The Discerning Texan
All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.
-- Edmund Burke
-- Edmund Burke
Thursday, November 08, 2007
UPDATED FOR READABILITY: The Mosul Dam: Time for an Iraqi Marshall Plan
Recently I weighed in about the Mosul Dam--but mostly from the angle of how our subversive media would handle such a catastrophe. Today the Instapundit points to a Daniel Pipes piece on that subject (i.e. the potential of the Mosul Dam collapsing), but Pipes seems to think our best move here is to abandon ship to the Iraqis and force them to address it. I say seems, because I like reading Pipes, and while I understand where Pipes' sentiments of protecting our own interests come from, to jump ship now would be highly irresponsible, analogous to our walking away from Vietnam. It would abandon the playing field to Iran, almost certainly resulting in further conflict down the road--for all the same reasons which were true before the surge.
Personally I think we have gone too far together with the Iraqis to sit back and do nothing, allowing the eventual collapse of that dam and the absolute catastrophe that would bring. I think the United States needs to turn up the heat and use whatever leverage we have to push the reluctant and dysfunctional Iraqi government to get off its collective ass and allow our Corps of Engineers to build a "safety dam" downstream. Or else we need to insist on the evacuation of Mosul before the dam breaks. For the Mosul Dam dam to collapse on our watch, with all those people downstream would not only result in what Pipes rightly calls "the greatest human-induced catastrophe" in world history; it would also dramatically impair the momentum and goodwill that the United States has achieved over the last year, because our subversive media would treat this as Katrina times ten.
Can you just see Anderson Cooper and Al Jazeera and the Times if that dam gives and half a million Iraqis die? Initially they would try to blame Bush, but that would get bloody, because it would be a shared failure. Yes, Bush got us into Iraq and into nation building--and so the blame would be partially his; but the flip side of that coin is that the Democrats now have completely poisioned the well for anything meaningful to take place in our government. How can politicians talk about "failure of political progress" with the Iraqis when our own Congress is so full of hate and partisanship that it has now made of our own Congress a place where progress is impossible. Between the Congressional "leadership" of Pelosi and Reid, cheered on by the nutroots and blood-lusting media, nothing worthwhile is being done in Washington. They have earned their 11% (and dropping) approval ratings.
The answer is to fix the damn thing by building a downstream dam (and yes, I think American taxpayers should share the burden with the Iraqis under the circumstances...we ALL lose if it goes) or else we need to evacuate Mosul as quickly as possible until this ticking time bomb can be diffused.
It is equally critical we protect the Mosul Dam from terror attack at all costs, for obvious reasons.
Will it cost us money? Yes. But we took on this responsibility--right or wrong. And to allow a catastrophe like this to happen, knowing we could have stopped it, would not just be a human tragedy for the Iraqis impacted--it would be a catastrophe for the United States; and the whole world would be watching.
This is a golden opportunity for America to show the world that it has more than one Marshall Plan under its belt. Doing so would send a strong signal to the world that America is no longer the America of the 1970's which abandons its friends; it is the America of the 1940's that stands by them and helps them rebuild. It is also going to require our putting real pressure on the Iraqi government too.
Unfortunately, all of these things are going to require bipartisan support, and rising above this pathetic level of political "gotcha" the Dems have been playing for 6 years now. Republicans are going to have to show some goodwill here as well. Because the alternative is unthinkable.
If America expects gratitude and loyalty we feel we have earned the hard way from the Iraqi people, then America is going to have to somehow force the issue here and get this thing done. And, with all due respect to Daniel Pipes--who I often agree with--we cannot simply walk away now. Fix the dam or evacuate Mosul. Period.
I would prefer Iraqis to have to spend a couple of years living in tent cities than for a half million to die on America's watch. The clock is ticking. Nancy and Harry are playing politics. And potentially millions of lives hang in the balance.
Get over yourselves guys, how about we save half a million lives and simultaneously win the hearts of the Iraqi people. Not because it is right politically, but because it is the right thing, period.
Personally I think we have gone too far together with the Iraqis to sit back and do nothing, allowing the eventual collapse of that dam and the absolute catastrophe that would bring. I think the United States needs to turn up the heat and use whatever leverage we have to push the reluctant and dysfunctional Iraqi government to get off its collective ass and allow our Corps of Engineers to build a "safety dam" downstream. Or else we need to insist on the evacuation of Mosul before the dam breaks. For the Mosul Dam dam to collapse on our watch, with all those people downstream would not only result in what Pipes rightly calls "the greatest human-induced catastrophe" in world history; it would also dramatically impair the momentum and goodwill that the United States has achieved over the last year, because our subversive media would treat this as Katrina times ten.
Can you just see Anderson Cooper and Al Jazeera and the Times if that dam gives and half a million Iraqis die? Initially they would try to blame Bush, but that would get bloody, because it would be a shared failure. Yes, Bush got us into Iraq and into nation building--and so the blame would be partially his; but the flip side of that coin is that the Democrats now have completely poisioned the well for anything meaningful to take place in our government. How can politicians talk about "failure of political progress" with the Iraqis when our own Congress is so full of hate and partisanship that it has now made of our own Congress a place where progress is impossible. Between the Congressional "leadership" of Pelosi and Reid, cheered on by the nutroots and blood-lusting media, nothing worthwhile is being done in Washington. They have earned their 11% (and dropping) approval ratings.
The answer is to fix the damn thing by building a downstream dam (and yes, I think American taxpayers should share the burden with the Iraqis under the circumstances...we ALL lose if it goes) or else we need to evacuate Mosul as quickly as possible until this ticking time bomb can be diffused.
It is equally critical we protect the Mosul Dam from terror attack at all costs, for obvious reasons.
Will it cost us money? Yes. But we took on this responsibility--right or wrong. And to allow a catastrophe like this to happen, knowing we could have stopped it, would not just be a human tragedy for the Iraqis impacted--it would be a catastrophe for the United States; and the whole world would be watching.
This is a golden opportunity for America to show the world that it has more than one Marshall Plan under its belt. Doing so would send a strong signal to the world that America is no longer the America of the 1970's which abandons its friends; it is the America of the 1940's that stands by them and helps them rebuild. It is also going to require our putting real pressure on the Iraqi government too.
Unfortunately, all of these things are going to require bipartisan support, and rising above this pathetic level of political "gotcha" the Dems have been playing for 6 years now. Republicans are going to have to show some goodwill here as well. Because the alternative is unthinkable.
If America expects gratitude and loyalty we feel we have earned the hard way from the Iraqi people, then America is going to have to somehow force the issue here and get this thing done. And, with all due respect to Daniel Pipes--who I often agree with--we cannot simply walk away now. Fix the dam or evacuate Mosul. Period.
I would prefer Iraqis to have to spend a couple of years living in tent cities than for a half million to die on America's watch. The clock is ticking. Nancy and Harry are playing politics. And potentially millions of lives hang in the balance.
Get over yourselves guys, how about we save half a million lives and simultaneously win the hearts of the Iraqi people. Not because it is right politically, but because it is the right thing, period.
