Taking Lessons From History

This morning the main headline in my local newspaper, The Press-Enterprise (Inland Southern California), read: Worse seen for unstable Iraq. Then the article's title/caption read: REPORT: U.S. Intelligence officials say the country's leaders "remain unable to govern effectively."

The New York Times posted a similar story with the headline: Report Raises Strong Doubt About Iraqi Government, describing Iraq's government as being paralyzed and unable to take advantage of the security gains achieved by the thousands of extra American troops dispatched to the country this year.

[about now I would expect the sound of an abruptly scratched record/LP - that's one of those round black discs that plays music on record players/turntables for you young'ns]

Did the New York Times in this article admit the surge is working?

Ah, but that's one of the points of this post. Since the military surge led by General Patraeus is obviously succeeding in lessening the violence level in Iraq, the liberal media and their cronies for defeat are in a mad scramble for a new strategy to convince America that Iraq is a disastrous defeat. But how, they asked themselves, can we still portray Iraq as a doom and gloom scenario when the surge is working?

The Liberal mainstream media has decided that since the military successes in Iraq keep piling up faster than they can handle they must begin chopping at the political end of the deal. In other words, do what they can to destroy the integrity of the government led by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, as well as hammer on the weaknesses of the fledgling democracy.

Has the Liberal media lost their minds? Or forgotten the lessons of history for that matter?

Unfortunately, the answer to the first question is "Yes" and "They lost their marbles a long time ago." From a historical point of view they seem to forget that the United States of America took a long time to become a democracy, and we are still tweaking the system. The American Revolution on its own took eight years to reach its completion, and even then, our battle for democracy was far from over. The U.S. Constitution wasn't officially adopted until 1789, six long years after the end of the Revolutionary War.

In other words, the wheels of democracy grind slowly, and it takes time to establish such a government. We can't expect Iraq to stabilize overnight. Impatience is not the answer. Abandoning the nation after freeing them from Saddam Hussein's iron fist is not the right thing to do, nor the wise thing to do from any direction you look at it. The stakes are high in that region, and our National Security has a vested interest in the success of a democratic Iraq.

Iran neighbors Iraq to the north, and Iraq is currently (of course the mainstream media won't tell you this) being shelled by Iran along Iraq's northern border. Iran has massed thousands of troops along that border in preparation for a ground assault against Kurdish fighters (who have long acted as allies with the American Forces). This is not only a violation of Iraq's sovereignty which has been guaranteed up to this point by American presence in that country, but it is a message that Iran is willing to come against the 16,000 American Troops in Iraq.

First, nuclear aspirations, and now Iran pulls this stunt? The writing is on the wall, folks. Cut and run would be disastrous.

As the mainstream media is crying for us to pull out, the enemy is positioning itself so that it may destroy the fledgling democracy in Iraq. And if we continue to listen to the Left and if we decide not to protect Iraq's New Democracy, continue to spew propaganda against her via our wonderful liberal (Marxist?) press, and do nothing about the threats being offered by Iraq's neighbors, we will be sending a terrible message. The enemy will see us and our presence in the region as weak, and unwilling to protect the freedom in Iraq we have inspired. Instead, after all that we have accomplished, Iran will launch a massive massacre against Iraq that will eventually spill over into Israel, and then into The West.

History has shown that weakness and the unwillingness to take these radicals serious in the Mid-East is always answered with death. In 1990 it became increasingly clear that Saddam Hussein was planning to invade Kuwait, attack Israel, and draw the world into a new Middle East war. Saddam Hussein said so in his speeches, claiming that it was his goal to destroy half of Israel with chemical weapons.

How did the American media respond to these threats?

Time magazine on June 11, 1990 chalked Saddam up as a loud, dangerous leader that really poses nothing to seriously worry about, saying specifically "Saddam is not likely to do anything that would jeopardize his standing either in Iraq or in the Middle East." On July 2nd of 1990 The Washington Post declared "New Middle East War Seen Unlikely." And just days before Iraq's invasion of Kuwait the London Times headlined that "Experts Believe Iraq Will Stop Short of Invasion." (Page 45 EPICENTER by Joel Rosenberg). And if anyone challenged the notion by saying something like "Doesn't all the evidence add up to an invasion?", in Joel Rosenberg's words the sophisticated, intellectual, enlightened response was, "Of course not, you uneducated moron."

On August 2, 1990, Iraqi forces began moving across the Kuwaiti border. In 1991 Iraq launched 39 SCUD missiles at civilian targets in Israel.

And what was the media's response? Accusations. The press accused the Defense Department of being blindsided by the Iraqi invasion - just as they did regarding 9/11.

Lesson from history?

When tyrants say they plan to do their bidding "by force if necessary," as Hitler proclaimed, or consider a million deaths to be no more than a statistic as Stalin quipped, or indicate that Israel's destruction is near as Ahmadinejad from Iran proclaimed recently, we best take them seriously.

On my radio show last Wednesday I asked my callers on the air if they truly believed that Islam could make good on their threat to dominate the world. The answer was a resounding "Yes."

Go to my Political Pistachio Radio Blog to see what's coming up on future programs.