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Strong Stance on Iraq is Imperative for Democratic Victory
By Roger Bybee and Carolyn Winter
How do the Democrats fantasize that they can make serious advances in the coming mid-term elections without a clear position on the Iraq War, the elephant in the room?
Yet the Democratic leadership seems deaf and blind to both public opinion and the necessary elements for successful Congressional campaigns. We need a Democratic alternative to Administration policy in Iraq that goes beyond the timeline for leaving and includes clear opposition to pre-emptive war as a foreign policy option.
Polls conducted in mid-June by Pew Research, NBC/Wall St. Journal, and CNN all show between 52% and 57% favoring either a timetable for US withdrawal or an immediate reduction in troop levels. Even 72% of US troops in Iraq want the US out by the end of 2006. While no leading political figure finds the sentiment of Iraqi citizens worth mention, repeated polling shows that an overwhelming 90% of Iraqis want a US pullout.
At this critical juncture for the future of our country, it is essential that the Democrats, the purported opposition party, present an alternative to the current policies endangering our troops, innocent Iraqi families, and our national resources. Further, the Democrats need to offer another path for dealing with the world community. The Administration and Republican- controlled Congress have squandered U.S. moral leadership in the world by using military force and expanding its ring of military bases among mostly authoritarian allies in the former USSR and elsewhere.
In this context, it becomes more and more difficult to respond to crises posed by Iran and North Korea which demand more refined tools than the blunt instruments favored by Bush. With the Bush Administration fixated on Iraq as the imaginary key front in the Global War Against Terror, we are so over-extended in Iraq and Afghanistan that we have few resources available for coping with other, genuine issues of international concern.
With regard to Iraq, the Democrats should emphasize the Administration’s bristling contempt for both domestic and international public opinion. Despite the clear-cut consensus against the US war, the Bush Administration is ramping up for a permanent US occupation of Iraq. The foundations for this ongoing presence are currently being sunk in 14 permanent military bases and the colossal new embassy under construction (a monstrosity costing at least $592 million, located on 104 acres, six times larger than the United Nations compound in New York). Meanwhile, the US has asserted effective control over Iraqi oil resources in order to assure a steady supply of petroleum and high prices for Big Oil. The Democrats must offer another vision for the future that includes returning Iraq and its oil to the Iraqi public.
Given the lies that have paved the way to war and the sustained occupation, it is totally clear that the American public wants to be able to trust public officials and feel good about our role in the world. Perhaps nothing is as critical to Democratic victory this fall as establishing trust with the electorate and the re-establishment of an truly multilateral approach to world crises.
In the face of this clear message from the electorate, the Democrats wind up seeming even less trustworthy than the Republicans, because the Republicans at least have positions to which they cling tenaciously and echo continuously. The Republicans manage to display the qualities of resoluteness and consistency in their public statements. The Democrats need to oppose the falsehoods about the war through some straight talk of their own about an exit strategy, not just carping on past Administration lies.
The current debate over “timelines” illustrates how the Democrats clumsily try to generate a position without really taking a firm, coherent stance. After a week of meaningless debate and taking heat about “cutting and running,” General Casey proposed a plan that is fairly similar to the Democratic plans for phased withdrawal. However, the Democratic plans for addressing Iraq don’t seriously deal with the US purpose in being there at the current time. The critical questions of “Why are we in Iraq?” and “What are we trying to accomplish now?” must frame any Democratic alternative.
As it becomes more and more obvious that this is no longer merely a war between two sides as depicted by Bush and Co., our role becomes more and more dubious. Who are we supposed to be protecting? Who are we fighting, the Sunnis or the Shiite militias (backed at least tacitly by Iran) or Al-Quaeda?
If our mission is to protect civilian lives, why are US military operations so oblivious to the toll of human life (estimated at 100,000 Iraqi civilian deaths by the British medical journal Lancet)? If we are siding with the Shiites over the Sunnis, how does this fit in with our opposition to Iran? What about the relationship of the Iraqi Shiites in now in power with the rulers of Iran, especially since so many lived in exile there during Saddam’s rule. Amidst this constantly-shifting environment, who is truly our ally and who is our enemy?
These are critical questions as the U.S. occupation daily consumes more civilian lives in our pursuit of the war (even US-backed Prime Minister al-Maliki has forcefully taken the US to task), causes death and injury to our own troops, and spends enough daily to add to our national debt while forcing the slashing of domestic programs. (Rep Jack Murtha recently noted that the US war effort in Iraq has cost $450 billion, while the entire Persian Gulf War cost the US $5 billion.)
The Democratic alternative must put civilian lives, our troops’ lives, and reconstruction of Iraq at the heart of its policy. The Democrats must begin with a forceful, explicit repudiation of the Bush plan for a permanent occupation of Iraq. The Bush occupation not only incites nationalist resistance as it would in any sovereign nation, but provides a massive recruiting service for Islamic terrorism of the Al Qaeda variety. The US must also withdraw its military forces to defensive positions to both protect our troops and allow Iraqis to reclaim their country. Only a declaration for total and permanent US military withdrawal can hope to dampen the various insurgencies and convince Iraqis that they truly have self-determination and democracy. Only such a plan can induce the international community to step forward with vital assistance and credibility after enduring one expression of contempt after another from the Bush Administration.
With this approach, Democrats can say that strength in support of Bush’s hallucinatory objectives actually weakens the US’s proclaimed goal of “democracy promotion” in the world. Having goals that reflect the deeply-felt sentiment and needs of the vast majority of American and Iraqis is not weakness but wisdom.
But up until now, Democrats have been so defensive that they haven’t re-framed or seriously questioned the “strength” issue. Most American want to unsnarl the Iranian and North Korean threats with an international approach, but are stymied while the US is preoccupied with Iraq. Is American foreign policy based on the red-neck concept of being the meanest dude on the block, or on the Declaration of Independence’s notion of “a decent respect for the opinions of mankind”?
The Democrats must question the whole structure of our commitment to Iraq if they want to provide a meaningful alternative to the current policy. With Iraqis overwhelming wanting America out, where do Democrats think prolonging the current approach will go? If Democrats don’t oppose a brutal and devastating occupation of the country, they will share in the immorality and no one will care that they wanted a 10% less cruel approach than Bush.
While we admire the domestic politics of John Edwards and others committed to uplifting working families and the poor (who are currently entirely shut out from the growing prosperity of the richest 1%), there is no Democratic vision that will be meaningful in the November elections without putting the war front and center.
Everything is connected to the war as it shamefully wastes our youth and U.S. resources on a daily basis, while earning the enmity of almost the entire world. We can’t build a bright future for this country without our government playing a global role that embodies the democratic ideals and compassion of the American people and also saves sufficient resources for urgent domestic needs.
Roger Bybee and Carolyn Winter are Milwaukee-based writers and progressive activists. They can be reached at winterbybee@earthlink.net.
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