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Abandoning the Democrats’
Timeline Idea, That’s a Good Thing
War on Terror/Frank
Salvato, Managing Editor |
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November 18, 2005
- This week the Senate blocked an attempt by Democrats
to force the White House into establishing a timeline for troop withdrawal
from Iraq. This rebuke is a good thing. If the Democrats were to have
succeeded in mandating a timeline it would have done two things; given al
Qaeda in Iraq and Saddam loyalists a timetable for their next offensive, and
signaled the surrender of the Republican Party to the pollsters.
It cannot be repeated enough; for the United States to establish a timeline
for troop withdrawal from Iraq is to aid the enemy in their quest for
victory. It is tantamount to telling them straight away that if you just
wait until such-and-such a date you can save all of the terrorist lives and
ammunition you would have used battling coalition forces so that you can use
it to roll into Baghdad unhindered by superior firepower. It is a kin to
bringing Abu Musab al Zarqawi into the Pentagon for an operations briefing.
It is a stupid idea and anyone who believes such a timeline should be
established joins the ranks of the terminally moronic.
The fact that the liberal left still doesn’t understand the very simple set
of goals already repeated ad nauseum by the president, his staff, and the
Pentagon only goes to reinforce the thought that either those leading the
left are significantly devoid of the sense of hearing or too intellectually
challenged to understand what has been laid out in language so simplistic a
third grader could understand it.
President Bush has stated quite a few times that US forces will start to
leave the Iraqi theater as the Iraqi government begins to competently
takeover its own security operations. It is a process that requires thorough
vetting and intensive training. To prematurely depart before this process is
completed in total is to invite opposition forces (read terrorist entities)
to exploit the Iraqi military’s weaknesses. It would also place the
fledgling government at the mercy of nefarious forces whose tactics mirror
the transgressions of the not too distant past, paving the way for a
re-emergence of the criminal human rights violations that were outlined in
the three premier reasons for toppling Hussein in the first place.
Already we are beginning to see the barbaric component of the old Arab
culture quietly creeping into the promise of a new era in the Arab World.
This week, US and Iraqi troops raided a ‘secret jail’ housed in an Interior
Ministry building in Baghdad. Inside they found over 173 starving prisoners,
mostly Sunni Arabs, bearing the unmistakable signs of torture and abuse.
While Iraqi Major General Hussein Kamal, the Interior Ministry’s
under-secretary for security, said that all those being held in the facility
were "terrorists,” it is clear that transition from the totalitarian and
tyrannical tactics of Saddam Hussein’s regime to a truly free democracy
requires more than simply training Iraqi troops in the tactics of war. It
requires the evolution of the basic Arab and Islamic mindsets of brutal
dominance – might makes right – to one of not only religious tolerance but
non-violent conflict resolution.
I find it important, albeit sad, to have to state for the record that the
tortured souls that were liberated from the Interior Ministry building in
Baghdad were not tortured at the hands of US soldiers or those under their
control. Rather, they were abused by those who embrace the Arab mindset of
old. Because the mainstream media and the liberal left cannot be trusted
with open-ended information, lest they make false statements against our
troops, this needed to be stated, pathetic as it may be.
Senate Minority Leader and political opportunist Harry Reid said of the
Senate vote, "Democrats and Republicans acknowledged that staying the course
is not the way to go. This is a vote of no confidence on the Bush
administration policy in Iraq." Of course, this, once again, is the exact
opposite of the truth.
The vote approved by the Senate actually requires the Bush Administration to
stay the course. It simply mandates the Bush Administration to – for the
zillionth time – define what the course of action is (and always has been)
while stating their requirements for withdrawal. Again, either Reid is
exhibiting his intellectual shortcomings or he is being a disingenuous,
politically partisan opportunist.
Reid’s additional statement that, "Iraq now risks becoming what it was not
before the war – a haven for international terrorists," further calls into
question whether he actually reads the intelligence reports afforded him or
just skims the Executive Summaries.
It has been well established that Hussein not only helped train terror
operatives for "jihad” against the US and other Western allies, even
rewarding families of martyrs with monetary awards, but that he hosted the
Ninth Popular Islamic Congress of 1999 which Ayman al-Zawahiri attended.
Iraqi intelligence documents confiscated by US forces after Iraq’s
liberation further place Hussein in the thick of anti-American/anti-Western
terrorist efforts in Somalia and across the Arabian Peninsula. In light of
just these few facts, of which there are literally hundreds more, Reid’s
statement is incredulously devoid of substance.
It cannot be denied that Iraq is part of the War on Terror and that it is
better to be fighting the ground battles of this war on the streets of Iraq
than on the streets of New York. Saddam Hussein aided, abetted, gave safe
haven to, promoted and took part in terror campaigns against the US and the
West throughout his tyrannical reign. To deny this is to deny the truth. To
champion Senator Reid’s position over these truths is to be seditiously
without a clue.
Related Reading:
Senate rejects pullout timeline
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20051116-121615-9551r.htm
US raid finds 200 victims in secret Iraqi 'torture' jail
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7374-1874245,00.html
Iraq: Former PM Reveals Secret Service Data on Birth of al Qaeda in Iraq
http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.php?cat=Terrorism&loid=8.0.169852178&par=0
Exclusive: Saddam Possessed WMD, Had Extensive Terror Ties
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewSpecialReports.asp?Page=%5CSpecialReports%5Carchive%5C200410%5CSPE20041004a.html
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Frank Salvato is the managing editor for The New Media Journal.us. He
serves at the Executive Director of the Basics Project, a non-profit,
non-partisan, socio-political education project. His pieces are regularly
featured in Townhall.com. He has appeared on The O’Reilly Factor and
numerous radio shows. His pieces have been recognized by the Japan Center
for Conflict Prevention and are periodically featured in The Washington
Times as well as other national and international publications...
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