Friday, October 24, 2008

Re ‘Thank You, Barney Frank, for Your Honesty’   [Jay Nordlinger]

Congressman Frank is usually described as one of the smartest of the Democrats, and smartest of the liberals, and, if so, we’re in bad shape: because he says, “The people of Iraq want us out, and we want to stay over their objection. It’s extraordinary.”

 

What an extraordinarily stupid statement. I have spent a fair amount of time on the question of the American presence in Iraq: whether the Iraqis desire that presence or not. I spent some time on it when I was in Iraq earlier this month. And all those who are familiar with the issue will say essentially the same things.

 

No one likes to be occupied, of course. And Iraqis would prefer us gone. They want no foreigners around at all — and that includes al-Qaeda and other terrorists.

 

They also want to be safe from predation. They don’t want to be left to the wolves. And many Iraqis — you could meet them — are terrified that the coalition will withdraw too soon, which is to say before the country can defend itself.

 

As I wrote in my Iraq journal earlier, it’s “Yankee, go home — but Yankee, stay, too. Don’t go home yet. Go home when it’s safe for us that you do — when our own authorities can beat back the extremists.”

 

You should have seen the people I talked with in a Baghdad marketplace: who dread a premature American withdrawal, because the wolves would be at their throats again. You should have met the Iraqi colonel who said, if we Americans leave too soon, we will turn over the country to al-Qaeda and Iran — and people like him will have to flee for their lives.

 

Barney Frank said, sweepingly, “The people of Iraq want us out.” He is supposed to be just about the smartest of the liberals. And if Americans are going to unite the federal government under liberals — we are in deep waters.

 

10/24 05:09 PMShare