California Conservative

Hugh Hewitt thinks that “President Bush was at his best tonight“, saying:

President Bush was at his best tonight: serious, detailed, and above all, resolute. He spoke to many audiences.

To the public weary and grieved by the death of many of the finest Americans, the president spoke of the crucial issue: “For the safety of our people, America must succeed in Iraq.”

It isn’t, he explained repeatedly, just about giving Iraqis hope, but maintaining American security for all of the reasons he detailed.

Iraqis who desire peace heard the commitment, but they also heard its contingent nature: The Iraqi government has run out of time to dodge the tough choices.

Our enemies did not hear what they had hoped to, a declaration of surrender, whether phrased as a “timetable” or a simple “We quit.” They know that as long as Bush as in office, they will not win in Iraq.

Crucially Iran heard a hint of measures beyond the borders of Iran, though in the sort of terms that none can object to. When the president spoke of destroying the networks aiding the terrorists, he meant the Quds Brigades and the other Iranian agents at work in Iraq, and the placement of the paragraph cannot be misunderstood.

Powerline’s Paul Mirengoff said:

“The first few minutes of the speech weren’t well-delivered, but I thought the substance was good throughout. I’ve had several reservations about a surge, perhaps the biggest of which is that at some point (a year, 18 months or whatever) we’ll pull out and the sectarian violence will ratchet up again. That’s why we need not only short-term military success but also political progress that will change the dynamic once we pull back. I have confidence in our military, but not in Iraqi politicians. But there is some relationship between the two; the better we’re doing militarily, the more influence we have with Iraqi politicians.”

Captain Ed live-blogged the speech here. Here’s the two best sections in Ed’s post:

8:04 - A failure in Iraq would be a catastrophe. Bush outlines a few reasons why:

The consequences of failure are clear: Radical Islamic extremists would grow in strength and gain new recruits. They would be in a better position to topple moderate governments, create chaos in the region, and use oil revenues to fund their ambitions. Iran would be emboldened in its pursuit of nuclear weapons. Our enemies would have a safe haven from which to plan and launch attacks on the American people. On September the 11th, 2001, we saw what a refuge for extremists on the other side of the world could bring to the streets of our own cities. For the safety of our people, America must succeed in Iraq.

8:07 - Why will this effort be different from earlier efforts? Nancy Pelosi asked that in her press conference today. Bush has an answer, which boils down to this: either we take on all of the militias, or we’ll pack up and leave Maliki to their tender mercies. I guess Maliki chose Door #1.

Last weekend, President Bush held a video conference with al-Maliki, which was described by some as al-Maliki’s “Come to Jesus” conference. I suspect that President Bush told him that he’d better ‘repent of his past ways’ or suffer the consequences. As Captain Ed said, it’s obvious that al-Maliki didn’t choose to ’suffer the consequences.’

I agree with the views expressed by Hugh, Paul and Ed. I’d add that I was encouraged with this section of the President’s speech:

Succeeding in Iraq also requires defending its territorial integrity, and stabilizing the region in the face of the extremist challenge. This begins with addressing Iran and Syria. These two regimes are allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We will interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq.

It’s long past time to interrupt the flow of Iranian and Syrian support for the militias, terrorists & insurgents. As I noted here, Iran is playing both sides against each other:

Iran is supporting both Sunni and Shiite terrorists in the Iraqi civil war, according to secret Iranian documents captured by Americans in Iraq.

Here’s something else that the President said that I liked:

In the long run, the most realistic way to protect the American people is to provide a hopeful alternative to the hateful ideology of the enemy, by advancing liberty across a troubled region. It is in the interests of the United States to stand with the brave men and women who are risking their lives to claim their freedom, and help them as they work to raise up just and hopeful societies across the Middle East.

I didn’t want this to be a lofty, ideological speech, which it certainly wasn’t. That said, throwing in this type of paragraph to remind Americans why we’re fighting is entirely appropriate.

Finally, this is my favorite section of the speech:

Honorable people have different views, and they will voice their criticisms. It is fair to hold our views up to scrutiny. And all involved have a responsibility to explain how the path they propose would be more likely to succeed.

In other words, politicians like Ted Kennedy, John Murtha and Dick Durbin will be held to account for their plans to leave Iraq before victory is achieved. Criticism won’t be tolerated but plans for victory will be listened to. In other words, he’s telling the defeatist Wing of the Democratic Party that they either do something useful or shut up.

Technorati Tags: President Bush, Troop Surge, Maliki, Iran, Syria

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 11th, 2007 at 6:16 am and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, Foreign Policy, Iran, Iraq, Military, Terrorism, W. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.