Anbar Awakening Reframed

The so-called Anbar Awakening where Sunni Tribal Sheiks have turned against the Sunni Al-Queda has somehow been turned into evidence we should continue stay in Iraq indefinitely with no guidelines to determine when real victory or defeat is achieved. Considering that the Anbar Awakening started before the Surge even got going and it was the Sheiks who came to the US with the plan this is a tough proposition to believe.

What it does show is that the doomsday scenarios of an Al Queda led terrorist state in Iraq comparable to the Taliban-led Afganistan is not exactly a likely occurrence if the US pulls out. Right now we are the occupiers not liberators in Iraq. Take US troops out of the firing line and both Sunni and Shiite groups will first try to establish borders between them (this might take a very long time and be bloody: Lebanon comes to mind) and each sect will have there own leaders vie for power. Without us, the frankly relatively minor Al-Queda in Iraq will have no base for support as local leaders with the legitimacy we lack will not want these other outsiders (i.e. wanna be occupiers) telling them what to do. In essence, Democrats need to reframe the Anbar Awakening from a reason to stay to the much more viable reality that Saddam is gone and that Iraq's fate for better or worse will be determined by home grown Iraqis. Remember, the definition of victory has never been clearly defined here - hell we don't even know who we are fighting half the time. Instead of withdrawal being about the US military being stabbed in the back, withdrawal is simply dealing with the reality the we have won our major goals*: no Saddam, no WMD's, likely no Al-Queda based on Anbar and since we are a people who love freedom it's time we stop acting like a colonial power.

*Since Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11, had no WMD's, and Al-Queda only came to Iraq after we bungled this whole thing it is definitely a hollow victory since we would have literally won anyway by not wasting thousands of American and Iraqi lives and billions of dollars in the first place.