50 More Years in Iraq?

"At a third hub down south, Tallil, they're planning a new mess hall, one that will seat 6,000 hungry airmen and soldiers for chow.

"Are the Americans here to stay? Air Force mechanic Josh Remy is sure of it as he looks around Balad."

Michael Hirsh wrote in Newsweek in May 2006: ""[T]he vast base being built up at Balad is also hard evidence that, despite all the political debate in Washington about a quick U.S. pullout, the Pentagon is planning to stay in Iraq for a long time -- at least a decade or so, according to military strategists. . . .

"U.S. officials routinely deny that America intends to put down permanent bases. 'A key planning factor in our basing strategy is that there will be no bases in Iraq following Operation Iraqi Freedom,' says Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, a spokesman for CENTCOM in Baghdad. 'What we have in Iraq are 'contingency bases,' intended to support our operations in Iraq on a temporary basis until OIF is complete.' . . .

"Technically, Colonel Johnson may be telling the truth about the Pentagon's long-term plans. But it is also true that the U.S. government has never drawn up plans for 'permanent' military bases, even when it ended up staying for half a century. In Korea, where tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers have been deployed for 55 years, since the end of the Korean War, 'they're only just now moving American troops out of temporary facilities like huts to real buildings,' says John Pike, a Washington security expert. A White House official, asked last week about long-term U.S. plans, himself made the analogy to Asia and to Germany. In every conflict the United States has recently been involved in, except Vietnam, U.S. forces have remained in the country, said the official, who asked for anonymity because the matter is considered sensitive."

Author Chalmers Johnson told Amy Goodman on Democracy Now in February: "[O]ne of the reasons we had no exit plan from Iraq is that we didn't intend to leave.... You can never get our ambassador, the Department of Defense, the President, or anybody to say unequivocally we don't intend to have bases there."

What You'd Tell Bush

Frank Newport announces a new Gallup Poll: "What would Americans say to President Bush if they could talk to him about the situation in Iraq for 15 minutes?

"The majority of Americans -- if they could literally file through the Oval Office and talk to the man they elected to be the top executive and commander in chief of the country -- would tell President Bush to focus on developing an exit strategy from Iraq and removing U.S. troops from that country. A smaller group of one in four would tell the president to stay the course or even to be more aggressive in Iraq. Six percent would tell the president to own up to his mistakes in Iraq and apologize. About 7% would advise the president to work with study groups or the United Nations to figure out a solution to the Iraq dilemma. Only 5% would have nothing to say to Bush about what Americans' currently rank as the nation's most important problem."

The new poll finds 54 percent generally advising President Bush to focus on removing the troops.

Interestingly enough, the same poll in September 2005 found 53 percent saying just the same thing: 41 percent said pull the troops out and come home, compared to 39 percent now; 6 percent said come up with and execute a well thought-out exit strategy, compared to 12 percent now; 6 percent said get them trained and let them run their own country, compared to 5 percent now.

In other words, the public has hated this war and wanted out for a long time. Politicians are only now catching up.

In Their Own Words

Gallup today released -- exclusively to me -- some examples of the actual wording respondents used in response to the open-ended question. A nonscientific sampling: