WASHINGTON -- Did you see that over the weekend Al Qaeda's
second-in-command, the Rev. Ayman Zawahiri, appeared in an online
67-minute video and declared that the Democrats' bill calling for a
troop withdrawal from Iraq is proof that the United States has
already lost the war in Iraq? I wonder how the Democratic
leadership took the news. Did the Hon. Nancy Pelosi send him an
e-mail congratulating him on his astuteness? Or was she a bit
embarrassed? Yet, can anything embarrass Speaker Pelosi and the
rest of the Democratic leadership? Frankly I doubt it. They are all
neatly shut off from the world in their fantasy of moral and
intellectual superiority.
Of course, the Rev. Zawahiri is shut off in his own fantasy
world. Does he actually think the United States has been defeated
in Iraq? Anywhere our army goes it destroys our enemies. All they
can do is blow themselves up. Zawahiri apparently deems it a
victory if one of his lunkheads blows himself up close enough to an
American unit to take an American casualty. Oh, I suppose he
imagines other glorious victories, for instance, a lunkhead blowing
up a market and killing scores of Iraqis, or a hospital, or a
mosque. These calamities are not what are usually described as
victories.
Apparently Al Qaeda franchises its name to terrorists in other
countries. Thus there is "Al-Qaeda in Iraq." Now it is time for the
Democrats to franchise their name abroad. As neatly as Zawahiri's
statement comports with the views of such Democrats as Senator
Harry Reid, who said last month that the war in Iraq is "lost,"
perhaps the Democrats will soon franchise their name to like-minded
groups abroad. Perhaps they will make the Rev. Zawahiri the head of
"Democrats in the Caves of Wajiristan." Maybe the Democrats and Al
Qaeda can exchange greetings, Senator Harry Reid in an online video
repeating to the cave dwellers in Wajiristan his message of last
month, "this war is lost," and the Rev. Zawahiri repeating his
message of this month that our war is "lost."
But there are differences in the two groups' views on the Iraq
war. The Democrats want us to get out, the sooner the better.
Zawahiri is not so brash. In his message over the weekend he
declared, "We ask Allah that they [the American and other coalition
forces] get out after losing 200,000 to 300,000 killed." That means
he wants our forces to remain in Iraq until 2207 and possibly 2307.
Even President George W. Bush would not go that far. And Zawahiri
believes that the casualties he envisages would constitute a
dreadful "lesson," giving "the blood spillers in Washington and
Europe an unforgettable lesson." That is how he put it over the
weekend. What does he have against "blood spillers"? His
dirty-necked galoots are wanton blood spillers. Frankly, I find the
Rev. Zawahiri even more incoherent than Senator Reid.
Pronouncing the American endeavor "lost" in Iraq is probably a
good idea for those who hate America, but I do not think it is a
very good idea for the Democrats. They did the very same thing
towards the end of our military engagement in Vietnam, and that led
to a decade of setbacks for American interests around the globe. It
also led to some dreadful setbacks for the Democrats. In fact, with
the exception of Bill Clinton's two elections and the recent
mid-term elections, it has mostly been downhill for the Democrats
since they bugged out on Vietnam and solemnized that war a
"loss."
The war itself was not a military loss, though we certainly
suffered a diplomatic defeat in Vietnam. Our military won every
large engagement and most small ones. Our losses were in the range
of 50,000, but the Communist Vietnamese lost two and a half
million, some 900,000 in combat. For two years after we evacuated
the country the South Vietnamese army held its own. What led to its
defeat was a massive Communist assault that went unopposed by
American airpower when the Democrats in Congress pulled a Harry
Reid and refused to support the use of airpower or even to resupply
the South Vietnamese.
Now we see the Democrats reenacting their Vietnam bugout in
Iraq. They cannot give us a military defeat there. Our army is too
powerful. Yet they can give us another diplomatic defeat. If they
do, my prediction is years of electoral defeats for the Democrats.
As to a decade of setbacks for American interests abroad, that is a
matter too terrible to contemplate.
topics:
Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Bill Clinton, Military, Iraq, NATO
