Say Anything Blog

In the New York Times today Obama has an editorial called “My Plan For Iraq.”  Now, given that even liberals in the media are begging Obama to update hid outdated notions about Iraq so that they reflect the success we’ve had in the country over the last year, the fact that Obama’s plan for the war remains essentially unchanged from what it was back in 2004 is a bit surprising.

As I’ve said many times, we must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in. We can safely redeploy our combat brigades at a pace that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010 — two years from now, and more than seven years after the war began. After this redeployment, a residual force in Iraq would perform limited missions: going after any remnants of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, protecting American service members and, so long as the Iraqis make political progress, training Iraqi security forces. That would not be a precipitous withdrawal.

This seems a bit arrogant, no?  The situation in Iraq is not the same as it was in 2004.  Everyone has admitted this.  We’ve had huge amounts of success in stopping violence, beating back the terrorists and letting the Iraqi government and security forces take control.  Even now Iraqis want to take over control of Baghdad, and beyond that want to take over full and autonomous control of other parts of their country as well.

That should, and will, happen.  But who is to say that it will happen within this arbitrary time line Obama is setting?  What if the Iraqis need a few extra months?  Are we going to deny them that at the end of the mission?  After all we’ve been through with them?

I realize that Obama needs to placate the left-wing hordes who pushed him to his marginal victory in the primaries, but this is hardly an issue where it’s ok to pander.  We’re talking about a mission in Iraq that countless Americans and Iraqis died for.  To see that mission tarnished because Obama wants to meet an arbitrary deadline set not because it’s the best policy but rather to pander to a political constituency would be hurtful.

To the military men and women who have worked so hard, and risked their lives and health, more than anyone else.