Wes Clark, when asked by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, "Do you think Congress should stop funding the war?" once again argued forcefully and clearly against troop withdrawal:
I think Congress should take a strong stand to get the strategy changed. I don't think that if you cut off funding for the war, it’s in the -- right now that's not in the United States' interest. What is in the United States’ interest is to change the strategy in the war. You cannot succeed by simply stopping the funding and saying, "You've got six months to get the Americans out."
You must give Clark credit, because it takes courage for a potential Presidential candidate to come out so strongly against withdrawal despite the fact that a solid majority of Americans want out of Iraq, even if it means civil disorder in that country.
But unswayed by public opinion polls, General Clark argues not for an end to our occupation of Iraq, but simply for a change of strategy.
On the flip, follow General Clark to the the deck of the Titanic
Clark continues:
That's not going to end the misery in Iraq. It's not going to restore the lives that have been lost. And it's not going to give us the power in the region to prevent later threats.
I would send a high-level diplomatic team into the region right now. I’d have no-holds-barred and no-preconditioned discussion with Iran and Syria. And I would let it be known that I’ve got in my bag all the tricks, including putting another 50,000 troops in Iraq and pulling all 150,000 troops out. And we're going to reach an agreement on a statement of principles that brings stability and peace and order to the region. So let's just sit down and start doing it. Now, that could be done with the right administrative leadership. It just hasn't been done.
You know, think of it this way. You're on a ship crossing the Atlantic. It's a new ship. And it's at night. And you're looking out ahead of the ship, and you notice that there's a part of the horizon. It's a beautiful, starry night, except that there's a part of the horizon, a sort of a regular hump out there where there are no stars visible. And you notice, as the ship plows through the water at thirty knots, that this area where there are no stars is getting larger. And finally, it hits you that there must be something out there that's blocking the starlight, like an iceberg. So you run to the captain. And you say, "Captain, captain, there's an iceberg, and we're driving right toward it." And he says, "Look, I can't be bothered with the iceberg right now. We're having an argument about the number of deck chairs on the fore deck versus the aft deck." And you say, "But you're going to hit an iceberg." He says, "I’m sorry. Get out of here." So you go to the first officer, and he says, "I’m fighting with the captain on the number of deck chairs."
You know, we're approaching an iceberg in the Middle East in our policy, and we've got Congress and the United States -- and the President of the United States fighting over troop strength in Iraq. It's the wrong issue. The issue is the strategy, not the troop strength.
I must agree with General Clark that the Titanic is an appropriate metaphor for the US misadventure in Iraq. But where I disagree, is the location of the iceberg: it's no longer ahead of us.
We've hit the iceberg - staying with this sinking ship isn't going to help anyone. Let's leave it to the captain of this enterprise - George Bush and his accomplices - to go down with the ship. It's time to man the lifeboats.
It's time to get out of Iraq