Note: The opinions and comments stated in the following article, and views expressed by any contributor to In Homeland Security, do not represent the views of American Military University, American Public University System, its management or employees.
By Glynn Cosker
Managing Editor, In Homeland Security
Love him or hate him—and his final approval rating indicated more hate than love—former President George W. Bush sounded quite prophetic during a July 2007 speech in the White House briefing room. At the time, he was warning about the risks of withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq before “our commanders tell us we are ready.”
Here is what President Bush said in 2007 about pulling troops out of Iraq too early:
“It would mean surrendering the future of Iraq to al-Qaida. It would mean that we’d be risking mass killings on a horrific scale. It would mean we’d allow the terrorists to establish a safe haven in Iraq to replace the one they lost in Afghanistan. It would mean increasing the probability that American troops would have to return at some later date to confront an enemy that is even more dangerous.”
The Rise of ISIS
Almost nine years removed from Bush’s statements, his warnings have come to fruition. Iraq is indeed now overrun, not with al-Qaida, but with an even more abhorrent group — ISIS.
ISIS is embracing “mass killings on a horrific scale” on an almost daily basis. The word ‘horrific’ is actually too weak for a group that beheads people on camera, buries women and children alive and is big into crucifixions. So, yes—terrorists have established a “safe haven in Iraq,” and American troops have indeed returned to “confront an enemy that is even more dangerous” than al-Qaida. Not nearly enough American troops according to some, but they are there.
Critics argue that President Bush was predicting a rise in al-Qaida’s occupation of Iraq and he had no idea what ISIS was or if they’d terrorize anybody. Counterpoint to such critics is the view that Bush was right—and ISIS and al-Qaida are interchangeable Islamic extremists as the enemy in the Middle East.
In 2014, President Bush told Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade that he “knew the nature of the enemy,” and went on to say that “anyone that kills 3,000 innocents or beheads people because of their religion, or because of their point of view, is dangerous. There’s a short-term strategy to bring them to justice, and a long-term strategy to encourage free societies to prevail so as to marginalize their ideology … Democracy takes time to take hold and yet there’s an impatience with that process.”
Was George W. Bush Right?
Over the years, President Bush has refused to second-guess President Obama. Instead, he’s told the American public to be patient with President Obama’s handling of the big problems in the Middle East. That said, President Bush has stated that he has always backed a position that maintained between 10,000 and 15,000 U.S. troops in and near Iraq — indefinitely. As of today, there are around 5,000 U.S. troops in the region. Whether ISIS had grown to power if policies similar to Bush’s had been continued is an ongoing debate.
As it stands now though, ISIS has beheaded U.S. and European citizens, has grown exponentially, has conducted deadly terror campaigns in France and Belgium, has infiltrated the United States and is now a huge problem for President Obama and his predecessor. The recently issued House Homeland Security Committee’s Terror Threat Snapshot is evidence of that.
Comments are closed.