Kevin, I generally agree with your analysis. However, if most of the troops (who volunteered) want to "win" something that may not be winnable, isn't this just a tad expensive for us taxpayers who are funding all of this futility? We've created plenty of enemies to complicate national security for years and years, but the money$$$?? This just isn't paying back.

I don't support the mission.

The mission, the occupation of a nation that has done us no harm, is fucked up in the first place.

So, sorry troops, you were sent on a bad mission by a cabal of idiots and monsters.

That may not be a pleasant truth to face, but it's the truth.

Military policy is not yet decided by the troops, or even their commanders. That should never be, as it has never been, in this country. The military is a tool, which by its very nature, is biased almost irrevocably in favor of what they are doing; they are like a team conditioned, as they must be, to succeed.

Frankly, that's bollocks. They don't swear an oath to a mission.

What the troops want is not necessarily the best thing for themselves and definitely not necessarily best for the country.

We need the troops to be intensely committed to the mission. But we can't just let them loose like a power saw with the trigger taped down. That may just result in a burned out, depleted military.

We at home need to have the courage and wisdom to know when to pull them back, no matter what they want - which, in fact, may be warped by being in the heat of battle or the desire for retribution.

I'm sure there were soldiers at Dunkirk who thought for sure they could beat the Germans if they hadn't had to get on the boats. Could they have? No. Would it have served any purpose? No.

It isn't even combat-specific: There have been plenty of hopeless IT projects where the engineers were damned sure they would finally ship this time, and damn the management for canceling it!

I agree with the Doctor. I can't support something that is wrong from the get-go, that harms our standing in the world at large, and would be advancing bad principles even if it were "winnable", whatever that means. We don't send troops to fight and die simply to "support" them, but for specific causes. And this one stinks. Big time.

There is truth to these arguments.

At the same time, no account arguing for withdrawal will "support the troops" in the way described. Taken too far, this would amount to delegating foreign affairs to the active duty forces abroad. Clearly, you're not arguing for that. But you shouldn't kid yourself that your account is any more "supporting the troops" than the one the Democrats currently are offering.

Further, one benefit to the current approach is that it is VERY difficult to paint the Democratic Left as anti-military. Compare this situation to Vietnam - the leftist position was often explicitly anti-military, and everyone knew it. Today, even the wingers mostly argue that the Left is insanely anti-Bush - they don't claim we're anti-military.

I'm sure that there are many soldiers who want the mission to be supported. But the large number of soldiers who recently wanted to ask Joe Lieberman "when are we going home" wanted to know "when are we going home".

So declare victory and go home. Praise the troops for defeating Saddam Hussein, and turn the fight over to the Iraqis.

Consider this:

Lt. Wellman's dedication to 'the mission' would, I'm sure, evaporate if Venuezuealan tanks and planes were invading Texas and Arizona across the Mexican border.

Why, I'm fairly certain his attitude would quite quickly shift to "why am I wasting my time here in Iraq when my country is being invaded?"

Well, that's what we need. A redeployment to a critical new mission on the home front, a crucial mission of R&R, retraining, and rebuilding.

This concept of supporting the mission, regardless of how messed up it is, reminds me of my neighbor, an old Viet Nam vet.

He clings to the belief that we could have won in Viet Nam and that we should have stayed until we did. The number of Vietnamese we would have killed if we had stayed is irrelevant to him. (He won't do business with Vietnamese here in America, to give an idea of his mindset.) Personally, I think he needs to believe that his buddies died for a mission that wasn't a lost cause. And maybe more importantly, he needs to believe that he didn't kill some number of people for effectively no reason at all.

Troops don't set military policy, civilian leadership does. And I think part of the reason it has to be that way is that, at some point, military people will continue a lost mission because their personal honor is at stake, regardless of the cost in lives and treasure.

"The truth of the matter, however, is this: many troops in Iraq, perhaps even most of them, want to stay and fight."

This is probably not true. Even back in December, this Military Times poll of active duty personnel was only slightly kinder to Bush than the general population was.

I think an emotional note about taking care of the troops has to be struck, but not in isolation. It can't be presented as the rationale behind the decision. However, if the emotional manipulation in alleging that Democrats do not "supporting the troops" is unanswered by an equivalent emotional appeal, then we're not presenting the argument as well as we should and can.

"I don't want them to just support the troops. I want them to support the mission."

What kind of babies are these people?

They're brainwashed babies.

You can't take the views on what they're doing of soldiers in combat seriously, they're cutting ears off as trophies. But Republicans, universally, want us to think the conditions of soldiers in combat reflect normal life.

"Telling the truth, as usual, is better: we need to leave Iraq not because we think the troops need rescuing, but because we think that leaving is what's best for our national security."

Who the heck thinks the troops need rescuing. Has anyone ever said that, Kevin?

Believing that the troops are dying for no good reason and that they should not be held in that position is not the same thing as saying they need to be rescued.

It's not 'rescue' if the situation they're in is entirely under your control.

The troops may want to "win" the mission, but they certainly do not like it when their stays are extended. The 60 minutes episode last weekend was rather telling. Interestingly, the extensions required for the surge coincided with the military sharply limiting internet/email usage.

Look! A majority of the troops supported going into Iraq in the first place. Did that make it the right thing to do? No. Obviously.

War is not about what the troops think is right.

Not only was the going into Iraq a bad decision at that time, continuing to think you are waging a war now -- and doing so -- is the wrong thing at this time.

As I've said before, framing the present as a war brings the situation into the wrong focus.

Iraq should have been put under civil control after Saddam was toplled. It's taken the Army 4 whole years to start admitting that it's politics on the ground as well in the airified Green zone that counts.

And we could all go on and on about the littany of mistakes made and the lack of awareness and direction from the top, but putting this in the refeerence of a military win or lose option is excusing the politicians from the responsibility they should be taking, and that the media should be exposing them on.

This is a political solution situation and the troops need to come out over a relatively short time in an orderly manner.

And this could all have started 4 years ago if the present incumbent had had an honest agenda that he had made us all aware of and could get behind. Hell! I really don't think they've had a plan or know what they are doing since it all gang aglie in May '03.

There will be no actual solution until there is a new commnader as the Demopcratic party are not going to force his hand unless the Republicans help them.

Wooses.

I agree with Kevin. Also, I think the Democrats' focus caused them to lose sight of what might have been both a good policy and devastating rhetorical strategy: to advocate sending the troops NOT home, but to Afghanistan (I don't literally mean sending all of our troops there, but that Democrats could have advocated a surge in Afghanistan made possible by a drawdown in Iraq). Democrats might have transformed the whole anti-terrorism issue as not being about whether to keep fighting, but about WHERE to fight, where to surge. The point would be that Republicans are soft on Afghanistan, which ties in to the original failure to find Bin Laden at Tora Bora because Bush pulled troops out to get ready for Iraq.

But Democrats instead preferred the arguments that we should relieve our soldiers of fighting, which foreclosed this possibility. There are compelling reasons to relieve our soldiers of the burden they've been carrying, but I don't think this policy is ultimately the best.

Wagster,

One slight disagreement with the Military Times Poll that you site. Just because they disapprove of President Bush's handling of the war in Iraq, or they say we should not have gone in the first place, is not the same as "wanting to leave Iraq." I think that what the Ackerman article is saying is that the troops might not like the war, or how it's going, but they will stay until "victory" is achieved - whatever that means.

I agree with Kevin. Also, I think the Democrats' focus caused them to lose sight of what might have been both a good policy and devastating rhetorical strategy: to advocate sending the troops NOT home, but to Afghanistan (I don't literally mean sending all of our troops there, but that Democrats could have advocated a surge in Afghanistan made possible by a drawdown in Iraq). Democrats might have transformed the whole anti-terrorism issue as not being about whether to keep fighting, but about WHERE to fight, where to surge. The point would be that Republicans are soft on Afghanistan, which ties in to the original failure to find Bin Laden at Tora Bora because Bush pulled troops out to get ready for Iraq.

But Democrats instead preferred the arguments that we should relieve our soldiers of fighting, which foreclosed this possibility. There are compelling reasons to relieve our soldiers of the burden they've been carrying, but I don't think this policy is ultimately the best.

"But Democrats instead preferred the arguments that we should relieve our soldiers of fighting, which foreclosed this possibility. "

Nobody has suggested pulling out of Afghanistan.

If we pulled out of Iraq - and stopped sending so many fresh troops to Iraq - there'd be plenty of troops to increase deployments in Afghanistan without sending much of anyone directly from Iraq to Afghanistan.

To put it another way, RiMac, there are over 5 times as many troops in Iraq as in Afghanistan. We could probably bring everyone in Iraq home, and only deploy people to Afghanistan after a decent break (or as fresh recruits on a first tour), and easily double the deployment there.

Afghanistan probably doesn't have the infrastructure to support much more than that.

I agree with Kevin and most of the posters on this discussion board. However, I would like to make two comments.

First, I think that most Democrats, the Democrat leadership, and most progressives in the U.S. sincerely support the troops, even though they don't support the war. I think that most progressives (and this is through anecdotal evidence) have learned lessons from the Vietnam era and have made a concientious effort to be nicer and more respectful to the men and women of our armed forces.

Second, I think that one additional thing I want to add to Kevin's post is that I think Democrats should also focus on resource allocation of the Department of Defense budget. When Republicans say, "let's support the troops by increasing defence spending," it is my understanding that most of that money does not go to "the troops." Instead it goes to developing weapon systems, purchasing aircraft carriers, etc. It does not go to health services, body armor, or things to help the soldiers on the ground. If there is someone who has more information and more knowledge of military affairs, that can back this up, the information would be helpful. I think allocating more resources to help the troops as opposed to the military industrial complex, might help our image with the military.

We must demand that Al Gore run. The realistic alternatives are Hillary, who has tremendous negatives and is hardly economically liberal, and Obama who has an undistinguished and limited record(forget the South). I'm assuming Edwards can't
get the nomination and as soon as I say that I think that he has it sans Gore(I picked Carter for the nom REALLY early). There you go place your bets.

A good post, KD.

Some Democrats are still stuck in a 1975 mindset. "Support the troops, bring them home" seems to be their attempt to make amends for 30 years of anti-military, anti-war hostility; But the mindset is reactionary, set on righting the injuries of an old war rather than confronting the reality of this one.

Any statistics to back up the claim that most of the troops want to stay in Iraq?

Also, if anything is condescending, it's this statement:

Telling the truth, as usual, is better: we need to leave Iraq not because we think the troops need rescuing, but because we think that leaving is what's best for our national security.

Did the troops order themselves to Iraq? I don't think so. They are the tools - not the arbiters - of foreign policy. That is why they have to obey the orders of the civilian leadership. It's that leadership that sent them to Iraq, and it going to have to be that leadership to order them out. The fact is that getting them out DOES rescue many who would otherwise lose life, limb or sanity AND it's the best thing for our national security.

Honest.

The all volunteer military is a bad idea. It's a mindless, obedient tool apparently. Draftees and their parents would have gotten us out of Iraq years ago.

Washington would have difficulty using a citizen army against the people in the future, but seeing how obedient the armed forces are to the chain of command in this loony war for imaginary WMD fomented by Israel loyalists makes me ruminate if they aren't too much a tool of government.

I'm sure they are a much finer fighting force than a draft army, but with 10,000 nuclear warheads, exactly who is going to attack us militarily? And to be objective, the primacy of our armed forces comes from the engineering staffs of the defense contractors (at great and unnecessary expense) and not from the cannon fodder, brave as they may be.

Put a pillow in front of your head before your read on....

Listenin to BBC. China is making pills to sell throughout Asia that are placebos. Free unregulated market play; seems like it to me.

Hogwash. Please, everyone - just stop. This entire topic is a Republican tar baby; no matter how you touch it, you're going to get stuck.

First, the premise is suspect at best; in all likelihood it's just flat wrong. I think most of the troops do want to go home (you can guarantee that support for the extended tours is slim to none). The military didn't put a vice clamp on access to the internet because the troops are being upbeat about the war.

Second, the premise is contrived to bait people into agreeing with staying in Iraq indefinitely or risk appearing as though they, you guessed it, hate the troops (or are at least a condescending elitist Liberal who discounts them).

The question sidetracks legitimate issues (is the war winnable, when should we bring the troops home, etc.) with a misleading and loaded premise that troop support for the mission is a relevant factor to be taken into account when addressing these issues.

The premise is loaded because troop support for any mission is going to be very high as a function of their professionalism, motivation, sense of duty, and other reasons.

The soldiers at the Alamo supported the stand even though they knew it was suicide. The troops at Little Bighorn were so over-zealous in their support of the mission that they recklessly divided their forces over and over again to bring that mission to a hasty conclusion (Custer's motivations may have even been political, as he was considered a contender for the presidency).

When someone insults your intelligence with a ludicrous argument like this, turnabout is fair play: accuse them of hiding behind the troops.

Or if you're a little more bold, accuse them of using our military personnel as political meat shields for their failed policies, e.g. gross mismanagement of the war, endless deceit about why we're there, and their willingness to sacrifice the lives of our military personnel for the sickeningly craven purpose of delaying the inevitable outcome beyond Bush's presidency, to minimize the harm to that worthless human being's image and possibly even to push the blame for the eventual loss on Democrats.

Be a little more organized Augustsus. Perhaps u dont know this:. Say what u r going to say, then say what you are saying(the heart of your argument), then say what you said.

Veteran of Omaha Beach says No to War

I just spent two days in a Veterans Hospital. For the record, the care was AAA excellent. My roommate, who also has cardiac issues, was an Omaha Beach veteran.

I saw him watching FOX News, and my being of the ilk that I had just marched on the Pentagon, I approached him warily.

Imagine my joy and surprise when he said that the cartoonish GOP bagman Sean Hannity made his blood boil.

His summary of Bush and Iraq was resignedly profound and bespoke his witness of slaughter as a youth..

"I simply do not see how killing other humans ultimately benefits the human race. There has to be a better way", he said

My point here is that we need a peace plan for the Middle East. To match the complexity of the tribal, religious, cultural divide existing between Islam and secular and Christian capitalistic forces extant elsewhere the plan has to be a hundred year plan.

This plan would feature cultural exchanges, guest worker visas (both ways), peace corp initiatives, student exchanges, etc. to accomodate rapproachment. A hundred year plan to accomplish peaceful co-existence should be "the Mission."

Without a clear vision of what the U.S. and others want to accomplish in the Israel-to-Iran region, staying in Iraq and leaving Iraq are equal. Both moves have no merit for the future of global peace and community without such moves being taken in the context of a century's long plan for peace.

Don't forget you can also accuse anyone who presents you with similarly absurd, loaded Republican talking points. Try insinuating they're blind supporters of Bush's cult of personality in a way that almost demands they deny it (much the way Republicans used to counter any opposition by accusing people of being 'Bush haters'), e.g.

You're not one of those 'true believers' who supports Bush blindly on everything, are you? Of course not...

The Bush administration has mismanaged every stage of the war, and been wrong about every prediction about the war. The troops deserve better, don't you think? Of course they do...

We've been in Iraq longer than it took for us to win WWII. Unless or until Bush can articulate a dramatic, new plan to win the war, it's not fair to the troops to support a continuation of these failed policies.

Well, you get the idea.

1. What's the right thing to do? (Withdraw from Iraq.)
2. Will the Democratic Party benefit from supporting withdrawal from Iraq? (Yes, within its constituency, and among the majority who don't vote; no, within the hard-right Republicans and their propagandists.)
3. Will the Democratic Party get more support within the military from supporting withdrawal from Iraq? (Never while you have a professional military; professional militaries are naturally conservative and breeding-grounds for extremism.)
4. Should the Democratic Party be worrying about seeking support from the right-wing military and currying favour with extreme right-wing propagandists? (No.)
5. Is the Democratic Party seeking support from the right-wing military and currying favour with extreme right-wing propagandists? (Yes.)
6. Is this a problem?

"...many troops in Iraq, perhaps even most of them, want to stay and fight...
According to what survey? Oh right, it's another MSU moment in journamalism. (making s**t up)

Do you have confidential survey data on this? Anecdote is not data (so why anecdote). Kevin - please write your story on the basis of facts.

Yes, of course this is just a slogan, a shorthand way of countering the republican's ridiculous notion that doing anything other than continuing the occupation in any way other than the way Bush wants to continue it is failing to "support the troops," that opposition to the war is a failure to "support the troops."

This kind of concern trolling would be a lot easier to take if we had had a series of columns on the fatuousness and dishonesty of republican sloganeering in place of policy-making. Starting with "global war on terror," skipping ahead to "we'll stand down as they stand up," stopping for a moment at "we have to attack them there so they can't attack us here," and on and on and on.

Where are the articles that say pounding this global war on terror message is going to backfire, because there isn't and can't be a global war on terror. Where is the commentary pointing out that attacking Iraq there has nothing to do with attacking anything here?

It's astounding. TNR types bitch about the democrats being in disarray and unable to stay on message, and then, when they do stay on message, they deride the message as not true. Where have they been as the republicans have spent the entire administration reducing complex policy discussions to irrelevant, or even flatly false phrases?

Oh, and while I'm on this rant, what the hell is Blitzer doing demanding yes or no answers to questions like "Isn't this an amnesty program?" That's a straight nativist wingnut talking point that is essentially meaningless. It's part and parcel with this nonsense--the idea being to make immigration policy choices being between amnesty (bad!!) and not amnesty (goood...).

It's infuriating to see democrats criticized for failing to have clear, succinct messages, and then ripped again when they develop clear, succinct messages as content-free as the republicans.

That doesn't make any damn sense Kevin. The troops are supposed to believe in the mission, whether they actually do or not, that's a given. If the mission is fucked up, it's not their job to oppose the mission. Democrats don't need to "save the troops", that's stupid shit. That's obvious.

You don't make your message, your points, based upon attacks by your opponents. You don't make some big hurrah about "supporting the troops" by bringing them home. You bring the troops home because the mission is fucked and the troops are friends, family, loved ones.

The whole fucking thing is dysfunctional to me how stupid this messaging thing is going. Ackerman used to have a level of intelligence that was impressive. Now he sounds like a fucking idiot.

Wake the fuck up and realize the mission is fucked and it's all a pack of lies. Then you'll do the right damn thing and hold the feet to the fire and get our loved ones the hell out of there, while also stopping the murders and mayhem we're responsible for over there (just a part of it, not all of it, there's resisters and jihadis also doing their own part in the violence over there, as well as the Saudis, Iranians, etc.).

The sooner we drop the "pretend" naivete the better, because this is all about domination of natural resources and there's not an idealistic root in any of this.

Augustus: "Custer's motivations may have even been political, as he was considered a contender for the presidency."

I don't think George A. Custer was seriously considered for that post by anyone other than perhaps himself. New York Gov. Samuel Tildon had the Democratic nomination pretty much in his hip pocket by June 25, 1876, and there is no way President Ulysses Grant would have ever allowed Custer the GOP nomination (which eventually went to Ohio Congressman Rutherford B. Hayes).

Nevertheless, it's probably fortuitous that events that summer afternoon at the Little Bighorn River proved Gen. Custer to be both a reckless fool and quite mortal, and thus thankfully precluded even the remotest possibility that either major political party would ever entertain such an absurdity.

Well, here's a little fact that no one wants to ever acknowledge - some of the people in the U.S. military are sick, sadistic perverts who enjoy killing and hurting other human beings. Anyone who has served in the military knows this. That's why I don't grovel in the dirt to worship the military like many Americans.

This is likely even more true now that we have an all-volunteer (read, mercenary) army. Reinstate the draft, and you will have a lot more soldiers that want to come home and not want to continue slaughtering innocent human beings, not one of which had anything to do with 9-11.

Since when did "support the troops" mean "fight the war the troops want to fight"?? That's nonsense.

Giving soldiers the equipment that makes them safer while conducting a mission IS supporting the troops, period; I can't see where there's an argument. And if and when we realize that a given mission is a lost cause, then it's the antithesis of "supporting the troops" to leave them in the kill zone, to get wounded and killed for nothing.

Whether they realize it at the time doesn't matter. But part of our moral contract with the troops is that when we spend their lives, we won't waste them. Once we believe their mission is doomed, we owe it to them to do our damnedest to bring them home.

They may well disagree at the time, but they will trust us in the long run far more if we do that, than if we leave them to fight and die for nothing.

Two legs ba-a-ad, for legs go-o-od. Suppo-o-ort the tro-o-ops. Suppo-o-ort the tro-o-ops. If the Democratic candidates can't find a way to bust this mindless slogan they're do-o-omed.

The "optimistic" ones who still think the mission can be accomplished are kind of dumb. And it's pretty hard not to condescend to dumb people.

I don't think "support the troops" was ever intended to mean "let the troops fight the war if they want to". In any case, we don't have "rule by military" in the US.

"I don't want them to just support the troops. I want them to support the mission."

and exactly what would that be?

in the big picture the mission of the military is to enforce policy. that's why bush's mantra about not overriding the opinions of the "troops on the ground" (except when they disagree with him) is bullshit, and that's why it's nice if col. gungho wants us to support "the mission", but we shouldn't listen to either of them.

gung-ho soldiers are a good thing because morale is very important (or to put it another way, if morale is gone you are well on the way to losing the war whatever it might be), but being dedicated to "the mission" does not confer the right to decide what "the mission" is. the day the military starts dictating policy we are well on the way to not being a democracy anymore.

Being in Iraq doesn't help America and the last time I looked the troops were still under civilian command. What the military thinks it can or can not achieve is relevant input in a just war that achieves larger ends. It is totally irrelevant to an unjust war that diminishes America. End of story far as I'm concerned.

Kevin got something half right: it's true that a Democrat gets no automatic credibility on national security for being a veteran (as it should be). It is simply untrue, however, that a Republican gets no automatic credibility on national security for being a veteran. Your liberal media at work.

Ackerman is off base these days and it's no longer "God's truth" Kevin.

The polls NOW show that a majority of the troops believe we're losing in Iraq these days. Their own eyewitness accounts ALONG with the observation of our war correspondence - of late we have read accounts of our militray members finding Iraq police among the dead of insurgencies whenever our military have had to defend against guerilla attacks, the very same people that our troops have trained, so that, you know, the Iraqi would stand up - while our military stood down.

It ain't going to happen, and its not like our miltiary members don't know it. The FACT is now that most our military members have come to this sad but obvious conclusion.

Both Kevin and Ackerman's observation would have been correct half a year back, but of course now it's not.

The truth of the matter, however, is this: many troops in Iraq, perhaps even most of them, want to stay and fight.

That is no longer the case.

Of late Kevin, local families who have family members die in this war, particular a parent whose son recently died in Iraq reported that his son had told him that he was fighting ghost. Our military members in Iraq no longer know who the emeny is, and just because our miltiary members do not want to leave comrade in arms should not be confused with wanting to stay in Iraq.

Bush's back-door draft is most definitely taking it's toll.

When anyone thinks about how Bush handled this war, well, it should infuriate every American citizen out there. Bush's fortifying a green zone, putting all his man power resources into building his billion dollar military bases without trying to secure Baghdad, and when the war correspondence tell us that the only building left unscathed was the oil ministry building, and that repainting the schools is nothing since Bush didn't bother providing security so that students could attend, the stench of public sewage, the fact that our military seems to have sat idly by whenever insurgency attacked the different Baghdad neighborhoods without intervening showed the Iraq people all they needed to know. That the overwhelming fact is that Bush was just there for the oil, has hence it has been the start of unrest, the insurgency we witness today. Bush never gave a damn about the Iraqi people, and Iraqi people figured it out.

Ditto for the Democratic obsession with using better body armor, higher GI pay, or the quality of military medical care as proxies for "supporting the troops."

Gee, well the GOP surely don't seem to give a damn about these things either.

What was it David Broder said about Republicans and their so-called "affinity" for the military?

What "affinity would that be?

I don't think Bush gives a damn about those his back-draft fighting men and women that Bush uses like so much toilet paper. Stange how the Republican's so-called Christian rightousness never provides for better body armor, higher GI pay, or the quality of military medical care.

I guess there nothing wrong with Dems supporting these "proxies" since certainly the GOP isn't going to do it. It's so much cheaper to talk about flag burning.

And sure, there is nothing wrong with providing better leadership, because certainly our militaries dumb *uck Commander and Chief has never provided anything but one lie right after another along with his horrilble stupid piss poor isolationust style of leadership.

"The troops" will never be fooled into believing that liberals support them. They know that liberals applaud every American setback, and are dismayed by every American success. The troops are committed to bringing democracy to Iraq, and will stay the course until the mission is accomplished. God bless them for that.

Let's just find out how much our troops support the war. Have the Dems pass legislation that unless they declare war in Iraq the President cannot extend deployments or keep the troops in the military beyond their enlistment dates. THEN we'll have a truly voluntary military, and we'll see just how much they support the mission.

Anarch: "It is simply untrue, however, that a Republican gets no automatic credibility on national security for being a veteran. Your liberal media at work."

Okay, the combination of logic and syntax, that double negative, confused me.

Are you were makng the following point? Thanks to our national media, a veteran who is a Democrat will get no automatic credibility for national security; The anti-war reputation of Democrats will neutralize his or her experience as a vet. Conversely, a non-veteran who is a Republican is always awarded credibility for national security because Republican breast-thumping tough-talk trumps experience.

If so, good point!

Oooooh! That has to hurt. That was a tremendous takedown of Dennis Kucinich and Grandmother's for Peace.

No better way imaginable to frame a foreign policy debate.

However, I have to take issue with the part tacked on the end about telling the truth and having a reality based foreign policy that takes the nation's interests into account. What's that about?

"As he (Lieutenant Wellman) told me of war doubters back home, "I don't want them to just support the troops. I want them to support the mission."

The problem is that most of the soldiers that want to stay still think "the mission" is about 9/11 and Osama bin Laden. A recent 60 minutes program illustated this fact. The soldiers need to understand that not only is the Iraq War NOT about 9/11, in reality it weakened our response to 9/11 by shifting our focus away from Afghanistan and bin Laden's base of operations.

I really don't understand Kevin's post, Ackerman, or many of the comments.

As pointed out above, a good number of the troops do want to get out of Iraq (e.g., reports that Lieberman was deluged with questions from the troops about when they are coming home). Most Americans want us out too. It is worth pointing out that the Dems support troop withdrawal (or redeployment) and the Reps will keep them in Iraq on a worthless mission forever. I don't think the troops will be insulted because Dems want to end the mission. Many if not most will be relieved when it happens.

Look, there is a propaganda war going on about "support for the troops." Dems have been attacked since before the war started for not supporting the troops. (Often it has just meant the Dems haven't given Bush all he wants.) But it is important to say that the Dem position is the one that really does support the troops: don't have them fight worthless wars, find a better mission for them, pay them, and get them what they need like body armor. These really are better ways to support the troops than anything the Reps have done in the last decade.

Oh, for Pete's sake...of course getting out of IRAQ supports the troops...they may not agree that it does but WE don't need their approval to think it best for ALL that we leave (Iraqis, troops,America)...way too much time spent on niggling all these points. Soldiers are SUPPOSED to, at least try to, believe in the mission otherwise how could they get up and go out and do what they're asked to...WE DON'T HAVE TO!!! Perhaps some of them should read A LONG WAY HOME by Ismael Beah and get another view of belonging to a group of "right thinking people" who ORDER you to do what they say or shoot you if you don't...there are other points of view informed by experience despite all the pontificating done by armchair experts.

Thanks, Kevin for the reality check I always get by reading this comments section - I was flirting with the idea of voting for Obama, but now I'm back to being a Fred Thompson Repub thanks to the unvarnished honesty of your readers. "Sadistic mercenaries lusting for one more mission" -- thanks guys.

And why does Spencer think oblivious is worse than condescending?

Kevin, please shut up. You proved a long time ago with your cheerleading for the Iraq war (and your subsequent attempts to softpedal that support) that foreign affairs just aren't your bag. Why not stick to what you're good at -- some nice domestic policy analysis or photographing your cats. Kay?

As a conservative poster, I am awestruck at this thread. It is shocking to see this level of intellectual honesty on the WaMo website.

I kept waiting for Kevin to pull a complete 180, and declare that the article was written in sarcasm.

I am being totally serious when I say that reading an article like this makes me think about the Democratic party as a viable option in 2008.

Of course, you only have to read the commentary to be reminded how far 'out there' the views of the leftist base are. Basically, the comments all follow the same formula: "The troops and commanders may be out there on the ground right in the center of the conflict, but somehow they don't understand it as well as Joe Liberal does sitting at home in his basement behind a computer monitor."

Read The Conservative Deflator's post at 5:33 or brooksfoe's post at 6:07 to see how liberals REALLY view 'the troops'.

By the way, U.S. military personnel understand this quite clearly. That's why they overwhelmingly vote Republican.

Very strange post by Kevin.

Telling the truth, as usual, is better: we need to leave Iraq not because we think the troops need rescuing, but because we think that leaving is what's best for our national security.

Why can't it be both?

In any case this is the usual quibbling over what is essentially a triviality in the big scheme of things that reinforces liberals' image as a querrelsome bunch like a group of three year olds.

The truth of the matter, however, is this: many troops in Iraq, perhaps even most of them, want to stay and fight.

Then let those who want to "stay and fight" join the Iraqi army. And let the Iraqi government pay them.

The US should not deploy its military into a conflict just because the soldiers want it to.

I don't see where any of these Dem arguments has anything to do with convincing the troops.

It is the public perception via the CW that says that doing these things represents supporting the troops and conversely getting the troops out is abandoning them.

The need to penetrate the great fog machine in getting the end-the-war message out - not the need to convince the troops - is what is driving the Dems jump through these political (and logical) hoops.

KEVIN---The first three words in your last paragraph
" Telling the truth " reminds me of this. " If they ask you why we died , tell them that our fathers lied . " RUDYARD KIPLING
The forces that are fighting are our ( NATIONAL GUARD ) not REGULAR ARMY . They are being treated as if they are THE AMERICAN FOREIGN LEGION . Sure the Romans and French had their FOREIGN LEIGONS , but do we really need that sort of
-----BULL SHIT ??
QUESTION ---How is it that these Generals can appear on t. v. with all that crap pinned to their uniform . it does not impress the fathers and mothers of those young men wearing a wheel chair or artifical arms and legs .
Those will be the medals they will wear for the rest of their life.
WAKE --UP THIS IS NOT A GOD-DAM HOLLYWOOD
MOVIE OR MOVIE SET.

Yeah, it is kinda hard, sometimes, to help those in abusive relationships.

Read The Conservative Deflator's post at 5:33 or brooksfoe's post at 6:07 to see how liberals REALLY view 'the troops'.

So you're claiming what he says isn't so?

That none "of the people in the U.S. military are sick, sadistic perverts who enjoy killing and hurting other human beings"?

Because he didn't say 'most', or even 'many'...

Let me add one more thought then it's off to work - I remember the final days of the Viet Nam war, when the guys knew they were left to die on the vine. There was mass insubordination, fragging, a complete collapse of the military. I enlisted in the Air Force a few years later and they were still trying to recoup from that disaster. These mindless gung ho zombies that you guys envision are straw men, the real live troops are not ignorant, and they're not brainwashed - if the mission in Iraq was as hopeless as you guys so desperately want it to be, they would not be willing to continue it.

To add to brooksfoe's comment:

The "optimistic" ones who still think the mission can be accomplished are kind of dumb. And it's pretty hard not to condescend to dumb people.

It's also pretty hard, if you're a shyster of some sort, to not use said dumb people to your own advantage as ruthlessly as possible. P.T. Barnum is credited with a phrase expressing the sentiment which birthed that strategy.

I think, getting to my point, that brooksfoe's statement needs some qualification.
Most "dumb people" can't articulate the mission that they are optimistic about - ask three of them and you'll get at least two different answers. They furthermore have an understanding of how possible the mission that they believe they are supporting that ranges from minimal, through negligible, right on down to the sqr rt of -1.

A few points:

Troops are voters, too. And we can't afford a rift between the military and the next commander-in-chief, like WJC had.

The troops believe in the mission, of course. They aren't supposed to be objective, it isn't their job. But what they appreciate most of all from political leadership is straight talk and courage. They don't want to be left in limbo.

The troops most definitely need to know that their buddies didn't die for no good reason, and that they didn't kill people for no good reason. They did what they were asked to do, and no blame assigns to them. They need to be told this. Repeatedly.

Al, I'm calling double-plus bullshit on you.

"The troops" will never be fooled into believing that liberals support them. They know that liberals applaud every American setbackliberal, nor is Bill Kristol) that applauded the election in 2004 of George W. Bush to be POTUS.

Support the mission?

The riddle of our system is that we have "civilian control" and military execution. When there is misguided control by the civlians and poor leadership by the military how do we correct it?

The military's oath requires obedience to the civilian decisions, so we won't hear much from them about poor leadership. Thus I'm not surprised at the lieutenant's declaration of support for the mission.

In fact, most now agree that the decision to invade was wrong on every issue--WMD, democracy, occupation, understanding the Shiite/Sunni rift, reforming the Middle East, etc. Adding to the chaos was the choices our military leadership made. Small force, no realistic plan for the aftermath, not a clue that there could be post war opposition--despite many warnings.

The Lieutenant wants support for a misguided mission. He needs his head examined.

This comment and the Spencer Ackerman comment that it is based on are foolish and simplistic (oh let's go all the way...just plain stupid). The attitude of troops in Iraq is not uniform; many of them would like to complete their mission (whatever that is), many feel the situation is FUBAR and want to get the f*** out; many think the whole war was wrong,stupid, misconceived, and duplicitously launched. Worse yet, their ideas are not fixed and are always in flux. The snapshot now is quite different than in 2003. So what? Getting our troops out supports our troops. It certainly supports the ones that want out. It certainly does not hurt the troops who want to continue whatever it is they are doing (it does not hurt THEM. It hurts their desire to continue) But just as a cumpulsory education aids those who do not want to learn or stay in school even as it clearly supports those who view education as a step to advancement, there is great (overwhelming) truth that education supports our children. And there are innumerable variants of this analogy.

Support our Mission

Thought that was the new NeoCon children's recruiting show which ends with the Big Bad Wolfowitz leading the children around the set singing, "It is the War that never ends, it goes on and on, my friends, we started fighting it, not knowing what it was, and we'll continue fighting it Forever, just because.......".

Donald from Hawaii,

Yes, Custer was a reckless fool, but no ChickenHawk - But, can't really see Shrub on a mountain tricycle leading troops down the long gully - Results are becoming more similar, though.

So, the Democrats want military personnel to love them, huh?

According to Military Times . . .

83% of military personnel describe themselves as conservative or moderate, one percent describe themselves as very liberal.

13% are Democrats, 56% are Republican

Only 23% believe gays should be allowed to serve in the military

81% believe the news media has their facts wrong (guess they share that with liberals).

You want military personnel to vote Democratic? Then make Zell Miller the head of the party.

I completely disagree, Kevin. As a mother of an 18-year-old son, I think your analysis and that of Ackerman's is just intellectual claptrack. What exactly is "the mission" in Iraq? What is the actual goal that is remotely realistic at this point? Wanting to bring the troops home, to prevent them from dying or being badly injured for no good reason whatsoever, is something Democrats should strongly advocate. Democrats should not worry about saving troops'lives will be characterized by a bunch of useless pundits. Bring them home. This war is a fraud.

"Telling the truth, as usual, is better: we need to leave Iraq not because we think the troops need rescuing, but because we think that leaving is what's best for our national security."

Oh, so it's an "untruth" to say that Democrats/progressives/liberals support the troops? I think it is fine to say that the most effective strategy for countering the "support the troops" line is to make the case that the best thing for national security is to pull the troops back (how far back is important to elucidate as well), but to cast in terms of "truth" is not helpful, IMHO.

"Support the troops" may be an emotively effective slogan, but - like most slogans - it is so vague that it falls apart under careful logical analysis. This can be seen in the "analysis" Ackerman tries to make. He seems to be unaware that he has obfuscated the two distinct intentions in the way the phrase is used. One is that "supporting the troops" means upholding their take on the war (or what is assumed to be the take of a majority of the soldiers in Iraq). The other intended meaning is to do what is in the best interest of the soldiers. Because the way Ackerman has placed these these two notions in conjunction to each other without making a clear distinction between them he is led to an emotional rather than an analytic conclusion that doing what is in the best interest of the soldiers is tantamount to "doing them a favor" - or in Kevin's more unnecessarily provocative terminology "rescuing" them.

The purpose of any slogan is to evoke an emotional response. That the slogan can be deconstructed by logical analysis doesn't really matter because the reality of the politics of large groups is that the emotion evoked by a slogan will almost always trump a logical analysis of it. That is why it isn't necessarily a bad idea to co-opt the slogan - even though that co-opting is just as open to logical criticism as was the original intent. Kevin wants to "sidestep" the issue of "supporting the troops" by appealing to another widely shared paradigm - "do what's best for our nation". Okay, there's a solid case to made for that approach. But to say that that approach is somehow more "truthful" than the approach of co-opting the slogan is much too much of an oversimplification (if not outright wrong) and does not benefit the discussion. For myself, I think that Democrats/progessives/liberals can effectively use both approaches. I think we can show that what is in the best interest of the nation is also in the best interest of the troops and that what is what we mean when we say that we support the troops.

Minion of the US Air Force,

Let me the first to congratulate you on helping restore duty, honor, country and dignity to the Permanent Latrine Orderly MOS. Well done, Sir!

Sorry, correcting spellchecker typos! I completely disagree, Kevin. As a mother of an 18-year-old son, I think your analysis and that of Ackerman's is just intellectual claptrap. What exactly is "the mission" in Iraq? What is the actual goal that is remotely realistic at this point? Wanting to bring the troops home, to prevent them from dying or being badly injured for no good reason whatsoever, is something Democrats should strongly advocate. Democrats should not worry about how saving troops' lives will be characterized by a bunch of useless pundits. Bring them home. This war is a fraud.

Do the troops themselves, if this is indeed a fair characterization of their appreciation of the war- and I doubt it is, understand the political origin of “The Mission”? Or do they see any mission sent down the pneumatic tube from the White House as right, correct, desirable, in the interest of the country and winnable? If so, perhaps we need a better informed citizenry and a better educated military.

Are Democrats so susceptible to the charge of lack of patriotism that they have to speak in soft tones about Dick Cheney’s Middle East pacification war? Never in the history of the American Republic, and there will be a huge literature on this subject, has an American administration attacked so many fundamental rights and been so presumptuous in matters of power. The war was predicated on lies and has been ruinously prosecuted. Herein lies the problem. Any gang of ambitious men with enough money can get into the White House and make up the war they want. Because they can charge their critics with lack of patriotism, and this will cost elections, everyone will respect their war and in one way or another get behind it or shut up. This has long been the ultimate danger to Republics and is the inverse of the parliamentary spirit.

What should end is the culture of deference. George Bush’s classic abuse of power reveals how under-serving and dangerous this culture is.

This argument will go round and round and round for ever.

"Support the troops" is almost as meaningless as "war on terror".

The only thing that matters is the fact that the invasion and occupation were and are WRONG and there should be no troops there. Their presence in Iraq is endangering U.S. national security by encouraging anti-American sentiment everywhere.

That's the reason to bring them home.

"And we can't afford a rift between the military and the next commander-in-chief, like WJC had."

Uhhhh... why not, exactly?

We could do a lot worse than 8 years of peace and prosperity. Come to think of it.....

Is their a record of any mission (apart from the one in the later yearsf Nam) that the soldiers on the ground did not support?

Democrats are determined to express support for the troops. This is admirable. The truth of the matter, however, is this: many troops in Iraq, perhaps even most of them, want to stay and fight.

This appears to me to be largely a game of semantics about the meaning of support and express.

Democrats may want to "express" support for the troops, but what is far more important is to actually support the troops. Words are nice, but deeds are far more important and this analysis appears to me to turn that on its head and put expression over action.

The next move is to distort the meaning of support from one in which involves meeting the concrete needs of the troops and ensuring they are not needlessly killed is again made somehow less important than supporting their individual subjective opinions and desires.

This is not and never has been as far as I know about supporting individual troops preferences. Whether or not most troops want to stay or not doesnt address the issue, its not a matter of taking a poll of the troops and supporting what most of them want. That is not and should not be the role of Congress.

Ditto for the Democratic obsession with using better body armor, higher GI pay, or the quality of military medical care as proxies for "supporting the troops." As with leaving Iraq, these are all good things to support. But they're good things on their own terms, not because anyone in uniform will be fooled into thinking that voting for them means you support the military.

Perhaps you should define exactly what you mean by support the troops rather than use this shifting construction. I have never seen this as a play to get soldiers to vote for them. This is to do whats right for America and right for the nations armed forces and not as some form of bribe. What basis do you have to support such a construct?

What is the mission?? The military routed Hussein and exposed the fraud under which the invasion was launched by finding zero WMDs.
A stable Iraq is something the Iraqis must solve.

If the mission morphed to prevent civil war, it was a fool's errand.

I posit that the real mission was one of oil interests, Israel and a permanent American presence in Iraq. I doubt the troops, the GOP, or any American would support this "mission." Truly supporting the troops means taking care of their needs before and after the battle. Not wasting lives and treasure. That kind of thing. We have an "all working class" military more than an all volunteer military. Many of our over worked personnel joined for medical care and job training. Wal Mart is a recruiting station every time it kills wage increases. So spare my the freaking sermon on who cares for the troops. A non dysfunctional society would HAVE to draft young people.

Kevin, good job for showing the disconnect between Democrats and the troops. If once again, as in Somalia, the Democrats succeed in withdrawing our military when the military does not believe they had been defeated, you will see the collapse of the volunteer service. Then a Democrat president will be in the position of the French in May 1940 if another crisis arises. They will have no force when it is needed. The conscript army collapsed after Viet Nam. This would collapse the volunteer military. Pacifism would then be your only option. That appeals to most of you anyway. Good luck.

This has to be the most inane post of Kevin's in a good long while.

What's condescending is to lie to the troops about the mission they are being sent to fight. I've seen recent interviews with soldiers in Iraq who still claim that they are there to revenge the attacks of 9-11. How about telling them the truth?

Most of the people dying over there are 18 to 20 year old kids who believe what their president and their commanders tell them - much to their own detriment.

It is precisely this fear of calling this mission what it is that got us into this mess in the first place. The Congress and the press were intimidated and cowed into not speaking the truth about this so-called "mission" and have been for 4+ years.

This man's primary mission is to support the people of the U.S., and that means 100% of the people, whether they agree with his notions of mission or not. It is dangerous when one party, whether Republicans or Democrats, whips up hostility among the military towards any segment of the population and doesn't recognize that missions are determined by the elected representatives and not the military and executives.

sportsfan79 nailed it. The cited article made sense; the responses not so much.

Dicksknee quotes a poll as showing that 81% of the troops believe the news media has their facts wrong. The troops in Iraq see first-hand what's going on. They see the media downplay good news. They can see that few in the media have military expertise. The troops are right. The media does get it wrong.

Even if the media did their job, first-hand experience is usually best. But, given the weak media coverage, what makes you think you understand the war better than the troops who are there?

mhr:

Bin-Ladin believes that he and his gang were the ones that brought down the USSR.

That's why I left Osama alive see...
So that little pricks like this...
Can advance the argument see...
In other words catapult the propaganda,
That what... see...
Osama thinks and says see...
Is more important see...
Then what the rest of the world thinks and knows...

Never misunderestimate me see...
My minion of pricks don't...

Kevin, you and Ackerman seem to have confused the claim by many on the left that these positions are the best way to support the troops with the idea that they are a way of politically pandering to the troops. They are not.

They serve many purposes, political and substantive, but pandering to the troops or claiming to be pandering to the troops is not one of them. They serve to underline the hypocrisy of the Right (including the Administration) claiming it is "supporting the troops" when it neither supports any consistent, articulated mission (shifting justifications and definitions of victory as conditions change), nor supports the welfare of the troops (failing to provide necessary resources, cutting benefits, etc.), nor supports the troops in any other way, merely chants "support the troops" while sacrificing their lives with no realistic vision of what is to be attained by that sacrifice except avoiding political defeat for themselves and their cronies.

Further, while Ackerman is able to find a couple of individual military officers to quote to support the picture he is trying to paint of the opinion of the troops in Iraq, he's got little else to support it. He attempts to cherry-pick the Military Times poll to find some support, while at the same time minimizing the year-over-year trend since the peak of support in 2004 of falling support for the war among the troops shown in that poll by claiming the poll isn't scientific because it relies on self-selected responses to a mailed questionnaire.

Had he been genuinely interested in what troops in Iraq think and looking for polls conducted by random sampling, rather than looking for excuses to select the results he liked and disregard those he didn't from the Military Times poll in order to paint a pre-conceived picture with which to bash fellow Democrats, he might have found the Zogby poll from early 2006 in which 72% of troops in Iraq (ranging from 58% of marines to 82% of National Guard and 89% of Reservists) thought US troops should be withdrawn by the end of 2006. (from Stars and Stripes)

Of course, had he done so, he might be hard pressed to explain the unsubstantiated assertion on which his entire piece rests, that is, that the majority of US troops support an open-ended continuation of the war in Iraq. Because without that, even taking (as he and you both seem to) "support the troops" to mean simply "advance the policy most troops support", there is little support for his argument that ending the war is somehow not the right way to do that.

In short, I see no reason not to see this as anything but the kind of dishonest, fact-averse, bashing of liberals we've come to expect from the establishment wing of the Democratic Party that has no values or ideas of its own, but exists only to get media attention by inventing superficially plausible reasons to claim that liberals are wrong.

Our message should be that we'll support the troops by making sure that we send them into war only with proper leadership, proper planning, and when the national security of the United States is genuinely at risk.

That sounds *exactly* like what John Kerry said over and over and over during his 2004 campaign. And what he's demanded in umpteen speeches since the election. One could argue that it's been the Democratic message for a few years now.

I think we all know there's no love for the military/troops from us, progressives. The US military represents: gingoism, racism, sexism, homophobia, nationalism, captialism, patriotism... The only reason we bother at all to say we support the troops, is that a large number of Americans have been brainwashed (by Bushitler/Halliburton) into thinking the military has any redeeming value.

We need to leave Iraq because the invasion was an immoral and unjustifiable enterprise designed for political and economic gain by a venal and corrupt band of war pigs and their malicious little stooge. Many thousands of noncombatant Iraqis are dead because of the war.

I don't give a fuck whether one or all of the servicemen and women in Iraq want to fight a war. The war is wrong if every last one of them wants to fight it. If "supporting the troops" means kissing the ass of people who want to continue an immoral war, I don't support the troops.

Speak for yourself, Freedom Fighter! Many of us have genuine admiration for the military. My father served in the Navy during the Korean War, and he's only one of the many people I admire who served. The military represents service, self-sacrifice, and the willingness to put the good of your country ahead of your own little interests (a concept which the current Administration, alas, does not remotely appear to grasp).

I suspect you may be a Republican pretending to be a progressive and mouthing what many on the Right want to *think* we think. In any case, you don't speak for me.

I think a lot of people in this thread are missing the larger point. Almost everybody here agrees that the war was a huge mistake and runs against protecting our national security. Almost everybody agrees that we need to get out. These things are not in contention (at least not in a Washington Monthly thread and certainly not in my mind).

IMO, what Kevin is talking about here is the framing of the narrative. What the troops need to hear is that they are being pulled out because their efforts in Iraq are no longer needed for our national security. Further, when the nation feels they are needed again, they will be called back into action without hesitation because they are the baddest ass military in the world. They do not need to hear that they lost, prefaced by a bunch of feel good "it's not your fault - the civilian leadership screwed up" crap. It doesn't matter one iota whether or not this is true.

Democrats, who I personally think tend to have much greater empathy than Republicans, should be able to consider this argument from the perspective of a soldier in the field. Even if they are not outwardly expressing these feelings, most soldiers are probably perfectly well aware that this war was a mistake, the goals are unclear, and under these circumstances it is impossible to even define winning and losing. For a politician to say, "we lost and we are pulling out" is just so unbelievably stupid it makes my head hurt. Emotionally, these soldiers are in very deep - they do not need to be pulled out because they lost, they need to be redeployed for national security reasons.

Our message should be that we'll support the troops by making sure that we send them into war only with proper leadership, proper planning, and when the national security of the United States is genuinely at risk.

In other words, lie again.

If once again, as in Somalia, the Democrats succeed in withdrawing our military

Factual correction: it was the Republicans who supported cutting and running from Somalia while the Clinton Administration wanted to stay. Here's Glenn Greenwald on the subject:

After the U.S. troops were dragged through the streets of Mogadishu, numerous conservative senators and representatives -- mostly Republican along with some conservative Southern Democrats -- demanded that Clinton withdraw all American troops immediately, insisting that the U.S. had no interest in Somalia and that not one more American troop should die there. They gave speeches stoked with nationalistic anger and angrily demanded immediate withdrawal, and even threatened to introduce legislation to cut off all funding for any troop maintenance in Somalia.

Clinton -- along with Democratic senators such as John Kerry -- vigorously argued against immediate withdrawal, in part because of the concern that America would look weak by panicking and abandoning its mission at the first sign of trouble (just like President Reagan did in 1983 when he immediately withdrew U.S. forces from Lebanon after the attack on U.S. Marines). Clinton had to virtually beg to be allowed to keep troops for an additional six months (and he even increased American troop levels) to stabilize the situation, demonstrate U.S. resolve and a commitment to the mission and, most of all, avoid a panicky, fear-driven retreat.

Republican senators attempted to force an immediate withdrawal and then ultimately compromised on a compelled withdrawal in six months. As but one example, from a Senate floor speech by Sen. Dirk Kempthorne, on Oct. 6, 1993: "The United S