Fully Funded Withdrawal

This is the new buzzword of the Out of Iraq caucus in the House. The leadership has claimed that they are constrained by the 44 Blue Dog Democrts, but the truth is that there are more members in the Progressive Caucus, the largest caucus in the House. The leadership is constrained because the want to be constrained, particularly people like Steny Hoyer and Rahm Emanuel. Maybe they don't particularly want to see the war end. But Barbara Lee does:

By framing their discussion of the war in terms of winning and losing, the Bush administration seeks to portray critics of their policies as opposed to victory, or supportive of defeat.

The fact is that you cannot "win" an occupation, just as there is no way for the United States to "win" an Iraqi civil war.

The Bush administration understands this, just as they understand that there are no pretty or clean options for bringing a responsible end to our policy there. They are content to mouth the words of victory while they try to run out the clock, playing a cynical game of political "chicken," where whoever acts to bring a responsible end to their failed policy will be accused of having lost Iraq.

We are spending $8 billion a month occupying Iraq, with an average of 67 U.S. troops being killed and 500 being wounded. The cost to our security of having our military bogged down in Iraq indefinitely is unsustainable, and is not only sapping vital funds from efforts to fight global terrorism, but is strengthening jihadist recruitment efforts internationally. The longer we allow the administration to delay meaningful movement, and the longer we fail to extract ourselves from this quagmire, the more dangerous this failed foreign policy becomes to America and the rest of the world [...]

Fully funding withdrawal is not micromanagement, it is macromanagement - the Bush administration has so badly managed this effort that they have forced Congress to intervene.

Fully funding withdrawal is not cutting off funding - we are going to fully fund a rational alternative to the administration's attempt to run out the clock on their failed policy.

There is ample precedent of both Republican and Democratic Congresses acting to restrict or direct funds during wartime and the time has come to consider such action again.

We have a responsibility to challenge the administration's efforts to run out the clock, and by proposing to intervene by fully funding a policy that actually fulfills our nation's long term strategic security objectives, we force them to defend their track record on the war, which is a debate that Democrats win every time.

I excerpted a lot of that letter because it really sums it up. This is an occupation, and furthermore it's an occupation during a civil war in which the US military has no role other than policeman. The surge is woefully undermanned, to the extent that the Defense Department now wants to surge the surge with another 2,200 troops. That will not be the end, and it's already being revealed that the money and troop strength was lowballed by the President. This counterinsurency strategy will take 10 years and only has a small chance at success by the admission of the general carrying it out.

It looks like Progressive Caucus pressure has brought around the leadership to earmark all new money for Iraq in terms of a phased withdrawal.

In a direct challenge to President Bush, House Democrats are advancing legislation requiring the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq by the fall of next year.

Democratic officials who described the measure said the timetable would be accelerated — to the end of 2007 — if the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki does not meet goals for providing Iraq's security.

The conditions, described as tentative until presented to the Democratic rank and file Thursday, would be added to legislation providing nearly $100 billion the Bush administration has requested for fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

If the White House vetoes this, they don't get their $100 billion in funding. It's that simple. And it's that simple in the Senate as well, and Democrats should use the same tactics of "you don't support the troops in the field" if the Republicans act to block the funding. I don't realy know why it took so long to settle on this, but I'm gald it has. Now it's time to call every member of Congress and ask them where they stand.

I'm cautiously optimistic about where the Democrats are going with this debate.