When Senator John Warner (R-Virginia) asked General David Petraeus if the current US strategy in Iraq was “making America safer” the first time, he got a non-response: the good general dutifully said he was doing his best “to achieve our objectives in Iraq.” When Warner repeated the question—a question that could not have been posed more simply: “Is it making America safer?”—Petraeus replied, “sir, I don’t know, actually.”
Nor did Petraeus venture an estimate of how long it would take to achieve those objectives. Two years or 20, the US citizenry is owed an answer even if its just an honest best guess.
The scene was eerily reminiscent of General William Westmoreland‘s testimony on Capitol Hill 40 years ago with regard to US objectives in Vietnam.
That the question was asked on the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks should not be lost on the American populace. The answer should be all we need to know about our “objectives” in Iraq. We’ve all seen this movie before.
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