Benchmarks by Alan Adaschik

Our war in Iraq has nothing to do with fighting terrorism and everything to do with the New World Order bringing the world's nations under its domination and control. Obviously, if this were accomplished, terrorism would have no place to hide, but the cost of doing this would be to turn the entire world into a police state no different than Italy was under Fascism. The alternative solution, in keeping with American principles and ideals, is to properly view the terrorism issue as a criminal matter and use diplomacy to bring other nations into a cooperative world community where wrongful criminal behavior is discouraged and dealt with.

This latter approach, apparently, is lost upon George Bush because he has chosen to fight terrorism by attacking a weak and defenseless Arab nation that had no links to terrorism. Not only has this dreadful action served as a catalyst for world terrorism, but it has made America a pariah among nations and brought death and destruction to innocent people at the insane cost of over 100 billion dollars of borrowed money yearly. Many Americans can't afford health care or health insurance, but our President believes we should pay for an un-winnable war that will accomplish nothing other than play into the hands and designs of our enemies. Apparently, he also believes that fighting a useless and self- defeating war in Iraq is more important than providing disaster relief to stricken communities throughout the United States.

The issue is now that President Bush has gotten us into a quagmire in Iraq, how do we get out of it? There paths are possible; win the war, pull out gradually, or pull out immediately. Republicans, being the party cursed with President Bush as its leader, wish to win the war at all costs and judging by the first Republican political debate, are ready to expand their war into Iran. On the other hand in keeping with public sentiment, the Democrats want to end the war but only by pulling out gradually. Unfortunately, this approach has many downsides as staying the course and it is not what Americans really want. Our ignoble war in Iraq, wrongfully conceived, wrongfully justified, and wrongfully executed is not worth one more innocent life or one more dollar of taxpayer money. It was a mistake from the beginning, it is a mistake now and it is a mistake to end a mistake gradually or by degrees. Most Americans know this, but apparently the leadership of this Nation does not.

Let's step back for a moment and examine the three options before us. Can we wind the war in Iraq? Conventional wars are winnable. They are fought by opposing military forces that meet in head to head conflict. The force that kicks the "bejeebies" out of their opponent is the winner and the ware is won when one party can no longer mount a credible force against the other. The war in Iraq is not a conventional war. Instead, it started as a regime change and now has become a police action where our military forces are wrongfully being used to quell a belligerent and rebellious population. The regime change came easily when our superior military forces routed the Iraqi army. It was this victory that prompted George Bush to foolishly declare the end of military action in Iraq. However, he failed to grasp what was obvious to many and that was that all we had accomplished was set the stage for an unstoppable and endless panoply of carnage and bloodshed wrought by an enemy we cannot see or find.

In order to win in Iraq we have to counter and eliminate the tactics used by the insurgency These tactics include roadside bombs, suicide bombers, indirect fire attacks, and snipers. The defenses available to us are motorized patrols, coordinated sweeps and searches, checkpoints, pinpoint bombing, and fortified compounds and buildings. While these defenses and tactics may be successful to some degree, they will never come close to being 100% effective and the truth of the matter is that the only way to eliminate the threat we face in Iraq is to deny the enemy its source of men, arms, and munitions. As long as they have an unending source of troops and weapons, the tactics they use are unstoppable no matter how many troops we have or how much firepower we employ.

The obvious reality of our situation in Iraq is that the insurgency will never run out of men, weapons, and supplies because we are fighting them on their home ground in an area of the world where we are a hated foreign power that invaded a defenseless Arab nation. Furthermore, because we are a hated foreign power, every action we take against the enemy, necessarily generates more recruits willing to die fighting the evil they perceive within their midst. The terrorists portray us as the Great Satan; a nation where money decides everything and rich capitalists prey upon a downtrodden and subjugated people. They further posture that these rich capitalists want to bring the same despicable fate to the Nation of Islam; robbing it of its heritage, its religion, and most important, its oil.

By invading Iraq, George Bush served to validate everything the terrorists say about us and in the minds of the most Arabs we are the enemy. You cannot win the hearts and minds of a people by invading one of their nations especially when the invasion was without valid justification. Furthermore, it is the epitome of stupidity to think that because we believe we are the good guys, Arabs will harbor the same opinions as us, especially when they are bearing the brunt of our wrongful actions. Good intentions and the desire to spread democracy are meaningless to people living beneath the bombs we drop, in front of the guns we level at them, or in the jails we create to torture and humiliate those we think are guilty of acting against our interests.

This is why we will not win in Iraq and this is why the Arab world and most other people are against us. Like it or not, despite our good intentions, despite the fact that we think we are there to help, and despite the fact that we think we have God on our side, to most Arabs, we are the enemy and those we fight and label terrorist are defending their families, their homeland, and their religion against the invading infidels. Under these circumstances and only a fool would think victory is possible. Unfortunately, America is not only stuck with a fool for a President, but a fool who is incapable of admitting that he is wrong about anything. How many more Americans and other innocent people will die to so George Bush can avoid admitting that he is part of the problem and not the cure?

If victory is not possible and it is not, our remaining options are to pull out immediately or pull out gradually as "benchmarks" established by us are met. This latter option is the Democratic Party's "political" solution to the war and unfortunately, it is nothing more than wishful thinking. The Democrats fail to understand is that if the best and most powerful military machine in the history of the world cannot win in Iraq, certainly an un-motivated and poorly trained Iraqi army of questionable loyalty will never be able to succeed either. And as far as benchmarks are concerned, what kind of benchmarks are we talking about? Perhaps one would be to have the Iraqi parliament meet outside the walls of the Green Zone. If they survived the meeting, we could claim success and begin our pullout.

The truth is that anything we or the Iraqi government does can be undone by the insurgency. Nothing done there has any permanence or meaning while we are there because the insurgency will do everything in its power to destroy anything accomplished at our behest. Furthermore, benchmarks are an absurdity when the war is spinning out of control at an ever increasing rate. We have failed in Iraq in every sense of the word. However, instead of admitting defeat we avoid the obvious by establishing benchmarks that are impossible to meet because of our presence. Once the inevitable happens, our leaders will hypocritically posture that we didn't fail, the Iraqi government did because they did not meet our benchmarks. In other words, benchmarks are nothing more than a ruse to allow the leaders of this Nation to save face and blame someone else for the horrible and unconscionable mistakes they have made.

Unfortunately, irrespective of benchmarks, a gradual withdrawal of our troops from Iraq is also nothing more than wishful thinking. For once George Bush is right! The moment we announce a timetable for withdrawal and begin to bring our troops home, the insurgency will go on an offensive reminiscent of the Tet offensive. Didn't we learn anything from Viet Nam? Upon withdrawal of the first group of our troops, panic and chaos will ensue and what is supposed to an orderly withdrawal of our forces will quickly degenerate into a rout. Our war in Iraq is has failed and for the same reasons it failed, a gradual withdrawal of our forces will fail. The day we invaded Iraq and dissolved its army, our fate was sealed and nothing we do now will change the inevitable. We cannot win in Iraq and there is nothing that we can do that will enable our puppet government to survive after we are gone.

What will become of Iraq? In Viet Nam our leaders told us that if we abandoned the fight there, all of Asia would fall into the grips of Communism. They were wrong! How many of our finest young men and women died or were mutilated because our leaders were wrong about Viet Nam? Now our leaders tell us that if we abandon the fight in Iraq, a bloodbath will ensue and world terrorism will score a great victory. The truth is that Iraq is already a bloodbath because of our presence there and it is our wrongful invasion that has given world terrorism its greatest victory. We were wrong about Viet Nam and we are wrong about Iraq. Once again America is fighting a costly war and the men and women of our military are being mutilated and killed because of the intransigence and stupidity of our leaders.

It has been argued that it is better to fight terrorism in Iraq than here. At first glance this seems to be an acceptable justification for our war. Surely fighting somewhere else is better than fighting terrorism within our borders. However, the truth being ignored is that we are not fighting terrorism in Iraq. Furthermore, it is wrong and morally bankrupt to bring death and destruction to and innocent people who played no role in the creation of our problems just so Americans can sleep better at night. Thousands upon thousands of Iraqis are maimed or dead because we wrongfully invaded their nation and our leaders have the nerve to posture in front of the American people that this carnage is to our benefit. I am sure their families and friends take solace and great pride in knowing that their loved ones were mutilated or died so Americans would be more safe and secure.

We cannot win the war in Iraq and neither can the puppet government we created. The war there has been lost and even though the insurgency cannot win either, they are not going to give up and they are not going away because they live there. Time and location is on their side. Therefore, the longer we stay there the worse things become and the greater the consequences will be when we leave. We made a terrible mistake by invading and we are making an even bigger mistake by not cutting our losses and running. The only reason for not doing so is that we will have to swallow our pride and admit we were wrong and made a mistake.

The lesson we should learn from Iraq is one well known to our Founding Fathers and is near and dear to the hearts and minds of peace loving people everywhere; it is wrong for one nation to force its will upon another through military action for any reason. If our misguided and morally bankrupt leaders would just grasp this one simple truth, it could mean a new beginning for all of mankind. Tyranny will have been defeated, the rule of law will replace might makes right, and once again America will be able to legitimately claim that we have God on our side.