Back to Iraq -- And Why We Must Win There

Charles Krauthammer, who as Lucianne points out is keeping his eye on the big picture, has another thoughtful column on the battlefield in Iraq and the National Intelligence Estimate that was initially portrayed by leakers as showing that the Iraq battle has made terrorism worse.

Krauthammer provides some much-needed historical perspective on Iraq and the excuses of jihadists:

As spun by Iraq war critics, the conclusion is that Iraq has made us less safe because it has become a "cause celebre" and a rallying cry for jihad.

Become? Everyone seems to have forgotten that Iraq was already an Islamist cause celebre and rallying cry long before 2003. When Osama bin Laden issued his declaration of war against America in 1998, his two principal justifications for the jihad that exploded upon us on Sept. 11, 2001, centered on Iraq: America's alleged killing of more than 1 million Iraqis through the post-Gulf War sanctions and, even worse, the desecration of Islam's holiest cities of Mecca and Medina by the garrisoning of infidel U.S. soldiers in Saudi Arabia (as post-Gulf War protection from the continuing threat of invasion by Hussein).

The irony is that the overthrow of Hussein eliminated these two rallying cries: Iraqi sanctions were lifted and U.S. troops were withdrawn from the no-longer-threatened Saudi Arabia. But grievances cured are easily replaced. The jihadists wasted no time in finding new justifications for fury and reviving old ones. The supply is endless: Danish cartoons, papal pronouncements, the liberation of women, the existence of Israel, the licentiousness of Western culture, the war in Afghanistan. And, of course, Iraq -- again.

How important is Iraq in this calculus? The vaunted National Intelligence Estimate -- unspun -- offers a completely commonplace weighing of the relationship between terrorism and Iraq. On the one hand, the American presence does inspire some to join the worldwide jihad. On the other hand, success in the Iraq project would blunt the most fundamental enlistment tool for terrorism -- the political oppression in Arab lands that is deflected by cynical dictators and radical imams into murderous hatred of the West. Which is why the Bush democracy project embodies the greatest hope for a reduction of terrorism and why the NIE itself concludes that were the jihadists to fail in Iraq, their numbers would diminish.

It is an issue of time frame. The bombing of the Japanese home islands may have increased short-term recruiting for the kamikazes. But success in the Pacific war put a definitive end to the whole affair.

Krauthammer finishes strong:

It is clear that one of the reasons we have gone an astonishing five years without a second attack on the American homeland is that the most dedicated and virulent jihadists have gone to Iraq to fight us, as was said during World War I, "over there."

Does the war in Iraq make us more or less safe today? And what about tomorrow? The fact is that no definitive answer is possible. Except for the following truism: During all wars we are by definition less safe -- and the surest way back to safety is victory.

There is no adequate substitute for victory in Iraq.  If we prevail in Iraq, we will have struck a mighty blow against Islamic terror by establishing a democracy in the heart of the Middle East.  Every bombing and beheading in Iraq is a reminder that the jihadists, and their financial and political sponsors, are fighting literally like madmen to avoid allowing democracy to take root in Iraq. 

The rest is up to us.  We should proceed in the confidence that we have much more to offer the Iraqi people than could ever be offered by terrorists.  We have right, and we have might.  What else do we need?  Just the will to do whatever is necessary to prevail.  Just the certainty that we will never accept anything less than victory.