Searching for Positive Results in Iraq

Re “What’s Going Right in Iraq,” by Christopher Hitchens, Michael Rubin, Frederick W. Kagan and Gary Schmitt, Opinion, Oct. 24: Hitchens poses the question: Does anyone want to know what Iraq would have looked like now if we had let it go on the way it was before?

One thing we now know that wasn’t going on before was any program for making weapons of mass destruction. Terrorists from Syria and Iran were not in Iraq either, to the extent they are now. I acknowledge that Saddam Hussein would still be in power if we didn’t preemptively strike to “liberate” Iraqis. However, if we had kept our focus on Afghanistan, would Osama bin Laden still be at large today?

Let’s look at what is going on now. Most experts agree it’s a mess. And anyone who believes Iraq will have fair elections anytime soon might also believe Florida doesn’t need to be watched closely this November.

Charles Coleman Jr.

Pacoima

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In reading Rubin’s comments I came upon the statement that there are three concepts that the University of Baghdad-trained interpreters could not translate into the language of Hussein’s Iraq: debate, tolerance and compromise. I thought that might just be true. Then I thought again -- this just might be true in the language of the Bush White House too.

Randal Seech

San Clemente

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If John Kerry had been president the past four years, Hussein would still be in power. If Hussein had a vote in this election, he would vote for Kerry. He (and other terrorists) would not want Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell and Rice in charge of defending the U.S. He would rather have a president who thinks we need the U.N.’s permission to take action against the terrorists. Vote President Bush for four more years of strong national security!

Jeff Jackson

Cypress

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After reading the Oct. 24 article, “Why America Has Waged a Losing Battle on Fallouja,” I turned on an all-news Arab television station. The news ticker on the bottom of the screen read “American airstrike shatters Fallouja.” The perception is not of American military action against insurgents, but of military action targeting the city -- the civilian population. For at least four months, I have read similar headlines on an almost daily basis. Fallouja is joining Palestine as a cause celebre across the Arab world.

We are losing -- if we have not already lost -- the hearts and minds of the Iraqi and Arab peoples. We need a change of direction, and soon, if we are to retrieve anything from this disaster.

John Yard

Sunland-Tujunga

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The article on Fallouja omits mentioning one important detail -- that if the U.S. military were to “succeed” in taking Fallouja, as many have urged, then we would have to occupy it. With supply lines already stretched to the breaking point, we would have to establish a new beachhead in the midst of enemy territory, forced to resupply our troops through another shooting gallery. We’re stretched too thin as it is.

The U.S. is in a vise in Fallouja because we don’t have the resources to occupy the city, nor can we allow it to remain under the control of insurgents. Genocide, however attractive it might look to the chicken hawks who run our military, is not an acceptable alternative.

That’s what happens when you start with a bad plan, as the American decision to invade Iraq clearly was -- whatever you decide to do from then on only makes things worse. This is our Stalingrad.

Russ Winter

Washington, D.C.

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After reading the well-documented piece covering the history of the conflict in Fallouja, it boggles my mind that our commander in chief didn’t ask, never mind insist, on being told what the Marine commander on the ground had to say about the situation. What kind of chief makes decisions without consulting the people involved? Bush is proving to be unfit for command.

Mary Ficalora

Agoura Hills

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How ironic -- The Times devotes pages to various versions of how great things are in Iraq, and within 24 hours we learn that dozens of newly trained Iraqi policemen have been executed and that hundreds of tons of extremely powerful, easily transported explosives have been stolen by terrorists. This material can be used to blow up buildings all over the world, including, of course, in the U.S.

The world is a much more dangerous place after Bush’s stupid invasion.

Crista Worthy

Pacific Palisades

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Re “U.S. Is Said to Urge Its Iraqi Allies to Unite for Election,” and Ronald Brownstein’s column, “Storm Clouds Gathering Over the Legitimacy of This Election,” Oct. 25: So now the Iraqis will receive, at tremendous cost in American lives and dollars, a “scaled-back democratic process.” Welcome to the club.

Daniel Koenig

Placentia