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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: greenspirit who wrote (35528)	3/19/2004 4:55:09 AM
From: unclewest	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 793671

Is it not amazing how many of the early on French statements opposing the war talked about it being about oil money. Turns out much of it was their money. They knew what they were talking about...Themselves. The troop issue is similar...but in reverse. Kerry and Friedman have argued for more troops...and against all troops. Clearly we had enough troops to accomplish the goal of deposing saddam and his sons. It was accomplished swiftly, with minimal loss of friendly lives. Those who chose to fight were accommodated. Those who argued for more troops were wrong. The troop strength issue for the attack should now be dead. We have enough troops now too. The bombings seem messy because they get such prominent media coverage. For perspective someone should refer to the FBI statistics and point out we average 2,000 bombing and attempted bombing incidents in the US annually for the past 15 years. GWB is using the troops now there for security and to continue the attack on terrorists. Many are also being used for training. They are training the Iraqis to do their own heavy work...as they must. That work has begun to accomplish great goals. Fear not the loss of 1,300 Spanish troops in Iraq. Nobody will miss them. If Friedman wants to know and judge if the war on terror is effective...he should read more. After 9/11, GWB began the counter-attack on al qaeda on October 7,2001 with the following results... "The lowest level of terrorism in 30 years was reported in 2002, with incidents of international terrorism declining by 44 percent from the previous year." state.gov Clearly the GWB declared war on terror has reversed a terrible trend. But we must stay the course. Clamoring for more troops was not and is not the answer. The conventional fighting between large armies is over in Iraq. Much of the work to be done now is police work. Our goal now is and should be to enable the Iraqis to provide their own security and to police their own people. Massive numbers of additional US troops will not accomplish that. Bush had it right when he said, "Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists." The presidents of France, Spain and John Kerry may need to be reminded of that. uw

To: greenspirit who wrote (35528)	3/19/2004 8:26:30 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (5) \| Respond to of 793671

The issue of "do we have enough troops" has always been a difficult one to judge. Lehrer asked Wolfowitz that direct question yesterday, referencing Friedman's column. Wolfowitz insisted we didn't need more troops but rather more intelligence. I know way to little to presume to have an opinion on that. I did think we should have had more troops in the immediate aftermath of the fall of Baghdad. We were derelict in not protecting people and institutions from the initial rampage. And I think that the tours in Iraq have been too hard on our reserves and we need more replacements. But I couldn't begin to speculate about current troop levels. It is distressing, though, to see civilian engineers or aid personnel killed for lack of protection. It's asking too much of civilians to work under those conditions. We are seeing more and more the gap between socialism and totalitarianism is closer than many believe. I don't question for a moment the connection between socialism and totalitarianism. But I wonder if folks who focus on the fact that the incoming government in Spain is socialist aren't injecting some oranges into the apples. That may be largely coincidental. Had the opposition party been of some other political stripe, it still would have been against involvement in Iraq because it was, after all, the opposition and the engagement in Iraq was very unpopular with the Spanish people. That the Spanish have chosen to go socialist has it's own problems given the economic gains made in Spain under the previous government, but perhaps that's a separate matter. Remember, too, that Spain was the Fascist variety of totalitarian in its recent history.