Frederick Kagan makes an excellent case for how we can win the war in Iraq...

Military historian Frederick Kagan (any relation to conservative international policy scholar Robert Kagan?) makes an excellent case in the December 19th edition of the Weekly Standard (a magazine that I had, as of late, been regarding as hopelessly partisan and thus one I was losing respect for) for how America can keep the faith and keep focussed on winning this war...rather than on giving in to our more cowardly and defeatist instincts and cut and run...

Frederick Kagan...Fighting to Win...The Weekly Standard, Dec. 19th, 2005...

Kagan argues in his article that a focus on cutting the number of troops rather than on winning the war and making a transition to Iraqi responsibility for its own security undermined the latter goal as Americans grow war-weary...and that a focus on cutting troops that does not keep the larger focus on transitioning to an Iraqi democracy where Iraqi military and law enforcement forces are responsible for their own security could likely allow a civil war to erupt that would, eventually, require a U.S. presence again, down the road...

I agree with that concern...and appreciate Kagan's very balanced and sober assessment of how Americans can remain to both train Iraqi troops to to be better prepared to more effectively undermine insurgents and terrorists militarily (which is necessary no matter what fantasies folks may have about political solutions to this situation, which are needed, of course, as well)...and to be more more professional (thus helping to prevent the kind of torture that arises out of fear and shortsightedness amongst less professional military and law enforcement forces)...

Specifically...Kagan calls for a duel strategy that includes what Andrew Krepinevich, in Foreign Affairs, calls an "oil-spot" approach to dealing with insurgents -- which sweeps insurgents from a limited number of territory that they gain strongholds in to prevent creating a permanent presence which allows them to recruit and train new fighters, to store weapons, and to strategize more effectively offensive and defensive efforts...as well as a more general strategy of securing larger tracts of territory and allowing Iraqi forces to maintain security of those tracts once Americans are able to more reliably sweep out insurgents...while holding that same territory, rather than moving from area to area with smaller numbers of troops, as Krepinevich suggests with his "oil-spot" or "whack-a-mole" strategy, the latter name given by its more skeptical detractors...

I wholly agree with this concern that we need to make sure that a transition to an Iraqi democracy makes sure that Iraqi troops can readily secure a freer Iraq with the help of Americans or else lose so many gains made in recent months in undermining the insurgency...

Kagan is right that the most important larger effort to undermine the insurgency comes from the most recent election, the participation of the Sunni minority, and (I hope) opportunities for the Sunnis to participate in a coalition government with the majority Shia who did not win a controlling majority...

Which matches our experience with successful efforts to undermine terrorism, Northern Ireland being the best example, to my mind, where opportunities for political participation created an alternative to violence that, eventually, undermined terrorist activity in Northern Ireland almost completely...

But, in the meantime, there is a need for a stronger and more professional and thoughtful military effort to take hold among Iraqi military and law enforcement servicepeople, under American mentorship, to more effectively secure a country with domestic military and law enforcement forces which would, in all likelihood, be more easily overwhelmed by the insurgency without American support...

Everyone wants American troops to withdraw, at some point, obviously...the troops, themselves, likely, more than anyone else, given the risks that they take to do that job...

But everyone involved should be more concerned at Mr. Kagan is, here, with a military effort that is long-term in its outlook and its commitment to success to assure a democratic transition that does not require further future intervention...

Left-wing and right-wing tendencies (more left than right, ironically, at this moment, I believe) toward a more isolationist, head-in-the-sand outlook on this war would result in the very same consequences that head-in-the-sand approaches have had in the past...which is more and more serious problems awaiting our recognition of our own foolishness...

And as Mr. Kagan makes clear in this article...a premature exit from Iraq would, in all likelihood, lead to losing ground on very promising recent trends in the war effort in Iraq...especially the number of those killed and injured around elections...

As Frederick writes...

"Data about insurgent attacks in Iraq do not support any sense of urgency about withdrawing either. The October constitutional referendum saw significantly fewer attacks than the January 2005 elections; 299 attacks on January 30 generating 213 casualties, versus 89 attacks and 49 casualties on October 15. Insurgents attacked only 19 election sites in October; in January they struck 88. Although the significance of such data is not clear, and other trend lines are less promising than this, there is certainly no case to be made that the situation is worsening enough to support urgent demands for immediate withdrawal. On the contrary, it appears that significant progress is being made."

Frederick is right...we need to stay the course until the Iraqis are fully prepared to take over their own security situation...this is not a video game...this is war, for real...and it is not something which responsibilities should be taken lightly because Americans are growing weary of the news reports and under the unrelenting and more mindless anti-war cries on the left...

We have a responsibility to the Iraqi people to do this thing right...and that means making sure that Iraqis are ready to secure their own country...not just cut them loose because we've grown weary of their presence in our domestic politics...

Frederick Kagan makes the case far better than I can in the Weekly Standard (Dec. 19th)...because he knows better what he's doing...which you will get a very clear sense of reading the article, I hope...

A very well reasoned, argued, and genuinely balanced case, I believe...from someone who knows better what the situation looks like on the ground...and what strategies might better help us achieve our bigger objectives...and why...

In an magazine otherwise lost in its own self-righteous partisanship, folks like Frederick Kagan and David Brooks make clear why it is so important for the most intelligent and thoughtful and courageous center to hold in such a critical situation...

Because too many lives are on the line to settle for anything less...

And because the conversation bottoms out, morally and intellectually, the more we engage in adolescent wars about who has all the right answers...which is noone, obviously, to anyone responsible and smart enough to see that...

Please check out Frederick's very powerful article...

Love,
Ben