Yesterday’s WSJ “Best of the Web” found this part of the Democrat response to the State of the Union Address noteworthy:

As I look at Iraq, I recall the words of former general and soon-to-be President Dwight Eisenhower during the dark days of the Korean War, which had fallen into a bloody stalemate. “When comes the end?” asked the general who had commanded our forces in Europe during World War II. And as soon as he became president, he brought the Korean War to an end.

James Taranto retorts:

Actually, it’s not quite accurate to say Ike brought the Korean war to an end. The Koreas signed an armistice but never a peace treaty, and thus remain technically at war, with some 30,000 U.S. troops still in South Korea to protect against the North–though the current stalemate, for the moment at least, is bloody only for the people of North Korea. The inconclusive outcome of the Korean War can easily be interpreted as a warning of the dangers of leaving threats for future generations to deal with.

There is an even more important point. Before the war fell into a “bloody stalemate” the Chinese attack across the Yalu River had pushed American forces to the brink of defeat; many large units were surrounded and had to be airlifted to safety, and an entire American division had been shattered and overrun. Communist forces recaptured Seoul after pushing American forces substantially back across the 38th parallel, reversing most of the gains from General MacArthur’s brilliant Inchon maneuver. In short, before there was the stalemate Webb refers to, there was first a disaster that needed urgent fixing.

At this juncture, MacArthur became increasingly insubordinate (and some would say incompetent) forcing Truman to replace him with General Matthew Ridgway.

As soon as Ridgway arrived at the front, and saw the utterly demoralized American army very much on the defensive, he realized it was time for a change in course. Ridgway began ordering counter-attacks all along the front, systematically drawing the Chinese forces into killing fields through tactical withdrawals, and exacting such a terrifying toll on the enemy, that it began to fall back in due course. Ridgway’s brilliant strategy of taking the offense everywhere worked, and he soon recaptured Seoul, stabilizing the front along the 38th parallel. It was only then — when American forces had recovered their élan, achieved a tenable situation, and saved South Korea — that the Truman administration began to consider an armistice.

Senator Webb would do well to suggest how he would stabilize the situation in Iraq and stave off an American defeat. Otherwise, his passionate advocacy of withdrawing American forces “in short order” is simply defeatism–a disposition that neither Truman nor Eisenhower can be accused of.