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| Iraq | |
| The future of America -- in Iraq, by Robert D. Kaplan | |
| 2005-12-26 | |
For several weeks, I observed these young officers working behind the scenes to organize the election in Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city. They arranged for the sniffer dogs at the polling stations and security for the ballots right up to the moment Iraqi officials counted them. They arranged the outer ring of U.S. military security, with inner ones of Iraqi soldiers and police at each polling station, even as they were careful to give the Iraqis credit for what they, in fact, were doing. The massive logistical exercise of holding an election in a city of 2.1 million people was further complicated by the fact that the location of many polling stations changed at the last minute to prevent terrorist attacks. Throughout Iraq, young Army and Marine captains have become veritable mayors of micro-regions, meeting with local sheiks, setting up waste-removal programs to employ young men, dealing with complaints about cuts in electricity and so on. They have learned to arbitrate tribal politics, to speak articulately and to sit through endless speeches without losing patience. I watched Lt. John Turner of Indianapolis get up on his knees from a carpet while sipping tea with a former neighborhood mukhtar and plead softly: "Sir, I am willing to die for a country that is not my own. So will you resume your position as mukhtar? Brave men must stand forward. Iraq's wealth is not oil but its civilization. Trust me by the projects I bring, not by my words." Turner, a D student in high school, got straightened out as an enlisted man in the Coast Guard before earning a degree from Purdue and becoming an Army officer. He is one of what Col. Michael Shields, commander of the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team in Mosul, calls his "young soldier-statesmen." Regardless of whether you support or oppose the U.S. engagement in Iraq, you should be aware that that country has had a startling effect on a new generation of soldiers often from troubled backgrounds, whose infantry training has provided no framework for building democracy from scratch. At a Thanksgiving evangelical service, one NCO told the young crowd to cheers: "The Pilgrims during the first winter in the New World suffered a 54% casualty rate from disease and cold. That's a casualty rate that would render any of our units combat ineffective. But did the Pilgrims sail back to England? Did they give up? No. This country isn't a quitter. It doesn't withdraw." Not withdrawing means bringing stability and liberal values to a society in which people have been trained to be subjects, not citizens. Young commanders in Iraq are experiencing in the bluntest terms the intractable cultural and political realities of a world that the U.S. seeks to remake in its own image, even as their own life struggles — as well as their religious faith, which is generally deeper than that of secular elites — make them not only refuse to give up but to feel betrayed by those who would. To label them conservative is to miss the point. Having ground-truthed the difficulty of implanting democracy in a place with no experience of it, Iraq has stripped them of any ideology they might have had. At the same time, they have become emotionally involved with building Iraqi democracy. They have developed a distrust of an American media that have not, in their eyes, recorded advances they feel they have made in reducing the level of combat or getting a nascent electoral system started. In a vast country of 23 million people, they rarely see the car bombings that kill a few dozen every day and are reported on the news at home. But they daily see the progress in front of their eyes. What these officers represent is the frontier ethos of applied wisdom, the combination of pragmatism and idealism that allowed for 19th century westward expansion, the clearing of land and the building of towns. Military men, with their impatience with ideas that cannot be field tested, are a vibrant illustration of this ethos, especially as so many of them have grown up in rural America (and many I spoke to came from family farms). Now their deep engagement in civilian development matters — in nation building — has extended the meaning of the continental frontier overseas. They are not imperialists, if by that we mean that they would support unilaterally invading a country again with a large number of troops. But they are absolutely committed to U.S. success in Iraq, no matter the cost to themselves. And as they trickle out of the service in coming years and rise to prominence in civilian life, the ability of the home front in these difficult days not to pity them, but to sustain them in their mission, could have enormous consequences for the future of American politics. | |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #10 No one serems to have mentioned it, but the Iraq conflict has seen a large number of USAR and NG units serving - and bleeding - alongside the active components. I would expect to see the returning leaders of these units start to exert influence in their home constituencies. I hope that this process has already begun - but I cannot say that I've seen even a whisper of political activism by any returning USAR/NG leaders. |
| Posted by: Lone Ranger 2005-12-26 21:47 |
| #9 maybe so, Mike, but it's a litle late for the Jenjis(sic) Khan and Babykiller labels to work. The military of today has much to be proud of despite the occasional bad apples who get all the MMS limelight |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-12-26 12:00 |
| #8 Frank- Your comment is an interesting one in that you may have put your finger on the real agenda of the LLL/MSM elites in this fight: They KNOW what these hundreds of thousands of men and women will do when they return to civilian life. A bloc of citizen voters that size cannot and will not be ignored - and the only option the LLL/MSM has is to force a defeat through public opinion in order to disgrace these heroes before they get back. Look at it another way - millions of Americans served in Vietnam across more than a decade. If the war there had even remotely resembled a success, what would our nation look like today? Hint: the LLL/MSM as we know it today wouldn't exist. Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2005-12-26 11:56 |
| #7 he gap between is what worries me. That'd be the CSM's and Majors. The one's who survived Nixon, Ford and Carter, new math, no fault divorce, parents on drugs and grunge. Some how I suspect they're better survivors and workers than they get credit for, mainly cause they looked so...grungy. And they're the ones who will really get screwed in the Social Security solution. But these youngsters in Iraq who are making your buttons bust will do the job there and in the next combat theater and will "win the war on terror" to return home to endless accolades that are now starting and to raise another generation of boomers just as the last "greatest" generation did. And so life goes on. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2005-12-26 11:36 |
| #6 If they can rebuild it there, they can rebuild it anywhere. |
| Posted by: newc 2005-12-26 11:23 |
| #5 Yes, Yes. Vote people in who Really have an appreciaton for Democracy. These guys are awesome to say the least. So, there is your ticket. Give them a meal card that they deserve and let us clean up that stinking hill where the capitol sits. |
| Posted by: newc 2005-12-26 11:20 |
| #4 when they come back, and speak out against the MSM/Donk agenda of lies....they'll drive a stake through the credibility of our enemies, foreign AND domestic |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-12-26 11:14 |
| #3 Awesome. Now I know what NMM should stand for: No More Murthas. We are now, and will be, down the road, in the most excellent hands. The gap between is what worries me. I am so proud of these people it hurts. |
| Posted by: .com 2005-12-26 10:05 |
| #2 I foresee great things in America's future.If we can avoid the Murtha Syndrome! |
| Posted by: raptor 2005-12-26 08:26 |
| #1 Pity them? Hell, more like be button-busting proud of them! Maybe some of them will be Democrats and able to turn that sad sack of a party around into a viable alternative that patriotic and intelligent Americans could reasonably consider voting for. (Yes, I know that's asking for a near-miracle.) I expect that these young men and women will make a difference and I'd bet that it will be a good one. |
| Posted by: mac 2005-12-26 07:20 |