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The Quickening

Again with anniversaries. Tomorrow will mark one year since the fall of Baghdad to U.S. forces. Today, those forces lost control of two Iraqi cities. Reuters reports:

U.S.-led coalition forces do not have control of the Iraqi cities of Najaf and Kut, where Shi'ite militiamen have seized control of key buildings in the center of town, the top U.S. general in Iraq said on Thursday.

It's that bad.

Now this, the Associated Press: "In an ominous new tactic, kidnappers seized foreign hostages, threatening to burn three Japanese captives alive if Tokyo did not withdraw troops." Elsewhere, in seemingly unrelated incidents, several South Koreans and Israeli Arabs have been taken, though the South Koreans have since been released. If this ignites a wave of kidnapping and murder of foreign civilians, the situation -- already very bad -- could become far less stable very quickly. I do not expect what military allies we have to pull out of the country over incidents like this, but it makes the prospect of expanded international cooperation in Iraq increasingly unlikely. And we need expanded international cooperation, not for some nebulous idea of legitimacy, but because it is the surest route to victory.

From the run-up to the war through the present the entrenched right has viewed efforts to internationalize the effort in Iraq with unabashed hostility. To a slight degree, I sympathize with this view. The atmosphere at the United Nations before the war, already poisoned by the administration's misplaced certitude, was not helped by the obstinate diplomatic bungling of certain nations, and there was no evidence that any move to oust Saddam Hussein, a worthy goal in my opinion, would have made it through the Security Council without extortion by the French and Chinese. But to continue to praise President Bush's leadership on this issue is nothing short of asinine. His supporters cite his ability to act decisively in the face of opposition as a powerful reason to re-elect him. The is an admirable trait, under two heavy conditions: the action must be right and executed well. In this case, reasonable people can debate whether the former condition was met, but I find it increasingly difficult to see any amiguity on the second. We came to Iraq with the best trained, best equipped, and most admirable military in the world and have met entirely inadequate success. A year after Baghdad fell, we have not even pacified the country, much less taken the steps necessary to restore sovereignty to the people we came to liberate.

Had the free world, united in its historically unrivaled might, come down as one upon the regime of Saddam Hussein, I do not doubt things would be better now. Good people were going to have to die to remove Saddam. But a truly strong leader with the political facility and moral authority to bring our allies in line might have minimized the loss and certainly could have lessened American casualties. It's not too late, but it's getting later. We have not lost in Iraq, and I do not think we will. But while it is noble to be willing to bear any burden, it is wise to make that burden less onerous when possible.

In times of crisis, small men act for the sake of action and oppose for the sake of opposition. Great men act on infectious vision and turn the tide of history. This is your cue, Senator Kerry.