New York City, April 29, 2006: "Bring Our Troops Home Now!"
New York City, April 29, 2006: "Bring Our Troops Home Now!"
The November 7, 2006 midterm elections in the US saw the Democratic Party regain control of both the House and Senate for the first time since 1994. Riding a wave of revulsion around the Iraq war and the blatant ruling-class partisanship of the Republicans, the Democrats were able to win without putting forward even the skeleton of an alternative policy to the discredited Republican one. The Democrats, who gained a 31-seat majority in the House and a majority of one in the Senate, were elected by the simple virtue of not being Republicans.
The issue that most voters had at the top of their list of concerns when they went to the polls was the war in Iraq. The Bush administration's utterly inept handling of the war is now widely recognized in the US. The Democrats latched on to this. But they only want to change the handling of the war, not its imperial goals. Indeed, many Democrats ran on the platform that they could "win" the war that the Bush administration is now losing.
It should not be surprising then that the Democrats since the election have rejected the demand of the American electorate for a quick withdrawal from the Iraq mess. Instead, in a show of magnanimous bipartisanship, they are giving Bush cover to escalate the war. There are differences in both parties over what to do next in Iraq. In fact, the same differences exist in both parties. This is because both parties are faced with the same dilemma: The US is engaged in a war that it cannot win and, unfortunately for the peoples of Iraq and the US, will not, cannot, concede defeat.
There are three main options for the US, all of which speak to crisis the Empire has created for itself in the Middle East.
The first option is to declare the war unwinnable and walk away. The US ruling class regards this as impossible. Not because it would mean abandoning the stated and wholly fallacious war aim of "bringing democracy to the Arab world", but because the real goal of the war was the imposition of US imperial rule on Iraq and the Middle East. Having gone to war to remove the insubordinate government of Saddam Hussein, the US now occupies an increasingly chaotic land in which a recalcitrant people live on ground that holds 25 billion barrels of oil. The rulers regards their interests in the region as vital. Very few capitalist politicians are willing to abandon the "Great Game" for peace. They prefer war to defeat.
The second option is "redeployment". This option is favored by a number of Democrats and Republicans. While this option may seem more realistic, because it recognizes the futility of trying to attain victory, it suffers from the fact that it is, despite the semantic summersaults of a number of leading Democrats, a recipe for the status quo.
What those supporting "redeployment" really mean is for the US to lessen its potential casualties (and, coincidently, opposition to the war) by diminishing the direct combat role of the US military. The US would, under this plan, keep tens of thousands of US troops in Iraq and neighboring countries, restricting them to several mega-bases. It would greatly boost the roles of the Iraqi army in ground combat and of the US air force in trying to bomb the Iraqi resistance into submission. In the hope that the Iraqi civil war would exhaust itself and the US could then impose itself on a divided people bled dry. But "Iraqization" and US air power would not stabilize the country. The redeployed US soldiers would quickly be back.
The third option is the one that the Bush administration will chose and will receive, with "oversight" and protest, the necessary cover and collaboration of the Democratic Party. That option calls for an escalation of the war, adding 20,000 more troops to try to take down the most non-compliant Iraqis. This "strategy" is a desperate attempt to prove to the region and the world that US is still a superpower, despite the fact that the people of Iraq, for many different reasons, thoroughly reject it. It would greatly adding to the death and destruction in Iraq and the heartache of the families of US soldiers, and it would still fail, since 20,000 more troops are nowhere near enough to stabilize Iraq.
The Democratic Party is a party of the US ruling class, but its popular base and its broad membership have rejected the war. It is a testimony to the role and character of the Democratic Party that it would so roundly ignore the voice of its base and members to continue a losing war. Further, it is clear testimony to the need for a really independent voice of the majority of the people of the US. The Democrats have ignored the voice of the American people to end this war. Even in their victory they have rescued the Bush administration and given it the space to continue the war. And for that, the latest betrayal in their long service to the Empire, they will be damned by history.
It is up to those who seek real change to create a challenge, an independent, working-class challenge to the wars against workers abroad and workers at home.