Time For Iraq Cease Fire

It is the obligation of the commander in chief who envisions himself a war President to speak truthfully to the nation, unite the American people, listen to his commanders with respect before the decision to wage war is made, and bring into his government some representation of the bipartisan views of the opposition party.

George Bush will, in my opinion, go down in history as possibly the worst commander in chief because he has not only violated every rule of a true wartime President, he has used war itself as a partisan weapon, dishonorably dividing the nation to win elections, rather than uniting the Nation to win the war, fomenting fear in the nation, for partisan ends, rather than rallying courage. which is what true wartime Presidents must always do.

It is the obligation of the Loyal Opposition in a great nation to either support the war policy, or to oppose it with courage and conviction, offering concrete alternatives that can be honorably and clearly explained to the nation, policies which would have a realistic chance of success. As a Sam Nunn defense Democrat who adamantly and aggressively opposed the war policy before the war began, mirroring many of the private views of most of the leadership of the United States Marine Corps and Army, I consider the leadership of the Democratic Party to be almost as derelict in its way, as the President has in his.

It is the obligation of a free press, which I have always vigorously defended here and always, to present its listeners, viewers and readers the full range of ideas and information in a great debate worthy of a great democracy heading towards war. It is not the duty of the press to become de facto insiders, to blow with the winds of war no matter how senseless, and to neglect their fundamental responsibilities. It is no coincidence, and much shame, that the most dishonest information wrongly driving a sadly intimidated nation to war appeared on the front pages of the New York Times, while some of the most biased, wrongheaded and factually incorrect representations in the history of journalism dominated the editorial and Op-Ed Page of the Washington Post.

A relevant digression; whatever the sins of Dan Rather and Mary Mapes, and like us all they make mistakes, those sins are part of larger careers of greatness, easily defamed in the heat of the moment. They pale by any comparison to the far larger sins of the major media which deluged the nation with misinformation, fanned flames of fear which which at one pathetic moment led to sellout sales of duct tape and bottled water, and viewed the slander and smearing of authentic war heroes as worthy of equal time, rather than giving them their voice, then checking the facts, then calling a lie a lie, and a smear a smear.

If Dan Rather should have been fired for his comparatively modest sin, and we apply that standard across the board, Stephen Colbert would have given his brilliant performance to a nearly empty White House correspondents dinner. You're no angel Dan, but thanks for a brilliant and distinguished career that did honor to the tradition of Edward R. Murrow.

It is the obligation of a Nation, once war is waged, rightly or wrongly, to give our troops everything they need and deserve. It is a dereliction of the first order to let our troops risk their lives in war, without the protection and equipment that the President negligently failed to provide, while far too many Democrats negligently failed to fight for, while they were deciding what they were for before what they were against.

Can we agree on this? There is blame to go around from all sides, we are in a hell of a mess, in Iraq and the Middle East with anti-American rising to deadly dangerous levels, and what we need is not more division, not more partisanship, not the false arrogance of those who made a failed policy, nor the bromides and evasions of an opposition party that has failed to support or oppose with any semblance of clarity, coherence of conscience from the day this blunder was initiated with arrogance from one side, and shameless capitulation from the other.

So, let me make a specific, actionable proposal that all Democrats can rally around, which the President should accept as his own, which will increase civility in our politics and rationality to our policy.

The United States should propose a cease fire that would include all American forces now in combat in Iraq, and would include all internal, indigenous Iraqi insurgents who would lay down their arms in return for a seat at the political table. Such a proposal would bring together Iraqi Sunnis, Iraqi Shi'ites. It would exclude all outside terrorists from Al Qaeda and any other source, with the strategic purpose of separating the authentically Iraqi insurgents, who would be brought into a reconciliation government, from the foreign terrorists, with the aim of uniting all Iraqi parties to kill those who are true terrorists and pose the real ultimate threat to the United States.

The United States should propose that any cease fire be accompanied by a major new reconstruction program that would aim to genuinely make life better for an Iraqi people who have endured true hardship from Saddam, and now from the results of the misguided way this war was initiated, and waged.

This will be hard, money is scarce, and I strongly commend Congressman Tierney who has proposed a new Truman Commission. He is absolutely correct, the waste, fraud and crimes that have surrounded this incompetent and crony dominated reconstruction included directly unpatriotic and criminal acts and any proven to have committed them, no matter who their pals in Washington, should be arrested, tried, convicted and incarcerated.

But Colin Powell was right, about this: we broke it, as a great power, we are responsible to fix it, as best we can. A genuine and partisan cease fire proposal would rally support from every major democratic nation and people throughout the world, who oppose US policy, but want to act responsibly. It would be not only possible, but probable, that we could attract through a new donor conference enormous money that would be available in the hundreds of billions in the coming years, and would make a major difference after achievement of a domestic cease fire among Iraqis. Such a program, waiting in the wings, would encourage domestic Iraqis to participate in a cease fire.

JFK said sometimes we do things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard. A rational policy would propose a cease fire that would enable a full diplomatic and political solution among Iraqis, and unite Iraqis for a total military victory in killing the relatively small but deadly true terrorists who have come from outside Iraq to promote a civil war that is deadly violative for all Iraqis.

I have proposed a similar plan on Bob Parry's site consortiumnews.com, some time ago, and I believe that those "in the know" would agree that it would receive substantial support from many in the military. It would be an offer to end the carnage among Iraqis with honor and with a profound appeal to hearts, minds and a better life for the good people of Iraq, who have endured indescribable hardship.

A cease fire proposal would be an offer that would, if executed, immediately and dramatically reduce the casualties for American forces and Iraqis alike. It would be a strategy, backed by tactics, that would enable the American and Iraqi forces to track down, find, and kill the real terrorists who came to Iraq to decapitate innocents, to kill children in houses of worship, and to foment murder that kills Iraqi Sunnis, Iraqi Shi'ites, and American alike.

The great and deadly fallacy of the Bush, Cheney and neoconservative obsession with this war has been the dishonest attempt to morph indigenous Iraqis with foreign terrorists into one giant, incoherent mass. At worst, this is a lie, at best, a historical miscalculation, with deadly consequences for Americans and Iraqis alike.

A true cease fire initiative would end the carnage sooner than timetables for withdrawal, no matter how worthy, and it would create at least a realistic opportunity for success, which the current status quo, in my humble opinion, does not. It will not be easy, but it would have a chance, would win support from our people and throughout the democratic world, would offer a vision and nobility of purpose worthy of our good and great nation, standing for our highest values, offering hope and generosity of spirit to the suffering people of Iraq, while we unite, with dramatically fewer casualties, to defeat the real enemy, the small number of true terrorists in Iraq, who pose the real threat.