Observations From The Ground

• The war in Iraq has been lost; we may win a few more battles (skirmishes) but the war is over.

• Iraq’s “government” is not working because it is viewed by most Iraqis as an American puppet government; we have made a shame of democracy in Iraq.

• If ‘the end” is not planned, it will be worse than the ill-conceived and poorly planned inception of the war. It will be worse and more chaotic than our withdrawal from Vietnam.

• We must begin planning NOW for the “orderly” withdrawal of our military presence. It will take a long time, but the planning must begin now, even though there is no “announced” date for our withdrawal. Gradual systematic drawdown does not require any absolute dates.

• The key issue has three dimensions, none of which are being discussed publicly:
  
  1. How will we deal with the oil issues?

2. How many of our military bases (assets) in Iraq will we continue to occupy
and support after our official “withdrawal.” Our 250 plus military bases
throughout the world define our “Empire.”

3. How will the United States assist with Iraqi refugees and the thousands of
Iraqis who have been our allies and comrades in our misguided conflict?

• Most important, we must LEARN from this experience and not just “cut our losses” as though it did not really matter. Our national character depends upon our facing the reality of what we have done.

++++++

* Note: These observations are virtually identical to the predictions many of us made in the fall of 2001, and communicated to our congressional representatives and the President, to no avail. It is time for our policy to be well “grounded” in reality.