Is the U.S. considering the “withdraw to an isolated base” option?

Alan R. writes:

I was listening to Dennis Prager today, and he was interviewing an Israeli scholar named Michael B. Oren. At the very end of the interview, Oren said the following (this is a paraphrase): “Before the current Iraq war, I testified before Congress, and I said that you (the U.S.) should just punish Iraq, then get out. You should not get involved in ‘nation building.’ Also, I said that after punishing Iraq, you should pull out, and establish a military base in Iraq’s Western desert, AND THE U.S. GOVERNMENT IS CURRENTLY CONSIDERING THIS OPTION.”

This was said at the very end of the interview, in a space of just a few seconds, and Prager let the comments lie without asking for clarification. Here is Oren’s website.

Hope he’s telling the truth!

The view that Oren said he was proposing before the war is of course the view VFR has also been advocating since before the invasion, and many times since the invasion, spurred by the insights of a tiny number of writers including Andrew Bacevich, Angelo Codevilla, Mark Helprin, and others. This strategic option has never become part of the mainstream debate. If Oren is correct that the U.S. government is now considering it, that is good news indeed.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at July 12, 2006 03:15 PM | Send