Dynamite news about Iraq: Bush will withdraw next year

According to Robert Novak, administration insiders say that the U.S. will withdraw our forces from Iraq next year, regardless of whether or not our forces have suppressed the terrorist insurgency. This, Novak says, means the end of “the neoconservative dream of building democracy in the Arab world.”

Without U.S. troops, the civil war cited as the worst-case outcome by the recently leaked National Intelligence Estimate would be a reality. It would then take a resolute president to stand aside while Iraqis battle it out.

If true, Novak’s scoop confirms what I’ve been saying here for many months: that Bush’s war on terror in Iraq following the toppling of Hussein has not been what Bush claimed it to be, because there is no real war unless you are seeking victory, meaning the destruction of the enemy’s will and ability to keep fighting, and Bush has manifestly not been doing the things necessary to achieve that end. But now it appears that Bush’s policy is even more divorced from reality than I had thought. Not only have we had no strategy to achieve victory over our enemies in Iraq; but, if Novaks’ information is correct, we’ve even given up on our ideological substitute for that victory, democratization. So all we’ve accomplished is to topple Hussein. But we achieved that 17 months ago, prior to the deaths of 1,000 American soldiers and the wounding and maiming of many thousands more.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at September 20, 2004 11:15 AM | Send