Everything else can be screwed up, but, politically, the daily casualties have to cease. They know that in DC, and I think you will see it stopped by October.
The bad boys in Baghdad know it too. They know it in Teheran and Damascus too, and along the Afghan/Pakistani border. The Saudi mullahs know it, and Hezbollah knows it, and on and on. They won’t just sit there. They can infiltrate people into Iraq freely, and our ability to track them down is very limited. It will not be easy. Our people are very vulnerable, and our position too reactive for comfort. The shooting scenes on TV have to stop too. The worst outcome for us would be an intifadeh-style resistance, even on a small scale. We are simply not prepared to deal with that, politically and militarily.
This will happen: any time there is a hostile demonstration in contact with Americans, provacateurs will fire on Americans, and try to goad them into firing back. That’s something we cannot do; the price is just to high.
We need to get our people off the streets soon, but the Iraqi forces can’t be trusted, and not too many allies are eager. We might have considered that before blowing everybody off, but that’s water under the bridge now. We lie in the bed we made. |
