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Victor Hanson and the “Victory in Iraq” two-step
Regarding the significance of Fallujah, the Bush supporters’ hopeless confusion (if you’re feeling charitable toward them) or artful ambiguity (if you’re not) continues. Here, in the midst of yet another adrenaline rush dressed up as an article, is Victor Hanson:
In the struggle in Fallujah hinges not just the fate of the Sunni Triangle, or even Iraq, but rather of the entire Middle East—and it will be decided on the bravery and skill of mostly 20-something American soldiers. If they are successful in crushing and humiliating the fascists there and extending the victory to other spots then the radical Islamists and their fascistic sponsors will erode away.In the first sentence, Hanson makes the utterly unsupportable claim that the success of Bush’s Iraq and Mideast policy hinges on Fallujah. To say that victory hinges on Fallujah means that if our forces win in Fallujah, then the defeat of the enemy is assured: no more insurgency, no more roadside bombs, no more kidnappings and beheadings, a successful election, a self-sustaining Iraqi government, and other Mideast countries following suit. Unfortunately, as has been evident from well before the battle of Fallujah (indeed, as has been evident since at least the summer of 2003), the killing of terrorists in one location does not at all mean the end of the war, since the terrorists can function and are functioning from lots of locations in Iraq, as well as being continually replenished through Iraq’s unguarded borders. Apparently recognizing the falsity of his boastful claim in the first sentence, Hanson in the second sentence redefines his “hinge of fate.” Now he tells us that the event that assures victory in Iraq is not just victory in Fallujah, but victory in “other spots” as well, in other words, wiping out the insurgents through the whole of the Sunni triangle and elsewhere in Iraq. So, winning in Fallujah does not mean the end of the tunnel or even daylight at the end of the tunnel, does it? Fallujah turns out to be one battle, not a decisive event assuring the insurgency’s defeat. It’s the same old line that Bush and his supporters have used ever since the fall of Baghdad. They trumpet the news that the war is won or virtually won, then they quietly add that of course the war is not yet won, and that we have a long hard slog ahead of us and must stay the course. If I turn out to be wrong, and Bush is successful in Iraq, I will be very happy. But he and his supporters have no credibility with me on this issue.
Addendum: when I initially wrote this entry I had forgotten that barely a month ago, Hanson had rather dramatically abandoned the Bush/neoconservative strategy of democratizing the Mideast, as I discussed at VFR. I’m apparently not the only one who forgot that Hanson had said that: he’s forgotten it himself, since in his current article he’s returned to his earlier support of democratization and is announcing that the victory in Fallujah presages the successful democratization of the Mideast. Furthermore, as I indicated in a follow-up to my earlier article, Hanson’s reversals of his positions should probably not be taken seriously, since he is “an overly emotional writer who spills out his contradictory feelings from one column to the next.” Comments
Hanson should have stuck with ancient history. He was first-rate in that field. His punditry, however, is no better than any of the other hacks at NRO. Posted by: Derek Copold on November 22, 2004 11:05 AMAdrenaline rush? I think Hanson’s specialty is really hot air. Since the longrange forecasts are for a cold winter, he may be useful to warm things up. Posted by: Alan Levine on November 22, 2004 11:57 AMWell, I’ve described Hanson as a “contradictory blowhard sending out vast flumes of overheated gas in every column.” http://www.amnation.com/vfr/archives/002266.html Posted by: Lawrence Auster on November 22, 2004 12:31 PM“The Russians threw the entire weight of their armed forces into defeating the Germans at Stalingrad; they sensed that the outcome of the whole struggle hinged on this battle.” A “hinge” is a turning point. It doesn’t mean everything is settled or over when the battle is won. Could the Soviets have lost Stalingrad and still won? Sure. But it is usually regarded as a turning point, the point of no return and diminishing successes for the Germans. Fallujah appears to be where many or most of the hostages were held and tortured. It was a factory for car bombs and a university for terrorists. They simply can’t hide and propagate and fight nearly as well without Fallujah. If six months from now, the Sunni terrorism is beginning to ebb and the police and army look stronger, Mr. Auster was wrong and Fallujah WAS the hinge at least in Iraq. If the battles are raging, not sputtering, accross Iraq, I was wrong about Fallujah and probably about Iraq, too. What say you Mr. Auster? You are an honorable man. Is your position falsifiable? I mean not just, “I will be very happy”, but “I had it wrong”? Or even if Iraq simmers down and stabilizes over the next few years, will you say, It was luck or something else, but not the strategy of the Bush administration? Jeff Kantor Posted by: Jeff Kantor on November 22, 2004 11:57 PMYou don’t have to twist my arm, Mr. Kantor. If six months or a year from now the insurgency has been dispersed or reduced to a small fraction of what it is now, and if it is then established that the battle of Fallujah was the turning point in weakening the insurgents, of course I will admit that it was the turning point. Note that my argument is only in part against our actual actions in Iraq. At least half my argument is directed against Bush’s _statements_ about Iraq, which continue to ignore much of the reality; which don’t satisfy a reasonably logical person, namely me, that Bush has a strategy aimed at victory; and which leave Bush without credibility in my eyes. Posted by: Lawrence Auster on November 23, 2004 12:06 AMThank you, Mr. Auster. I almost always come away from reading you with a feeling of gratitude, whether I agree with you or not. Simple integrity is boring to most people. I find it thrilling. JK Posted by: Jeff on November 23, 2004 12:41 AMOne does not normally speak of a battle being a “hinge” in the present tense. Professor Hanson is a good historian, but he must understand that every battle is not Issus or Gaugamella.
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