On the way back to the office from Court this morning, I was able to hear the majority of President Bush’s speech at the Naval Academy about the War in Iraq. I liked what I heard, particularly these parts:
America will not abandon Iraq. We will not turn that country over to the terrorists and put the American people at risk. Iraq will be a free nation and a strong ally in the Middle East. And this will add to the security of the American people.
In the short run, we’re going to bring justice to our enemies. In the long run, the best way to ensure the security of our own citizens is to spread the hope of freedom across the broader Middle East.
We’ve seen freedom conquer evil and secure the peace before.
In World War II, free nations came together to fight the ideology of fascism and freedom prevailed. And today, Germany and Japan are democracies and they are allies in securing the peace.
In the Cold War, freedom defeated the ideology of communism and led to a democratic movement that freed the nations of Eastern and Central Europe from Soviet domination. And today these nations are allies in the war on terror.
Today in the Middle East, freedom is once again contending with an ideology that seeks to sow anger and hatred and despair.
Great points. The only problem is I wish that the President had been making them 2 and 1/2 years ago during the run up to the war. Instead, he focused like a laser beam on the WMD issue, and the subsequent failure to find any such weaspons has proven to be a public relations disaster. This, I think is one of the reasons that the American public is uneasy about the what is going on now.
The President is right, though, that we cannot just pull out now. Like it or not, the United States owes a responsibilty to Iraq, and to its own citizens, to do everything possible to create an Iraq capable of defending itself against the barbarians who would destroy it. This is something Michael Moore’s and Cindy Sheehan’s of the world simply fail, or refuse, to understand or acknowledge.
The terrorists in Iraq share the same ideology as the terrorists who struck the United States on September the 11th. Those terrorists share the same ideology with those who blew up commuters in London and Madrid, murdered tourists in Bali, workers in Riyadh and guests at a wedding in Amman, Jordan. Just last week they massacred Iraqi children and their parents at a toy giveaway outside an Iraqi hospital.
This is an enemy without conscience, and they cannot be appeased. If we’re not fighting and destroying this enemy in Iraq, they would not be idle. They would be plotting and killing Americans across the world and within our own borders. By fighting these terrorists in Iraq, Americans in uniform are defeating a direct threat to the American people.
The President went on to point out the justifiably good progess that has been made in Iraq since Saddam was deposed:
And in just over two and a half years, the Iraqi people have made incredible progress on the road to lasting freedom. Iraqis have gone from living under the boot of a brutal tyrant to liberation, free elections and a democratic constitution, and in 15 days they will go to the polls to elect a fully constitutional government that will lead them for the next four years.
With each ballot cast. the Iraqi people have sent a clear message to the terrorists: Iraqis will not be intimidated. The Iraqi people will determine the destiny of their country. The future of Iraq belongs to freedom.
This is the one thing the media consistently fails to acknowledge. Like the people of Afghanistan before them, the people of Iraq are doing the little things it takes to create a free society, step-by-step. Its not perfect, and its sometimes messy, but they only other alternative open to them is to either let their country devolve into chaos or but themselves under the heal of another Saddam-like dictator.
Advancing the cause of freedom and democracy in the Middle East begins with ensuring the success of a free Iraq. Freedom’s victory in that country will inspire democratic reformers from Damascus to Tehran and spread hope across a troubled region, and lift a terrible threat from the lives of our citizens.
A good point, but why weren’t we hearing this in January and February of 2003 ?
To a large extent, I think that the War in Iraq is a public realtions problem. The American people are not against making a sacrifice, if the reasons for that sacrifice are clearly explained. By not putting all its cards on the table in the beginning, the Bush Administration has painted itself into a corner that it will have a difficult time getting out of.
James Joyner has further thoughts on the speech at Outside The Beltway
Update @ 4:00pm: James Joyner points out that Bush has mentioned the themes he touched on today in the past, both before and after the war started. While this is true, the problem I see is that the Administration based its entire pre-war argument almost exclusive on WMD’s and Saddam’s failure to comply with weapons inspections. The war was characterized as a war to depose a danagerous dictator, not a war to remake the Middle East — which is essentially what Bush talked about today. The question, of course, is whether the public would have supported the war if it had been sold as a crusade for democracy in the Middle East.
