Why Oh Why Can't We Have a Better Press Corps?

Why I think the Washington Post has ten years of life remaining. Fred Hiatt gives National Review's Rich Lowry a platform to say the opposite of what he's been saying for three years. Utter Stupidity:

Unclaimed Territory - by Glenn Greenwald: Rich Lowry, Serious Foreign Policy Expert, announces his serious plan for victory in Iraq: Today, Lowry was given a platform on the Op-Ed page of The Washington Post to outline for us (along with co-author Bill Kristol) the easy, obvious way we can win the war in Iraq -- and, in doing so, said the opposite of everything he has been saying for the last three years:

Rich Lowry (with Bill Kristol), today in The Washington Post:

We are at a crucial moment in Iraq. Supporters of the war, like us, have in the past differed over tactics. But at this urgent pass, there can be no doubt that we need to stop the downward slide in Iraq by securing Baghdad.There is no mystery as to what can make the crucial difference in the battle of Baghdad: American troops. . . . The bottom line is this: More U.S. troops in Iraq would improve our chances of winning a decisive battle at a decisive moment. This means the ability to succeed in Iraq is, to some significant degree, within our control. The president should therefore order a substantial surge in overall troop levels in Iraq, with the additional forces focused on securing Baghdad.

Rich Lowry, National Review, April 14, 2006 -- just 5 months ago:

You hardly qualify as a retired general these days unless you have written an op-ed piece demanding Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's resignation. One of Rummy's alleged sins was not providing enough troops to secure postwar Iraq. The debate over troop levels will rage for years; it is both characteristically American and somewhat beside the point.

Obviously, if we had it to do over again, we would send more troops in the hopes that sheer numbers would head off our problems. But to think that higher troop levels would have been a magic bullet is to indulge a very American faith in the power of mass to overcome anything. In Iraq, we have faced a delicate political and cultural problem that requires finesse above all -- finesse dependent on a fine-tuned understanding of an alien society.

So, in just five short months in Rich Lowry World, we went from "The debate over troop levels" is "somewhat beside the point" and "to think that higher troop levels would have been a magic bullet is to indulge a very American faith in the power of mass to overcome anything" to "There is no mystery as to what can make the crucial difference in the battle of Baghdad: American troops" and "The bottom line is this: More U.S. troops in Iraq would improve our chances of winning a decisive battle at a decisive moment." It's not just profoundly wrong; it's worse than that. It's ludicrous.

All along, over the past several years, Lowry has been insisting that troop levels don't matter, that we have a sufficient force to get the job done in Iraq, and that we are winning, winning, winning. This is the same Foreign Policy Expert Rich Lowry who, following the example of the Commander-in-Chief's aircraft career victory dance, boldly announced in the May 9, 2005 issue of National Review: "It is time to say it unequivocally: We are winning in Iraq" -- an article which prompted this embarrassing NR cover (a cover which, as TBogg notes, competes with "Dewey Wins" for humiliating headlines of historic proportions). In that same article, Lowry announced:

If current trends continue, our counter-insurgent campaign in Iraq will be fit to be mentioned in the same breath as the British victory over a Communist insurgency in Malaysia in the 1950s, a textbook example of this form of war. . . . The basic approach of the Pentagon to the insurgency was right from the beginning."The strategy was always political as well as military," says a Pentagon official. A counterinsurgency is never about simply killing enemy fighters the way it is -- or at least seems -- on a conventional battlefield. Insurgents have an endless capacity to replicate themselves, unless political conditions are created that drain them of support.

Back then -- just a year ago -- we were "winning" because the Pentagon brilliantly realized that you can't defeat an insurgency by increasing troop levels. Today, we would be "winning" if only we would increase our troop levels. It's like an Abbott and Costello routine, but that is what passes for serious foreign policy analysis in our national dialogue...

Comments

[P O'Neill]

Lowry now

"Insurgents have an endless capacity to replicate themselves, unless political conditions are created that drain them of support."

Lowry 3 months ago

"Killing Zarqawi is the equivalent of averting a Haditha every other day in Iraq, indefinitely."

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YzliZTEzYWFmOTQ3ZmEyMjNjZjExZDczMmMyYTc3MWM=

[jerry]

The surge is right on schedule, though I am not sure if this is the 1964-65 buildup, or the 196-66 buildup.

Troop levels in Vietnam:

Year American
1959 760
1960 900
1961 3205
1962 11300
1963 16300
1964 23300
1965 184300
1966 385300
1967 485600
1968 536100
1969 475200
1970 334600
1971 156800
1972 24200
1973 50

We have confirmation that our best and brightest is a whole bunch dumber than our parent's best and brightest since ours were not able to learn from theirs. Must have been the rock music or the fluoridation.

[Jack]

But he so nearly gets it. A counterinsurgency is never about simply killing enemy fighters the way it is -- or at least seems -- on a conventional battlefield. To think that higher troop levels would have been a magic bullet is to indulge a very American faith in the power of mass to overcome anything. More U.S. troops in Iraq would improve our chances of winning a decisive battle at a decisive moment. All seem unexceptionable. Clearly fighting the wrong battle the wrong way leaves you very confused.

Now the Whitehouse is horrified that Al-Qaeda has a plan for exercising power in Anbar province.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/09/20060905-4.html

Either it plans even when there is a slim chance of success or it has a significant chance of being in power in Anbar. Neither reflects well on the Whitehouse.

[larry birnbaum]

Strange he mentions the British experience in Malaysia. My recollection is that they needed more than 10 times the guerilla forces, for 10 years, to succeed there.

[anne]

Complete nonsense, tragic lunacy; we need to leave Iraq immediately as we have needed to leave from the day the Iraqi government was deposed. Not that we needed to attack Iraq, of course. We must leave Iraq to the Iraqis and give over the lunatic notion that we can control-colonize Iraq no matter what region. We must leave Iraq immediately.

[anne]

There is no succeeding in Iraq however other than for Iraqis. Can we not understand that beginning with the appointing of an American Viceroy for Iraq we were beyond deluded. Beyond the physical and psychological and moral destruction, even as a Monty Python sketch depicting Iraq as we have should be comical enough to leave us crying. Imagine, we dreamed of a Viceroy for Iraq and who of us laughed?

[anne]

Please try to get around the lunacy and understand that we must leave immediately and have needed only to leave for these 3 1/2 years. Leave Iraq, immediately. No though, we will not leave, we will have our American colony no matter the tragic cost to us and to the Iraqis.

[anne]

Where is the Monty Python portrayal of Iraq that can show us how crazed we have been and are for staying in Iraq. Imagine thinking America's safety resided or resides in Iraq. The lunatics on the right are all about America's safety and world democracy is the ultimate ploy. The left's lunatics are all for getting naked to help the helpless Iraqis who could never otherwise help themselves. We must leave Iraq, immediately.

[David Lloyd-Jones]

Surely it's an either/or.

Either there should be far more troops on the ground, or America should get the Hell out.

How about 200,000 Americans, 150,000 Germans, 150,000 Brits, 150,000 Russians... Canada and Australia could come up with a Division apiece if pressed, and the French, Brazilians, Indians, Chinese and so on could probably put up 100,000 or so apiece.

Surely it is obvious that George Bush chickened out when he handed the country back to the theocrats and their militias. What is needed is a total shut-down and an Occupation like that which de-Nazified Germany or that which brought something like democracy to Japan.

Who wold be the MacArthur or the Lucius Clay of the case?

How about Bill Clinton or Tony Blair?

[andres]

anne: as somebody who approaches the category of lunatic leftist on occasion (especially when provoked by anti-immigrant baiters), I don't get naked to help anyone, helpless or not. Particularly not with my physique ;-)

Ahem. I favor an Iraqi referendum on the continuing presence of US troops not because I have any illusions that the Iraqis want us there, but because I want something to rub on the noses of the right-wing interventionists when they inevitably accuse us of cutting and running. Letting the people of Iraq decide is the right approach.

[anne]

Precisely, what we need are 750,000 occupying-colonizing soldiers in Iraq and Tony Blair as Emperor (Bill Clinton could not be trusted, too much a Democrat). Germany could definitely send 200,000 soldiers to Iraq. Germany? Germany???

[Jack]

Ten years is pretty generous. I say five years before the paper folds in disgrace, though I wouldn't mind them closing up shop in ten months. There is only so much national humiliation you can cause and still stay in business. Right?

[anne]

Then have a referendum, immediately. Frankly though I do not care what the vote would be, only rightists would be too afraid of the likely outcome to allow for a vote. I however am thinking that with 750,000 German soldiers in Iraq we really would leave and who could criticize us then? German soldiers as colonists. I like that, really. All the yesterdays are so yesterday. German soldiers, yeah.

[anne]

Imagine what Monty Python would do with 750,000 German soldiers fanning out through Iraq to rightful places. I am all aflutter again just thinking about German soldiers fanning.

[anne]

Free Iraq, give the Iraqis to the Germans.

[Bupa]

Why isn't anyone looking for other possible reasons our neocons friends would want a massive troup build up in Iraq? Remember Iran is next door and they want to invade Iran.

[Matt]

Iraq has exactly what it needs, if the Yanks would just leave.

Iraq is debating, quite vigorously, the issues that divide the two major sects in Islam, a debate that has been delayed far too long. Iraq is deciding upon the level of federalism that seems appropriate to their culture. Iraq is finding it way to an accomodation with Iran. Kurdistan has found its niche.

Perhaps it is all too much to accomplish all in one era, and if so, then let Iraq be to find a temporary solution for another 20 years.

The only real danger to leaving Iraq be would be another round of domination by Sunni fascists, but I think this possibility is less dangerous than having yank troops hang on.

[anne]

http://www.matthewyglesias.com/

More and More
By Matthew Yglesias

Bill Kristol and Rich Lowry team up in today's Washington Post:

"I was going to call this the hawkery of fools, but really knaves is more like it. The wars are all going to be easy before we launch them, and the folks raising piddling questions should be dismissed. When the wars don't work out, it's always because we've been insufficiently warlike. When the wars produce broader strategic problems, we need more wars. And, of course, more troops. Always more troops."

[Jim Dandy]

I think you all are missing the point of the Kristol/Lowry lunacy. They really want a troop build up in Iraq in order to set the stage for the final showdown in Iran.

Note the wily way in which they allow someone else to make the point for them, by quoting from another supposed "authority":

“Harvard Law School's William Stuntz recently made the core point powerfully: "The territory over which we fight is among the most strategically important in the world. Victory will place the most dangerous regime on the planet, Iran's fascist theocracy, in serious peril. Defeat will leave that same regime inestimably strengthened. If there is any significant possibility that the presence of more American soldiers on the ground would raise the odds of success, not putting those soldiers on the ground is a crime.” “

[anne]

Whew, remind me to wear garlic and hold a cross when walking past the law school.

[jim]

Just as a matter of interest, since I wouldn't myself read the piece, would someone who has read it tell me if he mentions where these extra troops are to be found?

[anne]

Germany, all the troops necessary and then some are in Germany. As a heart-felt camp follower I am busily learning German marching songs. Lieder? or are they stockings? No matter, I like stockings too.

[anne]

Which reminds me, Meryl Streep has been playing in "Mother Courage and Her Children." War is everywhere on German lips, and I say let them fight as they were meant to fight. I will follow the Germans everywhere through the Iraqi black forests and swamps. Meryl is a wonder, but if she is ready I will follow strewing lieder everywhere. Germans to Iraq.

[Tom Hilton]

The headline wasn't "Dewey Wins", it was "Dewey Defeats Truman". And given the closeness of that election, it's way less embarrassing than "We're Winning".

[weichi]

Jim,

Needless to say, they do not. It's enough to make you want to cry.

[jimBOB]

Lowery and Kristol surely know there are no more troops to send, and that launching a draft in order to get more would assure the extinction of the GOP. This proposal isn't about dealing with the situation with any shred of honesty. It's about inflating themselves a rhetorical lifeboat as Iraq sinks beneath the waves.

When the final collapse happens, they'll be clicking their tongues and muttering about how if only we'd listened to their sage advice we'd not have had all these problems.

Hiatt is giving them the forum because he wants a seat on the lifeboat too.

[PW]

Muckraker has this addition to the Washington Post editorial pages which I think will just thrill you to death... Michael Gerson. ("16 little words" and "smoking ...cloud")

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/001505.php

[blister]

Wrong headline. This is about some NR turkey yapping on an op-ed page. Got nothing to do with a press corps, better or worse.

[rea]

"Ney called on Napoleon for reinforcements. 'Some troops!', he replied, 'Where do you expect me to get them from? Do you want me to make some?'"

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/
empire_seapower/battle_waterloo_05.shtml