First of all, I’ll join Nathaniel in calling attention to the massive, but forgotten story of Prime Minister al-Maliki’s endorsement of Sen. Obama’s Iraq plan. Like Nathaniel, it’s only in blogs and opinion journals that I find an admission of how earth-shaking this announcement is. This ought to be the one and only domestic story in any serious journalistic outlet. Instead, it’s easier to find Joe Lieberman’s Sharptonesque rhymes (“chose to lose” “retreat and defeat”) on CNN. Â If the US ignores (as it surely will under a President McCain) the expressed wishes of a democratic government that our troops end the occupation of their territory, the entire premise of the Iraq War will come tumbling down. We will prove that we have not created an independent democracy and that, regardless of our intentions at the war’s outset, we have instead devolved into old-fashioned imperialism and colonialism despite the Kiplingesque justifications we will doubtless hear.
From the serious, we turn to the seriously hilarious. The fact that John McCain v.08′s (like Vista there must be some way to differentiate this wreck from its more palatable predecessor) policies on Iraq, and indeed pretty much everything else, are nothing more than a jumble of recycled right-wing platitudes is not a surprise. What is a surprise, is that at long last someone has called him out on it. The New York Times published an op-ed from Barack Obama last weekend. When McCain responded with this piece, the Times editor told him
“However, I’m not going to be able to accept this piece as currently
written.
I’d be pleased, though, to look at another draft.
Let me suggest an approach.
The Obama piece worked for me because it offered new information (it
appeared before his speech); while Senator Obama discussed Senator McCain,
he also went into detail about his own plans.
It would be terrific to have an article from Senator McCain that mirrors
Senator Obama’s piece. To that end, the article would have to articulate,
in concrete terms, how Senator McCain defines victory in Iraq. It would
also have to lay out a clear plan for achieving victory — with troops
levels, timetables and measures for compelling the Iraqis to cooperate. And
it would need to describe the Senator’s Afghanistan strategy, spelling out
how it meshes with his Iraq plan.”
Substance? They want substance? How dare they?
And Sam just wrote a post that was pretty much the same of my second paragraph. Oops.
Still…. good post.
Substance is one thing, asking a candidate to change their own way of thinking on a matter is clearly another. What good is a timetable if there are variances that can change that timetable? I’m sure it wasn’t in President Bush’s plans to create the Department of Homeland Security after September 11th, 2001; it wasn’t really on his Presidential timetable because it followed an unexpected event.
Sorry to tell you, but McCain has a reason for never having a “timetable” for operations in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and that is because it’s impossible to lay out a plan in such an erratic time in both places. Everything depends on the present, and the present can only be seen in the present. If everything is going well, then McCain would withdraw troops, but if the troops need to be there for regional stability, then they will stay. It is stupid to lay out a plan that is destined to change weekly.
Obama’s timetable is more of an appeasement to the (stupid) American public. If anyone thinks that it will go as planned with that plan, they must’ve been born yesterday. Again, the McCain belief is that there is no point in creating a timetable just to appease certain people, such as New York Times op-ed editor David Shipley.
Now, all this being said, I am neither Democratic nor Republican. I am an independent that loves to play devil’s advocate. I may agree with everything you’ve said, or I may disagree, you’ll never know. One thing you might want to consider is knowledge of the opposing argument, because if you had any of it you wouldn’t have used the workd “substance” unless you knew the “substance” of McCain’s thoughts on timetables.
Anywho who thinks that Obama would stick to a timetable REGARDLESS of serious events on the ground is an idiot. Only a Republican would refuse to acknowledge the realities of a situation and change accordingly. There has been marked improvement in Iraq recently, and not just decrease in violence (as I’m told there is) but the country is stabalizing politically as well. A Sunni bloc recently rejoined the Maliki government, and all but a few of those long forgotten benchmarks have been met. A timetable provides us with something long missing in this misadventure, goals. Saying withdrawal depends on “conditions on the ground” is an excuse to prolong this indefinitely.
Obama’s plan to have combat forces out 16 months after taking office is a reasonable plan for withdrawal. As John McCain’s many years of military service, during which he commanded ground forces (oh wait), should tell him it takes a long time to successfully withdraw hundreds of thousands of personnel and their equipment. A timetable tells our boys and girls in uniform that we want them home, and we’ve got an idea of how to do it. For all their machismo, chest-bumping, flagwaving, chicken-hawk rhetoric Republicans have done nothing to show their support for our military is any stronger than their desire to exploit it for their own advantage.
If John McCain believes withdrawal depends upon “conditions on the ground” then shouldn’t we have begun our withdrawal when he was walking through that market, declaring it a nice day to “go for a stroll.” Or was that total bs?
Part of the reason we got into this mess in Iraq is because Bush was ruling “in the present.” The pentagon’s and White House’s plan for war lacked long-term thinking and in-depth planning. Bush was proud of this because it was “in the present.”
Americans died needlessly because of that mindset. Along with lacking a strategy the military lacked supplies, guidance, and support from the White House and Pentagon that sent them into the meat grinder of Iraq.
For further reading: Fiasco – The American Military Adventure in Iraq by Thomas Ricks
SamMarvin, while I do agree that tangible goals are peaches and cream, the whole point of what I wrote was that with the way events have played out in Iraq, a timetable is merely an appeasement to those who want to believe it can be followed. Part of what McCain has said is that a 16-month withdrawal is possible if things go well, but if violence is still existent to the point that the Iraqi armed forces cannot deal with themselves, then the American presence would continue until they can.
I see the attraction to ‘let the troops know we want them home,’ but another thing to keep in mind is that these are not the troops that started this war. Many of these armed forces that initially went into Iraq were something of a quasi-volunteer army comprised of a mix of soldiers who wanted to be there, and those that got roped in after following the benefits of going to get an education on the government’s tab (and I don’t say that in criticism, it just happened to be a bad time to be enlisted if you were interested only in the education aspect of it).
It is now a volunteer army of soldiers who knew what issue they were getting into with Iraq-Afghanistan and willingly accepted the overal mission. Whether or not you were mindful of this when thinking about how quickly they could be withdrawn, I do not know, but it is something to keep in mind, as they are there on their own accord now.
Thank you for your reply. Political banter and disagreement (devil’s advocate or not) is the foundation for intelligence and understanding.
You are so off base. This is still the same hodge podge mix of military you describe that went in at the beginning. Have you not heard of stop-loss (not the bad movie but the Pentagon policy of extending tours)? Many of these soldiers are stuck in a cycle of being sent back in since they signed agreements years ago to serve.
Once again, I disagree. A timetable would send a clear message to the Iraqis that there is a expiration date on our stay. Already the Iraqi leadership says they want us to leave, and Maliki said he likes Obama’s plan. Don’t forget that even after a US withdrawal from Iraq we would still have a residual force on the ground and bases in the region. You say that “the way events have played out in Iraq, a timetable is merely an appeasement to those who want to believe it can be followed,” the ways things have played out in Iraq suggests we should begin withdrawing troops as the situation improves, and recent developments (AKA the conditions on the ground) show improvement.
The fact we’ve been there long enough for enlistments to expire is more of a reason that we need to withdrawal. Additionally, many career soldiers have been in Iraq since the beginning, not to mention the over 3000 dead and the tens of thousands with permanent injuries. I’m not trying to tug at heart string here, I’m saying that we need to end this as soon as we can. Ask any soldier in Iraq if he’d rather stay there or come home.
Political banter and disagreement are not the basis for intelligence and understanding. Opinions are the basis for political banter, understanding and intelligence rarely make an appearance.
Nathaniel, do some research on the enrollment figures of the armed forces and then tell me that I’m wrong. The stop-loss is not holding an entire army in Iraq-Afghanistan. Take a look at the overall percentage of who is in Iraq-Afghanistan now and then look at where they were at the outset of the war. I have a strong feeling you’ll that the “many” troops you are talking about is not as large a figure as you’d expect.
Uhhhh the news was all over the New York Times?