Wednesday, July 06, 2005
Pass the Prozac Andrew
Andrew Sullivan has written a bit on Bush and the Iraq War that is thoughtful, insightful and just painful to read. Take a look. The backing and forthing of somebody who is bright, but wants to disagree with Bush, who "supports" the War, but wants to critique management, communication and tactics, is irritating and annoying.
Sometimes, I want to jump up and say, "yes, he gets it!":
On the other hand, sometimes you want to say, "what are you talking about?":
There's this naive "journalistic quest" for transparency that is just...stupid. The President shouldn't own up to tactical military mistakes, acknowledge the enemy's tactical successes, divulge strategy. Journalistic quests and warfighting are at odds. The President should be...ruthless, determined, obstinate and, hey, luck is GOOD, not to be sneered at.
What I find impossible to tolerate is any lack of empirical research and objective data used by Sullivan or the critical ilk to measure our success in Iraq. By any objective historical measure, the Iraq War and the Afghanistan War before it, have been massively successful wars. We displaced the reigning tyrannical governments in literally days. We supported the locals in creating popularly elected new governments within months. We did so at a MINIMAL cost in lives and wounded compared to any serious war in the 20th Century. We did so with a professional volunteer military, with no conscripts there against their will. Never in history, certainly not American history and perhaps never before, have such extraordinary wars been concluded so successfully.
So read Sullivan because he's smart and it's interesting to see how much Prozac might be required...you're likely to run into an opinion you can agree with at least once.
Sometimes, I want to jump up and say, "yes, he gets it!":
The fact that the insurgents in Iraq have no real alternative to offer the Iraqi people except mayhem and religious tyranny will count in Bush's favor. His strategic case for the democratization of the Middle East is indeed the only real solution to the threat exposed by 9/11, a threat that still exists and still menaces. Any time-table for troop reduction would merely tell the terrorists and insurgents how long they can wait before they decisively pounce on a fledgling and weak democracy.
On the other hand, sometimes you want to say, "what are you talking about?":
But he [Bush] is also ruthless and lucky. The signals from the White House suggest that the president will not attempt to explain the difficulties, acknowledge his own miscalculations, level with the public and try and unite the country around persevering. He will instead insist that everything is on track and more time and resources are all that's necessary. He will rightly argue that American security depends on winning the war in Iraq and that democracy can prevail. He will say that we have no choice but to carry on. He will attack much criticism as unpatriotic and disloyal to the troops. He will press ahead because it is all he knows.
There's this naive "journalistic quest" for transparency that is just...stupid. The President shouldn't own up to tactical military mistakes, acknowledge the enemy's tactical successes, divulge strategy. Journalistic quests and warfighting are at odds. The President should be...ruthless, determined, obstinate and, hey, luck is GOOD, not to be sneered at.
What I find impossible to tolerate is any lack of empirical research and objective data used by Sullivan or the critical ilk to measure our success in Iraq. By any objective historical measure, the Iraq War and the Afghanistan War before it, have been massively successful wars. We displaced the reigning tyrannical governments in literally days. We supported the locals in creating popularly elected new governments within months. We did so at a MINIMAL cost in lives and wounded compared to any serious war in the 20th Century. We did so with a professional volunteer military, with no conscripts there against their will. Never in history, certainly not American history and perhaps never before, have such extraordinary wars been concluded so successfully.
So read Sullivan because he's smart and it's interesting to see how much Prozac might be required...you're likely to run into an opinion you can agree with at least once.
1 Comments:
By 
Jimmy K., at
Wed Jul 06, 11:27:00 PM:
Andrew Sullivan is a flip flopper and I stopped reading him several months ago. You can't have it both ways. Period.
