Posted by: Jon Henke on Wednesday, April 05, 2006 It will be dismissed casually as "cut and run" defeatism by many, but John Kerry's column calling for an exit from Iraq contains an item worth serious consideration. Leave aside the parts with which you disagree, and consider this point... As our generals have said, the war cannot be won militarily. It must be won politically. [...] So far, Iraqi leaders have responded only to deadlines — a deadline to transfer authority to a provisional government, and a deadline to hold three elections. The Right has long preached the value of incentives and the stultifying damage produced by welfare. It's not a great stretch to apply the same incentive problem to Iraq. Kerry suggests... Iraqi politicians should be told that they have until May 15 to put together an effective unity government or we will immediately withdraw our military. If Iraqis aren't willing to build a unity government in the five months since the election, they're probably not willing to build one at all. The civil war will only get worse, and we will have no choice anyway but to leave.Without endorsing the rest of his column, I want to point out that forcing Iraqis to cope with the consequences of their political intractability, of their sectarian struggle for political advantage, is a very legitimate suggestion. Iraq war supporters ought to consider it. My own preference would be to draw back to the desert, forcing Iraqis to cope with the demands of their emerging society, with US troops available only for support and emergencies. Kerry concludes with the kind of thing we've been saying for a long time... For three years now, the administration has told us that terrible things will happen if we get tough with the Iraqis. In fact, terrible things are happening now because we haven't gotten tough enough. |
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