Wow. That was my reaction reading Walter Russell Mead’s Memorial Day blog post. Mead chooses to honor our American troops past and present by talking about what he calls their ‘momentous victory’ in Iraq. That’s right, Iraq. Not World War II or I, not the American Revolution or the Spanish-American war, but the George W. Bush-led war in Iraq. Mead, a top notch American historian, is one of the most sober, deep thinking social and political commentators our country has right now and this was one of his most memorable.

In the piece, Mead argues that the turning point in the wars, Iraq and War on Terror, occurred when Iraq’s Sunni population decided to choose the American side over Al Qaeda’s in 2006. Not only was a strategic victory for a future, democratic Iraq, but for Mead, it was the end of Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda’s dreams of bringing their version of Islam to the masses. Basically, the Sunni’s of Iraq saw what both sides had to offer, neither perfect of course, and made a fateful decision to choose America’s path. Here is Mead’s description:

But on this Memorial Day it is not enough to remember, and give thanks, that Osama’s dream died before he did and that the terror movement has been gravely wounded at its heart.

Because the dream didn’t just die.

It was killed.

And it was killed by coalition forces.  They killed it by fighting harder and smarter than the enemy and they killed it by winning trust and building bridges better than the enemy.  They did it because they were better, more honorable warriors and better, more honorable partners for peace.  Mostly American and mostly Christian, the coalition forces were more compassionate, more just, more protective of the poor and more respectful of Arab women than the crazed thugs who thought setting off bombs in the market was fulfilling God’s will.

Though I am sympathetic to Mead’s core argument that the war in Iraq should be seen as a victory for the United States, I believe there is much more work to be done before the history books will really have a definitive answer. Concerning the War on Terror, Osama may be dead, but Al Qaeda isn’t. There are still far too many people still left, who follow a disturbed and dangerous form of Islam, that wish the United States and our allies harm. Sadly, I would not be surprised in the least if the United States homeland was targeted for a serious terrorist attack in the near future. Back to Iraq, there are still so many questions yet to answer: How will the country handle life without a large US military presence? How will the Iraqi government handle a full transfer of power from one political party or leader to another, a key sign of a functioning democracy? How will the country deal with a more forceful Sadr movement? Will Iran be able to fill a vacuum that may be created when the US forces finally depart? What must be noted, however, is how amazing it is that these questions can be stated in reference to what used to be a totalitarian nightmare. Iraq is one of the more stable, democratic, and liberal places in the Middle East. That means something and Mead is right to call it a ‘victory’.

Another key part of Mead’s post is his calling out, though not by name, of all those who abandoned the Iraq war when the fighting got tough. From war hawks to Moveon.org (Never forget General Be-Tray-Us), it is amazing how many, including most of the ‘elite’, gave up on the war effort. Times got tough and a lot of people threw in the towel, at times, myself included. Thankfully, the men and women of the US military and their Commander-in-Chief George W. Bush did not. I’ll let Mead finish off:

We must continue to honor and thank the Arab allies and tribal leaders who made the choice for America in a dark and a difficult time.  But especially on this Memorial Day we must honor and remember the American heroes who by their lives and by their deaths brought victory out of defeat, understanding out of hatred and gave both Muslims and non-Muslims a chance to get this whole thing right.

The story of America’s victory over terror in Mesopotamia needs to be told.  In justice to those who sacrificed so much, and for the sake of those who may have to face similar dangers in the future, somebody needs to tell the real story of how, against all odds and in the face of unremitting skepticism and defeatism at home, our armed forces built a foundation for peace and reconciliation in the Middle East.

Go ahead and read the whole thing.

1. In your opinion, what were the main factors that led to the discovery and killing of Osama Bin Laden? In other words, who deserves credit for this remarkable accomplishment?

FMFP: Clearly there were several factors that lead to the capture and death of OBL. It appears undeniable, however, that the enhanced interrogation techniques used by the CIA – and criticized so vociferously by President Obama, AG Holder and virtually the entire liberal establishment – played a key role in getting the ball rolling. Some former Clinton staffers and others on the Left have come out and acknowledged this to their credit. We can only hope that the President decides to do the same, if not in words then through his actions by eliminating all talk of trying CIA interrogators who have proven so valuable in this War on Terror. As to credit, well many people deserve it, one of which is of course President Obama. He made the decision that we elected him to make and many Americans would have been disappointed if he did not make. Previous President Bush also deserves credit for putting into place policies that facilitated this event. Above all, though, the politicians should be much lower on the list of credit due than the military and intelligence officers who have actually prosecuted this war.

Pat: I have already stated that President Obama, former President Bush, Special Forces, CIA, and all the intelligence and military apparatuses that worked day in day out since 9/11 deserve our thanks for this accomplishment. I would also like to second, FMFP’s assertion that the much maligned CIA interrogators, who still this day are under investigation for wrong doing (a second investigation as they were already exonerated by one), need to be thanked for their service and sacrifices during one of the most stressful and tumultuous periods in our country’s history. They deserve our thanks, not our vindictiveness. It is likely true that without their efforts, Osama Bin Laden would still today be planning terrorist attacks on our homeland.

2. What does the killing of Osama Bin Laden mean for US national security? US foreign policy in Afghanistan and the Middle East?

Pat: Big question. The killing of Osama definitely hurts Al Qaeda’s short and long term capabilities, but by how much is uncertain. We will likely learn more in the next few weeks from the data uncovered during the attack, just how central Osama still was to their daily operations. Losing their most famous and unquestioned leader has to hurt the overall Islamist terrorist global movement, but I have no doubts that it is still alive and ticking throughout the globe. We can only hope that it’s ability to plan and implement a massive attack, such as 9/11, has been forever nullified. What his death means for the future of US policy in Afghanistan and the Middle East as a whole is much harder to answer. I have already heard numerous folks on the Right talk about declaring victory and getting out of Afghanistan and the Left has voiced this opinion for a couple years now. I can imagine there are a great many regular Americans out there who would feel much more comfortable getting our troops out of Central Asia now than they were a couple weeks ago. The President has so far not made any mention so far regarding changes to our Afghan policy, but the country will demand to hear rather soon if we are keeping our current strategy or making a change. President Obama has kept Afghanistan in the rearviewmirror publicly, almost never talking about it, but that will have to change real soon. Are we bring troops home since we killed the head of Al Qaeda? Or are we staying to fight the Taliban and the Al Qaeda elements inside of Afghanistan and Pakistan? The President needs to clarify his position, whether it has changed or not, very soon.

FMFP: Killing Osama probably doesn’t shift much in terms of our broader national security or the goals of our armed forces. It appears that he had a minimal role in the operation of al Qaeda so the various cells will certainly still continue planning and preparing attacks. This isn’t to minimize the impact of the death – it’s a huge deal and is a moral blow to terrorist networks around the world. Unfortunately, I do think this will open the door for Obama to pull out of Afghanistan and declare the mission over. This might have the effect of ceding Afghanistan back to the Taliban and a more general hands-off approach to the Middle East.

3. What does this successful mission mean for the Obama presidency?

FMFP: One smart political commentator that I have spoken to thinks it will be a permanent 3 point bump when all is said and done. This seems logical and likely. In a sense, Obama moved back to par when it comes to national security. He clearly still has Libya and the Middle East uprisings that he has so completely mismanaged but people are going to be happy to place these on the same level as the OBL killing when assessing his foreign policy acumen. In the end, though, this will not be a decider of elections one way or the other.

Pat: I think this is huge for President Obama. Obama’s commander and chief stature just exploded with this event and he is taking advantage of it. He unequivocally claimed responsibility for the successful attack during his speech, using ‘I’ many times, and released those great photos of him and his team watching. His team will wisely stretch this out for weeks.Obama can now also start to get out of Afghanistan without facing any significant claims of withdrawing in shame or not having resolve. This may turn out to be one of the more underestimated bonuses for the Obama team. All of a sudden, their position of wanting to get out of there is likely to be in line with a majority of the voters. This will of course also help please Obama’s base. How the President leads from here on out will determine how much of a lift this event has given his presidency. Just a week ago, his presidency seemed to be unraveling. Voter confidence was low in him, the economy, and America’s future. Even though Obama asked S&P to wait to hear his budget speech before their market judgment on American fiscal health, they still downgraded the US to ‘negative’. The slaying of Osama Bin Laden has given the President another chance to lead this country in the way he was elected to do so in the first place; in a bi-partisan, pragmatic, efficient manner. Unfortunately, for the country and Obama’s reelection hopes, he has so far done the exact opposite. It will be provocative to see if this changes his presidency in a truly meaningful way.

4. What do you think of the outward signs of happiness shown by the large crowds in New York, DC, around the country when the news was announced? Do you think this was appropriate?

Pat: While I wish we could all cheer over a signing ceremony of Al Qaeda’s formal surrender, I am fine with Americans celebrating Osama Bin Laden’s demise. This war will likely never have it’s V-Day like World War II and in a period where the enemy is so blurred and asymmetrical, this one case where we have clarity. Osama Bin Laden was a mass murder of Americans and hundreds of others. He dedicated his life (including what would have been his future) to the misery and death of the US and his personal destruction hurts his cause dearly. I have heard many from both sides of the aisle criticize the youthfulness of the revelers outside the White House, in New York City, etc. I disagree. Surely some of them are just using this as an excuse to ‘party’, but I’m sure most are celebrating the end of sad, scary era. An era were they never knew America before it became ‘Fortress America’ and they had to leave their shampoo at home when they flew or lose a relative or friend in one of the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan. I grew up in the booming 90′s and I remember thinking a year or so after 9/11, ‘dang, those were good times’. Those college kids didn’t get to enjoy those more peaceful, prosperous, less hyper political times. Osama Bin Laden changed their childhood for the worse and he has finally met his appropriate end. And for me personally, good riddance to human garbage and three cheers to all those that helped bring Osama to justice.

FMFP: I am generally fine with their sentiment. As Pat explained, this was a joyous day for America and Americans and these crowds embodied that feeling. My initial reaction was to look at the crowd and think it oddly similar in makeup to those same crowds that marched in the streets and chanted ridiculous slogans like, “Bush Lied, People Died” or “America Deserved It” Perhaps this is an irrational thought to have at a time like this but I just couldn’t help thinking feeling slightly skeptical of the sincerity of the crowd, specifically the young college students that dominated the scene (with pot smoke and drinking very visible). Anyway, I think the folks in NYC particularly were well within their right to celebrate this cathartic occasion.

‘World is Safer and Better Place Because of the Death of Osama bin Laden’

President Obama

You got that right, Mr. President. The death of Osama Bin Laden, the perpetrator of numerous crimes against the United States and humanity, including mass murder, at the hands of an American soldier is justice served. Bin Laden’s orchestrated attack against the United States on 9/11 was an act that will live in infamy in this country and to all those who watched those two towers fall. His death does not bring the nearly 3,000 fallen back to our lives, but it can’t help but bring some form of closure. This successful action also makes something very clear: If you mess with the United States and threaten our safety and way of life, you will get the horns!

A few thoughts:

• The braveness shown by the group of Navy Seals/CIA (details of course our sketchy), who were dropped from the sky to probably the most hostile of environments to carry out one of the most crucial, historical, and dangerous missions in American history, is hard to comprehend. They are heros through and through and have earned our eternal gratitude.

• This successful mission could not have been accomplished without years of hard work by our nation’s intelligence agencies, military forces, and diplomats and all of them deserve all the accolades coming to them.

• President Obama showed great leadership and of course this mission could not have happened without it. His presidency will forever be known as the one that got Osama, and like his quote above, the US and world are all the better for it.

• Though the details and facts of this amazing mission are still coming in, it seems that it could never have been accomplished without information gathered by the much-maligned CIA during the crucial and headspinning days/years after the 9/11 attack. It seems that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed gave up the name of the courier that led the US to Osama’s compound 5 years ago. This strategic information might never have been acquired without the Bush administration’s stress on capturing Al Qaeda figures alive so they could be interrogated. The success of this mission indeed has many fathers, and former President Bush and his staff definitely belong among them.

• This fight is far from over. Al Qaeda’s No. 2 al-Zawahriwi is still alive and free and this must change. He is a powerful figure and in many ways was the leader of Al Qaeda’s strategy and logistics. Violent attacks against the US by Islamic radicals did not all funnel from Osama Bin Laden, either. The failed bombing attempts in Time Square (car), Detroit (underwear bomber, plane), and Portland (Christmas tree), just to name a few, had no known direct links to Osama’s camp, but nevertheless they were real and dangerous and their threat is still alive.

• The big elephant in the room now is American and NATO’s mission in Afghanistan. Already I have heard in the media and among some colleagues about declaring ‘mission accomplished’ and ‘getting out’. Though I disagree with this, I do believe Osama’s death is going to be a game changer. More on this later.

So good riddance to human garbage and big cheers to all those who helped make our country and the world a bit safer and much more just.

(Photo Source: New York Times)

Rashid, a highly touted Pakistani journalist, begins the final chapter of his 2000 ‘Taliban’ by calling the country one of world’s ‘orphaned conflict’s’.  The country would quickly change from being orphaned to a month after 9/11 being the center of global politics, as the United States uprooted the Taliban government and sent them packing, unfortunately for only a short-term vacation.

Rashid’s valuable book walks its readers through a rather dense social, religious, military, and even psychological history of the group of radicalized Pashtuns, known as the Taliban.  He provides a solid regional historical overview and does not forget the many geopolitical actors involved in the fragmented country (Iran, Turkmenistan, Saudi Arabia, etc.).  A solid half of the book details the violent rise to power of the Taliban as they battled first fellow Pashtun groups, than the government in Kabul, and finally the Northern Alliance actors, which would never relinquish their autonomy to Taliban-ruled Kabul and Kandahar.  This book is worth reading just for those who don’t know just how fractious the Afghan society can be with many various ethnicities and sects, all with foreign partners, that have had to violently attempt to protect themselves and further their own people’s positions.  This book, just like Afghanistan today, is full of conflict and violence that shows no real sign of ebbing.

Rashid provides a telling description of the early members of the Taliban (around 1994) as Afghans born in Pakistan and raised mainly by madrassas as their parents, especially mothers, may have been lost in the years of fighting during and after the Soviet invasion and withdrawal.  These young men had ‘no memories of the past, no plans for the future’ and knew of nothing else but their Taliban leaders.  Like we have heard many times in reference to terrorist and gang groups, the Taliban offered these men, and boys, a meaning to their lives that they could embrace and fight for.

This type of camaraderie of course becomes dangerous when it is based on ignorant, stubborn, violent, yet a strong ideology and form of Islam, as they, the Taliban, surely had.  The Taliban, which by 1996 controlled large swaths of Afghan territory, including Kabul, ruled with a fundamental Islamic iron fist that showed no accommodation, not even towards UN aid providers.  The Taliban was controlling a large population and recruiting members with a version of Islam that ‘divested’ it of nearly all of its positive legacies, including Islamic philosophy, science, arts, civil society, etc.  It was the Taliban’s way or the knife.  One has never read about a more oppressive society.

The Taliban did not become the Taliban, or rule, in a vacuum.  They were of course incubated and constantly nourished by the Pakistani government and ISI.  When the Taliban needed more troops in their battles with Masud and what would become the Northern Alliance, Pakistan would just close some of their madrassas in FATA or the Northwest Provinces and send the men over the border.  Rashid, who also spends time on Osama bin Ladin’s terrorist network in Afghanistan, accurately predicted that the Pakistani state and military were creating their own nightmare with their support of the Taliban, instead of the ‘strategic depth’ they aimed for.  The author stated that the Islamic fundamentalism, drugs, weapons, and social breakdown that the Pakistani government was assisting the Taliban in performing or using, was making Islamabad ‘ripe for a Taliban-style Islamic revolution.’  While what is occurring today in Pakistan is so far, thankfully, not this extreme, it is too close for comfort.

Rashid’s ‘Taliban’ also details the human and women right’s abuses by the Taliban in great detail.  In addition, Rashid spends several chapters describing the ‘great game’ of pipeline politics in the Central Asia region and not surprisingly was correct in his assessment that Afghanistan, and the region as a whole, was just too unstable for Western groups to come in and build major gas and oil pipelines, no matter how much they wanted too.  Though these pipeline chapters were well researched, they can be passed over by most readers.

Rashid’s book provides much more than the history and make-up of a group that the powerful United States military is having a hell of a time defeating, it brings to life the challenging modern history of a people who have only known violence in their lives.  It is sad to think that one cannot imagine this changing in the near or even long-term future.  Though Rashid’s work is far from perfect, too many assumptions presented as facts (he is a journalist by trade), it brings light on a dangerous and important group, geopolitical actors and actions in a key region of the world, and on the suffering of millions.