Kerry's Plan on Iraq

By Sen. John Kerry . Posted September 21, 2004.

The following is excerpted from a speech John Kerry delivered in New York on Sept. 20.

...National security is a central issue in this campaign.  We owe it to the American people to have a real debate about the choices President Bush has made… and the choices I would make… to fight and win the war on terror.

That means we must have a great honest national debate on Iraq. The President claims it is the centerpiece of his war on terror.  In fact, Iraq was a profound diversion from that war and the battle against our greatest enemy, Osama bin Laden and the terrorists. Invading Iraq has created a crisis of historic proportions and, if we do not change course, there is the prospect of a war with no end in sight.

This month, we passed a cruel milestone:  more than 1,000 Americans lost in Iraq.  Their sacrifice reminds us that Iraq remains, overwhelmingly, an American burden.  Nearly 90 percent of the troops — and nearly 90 percent of the casualties — are American.   Despite the President’s claims, this is not a grand coalition.

Our troops have served with extraordinary bravery, skill and resolve.  Their service humbles all of us. When I speak to them… when I look into the eyes of their families, I know this:  we owe them the truth about what we have asked them to do… and what is still to be done.

In June, the President declared, “The Iraqi people have their country back.”   Just last week, he told us: “This country is headed toward democracy… Freedom is on the march.” 

But the administration’s own official intelligence estimate, given to the President last July, tells a very different story. 

According to press reports, the intelligence estimate totally contradicts what the President is saying to the American people.

So do the facts on the ground.

Security is deteriorating, for us and for the Iraqis. 

42 Americans died in Iraq in June – the month before the handover.  But 54 died in July… 66 in August… and already 54 halfway through September. 

And more than 1,100 Americans were wounded in August — more than in any other month since the invasion. 

We are fighting a growing insurgency in an ever widening war-zone.  In March, insurgents attacked our forces 700 times.  In August, they attacked 2,700 times – a 400% increase. 

Falluja…Ramadi… Samarra … even parts of Baghdad — are now “no go zones”… breeding grounds for terrorists who are free to plot and launch attacks against our soldiers. The radical Shi’a cleric, Moktada al-Sadr, who’s accused of complicity in the murder of Americans, holds more sway in the suburbs of Baghdad.

Violence against Iraqis… from bombings to kidnappings to intimidation… is on the rise.  

Basic living conditions are also deteriorating.

Residents of Baghdad are suffering electricity blackouts lasting up to 14 hours a day. 

Raw sewage fills the streets, rising above the hubcaps of our Humvees.  Children wade through garbage on their way to school.

Unemployment is over 50 percent.  Insurgents are able to find plenty of people willing to take $150 for tossing grenades at passing U.S. convoys.

Yes, there has been some progress, thanks to the extraordinary efforts of our soldiers and civilians in Iraq.  Schools, shops and hospitals have been opened.  In parts of Iraq, normalcy actually prevails. 

But most Iraqis have lost faith in our ability to deliver meaningful improvements to their lives.  So they’re sitting on the fence… instead of siding with us against the insurgents.

That is the truth.  The truth that the Commander in Chief owes to our troops and the American people. 

It is never easy to discuss what has gone wrong while our troops are in constant danger.  But it’s essential if we want to correct our course and do what’s right for our troops instead of repeating the same mistakes over and over again. 

Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator who deserves his own special place in hell.  But that was not, in itself, a reason to go to war.  The satisfaction we take in his downfall does not hide this fact: we have traded a dictator for a chaos that has left America less secure. 

The President has said that he “miscalculated” in Iraq and that it was a “catastrophic success.”  In fact, the President has made a series of catastrophic decisions … from the beginning … in Iraq.  At every fork in the road, he has taken the wrong turn and led us in the wrong direction.

The first and most fundamental mistake was the President’s failure to tell the truth to the American people.

He failed to tell the truth about the rationale for going to war.  And he failed to tell the truth about the burden this war would impose on our soldiers and our citizens.

By one count, the President offered 23 different rationales for this war.  If his purpose was to confuse and mislead the American people, he succeeded.

His two main rationales – weapons of mass destruction and the Al Qaeda/September 11 connection — have been proved false… by the President’s own weapons inspectors… and by the 9/11 Commission.  Just last week, Secretary of State Powell acknowledged the facts.  Only Vice President Cheney still insists that the earth is flat.

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