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| House Republicans Want Iraq Progress By September |
| 2007-06-29 |
| WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush is sending his top aide on national security affairs to Capitol Hill on Thursday to confront what has become a tough crowd on the Iraq war. A majority of senators believe troops should start coming home within the next few months. A new House investigation concluded this week that the Iraqis have little control over an ailing security force. And House Republicans are calling to revive the independent Iraq Study Group to give the nation options. What could work in Iraq? We should section cities and districts into the type of "strategic hamlet" arrangement that worked - somewhat - in Vietnam. Assigned locals would be directed to implement workable plans for not only weeding out the terrorists, but destroying the social movements from which they rise. Currently, jihadis have enough local respect to cause members of the Iraq military to believe that resistance to the terrorists is personally dangerous and militarily futile. There is no option other than to give cause to reverse that kind of thinking. My read is: get results by September, or face the catastrophe of US withdrawl from the Middle East. While the White House thought they had until September to deal with political fallout on the unpopular war, officials may have forgotten another critical date: the upcoming 2008 elections. "This is an important moment if we are still to have a bipartisan policy to deal with Iraq," Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., said in an interview Wednesday. If Congress and the White House wait until September to change course in Iraq, Lugar said "It'll be further advanced in the election cycle. It makes it more difficult for people to cooperate. ... If you ask if I have some anxiety about 2008, I do." Lugar, the senior Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, plans to meet Thursday privately with Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley. Hadley requested the meeting after Lugar delivered a lengthy floor speech contending the president's war strategy won't have time to work and that U.S. troops should start leaving. National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Hadley's message Thursday on Capitol Hill will be "where we see things currently in Iraq and that we need to see what the commanders on the ground and the ambassador have to say in September." The President needs to be persuaded that NO international organization - especially the OIC - can or will assist in aiding the eradication of terror from Iraq. |
| Posted by:McZoid |
| #8 Translation: Iran and Al Queda need to hold out for 2 more months to win. Regardless of strategic and tactical mistakes we may have made, we are in a test of wills that is emminently winnable. If the enemy thinks they can wait us out, they can stand anything for a fixed duration of time. However, if they think we are committed they will crumble eventually. Their bass ackward societies are simply incapable of withstanding sustained pressure from a superpower and they have too many internal divisions for us to expoit. Unfortunately our media, majority of voters and political class is proving as weak willed as they think we are. In this sense, we are unworthy of the troops we have in the field. We can blame Bush if we want to for being an uninspiring leader or poor Commander in Chief, but he fundamentally understands this is a test of wills and we need to be in it for the long haul. I personally believe our society has proven to be bad 'followers' more than he has been a poor wartime leader. |
| Posted by: JAB 2007-06-29 13:24 |
| #7 Or there. PIMF! |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2007-06-29 09:24 |
| #6 The reports seen here at Rantburg are clear that the military believe they are making wonderful progress, and may be near collapsing Al Qaeda in Iraq altogether, as well as the indigenous terror/criminal groups. It will take a good deal of time for the Iraqi Army and Police to be ready to stand up on their own; while the number of volunteers continues to accelerate, their training has to start at a level considerably more basic than needed by American recruits, and their NCO and officer corp are very green, to say the least. Nonetheless, the pace of real world training, so much more useful for driving lessons home than even live fire exercises, is surpassed only by what the Afghani units are getting. So how well the Iraqis are doing becomes a matter of perspective. Will they quickly match American/Coalition abilities, eg by this September? No. Will they develop into a professional army and a professional police force in time, becoming the best in the Muslim world? Very, very likely, although unlikely to match Israeli Defense Forces and police. Will this teach them never, ever to go up against the US? Very likely, and a useful exercise just for that, as the attitude of the acknowledged best-in-region is going to rub off on the other militaries, not to mention a deep awareness of how unwise it is to go up against American ally Israel (ok, that last may be a bit of wishful thinking), but I'm sure our guys can slip that idea into the training. At least that's how it looks to this little civilian housewife from the soccer suburbs of the Midwest. Where their are flaws in my reasoning due to my massive ignorance, please gently point them out. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2007-06-29 09:24 |
| #5 Sounds like Sen. Lugar would rather lose the war than the next election. Noooooo! Say it ain't so! |
| Posted by: tu3031 2007-06-29 08:58 |
| #4 What could work in Iraq? General fumigation. |
| Posted by: gromgoru 2007-06-29 08:14 |
| #3 Sounds like Sen. Lugar would rather lose the war than the next election. |
| Posted by: junkirony 2007-06-29 05:26 |
| #2 Seriously, the numbers don't look good. Members have to satisfy constituents. |
| Posted by: McZoid 2007-06-29 05:10 |
| #1 "House Republicans Want Iraq Progress By September" "And a pony!" |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2007-06-29 00:04 |