Terror

[rowyn]

Getting just what they wanted.

"CNN also has obtained an al Qaeda document that spells out the terrorist group's plan to separate Spain from the U.S.-led coalition on Iraq.
...
"The strategy spelled out in the document calls for using terrorist attacks to oust Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar's Partido Popular from power and replace it with the Socialists.
...
"'We think the Spanish government will not stand more than two blows, or three at the most, before it will be forced to withdraw because of the public pressure on it,' the al Qaeda document says.
...
"the Socialists unseat[ed] the Popular Party three days after near-simultaneous bombings of four trains killed 200 and shocked the nation.
...
"Prime Minister-elect Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said Monday he wants the 1,300 Spanish troops in Iraq to return home by June 30 if the United Nations 'doesn't take control of Iraq.'

"'I think Spain's participation in the war has been a total error,' he said."

I feel sick.

Comments

Building

[rowyn]

Right now, if I understand at all correctly, the objective is to restore something resembling order, to provide security, and to restore the "infrastructure" - fix schools, replace bombed bridges, make sure the electricity works before the scorching summer hits, keep patching the oil lines, and so forth.

If the US and all its partners were to unilaterally withdraw their forces, the mayhem wouldn't stop.

Needless to say, I agree with you. I am heartened that it is possible for the US to improve the situation by the success last century in transforming Japan and Germany from dictatorships to democracies. The same thing might not work with Iraq, and even if it would, America may not have the will to implement it.

But I think it's better to try, then to give up and allow a new tyrant to assume control -- which is almost certainly what will happen if we withdraw completely.