THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume IX, Issue # 1, January 1, 2007
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation' Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
TIME TO LEAVE IRAQ
By Alan Caruba
IRAQ & THE U.S. MILITARY OCCUPATION: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED; TIME TO DEPART -- THE ARGUMENT THAT,
SINCE THE U.S.A. HAS SUCCEEDED IN REMOVING SADDAM HUSSEIN FROM POWER & HAS DONE ALL IT COULD TO ASSIST
THE IRAQIS IN ESTABLISHING A STABLE GOVERNMENT & A NEW ARMY & POLICE FORCE, U.S. MILITARY FORCES & THOSE
OF OUR COALITION ALLIES SHOULD BE WITHDRAWN FROM IRAQ SWIFTLY, BUT DECIDEDLY -- IF THE IRAQIS PROVE
UNWILLING TO OPERATE A CONSTITUTIONAL DEMOCRATIC SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT & INSIST ON WAGING A CIVIL
WAR TO DETERMINE WHO CONTROLS IRAQ, THEN LET THE SUNNIS, SHIITES, & KURDS FIGHT IT OUT & KILL EACH OTHER
OFF -- IF THE ENSUING REGIONAL CONFLICT EXHAUSTS OR DESTROYS ISLAM'S MILITARISTIC INTENTION TO DOMINATE
THE ENTIRE GLOBE, AMERICA & THE WEST WILL BE THE ULTIMATE WINNERS
FULL STORY:
U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson would tell anyone who would listen that he did not know how to get out of Vietnam. The
result is a memorial wall in Washington, D.C., with the names of some 50,000 or more servicemen and servicewomen who
died in a war this nation unequivocally lost. Four Presidents wrestled with the questions of whether to get into that civil war
and then how to get out.
In the end, having failed to leave years earlier, our departure was ignominious. In failing to leave for political reasons,
President Richard M. Nixon compounded that ignominy in blood.
I wonder how many more of our soldiers will die in Iraq while President George W. Bush tries to find a way to leave as events
in that nation and the Middle East conspire against him. There is no good way. There is only leaving.
By “leaving” I mean withdrawing our troops to a level that will vastly reduce the day-by-day loss to improvised explosive
devices, snipers, and suicide bombers. That’s not the way our military is constituted to fight a war. The Iraqi insurgency an
internal guerrilla action intended to determine control of Iraq, while ridding it of the American military presence. It is the
needless sacrifice of young men and women in uniform for the notion that America cannot recover from leaving.
If we could recover from the devastating homeland attack of September 11, 2001, we can leave Iraq, doing so by swiftly, but
deliberately, departing the country.
History teaches us that we can and do make peace with our former enemies. Not long ago, President Bush was in Vietnam
meeting with our former Vietnamese foes.
We have, in fact, accomplished much in Iraq, not the least of which was removing a brutal, psychopathic dictator from power,
along with his two equally vile sons, and the coterie of thugs around him. We have overseen two elections there. We have
helped train and equip a new army and some semblance of a police force.
It is time to leave. We are now witnessing the irrationality, the endemic and historic veniality of the Middle East, where most
“political” issues are decided with a gun. The transition of power in the Middle East, a region of dictators and monarchies,
has always occurred by assassination or military coup.
The notion that America could export or impose constitutional democracy on a region where Islam and its Sharia law is the
only recognized form of government is false. Islam is not just a socalled religion; it is a form of political power and control
administered by Koranic clerics, not elected representatives.
It has been this way since Muhammad invented the Islamic political system. Muhammad's death in 632 A.D. was followed by
a schism in Islam between the majority Sunnis and the minority Shiites who, only in Iraq and Iran, are the major element of the
population. We are watching an ancient struggle for the soul of Islam play out in Iraq, and we are watching Iran seek nuclear
weapons for the purpose of winning that struggle for the Shiites.
The likelihood is that the entire Middle East and parts of Africa will remain in turmoil for years, if not decades, to come. If it
saps or destroys Islam’s militaristic intention to dominate the world, the West will be the ultimate winner.
The United States cannot be the policeman of the region. It can, however, provide military protection to those Islamic states
that provide us with the oil we require to function. That is why we liberated Kuwait in the early 1990s. We can and must
protect the Saudis, along with the other Gulf States. We may, given unforeseen events, have to intervene in the Maghreb,
the northern tier of Africa that is also Islamic.
We have a moral and practical obligation to protect the only true constitutional democracy in the region, Israel, against Islam.
The moral justification for removing Saddam Hussein from control of Iraq was valid. The economic and strategic justification
-- fact that Iraq sits atop the second largest reserves of oil in the Middle Eastern region -- is equally valid. That oil is the true
reason for the conflict, as Sunnis and Shiites battle for its control, while the Kurds gird to protect their oil fields as well.
In terms of our military involvement, the United States can leave Iraq. The time to do it is now. I do not want to listen to future
historians tell us that George Bush, like Lyndon Baines Johnson and Richard M. Nixon, was repeatedly asking his advisors
for an “exit strategy,” while more of our soldiers died.
In the words of the aircraft carrier banner from which Bush announced the successful capture of Baghdad, “Mission
accomplished.” For now.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
The Middle East & the Problem of Iraq
Page Two
Page One
The Problem of Rogue States:
Iraq as a Case History
National Strategy for Victory in Iraq
American Foreign Policy -- The Middle East
Middle East -- Arabs, Arab States,
& Their Middle Eastern Neighbors
Islamism & Jihadism -- The Threat of Radical Islam
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
International Politics & World Disorder:
War & Peace in the Real World
Page Two
Page One
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
Counterterrorism & U.S. National Security
U.S. National Security Strategy
Alan Caruba is a veteran business and science writer, a Public Relations Counselor, and Founder of the National Anxiety Center, a
clearinghouse for information about media-driven scare campaigns. Caruba writes a weekly commentary, "Warning Signs," posted
on the Internet website of the National Anxiety Center, which is located at
www.anxietycenter.com.
Caruba’s new book, Right Answers: Separating Fact from Fantasy, has been published by Merril Press.
© Alan Caruba 2007
Published with Permission of Alan Caruba
ACaruba@AOL.Com
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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