March 27, 2003
THOSE WHO CAN'T TEACH TEST:
Scorecard for the War: To know whether the allied forces are winning, there are six things one could watch out for. (THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN, 3/26/03, NY Times)(1) Have we occupied Baghdad--without leveling the whole city? [...](2) Have we killed, captured or expelled Saddam? [...]
(3) Have we been able to explain why some Iraqi forces are putting up such a fierce fight? [...]
(4) Have we won this war and preserved the territorial integrity of Iraq? [...]
(5) Has an authentic Iraqi liberal nationalist emerged from the U.S. occupation to lead the country? [...]
(6) Is the Iraqi state that emerges from this war accepted as legitimate by Iraq's Arab and Muslim neighbors? [...]
(1) Obviously, otherwise we could have just MOABed it.
(2) Duh?!?
(3) Who cares as long as they're dead?
(4) Yes and no. There's no such thing as Iraq and there's going to be a Kurdistan, whether independent or federated within Iraq is merely a matter of aesthetics.
(5) We can't guarantee a post-Saddam Iraq will be a liberal nation, only that it will be more liberal than it is now.
(6) If we were by some chance to achieve #5, isn't the real question whether that Iraq and we accept the anti-liberal regimes in the rest of the Arab world? Why would we let Syria determine the legitimacy of Iraq instead of vice versa?
Posted by Orrin Judd at March 27, 2003 9:05 AMWinning the war (#4) will be a sign that we're winning? Gee, thanks, Tom.
This is part and parcel of the left's view that the war is only acceptable as part of a large social welfare program. I'm not saying we shouldn't help Iraq after the war. We should and we will, both for humanitarian reasons and out of self-interest. But winning the war is
winning the war and is all we should be focussed on right now.
This boils down to Friedman trying to make an omelet without breaking eggs.
Posted by: Harry Eagar at March 27, 2003 2:32 PM