Last year, the Bush Administration told us they wouldn’t withdraw American troops from Iraq because there was “too much violence” in Baghdad; this year they’re telling us they won’t withdraw troops because “the surge is working” and they don’t want to “jeopardize the security gains of the past several months.”
So, here’s my question: if they won’t withdraw troops when violence goes up, and they won’t withdraw troops when violence goes down, then is it not self-evident that their policies in Iraq have NOTHING TO DO with the situation over there and, instead, depend entirely on something else…such as, continuing to butter the bread of the Bush/Cheney neo-con constituency (e.g., Halliburton, Exxon, Blackwater, etc.) and other special-interest groups within the American military-industrial complex?
Bush’s goal has been to be to keep boots on the ground no matter what, and that smells more like self-serving politics than like military strategy. Strategy is about achieving goals; politics is about rewarding supporters. We don’t hear much from the Bush Administration about achieving goals in Iraq, but we sure do see a lot of rewards going to his supporters. Do the math.
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