Citing polls indicating a waning of popularity of the war in Iraq, some people on Capitol Hill who are seeking reelection or entertaining ambitions of campaigning for higher office have begun pressing for an exit strategy, complete with a schedule, for our military presence and operations in Iraq. Unfortunately, these are not only Democrats, but also a Republican or two, the latter kissing up to the moderates in our own party as well as those Democrats who have become disillusioned with the liberal moonbats currently running their party. 

The Wall Street Journal’s Brendan Miniter weighs in on the subject in the Opinion Journal.

The Goal in Iraq is victory, not withdrawal

The last thing we need in Iraq is a timeline for withdrawal. Victory sets its own schedule, and it’s not contingent on the U.S. election calendar. Arbitrarily forcing a timetable on the battlefield will only aid the enemy. Yet a growing number of politicians are calling for just that–or, at least, a better(read more negative) official accounting of what’s happening in Iraq. With polls showing less support for the war and pols parroting that public opinion, we’re in danger of losing sight on how to defeat the enemy.

Sen. Joe Biden, a Delaware Democrat, joined the parade over the weekend while also bluntly saying he’s looking at a presidential bid in 2008–although he was careful to add that he thinks the next presidential election will turn on national security. Rep. Harold Ford, Jr., normally a sensible Tennessee Democrat, has also joined the procession and hopes his call for a timeline will help him win the Senate seat Bill Frist is vacating. And it’s not just Democrats, Sen. Chuck Hagel is making similar noises as he considers his own presidential bid. 

The prime objective of the war in Iraq goes ‘way beyond the done-deal defeat of Saddam Hussein, its ultimate goal is to establish a democracy in the midst of dangerous theocracies that are the petrie dishes for the cultivation of global terrorism, demonstrating the advantages of living in a free society to those in the rest of the region who never have.

Iraqis, despite the anti-Bush MSM campaign to depict our efforts in Iraq as a total failure, have been relishing the trappings of their new freedom and their young people have been fighting for it in the uniform of their military forces. We are kicking butt over there, but to complete their mission will take our soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen time, time that we cannot define with exactitude, although as we train and equip more Iraqis to defend their new democracy, we will be decreasing the number of U.S. troops deployed in security capacities.

These politically agendized liberals who want to sacrifice American lives for their own partisan purposes and the Republican pols whose careers are more important to them than doing the right thing for the U.S. and the West in general are traitors in my book: The politicians who want to schedule our withdrawal are educated men and women, most if not all lawyers and earning a law degree requires a great deal of intelligence. To read some of their opinions and see what they vote for in Congress tells me that they have agendas that pay little attention to the real wellbeing of their fellow Americans or the security of our country.

If we schedule a withdrawal of our military presence from Iraq, what do you suppose happens? The al Qaeda and other guerillas in Iraq back off and wait until the due date for us to be gone, then they attack the Iraqi government with strategies they’ve had time to plan carefully and forces they’ve had time to martial with full knowledge of the coalition’s exit date, and the next thing you know, the Iraqis are enslaved by another oppressive, evil regime.

Do we really want what the Democrats do, to make waste of the sacrifices by those American warriors who have given their lives in Iraq?

The hope, of course, is that as democracy takes root in Iraq it will spread to the rest of the region. Since the invasion there have been plenty of encouraging signs. Lebanon and Egypt appear to be moving in the right direction. And even Syria is looking to set up its first stock exchange, perhaps a precurser to liberalizing economic reforms. Inside Iraq a civil government is slowly standing up even as the insurgency continues to pull off deadly attacks.

This is a war of civil society versus the agents of anarchy. We don’t need to set a schedule to accept defeat. We need more civil societies to help us keep a lid on the violence that will otherwise creep into our lives. That’s what the war in Iraq is all about and why winning it remains in our nation’s vital interests. 

Those patriotic Americans who want what’s right but whose beliefs are programmed by what they read, listen to or watch in the MSM, do not have a clue. They have little or no idea that complete success in Iraq will be an important measure in protecting ourselves and other free countries from terrorism.