A Democratic Plan

Trudy Rubin on How Democrats Can Frame Ideas to Fix Iraq Mess

I don't envy Democratic Party candidates who are asked to define a new Iraq policy.

White House mistakes have left the United States with no good alternatives in Iraq.

To leave now would (I believe) cast the country into full-scale civil war, leaving a failed state that is a haven for jihadis. But to stay on under the current policy will do little but hold off the deluge.

That said, Democratic candidates still need to make the case for why it makes sense to let their party try to salvage the Iraq mess. So let me suggest what a Democratic candidate might say:

Fellow Americans, there is no issue of more consequence to American foreign policy than Iraq.

Republicans accuse us of aiding the terrorists. That charge is untrue and unseemly, given that Republican mistakes have turned Iraq into a training ground for al-Qaeda. However, what you want to know is whether Democrats have a better plan.

The mistakes of the last three years have left few good options, and the past colors our choices for the future.

Some of my fellow Democrats, and some in the military, believe a speedy troop drawdown would take the steam out of the insurgency. I respectfully disagree. I believe a quick U.S. exit would open the door to a full-scale civil war and the collapse of Iraq, leaving a failed state that would become a magnet for terrorists. Iraq's Shiite and Sunni neighbors would play out their quarrels over its bloody corpse.

Yet I do not believe that we can just "stay the course." This White House mantra is based on the hope that Iraq's national unity government can pull Shiites and Sunnis together and thus undercut the Sunni insurgents. But the mantra isn't working.

The hard-core Sunni ex-Baathists and jihadis who want to seize power have brought the country to the brink of civil war. They have viciously attacked Shiite civilians since 2003. After years of turning the other cheek, the Shiites are retaliating against Sunni civilians.

Unless these hard-core Sunnis can be stopped, Iraq's national unity government won't hold together. The slide toward civil war will accelerate, as moderate Sunnis are assassinated. The Iraq national security battalions we've trained won't jell, as their country falls apart.

So we Americans are facing a moment of truth. Right now, U.S. forces are fighting alongside Iraqis to try to drive Sunni hard-liners out of Baghdad. But the U.S. military is strained and degraded by the administration's lack of planning for the demands of the postwar. It doesn't have enough troops in Iraq to do the job.

In order to fight in Baghdad, we have pulled troops out of Al-Anbar province, the bastion of Sunni hard-liners. This led recently to a remarkable protest memo by the head of U.S. Marine intelligence in the province, calling desperately for more aid and troops.

We are playing whack-a-mole, moving troops from one hot area to another and losing the gains we've made each time we do so. This lowers the chance that we can stop the hard-liners. It shrinks the chance that Iraq's unity government can survive and that its security forces thrive.

Few Americans are in the mood to send more troops to Iraq. Many military specialists say there are no more combat-ready troops to send. Perhaps so.

But if you elect this Democrat to office, I will not continue a Republican policy that is failing.

We must decide as a nation, and soon, whether we think it is worth trying to bring stability to Iraq, a nation whose previous system we took down. We must search harder to find the troops we need, and the right kind of troops, to stabilize Iraq over the next year - and to give its government a chance.

We must also try harder to enhance a program that is showing success, that embeds U.S. units within Iraqi units and helps them fight. These special U.S. units need more men, and soon.

We must stop funneling U.S. aid money to large contractors - and hold the administration responsible for a system that has produced shameful scandals and a scarcity of results.

And we must put Iraq into the context of a broader regional strategy. It will not be possible to stabilize that country without revising our policy toward Iran. Nor can we halt the destabilization of the Mideast region without a new effort to rejuvenate negotiations over a Palestinian state.

I haven't even broached the need for an energy policy that makes us less dependent on Mideast oil wells - a policy this administration has shamefully failed to devise.

But first and foremost, you must ask whether you trust a government that has failed so badly. We need competence, accountability, and the willingness to change course. Otherwise, our Iraq venture is destined for disaster.

The choice is yours.

Sunk-Loss Theory

Barry Schwartz, is a professor of psychology at Swarthmore College, writing in the Los Angeles Times about
The 'Sunk-Cost Fallacy':

We make a significant investment — of money, time or emotion — in some project, relationship or business deal, and it doesn't seem to be working out. Do we continue to "throw good money after bad" or do we "cut and run" and "stop wasting time"?

Psychologists, decision scientists and economists have an answer. They tell us that it's a mistake to continue with a project or an activity because of what you have already invested in it. The time or money you've already spent is gone. You can't reclaim it. Using a past investment to justify a future investment is what they call the "sunk-cost fallacy."

Instead of thinking about the past, what we should be doing is thinking about the future.

Life is full of uncertainty. But what we can say is that if the reason for "staying the course" is past commitment — sunk costs — we need to find a better one.

Oh, yes, we've heard them trotted out in defense of continued U.S. involvement in Iraq as death, injury and insurgency mount. President Bush has offered several reasons for staying the course. And one of them is the more than 2,600 Americans who have already died in Iraq. Bush said said at Ft. Bragg, N.C., on July 4:

I'm going to make you this promise . . . I'm not going to allow the sacrifice of 2,527 troops who have died in Iraq to be in vain by pulling out before the job is done.

We heard this argument often enough in the 1960s. As casualties mounted in Vietnam, it became more difficult to withdraw because withdrawal would have "cheapened" the lives of those already sacrificed. We "owed" it to the dead and wounded to "stay the course." What staying the course produced was thousands more dead and wounded. "Knee deep in the big muddy" is how folk singer Pete Seeger described it.

The question should never have been, "What have we invested so far?" but "What are our objectives for the future and can we attain them at a reasonable cost?"

. . . The sunk-cost fallacy took many lives in Vietnam. Whether Iraq is or is not another quagmire I leave to others, and to history, to determine. But there is one respect in which we must not allow Iraq to become another Vietnam: Continued involvement must not be justified by appealing to the imperative not to allow the dead to have "died in vain."

How should we honor the sacrifices of those who have died or suffered serious injury in a U.S. military conflict? The best way to show how much we respect and value their lives is by not risking other lives unless future prospects for success fully justify putting more people in harm's way. Therefore, our standards for putting more people at risk should, if anything, become more rigorous, not less, as casualties mount.

Yet people seem willing to waste even more (time, money or lives) to justify what they have already spent and avoid that sick feeling of failure . . . .And troops haven't really "died in vain" as long as you continue to press on in the fight, no matter how disastrous the results.

. . . . it is unacceptable to justify continued involvement in Iraq or any other conflict on the grounds that we "owe" it to those who have already fallen. That is a justification that has strong emotional appeal, but it is fallacious, and no one should be allowed to get away with it.

Whatever the differences between Iraq in 2006 and Vietnam in 1968, if we allow policymakers to use our "sunk costs" — our dead military — to justify further conflict, we will have turned Iraq into another Vietnam. And if we do, we will be shamed by Iraq just as we were shamed by Vietnam.

Jack Murtha Says,

Rep. John Murtha, To Surge or Not to Surge, in part:

. . . . When several military experts called for the addition of hundreds of thousands of troops early in the Iraq War, the Bush Administration rejected the call, and instead chose to fight with a minimal force. And now, when our troops have been deployed over and over again; when almost all of our combat units at our bases at home are at the lowest state of combat readiness; and with this Administration's continued insistence to stay a failed course; it is now more obvious than ever that we can not sustain this war on its current course and we must change direction.

The burden of the Iraq War has fallen squarely on our all-volunteer military and their families. They have performed remarkably well, particularly in light of the unclear and ever-changing mission dictated to them by Pentagon civilians of the Bush Administration. But they are overstretched and overextended. They deserve fresh reinforcements so that they can return home to rebuild their units, their psyche and their family and community relationships.

While the Administration stresses that we are a country at war, they refuse to spread the burden proportionately. Instead, they pursue tax incentives for the rich, run up our federal deficit, and spend astronomical sums in Iraq with little or no control over wasteful and fraudulent spending. This is not the picture of a country at war. Consider the following:

The current war in Iraq has lasted longer than the Korean War, World War I and World War II in Europe. This war is the first protracted conflict in modern times in which our nation has not utilized a draft for additional support. If the President is genuinely serious in his comparison with communism and fascism, perhaps he should reconsider a call to reinstate the draft. The selective service provided:

• 2.8 million U.S. Servicemen in WWI,
• 10 million U.S. Servicemen in WWII,
• 1.5 million U.S. Servicemen in the Korean War, and
• 1.8 million U.S. Servicemen during the Vietnam Conflict

The facts are that in 1950, the United States had about 1.5 million active duty personnel under arms and by 1952 they surged to 3.6 million. In Vietnam the U.S. had 2.7 million in 1964 and by 1968 we had over 3.5 million.

In 2006, the overall active end-strength of our nation's military was 1,367,500. The President's 2007 budget request reduces that end-strength to 1,332,300. This means that there is projected to be 35,200 fewer troops on our nation's active duty rolls this year as compared to last year.

We cannot sustain the President's open-ended, vague and bankrupting war policies indefinitely. He should try less rhetoric and more action.

If we are to fight this war with the same sense of dedication and vigor as we did prior wars, we cannot do it without a surge in force.

It is unlikely that the President will call for a draft. A draft is politically unpopular. But we cannot continue to allow the President to pursue open-ended and vague military missions without a change in direction.

Two years ago, I was one of only two in the House of Representatives who voted for a draft, because I believe if we are a country truly at war, the burden should be shared proportionately and fairly. So Mr. President, you have two options, either change the course in Iraq and reduce the burden on our overstretched active force or reinstitute the draft. We cannot sustain the current course.

Bush Proxies Seek More Isolation?

Al Arabiya, a Dubai-based TV channel, has been banned from Iraq by our proxy-puppet government.

In a similar incident, the US-backed government in Iraq imposed a ban on Al Jazeera, another prominent Arabic channel two years ago. The ban has not been lifted yet.

Ali Muhammed, an Iraqi national, says:

Initially they banned Al Jazeera, and now Al Arabiya. It shows that the Americans want to keep what goes on in Iraq a hush-hush affair. The Iraqi government seems like just a tool in the hands of Americans. Now the Arab world lost the chance to know what is exactly happening in Iraq.

When a Danish daily published blasphemous cartoons, the Western media branded it as freedom of expression. Why all of them shut their mouth now?

Ahmed Rafeeq, a Lebanese national, said:

I am sure the Iraqi government closed down Al Arabiya office as part of a US plan. They do not want the truth to come out.

The best way they found is to close down the Arabic channels which talk against them.

The Arab world definitely lost the chance to get the true stories on Iraq war now. All the Western media which report pro-US stories have no ban imposed on them.

Khalee Times

Finally, Someone Says It!

Juan Cole, Bush Turns to Fear-Mongering Creation of "Islamic" Bogeyman:

And this is the reason for which he needs to keep 140,000 troops in Iraq, to stop the Muslim fundamentalists from taking it over. But of course, the Da'wa Party, the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq and the Sadr movement have *already* taken it over.

Nor is it plausible that "al-Qaeda" could take over Iraq! The United States couldn't take over Iraq. The Shiites and Kurds would never put up with it. Bush doesn't need to stay in Iraq to fight al-Qaeda there. If Bush weren't in Iraq, neither would al-Qaeda be. There less than 1,000 such foreign fighters, anyway.

So there are good Muslim fundamentalist movements and bad ones. What seems to distinguish them is whether they are eager to do business with Houston or whether they badmouth Bush.