Last week, the [tag]president[/tag] sounded rather [tag]impatient[/tag] with the lack of political progress in [tag]Iraq[/tag]. Bush said that he wanted “the Iraqi people to hear” that “pretty soon it’s time to shut her down and get governing.” He did not, however, set any conditions, establish any deadlines, or explain whether there would be any consequences for additional delay. As I noted last week, Bush sounded a bit like the unarmed policeman who sees a criminal and shouts, “Stop! Or I’ll say ‘Stop’ again!”
Today, in a terrific New York Times op-ed, [tag]John Kerry[/tag] makes the case that [tag]Bush[/tag] would not, or could not, offer.
So far, Iraqi leaders have responded only to deadlines — a deadline to transfer authority to a provisional government, and a deadline to hold three elections. Now we must set another deadline to extricate our troops and get Iraq up on its own two feet.
Iraqi politicians should be told that they have until May 15 to put together an effective unity government or we will immediately withdraw our military. If Iraqis aren’t willing to build a unity government in the five months since the election, they’re probably not willing to build one at all. The civil war will only get worse, and we will have no choice anyway but to leave.
If Iraq’s leaders succeed in putting together a government, then we must agree on another deadline: a schedule for withdrawing American combat forces by year’s end. Doing so will empower the new Iraqi leadership, put Iraqis in the position of running their own country and undermine support for the insurgency, which is fueled in large measure by the majority of Iraqis who want us to leave their country. Only troops essential to finishing the job of training Iraqi forces should remain.
I think this is absolutely right, and I’m delighted to see Kerry offer the plan. This strikes me as a blueprint for what the Dem plan for Iraq should be. It’s similar to the Murtha plan — except it calls for redeployment after a unity government is formed.
I’ve never been altogether clear on why timelines are so awful anyway. As Kerry noted, they keep working in Iraq, so Bush’s ideological opposition to deadlines has never made a lot of sense.
In fact, this op-ed is further proof that [tag]Kerry[/tag] “gets it.”
We will defeat [tag]Al Qaeda[/tag] faster when we stop serving as its best [tag]recruitment[/tag] tool. Iraqis ultimately will not tolerate foreign jihadists on their soil, and the United States will be able to maintain an over-the-horizon troop presence with rapid response capacity. An exit from Iraq will also strengthen our hand in dealing with the Iranian nuclear threat and allow us to repair the damage of repeated deployments, which flag officers believe has strained military readiness and morale.
For three years now, the [tag]administration[/tag] has told us that terrible things will happen if we get tough with the Iraqis. In fact, terrible things are happening now because we haven’t gotten tough enough. With two deadlines, we can change all that. We can put the American leadership on the side of our soldiers and push the Iraqi leadership to do what only it can do: build a [tag]democracy[/tag].
Now, if only Bush could see the obvious benefits of this approach, we’d really see some progress.