Withdraw or stay?

The sudden or phased withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq at this time would be extremely detrimental to the national security of our country and our allies. There. I can't make it any clearer than that.

Forget about what Bush said or didn't say. What Rumsfeld did or didn't do. What the Iraqi people believe or don't believe. What the American people think that they want or don't want. Whether the Democrats or Republicans won the election. Forget about the past (there is too much talk about what happened before). What are we going to do right now?

The facts are clear: most Americans haven't a clue about what is going on in the Iraq, much less the Middle East. All they know is that the situation is very unpleasant and that they would rather that it end sooner rather than later. Look at all the casualties, I hear them say, and the money this is costing and shouldn't we be using our resources to hunt down Osama?

Right now, Iraq is the central battle in the global war on terrorism. Osama said it so it must be true. Osama noticed that when some marines were killed in Beirut that President Reagan soon after pulled them all out. Osama noticed that when some rangers were killed in Mogadishu that President Clinton pulled them all out. Soon afterwards when a shipload of marines approached Port au Prince a crowd of Haitians formed to protest and the ship turned around. Osama noticed that, too.

Regardless of why we got into Iraq, or the mistakes that we made after we got there, the Osama's of this world are watching to see what we are going to do now. Based on past experience, they think that we aren't tough enough. They think that we are soft, and that we don't have the political will to defeat their fanaticism. They think that, ultimately, we will wilt before the intensity of their belief.

There is ample precedent in history for our current situation. On December 16, 1944 Adolph Hitler launched a surprise attack against a weak portion of the Allied line in the Ardenne forest of Belgium. Hitler thought that the advancing democracies to his West were fundamentally weak and that his surprise attack would convince them to sue for peace. The resulting Battle of the Bulge caused over 60,000 U.S. casualties alone, but the soft and coddled American Army defeated the fascist attackers.

When I hear people wonder how we can fight such an unpopular war with the country divided I remember reading the Memoirs of U.S. Grant. As Grant struggled to find a way to envelop Vicksburg he was very aware of the newspaper editors in the north who were continually denouncing his incompetency and calling for his head. When Grant took command of the Army of the Potomac and locked horns with Bobby Lee he had to suffer an order from the War Department asking for troops to suppress New Yorkers rioting against the draft.

Somehow we managed to win both those wars. And we will manage to win this one. We can't afford not to.

The Arabs and language

"A simple assertion from an Arab can be, for him, nothing more than a polite form of evasion, while the same word for his English interlocutor a definite, positive commitment. Americans should keep in mind that statements which seem to Arabs to be mere statements of fact will seem to Americans to be extreme or even violent assertions."

- Raphael Patai

I recently spoke to an Army Reservist friend of mine who returned this summer from his second tour in Iraq. He spent his tour working with one of the Iraqi Ministries in the Green Zone and told me that he almost never traveled anywhere. He worked with Iraqis but was not able to visit their homes or really see what Iraq was like outside the confines of the barbed wire and concrete barriers that defined his existence.

I was fortunate in that during the last five months of my tour that I was able to travel and see a lot of Iraq and the Iraqis. I believe that the circumstances on the ground now in Iraq are substantively different than it was when I was there but the Iraqis are still the same. We spent a lot of time when we were there trying to figure out what the Iraqis were thinking and doing. I am sure the Iraqis spent a lot of time wondering what we were up to.

In the buildup to the war we pretty much knew that we were on the list to go and we knew where we were going and why. Very few of us knew anything about the Middle East and even less had even traveled there. I was an expert in Latin America and I spoke Spanish and at least this gave me some insight into some of the cultural and language problems that we could expect to encounter. I was smart enough to know how much I really didn't know.

Undaunted, I decided to learn as much as I could in the time that I had available. I purchased and read "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" by T.E. Lawrence. I found a book on the history of Iraq. I purchased Arabic language tapes and began learning Arabic.

One book that was highly recommended to us and which I consulted on many occasions is "The Arab Mind" by Raphael Patai. The book was originally published in 1976 and revised in 1983. The book speaks in generalities about a large and diverse population, but there are some great truths in what he had to say. One point that I remember well is the Arab penchant for substituting words for action.

"In fact," Mr Patai wrote, "the Arab custom of trying to intimidate an adversary by verbal threats is such a prevalent feature of the Arab personality that it could not escape the notice of either native or foreign observers. The adult Arab makes statements which express threats, demands, or intentions, which he does not intend to carry out but which once uttered, relax emotional tension, give psychological relief and at the same time reduce the pressure to engage in any act aimed at realizing the verbalized goal."

When seen from this point of view, a lot of the words and crowd images that are beamed to us from the Middle East don't seem quite so crazy.

A holiday in a combat zone

Thanksgiving, or any holiday spent overseas,especially if in a combat zone, is an especially poignant one. On these occasions the bonds between military men and women become especially strong because the absence of our families reinforces the sacrifice that we are all making. During these times the people around you become family because they are all you have, an inadequate but necessary substitute to making the daily journey to the end of your tour. I did not necessarily like all these people but they were my substitute family.

Now that I am home with my family during the holidays I feel a new and special poignancy for the service men and women overseas, many of whom are in harm's way. Somehow, though I don't even know them, I have a bond with them, too. When I give thanks for the many blessings that I have, I say a prayer that they all may return home safe.

Holidays were an unusual hardship when I was in Iraq. Like leftover grains of sand in my pocket, I carry little pieces of that hardship with me with during holidays at home. I remember. Or maybe I just can't forget.

Don Rumsfeld and the war

Based on my personal experiences and first hand knowledge of events during the buildup and first year of the war in Iraq I sincerely believe that Donald Rumsfeld was responsible for the problems that developed during that first year: problems that are affecting us to this day.

Persons other than Don Rumsfeld made critical mistakes but he took control of the planning for and execution of the invasion and deliberately excluded the Department of State and other agencies from any significant participation in the planning for or execution of the occupation. I can't say that greater DOS participation in the occupation would have improved the results but they could hardly have made them worse. The occupation was begun with minimal planning or preparation. As a result the military forces in Iraq were left to occupy the country with little guidance from the political authorities that had ordered the invasion.

As an Army colonel working to assist the Marine forces in the occupation of the southern half of Iraq, I had direct access to the planning documents and had personal knowledge of their inadequacy. I watched as the Marine commanders tried to govern a large, populous Arab country through trial and error and improvisation. They did the best they could under the circumstances. We all did.

When I left Iraq I was convinced that Rumsfeld was to blame for the fundamental problems that we faced and have continued to face. From all acounts, Rumsfeld is a brillant, extremely hard working, experienced and capable administrator. He believed (and still believes, for all I know) that he did the right thing. I believe that he should have been removed years ago, and for that I hold the President responsible.

Now that Mr. Rumsfeld has been removed from the post of the Secretary of Defense I hope that he will write a book that explains to us all why he took the actions and decisions that he did. In particular, I want to know why he didn't apply that brillant and capable mind to ensuring that there was an adequate plan for the occupation. My great fear is that his book, if it even comes, won't adequately address that question.

Veteran's Day

On Friday I marched in my first Veteran's Day parade.

Because the 11th fell on a Saturday, Leon County and the city of Tallahassee held the parade on a Friday when everyone was off for the holiday. The assumption among large numbers of people in Tallahassee was that the parade was moved to accomodate the Florida State football game. I don't believe this to be true, but it is hard to change public perception.

I found the whole experience to be very emotional. The WW II and Korean veterans rode on a float while the Vietnam, Desert Storm and Iraq/Afghanistan veterans walked. I helped a 97 year old WW II veteran out of his wheelchair on on to the float. He had recently decided to join my American Legion Post. We gave him a discount.

By the way, I was recently appointed Finance Officer of American Legion Post 13 in Tallahassee. I think no one else wanted the job.

The parade was short but memorable. As the float moved forward, and I walked alongside handing out little flags to children, the citizens of the county who came out to see the parade arose as if in a wave on both sides of the street and gave us a standing ovation. Several times I had to pause and wipe the tears from my eyes.

There were some Viet Nam veterans there who really appreciated the love. They had waited a long time for this kind of response.

Demons in the water

People I know or meet who understand that I have been to Iraq almost never ask me about the war. A river of understanding divides us, but I keep trying to throw pebbles of knowledge to the other side. I believe that they think there are demons hidden in the water, and their questions might rouse them. I have tried to bridge this river with a novel, and 85,000 words have carried me half way across. I hope to have the bridge finished by next year.

In the meantime, I thought about writing an essay on how I feel about the war. Words, sentences and paragraphs came to me in solitary moments. I finally decided to write some of them down, but I didn't like what I read. I always seemed to be taking a fire hose to a candle. Or the negative demons would rise from the water. But I didn't want to go that way. I knew that the essay had to be positive. Nobody wants to hear the complaints, real or imagined, of a fifty three year old man.

From the moment that I left Iraq on February 28, 2004 and unloaded my weapons at the Kuwaiti border, I have struggled to communicate what I learned there and how the experience of being there has changed my life. For this reason I have hesitated to speak my mind, but I made a promise when I was in Iraq, and I want to come forward now and speak what I believe.

I believe in the Iraqi people. I did not believe in them when I arrived in Iraq but I believed in them when I left. I had few occasions to meet the sullen and suspicious Sunnis of Ramadi. I spent most of my time among the majority Shia in towns like Hilla, Diwaniyah, Najaf, Karbala and Kut. The more that I came into contact with these people the more I was impressed with their industriousness, piety, courtesy, and sense of family. The most enduring memory for me is not of an Iraqi with his fist held high in anger, but of an Iraqi family, the mother in full length abaya carrying a baby and the father, walking ahead in a white dishdasha, and holding a small child.

I cannot forget the Iraqi woman who came forward, despite great personal danger, to lead the women’s rights center that we created in Karbala. I shared with her a picture of my family that I carried in my helmet. She gave me a postal card of Karbala to give to my daughter. I think of this woman often, and I do not even know her name. When I think of the sacrifices that I made, and the sacrifices that my family made, I believe that they were made for this woman.

I believe in the Iraqi people. I believe in the message of the Iraqi woman that I saw in the streets of Hillah. She looked at me, an American soldier wearing a helmet and body armor, and carrying a loaded weapon, and wasn’t afraid. If she had been, she would not have lifted her baby’s arm to wave at me.

Many times when I was in Iraq I was thanked, often by grown men in tears, for helping to remove the terror and the horror that had beset these men’s lives for over thirty years. And I promised them, each one, that this time we would see the job through, that after awakening them from their nightmare we would lead them to the democracy that they deserve. When I made that promise, I believed what I said. And I continue to believe it today.