Progress in Iraq, plus challenges
The president's recent trip to Iraq highlighted both the successes and the continuing challenges in that country.
First of all, and most significantly, President Bush was in Baghdad primarily to meet with the duly elected prime minister of Iraq, a man who has put his very life on the line to bring democracy and prosperity to his people.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki put the finishing touches on his Cabinet last week, the same day that top Iraqi terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed in a U.S. air attack. Those two men represent the poles of ambition in the Middle East - the yearning to be free that helped Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds join together in a coalition government that put forward al-Maliki as its leader vs. the bloodthirsty cult of death headed by Zarqawi.
It is easy for Democratic opponents of President Bush to say that they do not support the Iraq war, because no one is glad to see American lives lost in any struggle, but it should be hard for them to say that they do not support the aspirations of the Iraqi people to be free.
And frankly, it is hard to see how the Iraqi people can hope to escape the familiar cycle of death and despotism in the Middle East without the continued assistance of the American people and the American military. A timetable for withdrawal from Iraq is nothing but a countdown toward chaos.
If we had already withdrawn as Rep. John Murtha and others proposed last year, then Zarqawi would not only be alive today, but stronger than ever. He would indeed be taking credit for defeating the American military with the sword he used to hack off the head of Nicholas Berg back in 2004. Now Zarqawi gets credit for nothing except the slaughter of innocents.
On the other hand, no one expects the death of one terrorist mastermind to bring about the end of the war in Iraq. There are still many who will fight with the same religious fervor, tribal hatred and anti-Western zeal to return Iraq to the dark ages of intolerance. Using a strategy of wanton attacks and random killings, they can do much damage. But they cannot win unless the United States abandons its commitment.
The temptation to do so is great, especially when we hear stories back home about such things as the Abu Ghraib prison scandal and the killing of civilians at Haditha. But we cannot set our foreign policy based on the failings of a few individuals, any more than it can be based on the death of one man such as Zarqawi or even bin Laden.
War brings out the best and the worst in mankind, and no one should expect a war to be fought without excesses and errors of judgment on both sides. This has been true of all wars. No one knows for sure yet whether anything criminal was done by the Marines at Haditha, but the U.S. military, to its credit, has a process for bringing to justice anyone who did in fact commit crimes against the enemy. The same cannot be said for the terrorists who kidnap and behead innocent children.
Let us, thus, not lose sight of the nobility of our cause. If we do - if we doubt the importance of decency and dignity - then the world will have lost its champion, and America will have lost its heart.