Stop Me Before I Vote Again

Among the delights that paid-up attendees will be getting is a personal presentation on the sexy subject of "A Responsible Plan To End The War In Iraq." Gotta love the "responsible" part -- as if Luther had flinched at the last minute, while nailing his theses to the church door, and smashed his thumb instead of the nailhead.

This "responsible" plan emerges over the names of several Congressional aspirants -- people who would dearly like to become responsible for the war in Iraq -- bolstered by those obligatory legitimators of the electoral pwog, a general or two.

The Plan makes mighty dull reading, but here is what I take to be the crux of it. We need to

...Create the capacity for nation-building and the use of diplomatic power by both the United States and the international community...

President Bush ran for election in 2000 saying, “I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation building.” But by late 2005, the Pentagon had issued a directive declaring nation-building to be a “core U.S. military mission.” And although the Pentagon had asked the State Department to provide expertise and people, the State Department has indicated they don’t have the capacity or the staffing to do so.

“I’d rather have more members of the State Department on the field than soldiers on the field.” --General John Abizaid (ret.)
Former Commander, United States Central Command
October 2007

The Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) currently operating in Iraq are a good start, but are too small in scope and structure to create the transformation that is required. We propose the expanded use of non-military personnel working at the grassroots level to strengthen the capacity of towns and villages to resist the insurgency on their own, as well as an internationalization of the effort. The end goal should be the creation of a network of local PRTs reaching the entirety of the Iraqi population, thus addressing the medical, agricultural, educational, and commercial needs of the population served.

Do they really think that this is possible? I bet they do. I bet they go into office next winter fervently believing that the circle can be squared in some such fashion. I bet it takes them a good six months or so to acknowledge, sadder but much, much wiser, that the natives have proven unworthy of their trust, and it turns out the machine guns are necessary after all. But these are Pwogs, and Democrats, so you can be sure the weaponry will be deployed in a more measured, judicious, smart way -- a la Kosovo. Or Vietnam.

The mugged-by-reality pwogs will look back on their younger, idealistic, out-of-office days with an indulgent, retrospective glow; and at the same time, their earlier good intentions will strangely radiate forward and shed a gentle forgiving luster on the ensanguinated jowls and dripping fangs of once-well-intentioned managers of empire, junior division.