That is the opening sentence of a speech I would like to see Democrats give in the weeks to come, in the context of supporting a bill to repeal the 2002 Authorization to Use Military Force in Iraq.
My analysis stems from this excellent article in Slate by Philip Carter, which I recommend that everyone read. He points out that Iraq is not one war, but several wars happening simultaneously within the same country. Right now, we're involved in the big war -- the civil war -- that we can't help win, at the expense of a smaller war -- against Al Qaeda -- that we can.
I've diaried about this before, but as sometimes unfortunately happens, since then I've convinced myself that I'm right, so I'm doing it again. I think that this is the Democrats' path to victory: either passing legislation or at least holding the caucus together in the months ahead.
Update: pico reminds us that the above discussion actually relates to "Al Qaeda in Iraq," an affiliate of the group that actually bombed us. See his post for my response.
We are still looking for the best words to distinguish those who think we should do something because it expresses our values with less attention to whether it will succeed from those whose primary concern is getting the best result we can out of the political system, but as I've said I'm pretty firmly in the former camp. I don't want to toss up legislation knowing that it has no chance to change policy, unless it will truly hurt our opponents. (I love a good wedge issue as much as the next person.) And my proposal has one obvious disadvantage when it comes to expressing our values: it does not take us out of Iraq. But I think that it has some countervailing advantates worth noting: it makes sense, it puts the Republicans in a terrible position, it holds the party together, and the public will embrace it.
Here's the proposal:
Democrats should tie funding for the war to a repeal of (or rapid sunsetting of) the Iraq War Resolution -- the 2002 "Authorization to Use Military Force Against Iraq" under whose auspices Bush is currently operating.
Doesn't that mean that we would have to leave Iraq? No, it doesn't. Bush would remain authorized to stay in Iraq even without the 2002 AUMF -- he just wouldn't remain authorized to fight the war that he is currently fighting.
Bush's authorization to remain in Iraq would be based on the 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force Against Terrorism passed in the wake on 9/11. That is, Bush could remain in Iraq to fight Al Qaeda. As you may recall, Bush could not use the 2001 AUMF to go into Iraq because Al Qaeda was not operating in Iraq at the time. But now they are. They are attacking participants on all sides, simply trying to stir the muck. Everyone hates these foreign fighters -- both people on all sides in Iraq and all of Iraq's neighbors. Everyone wants them gone. They want Iraq to continue to be wounded and festering, to serve their own goals.
Rooting out Al Qaeda from Iraq is about the most popular thing that the U.S. could do right now. Everyone would appreciate it. They would also mostly appreciate our doing nothing else in the other parts of the country, at least not without international approval to, say, stop a major set-piece civil war battle using air support.
Fighting Al Qaeda in Iraq is also the only part of the war that could remain popular with the American public. People know that we're screwing up by fighting in Baghdad, yet they still fear Al Qaeda. Note that Republicans are trying to justify this war by talking about the need to fight Al Qaeda. Go back and listen to Republican speeches during the House debate -- everything was in defense of fighting Al Qaeda, not in defense of intervening in a civil war.
These two actions can be decoupled. And when they are, Republicans are dead. Seriously. They have to argue that we need the 2002 resolution so that we can fight the war Americans don't want fought -- the one they can't even defend in their speeches -- rather than the war that Americans are probably still willing to see fought under the 2001 resolution.
If we solely fought Al Qaeda -- a mission that I believe our troops would welcome -- this would become a cheaper war.
We would need fewer troops. People could rest more between deployments. We would have enough armor for them. We would not need to call up 14,000 new Guardsmen. We would not be hemhorraging money off-budget. We can substantially cut the appropriation for the war. And we are not cutting and running.
If we tell the American people "We can fight one of two wars in Iraq" and explain how repealing the 2002 AUMF is the way to ensure that we stop fighting the wrong one and start concentrating on the right one, I think that we can unify the entire caucus behind the message. Republican plans for tactical political victory in Congress are based on the idea that our caucus will split when they call us weaklings. A unified caucus is critical. I think that we can read back their own justifications to the war to them and watch their caucus split.
Oh, and by the way, this keeps us in the part of the country furthest from Iran, meaning that we're less likely to get into a fight with Iran. And even Iran would love for us to go after Al Qaeda.
Now, you will say, Bush will just claim that Al Qaeda is all throughout the country and that he can therefore have troops everywhere anyway. That's a good argument, but I think it can be defeated.
Here's the trick: repealing the 2002 AUMF and directing Bush to conduct his war only in areas of Al Qaeda concentration (mostly in Sunni-majority provinces) means that we can cut funding for the war. Bush may want to have troops all over Baghdad, but he won't have the money for it. Al Qaeda may try to bring us into other provinces, but we'll just have to say no. We'll have to say that we will work with people on all sides of the civil war -- all of whom hate Al Qaeda -- to root them out of those other provinces. I don't care if we send a small number of troops on anti-Al Qaeda missions to Baghdad, and we'll get a lot more cooperation once we're not such an overall irritant. But we will not have massive deployments there, we will not be the Shi'ite security force, etc. That is their baby now. We're in Iraq to go after Al Qaeda and we wish everyone else minimal bloodshed. We'll show up with a check when it's time to pay reparations for starting the damn thing -- and still save money over the current approach.
Iraqis will go for it. The American people will go for it. The international community would prefer it. Democrats can unite around it. Republicans will fear our doing it.
We can fight one of two wars in Iraq.
The one that we're losing -- that we can't win, that we can't even justify -- under the 2002 resolution. Or the one that we can win, that we can justify, under the 2001 resolution alone.
Let's frame the debate this way. This is how we can win the debate, even if not the war.