Giuliani says we must win

NY Times:

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... Sept. 11 was a constant backdrop, and as Mr. Giuliani promoted his vision of a forceful foreign policy that calls for the United States to continue slugging it out in Iraq, he let his audiences know that his was an outlook forged by fire.

“What they say in Washington is not going to affect the fact that there are terrorists around the world that are planning to come here and kill us,” he said in Iowa, in the most spirited part of his newly honed stump speech.

Pointing his finger and bouncing up and down on his toes, he declared, “It is something I understand better than anyone else running for president.”

Rudy Giuliani’s biography is clearly his message, especially when it comes to foreign policy. He is drawing heavily on his résumé as a crime-fighting mayor who has seen the horror of terrorism to convince voters that he is the candidate who can lead the country in a time of war.

Mr. Giuliani struck other central themes as well this week on a four-day campaign swing that ended in South Carolina on Thursday. The nation must find a way to become energy-independent, he said, promising as president to undertake an effort comparable to the one that put man on the moon. He said he believed there was broad agreement that human behavior was a factor contributing to climate change.

And, he said, it is time to eliminate the estate tax and vastly simplify the tax code.

But it was the Iraq war and efforts against terrorism on which he was most impassioned.

Until this week, Mr. Giuliani’s views on Iraq were not well known. But on this trip he made clear, though never mentioning President Bush by name, that he firmly supported the administration’s current strategy, including Mr. Bush’s decision to send more than 20,000 additional combat troops there.

In an interview, Mr. Giuliani did say there had been mistakes in the execution of the war, including what he described as failure to send enough troops initially and the decision to dismantle the Iraqi Army that had served Saddam Hussein. He also said there had not been the effective communication and leadership needed to convince Americans that the war was crucial to their security.

But the criticism ended there. At a house party in New Hampshire on Monday, he said the United States would most likely be fighting in Iraq for a long time, “unless there is some kind of miracle.” He attacked the “dangerous and irresponsible” Democratic effort for a withdrawal timetable.

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He has a good message. I would add to it another aspect of the dangerous and irresponsible aspect of the Democrat strategy for defeat. He should make clear that retreat from IRaq will not end this war. The enemy we are fighting in Iraq is the same one we are fighting in Afghanistan. Retreat will give the enemy more resources and space for his future attacks on this country.

What Giuliani and McCain are now doing is something the Bush administration should have done a better job of. They are saying why it is important to win this war and they are attacking the irresponsibility of the Democrats. They can hammer that irresponsibility by focusing on the fact of the Democrat fantasy about the consequences of defeat in Iraq. They may see some short term political gain in losing, but they will be setting us up for future conflicts with insurgencies anywhere we face a weak but determined enemy.