Your June 23 editorial “No deadline, no retreat” applauds the gains in Iraq. We are in this war now, and having chosen to go to war, the attitude you espouse may be the only reasonable course of action. I believe your editorial, however, views this war in somewhat of a vacuum. While a clear majority may agree with your words, another majority, probably consisting of many of the same people, have serious issues about how we got into and have carried out this war.
Specifically:
– Were we misled, maneuvered, even lied to about this war in order to justify it? It was not about weapons of mass destruction, aluminum tubes, mobile weapons factories, Al Qaeda or Sept. 11, 2001. It is now about spreading “freedom,” a justification with some traction that came along far after the war began. Just how much freedom, to whom and at what cost do we intend to spread?
– Did we properly plan for this war? Troop levels and their equipment have been admitted to be inadequate. The pre-war estimated costs have been far exceeded and continue to grow. Some who ought to be our allies in this endeavor did not buy in and felt the war was misdirected. The rosy reception expected from the people of Iraq did not materialize and an insurgency quickly spread. We have a huge overall federal budget deficit and large tax cuts aimed at wealthy campaign contributors. Our corresponding efforts to pay for these costs have come with attacks on benefits for lower- and middle-class people. All these things conspire to give the suggestion that this war was entered into without realistic consideration of its overall costs and how those costs would affect us all at home.
– Have we multiplied our enemies, alienated our friends and weakened ourselves with regard to options we may have in dealing with other world problems (such as Iran or North Korea), to an extent that the benefits of winning the Iraq war can never compensate?
These issues and more surround the war debate. Yes we are there now and we should be committed to victory, but we should also be committed to analysis of why, how and at what cost we got to where we are.
If the war on terror is to be a long, perhaps generational war, we must openly and eagerly discuss and understand, not ignore, these issues.
Or do we as a nation want to find ourselves in this same situation again?
