Like It Or Not, An Iraq Withdrawal Deadline Is Defeatism

I've noted previously my desire to keep this blog focused on Orange County issues. But I'm going to make an exception today in response to the Congress's vote to establish a schedule for pulling U.S. troops out of the Iraq War -- particularly this OC Register editorial and this TheLiberalOC.com post that spelling out when American forces will be gone isn't somehow defeatist -- a triumph of wishful thinking over historical experience. It's such an absurd statement, it deserves comment.

Reasonable people can argue until they're blue in the face about whether we should have invaded Iraq, but it's a moot point. We are engaged in a war there, so are we going to win it or we're are going to bug out and abandon the Iraqis for the second time in 15 years.

It's amusing to read advocates for a withdrawal deadline try to convince themselves and others that telling the enemy when you'll be gone really, really doesn't help them and hurt us. The OC Register editorial contains this line intended to assure readers that "we've really thought this out":

We understand the argument that if they know when U.S. forces are leaving, insurgents and terrorists in Iraq may lay low until that deadline, then accelerate their attacks.

Forgive me, but I doubt the OCR editorial page does understand that argument -- or else they wouldn't advocate what is more accurately seen as a timetable for defeat. The terrorists in Iraq cannot drive us out by force of arms. Their only hope is to defeat our will to win and our stomach for war, and the American withdrawal necessary for a terrorist victory in Iraq inevitably follows.

When your enemy's strategy is to wait for you to leave, how does NOT help that enemy to give them ample advance notification of that departure? Where in history has the novel strategy of keeping one's enemy well informed about one's intention to leave ever led to victory?

History is clear: occupying powers always win -- provided their will to prevail doesn't fail. The truth of this goes back to ancient times. Sooner or later, insurgents lose heart and quit because they cannot match the enemy in men or materiel. Insurgents will not continue fighting and dying against an enemy they cannot beat in the field -- unless they think that enemy is soon going to pack up and leave.

Insurgents pay attention to -- and seek to influence -- domestic public opinion in the occupying army's.  homeland. During the Philippine War, the  Filipino guerrilla army closely  followed the 1900 presidential election between incumbent President William McKinley and anti-war Democratic nominee William Jennings Bryan. Bryan's lopsided defeat was a major blow to the desire of the Filipino guerrillas will to fight on, and American forces brought the war to a close by 1902. (I don't advocate employing the brutal examples of our tactics during that conflict over in Iraq -- we couldn't even if we wanted to. I'm simply using the Philippine War as an example to illustrate my point).

Telling insurgents when we are going to leave gives them hope -- and such hope is what keeps insurgents fighting and able to attract recruits.

I don't have a magic formula for winning the war in Iraq, and I'm not making excuses for mistakes that have prolonged this war. But until someone invents a time machine, the best we can do is apply lessons learned from those mistakes to achieving victory in Iraq. Lt. Gen. David Petraeus seems to be the right man for the job -- in no small part because his most recent command was the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center -- which includes the Center for Army Lessons Learned.

American forces will eventually leave Iraq. I'd prefer we do so by winning -- which in this war will mean simultaneously reducing the insurgents ability to fight and increasing the Iraqi government forces ability to ensure internal security. But bolstering the morale of the Iraqi terrorists by saying, "Don't worry -- we'll start leaving in March 2008 and be out of your hair completely three months later" makes it less, not more, likely we will win. In other words, it's defeatist.

Withdrawal deadline advocates can spin all they want, but what they are advocating is a scheduled defeat.

Comments

[redperegrine]

"anti-war hippies"

Okie, like a rare piece of art you're priceless!

[Okie Sooner]

redperegrine....thank you, I will take that as a compliment.

[Pat]

"I agree it has become the best terrorist recruiting tool out there."

True perhaps--but it's also the best terrorist killing tool out there. So why not break up the networks and sap their will while we have the chance, before a nuclear Iran (or whatever Islamic state) ups the stakes?

[Gary Kephart]

I'm all for us getting out of Iraq and finishing the job in Afghanistan. Yes, I think the terrorists will follow us there, which will be better for Iraq. Our presence is instigating violence. While our troops may help in the short term, as we all know the real problem is political. The Iraqis lack the political will to form a unified Iraq. No amount of military might will help that. We can keep fighting the insurgents, but as long as the people in the government are helping the insurgents, it's a lost cause.

[Quang]

The Army is taking recruits up to age 42. I will help you train for boot camp. Meet me outside the El Toro gate at 0500 for PT!

Stay the course but keep sending the other guys and gals and their children.

[Pat]

Okay, let's have only the military vote on whether to stay in Iraq!

And no one is sending them, Quang, they are volunteering. This is not 1963.