Playing Politics with American and Iraqi Lives

A few days ago, a rather remarkable exchange took place on Fox News between Weekly Standard columnist (and Fox News regular) Bill Kristol and anchorman Shepard Smith. The subject was whether more troops were needed in Iraq and Afghanistan and, if so, why the president was not sending them.

Here's the transcript (or save time and watch the video):

SHEPARD SMITH: "Can't you say beyond...beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt that what's happening in Iraq is not working as we had hoped it would happen?

BILL KRISTOL: Yes.

SMITH: That the terrorism is getting worse? That they are feeding off it? Today, one side is talking about secession if they don't get over it, that the sectarian violence is spreading, that we're clearing out one area and not able to hold it and the insurgents ... that stay the course isn't working? Any more than, maybe, cut and run would work? And that everyone seems to know, but won't say the answer is to add troops not take them away? Where are the people who are looking out for our best interests?

KRISTOL: Well, I've said that many many times, so often I've been ridiculed for saying "more troops, more troops, more troops." I hope the president...

SMITH: If they really want to win it!

KRISTOL: I agree...I hope...

SMITH: But I think they are just paying lip service to all this!

KRISTOL: Well, I hope not because it really wouldn't be the right thing to do and I think President Bush wants to do the right thing and I think he knows there's a problem. He can't probably do anything until election day. I very much hope after election day he takes a fresh look at Iraq, sends enough troops, surges the...goes on the offensive there and plays for victory because

SMITH: Bill...

KRISTOL: it's just too important to just, you know...

SMITH: It's horrifying that you just said he can't do anything until after the election. We've got men and women over there who are dying every day and you just said that the man who you support can't do anything even though you believe he knows it's wrong.

KRISTOL: I...I...urged him...

SMITH: OK, but what is worse that? What is worse than that, Bill Kristol? This isn't working. Well, isn't that what you are saying?

KRISTOL: It's not working....

SMITH: It's not working.

KRISTOL: It's not working, but some of the alternatives would work, would work worse and to be fair to him he has been....look ... I....Two months ago a Democratic senator said to me, I was saying Bush was going to stay the course and I admire him for his sticktoitive.. for his courage on Iraq and he said, "You're kid... You're crazy...everyone in Washington knows he is going to pull troops down before election day. He wants to give those Republican congressional candidates the benefit of seeing troops come home." It is to Bush's credit that he did not do that. We have moved a few more troops into Iraq. Bush has committed...

SMITH: A few more troops. [sarcastically]

KRISTOL: We should... We should ...

SMITH: We're still losing ground in city after city every day...

KRISTOL: I agree we should move more, but I think Bush has done...at least he has held his own ...ummm... I don't know...it's going back and forth there right now... I agree we could hit a crisis in two, three, four months unless we surge troops after the election. I thinks its hard to ask Bush to do something in the middle of this election season. We've seen how poisonous this political debate has gotten and I think... I just hope... I think he's right to hang tough and I hope he does the right thing after election day.

SMITH: That's a disgusting and repulsive reality Bill you have to admit that. That we can't do anything about something that is not working and where people are dying until after our elections are over...

KRISTOL: Well, we could do something... we should do something...but I'm just telling you that....

SMITH: The political reality is we can't. [scornfully]

KRISTOL: it's been a poisonous political debate ...both sides.

SMITH: If I were the mother of a father of a young man who dies between now and that election in this war I would be raising holy hell. Wouldn't you?

KRISTOL: Well, no....

SMITH: Wouldn't you, Bill? If you believed that this isn't working...

KRISTOL: No. They do..they're doing..They think they're doing the best the military strategy

SMITH: Do you think they think that, Bill, really?

KRISTOL: I think they, I think so.

SMITH: Because you don't think so, you just said so.

KRISTOL: Well, I've been critical of them. I think they should send more troops, but other people differ. I think Bush is going to reconsider when he thinks uh..after he gets through this election here. I wish he would have reconsidered six months ago. I urged him to six months ago. He chose not to. But to be fair to him, to be fair to him I think he is doing what he thinks is his best for the country and I think he is right, that the alternative of somehow pulling down wouldn't help. And incidentally, for the mothers and fathers who have kids there my solution does not...does not... decrease the chance of casualties. I'm willing to.. I think we may have to take more casualties there.

SMITH: To win! But what they keep saying is they want to win. And yet you talk to soldiers and captains and colonels who come home or who talk to you on the phone or who send you an email and they say, "Look! We win individual battles. We leave the individual battle and go to the next town and the insurgents come back." It's happening in Afghanistan right now!

KRISTOL: I agree.

SMITH: The Taliban had been wiped out. Now the poppy production is up to supplying 92% because we don't have enough people there. So how fair is it to the people of this country and to the world to be in a process that you know is not working, to know what the solutions are, yet because of the election system and the political process you allow a losing thing to continue?

KRISTOL: Well I think we can make it a winning thing, I think Bush will make it a winning thing. It's a democracy. It has drawbacks. I agree on Afghanistan,incidentally, that's another place where we're going to have to increase troop levels in the next few weeks.

Remarkable, isn't it? The chief neoconservative chearleader of the war, Bill Kristol--a man with close ties to the White House and Republican leaders--is admitting on national television that 1) our current strategy in Iraq is a losing one, and 2) nothing is going to be done about it until after the November election.

As Smith points out--with appropriate anger I might add--Kristol's statement is nothing short of an admission that the White House is playing politics with the lives of American servicemen and women (not to mention the scores of Iraqis who are killed every day). The President's message to the troops is, essentially, "you're going to have to wait for reinforcements; we've got some elections to win over here."

As disgusting as that is, it really shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. The same exact thing happened in 2004. As the situation in Iraq deteriorated and insurgents took over towns like Fallujah and Mosul, the Bush administration delayed taking any action to address the problem. They knew that taking those cities back would be messy and would result in many casualties, so they just put it off. They put it off and focused on painting John Kerry as someone who couldn't be trusted to make important national security decisions. They put it off and allowed the insurgents to further entrench themselves and prepare for the inevitable U.S. counteroffensive.

That counteroffensive finally began in November of 2004, just days after Bush had secured reelection. By November 18, less than two weeks later, 51 U.S. soldiers had been killed and 425 wounded in Fallujah alone. I remember wondering at the time how many of those dead and wounded could have avoided their fate had we not put the matter off until after the election.

As Bob Woodward's latest revelations only reinforce, this is a White House that routinely allows political considerations to dictate war policy. Woodward reports that following Bush's reelection, many of his advisers--including Condoleeza Rice, Andy Card, and Stephen Hadley--were strongly urging him to dump Donald Rumsfeld and replace him with someone competent. But, according to Woodward:

Karl Rove, Bush's top political adviser, weighed in with the president. A contentious session with Congress was coming up. As he saw it, the Democrats were in no mood for a honeymoon. . . . clearly, the conduct of the war in Iraq would be the subject of confirmation hearings for anyone Bush nominated to be the new secretary of defense.

Rove agreed they did not want to do anything that would prompt hearings on the war.

So Bush did nothing. Rumsfeld stayed, and the war spiraled even further out of control. It's so maddeningly predictable. As we approach another crucial election, we can count on our leaders not to engage in any self-reflection or make any serious attempt to correct our course. Important decisions that affect the lives of U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians are once again being held hostage by the political calendar.