Who could forget? Purported leftist Marc Cooper sanctimonously condemning advocates of an immediate withdrawal from Iraq as sacrificing Iraqis to a future of indiscriminate, exponentially increasing violence:

Those who ought to have the best answers, the anti-war movement, have none -- other than a discordant call for U.S. Troops Out Now. I sympathize with the quandary of the peace movement, because I pretend to have no viable answers. I know only that the present course is leading to disaster. And that withdrawal of U.S. troops – who shouldn’t be there in the first place—would bring only more bloodshed.

Read no further than this painfully distorted account of my position by Dennis Perrin to capture the moral tone-deafness of the radical left. Here we go once again withthe same-old primitive reductionism i.e. Opposing Immediate Withdrawal = Supporting Bush’s War.

Rather than face the ugly truth that things could actually get worse in Iraq if the current political vacuum were enlarged by an American withdrawal, it's easier to stand apart and accept an Iraqi apocalypse as satisfying payback for Bush's sins.

I challenge the "Out Now" readers to put themselves in the shoes of an Iraqi tonight as they read Perrin’s piece. Car bombs exploding around you like firecrackers and the streets running red with blood. Do you think that the wholesale murder by the car bombers –intent on rubbing out the tenuous Iraqi government—is going to decrease or increase if the American troops were pulled? Do you think that the people behind the bombs would establish a regime more humane, more democratic or, instead, even more authoritarian than the current U.S.-backed administration? You can keep your answers private, but at least ponder them seriously.

In the end, Perrin throws up his hands, declares that no matter what, the U.S. troops are destined to be bogged down Iraq forever, and that – to top things off—he argues that Iraq is worse than Vietnam.

The second assertion is demonstrably false, if only by the lesser magnitude of death in Iraq…a far lesser magnitude. War is evil. A war that kills 3 million people is more evil than one that kills 100,000. Or am I missing something? The whole formulation is beside the point. (Yet, there is some sort of wondrous political point to be scored by proving, say, that Bush is worse than Nixon. A game, by the way, we don't have the luxury to play).

The first assertion, about an indeterminate stay of the American troops is nevertheless and -- unfortunately -- quite plausible. And more than plausible, perhaps inevitable, especially if the anti-war left can do no better than propose immediate withdrawal. I find it extremely difficult to imagine that being a persuasive counter (at least for those who give a rat’s ass about the Iraqi people themselves) to the status quo.

Indeed, it’s a moral forfeit that cedes undue and dangerous credence to the Bush admin’s disastrous stay-the-course strategy.

We need a third position that moves toward an end of the U.S. occupation but does not, in the process, abandon the Iraqi people to car-bomber fascists.

It will be of little consequence to those blown apart by suicide-bound fanatics to stand over their corpses and say: “It’s all Bush’s fault. There was nothing we could do.”

As noted by Perrin in his passionate post, David Corn, perhaps a little more self-confident, and uninterested in establishing himself as the Christopher Hitchens of the West Coast, dealt with the problem more honestly:

All this does not mean it's wrong to call for withdrawing the troops. One can argue that Bush's war - pitched to the public with the phony arguments that Saddam Hussein's regime was loaded with WMDs and in cahoots with al Qaeda – does not deserve the life of one more American soldier, one more Iraqi civilian, or one more emergency spending bill. I'm sympathetic to that case. But those pushing for withdrawal have to acknowledge that a pullout may well come with serious costs. In the short run, those costs might include more violence in Iraq and a more out-in-the-open civil war that yields a terrible outcome.

Before the war, I and others argued that an invasion of Iraq could lead to a situation in which there would be no good options. That prediction has come true. Bush has created a mess that defies an obvious and low-cost solution. Military experts of late have been saying that the insurgency probably will last for years (perhaps decades) and that establishing an effective Iraqi security force could take five years or more. Yet Bush refuses to admit these realities. He has not told the public what his five-year (or fifteen-year) plan is. He has refused to discuss the price the American public will have to bear for his misguided war in Iraq. Withdrawal, though, would come with a price, too. It may be the best of lousy alternatives. But its advocates ought to acknowledge it is not cost-free. Unless they want to risk comparison to the fellow who started the war.

There might have been some surface plausibility to such views in the spring and summer of 2005, despite the fact that many Iraqis have been consistently blaming the presence of US troops for the escalating violence, as they did most recently over the bombing of the Imam Ali Al Hadi shrine in Samarra. But they have become increasing untenable in the face of persistent Iraqi support for resistance attacks on US/UK forces, as disclosed by British Ministry of Defense polling data revealed by the London Telegraph:

• Forty-five per cent of Iraqis believe attacks against British and American troops are justified - rising to 65 per cent in the British-controlled Maysan province;

• 82 per cent are "strongly opposed" to the presence of coalition troops;

• less than one per cent of the population believes coalition forces are responsible for any improvement in security;

• 67 per cent of Iraqis feel less secure because of the occupation;

• 43 per cent of Iraqis believe conditions for peace and stability have worsened;

• 72 per cent do not have confidence in the multi-national forces.

A recent UPI poll confirmed continuing strong Iraqi support for attacks on US/UK forces, while, understandably, reflecting opposition to ones directed at Iraqi governmental institutions and civilians, with Iraqis wanting US/UK troops withdrawn over a period ranging from 6 months to 2 years. One can infer that the Iraqis perceive the attacks as a necessary means of forcing the troops to the leave the country, as they also explicitly said, quite understandably, that they don't believe that the troops will ever depart. Even US troops themselves, in the absence of a stronger military commitment, have expressed approval of a withdrawal within a year.

Such results would appear to partially validate the Cooper/Corn perspective. But someone is paging them over the public address system: Marc Cooper and David Corn, there is a phone call for you, please go to one of the white courtesy phones in the lobby. Turns out Moqtada al-Sadr would like to speak with them to ask this question: to what end shall the troops remain? He's concerned because it doesn't appear that the protection of Iraqis is a priority for them in the future anymore than it has been in the past:

Rumsfeld previously had been reluctant to say what the US military would do in the event of civil war, but in an appearance before the Senate Appropriations Committee he was pressed on the matter by Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd.

“The plan is to prevent a civil war, and to the extent one were to occur, to have the - from a security standpoint - have the Iraqi security forces deal with it, to the extent they are able to,” Rumsfeld told the committee.

Not surprisingly, Sadr, a consistent opponent of the occupation, responded angrily:

Sadr also criticised Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld who had said last week that Iraqi troops, not U.S. forces, would intervene if civil war broke out in Iraq, JTW said.

"May God damn you," Sadr said of Rumsfeld. "You said in the past that civil war would break out if you were to withdraw, and now you say that in case of civil war you won't interfere."

Let's repeat that: You said in the past that civil war would break out if you were to withdraw, and now you say that in case of civil war you won't interfere.

Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Sounds kinda like what Cooper said back in the spring of 2005: We need a third position that moves toward an end of the U.S. occupation but does not, in the process, abandon the Iraqi people to car-bomber fascists. It will be of little consequence to those blown apart by suicide-bound fanatics to stand over their corpses and say: “It’s all Bush’s fault. There was nothing we could do."

At least, Rumsfeld's hypocrisy has the virtue of brevity. So, Sadr would like to talk with Marc and David about it, and ask them: why are the troops still in Iraq? Once they start talking, I'm sure that Sadr has some even more pointed questions, such as: Why are US troops doing the opposite of what the Iraqi people want, attacking the insurgents, while failing to protect us against suicide bombings? Why are they using drones to call in airstrikes that indiscriminately kill civilians to prevent roadside bombings of US troops without providing basic security for us?

I can imagine that Corn would engage in such a conversation candidly, but it would be difficult for Cooper. It would require him to acknowledge that, contrary to what he wrote in his blog entry, the anti-war movement, especially the left participants in it, have some pretty clear answers to these questions. Unfortunately, they are answers that he probably doesn't want to hear, as they involve references to things like oil, neoliberalism, imperialism and the inescapable relationship between militarism and capitalism, to explain that the presence of US troops in Iraq has never been about the protection of Iraqis.

Labels: Iraqi Resistance, Muqtada al-Sadr, Occupation of Iraq, Withdrawal