Steve Lynch: “lately it seems that the national debate over the next move in Iraq has become bogged down in a way that really reflects…”

“lately it seems that the national debate over the next move in Iraq has become bogged down in a way that really reflects the military struggle itself. The administration has dug in, believing that simply staying the course, we can simply outlast the military insurgency. Conversely, there are some in my party who, angered understandably by war under false pretenses, are seeking a pell-mell evacuation complete with a publicly announced evacuation date, which I think makes the withdrawal of 136,000 troops more dangerous and more difficult. But, Mr. Speaker, drawing upon the lessons of history, I would like to propose a third way: creating a mechanism to more effectively empower the new elected Iraqi Government, which will allow for a gradual but permanent U.S. troop reduction. Mr. Speaker, I would like to take a moment to talk about a process that we went through in my office after five visits to Iraq to try to find a model that would allow us to shift the governmental operations in Iraq away from the U.S. military and to their new government. And the example that we came up with, that has been used by this government in the past, is actually the model that was developed during the Second World War. In 1944, after driving Japanese forces from the Philippines with the help of the Filipino resistance, the United States military, like today in Iraq, found itself in complete control of the Philippines, over 7,000 islands.…”