http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/03/opinion/03herbert.html?ex=1095324365&ei=1&en=a989e4ab2bd4a980 When
asked this week on CNN how long the U.S. military is
likely to remain in
Iraq, Senator John McCain replied
"probably" 10 or 20 years. "That's not so
bad," he said,
adding, "We've been in Korea for 50 years. We've been
in
West Germany for 50 years."
Reporters have come to expect
candor from Senator McCain,
and in this case he didn't disappoint. But
there weren't
any speakers mounting the podium at the Republican
National
Convention to hammer home the message that G.I.'s would be
in
Iraq for a decade or two.
That's not the understanding most
Americans had when this
wretched war was sold to them, and it's not the
view most
Americans hold now.
If Senator McCain is correct
(and the belief in official
Washington is that he is), then boys and girls
who are 5 or
10 years old now will get their chance in 2015 or 2020
to
strap on the Kevlar and engage the Iraqi "insurgents" who,
like the
indigenous forces we fought in Vietnam, will never
accept the occupation of
their country by America.
Marcina Hale, a protester who came to
New York this week
from suburban Westport, Conn., said she has two
teenage
boys and that Iraq "is not a war that I'm willing to send
my
sons to." As the years pass and the casualties mount,
that sentiment will
only grow.
The truth is always the first casualty of politics.
But
there was a bigger disconnect than usual between the
bizarre,
hermetically sealed perspective that was on
display in Madison Square
Garden this week and the daunting
events unfolding without respite in the
real world.
Iraq is a mess. While the cartoonish Arnold
Schwarzenegger
was drawing huge laughs in the Garden and making
cracks
about economic "girlie men," reports were emerging about
the
gruesome murder of 12 Nepalese hostages who had
traveled to Iraq less than
two weeks earlier in search of
work.
At the same time, an
effort to disarm insurgents in the
militant Baghdad slum of Sadr City
collapsed, and the death
toll among American forces in Iraq continued its
relentless
climb toward 1,000.
The Los Angeles Times noted
yesterday that a report by the
respected Royal Institute of International
Affairs in
London has concluded that Iraq will be lucky if it avoids
a
breakup and civil war. The often-stated U.S. goal of a
full-fledged
Iraqi democracy is beyond unlikely.
In Afghanistan, a legitimate
front in the so-called war
against terror, much of the country remains in
the hands of
warlords, and the opium trade is flourishing.
Experts
believe substantial amounts of money from that trade is
flowing
to terrorist groups.
In Israel, 16 people were killed by suicide
bombers who
blew themselves up on a pair of crowded buses on Tuesday.
In
Russia, a series of horrific terror attacks, in the air
and on the ground,
have cast a pall across the country.
Despite all the macho
posturing and self-congratulating at
the Republican convention, the wave of
terror that's been
unleashed on the world is only growing. The
American-led
war in Iraq is feeding that wave, causing it to
swell
rather than ebb.
Any serious person who looked around
the world this week
would have to wonder what the delegates at the
G.O.P.
convention were so happy about.
The Republican
conventioneers spent the entire week
reminding America that we were
attacked on Sept. 11, 2001.
But interestingly, there was hardly a mention
by name of
those actually responsible for the attacks - Osama bin
Laden
and Al Qaeda.
Discussions about the nation's real enemies were
taboo. We
don't know where they are or what they're up to.
The
over-the-top venom of some of the speakers and delegates
was
reserved not for Osama, but for a couple of
mild-mannered guys named John.
What Americans desperately need is a serious,
honest
discussion of where we go from here. If we're going to be
in Iraq
for 10 or 20 more years, the policy makers should
say so, and tell us what
that will cost in money and human
treasure. The violence associated with
such a long-term
occupation is guaranteed to be appalling.
Vietnam tore this nation apart. As we've seen in
this
campaign, the wounds have yet to heal. Incredibly, we're
now
traveling a similarly tragic road in Iraq.
