No second place winner, no "third way" solution -- it's March or Die time, folks.
It's Us versus an eighth-century "culture" of plunder, forced religious "conversions", and the mistreatment of women. The sooner we face this fact realistically and quit dancing around PC talking-point bullshit about diversity and tolerance, the better off we'll all be.
We didn't pick this fight -- which really has roots in Jimmy Carter's appeasement in 1979 of Islamists -- but we had damn well better see it for what it is, and be prepared to face it and finish it.
I'll put it bluntly -- I don't want Sharia law visited upon my women, and I don't want a goatroper "culture" infesting my land.
They picked the fight, so it's up to us to finish it -- balls to the wall, hammer and anvil, fire and blood and iron ... freedom is never, ever free, and the coin of the realm is human lives.
What we saw during Gulf War I was our military doctrine (high tech) versus Soviet (throw a lot of low tech iron at the problem) -- and we all know how that turned out.
What we have just seen in the three week trip to liberate Baghdad is Information-Tech, (Some are calling it Hyperwarfare...) or 21st Century warfare versus 20th Century...
I call attention to the fact that we, and Israel, are capable of waging 21st Century warfare, and the entire Arab world is not.
Time to kick the tires and light the fires...
Process women, children and elders through one center ... process all males of fighting age through another.
After 48 hours, ARC LIGHT the place to rubble, with MOABs thrown in for any hardened targets. Do it until not one stone stands on another. Then bomb it again.
Have the Marines man the perimeter through the action, taking any who surrender into custody, killing any who resist.
At the end, send in 100 D-9 cats and level the ground. Salt it and liberally sprinkle pig's blood and fat over it. Then let stand the following in the center of town:
Here stood Fallujah, until it was occupied by barbarians, terrorists, desecrators and those who harbored, abetted and aided them, who then committed atrocities against the United States of America.Repeat as required in other radical Islamic stronghold towns.The blood of any innocents who were held here is on the hands of the terrorists, extremists and those who gave them sanctuary.
Now there is nothing here but a desolation of pig-blood and salt.
Let the fate of this city be a clear message to all those who would consider committing similar atrocities against United States forces, personnel or civilians, and impeding the liberty of the Iraqi people.
To the innocent we allowed to escape we say --- De Oppresso Libre!
To the barbarians who died here we say --- Sic Simper Tyranis!
Yet, four years later, where does this leave us? Like the endless and equally contested debate over the case for going to war, nowhere. For better or worse -- better, in many ways -- we are where we are today.
And just where are we? Can this war be saved?
Militarily, the new counterinsurgency strategy -- the surge -- sends more troops to Baghdad and Anbar province to help Iraqi forces to provide security. It also involves more robust rules of engagement against all of Iraq's bad actors, al-Qaida, Sunni and Shiite.
Of course, you'd never know it when you listen to most Democrats and all anti-war critics. The only policy they consider a change of course is the change of course they favor -- heading for the exits before the job is done. So politicians deny Bush has changed course in Iraq. Why let facts get in the way of a base-pleasing "bring our troops home" talking point?
But the new troops who have arrived already know there's a change in strategy. That's why they're fighting in Anbar or living in Baghdad's Shiite and Sunni neighborhoods with Iraqi forces. The troops who'll arrive between now and the completion of the buildup in June know there's a change in strategy. That's why they're going to Iraq. And the Iraqis know there's a change of strategy.
It's one thing to want to pull out of Iraq, come what may. It's one thing to oppose Gen. David Petraeus' surge strategy because you somehow know it won't work, because you're invested politically or intellectually in defeat. It's another thing to insist that nothing's changed since last fall and that President Bush is simply "staying the course."
If anyone is staying the course today it's Democrats like Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who continue to say Bush is "staying the course." It's so Campaign 2006.
Of course, people who won't acknowledge a new strategy are unlikely to admit it shows signs of working. But Pelosi, Reid and the gang might ponder some of the encouraging news coming out of Iraq already.
Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash., a critic of the war's execution, returned from Iraq in late February with cause for "optimism." He said he believed the new plan would improve the situation there. Two weeks later, Arizona's Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano came back from Iraq and said the leaders and troops she met with are "cautiously optimistic that they're at least seeing improvement." After visiting, she was not ready to call for a U.S. withdrawal: "I think we're restoring stability."
NBC's Brian Williams was on the ground in Ramadi and had a similar take. Things were different this visit. The new strategy was having "an obvious and palpable effect" and "the war has changed."
They all better be careful or the Iraq war's "hear-no-good, speak-no-good, see-no-good" set will start calling them "neocons," whatever that now means.
What are the hints that "the war has changed"? Well, U.S. and Iraqi forces are taking on the Shiite militia -- with Nouri al-Maliki's Shiite-dominated government's blessing. Petraeus recently told USA Today that coalition forces have detained 700 members of the Mahdi Army, the biggest Shite militia in Baghdad. Its leaders have left town. Muqtada al-Sadr hasn't been seen in weeks, and the Pentagon says this Shiite cleric-thug is in Iran.
Lt. Gen. Abboud Qanbar, the Iraqi in charge of the Baghdad security plan, reported that 265 civilians were killed and 781 injured since the security crackdown's mid-February start. That compares to 1,440 killed and 3,192 injured the month before. He also said sectarian displacement was also decreasing, with about 2,000 families returning to their homes.
"The achievements of the last 30 days cannot only be evaluated by numbers and statistics," he told the Los Angeles Times, "but must also take into account the confidence of ordinary Iraqis that a positive change is taking place regarding security and being felt by people."
The results are tangible. Markets and stores are reopening. Security tips are up.
Of course, it's early yet. The surge of U.S. troops won't be complete until late spring, and the enemy will react and have his bloody say. Of course, Qanbar is invested in the crackdown's success. But these and other signs of progress suggest this new "last chance" strategy has a chance of success. Good news, unless you're somehow invested in the new strategy's failure. That is, if you can even bring yourself to acknowledge there is a new strategy.
David Reinhard, associate editor, can be reached at 503-221-8152 or davidreinhard@news.oregonian.com.
The latest proof came last month, as the Iraqi army - just a few months ago the target of scorn and abuse from Democratic politicians and journalists - forcefully reoccupied three cities that had served as key insurgency bases (Basra, Sadr City and Mosul).
Sunnis and Shias alike applauded as their nation's army compelled insurgent militias to lay down their arms. The country's leading opposition newspaper, Azzaman, led the applause for the move into Mosul - a sign that national reconciliation in Iraq is under way and probably irreversible.
US combat deaths in May also were down to 20, the lowest monthly total since February 2004. The toll for May 2007 was 121.
In a Washington Post interview, CIA Director Michael Hayden said we're witnessing the "near strategic defeat of al Qaeda in Iraq."
The Bush administration has taken heaps of abuse for its Iraq policy, including its decision to launch the "surge" last December. Now the strategy, which our nation's "best and brightest" regularly dismissed as a failure, has cleared the way for the establishment of a secure democracy in Iraq and a lasting peace.
It would be foolish to pop open the victory champagne yet. The truce between the Shia and Sunni in Iraq remains fragile; al Qaeda may well launch one more last-ditch offensive there (a la Tet 1968), in order to discourage the US and/or Iraq publics on the eve of the elections.
Meanwhile, we're still fighting a vicious insurgency in Afghanistan, and have yet to root out the al Qaeda remnants of along the Afghan-Pakistan border. And the continued threat of home-grown terror cells keeps European governments nervous.
In wars, however, trends have their own momentum. And the trend is running away from al Qaeda and its jihadist allies - not only in Iraq but also across the Middle East.
According to Hayden, al Qaeda faces a similar strategic debacle in Saudi Arabia.
And al Qaeda's fugitive leadership is learning that its former safe haven along the Afghan-Pakistan border is no longer so safe. Thanks to cooperation with Pakistan's new government, unmanned US Predator drones recently killed two top al Qaeda leaders there.
Once Gen. David Petraeus is confirmed as commander of US forces in the Middle East in July, he'll be able to apply the same strategy for victory learned in the Iraq surge to the war in Afghanistan.
In short, the larger War on Terror may be reaching a tipping point similar to that of the Iraq war.
The US public and policymakers need to recognize how this happened - and draw lessons from this success.
1) We need to acknowledge that the Iraq war wasn't a "distraction" from the War on Terror, as critics still complain, but its centerpiece.
It's not mere coincidence that our success against al Qaeda globally comes along with success in Iraq. For all its setbacks and frustrations, the Iraq war drew jihadists into a battle they thought they could win, because it would be fought on their home turf - but which they're now losing disastrously.
2) The US decision to "stay the course" in the Iraq war, which was also widely mocked and criticized, served to thoroughly demoralize the jihadist movement.
From its start in spring 2003, the Iraqi insurgency has been entirely built on the premise that it could use suicide and roadside bombings, sectarian slaughter and the torture and murder of hostages to force America out of the Middle East.
If Democrats had won the White House in 2004, the jihadists might have succeeded.
Instead, America doggedly refused to give in to terror, despite 4,000 combat deaths and massive antiwar sentiment, and unwaveringly supported an Iraqi government that was at times feeble and confused - and proceeded to break the jihadist movement's back.
In that interview, the CIA's Hayden also that al Qaeda is no longer able to use the Iraq war as a way to draw in new recruits. The reason is clear: If you go to Iraq to fight the American infidel you will die, and die for nothing.
3) Finally, the Bush administration's success in Iraq, and growing success in the War on Terror, offers a powerful object lesson in how to deal with the continuing threat from Iran.
Iran remains the most lethal state sponsor of terrorism, fomenting proxy wars in Lebanon and Gaza, and in Iraq itself. Its nuclear-weapons program proceeds despite minor sanctions and endless international efforts at engagement.
Now the Bush administration has shown the way for the next president. Instead of trying to "understand" the enemy, disrupt and defeat his plans. Instead of listening to domestic critics, act in the nation's best interests. Instead of relying on multilateral support to decide what to do, go it alone if necessary.
Instead of worrying about an exit strategy, realize that there's no substitute for winning.
Arthur Herman is the author of "Gandhi and Churchill: The Epic Rivalry That Destroyed an Empire and Forged Our Age," just published by Bantam.
