The Case for Defeatism: Why Harry Reid Was Right

[babylonsister]

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/7406

The Case for Defeatism: Why Harry Reid Was Right
by Ted Rall | May 11 2007


"I believe...that this war is lost," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Obviously he's right (and overdue). Amend that: he was right. Within 24 hours Democrats were backpedaling, stampeded by the usual onslaught of scorn and pseudo-patriotic outrage from Fox-fed GOP dead-enders.

snip//

The trouble is, Bush did define what victory in Iraq would look like. By Bush's standards, we lost.

" possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons," he told a crowd in Cincinnati four months before the war. "It is seeking nuclear weapons...If we know Saddam Hussein has dangerous weapons today--and we do --does it make any sense for the world to wait to confront him as he grows even stronger and develops even more dangerous weapons?"

If the U.S. invasion force had found stockpiles of biological, chemical or nuclear weapons in Iraq, we could have claimed victory. Although critics would have remained disgusted with the sleazy origins of this roll-the-dice war, we would have been forced to concede that Bush had validated his policy of preemption.

snip//

Harry Reid should stand by his statement: the war is lost. Winning isn't on the table in Iraq. Neither is damage control. Genocide and civil war, and perhaps balkanization into smaller ethnic-enclave states, will almost certainly tear Iraq apart--with or without a U.S. troop presence.

In Afghanistan and Iraq, defeatism is a synonym for realism.

[theoldman]

1. If you look at what Bush was trying to accomplish, the war is lost.

The question is "What did we win"? Nothing that I can see.

[Rydz777]

2. "Defeatism is a synonym for realism"

Won, lost, defeat, victory are emotionally loaded words. They are regularly used by Bush for that very reason. He knows the American people hate to lose. I wish we could frame the debate simply in terms of realism and rationality.

The war is irrational on so many levels: (1) We've lost more American lives than on 9-11 with no end in sight; (2) We can't afford what we are spending - and are borrowing money from China to pay for the war; (3)Intervention in a civil war is a fool's errand - and it goes on and on from every perspective. Out NOW - and let's turn rationally to our own problems at home.