Whom Does John Kerry Want to Lead Iraq?
Written by Jay Bryant
Tuesday, September 28, 2004
These are your choices: Saddam Hussein, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, or Ayad Allawi.
Whom do you want to be the leader of Iraq? The slick-mustachioed dictator with his mass graves? The cunning terrorist bent on holding the Guinness record for beheadings? Or the rumpled, avuncular prime minister courageously facing day-by-day danger to bring democracy to his country?
Those are the choices.
And John Kerry's choices, too. Among many other things, John Kerry has said the Iraq war was the ''wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time.''
There is no possible way to interpret that statement than the way President Bush has: if John Kerry had been President these past two years, Saddam Hussein would still be in power.
And Allawi, therefore, would not. But thanks to President Bush and the sacrifices of American troops and taxpayers, Saddam is out and Allawi is in. The evil Zarqawi has vowed to change that, to deliver Iraq and its 25 million people to the merciless governance of al-Qaeda, and make it the capital of world terrorism so it can behead Western Civilization en masse, as it does to innocent people in Iraq and, with striking and appalling visual similarity, as it did to the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.
Only the success of Allawi and his plan for democracy can prevent this outcome. For an American to do anything that diminishes Allawi's chances for success is despicable.
Allawi knows how greatly his chances depend on America and its allies. So he has come here, to offer us his thanks and his encouragement. There should be an outpouring of support for him as he visits our shores. We should give the man a ticker-tape parade. Schoolchildren should be encouraged to draw pictures illustrating our support for his efforts. The flag of free Iraq should greet him from store windows and lampposts wherever he goes.
He came to thank us, to encourage us. We need to thank him, and encourage him. This man, a 59-year old neurologist, has reported for duty when his country, and ours, needed him.
John Kerry does not see it that way. John Kerry is so cynical that he will distort Allawi's words and attack him verbally, even as he is our guest. ''I think the prime minister is obviously contradicting his own statement of a few days ago, where he said the terrorists are pouring into the country,'' Kerry sneered in reaction to Allawi's encouraging words before a joint session of Congress. Shameful, shameful. The comments from which Kerry cynically clipped his reference was this: ''Foreign terrorists are still pouring in, and they're trying to inflict damage on Iraq to undermine Iraq and to undermine the process, democratic process in Iraq, and, indeed, this is their last stand. So they are putting a very severe fight on Iraq. We are winning. We will continue to win. We are going to prevail.''
I've tried, and I can't think of a more unethical use of an out of context quote, not even the one Kerry and his cronies tried to pull on Cheney a couple of weeks ago, when keening in their girly-man fashion, they accused Cheney of saying that a Kerry election would increase the likelihood of a terrorist attack on the U.S.
That's not what Cheney said, but I'll tell you something: by his inexcusable dissing of Allawi, Kerry has decreased the likelihood of Allawi's success, and that would most assuredly increase the likelihood of a terrorist attack on the U.S.
Imagine if Wendell Willkie had said those things about Churchill in 1940.
The old bromide that politics stops at the water's edge has never really been true. Robust discussions of foreign policy are not forbidden by our political code of ethics, nor should they be.
But the contumelious slander of a heroic and valued ally like Allawi is unprecedented for a candidate in wartime.
Kerry would have us believe this brave man is a vacuous puppet and a flip-flopper. By his slander, he has insulted the people of Iraq, not to mention the troops of the international coalition who are putting their lives on the line for the Allawi government's plan for elections in January.
Such talk was not justified with regard to Nguyen Van Thieu in 1971, but at least then Kerry had the excuse of being young and inexperienced. In all likelihood, he was even sincere. He probably actually believed Vietnam would be better off under the rule of the communists.
By his disgraceful attack on the great hope of Baghdad, Kerry begs a parallel question, 33 years later: You've got three choices: whom do you want to be the leader of Iraq?
About the Writer: Jay Bryant is a media consultant whose regular op-ed columns are available on his website at http://www.theoptimate.com.
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