What always leaves me a bit shocked with the Bush administration's handling of Iraq is how unwilling they are to pursue courses of obvious political and military worth. Nobody in the White House thinks this war is playing well in the country, none of them are missing the polls or being blinded to the attitude shift. Back in the day, Don Rumsfeld's "behinder" memo proved he understood what was happening on the ground. And yet, aside from some weird leaks here and there, there's no effort to assure Americans that we have strategy for leaving, no move to convince Iraqis that we don't want to stay, and no sign that the Administration even knows what it's objective is.
Larry Diamond, the Stanford democracy advisor who returned from Iraq and wrote Squandered Victory, is doing a book club over at TPM Cafe. His suggestions for the Bush administration had been a public disavowal of long-term designs (i.e, no 14 permanent military bases), a timetable for withdrawal tied to certain benchmarks in the Iraqi government, and a multilateral nation-building effort. But the Bush administration circled option "d", none of the above, and our troops are paying for it.
It's such a strange abdication, though. Why wouldn't we have a set of guidelines detailing what a stable Iraq would look like and at which point it'd cease to need us? Why would we even want permanent bases in the chaotic country, knowing the rage and violence that our long-term presence in Saudi Arabia provoked? That is, after all, what gave rise to bin-Laden.
So what's the end game here? Is the Bush administration simply too stubborn to accept advice that originates outside their walls, or is there some genuine objective, some next step, that they're waiting for and we're unaware of? As things stand now, though, things doesn't make sense. The Mayberry Machiavellis are better wind readers than this.