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Friday, June 23, 2006
Congress avoiding real debate on Iraq war

Column by Nick Clooney

Congress' phony election-year "debate" on the war in Iraq left us unenlightened. All we heard were campaign slogans and bumper-sticker arguments.

Will there never come a time when our highest deliberative bodies will have a rational discussion on what has become the overriding issue facing our country?

We hear hot-button phrases like "cut and run." Those who use that sort of slogan ought to be ashamed of themselves and go back to the grade school playgrounds where they apparently learned their debating skills.

They know very well the only ones "cutting and running" from Iraq are the Iraqis themselves. The government in Baghdad estimates that 40 percent of the middle class - without which no viable nation can be built - have left the country in the last two years to escape the ongoing violence.

That is a staggering statistic. Four out of ten of that nation's best and brightest have voted with their feet against what remains of their country. Those left are mired ever deeper in sectarian ideologies, not willing to even try the compromises without which no democracy can survive. For Sunnis and Shiites and sub-sects, it is "my way or the highway." In this case, the highway is littered with improvised explosive devices.

On that highway, caught between warring fractions, stand our American troops, seldom sure which Iraqi is the enemy and which the friend. And how might that change overnight.

Our current policy of staying until the new Iraqi government can provide a "stable and democratic nation" is no policy at all. Who will decide when that tipping point has been reached? The crucial moment will be in the eye of the beholder. Some would say that moment has passed already. Others might say it will not come in a lifetime.

Here's my two cents' worth. The government of Iraq will never "stand up" as long as we are there. It will never be an independent ruling body as long as it must meet in a fortified "green zone" under the protection of the United States military. And it will never be accepted by a skeptical Iraqi public as long as it genuflects every time President Bush coughs.

Here is a fact we still can all count on. Whenever the United States removes its military contingent, there will be a period of chaos. It does not matter if we leave today or 20 years from today, there will be jockeying for political power and that jockeying will result in violence. Whether or not the violence descends into civil war is and always will be beyond our control. Only the Iraqis themselves can write that chapter of their long story.

It is true that the will of the United States government brought Iraq to this moment. They no longer have to deal with the brutal dictator Saddam Hussein, and that is a gift of the United States.

Here is a test of true independence. If the current Iraqi government ordered all Americans out tomorrow, would we go? If they were independent, we would have to leave. But we wouldn't, would we?

What if the Iraqi government completed an alliance with their neighbor Iran? An independent nation would have every right to make such a treaty. Would the U.S. allow it? Not on your tintype.

So much for an independent Iraqi government. They will only be independent the day we leave.

Moments we were sure would be milestones have come and gone with no real change. The fall of Baghdad. What if we left then? The installation of an interim government. The capture of Saddam Hussein. The election. The new government. The death of Zarqawi.

Yet the killing goes on today. Every day. Living conditions do not improve. Corruption rules. The oil doesn't flow. People vital to making it work leave by the thousands. A few - a very few - of our own troops, brutalized by a ruthless insurgency, may even have forgotten what it means to be an American, if charges are true.

Others have had their say. What's your solution?

Nick Clooney writes for The Post every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. E-mails sent to Nick at nickclooney@cincypost.com will be forwarded to him via regular mail.