A-Rock in the Stream

Fire of Liberty

Frederick W. Kagan, an expert in US military/defense issues and resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, has written a wonderful piece in the LA Times calling for President Bush to stay the course in Iraq. You only have to look at Kagan's piece to see why we must persevere in this battle, take a look:

By waging a terrorist campaign, the insurgents have designed a war they can sustain for a long time. Obtaining explosives, making bombs and setting them off does not require much skill, money or even courage. The next year will probably not see a significant reduction in the number of explosions, and it's possible, as the Palestinian intifada and the three-decade-long campaign of violence by the Irish Republican Army show, that this situation may last for many years. It is thus unwise to measure progress in Iraq by the number of deaths or bombs in a given period. Progress must instead be measured in the establishment of a stable and legitimate government and the creation of state structures able to function even in the face of attacks.

One big problem, however, is the paucity of coalition troops. Commanders, as a result, are required to make hard choices among such critical tasks as sealing borders, keeping critical lines of communication clear, defending their own troops, training indigenous forces, clearing insurgent-infested areas and attacking promising insurgent targets.

If the U.S. were to keep its troop levels constant over the next 18 months, the manpower available to perform all of these critical tasks would increase dramatically as Iraqi forces became available to handle basic security functions.

Sixty-two million people didn't vote for you just to abandon you now. See keep your nose to the grindstone Mr. President and do what you said you were going to do and America will continue to support you, no matter what a media poll says. True grit counts more.