Legislating Defeat

I am usually willing to give political figures the benefit of the doubt regarding their motives. I have assumed that for the most part, the Democrats were simply incompetent and shortsighted on the issue of Iraq. They may have tried to milk it for political gain, but I did believe that most Democrats, if given the chance, would not actively sabotage the war effort.

But now, it seems apparent that congressional Democrats- the rank and file, not just a few far leftists- are indeed working for America's defeat. Although they ignored the surges beneficial effects, and tried to smear General Petraeus, I did not think that they would sink to actively attempt to undermine the effort.

It is obvious to anyone who has any knowledge at all of the Iraq War that it is mostly a political war. Militarily, the U.S. has destroyed Al-Qaeda- we have killed over 55,000 insurgents. If the U.S. is defeated, it will be because the political situation there is unstable and unmanageable, not because our losses will by so high as to be unsustainable.

In order to achieve a political victory, it will obviously be necessary to enlist the aid of, or at least not antagonize unnecessarily, Iraq's neighbors such and Iran (and the Democrats don't have much of a track record on Iran) and Turkey.

Although Turkey doesn't get much attention from the media, Turkey is a reasonably powerful country- and a key part of our supply line to Iraq. Turkey is one of our few Middle Eastern allies. In fact, the is only one major bone of contention between the two countries, and that is the subject of the Kurds- we support them, and the Turks don't.

Now, given that the Turks play such a large role in the politics of the region, it seems that it would be an easy decision not to unnecessarily antagonize them. Even the most naive individual could see that.

Congress, however, is frantically trying to pass a resolution condemning Turkey for genocide against the Armenians- ninety years ago. Apparently, the Turks object to the claim that they were responsible for genocide- they claim that while they allowed it, they didn't actually order it, or some such dumb explanation.

Even though the Turks might be a bit oversensitive about the subject, there is absolutely no need to suddenly condemn them for something that happened nearly a century ago. The Turks seem to agree, as the Turkish ambassador indignantly left the country after the bill was introduced.

Such a reaction was fairly predictable. The Democrats don't have to believe that entering Iraq was a good idea. They can believe that an immediate pullout would be the best course of action. They cross the line, however, when they start legislating defeat. They may see the Iraq War as Bush's War, but that does not give them the right to sabotage.