Crossroads

We've arrived at a crossroads in history. The choices are simple.

In a letter to President Bush Friday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate President Harry Reid said they want out of Iraq. It's over. The American people are sick of it. There is no reason and no will to keep fighting this.

At the American Enterprise Institute the same day, senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman came out for a big, sustained surge of troops into Iraq. They made the case for fighting. Key word: "Winnable." They outlined the consequences of accepting defeat. Key word: "Catastrophic."

We are sharply divided as a nation. There will be no governing by consensus. Only by hardnosed leadership. This week, we'll find out what it is going to be. Neither of our options is attractive. But that's war.

Option One: Pull out. Achieve short-term gratification for those who believe our absence from Iraq will solve our problems. Watch Iraq descend into further violence. Watch a nuclear-armed Iran come to dominate Iraq and the world's richest oil fields.

No longer a world power, discredited by our own choice, we can watch the pile of bodies mount. Maybe we'll be restored to our national senses, as we were a decade after Vietnam, when we woke up and realized we never really had the luxury of disengaging from the fight.

This time, it will be harder. It won't be so neatly contained as it was then. The only good side to this is the army gets to rest. Don't count on the Democratic Congress to refit or build it up, or to do anything but dither when we need to use it again.

More likely, a dispirited people, our army broken by defeat, we'll just wait to see who emerges as the new world power. It will be a while before there is one, and much longer before there is one we would care to live under. I predict a dark age, in which brutal second-rate powers such as Russia, China, Iran and North Korea do what they choose to whom they choose without restraint. An age of modern warlords, with no over-arching, feared power to keep them in check. We can watch the sick man that is Europe slowly succumb. We can watch small free nations try to fend for themselves. We can await the inevitable nuclear crisis.

Does that sound at all medieval or apocalyptic? It is. Don't think we can't go back to that.

Does it sound overly melodramatic and alarmist? If so, you're a fool with no understanding of history. I have bad news for you. The fight against evil in this world is business as usual. It never ends.

We've faced this kind of choice before. We have not always chosen well. You know people who lived through such a time, when the failure to act against evil early led to more horrific bloodshed later. You may have relatives who died because of that. I do. In our lifetimes, we've never been more than a few inches from the abyss, however comfortable and safe our lives seem today. If you're an adult, then you've lived through a time when the evil of communism was held at bay. But only just, and millions died. Millions remain enslaved.

Which brings us to Option Two: Fight now. Fight harder. Expend our precious blood and money now, so we don't have to spend more blood and more money later. Fight now, while we can.

They're simple choices, not easy choices. But we are fortunate. The Democratic Congress, so eager to abandon Iraq, is fortunate. The world that seems to revile us no matter what we do is also fortunate. Because it will not be their decision.

We have a president who understands what is at stake. This week he will tell us what it is going to be. All signs indicate he recognizes the mistakes of the past, errors such as are often made in war, and he intends to do what is right. That would be the harder choice, to fight now, when we are tired and feel spent. But, as another American once said, we have not yet begun to fight.

It is his decision to make, and it will fall to a small number of our fellow Americans to execute. It falls to each of us to join the fight in the best way we can. We can be grateful that we still have men and women who are willing to face death for us, who make their choice every day. We are very fortunate to have them. Because Option One, accepting surrender and defeat, is no option at all.

Crossposted at Boston Herald here.

A shout out to my friend Paco and the son he raised, who is now a United States Marine.

Related:

Ralph Peters at the New York Post notices a swab is taking over CentCom and he thinks he knows why. Iran.

On that subject, here's my Jan. 4 post, "Iran Wants War." Iran just doesn't want to fight it. Iran's campaign to sow chaos and create the conditions for our failure in Iraq.

here's my Dec. 27 post about naval forces moving into place for a possible attack on Iran's WMD and air defense sites, with ground surge to protect our flank in Iraq from Iran's proxies there. Stuff Happening.

DEBKAfile has Bush on an all out push: "President George W. Bush is poised to stake every US resource to hand on a no-holds-barred military operation all the way to victory in Iraq, after first bringing Baghdad under control. The chips should all be lined up by the time he goes public next week on his new strategy for Iraq and the Middle East at large."

Times of London has the Israelis ready for a tactical nuke strike on Iranian nuke facilities. A tad ironic, but it works for me. Again, I doubt we'll see Israeli involvement. Update: Israelis say its bunk.

Tigerhawk thinks the Dems are trying to be clever:

"Given that the surge does not preclude the option of withdrawal down the road, why are the Democrats pushing so hard right now? I think it is because they believe that they have a shot at winning the White House in 2008, and that their chances are enhanced if we withdraw today. Why? First, if we withdraw during 2007 Democratic candidates will not then have to engage in their own civil war over what to do about Iraq or come off like yellow-bellies in the general election. Second, if after American withdrawal Iraq melts down into a genuine bloodbath that causes voters to wish we had stayed in, the Democrats hope that voters will blame Republicans."

Flopping Aces excerpts Tom Snodgrass' examination of historic American warfighting doctrine that is directly relevant to our problems today. Read it.

Don Surber totals up the direct costs of surrender:

...the penalty for early withdrawal is cataclysmic. The Fall of Saigon led to 2 million deaths in Cambodia alone. Stopping short of Baghdad 16 years ago cost a quarter-million lives directly, plus whatever number of deaths they tag on to the Oil for Food scandal.

Childish demands for "Peace Now" ignore history and reality and the welfare of the Iraqi people.

And our own soldiers. We could have had Iraq for free in 1991. What's it cost us to return? 3,000 lives? A half-trillion dollars?

Dan Riehl thinks our differences, our choices and the consequences are not so dire as I've painted them. We'll muddle through somehow.

Pelosi won't support funding for more troops if Bush surges. Good. So we get to have a debate on the merits of surrender, and see whether Americans prefer quitting to winning. So the Dems have to take responsiblity for defeat and for undercutting American troops in the field. Pelosi's pro-surrender instincts have not served her well so far, with her support for leading Defeatocrat John Murtha for majority leader.

The guy who beat Murtha, Steny Hoyer, meanwhile, says a nuclear Iran is unacceptable. The Dem Cong leadership better figure out what their message is going to be, if they plan on exerting any kind of leadership. Iran won't be disarmed short of military action. Iraq is a playground for Iranian proxies. Iraq, in any action against Iran, is our flank. You want to deal with Iran? You have to deal with Iraq. It's that simple.

Gateway: Pelosi makes preparations for Iraqi Killing Fields.