New York Times columnist Tom Friedman, who has left many of us (including me) disappointed and puzzled by his support of the Iraq war, gives a sort of explanation (and a sort of apology) in today's NYT:
We cannot liberate Iraq, and never could. Only Iraqis can liberate themselves, by first forging a social contract for sharing power and then having the will to go out and defend that compact against the minorities who will try to resist it. Elections are necessary for that process to unfold, but not sufficient. There has to be the will - among Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds - to forge that equitable social contract and then fight for it.
In short, we need these elections in Iraq to see if there really is a self-governing community there ready, and willing, to liberate itself - both from Iraq's old regime and from us. The answer to this question is not self-evident. This was always a shot in the dark - but one that I would argue was morally and strategically worth trying.
Because if it is impossible for the peoples of even one Arab state to voluntarily organize themselves around a social contract for democratic life, then we are looking at dictators and kings ruling this region as far as the eye can see. And that will guarantee that this region will be a cauldron of oil-financed pathologies and terrorism for the rest of our lives.
What is inexcusable is thinking that such an experiment would be easy, that it could be done on the cheap, that it could be done with any old army and any old coalition and any old fiscal policy and any old energy policy. That is the foolishness of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. My foolishness was thinking they could never be so foolish.
Still, the game is not over. We know that the Iraqi people do not want to be ruled by us. But what we don't know is how they want to rule themselves. What kind of majority are the Iraqi Shiites ready to be - a tolerant and inclusive one, or an intolerant and exclusive one? What kind of minority do the Iraqi Sunnis intend to be - rebellious and separatist, or loyal and sharing?
Elections are the only way to find out. Or, as Rumsfeld might say: You go to elections with the country you've got, not the one you wish you had - because that is the only way to find out whether the one you wish for is ever possible.
Interesting, but strangely irrational. I suppose that if the United States could succeed in establishing democracy in Iraq, then that would prove that Arab Muslim nations can have democracies. But the converse is not true. It may be possible to establish democracy in an Arab Muslim nation, but still be impossible for the United States to do so, without significant international support, at a time when the Arab Muslim world hates and distrusts us for a long list of reasons having little to do with our (current) invasion of Iraq. So if we succeed in our "shot in the dark," it proves much more than merely that an Arab Muslim democracy is possible, but if we fail, it proves much less.
I think Friedman needs to admit a much deeper error than misunderestimating the foolishness of the Bush administration.