I Agree With George Bush

I must admit that the man has got it 100% right this time. His assertion that withdrawing from Iraq would be catastrophic is right on the money. The only problem being that the alternative, not withdrawing, is creating a catastrophe of equal proportion. This is the reality that is rarely discussed. Simply stated: We can't possibly leave Iraq and we can't possibly stay.

Just before the invasion I wrote that the best case scenario after invading Iraq would be catastrophic. Well here we are, holding a tiger by the tail. The best analogy I've heard is that of having driven off a cliff. This is appropriate because when you are in the air travelling at 32 feet per second downward, there aren't whole lot of effective solutions. If you have a gun handy, you can always shoot yourself in the head before you hit, short of that you are about to die on impact.

The truth is, contrary to what you hear in the mainstream media, we aren't in a war. Media outlets outside the United States correctly refer to the "occupation" rather than the "war". We are in an occupation and you can't WIN an occupation. You just occupy a country and at some point you are no longer occupying it. The Presidents call for victory is misleading hogwash.

I would argue that if this is considered a win or lose scenario, we have already lost. To win a military campaign you must achieve the political goals which you believe created the need for military intervention. Our goal was to seek and destroy WMD's and then somehow morphed into creating a stable democracy. The WMD's never existed, and any hope of a Western style democracy evaporated with the Samara bombing in February of 2006. So by the standards of achieving political and military goals, we have no chance of either. It's hard to argue that a country who sets forth military and political goals, launches an invasion to achieve those goals, and fails to achieve any of them hasn't lost the military campaign. Now we just stay and watch the horrific slaughter, then eventually leave and watch more horrific slaughter.

If this is freedom, I suspect that most Iraqis would rather be alive than free.