Say hello to the new plan

Same as the old plan.

Remember Nixon’s “Secret Plan to Win the War?” The sad thing is that most of you do not. The Plan was to continue to do what had not worked and was failing to work and continue doing it until we won. We lost. The failure of the plan was inherent. You cannot win a war when you don’t know who the enemy is. You can’t know who the enemy is when you define the word as anyone you’re fighting against. You can’t know who will shoot at you, or detonate a bomb until it’s too late, so you must assume they are all the enemy.

Then as now, an enemy that cannot be told from anyone else will always lead you into committing atrocities that create more enemies. We become simply a hated occupier and occupiers are almost always on the wrong side of history.

The Administration is fighting for its raison d'être by releasing a detailed strategy plan yesterday and George Bush’s new 35-page "National Strategy for Victory in Iraq" plan to continue fighting until we win the war is just simple minded enough to please the multitudes of enthusiastic idiots who cannot see the difference between the occupation of a nation that was not an enemy until we occupied it and the liberation of Western Europe in World War Two. There is no “victory” aside from convincing the population that we are there for their own good, or as Nixon’s cheerleaders put it: win their hearts and minds. Infidels occupying Iraq don’t win any hearts or minds even when they manage to restore utilities and refrain from burning up, blowing up or torturing confessions out of even a few civilians.

The plan we have been given identifies the "enemy" in Iraq as "diffuse and sophisticated" and “a combination of Iraqis who reject democratic reforms, Saddam loyalists and al-Qaeda inspired terrorists.” That’s only partly the case as the chief inspiration for al-Qaeda is the presence of Western powers and the percentage of those who want us out is over 80% and growing. All that differs when comparing the two conflicts is that all who opposed us were called Communists and all who oppose us now are called “terrorists” in an attempt to hide their actual concerns. The “enemy” in Iraq is Iraq.

We are being assured and were assured by Nixon that local forces were being trained, although we were never given the numbers to show how ridiculously small and undependable they were and much of the report, as is customary, refers only to what we have to do, hoping you will think that it is thus not only being done, but is do-able.

We are a born again and born yesterday nation. We’re either too young or too blinded by faith to know that we’ve been there and done that and all we got was a war memorial.