Anyway, I was tempted to fisk this article by the man. But good grief, it is such a target-rich environment that I can't bring myself to have a go at it.
But let me comment on just one part, where he summarizes the horrible results of the war as he sees them:
...and the best we can hope for will be a loosely federated Islamic republic that isn't completely in Iran's pocket.
One, if the Iraqis want a loose federation, they are free to have it. But remember that a federation is the plan and not a flaw. We don't want a centralized state that another madman can control by seizing the capital.
Second, while Iraq is certainly composed of Moslems and will be a republic, it is not going to be an Islamic republic with all the baggage that term carries (and this verbal slam is made despite the Left's denial that Islam is anything but a religion of peace).
Third, Iran will not dominate Iraq if the Iraqi people have anything to say about it.
And fourth, the best we can hope for his a free and democratic Iraq that fights with us as an ally in the Long War and inspires other Moslems to want democracy in place of the deadening autocracies that have given them nought but misery and woe the last sixty years.
So in one portion of a sentence, Fred Kaplan gets four things wrong. So forgive me for not slicing and dicing the whole thing. Or even one complete sentence. I'm just one man, after all. I am unwilling to be a volunteer Slate editor.
Instead, read this and understand what we are in the process of achieving in Iraq:
So we did not turn Baghdad into a democratic city on a hill, and we learned that the dismantling of Sunni tyranny would leave the Arab world's Shiite stepchildren with primacy in Iraq. A better country has nonetheless risen, midwifed by this American war. It is not a flawless democracy. But compare it to the prison it was under Saddam, the tyranny next door in Damascus and the norms of the region, and we can have a measure of pride in what America has brought forth in Baghdad.
This is not a Shiite state that we uphold. True, the Shiite majority was emancipated from a long history of fear and servitude, but Iraq's Shiites have told us in every way they can that their country is not a "sister republic" of the Persian theocracy to their east. If anything, the custodians of political power in Iraq have signaled their long-term intentions: an extended American presence in their midst and the shoring up of an oil state in the orbit of American power.
But our Left sees nothing and knows nothing. And they want the keys to the national car?
Further, even with the outcome of our long range goals and hopes for Iraq in the balance, we achieved much just in getting rid of the Saddam regime:
What our troops found in Iraq following Saddam's removal was horrifying. They uncovered children's prisons, and torture chambers, and rape rooms where Iraqi women were violated in front of their families. They found videos showing regime thugs mutilating Iraqis deemed disloyal to Saddam. And across the Iraqi countryside they uncovered mass graves of thousands executed by the regime.
Because we acted, Saddam Hussein no longer fills fields with the remains of innocent men, women and children. Because we acted, Saddam's torture chambers and rape rooms and children's prisons have been closed for good. Because we acted, Saddam's regime is no longer invading its neighbors or attacking them with chemical weapons and ballistic missiles. Because we acted, Saddam's regime is no longer paying the families of suicide bombers in the Holy Land. Because we acted, Saddam's regime is no longer shooting at American and British aircraft patrolling the no-fly zones and defying the will of the United Nations. Because we acted, the world is better and United States of America is safer. (Applause.)
When the Iraqi regime was removed, it did not lay down its arms and surrender. Instead, former regime elements took off their uniforms and faded into the countryside to fight the emergence of a free Iraq. And then they were joined by foreign terrorists who were seeking to stop the advance of liberty in the Middle East and seeking to establish safe havens from which to plot new attacks across the world.
The battle in Iraq has been longer and harder and more costly than we anticipated -- but it is a fight we must win. So our troops have engaged these enemies with courage and determination. And as they've battled the terrorists and extremists in Iraq, they have helped the Iraqi people reclaim their nation, and helped a young democracy rise from the rubble of Saddam Hussein's tyranny.
So remember, for all that the future of Iraq is unclear, we and the Iraqis could not have embarked on this course--fought tooth and nail by Iran and Syria who have mobilized Shia and Sunni thugs to fight us in Iraq--if we had not destroyed the Saddam regime in March and April 2003.
This is a just war. And we are winning this war.
