IraqWhy We Want to Win This War

It is high summer in Washington, and there is one heck of a storm brewing on the banks of the Potomac River. Across the nation’s capital, senators and presidential candidates are lining up at the lectern to advocate a foolhardy policy of early withdrawal from Iraq. Politicians from both sides of the aisle are willfully ignoring the consequences that such an act would have on the viability of a sovereign and democratic Iraq, on the future of American interests in the Middle East, and on the ability of the United States to prevail in the larger struggle against Jihadist Fundamentalism.

The cut-and-run politicking of Congressional Democrats and wobbly-kneed Republicans flies in the face of good sense and the lessons of history. It is neither right nor reasonable to initiate a politically orchestrated retreat during a critical moment in the struggle for the future of the Iraqi Republic. The consequences of American withdrawal from Iraq would be disastrous for the Global War on Terror and fatal to the nascent republics of Iraq and Afghanistan.

In Iraq, the power vacuum that an American military exit would create would invite competing sectarian insurgents and militias to enter into an ever-escalating contest for control of individual neighborhoods and major cities. American forces in Iraq today are the primary providers of order and control in a society beset by ethnic and sectarian divisions.

Although it would be preferable in the long term for the principal provider of order and control in Iraqi society to be a sovereign and democratic government of Iraq (perhaps with the assistance of an effective, professional, and constitutionally-limited Iraqi Army and police force), at present, neither the government of Iraq nor the Iraqi armed forces are independently capable of being “the principal provider of order and control.” The untimely exit of American forces would unleash the pent-up fury of sectarianism and agitation in such a way that the collapse of democratic government in Iraq, the dark descent into ethnic and religious atrocity, and the rise of illiberal militant fundamentalism, would be all but certain.

A partial troop drawdown, popular as it is amongst moderate Democrats and Republicans, is in fact the worst possible option. It would trap the remaining American troops in a last-ditch rear-guard action against insurgents bolstered by the belief that their car bombs and suicide attacks are finally sending American forces packing.

Indeed, a drawdown of any form would provide serious psychological ammunition for anti-democratic, anti-American forces in Iraq and in other areas of the Middle East. In this respect, Afghanistan is an area of particular concern. The Taliban forces thoroughly routed by the militaries of the United States and its allies in 2001 are staging a bid to regain lost ground through the use of murder-kidnappings and car-bomb attacks on Afghan civilians – tactics borrowed from the insurgency in Iraq. Should the United States withdraw from Iraq now, the move would most certainly be interpreted by Taliban forces in Afghanistan as a sign that terror-bombing and terror-kidnapping, when carried out with sufficient regularity and intensity, are an effective fighting strategy against the United States.

The history of the Second World War does not begin with a ticker-tape victory parade down New York City. Neither should Americans expect an easy victory in Iraq. The struggle to defeat illiberal militant fundamentalism and to restore liberty, security, and sovereignty in Iraq and Afghanistan has been long and difficult. But history is made in trying times. And there is reason to hope that the tide is truly turning.

In their tour de force article, “A War We Just Might Win,” featured in the July 30 edition of the New York Times, Michael E. O’Hanlon and Kenneth M. Pollack of the Brookings Institute (a prominent center-left think tank in Washington, DC) described what they observed on their most recent visit to Iraq. The two veteran strategic analysts, both of whom have outspokenly criticized the President’s handling of the war in the past, write, “the most important thing that Americans understand is that we are finally getting somewhere on Iraq.” As evidence, Pollack and O’Hanlon cite a one-third drop in the number of civilian casualties since the beginning of the troop surge, the outpouring of civilian antagonism towards Al-Qaeda and sectarian militias that have indiscriminately targeted Iraqi civilians in raids and street bombing, and the marked improvement in the training, coordination, and morale of the Iraqi security forces.

There are two decisions to be made regarding the war in Iraq, and they ought to be made independently of each other: the first is the decision over whether or not to go to war, and that decision has already been made. Now, we must decide whether or not we want to win.

If we choose not to do what it takes to win the war in Iraq today, the geo-political realities of the Global War on Terror will force us back to the deserts of the Middle East in the not-so-distant future. The costs and circumstances of that war are unknown to us – but for one simple condition: it is then that we will reap the fruits of our efforts in this current struggle. If we are to create a legacy of success, we must act with tenacity and dogged conviction to meet and overcome the difficult challenges that face us now on the geopolitical stage. Only in this way can we prevail over an enemy who seeks to disrupt and destroy our way of life, as well as the peace and stability of the Middle East.