The Federal Republican

One Last Chance

by Robert J. Romano

Following a monumental political victory for the House and Senate after nearly twelve years in the minority when the Democrats last lost the House and Senate in 1994 (except for briefly holding the Senate from 2001-2002), the new majority is poised to either inflict great damage to the war effort, or is in a unique historical position to redeem itself on the issues of national security. It becomes important to analyze if political support for the war effort would be beneficial to its prosecution in addition to appropriations made on an annual basis to fund daily military and humanitarian operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. The real challenge is to perhaps demonstrate a political advantage for the majority to support victory in Iraq in particular, and in the greater war on terrorism in general, with President Bush who, mind you, only has two years left in his term, one of which will be embroiled with a presidential election, and after which, Democrats may ultimately have to take the reins in leading America at war.

One immediate impact of a supportive majority would be to show the American people that the parties in Washington can work together to achieve an important national objective: victory in the war effort which we have sacrificed our best and bravest.

A tremendous problem would be political accusations that the new majority had sold out its base, an eminently reasonable concern, perhaps an insurmountable one, which this piece shall seek to diminish. First and foremost, it is important to recognize that when Republicans were in the majority, the war effort could be reasonably sustained with minority objection. It remains to be seen if a war effort may be sustained without the support of a majority of Congress.

Much depends upon the President’s State of the Union address, in which he should take a unique moment to reach out to the Congressional majority in an appeal to do what it takes to achieve victory. In many ways, the President must appeal to Congress, if simply to fund the war effort, and outward indications appear that the majority will not be seeking to defund that effort as took place after the “peace” was signed between North and South Vietnam, and therein lies an opportunity for the minority President to remind members of our past failings to prosecute foreign wars. The truth remains that the climate of the election of 2002 birthed the theatre of and war’s expansion into Iraq, an effort with which the majority of Americans bear responsibility for if the sentiments of their representatives in Congress at the time were any indication.

The Democrats can be right to demand milestones be achieved by the administration and by Iraq itself, but only if they support the objective of victory. In the very least, they could release a Roadmap to Victory, and then criticize the President for not doing all that is necessary to achieve victory. The majority will lose credibility on the war if they, on the one hand, oppose the mission, and on the other, demand that its prosecution be more effective. This weakness is glaring perhaps not in a midterm election cycle, but will be on display in less than two years when the American people may in all likelihood have to choose between a wishy-washy Democrat Senator and a tough-as-nails Republican prosecutor of the war on terror.

The majority may believe that public will to pursue victory in the war on terror is spent, and if so, they may be in for a rude awakening in 2008. In many ways, when the Democrats were in the minority, they did not need war goals. Sure, they could lean on their Bush-lite prescription of simply fighting the war on terrorism in Afghanistan since that’s where al Qaeda was at the time of the attacks, or perhaps anywhere but Iraq, but the truth is that America is going to be the target of terrorist and Islamist aggression for the foreseeable future. In the isolation of the 1990’s, the political parties could resign themselves to the prospect that terrorism was a far-off problem, too far away to be directly embroiled in “solving.” Even with the “isolated” incidents of the Oklahoma City bombing or the first World Trade Center attack, the only trouble was to find the perpetrators and their accomplices. On September 11^th, however, the consequences of state-sponsored terrorism were seen, and the stakes involved today demand that we not repeat the doldrums of the 1990’s and wait for the next attack, and then dutifully round up the perps, meanwhile pretending mightily that these efforts are not being directed, or allowed, by our enemies in the Middle East.

This author shall admit a mistake inasmuch as casting the elections of 2004 and 2006 as referenda on whether Iraq is a theatre in the war on terrorism. In truth, they were probably referenda on whether the war on terrorism is a war at all. For, if not in the Middle East where reactionary forces seek to overthrow the forces of civilization, then where and when will America stand up to terrorist networks that actively seek the destruction of and rule over free peoples everywhere?

The notion that this must not be done in the Middle East lest the situation be inflamed was discredited on September 11^th. If there were to be a theatre opened up militarily in the war on terror after Afghanistan, it needed to be in the Middle East as a region because that is where the movement began and also because that is where it must end. The 9/11 hijackers were primarily not from Afghanistan, though that is where the Taliban ruled. Instead, they were Middle Eastern.

The response to September 11^th was not merely a reordering of security to prevent the next attack, though that is a primary concern and functionally that is why laws such as the Patriot Act and policies such as the Terrorist Surveillance Program are necessary, it was to uproot and eradicate terrorist networks and to address the root causes of the conflict: the freedom deficit in the Middle East. A regime such as Hussein’s Iraq, which was a state sponsor of terrorism despite claims to the contrary, was also a brutal tyranny guilty of genocide, and which also had sought and used weapons of mass destruction. The reason terrorists are able to take root is because of welcoming or non-intervening governments which either actively sponsor or tacitly allow their murderous activities to continue. Certainly there is a diplomatic front in this war, and our allies throughout the Middle East which we have worked with, such as with the sharing of intelligence and the elimination and apprehension of the enemy, are a testament to the necessity of finding viable partners in the region, and when confronted with the prospects of a republican Iraq, we should be seizing the opportunity to change the landscape throughout the region.

Not all of the actors in the region will be as helpful as the Iraqis have been in uprooting terrorist networks. Though the terrorists have small havens in Iraq, the state is on the whole an ally in this war which we fight, and is not a safe harbor, and we must distinguish between those states which are helpful, and those of which are not.

How we fare in Iraq may ultimately determine how we prevail throughout the region and in the war, and whether the region will be swallowed up for another generation by the darkness of fascism, or if it shall embrace the light of freedom.

With stakes so high, it appears less unthinkable that the President could reach out to members of Congress to create a united front in the war. In several ways, he is left with little choice than to at least make a political overture to work with members of both parties to achieve victory.

In the political context, it can be advantageous for Democrats to support America’s war effort in all of its theatres, as it will help them to establish long-needed credibility on national security issues which has plagued their presidential prospects since the collapse of the Cold War consensus. In addition, sustaining the war effort and achieving victory will ultimately be contingent upon overall public support, which is in turn contingent upon political support coming from our leaders in government. And, being in a necessary war against the terrorists, the tyrannies that enable them, and the Islamist ideology which they embrace, the sooner we achieve victory, the sooner our forces can come back home.

Assuming the majority is sincere in wanting to bring an end to hostilities, indeed, in wanting to bring peace to the region, they must embrace victory as a goal.

There is a great chance that, if the Democrat majority is a growing one, they may have to take the reins in the greater war on terrorism via the presidency after 2008, and they must make a decision if they have the will to take the fight to the terror states. For, a tacit allowance and willful ignorance of terrorism and the states which sponsor it is an invitation for those states to escalate their efforts to, amongst other evils, destabilize Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, and Saudi Arabia, to destroy Israel, and continuing to wage devastating attacks against the free peoples of the world entire.

The choice is theirs, and it may ultimately be the coalition’s last chance to sustain the offensive we are on, for if Democrats are elected in 2008 on the notion that the war on terrorism is merely a limited engagement militarily that should primarily be dealt with diplomatically and via law enforcement, woe unto us all.