Kerry vs McCain on Meet The Press

The debate was pretty much what you might expect. McCain saying that the surge is working and that we need to get the job done. Kerry making the point that we need to change the equation and give Maliki a date that we are going to start withdrawing. I don’t want to argue here which strategy is better. Instead, let’s assume that Kerry makes a good point, namely that we need to force Iraq to get their own shit together. And the best way they will do that is to give them a timetable for withdrawing our troops.

My question (again, assuming Kerry’s strategy has merit) is, given that one of the downsides of a timetable with any dates is that we announce that date to our enemies, as well, who can use that information to their advantage, wouldn’t the best way to impose a timetable to Maliki be to do it in private. To publicly state that we’ll be there for as long as it takes, but to tell him privately, “Okay, Bubb, you guys have to get your shit together. And you have ?? months/years to do it then we’ll start pulling troops in a big way”.?

Wouldn’t that accomplish what Kerry and others think needs to be done to “change the equation” while avoiding the downside the many on the right have pointed out?

If you think the strategy I propose isn’t the best of both (those two) worlds? Why not? If you agree that it would be the best of both worlds, why do Kerry and others on the left keep attempting to force a public timetable? Doesn’t this just guarantee that a timetable can’t/won’t be issued? I mean, it’s not like the best of both worlds scenario I mentioned isn’t pretty obvious.

My take is that Kerry and his crowd thinks it more important to hang a troublesome and unpopular war around the neck of Bush and Republicans than for Iraq to go well. Okay, better.

Disagree? Why?

I’m not sure I necessarily disagree, but I can think of a few problems with a private deadline. The first is that when the time comes, and the U.S. troops say “OK, we had a secret deadline, it was now, let’s get out of here” Maliki might just say “You had what? No-one talked to me about this. Boo American forces!” if he wants to make himself look good. A private timetable means Maliki can later pretend he didn’t know about it. A second problem is that Maliki might not still be in charge at that point. And when the new guy comes in, do we just say “Welcome to the job, good luck, here’s your bodyguard, and oh yeah we’re off in a week”. A public deal would make any new leaders feel more obliged to agree with it. The last problem that I can think of is that things called “secrets” will not necessarily stay secret, and if it’s going to leak out to the enemy it’s probably a good idea that *our * guys know about it, too, so they can prepare.

I think it’s long past time that any deadline private or public will make any difference.
It’s a failure. Get out!!
IMO the key issue and the reason it will fail is that the admin wants an Iraqi government that will hold American interests as a high priority rather than being a true democracy that gets to decide it’s own priorities. It’s an old story or us interfering in the affairs of other sovereign nations to serve our interests, under the guise of “spreading democracy”

Well, to an extent I’m already on the record as saying ‘We’ve lost…it’s time to cut our losses’.

But at the same time I can acknowledge the arguments behind the ‘if you announce a deadline then the bad guys know they just have to wait’. But it’s also true that they ALREADY know that. Our commitment isn’t open-ended. ANYONE with a basic grasp of the American political psyche and system should have known that prior to the invasion.

On yet another hand I don’t see Maliki EVER actually working towards a stable and happy democracy. I think the guy is in it for himself and his own goals and having us there helps him maintain his place. I think his life expectancy/tenure in power will be measured with a stopwatch the minute we leave. Were I him I’d damn well have my boarding pass for the day before.

Or, I suppose, we’re screwed either way.

Excellent job of completely ignoring the questions in the OP. Do you have an opinion on what was asked?

Good points. But I think you take the “secret” too far. It needn’t be a whisper in his ear only. The crucial elements seem to be very public statements that we will stay as long as it takes, etc. And that the actual timetable not be acknowledged by the U.S. publicly, only behind closed doors to Maliki and other top officials. If things leakout, we treat them as gossip and publicly restate our commitment to do whatever it takes.

But they don’t know when. That’s the crucial piece of information. And that is the real point of differentiation between the two camps. Everyone agrees on a draw down of our troops eventually.

You might be correct, here, but it doesn’t go to the questions asked in the OP.

One reason to make it public is that measures to minimize the negative effects of withdrawal will need to be public. If we decide to withdraw, we might want to do things like provide secure routes for population shifts. We might also want to engage in public diplomacy with Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Jordan and others about what will happen following withdrawal.

Also, presumably, we’re not just trying to force Maliki’s hand here. He needs to negotiate with other parties including the Kurdish and Sunni leaders, who would also presumably need to know how the equation has changed in order to be amenable to new proposals based on that changed equation.

As to the accusation that the dems are just using this for political gain, it seems plainly false. Politically, the best strategy would be to protest but let the Republicans dig their own hole. When the surge fails, a Democrat can come into office and fix things. By trying to force a withdrawal now, the Democrats are actually taking a significant political risk in order to try to make things better. If they succeed in forcing a timetable, Iraq can then be placed squarely on the dems shoulders by those like the OP.

It might be a good idea, but I don’t see how you could make it work. It’s next to impossible to keep a secret like that, and it would give Maliki too much blackmail power over Bush. He could threaten to make the discussion public if Bush didn’t promise to do <insert whatever favor you pick here>.

One of the biggest recruiting tools that al Qaeda has (among the Sunnis) is that the US is never going to leave. If we announced our intention to leave, and executing that exit as announced, then they would lose that leverage. Besides, I think the most important thing to do is to scare the shit out of the current crop of politicians, so they know they are dead ducks if they don’t get something accomplished on the political front. As it is, they have no incentive to do anything but bicker.

First, it’s not really accurate to say that we are fighting an “enemy” in Iraq. We are in the middle of a sectarian civil war that really has nothing to do with us. It’s not like we’re actually defending anything. Leaving Iraq poses no danger to the US.

Secondly, I find it laughable that the so-called “enemy” is going to benefit particularly by knowing if and when the US will pull out. Like Mace said, if it does anything, it hurts them with recruitment. The whole OP smacks of grasping at straws to me – trying to find any excuse at all to stay in Iraq.

Once it’s noticed that the troops are pulling out, things will escalate. (You can’t pull out in one day.) It doesn’t matter much if it’s announced or not.

Let me rephrase the OP for you: There are three basic positions. 1) Leave today, which is a minority position (Kucinich), and two more mainstream positions 2) give the Iraqis a timetable (Kerry) and 3) leave as we can, not through pre-determined dates but as conditions allow (McCain). (Of course, more than the people mentioned hold those positions.)

For the purposeds of this discussion, we are ignoring #1. That leaves 2 and 3. Both positions foresee leaving Iraq. Position 2, we’re assuming has great merit. At the same time it has a potential drawback. At the very least, the republicans believe that annoouncing a date will be helpful to the enemy and therefore will NOT do it. So, the question is, why don’t the people who advocate #2 convey the timetable to Iraqi officails privately, while publicly stating nothing but “Iraq is too important, we must stay until the job is done, blah, blah, blah”?

Now, if you have an opinion on THAT, I’d be very interested to hear it.

The answer is simple and two-fold.

  1. The assertion that letting the so-called “enemy” have knowledge of a timetable will be helpful to them is horseshit.
  2. Any notion that a drawdown could be logistically kept a secret is ridiculous.

The latter would be accomplished by the timetable being issued—even privately. And are you sure that an announcement of our leaving would de-incentivize Al Qaeda? From what I’ve been hearing it seems that if the US were to go there would be a three-way grab for power between the Shia, Sunni and the Kurds. If I were the head of Al Qaeda and heard the US was leaving I’d say, "Okay boys, save your ammo. The war—the war that we can actually win starts on (stated date of withdrawal).

I’d suggest that they would have the opposite reaction. Shit - in X number of days we’re going to be hunted down like dogs. Best try something risky.

There is no way in hell that the tiny number of Al-Q-in-Iraq are a viable ‘side’ in Iraq compared to the three major divisions.

  1. Horseshit or not, many military experts, Bush, and republicans in power believe this to be the case, so it will not happen.

  2. People are getting hung up on “secret”. I don’t mean something that might never get out. But something issued privately, that once it does get out, we can discount as rumor. Publicly our position would be “We’re staying until the job is done”. (Whatever that means is irrelavant to this discusion.) If we start pulling troops out on June 19, 2008, isn’t the important thing that they are leaving. Who cares if it was stated publicly ten months prior?

So, again, the question to you is, if you believe a timetable to Maliki and his gang would be helpful, given the opposition to doing so, wouldn’t the “private” issuance of said timetable accomplish what you hope a public issuance would accomplish? Isn’t the inmportant thing issuing the timetable?

Are you arguing here against a timetabel of any sort? I’m not following you.

Al Qaeda is a Sunni organization. What we don’t know is to what the degree the 40% Sunni population will side with Al Qaeda when it comes to a battle for power/survival.

Bush and the Republicans in power are politicians, not “military ex[pertes.” I reiterate that the assertion is horseshit and I would invite you to provide some substantial means by which the so-called “enemy” could use any knowledge of a timetable for withdrawal to its own advntage.

I don’t see what the point would be. I also think it’s better for morale if the troops and their families have a known date for their return.

So you’re FOR a timetable? I guess I don’t follow your question in that I don’t understand what kind of distinction you’retrying to draw between “secret” and “private.”

Side with al Qaeda against what?

That makes sense. I think the leaking on that point could be pretty bad, though. I have confidence that there are people who will ignore it or won’t hear of it and continue to attack anyway, but I think enough will get to know that it would be rendered reasonably ineffectual. And it only has to lead to a reasonably significant surge on the day after the troops leave to cast whoever in a bad light.

I think though that this seems to bypass your take on the matter; if Kerry and his crowd are just trying to hang this on Bush and the Republicans, your suggested idea would be an even better move for them; they’d continue to count on the U.S. not knowing about the secret timetable, allowing them to still be blamed, whilst also knowing that the U.S. will be out at some point (assuming they do genuinely want that also). It would get them both of those things, rather than one or the other; were they as motivated as you suggest, I think they’d be all for your idea rather than simply asking for an overt timetable.