Toot
December 20th, 2002 - 12:21 am
Senators Biden and Hagel, just back from Iraq, write that
Although no one doubts our forces will prevail over Saddam Hussein’s, key regional leaders confirm what the Foreign Relations Committee emphasized in its Iraq hearings last summer: The most challenging phase will likely be the day after — or, more accurately, the decade after — Saddam Hussein.
If that sounds somewhat familiar, it’s because you read it here first.
The same people who say we shouldn’t topple Saddam unless we are willing to nursemaid the Iraqi people for thirty years would scream the loudest if we refused to leave when the Iraqis said they were ready to go it alone. And that might be in five years, or six months, after the toppling. I think we should have done a lot more “nation-building” in Kuwait after the last war. Why leave a corrupt Sheik in power? But you don’t hear anyone complaining about that. The fact is we can’t control the political evolution of Iraq. We would be stupid to try. What we can do is make sure Saddam has no access to nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.