More than 150,000 U.S. troops and nearly that number of mercenaries known as "independent contractors" -- many trigger-happy in their fright, never knowing who was the enemy -- lost the war early for the hearts and minds of Iraqi civilians, especially because of their indiscriminate and widescale use of torture and their casual acceptance of civilian "collateral damage." The stalemate war was on. Vietnam 2.0.
The U.S. occupying force made sure to protect the Oil Ministry in Baghdad, but no such effort was employed to protect its own troops, who were sitting ducks in their unarmored vehicles and without adequate body armor as well. Abandoned ammunition dumps around Iraq were left ung uarded by U.S. forces, and those armories supplied the insurgents with the bomb-making materials with which to set off their deadly improvised roadside explosives. (You go to war with the army you have, Rumsfeld said in the way of an explanation, a statement that verified that the war was launched precipitously without proper thought or contingency planning.)
The handwriting about Iraq has been on the wall for the past several years. The American people had concluded that the decision to go to war there was a ghastly mistake, and that we need to get our young men and women back home as soon as is practicable. The Iraqis agree. Poll after poll in Iraq indicates that U.S. occupying troops are regarded as a large part of the problem and should leave. The Iraq government agrees with Obama that most U.S. troops should be out of there within the next 16 months.
These re alistic assessments, plus the constantly swelling costs of the war (total estimates are now at one trillion dollars and climbing!) have created a genuine problem for CheneyBush and their neo-con supporters, as well as for GOP candidate John McCain. They don't want to leave. They don't plan on leaving. Their whole strategy is based on control of Iraqi oil reserves and permanent military bases in Iraq from which to alter and police the Greater Middle East.
But the Iraqis want the U.S. out of their country, the American citizenry wants the U.S. troops out of that country. How to square that20reality with the CheneyBush desire, as the world's remaining superpower, to control the geopolitics of that explosive region, one that houses much of the world's oil reserves? (The U.S. is the one superpower now; coming up fast on the outside are China and India -- and the comeback kid, Russia.)
The Republican/McCain solution to their Iraq dilemma seems to rest, as did the original decision to attack and occupy the country, on lies, deceptions, and obfuscations of the truth.
McCAIN IS BLINDSIDED ON IRAQ
CheneyBush see the calendar as their friend. If they can delay hard-and-fast decisions another six months, and if McCain were to win and thus complete Bush's third term, the original neo-con plan for Iraq could be re-installed.
In the meantime, starting in the Fall, tens of thousands of U.S. troops will start to "redeploy" from Iraq, making it seem as if America under the Republicans is winding down the war, thus stealing Obama's thunder. The reality, of course, is that such a withdrawal is for show, to help Bush and Cheney complete their tenure without having to admit the war was lost on their watch and to help McCain hold onto Republican voters. The troops easily can be re-inserted into Iraq after the election.
McCain has been riding the surge horse for months now, using its limited successes as a demonstration of his good judgement. (He never mentions the evidence of his bad judgement: That he voted eagerly to send troops into Iraq in the first place.) He also doesn't mention that without the Sadrist militias going to ground and the Sunni Awakening against Al Qaida-in-Iraq (which began months before American surge forces entered the country), there would have been no major dimunition of violence. Nor does he mention that the surge was designed as a breather to allow for political reconciliation to take place among the various Iraqi factions -- which still hasn't happened.
Iraq, for McCain, seems to be Vietnam all over again. His anger at the North Vietnamese guards (his term is "gooks") who mistreated him has never gone away, and all his Iraq talk about "not giving in...no surrender...we just need the will to win...courage in the face of hardship...stay the course" -- all these seem to be exhortations to himself, flowing from his painful years as a POW in 'Nam, rather than from political and military reality on the ground in Iraq.
Maybe that's why he seemed so unprepared last week when he was politically knee-capped by his handlers -- and before them, the Iraqi prime minister who publicly bought into Obama's timeframe for withdrawal -- all forcing him to make yet another contortionist flip-flop. In an instant, McCain went from Stay the Course for another 100 years if necessary, to OK, let's get out by 2010 (which of course long has been Obama's plan).
It's all B.S. political theater, and McCain seems very uncomfortable in the role of handled candidate, twisting to the tune of the daily party line. His body language is that of a reluctant, uncertain warrior, one forced by Obama's solid lead to lie, deceive, and even question the patriotism of his opponent -- this last desperate tack because McCain hasn't got much else to attack Obama with. He really wants to be the more moderate/maverick John McCain of olde, but he suspects he couldn't win the presidency with that persona, so he's willing to keep spouting the demented Republican party line.
Obama is doing a lot of shifting of positions as well, but seems much more skilled at making, or at least hinting at, believable transitions.
THE CHOICE FACING VOTERS
What we've got is the one-time "maverick" Republican, McCain, forced into becoming the standard-bearer for the HardRightists backing Cheney and Bush. In other words, McCain is tied to ultra-conservative po licies that simply don't work, and the public knows that. McCain, who sold his political soul in 2006 to gain the presidency, is chomping at the bit that he willingly permitted his handlers to insert into his mouth. On the other side, there is a Democratic centrist/reformer who's moving toward the middle-right, while disguising the changes with grand, smooth rhetoric.
