Here's a simple truth about war. If you don't know how to win one and you don't intend to negotiate, there's only one other option left: defeat. The Republicans proved that during Vietnam. They won elections by claiming they had a "secret plan" for victory. That "plan" turned out to be to extend the war needlessly for another four years - just enough to carry them through one more election cycle as the "strong on defense" party. Then they ended it, with a negotiated settlement that was nothing more than unconditional surrender in disguise.
Sound familiar? The usual GOP suspects, famed from those days of ignominious failure, are back. James Baker and his ad hoc group (I call them the "B team") are likely to recommend a watered-down version of the Kerry/Feingold amendment.
Bush's "what the definition of is is" hair-splitting about "timetables" vs. "benchmarks" at today's press conference is another sign of deceit and confusion. The fact is, he's going to establish "benchmarks" for the Iraqis - but that each "benchmark" will have a "timetable." Same difference.
When the Iraqis fail to meet the "timetables" attached to the "benchmarks," Bush will probably set a "date certain" for withdrawal (leaving some troops nearby for needed anti-terrorist missions, just as Kerry/Feingold would have done.) He won't call it that, of course, and he won't give the Iraqis enough warning to respond in a clear way. He won't give them strong guidance, either.
I say "probably," because the other option is that Karl Rove will decide it's worth another two years of war so he can drag the "weak Democrats" meme through just one more electoral cycle. Sorry about your kids, Mr. and Mrs. America (and Mr. and Mrs. Iraq) - but we've got elections to win.
Then the next President can clean up the mess. If that President's a Republican then, given their hostility toward effective negotiation, withdrawal will be accompanied by a "settlement" that's just as ineffective as the one that ended our involvement in Vietnam. Refugees will scramble for helicopters and trucks as the last Americans leave, and we'll see it all on live TV.
If the next President is an Democrat, there will be no way to fix what's broken without right-wing sniping that the Dems "lost" Iraq. That would be part of the GOP plan, of course - and to them, well worth the additional loss of life.
There's a third option - permanent occupation of Iraq. It's likely that permanence was the original plan, but that they recognize there's no political will for that now. They'll let the contractors continue to get rich by building that Death Star of a US Embassy in Baghdad, of course, but they probably realize by now that this particular outpost of the neocon empire will have to wait a little while.
Permanence is the dark horse possibility. It's safe to assume, however, that sooner or later they'll decide to throw in the towel. That's why It's not surprising that the GOP sought out Henry Kissinger and brought him back from his oak-panelled boardroom in Purgatory's executive office suite. Kissinger was the chief surrender monkey during the Nixon era.
Had a Democrat been elected in 1968, there would have been time to negotiate multiparty talks that might have resulted in a better outcome for all Vietnamese with far less loss of life. But then, as now, politics got in the way.
The GOP of 1968 saw too much advantage in making the Democrats look "weak, " just because they understand the value of negotiation as a tool of governance. Why negotiate an end to the conflict, when it's helping us at the polls? Then, as now, they saw war in primarily political terms.
Here's what will happen as long as the Republicans stay in charge. There will be no meaningful negotiations centered around U.S. withdrawal. The government will not set clear enough timetables to spur the Iraqis into action, or into holding meaningful talks. We will lack the worldwide credibility to broker a meaningful settlement in Iraq, or anywhere else in the Middle East. The war will go on until they decide it's no longer a political tool. Then they'll surrender and call it victory.
Some things never change. Vote Democratic.