Navigating through Iraq

After reading your Nov. 27 editorial, “The way forward in Iraq,” I have a suggestion: Try to avoid parroting GOP talking points in your comments about Rep. John P. Murtha’s proposal. First, don’t call it a proposal for “withdrawal.” It isn’t. Murtha (D-Pa.) has called for “redeployment” in the region. Second, don’t call it a proposal for “immediate” departure. It isn’t that either. It calls for redeployment “as soon as possible.” The distinctions are important -- too important to be blurred by your newspaper.

MARCY ROTHENBERG

Porter Ranch

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The Times appears torn about Iraq without a clear template to guide editorial recommendations. However, history suggests that should the U.S. retreat produce a “negative watershed” that advances messianic totalitarianism, Washington should invest far more resources to defeat the insurgency. If not, cutting America’s losses is not unreasonable.

This perspective begs the question: Would a U.S. retreat merely mark a battle lost or the first Arab domino to fall to Osama bin Laden’s vision? Would a departure from Iraq compare with the 20th century “unrealized” negative watersheds that the success of fascism and communism posed? The answer will turn on the ability of surrounding regimes to immunize themselves from infection. History suggests that Iraq’s neighbors have demonstrated a brutal capacity to suppress political violence while preserving American interests.

That said, the U.S. can retreat, leaving Iraqis to their own devices -- as Washington left Somalia and Lebanon to theirs -- to resolve affairs America cannot. In that event, the U.S. may look back at Iraq, like Vietnam, as one battle lost -- or muddled -- in a long conflict between the West and radical Islam.

BENNETT RAMBERG

Los Angeles

Ramberg served in the State Department during the presidency of George H.W. Bush.

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Everyone is stumbling around, including your newspaper, on how to end this devastating Bush/Cheney incursion into Iraq. There are no answers. The truth is, we are witness to violence once held in check by a strongman named Saddam Hussein. Just as there are no good reasons why we went in there, there are no good solutions for getting out. Whatever happens, we will have gained nothing but death to our troops, the enmity of half the world and a mountain of debt.

DALE A. PAGE

Granada Hills