I was a strong supporter of the War in Iraq even before our troops hit the ground. Even as its popularity has diminished to Vietnamesque levels, I stood by the war and the President's decision to keep our troops in Iraq. I thought Rep. Jack Murtha (D-Penn.) was mistaken when he called for the withdrawal of American troops earlier this year. After all, there is no debate that it is our troops who are holding Iraq together and propping up its fledgling government. Once American forces leave, Iraq will undoubtedly erupt in a full-scale civil war that not even President Bush could play off as "sectarian violence."
But the reality is, Iraq is getting worse, not better. Our troops are not fixing the problem. American men and women are dying everyday. Thousands of Americans are coming home from Iraq maimed or seriously wounded. The U.S. military is at its weakest point in decades, and many critics are doubting its ability to respond to a crisis should one erupt with Iran or North Korea. To make matters worse, if we fail, the vacuum left in the wake of the collapsed Iraqi state will become a virtual playground for terrorists, a safe haven where they can train, recruit and plot their attacks. With all that in mind, the following decision was not easy.
The United States needs to leave Iraq. After years of supporting the war, I have changed my mind because we are not accomplishing anything in Iraq other than damaging our military and putting the lives of American soldiers at risk. Our military is designed to win a war, not to maintain peace where peace seems impossible. We have no place fighting in an Iraqi civil war. Many of the top US generals disagree, saying that we need to stay in Iraq because the Iraqi military forces are making progress. What progress? As Peter Galbraith wrote in Time, "Iraqi security forces, the centerpiece of the U.S.'s efforts for stability, are ineffective or, even worse, combatants in the country's escalating civil war."
With all due respect to the generals, they have done a poor job creating an effective military plan for the United States in Iraq. Brave American soldiers have been fighting in a hostile land for three years; one would hope our top military leaders could have created a winning game plan by now. But now it's too late. Republican Senator Chuck Hagel, a supporter of the war, recently wrote in an op-ed in The Washington Post, "There will be no victory or defeat for the United States in Iraq. The future of Iraq was always going to be determined by the Iraqis - not the Americans."
If what Hagel says is correct, then Iraqis need to step up and make the tough decisions for the future of the country, decisions that so far they have refused to make. The Iraqi government, if you can even call it that, has refused to disarm the sectarian militias that wreck havoc on a daily basis. As long as these militias remain an extra-governmental force, the prospects for a stable Iraq are slim.
There is no doubt things will get worse as Americans start to leave. Iran will exert more influence in Iraq. Since Iraq and Iran are both majority Shi'a Muslim countries it only makes sense for them to be close allies. The only reason they were enemies under Saddam was that as a Sunni, Saddam suppressed the Shi'a. The Shi'a are showing their power in the new Iraqi parliament. We might not like it, but this is democracy at work.
The war has been mismanaged by the Bush administration since day one. It did not have to turn out this way. Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld's poor planning and ill-conceived notions of the situation in Iraq under Saddam have led the U.S. into this quagmire. Now we have the chance to cut our losses and focus on other problems in the world. Let's hope the president will make the right decision and start bringing the U.S. troops home.
Benjamin van der Horst is a College sophomore from Cincinnati. He is executive director of the nonpartisan political organization CSAmerica and the managing editor of the Emory Political Review.
This ran in the Emory Wheel on 12/12/06.
No comments:
Post a Comment