Visualize Victory

The Left has likened the Iraq War from day one in their efforts to demonize it and insist that we are doomed to defeat.

The Left objected when the president rightly likened the Iraq War to Vietnam in warning against casting aside a victory that is ours for the taking.

The Left is wrong on both counts and misses a point, to boot.

We were not doomed to defeat in Vietnam. We were defeated. But that was because of what the president noted--we defeated ourselves by turning our backs on the South Vietnamese. It was a shameful moment in our history. This president does not want to repeat that national dishonor by abandoning Iraqis.

The Left misses the point, too, about what we did accomplish in Vietnam even in loss. Losing in 1975 left far fewer bad effects than losing in the early 1960s would have triggered. The ripples could have spread to other parts of Asia and even to Europe if we had lost South Vietnam a decade or more earlier. I found a two-year-old post of mine on this (so I can't be accused of reflexively defending the President on his analogy).

Even in defeat we accomplished much from our fight in Vietnam. Imagine what we could have achieved had we allowed our allies to win!

And then imagine what we could win today by seeing through our fight in Iraq and the consequences of losing to jihadis and mullahs determined to kill us at home.

Perhaps, as a bonus, our Vietnam veterans will get the credit for what they achieved far from the rice paddies and jungles of South Vietnam.