America Held Hostage - New York Times

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Fri, 01 Jul 2005 05:20:21 -0700

Subject:[Zepps_News] Krugman: America Held Hostage - New York Times

 

 

 

 

<http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/01/opinion/01krugman.html?hp>

 

America Held Hostage

 

 

 

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Published: July 1, 2005

 

A majority of Americans now realize that President Bush deliberately

misled the nation to promote a war in Iraq. But Mr. Bush's speech on

Tuesday contained a chilling message: America has been taken hostage

by his martial dreams. According to Mr. Bush, the nation now has no

choice except to keep fighting the war he wanted to fight.

 

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Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

 

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Never mind that Iraq posed no threat before we invaded. Now it's a

" central front in the war on terror, " Mr. Bush says, quoting Osama bin

Laden as an authority. And since a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq would,

Mr. Bush claims, be a victory for Al Qaeda, Americans have to support

this war - and that means supporting him. After all, you wage war with

the president you have, not the president you want.

 

But America doesn't have to let itself be taken hostage. The country

missed the chance to say no before this war started, but it can still

say no to Mr. Bush's open-ended commitment, and demand a timetable for

getting out.

 

I know that this argument will be hard to sell. Despite everything

that has happened, many Americans still want to believe that this war

can and should be seen through to victory. But it's time to face up to

three realities. First, the war is helping, not hurting, the terrorists.

Second, the kind of clear victory the hawks promised is no longer

possible, if it ever was. Third, a time limit on our commitment will

do more good than harm.

 

Before the war, opponents warned that it would strengthen, not weaken,

terrorism. And so it has: a recent C.I.A. report warns that since the

U.S. invasion, Iraq has become what Afghanistan was under the Soviet

occupation, only more so: a magnet and training ground for Islamic

extremists, who will eventually threaten other countries.

 

And the situation in Iraq isn't improving. " The White House is

completely disconnected from reality, " said Senator Chuck Hagel,

referring to upbeat assessments of progress. " It's like they're just

making it up as they go along. The reality is that we're losing in Iraq. "

 

Mr. Hagel claims to believe that we can still win, but it's hard to

see how.

 

More troops might help, but pretty much the whole U.S. Army is already

in Iraq, on its way back from Iraq or getting ready to go to Iraq. And

the coalition of the willing is shrinking.

 

Helping Iraqis rebuild their country could help win hearts and minds.

But for all the talk of newly painted schools, the fact is that

reconstruction, originally stalled by incompetence and corruption, is

now stalled by the lack of security. When Ibrahim al-Jafaari, the Iraqi

prime minister, visited Washington, he was accompanied by Iraqi

journalists. One of them asked Mr. Bush, " When will you begin the

reconstruction in Iraq? "

 

Meanwhile, time is running out for America's volunteer military, which

is cracking under the strain of a war it was never designed to fight.

 

So what would happen if the United States gave up its open-ended

commitment to Iraq and set a timetable for withdrawal?

 

Mr. Bush claims that such a step would " send the wrong signal to our

troops, who need to know that we are serious about completing the

mission. " But what the troops need to know is that their country won't

demand more than they can give. He also claims that it would encourage

the insurgents, who will " know that all they have to do is to wait us

out. " But the insurgents don't seem to need encouragement.

 

It's far more likely that if the Iraqi government knew that our

support had an expiration date, it would both look to its own defenses

and, more important, try harder to find a political solution to the

insurgency.

 

The Iraq that emerges once U.S. forces are gone won't bear much

resemblance to the free-market, pro-American, Israel-friendly

democracy the neocons promised. But it will pose less of a terrorist

threat than the Iraq we have now.

 

Remember, Iraq wasn't a breeding ground for terrorists before we went

there. All indications are that the foreign terrorists now infesting

Iraq are there on the sufferance of a homegrown insurgency that finds

them useful for the moment but that, brutal as it is, isn't interested

in an apocalyptic confrontation with the Western world. Once we're no

longer targets, the foreign terrorists won't be welcome.

 

The point is that the presence of American forces in Iraq is making our

country less safe. So it's time to start winding down the war.

 

E-mail: krugman

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