Comment of the Week

Week Ending 4/18/04

My brother-in-law is in Kuwait, and will soon be home. But my heart goes out to those who's kin will not be returning on schedule. Yes, this 'uprising' was predicted, but apparently the prediction ball was dropped somewhere.

Or perhaps there is a simpler explanation. I cannot escape the growing feeling that the insurgency was timed directly to coincide with our troop rotation, deliberately to force the extended deployment and thus, they hope, damage the morale of our men and women on the ground.

We have a responsibility in Iraq, a responsibility that extends beyond the borders of that land. That responsibility is to stand firm to our plans to return the sovereignty of that land to its people. It is to assist them in rebuilding, but not to rebuild for them. It is to guide them to democracy, not to lay down rails they must follow.

Whether these things will come to pass, I do not yet know. There are clearly those who wish a return to dictatorship, religious or secular. Furthermore, there are those who would pull all of the foreign troops out, leaving anarchy and a humanitarian disaster in their wake. We no longer have that easy way out. This is not Vietnam, this is, true, a war that should never have been, but it is now a war that must be resolved.

It is hard for our troops who must remain on extended deployment. Harder still for their families. We must have replacements ready as soon as is logistically feasible, and we must bring these men and women home. But we must not abandon what we have begun.

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