In the past week, there has been both good and bad news about Iraq. The good news is that we might actually leave the country in the future. The bad news is that we have to "win" first.
President George W. Bush announced his plans for the future of the war in Iraq on Tuesday. Unfortunately, the only thing the public heard is what Bush has been touting from the beginning. With no real plan for the future, Bush fell back on his old ways of telling everyone about the recent accomplishments in Iraq in an attempt to distract listeners from the real issue. The only actual commitment to leaving Iraq hinges on victory, which is a slippery slope at best.
"Setting an artificial deadline to withdraw would vindicate the terrorist tactics of beheadings and suicide bombings and mass murder and invite new attacks on America," Bush said.
However, setting some timeline would satisfy an American public that is tired of watching American soldiers die every day for a war that started under questionable circumstances in the first place. The public deserves more than the rhetoric Bush serves up every time Iraq is discussed.
In an attempt to satisfy the public more than Bush was able to, the White House released a 35-page document outlining the "plan" for Iraq. Once again, the report explained that leaving hinges on victory.
Fortunately, the document spelled out exactly what "victory" means. Unfortunately, the exact definition of victory leaves something to be desired.
"Unlike past wars, however, victory in Iraq will not come in the form of an enemy's surrender or be signaled by a single particular event - there will be no Battleship Missouri, no Appomattox," according to the White House document. "The ultimate victory will be achieved in stages."
What the White House should have said: "We really have no idea when or how this war is going to end, but we think it will end eventually. We're sorry for any inconvenience this may cause, but we don't want to lie to you."
The stages explained in the report are, in reality, indeterminable amounts of time that can be used as excuses - "We have yet to complete stage three, so we are not leaving yet" could end up being a viable excuse.
The problem with wars are that even when they are "over," American troops are still there to make sure that nothing bad happens. There are still American troops in Japan and Germany who have been there since World War II, and troops remain in Korea to make sure the hostility in North Korea doesn't trickle down to South Korea. These troops represent more American lives that might be going to waste "protecting" another country.
I was under the impression that young men and women joined the military to protect their own country. Feed me all the propaganda you want about how these countries are a major threat to us; I still don't want to lose my life protecting them from themselves.
One part of our history leaves some hope for the soldiers in Iraq. During Vietnam, we totally pulled out of a country for the first time in history. We cut our losses, grabbed our prisoners and ran the hell out of there - and we didn't look back. This past precedent of Vietnam shows we might eventually be able to pull out of Iraq.
In the end, it all boils down to some pretty basic realities: We shouldn't have gone to Iraq in the first place, we shouldn't have stayed once we didn't find any weapons, we shouldn't have overtaken the Iraqi government and force fed them a version of ours, and we shouldn't be in Iraq now.
The end is coming, but just how far away it is might be the million-dollar question - or more appropriately, the million-deaths question.
Write to Logan at lmbraman@bsu.edu
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