“The consequences of U.S. defeat in Iraq.” From the WSJ, which, like me (or, say, Christopher Hitchens), is becoming “unhinged” and “unglued” for suggesting that some politicians and an ideologically /sensation- driven media are having an actual, tangible effect on our ability to wage the war in Iraq:
Yet there’s no denying the polls showing that most Americans are increasingly weary of the daily news of car bombs and Iraqi squabbling and are wishing it would all just go away. Their pessimism is fed by elites who should know better but can’t restrain their domestic political calculations long enough to consider the damage that would accompany U.S. failure. A conventional military defeat is inconceivable in Iraq, but a premature U.S. withdrawal is becoming all too possible.
Watching many of the war’s most strenuous critics turn what to me is a simple, quantifiable observation into “proof” that the “wingnuts” are looking to shirk responsibility for the “miserable failure” that is the Iraq campaign is, from my perspective, a sign that some of them realize that, should we indeed fail, the consequences for our failure could be enormous (both in the short term and the long term)—and that the part of our retreat that comes about as a result of their constant framing of Iraq as a failure based on the calculated lies of evil men imcompetently running an illegal, imperialist shell game using torture, outlawed chemical weapons, and murderous, thuggish, poorly-educated killbots in the armed forces (whom, by the way THEY LOVE!) will directly circle back to them.
This is NOT to say that the disingenuous (and particularly vicious and vile critics) are solely responsible for the “failure” in Iraq (a premise that by any military historical standard, incidentally, I refuse even to countenance), just to say that they have added to the problems by consistently framing the narrative of the war in a way that helps sap American public will and, in doing so, giving the enemy one of the victories they were hoping for [see Usama’s “strong horse/weak horse” speech; or read al Qaeda’s strategic writings].
For the life of me, I can’t see why this is so controversial a premise—other than because it shows badly on those who let their anti-war emotions and hatred for this Administration drive them to conscious rhetorical excess. Even if their words had no effect on questionable or poor decisions made on the ground, the fact is, their representation of those missteps in terms that are both defeatist (often longingly so) and dishonest (insofar as they carefully bracket out any successes as a counterweight to their criticism) affect public opinion and makes things more difficult for both the military and propaganda aims of the GWOT strategy.
And so we see forming now the argument against their “dissent” having any force whatsoever trying to attach itself to principled and substantive (albeit, I believe, incorrect) criticisms of the Iraq campaign offered by those on the right (and, in some cases, the left); which explains their sudden love affair with Bill Buckley and George Will and Frances Fukuyama (and their tacit acceptance of Pat Buchanan). Surely, the charge goes, you deluded neo-cons aren’t presuming to call Bill Buckley or Fukuyama “leftists,” are you?
But this argument purposely ignores the substance of both Buckley’s and Fukuyama’s critiques— and particularly Buckley’s, who, had they read it closely rather than tried to extol it as another gotcha moment to discredit the “neo-cons”, they would have seen is based on what Buckley views not as a failure of general policy (in fact, he lauds the effort, though he was never much of an interventionalist), but rather as a localized problem, the reason for which he posits as the inability (or unwillingness) of the Arab world to embrace some of the precepts of liberal democracy.
Under different circumstances, one can envision the scenario where many on the progressive left would rush to call such a critique racist. But they seem quite forgiving of such nativist thinking when it suits their purposes. Which is why I’ve called them tin-plated Machiavellians, a moniker they don’t much care for (and respond to by calling me all manner of colorful names).
For Fukuyama’s part, those who cite him approvingly fail to acknowledge that he has retreated into the space between his neo-con roots and a neo-realism—which pushes him more toward Bush I and realpolitik than it does toward JFK.
No, the only people left supporting the war, the argument goes, must be Bush Kultists—and because polls show such Kultists are increasingly alienated, this is proof that the they are all that remains of the true believers (presumably, the polls, in this scenario, are driven by a slow and unaided awakening by the American public to the “illegal” and “immoral” nature of war, and has nothing to do with the relentless, often disingenuous criticisms of the administration, nor to the sensationism of a media who shows us nothing but roadside bombings and “insurgent” victories.)
Of course, there is an irony to such a dubious explanation for the poll numbers, as this new poll shows:
New Gallup Poll data make it clear that the U.S. public is not so much hostile toward Muslim countries as it is concerned that the people in Muslim countries are hostile toward the United States.
A majority of Americans have either mixed or favorable views of Muslim countries. But the vast majority of Americans are convinced that Muslims have unfavorable views of the United States. Americans also say they are concerned about improving relations with the Muslim world, but believe that Muslim societies are not concerned about improving relations with the United States.
So, instead of convincing Americans that the war was wrong because the US acted illegally and “unilaterally”, a 3-year bombardment of anti-war propaganda has managed to turn (or in some cases simply reinforce) Americans’ perceptions of the Arab / Muslim world as one whose hostilities against the US are the root of our troubles in the middle east.
Which is to say, they have accomplished the exact opposite of their ideological intentions—which began with notions of blowback and continues with suggestions that the US is alienated on the world stage because of their arrogance and their bullying and illegal imperialist, warmongering, oil-coveting adventurism.
Quite an accomplishment, that.
But then– the ends justify the means, as Glenn Greenwald once showed candor enough to argue—so no matter: a US pullout is a US pullout, and in the long run, certain people feel, we’ll be better for having been humbled. The Iraqi people and the Afghans? Well, that’s not really our problem in anything other than theory—useful as showpieces for those who decry tyranny, so long as nothing is actually, y’know, done about it, even when action coincides with US interests.
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(h/t for WSJ, Terry Hastings; h/t Gallup poll, Allah)
related: On Torture; The rise and fall (and rise again) of Willy Pete; Willy Pete: Still alive—but on life support
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update: See also, video of Michael Yon and Hugh Hewitt discussing media coverage of the Iraq war on Anderson Cooper’s show. (h/t Glenn Reynolds, who has additional links, including those to Hewitt interviewing Hitchens and Yon)
The U. S. hasn’t been conventionally defeated since the retreat from the Chosun Resevoir, arguably. The decisive battles are being waged here at home.
I sure hope the administration can get fresh traction on Iraq in the immediate future. Success is the best retort, and a situation in which a couple of dozen civilians get blown up daily is hard to represent as a success.
Who was it who once said, “The only way out, is through.” Other than that line of dialogue in Swamp Thing, I mean.
Turing = nations, as in It certainly is hard building nations, some months.
I say, “Be grateful that GWB is President.” Three years left and he certainly will not pull out until the job is done. If one would look at the dramatic results that three years have produced in Iraq to date – imagine what three MORE years from this point forward will look like.
I think Bush (and the Administration) has finally realized that he needs to personally sell what is at stake in Iraq over and over again.
It doesn’t amaze me that the far Left has demonized Bush. What does amaze me is the lack of respect the MSM shows to the “Office of the President”.
I guess that makes me a Bush fellating Kultist. So be it.
If we lose in Iraq, we may never be able to go to war again.
If we win in Iraq, we may be able to overcome Iran without open warfare. We can turn Iraq for Iran into what Afganistan was for the USSR.
Here is a great article on the past and future of warfare, with commentary on Iraq in particular.
Let’s not let the Muslim world off the hook for some of that. Reactions to things like the Newsweek Koran story, the Danish cartoons, etc. haven’t played well, either.
If we lose, the Tigris and Euphrates rivers will run red with blood. After all, when the US withdrew from Southeast Asia, that’s when the real killing started.
There are groups in the Middle East that make the Khmer Rouge look like Boy Scouts.
If we’re not there to support democracy, these groups will come to power.
Hmmm.
What I’m curious about is what kind of repercussions could there be for the MSM in the even of an American defeat?
It’s pretty clear that if there is a defeat in Iraq that it can be laid at the feet of the MSM.
Honestly, I expect nothing to happen to the press. If anything, we’ll see some clever attempts at “press reform” by Democrats that amount to reinstating the fairness doctrine and restricting political speech online, but that’s about it.
Now wait a minute. You know it is because we’re there that all this violence is taking place. If we would just pack up and leave Iraq would settle down to its pre illegalimmoralHalliburtonoilbaronBushHitler invasion days, where little kids flew kites and flowers bloomed along the Tigris. After all, we’re creating more terrorists than we are killing.
If we left Zarquari (sp) would quit, all of the foreign terrorists, oops!, freedom fighters would go back home, Iran would give up the nuke and Palestine and Israel would start swapping wives and pretty little boys.
BUSHHITLEREVILMCHALLIBURTONCHENEY!!
Our dissent is the highest form of patriotism.
Your dissent against our dissent is fascist warmongering jingoism.
/moonbat
I dunno. I hear (or mostly read, actually) a bunch of jackasses claiming that Iraq is a failure. But according to Brookings data, our troop fatalities are trending downwards, as are troop woundings; Iraqi military and police fatalities are also trending downwards (surprisingly, since they’re taking on larger roles); car bombings are down, Iraqi civilian deaths seem to be trending down, attacks against oil and gas infrastructure are down, daily insurgent attacks may well have peaked—and all of this is against the background of much-hyped “civil war”. Iraq has a political freedom score of 5.05 (topped only by Lebanon among Arab Muslim states, and considering Lebanon a Muslim state is dodgy at best). Economically, they’re at roughly 80% of the pre-war peak oil production, generating more electricity nationally than prewar (in fact, when you consider that the vast majority of the electricity was used in Baghdad alone, you begin to see that the rest of the country is in dramatically better shape in this regard than it was prewar). Per capita GDP is up over 25%, nominal GDP is up—get this—nearly 50%.
Did I cherry-pick that? Sure, a little. Or maybe my analysis of the data is flawed. Unemployment is still bad, and the insurgency is about the same size as it was (both are estimates). But the majority of the hard data, regarding security and economics, look pretty good. So yeah—the only way we lose at this point is to quit like certain elements want us to. (Some idiot comparing that conclusion to “The stab in the back thesis” in 3,2,1 . . .)
I’m not worried about a premature withdrawl. That’s a problem only liberals have
Let’s not let the Muslim world off the hook for some of that. Reactions to things like the Newsweek Koran story, the Danish cartoons, etc. haven’t played well, either.
True. The fact that the Koran story was completely fabricated made their reaction that much more ridiculous.
1) We will lose Iraq…because the Left and the media wants us to lose Iraq.
2) The Iraq War will be a defeat…because Bush and the American people were shamed into submission by the Left and the media.
3) Bush will lose…because he and his supporters chose to listen to those who want the US to fail, mainly the Left and the media.
4) Bush and his supporters biggest failure will be trusting the Left and the media to not stab our military in the back.
5) The brave US military men and women will have died in vain because the Left and the media wanted them to.
6) Millions of Iraqis will perish, and it will be the fault of the US, Bush and the war supporters… because they let the Left and the media subvert the military effort.
7) The GOP will lose elections because it lost the war…because the Left and the media wanted to lose the war.
8) The Islamists will grow in power by beating the US and showing how weak and powerless the West is…because the Left and the media wants the West weak and powerless.
9) The US will lose the War on Terror, and deserve to..because it is really is weak and powerless in the face of Islam, which is what the Left and the media set out to prove in the first plance.
10) The Left and media wants the US to lose the War on Terror…and they will win because the anti-leftists let them win.
I’m not sure the media is quite as powerful as that, though, RIAW. I guess I’m a little more optimistic than you are.
The terrorists now have the idea that all they have to do is hang on for 3 more years when Bush’s democratic replacement will no doubt yank the troops out of Iraq immediately.
A modern-day Peter Braestrup will write a modern-day Big Story about the modern-day Vietnam; modern-day conservatives will bash modern-day newsies with it, who will not be chastened, and nothing else will change.
Turing = free, as in ‘Coz hey! it’s a free country, right?
Phil,
Did you know that 47 countries have reestablished their embassies in Iraq?
Did you know that the Iraqi government currently employs 1.2 million Iraqi people?
Did you know that 3100 schools have been renovated, 364 schools are under rehabilitation, 263 schools are now under construction and 38 new schools have been built in Iraq?
Did you know that Iraq’s higher educational structure consists of 20 Universities, 46 Institutes or colleges and 4 research centers, all currently operating?
Did you know that 25 Iraq students departed for the United States in January 2005 for the re-established Fulbright program?
Did you know that the Iraqi Navy is operational?! They have 5- 100-foot patrol craft, 34 smaller vessels and a naval infantry regiment.
Did you know that Iraq’s Air Force consists of three operational squadrons, which includes 9 reconnaissance and 3 US C-130 transport aircraft (under Iraqi operational control) which operate day and night, and will soon add 16 UH-1 helicopters and 4 Bell Jet Rangers?
Did you know that Iraq has a counter-terrorist unit and a Commando Battalion?
Did you know that the Iraqi Police Service has over 55,000 fully trained and equipped police officers?
Did you know that there are 5 Police Academies in Iraq that produce over 3500 new officers each 8 weeks?
Did you know there are more than 1100 building projects going on in Iraq? They include 364 schools, 67 public clinics, 15 hospitals, 83 railroad stations, 22 oil facilities, 93 water facilities and 69 electrical facilities.
Did you know that 96% of Iraqi children under the age of 5 have received the first 2 series of polio vaccinations?
Did you know that 4.3 million Iraqi children were enrolled in primary school by mid October?
Did you know that there are 1,192,000 cell phone subscribers in Iraq and phone use has gone up 158%?
Did you know that Iraq has an independent media that consists of 75 radio stations, 180 newspapers and 10 television stations?
Did you know that the Baghdad Stock Exchange opened in June of 2004?
Did you know that 2 candidates in the Iraqi presidential election had a televised debate recently?
The above facts are verifiable on Department of Defense web sites.
Add to the above the fact that autos are so prevelant that there are now gas shortages.
Sounds to me like a lot of progress has been made.
I don’t see Bush withdrawing from Iraq. The hullabaloo is all about the ‘04 elections. If present trends in Iraq continue, the dems are going to look silly.
Of course not. Absolutely not solely responsible. A mere 90%, I’d say. Largely because only about 10% of the “failure” is actual, real, quantifiable “failure” of some type; the balance is simply fevered dreams of Bushco “incompetence”.
I didn’t know all of it, but I knew most of it. I just picked the Brookings report because it’s a one-stop shop, and it’s a little harder for the lefties to disparage it than a DoD website. Not that it will stop them, but whattayagonnado?
The terrorists now have the idea that all they have to do is hang on for 3 more years when Bush’s democratic replacement will no doubt yank the troops out of Iraq immediately.
They’re in for a big shock when Romney or McCain gets in and stays the course.
Does anyone else notice how pissed off Gdubya seems these days?
That question from Helen Thomas during the press conference should be enough.
(paraphrased)-“With all due respect Ms. Thomas I didn’t WANT to go to war. I wasn’t responsible for flying those damn planes in to those buildings. I wasn’t training al-qaeda. I wasn’t selling WMD components. I’m trying to end all of that. I’m trying to END the war. I didn’t start it, but I do plan to end it as quickly and completely as I can. I may not be able to. However, if I didn’t have to do it with one hand tied behind my back we wouldn’t be having this conversation, now would we?….”
Or something like that. I think Dubya is turning in to one helluva speaker after all these years. I wish he’d be pissed off more often.
OK, I was more or less with you up to here (disagree on some specifics, but the overall picture seems plausible enough), but now I’m confused. If the Left has not been able to achieve its aim of convincing the American people that the US is alienated on the world stage because of their arrogance and their bullying and illegal imperialist, warmongering, oil-coveting adventurism, but has instead helped to convince them of the hostility of people in Muslim nations, then how, exactly, is that harmful to the war effort?
I don’t know about you, but my will to win the war in Iraq has been strengthened by the fact that I’m now convinced of that very hostility (or at least, of the threat represented by whatever percentage of the population is hostile), whereas before, I wasn’t. A large part of my initial opposition to the war came from a belief that Islamic extremism simply was not as much of a threat as some people claimed. Now that my view of that particular question has changed, I see not just the benefits of victory in Iraq, but the dire consequences of defeat.
So I guess what I’m not understanding is the logic of your conclusion. Unless you believe that most Americans would not have the same reaction I’ve had to being convinced of the Islamic extremist threat, then I’m really not sure how convincing people of that threat could be considered to have sapped the public’s will to win. Furthermore, I would suggest that maybe this particular manifestation of the law of unintended consequences is one of the benefits of free speech – the very fact that the incoherence of the anti-war rhetoric has been on such public display has actually helped promote one of the core philosophical bases of the war on terror.
(By the way, before anyone dismisses me as a “leftard” or whatever, please assume that this comment is written in all sincerity and is not intended to beg any questions or spread any memes. It’s just one guy who’s trying to come to a reasonable conclusion based on the available inputs.)
Citizen-
I think Jeff’s point would be the following:
The “media’s failure” in this particular context is that, in an attempt to show America as jingoistic and hypocritical in order to shame the public into not wanting war, they have instead helped generate an atmosphere of (what I call with some reservation) racism and hypocracy that too-easily conflates Islamicism with Islam- a point President Bush has tried to make explicitly for the audience at home while certain members of the sneer-brigade guffawed and tossed their heads in a “oh, we know what you really mean” manner.
In regards to how this is harmful for the war effort: first, we have to consider how such media coverage plays “over there”- not only in how it is used by Islamicists like OBL and Al Queda, but in how it is abosrbed through less tinted media lenses (and I’ll be all little out there and include Al-Jezera as less tinted).
However, the media could still be identified as hurting the war effort at home when it serves to mis-identify our enemies. By harping on how much of the insurgency in Iraq is composed of Iraqi citizens (without counter-balancing such points with discussing how small the insurgency is estimated to be in comparison to the population of Iraq), we end up convincing people that Iraqis are more resistant to the possibility of democracy and secularism than they actually are.
Sanity Inspector: I think Winston Churchill said “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” At least according to a magnet I bought in London…
Aren’t there parts of London that resemble Hell?