At various times, administration officials and their allies have offered a variety of historical comparisons for the war in Iraq. To hear war supporters tell it, the conflict is like the Revolutionary War, WWI, the U.S. Civil War, the Spanish Civil War, and World War II.
Today, the White House has a new historical model in mind.
President George W. Bush would like to see a lengthy U.S. troop presence in Iraq like the one in South Korea to provide stability but not in a frontline combat role, the White House said on Wednesday.
The United States has had thousands of U.S. troops in South Korea to guard against a North Korean invasion for 50 years. […]
White House spokesman Tony Snow said Bush would like to see a U.S. role in Iraq ultimately similar to that in South Korea.
“The Korean model is one in which the United States provides a security presence, but you’ve had the development of a successful democracy in South Korea over a period of years, and, therefore, the United States is there as a force of stability,” Snow told reporters.
How wrong is this? Josh Marshall counts the ways.
Let’s run through a few differences. First, Korea is an ethnically and cultural homogenous state. Iraq, not a culturally or ethnically homogenous state. And needless to say, that has been a point of some real difficulty. Second, Korea a democracy? Well, yes, for about fifteen years. Without going into all details, South Korea was a military dictatorship for most of the Cold War.
A deeper acquaintance with the last half century of Korean history would suggest that a) a fifty year occupation, b) lack of democracy and c) a hostile neighbor were deeply intertwined. Remove B or C and you probably don’t have A, certainly no A if you lose both B and C.
The more telling dissimilarity is the distinction between frontline troops and troops for stability. At least notionally (and largely this was true) US troops have been in South Korea to ward off an invasion from the North. US troops aren’t in Iraq to ward off any invasion. Invasion from who? Saudi Arabia? Syria.
No, US troops are in Iraq for domestic security, in so many words, to protect it from itself, or to ensure the continued existence of an elected, pro-US government.
The Bush gang told the nation that the war in Iraq would be brief. Then they said, repeatedly, that we are “turning the corner.” Then they said there would be a short-term “surge.”
Now they envision a scenario in which U.S. troops are in Iraq, refereeing a bloody internal conflict, for several decades.
The politics of this matters, as well. Congressional Dems have been saying for quite some time that Bush not only wants a blank check, but that he also wants an open-ended presence in Iraq, with no end in sight.
As of this morning, the official White House response to this, apparently, is, “Yep.”