May 25, 2004 [LINK]

Determination vs. disinformation

President Bush's speech last night at the Army War College in Carlisle Barracks, PA (where I presented a paper on terrorism last fall) may have been a belated attempt to shore up support, but at least he made all the important necessary points. He left no doubt about the difficulties that lie ahead, and kept the focus on the long-term goal of denying terrorists a safe haven. While the President sometimes falls short in the eloquence department, his rock solid determination to prevail are exactly what we need in a leader right now. True, his proposals are "easier said than done," but it is precisely because the goal of a free Iraq is now within our grasp that terrorist violence has escalated in recent weeks. The transcript is available from the White House Web site. Here are the five steps outlined by the President:

1. Transfer full sovereignty to a government of Iraqi citizens on June 30th
2. Establish the stability and security necessary to hold elections
3. Continue rebuilding Iraq's infrastructure, leadin to economic independence
4. Enlisting additional international support for Iraq's transition
5. Holding free, national elections, no later than next January

Thanks to Glenn Reynold's Instapundit, I came across Jason Van Steenwyk's iraqnow blog, which calls to task the New York Times and other mainstream news sources for grossly misquoting Gen. Mattis, commander of the First Marine Division, in a news conference that focused on the recent U.S. attacks in western Iraq where a "wedding party" was underway. Otherwise minor lapses in journalistic standards become greatly magnified given the vital psychological aspect of this conflict. The BBC reports that the International Institute for Strategic Studies concludes that Al Qaeda has been "spurred on" by the U.S. campaign in Iraq, gaining new recruits and prestige in the Arab world. What did we expect, that the Arab world would be dancing in the streets after the fall of Baghdad? Unfortunately, it seems that many well-informed people are just not willing to face up to the nature of this global-scale war. It would have been easy to tiptoe around the sociopolitical malignancy that fosters terrorism, but President Bush decided, for better or worse, to resolve the matter once and for all. For anyone with a sense of history, the setbacks the U.S.-led Coalition has encountered in Iraq are part of the natural ebb and flow of war. As if that IISS report wasn't enough, Tom Clancy has hinted that he agrees with the co-author of his latest book, retired Gen. Anthony Zinni, that the U.S. war in Iraq was a mistake. If the Superhawk himself indeed has pulled the "Eject" lever, the precipitous drop in public support might make this conflict start resembling Vietnam after all.