The NYT editorial denouncing a timetable for withdrawal is more spin

[ProSense]

Editorial

A Timetable Isn’t an Exit Strategy

Published: August 6, 2006

Snip...

Mr. Bush’s cheerleading encourages the illusion that it is just a matter of time and American support before Iraq evolves into a stable democracy. The Democratic timetable spins a different fantasy: that if the Iraqis are told that American troops will be leaving in stages, at specific dates, their government will rise to the occasion and create its own security forces to maintain order.

The Iraqi government has not failed to develop adequate police and military forces of its own because it lacks the incentive. It has failed to do so because it is weak and divided, because its people are frightened and because the strongest leaders in the country are the men who control sectarian militias. A phased withdrawal by itself would simply leave the American soldiers who remain behind in graver danger, and hasten what looks like an inevitable descent into civil war.

Democrats are embracing the withdrawal option because it sounds good on the surface and allows them to avoid a more far-reaching discussion that might expose their party’s own foreign policy divisions. Most of all, they want an election-year position that maximizes the president’s weakness without exposing their candidates to criticism. But they are doing nothing to help the public understand the grim options we face.

more...

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/06/opinion/06sun1.html?_r=1&oref=login

First, withdrawal is not a sound-good option, it is the only sound option. Second, this editorial is a direct attack on Kerry-Feingold, since it's the only plan that sets a timetable. This statement from the article is completely disingenuous:

Democrats are embracing the withdrawal option because it sounds good on the surface and allows them to avoid a more far-reaching discussion that might expose their party’s own foreign policy divisions.

Did the NYT miss the Senate debate on both the Kerry and Levin amendments?

The article goes on to denounce a "phased withdrawal by itself," implying that none of the Democratic withdrawal plans lay out a strategy. By spinning the Democratic plans that call for a either a timetable or phased withdrawal as superficial, the NYT is basically creating the impression that the Democrats have no plan.

What's the purpose of this? It seems the NYT wants to give the Republicans room to come up with a plan---maybe the October surprise Gary Hart wrote about:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2759782&mesg_id=2759782


The editorial seems to be suggesting that they are more keenly aware of the complexities associated with getting the troops safely out of Iraq than Senator Kerry and Congressman Murtha. The Democrats and others calling for a timetable have far more credibility than the NYT editors, who want to play politics with the issue.

As Daniel Ellsberg said: Withdrawal is the solution, not the problem.

Snip...

Ellsberg readily acknowledges American troop withdrawal to be a painful solution but, he says there are no good solutions. Great pain may accompany US withdrawal, but that pain largely will be the inevitable consequence of the improper strategy of occupation at the outset, just as is the pain suffered on a daily basis in Iraq now. Withdrawal is the solution, not the problem. It is the only solution because “there isn’t going to be any improvement if the US stays in Iraq.”

As both a participant in and a careful student of the Vietnam War, Ellsberg is no stranger to such pain. He understands the hardships and sacrifices American troops suffer every day trying to improve the lives of Iraqis and to make the world safer. He saw plenty of the same in Vietnam. He also saw what happens when you refuse to face the realities of the battlefield and execute an orderly withdrawal, such as the pandemonium engulfing the evacuation of the American embassy in Saigon in ’75.

Snip…

“If we will not make things better by staying,” Ellsberg says, we must “set a definite timetable for getting out, three or six months and we’re totally out. I would make averting civil war a secondary objective, but to think that can be done only by an American occupation is hogwash. We should get out of Iraq the way Gorbachev got out of Afghanistan, the way De Gaulle got out of Algeria and the way Mendes-France got the French out of Indochina. Getting out doesn’t mean we don’t use diplomacy to try and moderate the situation and that we don’t contribute to the rebuilding of Iraq. Contributing $150 billion for rebuilding Iraq would be far cheaper than where we are headed now.” The Congressional Budget Office has estimated the US costs of war in Iraq at current rates will pile up fast enough to reach $600 billion by the year 2010, according to the Christian Science Monitor.

more...

http://www.vaiw.org/vet/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=2062&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

The NYT seems determined to be part of the problem. The NYT should watch the Senate debate on both Democratic plans (again), and read Senator Kerry's speeches on Iraq from the past two years, starting here:

04/06/2006
John Kerry Speaks on His Iraq Strategy: Two Deadlines and an Exit
http://kerry.senate.gov/v3/cfm/record.cfm?id=253876&

[Kagemusha]

1. NYT is factually correct that a timetable won't fix Iraq. Does it matter?

No. It does not, because we're not fixing that place no matter what we do. At least, not without a huge increase in boots on the ground. Do you see that coming? I don't either.

[ProSense]

2. The timetable was never about fixing Iraq.

The calls for withdrawal, as Senator Kerry has said, are based on the fact that the troops' presence is making the situation worse and the country is involved in a civil war. The timetable is about turning security over to the Iraqis and getting out of Iraq. It's funny that the NYT links fixing Iraq to the timetable when that isn't part of the plan, but then ignore the parts of the plan that they have labeled the "responsible way out of Iraq." Bush is ignoring these aspects, but Senator Kerry's plan hasn't.

[ProSense]

3. Hagel's suggestion

Hagel said there were no longer any good options in Iraq for the United States. He suggested enlisting former Presidents Bill Clinton and George Bush the elder to convene a regional peace conference.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060806/pl_nm/iraq_usa_hagel_dc_1

Clinton and Bush Sr.?

Hagel should back a real solution and co-sponsor the http://www.johnkerry.com/pressroom/news/news_2006_0620.html">Kerry-Feingold Amendment:

(b) IRAQ SUMMIT.—The President should work with leaders of the Government of Iraq to convene a summit as soon as possible that includes these leaders, leaders of the governments of each country bordering Iraq, representatives of the Arab League, the Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, representatives of the European Union, and leaders of the governments of each permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, for the purpose of reaching a comprehensive political agreement for Iraq that engenders the support of Sunnis, Shias, and Kurds by ensuring the equitable distribution of oil revenues, disbanding the militias, strengthening internal security, reviving reconstruction efforts and fulfilling related international economic aid commitments, securing Iraq’s borders, and providing for a sustainable federalist structure in Iraq.