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Kicking Ass in Iraq?
Matthew Robinson, PhD

According to the Sydney Morning Herald of Australia, President Bush recently gave an assessment of the war Iraq to Deputy Prime Minister Mark Vaile. His assessment? "We're kicking ass."  What a sad commentary on our nation’s leader, especially on day when seven more US troops were killed in Iraq.

Bush also claimed that we cannot leave Iraq because it would allow Iraq to become a breeding ground for terrorists. It is frightening how out of touch with reality our leader is. US intelligence has been saying for at least two years that Iraq is already a breeding ground for terrorists.

A 2005 assessment by the Pentagon's National Intelligence Council (NIC) showed that Iraq was "a training ground, a recruitment ground, [providing] the opportunity for enhancing technical skills" for terrorists. Its report took a year to produce and included analysis by 1,000 experts!

One member, David Low, said: "There is even, under the best scenario … the likelihood that some of the jihadists who are not killed there will … go home, wherever home is, and will therefore disperse to various other countries."

In a new book, Terrorism as Crime: From Oklahoma City to al-Qaeda and Beyond, author Mark Hamm shows this has already happened. Iraqi citizens have been recruited by al-Qaeda in Iraq to conduct terrorist attacks across the globe. One example is the November 2005 bombings of three Jordanian hotels. The four suicide bombers included a husband and wife whose children had been killed by US troops in Baghdad!

When framed in the context of the Iraqi Study Group report (which concluded that the US combat mission should be transferred to Iraqi forces by early 2008), as well as a new study on Iraq’s security forces by a 20-member panel made up of mostly retried senior military and police officers (which concluded that US military forces should be reduced in Iraq because out our continued presence there gives the impression that we are a permanent, occupying force), the crystal clear implication is that it is time to change strategy in Iraq. As noted by Chairman General James Jones (retired, US Marine Corps.): "Significant reductions, consolidations and realignments [of US troops] would appear to be possible and prudent."

Simply stated, our own intelligence shows that President Bush is wrong. Our presence in Iraq created a breeding ground for terrorists, and people are being murdered by them now. This is "kicking ass?"