Thoughts, from both sides, on setting a date certain for withdrawal of U.S.

troops.

Argument against, by email from a UK reader who sounds as if he has some actual experience in this zone:

“Mr Derbyshire—…An open and rigid timetable for withdrawal would be death to the counterinsurgency effort. … British COIN [=counter-insurgency] operations in Aden were struck a fatal blow by the decision taken in 1967 to withdraw from commitments East of Suez. While Aden was actually never a particularly model counterinsurgency by British standards (among other things the security services were thoroughly penetrated by the insurgents) things were far from unsuccessful and there was a general feeling that things were going well. The announcement that, come what may, British operations would cease on a set date resulted in the situation being reversed practically overnight. It sent out the message to the insurgents that all they need do was cling on as a force in being for a few months and victory would effectively drop into their lap.

“Natives working for the counterinsurgency forces get a stark message of where the wind was blowing and acted accordingly. There was also a negative impact on British COIN forces – similarly to Vietnam, nobody wanted to be the last person killed in a campaign that was, all of a sudden, very obviously going nowhere.

“Sources of intelligence dried up almost completely – a fatal blow given that successful counterinsurgency operations are almost invariably intelligence driven.”

Now the other point of view from Cal Lanier.

“[Quoting the President’s speech] ‘As the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down.’

“And what do we do if the Iraqis never stand up? How long do we expect them to take baby steps? A year? Three years? Five years? Ten?

“Some say unhesitatingly that we should stay as long as it takes. But the President didn’t win support for an open-ended war, because America has never supported endless military action and it shows no sign of starting now. The President refuses to give an exit date because it will encourage the terrorists–but does he seriously think that a four or five year end-date would have that much meaning? More likely, he knows the impact of public opinion, were he to give an end-date that far out. But any honest attempt to sell the American people on the continued effort must include a timeframe, be it months or years.”