February 2, 2007
Warblogging Department
A Modest Proposal for Iraq: Pocket the Victory
President Bush has offered his plan for Iraq, and in fielding criticism of it, Press Secretary Tony Snow has said anybody who didn't like it should offer a better one. I'm rising to that challenge with a series of modest proposals addressing not just the conflict in Iraq, but the emerging larger war against Islamofascism.
My first proposal is simple: We declare victory and go home. This is completely different from "cut-and-run."
People say we haven't won in Iraq, but that's rigid literalist thinking. Just because we haven't succeeded at every single one of our goals doesn't mean we haven't scored some meaningful victories. Consider:
- The United States no longer neads to fear Iraqi weapons of mass descruction.
- Saddam Hussein is dead. There's your regime change right there.
- Iraq is no longer a military threat to other nations in the region.
We should just put those victories in our pocket and leave.
True, Iraq is not a peaceful democracy like we were hoping, but is that a real problem? If you live in Iraq, then obviously yes. That's why so many people who advocate a withdrawl are insisting it will make the Iraqis stand up for themselves. They don't want to be blamed for the chaos and bloodshed that will follow our departure.
That's where my plan differs from cut-and run: Under my plan, we don't pretend to care what happens in Iraq after we leave. So let me restate my original question: True, Iraq is not a peaceful democracy like we were hoping, but is that a real problem for us?
I don't think so, because I don't think Saddam Hussein was feeling very victorious as they tightened the rope around his neck. From his point of view, it didn't matter if we stayed or left. All that mattered is that we'd been there and kicked his ass.
We no longer care what mattered to Saddam Hussein, but we do care what matters to other people like him. When we declare victory and leave Iraq, we want to leave behind a message that matters to people like Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadi-Nejad, Syrian President Bashar al-Asad, and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il.
That message is simple: Piss us off and we'll fuck you up.
Sure, we may not replace you with a peaceful democracy, but we will replace you. In the process of doing so, we'll destroy your military and kill a whole bunch of your supporters and probably you too. Heck once your supporters realize they're going to die because of you, they just might do the job for us.
In short, this is a strategy of deterrence. We want our enemies to believe we'll destroy them if they misbehave. Hopefully this will discourage them from misbehaving so we won't have to go through the wearying exercise of destroying them.
One of the biggest advantages of this strategy is that it's quick. If we're going to declare victory and go home without rebuilding anything, we can get it over with in a jiffy. We could have left Iraq three years ago, pausing only to shoot Saddam on the way out so he didn't regain power during the descent into chaos.
Alternatively, since we would have finished the job so quickly, we could have done a few more jobs. Why try to threaten and deter other countries when we have plenty of time to destroy them? In the four years we've been fighting in Iraq, we could have destroyed Syria, Iran, and the parts of Pakistan we don't like.
There are a few downsides to this strategy.
First of all, Al-Qaeda will see our withdrawl from Iraq as a victory for them. Even worse, some of the very people we're trying to frighten will see this as an Al-Qaeda victory and won't think we're all that scary because of it. Maybe we need to stage a big attack on Al-Qaeda to show them we mean business...but then we're not really going home, are we?...I still need to work on this part of the plan...
The second problem is that Iraq didn't really do anything to piss us off right before we attacked them. Oh, they've been shooting at our aircraft in the no-fly zone for years, interfering with weapons inspectors, and causing all kinds of trouble, but it's not like we were responding to a sudden change in their behavior. That's going to make it hard for other countries to tell when we're pissed off at them until we actually blow them up...which defeats the purpose of having a deterrent.
Fortunately, having just watched the DVD of Snakes On a Plane, I think we can borrow a solution from Mother Nature. Rattlesnakes shake the rattle on their tail just before striking. It's a built-in reflex, so when a snake shakes its rattle, you know it's not bluffing. Other animals have recognizable pre-attack behavior as well, such as screeching birds or growling dogs. We need to find the equivalent of an animal's attack cry for an American military attack, so our enemies will know when we're serious.
I have an idea about that, and a Democratic congress is a start. We should also elect a Democratic president. Then, if our enemies do something to piss us off again, we scare the crap out of them by electing ourselves another Republican from Texas. Or maybe we elect Jeb Bush. He's another Bush (and you know how those Bush guys are about middle eastern wars) plus he's from Florida, so you know he's much crazier than his brother.
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