Dale K. Robinson

We have to finish the job in Iraq

April 27, 2006

She's cute as button with big brown eyes and a shy smile. She's four going on fourteen and she doesn't know about war, Iraq, al Qaeda, liberals, conservatives, or politics. She doesn't know about troop pullouts, suicide bombers, radical Islamists, Abu Graib, Gitmo, IEDs, or what happened to the weapons of mass destruction Saddam Hussein once possessed. Her biggest worries revolve around Dora the Explorer and whether granddad will be late picking her up for church on Sunday.

Granddad's biggest worry is about her future.

Her future is tied to such things as troop pullouts, democracy in Iraq, al Qaeda, radical Islamists, and, God help her, U.S. politicians.

John Murtha, a retired US Marine Reserve colonel, decorated Vietnam veteran, and 31-year veteran of the US House of Representatives has said that US troops in Iraq have become the primary target of the insurgency.

How many US troops were attending the funeral of an Iraqi Shiite in the town of Abu Sayda when a suicide bomber drove into the crowd? Fifty Iraqis died and another 75 were wounded. How many US troops were in the market near Diyala Bridge when a suicide bomber blew up his car, killing 13 and wounding more than 20? Were US troops the target when two suicide car bombers killed six and wounded 40 outside a Baghdad hotel frequented by journalists and contractors? There were no US troops present when suicide bombings at Shiite mosques in Khanaqin killed 77 Iraqis. More and more, Iraqi civilians are the targets of the insurgents as they try unsuccessfully to disrupt the political process by inciting a civil war between the Shiites and Sunnis. In July, even Osama bin Laden's number two man Ayman al-Zawahiri expressed his concern to insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi that public opinion would turn against the insurgency if such attacks continued.

To his credit, Murtha's concern is for the American soldiers and Marines and sailors and airmen deployed to Iraq. While they are not the only targets of the insurgency, they certainly are targets. US troops carrying toys to children in an Iraqi hospital were targeted; no Americans died, but 30 Iraqis were killed in the attack.

But what I don't understand is how Murtha, a decorated Vietnam veteran can forget the lessons of Vietnam, lessons that are not lost on the enemy.

Ayman al-Zawahiri wrote to al-Zarqawi: “The aftermath of the collapse of American power in Vietnam-and how they ran and left their agents-is noteworthy. Because of that, we must be ready starting now, before events overtake us, and before we are surprised by the conspiracies of the Americans and the United Nations and their plans to fill the void behind them. We must take the initiative and impose a fait accompli upon our enemies, instead of the enemy imposing one on us, wherein our lot would be to merely resist their schemes.”

Withdrawing from Iraq before the job is done, before a stable, self-sufficient government is in place, capable of defending its citizens and institutions from enemies within and without, will be a mistake. It will likely plunge the nation into a civil war that will spread across the region, pitting the Shia against the Sunnis. Zawahiri considers the Shiites to be traitors to Islam, declaring their cooperation with the US-led coalition to be collusion: “Their prior history in cooperating with the enemies of Islam is consistent with their current reality of connivance with the Crusaders.”

And while I understand Murtha wanting to remove our troops from harm's way, I believe that an immediate withdrawal of troops, even over the course of six months, will expose the American people abroad and at home to further attacks in the future. It may buy some temporary safety, but it will only be temporary.

"The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies - civilians and military - is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it... We, with God's help, call upon every Muslim who believes in God and wishes to be rewarded to comply with God's order to kill the Americans and plunder their money wherever and whenever they find it. We also call on Muslim ulama [clerics], leaders, youths and soldiers to launch the raid on Satan's US troops and the Devil's supporters allying with them."

So wrote Osama bin Laden, in a fatwa he issued against the United States five years before the invasion of Iraq, three years before 9-11, two years before the USS Cole, and five months before the bombings of our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Iraq wasn't the start of this war, leaving there won't end it. It is not a war over territory or resources, but a war over ideologies, a war against a loosely organized group of men who want nothing less than to impose their beliefs upon the rest of the world.

We can argue about why we went to Iraq with the benefit of 20-20 hindsight, but the fact of the matter is that we are there and we have to finish what we started. We owe it to the Iraqi people, we owe it to the American people. We owe it to the little girl with big brown eyes who knows nothing of al Qaeda, Zarqawi or bin Laden. We owe it to her to stop these killers from reaching their goals.

And their immediate goals were clearly outlined by Ayman al-Zawahiri this last July: Expel the Americans from Iraq. Establish an “Islamic authority”over as much territory in Iraq as possible immediately after US troops leave. Spread the “jihad” to secular countries neighboring Iraq - Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Syria. Destroy Israel.

President Bush asked, “Would the United States and other free nations be more safe or less safe with Zarqawi and bin Laden in control of Iraq, its people and its resources?”

Duh.

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