Ready for surrender?

From the sound of their rhetoric, it would appear that the democrats are ready to surrender in Iraq. In the U.S. House of Representatives the other day, however, only 3 backed the resolution supporting surrender; i.e., the withdrawal of U.S. forces at the present time. One can only conclude that most of the advocates of a surrender in Iraq were unwilling to go on the record with that sentiment.

But while the type of surrender envisioned by anti-war democrats would reduce the trickle of U.S. casualties, at least in the short term, it would certainly have other negative and long-term consequences.

The advocates of surrender support their position with the assumption that the terrorists operating in Iraq are only there because of U.S. actions in removing Saddam Hussein. Under that line of reasoning, once U.S. forces are removed, the foreign terrorists currently active in Iraq will go home to the countries they came from (most are not from Iraq), lay down their arms and become peaceful and productive citizens. But the terrorists (termed insurgents by mainstream media) operating currently in Iraq have expressed goals far beyond the removal of U.S. forces from that county to include elimination of all U.S. influence in the region as well as the elimination of Israel! It is hard to believe that a U.S. surrender in Iraq would cause these groups to suddenly abandon their larger goal.

But the overarching belief of those advocating U.S. surrender in Iraq is that terrorism is a product of the foreign relations policies of the Bush administration. Under this view, changing those policies would somehow cause terrorism to fade away and cease to exist. This view, of course, ignores the fact that terrorism was present prior to Bush assuming office and that it was the United States that was attacked on 9/11. It also falls short in beginning to explain why France, a supporter of Saddam Hussein and opponent of U.S. policy, has recently been subject to terrorist attacks and/or insurgent activities, depending on what you want to call them. (It certainly makes no sense to call the activities of young Muslims in Iraq an insurgency and to call those of young Muslims in France the actions of unhappy youths as done by the mainstream media).

It is my view that the surrender of U.S. forces in Iraq would lend considerable support to terror operations throughout the world, increasing their ability to recruit new members and increasing the likelihood that the next battleground in the war on terror will be in the United States and not in Iraq. Surely, the democrats will be unwilling to surrender when terrorists again strike New York or Washington.