While describing the effects of the war in Iraq on future public opinion over American conflicts, Ohio State political scientist John Mueller remarked that “what you’re going to get after this is ‘We don’t want to do that again – No more Iraqs’ just as after Vietnam the syndrome was ‘No more Vietnams.'” On the surface, this is not a terribly insightful prediction. But what is interesting is his comparison between the war in Iraq and the Vietnam War. Although inadvertent, Mr. Mueller highlighted a growing sentiment among Americans that there are parallels between Iraq and Vietnam. And this sentiment has crossed over into the realm of politics. Republican Senator Chuck Hagel stated that the war in Iraq is “not dissimilar to where we were in Vietnam,” and that “the longer we stay there, the more similarities to Vietnam are going to come together.
It’s not surprising to see these parallels emerge. Both wars employed guerilla warfare and drew low approval ratings and widespread protests. President Bush recently announced that the military was going to begin utilizing a “clear, hold and build” strategy designed to combat insurgents. The last time such tactics were employed was during the latter part of the Vietnam War. Indeed, the similarities between the two conflicts certainly exist. But it is a mistake to assume that Vietnam is the only historical reference that can be compared to Iraq. In fact, in terms of war rhetoric, Iraq bears a much better resemblance to World War I than Vietnam.
On the eve of the United States’ entrance into World War I, it was President Woodrow Wilson who implored Congress that “the world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty.” A free, democratic Europe was all that Wilson needed to justify American intervention. But Wilson’s lofty rhetoric came crashing down during the aftermath of World War I as it became increasingly clear that the fight “for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own governments” would not be won. Germany’s new liberal democracy was powerless to stop a period of severe civil strife that plunged the nation into chaos. Institutional problems, as well as the severe punishments imposed by the Treaty of Versailles, would eventually contribute to the collapse of this fledgling liberal republic and the subsequent rise of Nazism. In Russia and other nations, socialist revolutions would take hold and deny any hope for democracy to millions of people. And in the Middle East, the brutal history of modern Iraq began when the League of Nations installed a Sunni king to rule over three disparate provinces from the former Ottoman Empire. President Wilson was undoubtedly disillusioned with the actual fruits of his grand vision.
A similar gap between rhetoric and reality is now apparent when listening to President Bush discuss Iraq’s transition from tyranny to democracy. The Iraq that exists today is something far less than the country that he describes as “a free nation that can govern itself, sustain itself and defend itself.” The newly created Iraqi constitution is a bland document that fails to reconcile the ethnic and religious tensions between the Sunni, Kurdish and Shia communities. It also grants considerable autonomy to Iraqi provinces, creating a fractured country that deprives the Sunnis of their traditional hold on power. While 79 percent of Iraqis approved the constitution, an overwhelming 81 percent of voters rejected it in the Sunni-dominated Sallahudin province. Additionally, the Sunni community has very little representation in the Iraqi security forces and remains supportive of the Baathist element of the insurgency. Economically, the country has high levels of unemployment and a basic infrastructure that is so crippled and ineffective that 60 percent of Iraqis still depend on foreign humanitarian aid for food and water. Iraq is a hollow democracy where the government cannot provide for its citizens, an entire ethnic group is marginalized and unity is effectively dead. No, this is nothing like what the United States originally sought for Iraq.
Yet even though there is very little hope that Iraq will transform into a liberal democratic bastion for the rest of the Middle East, there are still reasons to continue fighting for it. Lawrence Kaplan, senior editor of “The New Republic” remarked that while there is very little left to fight for, “there’s plenty left to fight against in Iraq.” And he’s right. The consequences of allowing Al Qaeda and Sunni terrorists to bring down the Iraqi government and transform it into a haven for their own would be severe enough to jeopardize global security. Additionally, U.S. forces are quite possibly the only reason that current ethnic and religious tensions have not yet plunged the country into a civil war that would kill many more Iraqis. The gap between President Bush’s lofty rhetoric and the reality in Iraq can probably never be closed, but it can be narrowed. The goal of defeating an insurgency is not as admirable or as glamorous as transforming Iraq into a liberal democracy, but it is no less important. It is, as Lawrence Kaplan continued, “a different war now, a war worth fighting but a war without ideals.”
Nathan is a sophomore in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.