Wrong metric. With the possible exception of the removal of Saddam, and that went poorly as the circumstances of his execution has made him a martyr for the moment, none of our goals, official or otherwise, have been achieved.
On the other hand, Iran is now the sole regional power, their arch-enemy Iraq has been vanquished, the price of oil has sky rocketed, Shiites are in control of Iraq and that likely means a satellite state they never had before, and the mullahs are even more entrenched than they were before. That is hardly "losing".
Actually, I think the whole dialogue around "winning" or "losing" in Iraq is inappropriate - it's not a game of monopoly, or a sporting event, where there is a winner or loser. It's more (as you write) a situation where objectives will or will not be achieved, at costs that may or may not be justified. The coalition (is anyone left other than us and Australia??) may be failing to stabilize Iraq, but failing to achieve an objective isn't best described as losing a war.
If the press leaks on Bush's upcoming plan for a troop surge are at all accurate (he wants to increase the troop count by ~20,000?), I think it will make for an interesting news week. From what I can tell the problems in Iraq today aren't going to be cured by more US soldiers. |
