Democrats Are Willful Ignoramuses over Iraq

The willful ignorance of so much of the Democrats’ commentary on the president’s speech today on Iraq (read it here) is outrageous. It will either be their ruin, or that of the U.S.’ security and of all in the MidEast who care about a democratic and economic progress that directly benefits its peoples.

President Bush today fired a fact-filled torpedo at the rusty hull of the Democrats’ ship of fools. It will be up to us to see that the barrage finishes sinking that ratfull rustbucket.

As the Washington Post reported, Democrat “opposition leaders [were] rushing out critiques, in some cases even before he had finished speaking in Annapolis.”

That exemplar of an administration whose foreign and military policy ineptitude and timidity through the ‘90’s encouraged bin Laden and Saddam that the U.S. is a paper tiger whose threats’ credibility was laughable all the way across the MidEast, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, was wheeled out on cue to say, “I so wish I could believe him. I like to believe an American president. But he’s got such a credibility issue.”

Such vaunted nonmilitary but political backknifers as Teddy Kennedy, employed his experience in lowlife womanizing as “he called Bush’s speech ‘lipstick’ on a failed Iraqi strategy.” And that venomous sound bite queen Nancy Pelosi, without reading the “Our National Strategy for Victory in Iraq” that accompanied the president’s speech immediately “dismissed [it] as ’35 pages of rhetoric on old sound bites.” (Only 24 pages on my printer, with easy to follow bullets and highlighting, even she might understand; read it.)

The Senate Democrats even fell into a catfight over which would center stage their predetermined harping:

“Here’s what was supposed to happen: Harry Reid designated Senator Jack Reed (no relation) to do the rebuttal to Bush’s speech. Indeed, Reed had done the “prebuttal” the day before (showing just how open-minded the Democrats were to Bush’s proposal). Apparently miffed at being bypassed for the spotlight for some senator no one’s ever heard, Kerry called his own competing press conference for this morning. Naturally Kerry’s presser would get more coverage than the obscure Reed’s, so in order to maintain the appearance of a united (and mature) Democratic front, minority leader Reid had to combine the two press conferences. Naturally, Kerry’s antics have created some ill-will amongst his fellow democrats.” [HT: Instapundit]

True to the Clinton triangulation tactic of being on all sides of an issue, Hillary continued her 2008 branding campaign as the “other white meat” mealy mouth. “I take responsibility for my vote [authorizing the war], and I, along with a majority of Americans expect the president and his administration to take responsibility for the false assurances, faulty evidence and mismanagement of the war.” Simultaneously, she said the U.S. must “finish what it started.” In other words, “Stay the course, follow the Bush war agenda, but sit in the back seat and bitch the whole time.” [HT: theglitteringeye.com]

President Bush, on the other hand, was unwavering. He outlined the composition of the approximately 10,000 insurgents (compared to the 27-million other Iraqis), as “a combination of rejectionists, Saddamists and terrorists.” Sunnis are leaving the opposition to “peaceful participation in the democratic process.” Further, “hard-core Saddamists…lack popular support and therefore cannot stop Iraq’s democratic progress.” The “most lethal” are foreign terrorists “affiliated with or inspired by al Quaeda.” About them, “These terrorists have nothing to offer the Iraqi people. All they have is the capacity and the willingness to kill the innocent and create chaos for the cameras.”

President Bush outlined three elements of his strategy: 1. “[F]ree societies are peaceful societies, so we’re helping the Iraqis build a free society”; 2. [W]e’re working to build capable and effective Iraqi security forces…[to] eventually take responsibility for the safety and security of their citizens without major foreign assistance” ; and 3. [W]e’re helping the Iraqis rebuild their infrastructure.” The accompanying 35 (or 24) page National Strategy for Victory provides much more details.

Over half the long speech stressed the importance of and the signal progress in building effective Iraqi security forces, with many details (accompanied by more in an appendix fact sheet), and that success can only be undermined in Washington’s Democrat salons.

“As the Iraqi forces gain experience and the political process advances, we will be able to decrease troop levels in Iraq without losing our capability to defeat the terrorists. These decisions about troops will be driven by the conditions on the ground in Iraq and the good judgment of our commanders – not artificial timetables set by politicians in Washington.

“Some are calling for a deadline for withdrawal….Setting an artificial deadline to withdraw would be a signal to our enemies -- that if they wait long enough, America will cut and run and abandon its friends. And setting an artificial deadline to withdraw would vindicate the terrorists’ tactics of beheadings and suicide bombings and mass murder – and invite new attacks on America.”

“Victory in Iraq will demand the continued determination and resolve of the American people….I will settle for nothing less than complete victory….Before our mission in Iraq is accomplished, there will be tough days ahead.”

As President Bush said, “it’s not realistic to expect a fully functioning democracy, able to defeat its enemies” in just three years.

A political strategist for John McClain commented: “What they’ve got to do is win this argument and correct the misinformation that’s out there about what’s going on in Iraq and do so while leveling with the American people that it’s going to be a long, hard slog.”

There’s not much more that President Bush could have done in his speech, to any who would listen. There’s not much less listening than exhibited by the Democrat leadership. The mainstream media’s repetition of the Democrat’s whine is predictably incestuous, and exclusion of most of what President Bush presented is predictably slanted, as one can see from the leading media articles linked above, and here and here at the New York Times.

As Max Boot reflects:

“Just a few years ago, it seemed as if the Democrats had finally kicked the post-Vietnam, peace-at-any-price syndrome….Now that the war has turned out to be a lot harder than anticipated, the Democrats want to run up the white flag.”

Boot continues:

”The Democratic mindset – cakewalk or cut and run – has already had parlous consequences. It is the reason why President Clinton did not take meaningful action against al Quaeda in the 1990’s. He figured that a serious military response – an invasion of Afghanistan or even a covert campaign to aid the Northern Alliance – would run steep risks, like body bags coming home….leading our enemies to think that we were, in Osama bin Laden’s words, a “paper tiger” that could be attacked with impunity….”Things may develop faster than we imagine,” al Quaeda’s deputy commander, Ayman Zawahiri, apparently wrote to Abu Musab Zarqawi, the top terrorist in Iraq. “The aftermath of the collapse of American power in Vietnam – and how they ran and left their agents – is noteworthy.” Even more noteworthy is that so many Democrats seem so sanguine about letting history repeat itself.”

The rapidly increasing performance of the Iraqi forces is central. For those swayed by the fearmongering from the Democrats, seeking to exploit misapprehensions created by their defeatist mythbuilding about Vietnam, an important corrective book was recently published: “The Battle of An Loc” by James Willbanks. In 1972, North Vietnam launched the Easter Offensive against South Vietnamese forces during the process of "Vietnamization" to turn the war over to the South Vietnamese army. An Loc, the capital of Binh Long province 60 miles north of Saigon, was besieged for three months by North Vietnamese forces, which wanted to accomplish a 1954-like Dien Bien Phu to get their way in another Geneva. In a battle that would result in over 150,000 combined belligerent casualties, the South Vietnamese would distinguish itself by defeating the Peoples Army of North Vietnam. Unlike 3-years later, when the Democrat Congress had cut off U.S. air support and supplies, U.S. advisors and air support – as Willbank details – were critical factors in that victory by South Vietnamese forces, directly and in sustaining morale by affirming U.S. willpower.