Mission Accomplished!

In case you hadn't noticed today is the fourth anniversary of Captain Codpiece Day. Four years since they hung that infamous banner from the USS Lincoln and Mr. Bush donned his flight suit for the mother of all photo opportunities. Four bloody years and we're still searching for purpose in the desert. Look at how much “progress” we've made in four years.

And how did the president celebrate? Why, by vetoing the latest spending bill, of course (Oh, and apparently spreading some carefully crafted misinformation. The timing and potential impact are just all kinds of shady here.). Because, after all, this war we'd fund on the cheap for $50 billion and the reconstruction we'd pay for with Iraqi oil has wound up costing us $500 billion and counting at this point. Drops in the bucket compared to the the gallons of blood. Or the international prestige and capital we've squandered on this misconceived venture. I'm not quite sure why an administration so concerned with image and theater managed to miss the significance of that – it's not like the veto couldn't have waited until tomorrow or something – but the fact it did speaks volumes about just how far we've come. And how far we've still got to go.

As with all anniversaries, I'd like to take this time to reflect. If you ask me, Mr. Bush was right in substance if not style. The war was won. If by war you mean the leviathan conflict of Clauswitzian nation states smashing against another until one is annihilated. Because, by May 1st, 2003, Saddam was ousted, Baghdad had fallen, and the last of the Iraqi armies defeated. By the myopic point of view that there are only two digital states – war and peace – that should have been the end of things but by another more important measure, it was only the beginning. Because the end of war marked the beginning of occupation and conflict not against another nation state but non-state actors, floating in an interconnected network of social organizations. Something our military was unwilling and unprepared to face. We did – and I think still could – defeat any nation that dared to match its military might against the United States's. But as we prefer to think of ourselves as a country that doesn't wage wars of aggression we're just not suited to the arduous slog of an occupation in hostile territory. As you can see from the polls, there's only so long that the American people will tolerate the level of bloodshed needed to maintain control before their approval starts slipped away (Which, you know, isn't a bad thing.). Of course, I think the awesome Mr. Webb says it much more succinctly when he says, “We won this war four years ago. The question is when we end the occupation.”

And that is a troublesome question. The crassest answer is a political one. Mr. Bush has dug his heels in like the most petulant of children told it's time to leave the sandbox in order to kick the whole Iraq problem to the next administration. If someone like Mr. McCain becomes president and keeps the troops where they are, then his whole plan has been vindicated. And maybe, just maybe, history will remember him more fondly than I and the rest of the American people will. However, if a Democrat gains the oval office and begins a pull-out then the war and its consequences fall on their shoulders. And the Republicans can sharpen their knives and fire up their noise machine about how their party and their president tried to keep a lid on the coming disaster and, you know, it's all those namby pamby Defeatocrat's fault we're in this mess. There's a certain appeal to that because, knowing how Mr. Bush operates, it makes a certain kind of sickening sense.

However, I'm of the belief that we really have accomplished our mission in Iraq – at least as far as Mr. Bush or at least those advising him see it – which was, simply, to occupy the place. Mr. Bush and those who've bought into his cult of personality because they truly see it as a transformative event to usher in democracy to the Middle East. But as for Mr. Cheney and the rest of the hawks, well, there are disturbing neocon theories (Which I've not the stomach to go digging for at the moment) that the next capital “w” War will be fought over oil. That China is growing too fast and the oil supply dwindling and that will eventually put them on a collision course with the U.S. Which now, of course, thanks to a series of Middle Eastern wars built up quite a troop presence in what's sure to be a major theater of conflict. Those bases we've built in Iraq, then, are our real cause for being there. And not ceding them to the brewing civil war is why staying is so vital. Again, disturbing and hopelessly wrongheaded (like just about everything neocon), but it makes a certain mad kind of sense.

But, in the end, the answer is we're still there occupying a people who don't want us there because we haven't left. Yet. We will eventually. At least we won't be there in the levels we are now - we're still in Germany and Korea, after all. At this point, the plan seems to be to hang around until the various Iraq factions can work out some kind of political deal. The only problem is that they have no motivation and no inclination to do so – they'd rather set the table for the civil war in the offing (Or partion or whatever it is that will end the chaos. I highly doubt it but, you never know, it might even be something positive. The point being that the current situation cannot continue indefinitely and something's got to give eventually.) and are using the U.S. Army as cover to do so. We will have to get out and the issue now is minimizing the damage that's going to cause. The wound's too deep, it's infected, it's time to save what we can and cauterize the bits we chop off.