"Everyone from Chuck Hagel to Richard Holbrooke to Ret. General William Odom has judged Iraq worse than Vietnam".

This pretty well proved the point. Anyone that doesnt notice this argument manages to hit about every logical fallacy in one little sentence isnt thinking rationally.

This is a very good post and i think it rightly identifies the reason the Democrats are imploding when they should be mid-ascendency. Its one thing to have talking points, its one thing to have a media that slants things to your benefit, but this becomes a trap when you start believing your own BS.

I posted a link to polling data in an earlier thread that indicated the American people barely trust Bush to handle the Iraq war... but that they trust Democrats even less. I think what has happened is that just when the Dems should theoretically be in the opportune position to run the table, they have entered a perfect storm of self-dellusion. The obsession with Vietnam and reliving the halcyon days is biting them in the ass. The American people just are not in that place. 50% of the country wants to stay in Iraq until the job is done, and most of the rest are willing to spend up to another year getting it right. But the Democratic leadership party-line has mutated into a get em out now mantra. They really believe the country thinks this is Vietnam and that we should abandon Iraq when that is simply not true. A similar fixation with domestic (and overseas) intelligence doesnt jive with where the American people are either. Its ok to disagree with the American people and try to convince them you are right, but it is a pretty bad idea to dellude yourself into thinking they already agree with you and all you have to do is show up at the ballot box and in the mean time get your impeachment paper work in order.
And it is fast becoming necessary to toe that party line if you want to be welcome in the tent. That is a total disaster for the Dems, and that isnt good for the country in the long run.

"Worse than Vietnam?" By what standard? In what weird fantasy world?

Because they say it a lot, and they say it incessantly.

And because they dearly want to believe it.

Ergo, it must be true. Irrefutably.

"Everyone from Chuck Hagel to Richard Holbrooke to Ret. General William Odom has judged Iraq worse than Vietnam."

This sort of statement just leaves me utterly baffled. By what objective standard is this true?

Of course, the whole point is that there is not an objective standard. The whole point of the statement is that the subjective standard creates the truth - the statement is true because it is believed to be true. This is of course itself to me completely baffling on some level, though its a reoccuring theme of much modern literature, philosophy, and (for lack of a better word) 'leftist' thought so it is not completely unexpected however incomprehensible it remains to me.

To me, the most baffling case of this is Martin Van Creveld's statement regarding the Iraq war - "the most foolish war since Emperor Augustus in 9 B.C sent his legions into Germany and lost them". Van Creveld's "Supplying War: Logistics from Wallenstein to Patton" is the finest peice of academic miltary writing I've ever read. (Albert Marvin's now sadly out of print "Broadsides and Boarders" is more fun, but far less technical and relevant to today's wars.)

To utter this statement, the man who seems so thoughtful and so analytical in his writing must somehow utterly forget everything that he's ever written and most especially and most obviously the chapter in 'Logistics' on Operation Barbarossa. How he can even directly compare the second Gulf War to the Varian disaster of Rome - or even for that matter to Vietnam - I am at a loss to say.

And the statement cannot be explained as the emotional hyberbole of a single moment, regretted almost as soon as it was uttered, because its part of an equally bizarre and fact bereft and hysterical essay. It is almost impossible for me to understand the writer of Van Creveld's books to be the same mind as which guided the creation of that essay. Van Creveld apparantly has a totally different approach to the question when he is examining a current event as opposed to a historical one. It is not enough apparantly for Van Creveld to oppose the war. I agree that Van Creveld's departure from his own highly regarded sensibility can only be regarded as a Shibboleth, something that he must do (apparantly also for himself) to maintain his membership in a certain community.

For that matter Van Creveld is hyperbolizing the impact of Teutoburg Forest on Rome's longterm viability (its conventional wisdom, but its also historically untenable, even ridiculous). The battle happened in 9AD and 3 legions were lost, maybe 25,000 men. The empire continued to expand for another century and survived for more than 4 more centuries.

I guess the campaigns are indeed comparable in the level of overdramatization attached to them. To think that either rises to the level of Napoleon or Hitlers invasion of Russia, or Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor is absurd. To compare Teutoburg to the longterm impact the Battle of Little Bighorn is overselling it, but it was probably closer to that than to some of the truly empire wrecking adventures of history.

Van Creveld is a genius but Iraq happened to fly in the face with his master work on asymetrical combat and he seems to be emotionally invested in being correct about it. In my opinion he is missing some of his own lessons regarding the situation on the ground as well as the opportunities available to us in this particular scenario.

So Vietnam wasn't as bad as they said after all.

We have lost about 2700 men in Iraq. A "Soccer War" between Guatemala and Honduras (IIRC) in the Sixties cost 2000 lives approximately.

Just for perspective.

Are we safer with Saddam gone? Yes, we don't have a hostile dicator controlling a state filled with oil. As bad as Iraq is, it's much less a threat to us with Saddam gone.

Of course you could argue that Iran rather than Iraq deserved dealing with first, or that US forces should have focused on Saudi or Pakistan or some other country, given limited US resources and a different list of threats to prioritize.

What is disheartening is that Dems don't act as a realistic check on the GOP. There is no alternative other than sappy romanticism of Third World and the belief that if we grovel enough we won't get attacked.

Dems won't even push isolationism (expel every Muslim that can be done, legally ala overstayed visa; prevent any from coming in; and watch the rest like crazy along with a sealed border and no more illegal immigrants). They have nothing other than the romantic anti-Liberalism and hatred of the modern world.

Dems hate Bush so much because he along with Nixon and Reagan represent the claiming of the classic Liberal Mantle from FDR and LBJ. Big Government in defense of conventional mores and the middle class. Something the trustafarians and self-selected elitists can't stand. Because they are elitists (progressivists) and because they know what they gave up.

And it is a tragedy of contemporary politics that the Democratic Party's shibboleth has become a conviction that the US is losing the Terror War and that almost all efforts at defense are illegitimate.

Hence the outrage from rank and file Democrats over the invasion of Afghanistan.

Oh, wait... Nice straw man you've got there. Whack away at it.

Personally I agree, no single action in the war on terror has been more effective than the invasion of Iraq.

At creating tens of thousands of new terrorists. And providing plenty of fodder for them.

Dems hate Bush so much because he along with Nixon and Reagan represent the claiming of the classic Liberal Mantle from FDR and LBJ.

ROTFLMAO! So this is what up is down and dogs and cats getting along looks like!

And for the record. Iraq is nothing at all like Vietnam.

In Vietnam US troops could walk in safety through most of Saigon. And of course the Vietnam was cost much less per month even with adjustments for inflation.

That, and Dubya had a plan to get out of Vietnam.

Davebo, davebo: Saigon during the Vietnam War (and ending it from Kissenger's perspective) as an ally. Baghdad, as you know, did not.

Of course, we could screw all the Kurds and allies outside the Sunni Triangle just like we screwed the South Vietnamese, but for the Democrats, hoping the Republicans will repeat the sins of Richard Nixon is the wet dream that just won't stop delivering.

Go back to sleep, Davebo.

Davebo...LMAO! #9 is a classic to be sure!

"That, and Dubya had a plan to get out of Vietnam"

I protest!

I was drinking coffee when I read that!!

My guffaw after reading that line spewed out of my mouth, ruining my slacks!

I tell you, Davebo, your humor is a menace!!

:)

> Hence the outrage from rank and file Democrats over the invasion of Afghanistan.

Actually, they were mostly a twitter about the Afghan winter, or was it summer? And, how Afghanistan is where empires always get defeated. Heck, look at what happened to the USSR.

Yes, congressional Dems voted for Afghanistan, as they voted for Iraq, but they set up their "I told you so"s first and were ready to fire. And, occasionally they let one slip when something bad happens.

Here's my prediction. If Bush fails in Iraq, a Dem will nuke Iran. (Yes, there will be intervening events, but cut-and-run eliminates a lot of options.)

And it is a tragedy of contemporary politics that the Democratic Party's shibboleth has become a conviction that the US is losing the Terror War and that almost all efforts at defense are illegitimate.

This is BS because this article is written is defense of Liberman. He is a Democrat.

The issue for me is that the campaign in Iraq is advertised as the epicenter of the war and has been conducted so incompetently from day one that it has become the war on terror not the other way around. As long as blogs like this and its commentators refuse to call for Bush being held responsible for his incompetentence your attacks on the Democratic Party are simply so much dreck.

Liberman is being held accountable for his inability to realize that Bush's handling of Iraq has created a political situation whereby the agenda of the President can constantly trump legitimate criticism. Much of Bush's domestic agenda is anathema to Democrats and many independents. When a war is being used to bankrupt the country under a guns and butter approach to policy and the butter is rancid(policies coming to fruition only because of the war) why should the Democrats support a member of their party whom will not speak out against those policies and that President? Why should Lieberman be allowed to make the false claim that the danger AQ poses is enough to suppress our contemporary notions of Liberty?

On a bell curve the success of AQ's 4 pronged strike by hijacked aircraft is on the extreme wings. Examining the fact we are dealing w/ people for whom suicide is a viable weapon, a non state status and leadership by e-mail does require a different type of response. But once that response included invading a country(break it you own it) and you failed to secure it your response to this cannot become Pontius Pilate and wash your hands of it by crucifying everyone whom says(correctly) this is no way to win a war let alone a campaign.
For supporting these actions Liberman truly is a Judas and deserves his fate.

"When a war is being used to bankrupt the country under a guns and butter approach to policy and the butter is rancid(policies coming to fruition only because of the war)"

I'm sorry, I'm not following your metaphor all the way through. Also - bankrupted? Are you talking about the deficit?

"you failed to secure it your response to this cannot become Pontius Pilate and wash your hands of it by crucifying everyone whom says(correctly) this is no way to win a war let alone a campaign."

If the Dems had an alternate plan this owuld make sense. Then we could weigh both alternatives and assess whether Leiberman was upholding the best one. but everything I've heard form the Dems has been either vague and therefore not useful, or ludicrous ("redeploy to Okinawa"), or would erase whatever gains we have made (and we have made some) ("cut and run").

So it's all very well to critique Lieberman for supporting Bush, but what do you propose instead?

This is Andrew Lazarus' clue to appear and inform me that there is no pony!

"As long as blogs like this and its commentators refuse to call for Bush being held responsible for his incompetentence..."

So Bush is incompetent?

"Bush's handling of Iraq has created a political situation whereby the agenda of the President can constantly trump legitimate criticism."

Hmmmmm. Maybe not.

Sounds like good strategery to me.

Whether the "War on Terror" is just another political shibboleth, like the "War on Drugs", the "War on Poverty", "War on Alcohol", "War on Jews", "War on Pornography", etc, may be both obvious and yet debatable, but the evidence seems overwhelming that Bush's war for oil has done a good job at incensing moderates in at least a dozen countries into supporting almost any anti-Americans no matter how fanatic, and changing the charges that the US is out to kill, rape, and torture Moslem men, women, and children, from a ridiculous propaganda charge to a charge that seems both credible and being proven to people across the Islamic world, both inside and outside the Arab world.

Bush has done a good job at multiplying the level of terrorism, at providing ongoing training to the Islamic terrorists originally trained by the CIA and others, in how to strike and kill US soldiers, and at convincing the world that the US is a public state sponsor of terrorism and torture.

It is oftentimes a mystery to myself why the US citizens are happy about these "accomplishments" -- the last (Bush' transformation of the US into a public state sponsor of terror and torture) seems a tragedy in direct contrast to George Washington's efforts to do the exact opposite (as G.W. made a name for himself opposing torture and war crimes).

Davebo, davebo: Saigon during the Vietnam War (and ending it from Kissenger's perspective) as an ally. Baghdad, as you know, did not.

Newsflash.. The war is over. Mission acomplished and all that. Did you miss the photo op or what?

Here's my prediction. If Bush fails in Iraq, a Dem will nuke Iran. (Yes, there will be intervening events, but cut-and-run eliminates a lot of options.)

And if the Orioles lose in the world series FIFA will abandon the world cup.

Sorry, Yehudit, I was busy.

There is no pony.

Whatever it was Bush intended to achieve in Iraq beyond the removal of Saddam is lost. Now, what Bush intended to achieve in the US still has potential: by Bush's own admission, he is leaving the IraqWagmire for his successor, so the theme that Democrats are weakies who refuse to tithe to the Minotaur may work in the 2026 election as well as it worked in the last two.

Let's just go to the tape: we're bringing our reconstruction effort to a close with Iraqi infrastructure more or less where it was when we started, but Cheneyburton's stock price up 800 percent. Sectarian violence is out of control. The Christians are fleeing. The remnant middle class is fleeing.

And in this mess, Joe Lieberman announced that Iraq is better off than a year ago. Maybe the voters of Connecticut prefer someone living on Planet Earth. Question: isn't it possible that even if the Iraq invasion was a good way to fight the War on Terror, that President Bush has bungled it irretrievably? Is there some cosmic law that precludes that? Is it irretrievable only if we liberals are persuaded not to mention it?

But, no, look at the comments on the Lieberman threads. What if we are about to turn the corner? (Again—sneer.) The Union was discouraged before taking Atlanta. Well, maybe. And the Confederacy was discouraged before losing the Battle of Five Forks, and two weeks later they were out of business. Concentrating on how even successful wars have had intermittent setbacks closes the eyes to the possibility (that is, the high probability) that this is not a successful war, that the personnel in charge of its strategery are clueless, and that the situation elsewhere (Somalia, Afghanistan) is deteriorating.

AJL's theory apparently is that Bush and Cheney are in it for the money. Do you have any idea how ludicrous that is? How did that meeting go in 99? "Hey Dick, listen, I got a great scheme thats gonna make us a fortune... now hear me out cuz its kinda crazy and it involves winning the presidency twice...".

Sure, these men that were already millionaires many times over decided to spend 8 of their remaining years (and probably lop 10 more off their lifespans with all the stress) running themselves ragged to pump up a stock price. Even Krugman might not consider that the best investment vehicle imagineable. But I guess part of being a conspiracy nut is not knowing you are a nut.

AJL, seems to me a Bush failure in Iraq and elsewhere is rather essential to your analysis. So what happens of Michael Yon, Zalmay Khalilzad, et al are right and Iraq is all but a done deal, with the "insurgents" not only defeated, but al Qaeda damaged and with diminished esteem. If true it'll eventually out no matter what the NYT keeps saying and hoping.

What then?

You always predicted and were supportive of US success in Iraq, right? Never waivered!

To debate whether the Iraqi war has been successful, one must first wade through a minefield of definitions of the war and its goals.

The original goals have all been discredited -- "nucular" weapons, weapons of mass destructions, chemical weapon laboratories, close ties between Saddam and al-Quaida (okay, this was just ludicrous propaganda from the outset), Saddam being responsible for 9-11.

Because the original goals shimmered and shifted into whatever was most useful for propaganda purposes, it is difficult to evaluate the strategy. If there was on real strategy, one could even argue there was no strategic failure per se. :)

To debate whether Iraq is happily liberated, one must debate what seems like inane questions, at least to me -- does skyrocketing child mortality, skyrocketing unemployment, brain and education drain (and kidnapping & murder drains thereto), and growing sectarian bloodsheet qualify in any way as success?

Is it success to stop Saddam torturing, and then have instead US torturers in the same facility, but not torturing nearly as many people?

Is it success to stop Saddam's slave trade, and instead have slave trade by contractors to the US military?

Is it success to popularize resistance to the US, and to cause skyrocketing recruiting growth for anti-US militants and terrorists? Maybe this is success for anti-US terrorist groups, and for arms dealers.

Maybe Iraq is a success in terms of growing anti-US terrorism and thereby growing the world arms market.

Surely it is a success from the point of view of convincing most Arab and Iranian citizens that the "Great Satan" is really a well-deserved epithet.

But asides from oil barons and arms dealers, other US citizens seem to be poorly served by these achievements of growing world and mideast terrorism.

"When a war is being used to bankrupt the country under a guns and butter approach to policy and the butter is rancid(policies coming to fruition only because of the war)"

Under what possible standard can you say we're being bankrupted? As a percentage of federal spending, the amount we spend on the war is miniscule. It's all those social "entitlements" that the Democrats insisted on that is bankrupting us. Not to mention Social Security, which the Dems refused to reform.

"Bush has done a good job at multiplying the level of terrorism"

Jeane Kirkpatrick, 1984: "But they always 'Blame America First'"

As if these people weren't looking to be Jihadists anyway. If they weren't coming after us in Iraq they'd be trying to get us over here.

"The issue for me is that the campaign in Iraq is advertised as the epicenter of the war and has been conducted so incompetently from day one"

In 1861 President Lincoln requested 75,000 90-day volunteers, figuring that after one or two Napoleonic battles the whole thing would be over. Oops. Lincoln was villified by the Dems then much the same way Bush is today.

But everyone's a genius, except those actually running the war. Oh yes, "Bush bungled it" yada yada yada.

But the reality is that war is not won by those who don't bungle things, because both sides always do. They are won by the side that makes fewer mistakes, a point that seems entirely lost on several commenters. Who's shoes would you really rather be in, Al-Qaeda's or ours? I'd say the latter.

Khalilzad. Didn't he recently approve that memo that the embassy's own employees are harassed at checkpoints and lie about where they work?

If Michael Yon is right, more credit to him. I opposed the war as a strategic blunder. I didn't expect quite this bad an endgame: I thought it more likely we would install Saddam Junior as a more pro-American dictator (see under: Mubarak) than watch the place devolve into civil war. The facts on the ground over the past fortnight are dismal.

Robert E. Lee never wavered, but he ended up surrendering anyway. Stop thinking of the war as a game of will.

To debate whether the Iraqi war has been successful, one must first wade through a minefield of definitions of the war and its goals.

I knew what my goals were for the war, and in my estimation they were a great deal more pressing than WMD. I can't say we've achieved them, but I didn't expect overnight miracles. According to both Omar at Iraq the Model, and Zalmay Khalilzad. I guess if you don't think the "bad neighborhood" was a bigger problem than mere WMD you might be dissatisfied, but I knew pretty much what I was getting.

Up at Cato Unbound you can find Reuel Marc Gerecht's latest argument for bombing Iran. I think I've covered the policy arguments on this score extensively elsewhere, so let me just note something in particular about Gerecht's essay. Like a lot of conservative writing on foreign affairs it puts a huge amount of weight on things like will, resolve, and perceptions of strength and weakness. It's a view of things that reminds me of nothing so much as the Green Lantern comics, which I enjoy a great deal but regard as a poor guide to national security policy.

As you may know, the Green Lantern Corps is a sort of interstellar peacekeeping force set up by the Guardians of Oa to maintain the peace and defend justice. It recruits members from all sorts of different species and equips them with the most powerful weapon in the universe, the power ring.
The ring is a bit goofy. Basically, it lets its bearer generate streams of green energy that can take on all kinds of shapes. The important point is that, when fully charged what the ring can do is limited only by the stipulation that it create green stuff and by the user's combination of will and imagination. Consequently, the main criterion for becoming a Green Lantern is that you need to be a person capable of "overcoming fear" which allows you to unleash the ring's full capacities. [snip]Suffice it to say that I think all this makes an okay premise for a comic book. But a lot of people seem to think that American military might is like one of these power rings. They seem to think that, roughly speaking, we can accomplish absolutely anything in the world through the application of sufficient military force. The only thing limiting us is a lack of willpower.

What's more, this theory can't be empirically demonstrated to be wrong. Things that you or I might take as demonstrating the limited utility of military power to accomplish certain kinds of things are, instead, taken as evidence of lack of will. Thus we see that problems in Iraq and Afghanistan aren't reasons to avoid new military ventures, but reasons why we must embark upon them: "Add a failure in Iran to a failure in Iraq to a failure in Afghanistan, and we could supercharge Islamic radicalism in a way never before seen. The widespread and lethal impression of American weakness under the Clinton administration, which did so much to energize bin Ladenism in the 1990s, could look like the glory years of American power compared to what the Bush administration may leave in its wake."

I don't even know what else to say about this business. It's just a bizarre way of looking at the world. The wreakage that the Bush administration is leaving in its wake is a direct consequence of this will-o-centric view of the world and Gerecht takes it as a reason to deploy more willpower.

"Robert E. Lee never wavered, but he ended up surrendering anyway. Stop thinking of the war as a game of will."

Robert E Lee was beaten by overwhelming conventional force.

The insurgency is incapable of winning by material force. They can only win if we CHOOSE to leave. Ergo, it IS a game of will.

The insurgency is incapable of winning by material force. They can only win if we CHOOSE to leave. Ergo, it IS a game of will.

And, of course, Lee did waver. It was Lincoln and Grant who didn't. Most of the Confederate establishment was willing to continue fighting, including Jeff Davis. They'd have, essentially, become a guerilla force; and they were more than prepared to do so. Lee nixed the idea before they could pull the threads together, and after he'd gotten some minor concessions about disarming and feeding his troops.

It's interesting that Andrew not only fails to equate the pro-slavery forces of 1864 with the pro-totalitarian forces of today, but he has the analogy completely bassackwards. And my comment about never having wavered was actually a reference to the fact that the Left will attempt to revise history if we win, sowing the impression that they were never against democratizing the middle east of fighting terrorism in Iraq after all. They were just demanding oversight, or some sort of purely technical adjustment.

Well, I suppose it depends what your objectives are. If the objective is to keep troops in some base in Iraq, then I suppose it's just a question of will. We do have the military might to do that.

I hadn't realized, however, that was our objective in Iraq. Setting up a functioning Iraqi state, which I took to be the objective, however naively, is not a question of will. I would have thought that chaos and civil war in Iraq is an insurgent victory, whether we choose to leave or to stay, or whether we choose to concede the point aloud or not.

These last two comments certainly explain why I refer to our continued presence in Iraq as tithing to the Minotaur.

Andrew #30:

Setting up a functioning Iraqi state, which I took to be the objective, however naively, is not a question of will.

Of course it is. Why wouldn't it be? Even if the strategy is to usher an ally across the finish line first they still need to draft us up to the point that we can confidently wave them ahead. This sort of thing isn't your forte, is it?

I would have thought that chaos and civil war in Iraq is an insurgent victory, whether we choose to leave or to stay, or whether we choose to concede the point aloud or not.

By this sort of logic the Germans won WWII at the Battle of the Bulge simply by outperforming low expections. You've redefined "victory" in a way that no general would. Again, not your forte, I guess. Or to put it another way, that guy who keyed your car won a victory over you that should now inevitably lead to your capitulation to whatever he desires. This may be a way to run your life, but it's not a way to run a nation, whether that's Iraq or the US.

Demosophist, what general defines victory your way: as long as we can keep soldiers somewhere in Iraq, we're winning? Your entire argument suffers from the Green Lantern folly, that it is possible to establish the Iraqi state with enough 'will', so all our efforts must be devoted towards opposing the liberals who weaken our will (less painful than stepping on an IED, too). All the will in the world won't get you to trisect an angle with just straightedge and compass.

Andrew:

Demosophist, what general defines victory your way: as long as we can keep soldiers somewhere in Iraq, we're winning?

This question isn't well formed. I thought you were talking about the "chaos" in Iraq as a "victory" for the insurgency? I'd first note that you haven't even been in Iraq, so the perception of chaos is conditioned by the media... or more to the point it's probably conditioned by a diliberate strategy by the insurgents to manipulate our media (not that this is tough to do). For most Iraqis life isn't chaotic.

But I don't understand what this has to do with defining victory as remaining in Iraq? We're there as an instrumentality. Victory, in that operation, would be seeing a liberal/democratic regime legitimized in the Arab Middle East. Whether we happen to be there at the time may or may not be critical, depending on the circumstances, but as the regime crosses the finish line of necessity we probably won't be much in evidence. At the very least we'll be "beyond the horizon" somewhere.

Note that the critical element to such a victory isn't as much military as political, and involves an extremely subtle transition. But make no mistake, getting there requires an extraordinary level of political will and commitment. I don't understand why this isn't obvious. If you don't comprehend the principles turn on OLN and watch the Tour de France for awhile. It'll come to you.

our entire argument suffers from the Green Lantern folly, that it is possible to establish the Iraqi state with enough 'will', so all our efforts must be devoted towards opposing the liberals who weaken our will (less painful than stepping on an IED, too). All the will in the world won't get you to trisect an angle with just straightedge and compass.

This is just jibberish. First, I don't know that will is sufficient, but I do know that it's necessary. There's nothing about that, that demands your Green Lantern paradigm. Moreover, the deneument actually requires that we recede into the woodwork, which admittedly also takes a form of will and political savvy. The point is that you're not even attempting to exercise the necessary judgment. Any sort of "victory" of the US appears to be illegitimate.

What I do know, beyond a doubt, is that "lack of will" is a recipe for defeat, and that will and judgment are both necessary (but possibly not sufficient).

Again, tune in OLN and watch the Tour for awhile. They should be getting to the mountain stages soon, where the men are separated from the boys.