a sense that America had gotten its comeuppance. There were regimes hunkering down, feigning friendship with America while aiding and abetting the forces of terror.

Liberal opinion in America and Europe may have scoffed when President Bush drew a strict moral line between order and radicalism – he even inserted into the political vocabulary the unfashionable notion of evil – but this sort of clarity is in the nature of things in that Greater Middle East. It is in categories of good and evil that men and women in those lands describe their world. The unyielding campaign waged by this president made a deep impression on them.

Nowadays, we hear many who have never had a kind word to say about the Iraq War pronounce on the retreat of the jihadists. It is as though the Islamists had gone back to their texts and returned with second thoughts about their violent utopia. It is as though the financiers and the "charities" that aided the terror had reconsidered their loyalties and opted out of that sly, cynical trade. Nothing could be further from the truth. If Islamism is on the ropes, if the regimes in the saddle in key Arab states now show greater resolve in taking on the forces of radicalism, no small credit ought to be given to this American project in Iraq.

We should give the "theorists" of terror their due and read them with some discernment. To a man, they have told us that they have been bloodied in Iraq, that they have been surprised by the stoicism of the Americans, by the staying power of the Bush administration.

There is no way of convincing a certain segment of opinion that there are indeed wars of "necessity." A case can always be made that an aggressor ought to be given what he seeks, that the costs of war are prohibitively high when measured against the murky ways of peace and of daily life.

. . . In the narrow sense of command and power, this war in Iraq is Mr. Bush's war. But it is an evasion of responsibility to leave this war at his doorstep. This was a war fought with congressional authorization, with the warrant of popular acceptance, and the sanction of United Nations resolutions which called for Iraq's disarmament. It is the political good fortune (in the world of Democratic Party activists) that Sen. Barack Obama was spared the burden of a vote in the United States Senate to authorize the war. By his telling, he would have us believe that he would have cast a vote against it. But there is no sure way of knowing whether he would have stood up to the wind.

With the luxury of hindsight, the critics of the war now depict the arguments made for it as a case of manipulation and deceit. This is odd and misplaced: The claims about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction were to prove incorrect, but they were made in good faith.

It is also obtuse and willful to depict in dark colors the effort made to "sell" the war. Wars can't be waged in stealth, and making the moral case for them is an obligation incumbent on the leaders who launch them. If anything, there were stretches of time, and critical turning points, when the administration abdicated the fight for public opinion.

Nor is there anything unprecedented, or particularly dishonest, about the way the rationale for the war shifted when the hunt for weapons of mass destruction had run aground. True, the goal of a democratic Iraq – and the broader agenda of the war as a spearhead of "reform" in Arab and Muslim lands – emerged a year or so after the onset of the war. But the aims of practically every war always shift with the course of combat, and with historical circumstances. Need we recall that the abolition of slavery had not been an "original" war aim, and that the Emancipation Proclamation was, by Lincoln's own admission, a product of circumstances? A war for the Union had become a victory for abolitionism.

America had not been prepared for nation-building in Iraq; we had not known Iraq and Iraqis or understood the depth of Iraq's breakdown. But there was nothing so startling or unusual about the connection George W. Bush made between American security and the "reform" of the Arab condition. As America's pact with the Arab autocrats had hatched a monster, it was logical and prudent to look for a new way.

. . . It is not easy to tell people of threats and dangers they have been spared. The war put on notice regimes and conspirators who had harbored dark thoughts about America and who, in the course of the 1990s, were led to believe that terrible deeds against America would go unpunished. A different lesson was taught in Iraq. Nowadays, the burden of the war, in blood and treasure, is easy to see, while the gains, subtle and real, are harder to demonstrate. Last month, American casualties in Iraq were at their lowest since 2003. The Sunnis also have broken with al Qaeda, and the Shiite-led government has taken the war to the Mahdi Army: Is it any wonder that the critics have returned to the origins of the war?

Five months from now, the American public will vote on this war, in the most dramatic and definitive of ways. There will be people who heed Ambassador Crocker's admonition. And there will be others keen on retelling how we made our way to Iraq.

Read the entire article.

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Interesting Posts From Around The Web - 1 June 2008

The most interesting posts of the day from across the blogosphere, all below the fold.

Art: Sappho, Charles A. Mengin
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Callimachus has an incredibly poignant Memorial Day Post where he honors a gallery of the military and non-military who have fallen in Iraq, each with a unique and important story. Do read this one. And as always, see Wednesday’s Hero at a Rose By Any Other Name.

How much improved is the Iraq situation? From Political Insecurity, the story of a Marine platoon just returned to the U.S. from a tour in Anbar without firing a shot. And from Jammie Wearing Fool, this four year low in casualties throughout Iraq is simply inexplicable to - and apparently hoped to be a temporary anamoly by - the AP. Perhaps that is why, as JoshuaPundit points out, MSM coverage of the Iraq war has fallen off by 92%.

Soccer Dad adds his thoughts to Krauthammer’s on the proposition that "the global warming hysteria is is just a mask for governments asserting unreasonable control over their respective citizenries." Hillbilly Politics opines on the recent speech on global warming by Czech President Vaclav Klaus. And see Paladin’s Page, where he has a good post on the circumstances surrounding global warming. At Crusader Rabbit, KG posts on the insane greens who seem to want to see economies fall rather than drill another drop of oil.

Bookworm Room writes on why she thinks conservatives who plan to sit out this election are making a foolish error indeed. I concur. McCain is a fiscal conservative, strong on national security, and will choose conservative judges. And the alternative is not merely bad for America, but potentially catastrophic. Power and Control writes a very insightful essay on what a conservative Republican tent must look like if it is to both retain its most important principals and attain a ruling majority. He (or she) does so by citing to Reagan.

From Cheat Seeking Missles, Obama just picked up the much coveted Castro endorsement. Discriminations ponders the similarity between Obama and Carter and arrives at some troubling conclusions. Obama has far less experience and is far more a doctranaire leftie. And yet more evidence from Rhymes With Right that the true nature of Obama’s church is racist to the core. You can also find out more about Trinity United at Faultline.

Obama finally resigned from Trinity United yesterday after a radical sermon by one of his long-time associates, Father Michael Pfelger, made the news. Confederate Yankee looks at the many other associates of Obama and observes: "By comparison, Father Michael Pfleger, while a frothing radical in any other company, actually looks sedate compared to other men who have helped shape and mold Barack Obama."

At Stop the ACLU, they opine about Obama's resignation from Trinity, saying "everyone on planet earth will see such a move for what it is: a cheap, years-late political calculation. I guess Obama means to put this on the list of things we are not permitted to discuss." BizzyBlog points out that, though Obama announced that he is severing ties with Trinity, he is explicitly refusing to "denounce it." I do not think too many people will believe that a principled stand.

Indeed, Deleware Curmudgeon opines that Obama has talking points, not principles. Verum Serum observes that when those talking points become embarrassing, such as Obama’s 2007 pronouncements on the surge being doomed to failure, "he sends out his flunkies to move the goalposts, . . ."

As Dave in Boca notes, at least some of the electorate are paying attention. Others are busy getting tattoos of their favorite candidate – and as Vast Right Wing Conspiracy opine, "God help us – these people probably vote." Regardless, as This Ain’t Hell notes, it appears that the fat lady is singing for Obama, though it may well be a very long aria.

Possibly no subset of socialist thought has been more thoroughly discredited than multiculturalism. Sake White says common sense will tell you why multiculturalism is unworkable. And Fulham Reactionary will point to how the Labour government utterly refuses to apply such common sense, now inviting Imams into the school system in order to promote multiculturalism and lessen radicalism. Hopefully, as Dhivestan Report memorializes, they will not kill the schoolchildren for failing to memorize the Koran.

An Englishman’s Castle observes that it appears the Scottish Raj may be out of touch with the voters south of Hadrian’s Wall. From Blonde Sagacity, one thing socialists on both sides of the pond do not like is a flag waving display of nationalism. This speaks of the poison of socialism spread through our lands that has as part of its dogma that our Western governments are the world oppressors.

In Britain, as in the U.S., the left attempts to address violent crime by further de-arming the public of anything they might use to protect themselves. As quoted at 4 Right Wing Whackos, "A person properly schooled in right and wrong is safe with any weapon. A person with no idea of good and evil is unsafe with a knitting needle, or the cap from a ballpoint pen." That is a profoundly true statement.

As Sheik Yer’mami observes, the radicals of both the socialist and Islamic variety are in max whine mode over the outspoken and much needed comments of Bishop Nazir Ali. Seraphic Secret notes comments similar to the Bishop’s from Italian journalist and Muslim convert to Catholicism, Magdi Allam, Dinah Lord has the story of two evangelical ministers who entered a Muslim enclave in West Midlands only to be ejected by the police and told that they would be charged with a "hate crime" if they returned to the area to proselytize.

From the Colossus of Rhodey, Islamist organizations are in a whinefest claiming that the term "war on terror" means war on Islam. No, though I wish it really did mean war on several specific sects. This is just a strategy by the Muslim Brotherhood and other related organizations to take the "war" out of the "war on terror" and turn it all into a police action.

YouTube gets "thoroughly punked" by Red Alerts "favorite [Independent] Democrat." Lieberman is a class act.

Heh. From Hillbilly White Trash. "Back in November of '06 I said that the Republican congress didn't deserve to be reelected but that the nation didn't deserve what would happen if they lost."
Betsy ponders Al Franken’s situation and the minimum acceptable standards to be a Democratic Senatorial nominee.

Quoted at American Digest on Scott McClellan: "Not since America's most revered feckless crapweasel, former Vermont Sen. James Jeffords, switched parties have Beltway Republicans been more eager to sew a half-starved ferret into someone's body cavity." Gay Patriot diagnoses Scott McClellan as suffering Huffingtonitis, a disease that manifests with an individual defining "his political views and make[ing] public statements in order to win social approval and/or acceptance."

Visit the swami at the Whited Sepulchre for his prognostications and the most important matters of the day. I think he may be batting 100% when all is said and done.

We are in a cyber-war with China, and likely losing according to the Glittering Eye.

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Whoa . . .A McClellan-Soros Connection

This promises to get real interesting real quick.
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Scott "Fredo Corleone" McClellan, has written a scathing book that takes aim at the Bush White House. With the latest revelations, it seems possible that McClellan's work was heavilly influenced by, if not twisted by, Soros minions. If so, this could be a true scandal. Media Mythbusters provides some of the background:

This just in from The American Pundit:

Very interesting. Especially since Ari Fleisher spoke with McClellan yesterday, who claims his editor “tweaked” the book. Apparently the original book Ari was told about was supposed to be “good for the president”.

Rumor has it from what I hear on radio and the Internet that large parts or most of this book was not even written by McClellan… Hmmm, the worm turns…

Now it turns out that the book publisher is ultimately owned by . . . Dr. Evil himself. As ham-handed as Soros is (Gen. Betrayus, Lancet Study), this is one of those rare situations where there really might be a conspiracy.

Dafyyd, at Big Lizards, has spent already written posts (here and here) pointing out the glaring disconnects already evident about the book itself.

It will be fascinating watching this one pan out. I am really glad now that our Democrats are planning to subpoena Fredo to give testimony before Congress. I'll have to break out the popcorn for that one. I want to see if Soros appears at the hearing with Fredo's brother to sit in gallery.

(H/T Fausta)

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"Fredo" McClellan

It is one thing to turn on your friends and mentors on the basis of principal. Scott McClellan has not done that. In reading of Scott McClellan's new book and its contents, I am reminded of nothing so strongly as Fredo Corleone in the Godfather - the weak, incompetent and disloyal brother who turned on his family to build himself up and curry favor with those who stood opposed to his family. I think that the apt analogy for the weak, largely incompetent and supremely disloyal Mr. McClellan. Karl Rove responds on video here. Dave in Boca adds his own cogent thoughts. Update: And similar thoughts at Powerline.

My parting advice to McClellan, don't accept any offers to go fishing.

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