THE PROGRESSIVE REVIEW - January 11, 2007
Stopping the Surge
By Scot Lehigh
The Boston Globe
Ted Kennedy thinks George W. Bush is dead wrong on a troop
surge for Iraq - and while some other Democrats have
reacted diffidently, he is determined to force the issue.
Today the Massachusetts senator will introduce legislation
to prevent the president from increasing US troop levels
in Iraq without specific authorization from Congress. And
in a speech at the National Press Club one day before the
president outlines his new Iraq plans to the nation,
Kennedy will take aim at the idea of sending more troops.
"In the election, the American people made it very clear
they wanted a change in direction," Kennedy said in an
interview yesterday. "The president has been going in the
wrong direction - and we are going to do everything we can
to get accountability."
Congress has to act now, Kennedy stresses, because if
lawmakers wait, they could be put in the position of
voting to cut off funding for additional troops after the
administration has already sent them to Iraq - a difficult
vote for any elected official to take.
If that happens, "they will have effectively won the day,"
Kennedy said. "They will have gotten what they are looking
for." Thus Kennedy says he will press for a vote on his
legislation "at the earliest possible time."
Kennedy's bill wouldn't cut off funding for troops already
in Iraq; rather, it would prohibit the administration from
using federal funds to increase US troops beyond the levels
there on Jan. 1 of this year without specific congressional
approval.
It's time for Congress to reassert itself, declares
Kennedy, who argues that the October 2002 resolution that
gave Bush authority to go to war should now be considered
expired.
Certainly the case the administration made on its way to
war - that Iraq was well on its way to a nuclear bomb,
that it possessed other weapons of mass destruction, that
there were operational ties between Iraq and Al Qaeda -
have been proven stunningly wrong.
Further, Kennedy says, military experts who know Iraq
don't think that sending more troops is the answer. The
senator cites recent statements by General George Casey,
senior US commander in Iraq, Centcom chief John Abizaid,
and Colin Powell, the former secretary of state and former
chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
In November, Abizaid told Congress that the consensus
among military commanders in Iraq was that sending more
troops wouldn't "add considerably to our ability to achieve
success" there. Casey, too, has been wary, saying that the
longer the United States stays in Iraq, the longer it will
be before the Iraq government works for reconciliation with
the Sunnis and deals with the militias.
Powell, now in private life, has offered similar anti-surge
arguments.
The administration has recently said that new generals will
oversee the Iraq war effort as it goes forward.
In his speech, Bush will no doubt present his plan as a
way to stem the violence in Baghdad and give the Iraq
government time to succeed. Yet the real question is this:
Can 20,000 more troops help mold a functioning nation out
of three disparate groups, two of whom increasingly see
themselves as parties to sectarian war, and the third of
which - the Kurds - already has a mostly autonomous region?
The answer is pretty obviously no. Rather, a surge just
delays confronting the harsh realities of Iraq. And that's
why the carte blanche that Congress has granted this
administration shouldn't continue.
Kennedy's legislation faces an uphill battle, of course.
Even if it passes, the bill would certainly draw a
presidential veto, which means it would need two-thirds
majorities in both branches of Congress to become law.
At the very least, however, the legislation would force
federal lawmakers to confront the issue of a troop surge,
and declare whether they support or oppose it.
That would certainly be uncomfortable for Republicans and
probably lead to some gnashing of teeth among Democrats as
well.
But Kennedy says he won't be deterred by the reaction: "I
am going to offer it no matter what."
The senator hopes the measure will catalyze a broader
debate about a war he has opposed, vocally and presciently,
from the very beginning.
"I think the American people are way ahead of the Congress,
way ahead of the Senate," Kennedy says. "This will give an
opportunity for them to rally, and hopefully they will."