Monday, April 30, 2007

Consequences of losing in Iraq

OK, so I'm doing back-to-back posts dealing with defeatism and Iraq. So sue me. Besides, this is important. Thanks to Kanaka Girl for alerting me to this. Full column here (please read it), excerpts follow:
If Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is right, nearly 60 percent of Americans agree with him that the war in Iraq is already lost. And if he is correct in saying that losing the war will increase Democrat majorities in future elections, then it may be fair to conclude that Americans now love losers. I'm not buying any of it -- and neither are the troops who are fighting this war.

In the days since Reid announced "this war is lost," I have heard from dozens of the soldiers, sailors, airmen, Guardsmen and Marines that I have covered in eight trips to Iraq and two to Afghanistan for FOX News. Some of those who correspond with me are there now, others are home. Some are preparing to deploy again. None of them agree with Reid's assessment.

Now I did go to Florida State, but if my remedial math class served me well, I infer that the "dozens" who disagreed with Reid's defeatism outnumber the seven that Vince N. purportedly heard from who agree with Reid. To quote my liberal visitor: "I'll take their word over any statistic I see any day."

Continuing:
What would losing the war in Iraq mean? It's a picture so dark and depressing that it makes the collapse in Vietnam, 32 years ago next week, look like a Sunday school picnic. The fall of Saigon was horrific for the people of Vietnam and their neighbors in Cambodia and Laos. More than 5 million became refugees and by the most conservative estimates at least a million others perished.

For most Americans, the consequences were minimal. The vast majority of the 2.8 million of us who had fought and bled there mourned the loss of 58,253 of our comrades, swallowed the bitterness of defeat and got on with our lives. Our nation spent a few hundred million tax dollars on refugee relief and resettlement, and tried to forget what people in Reid's party called "the long nightmare of Vietnam."

But classified U.S. intelligence assessments, military contingency plans and staff studies evaluating the consequences of a precipitous U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, coupled with the lack of funding for political reform measures, as contained in the legislation just passed by Reid's party, paint a far more dismal picture than anything that happened after Vietnam.

(Intel's retreat consequences here...READ IT! - Ed.)

Reid and his cohorts in Congress who believe "this war is lost" have acted to ensure that it will be. No one asked them: "If we lost, who won?" The answer should be obvious.

It's a simple question, folks: If we lose in Iraq, then who wins? Answer: Al Qaeda...and the Democrats. That's a damning testament as to whose best interests the Dems are serving.

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