When the adults and establishment sorts start to sound angry and frustrated, you should be on guard. I watched about half of a particularly striking episodeof Q&A, the new show hosted by Brian Lamb in which he interviews policy makers, both small and large. The striking thing this weekend was as much as the doubting questions as well as the concerns of the supporter of the Iraq War he interviewed.
This week he had a guest that he had once before on his Booknotes* program, Eliot A. Cohen, a member of the Defense Policy Advisory Board (which advises the Department of Defense, you know, Rummy), who has a son soon to go over to Iraq. He used this moment as an opening for a recent editorial, which inspired Lamb to ask him on the show. Unlike the stereotypes, Cohen forthrightly supported the war and had a son in the military too. These people exist. And, to show his mindset, he summed his stance thusly:
After September 11th, I think I found as well persuasive the argument that there would be positive secondary effects from the overthrow of that regime and its replacement by something more reasonable. And I think to some extent we've seen it. Some of them are in a way negative. That is to say, enabling us to get out of Saudi Arabia, which was a major, major irritant.
But I believe then and I still believe that, you know, if you could help create a reasonable kind of regime in Iraq, which is not the same thing, you know, an advanced liberal democracy, but something much more reasonable, that there would be positive secondary and tertiary effects in the region.
And you know, I think you see that in something like, say, Lebanon; or even beginning to see it in places like Egypt.
These people also are very concerned about how things are going; he among them. "What I did not know then that I do know now is just how incompetent we would be at carrying out that task." In particular, "Phase 4," the stage after the initial attack and destruction of Saddam's forces. An overall summary of his various thoughts was put in a later paragraph:
A variety of emotions wash over me as I reflect on our Iraq war: Disbelief at the length of time it took to call an insurgency by its name. Alarm at our continuing failure to promote at wartime speed the colonels and generals who have a talent for fighting it, while also failing to sweep aside those who do not. Incredulity at seeing decorations pinned on the chests and promotions on the shoulders of senior leaders -- both civilians and military -- who had the helm when things went badly wrong. ["Those three guys got the Presidential Medal of Freedom. That's just wrong."] Disdain for the general who thinks Job One is simply whacking the bad guys and who, ever conscious of public relations, cannot admit that American soldiers have tortured prisoners or, in panic, killed innocent civilians. Contempt for the ghoulish glee of some who think they were right in opposing the war, and for the blithe disregard of the bungles by some who think they were right in favoring it. A desire -- barely controlled -- to slap the highly educated fool who, having no soldier friends or family, once explained to me that mistakes happen in all wars, and that the casualties are not really all that high and that I really shouldn't get exercised about them.
Other matters addressed: raw anger at putting troops in danger without proper safety precautions as well as with the lack of proper rotation of the troops, wonder at honoring those who simply didn't do their job, desire for an alternative energy policy, rejection of denial that the military too sometimes crosses the line, and simply "what the father in me expects from our leaders is simply the truth." And, we have not received it.
In fact, the striking thing about the interview was the at times thinly disguised wonderment (and surely disgust) in Brian Lamb's questions, including the note that major people involved in the war effort simply served their time and was never saw again -- including, to be questioned by Congress or others. Put aside the venom. Cut to the quick: this underlines how something has gone seriously wrong.
Cohen references a few things he gives the administration credit for -- to suggest my bona fides, let me note that they leave something to be desired. I will end with two:
And I give the administration a lot of credit for realizing that was ultimately a mistake. And I think that's a realization which is out there more broadly, even in place that don't seem to really agree with us very much, even among the Europeans I think I detect some realization that you do have to be concerned about what goes on in these societies.
That is, "the policy which we have pursued for decades of basically completely ignoring the domestic aspect of these regimes and what they're doing to their societies" was ill-advised. But, of course, they really were not forthright to the American people about this. The people involved in these past policies hold some key roles in our government today, and they did not say "we must change our policies" and so forth. In fact, we still (for the same pragmatic reasons) have ties to some questionable governments. The rhetoric of freedom, rhetoric that Carter as much as anyone used, rings a bit false in its inconsistency.
I admire the basic vision. And I definitely admire the resolve. And you know, it's easy to say that, well, he's determined, and to confuse that with stubbornness. But in wartime determination means an enormous amount. And the president's backbone is made of steel. And we're very lucky that he has got a backbone made of steel. But there are plenty of other things that I'm critical of.
Determination in the face of a flawed policy is not a virtue -- if it is, it is a tragic one. Those who support this administration for that reason must understand this; the fact not enough do is the ultimate tragedy of recent days.
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* As an aside, let me say that the Booknotes sequel is a poor replacement for the show he hosted, a hit and miss sort of thing with various hosts (some "names" like prior Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle -- remember him?) that suggests the value of Lamb as an interviewer.