America’s Madrid Moment?

The horrific spectacle of the murder and dismemberment of American civilian workers in Iraq makes it imperative that we ask the question: Is it time to leave? Was this our Madrid moment?

We have a split-brain response.

The horrific spectacle of the murder and dismemberment of American civilian workers in Iraq makes it imperative that we ask the question: Is it time to leave? Was this our Madrid moment?

We have a split-brain response.

Half of each of us wants to pack it in and bring our people home. Not because they can’t tough it out and not because we weren’t right to topple Saddam for reasons of American national security. They can and we were. But because people who can descend into the depravity of the mob in Falluja don’t deserve our help. Why risk American lives to bring medicine, resources and infrastructure to people who respond by mutilating the corpses of the Americans they murdered? Why try so hard to establish a civilized government for people who aren’t civilized? The $20 billion Congress appropriated for services in Iraq would go a long way in this country.

The other half of each of us wants to spit in the eye of the terrorist organizers and mob instigators by proving that Iraqis can do better and deserve better. And proving that other voices in the Middle East have been emboldened by the experiment in Iraq to rise up against other terrorist organizers and dictatorial regimes to demand better. And proving that this is an ugly setback on the road that will redress the only “root cause” of terrorism that matters – the repression of millions of people across the Arab/Muslim world and the black holes that are their governments, sucking up resources and energy and talent, and leaving people poor, ignorant and vulnerable to violent radicals who promise them in another world what they cannot get in this one.

We don’t expect at the moment that very many Muslims will shed a tear for the American dead in this incident or any other Americans killed trying to bring a better life to 27 million Iraqis – although they surely should. Whether they admit it or not, they are remarkably lucky to have been liberated by us and our coalition. Frankly, taking our marbles home would be a lot more comfortable than staying among people whose good will appears negligible. But only for the moment.

It disturbs us then that the 9/11 Commission is spending its time grandstanding and politicking the issue of who knew what before the cataclysm, particularly since they appear agreed that nothing we knew or could have known would have prevented it. Would that some similarly august body would spend half as much effort working on the best ways to fight the war that was declared on us that day and continues to this day.

The world discovered the full extent of Nazis horror only after we won the war. This time we know. Far from being a reason to quit, that knowledge is the reason we have to stay the course. We are not Spain; Falluja was not our Madrid. While it is clearly in the world’s interest to see the sphere of liberty and civilized government expanded, not contracted by violent radicals – secular or religious – some countries believe they can opt out of the fight. The United States cannot.