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Edited on Fri Jun-17-05 02:47 PM by Jackson4Gore
Here, read this. He talked about it on Hardball yesterday:
REP. HAROLD FORD (D), TENNESSEE: A few weeks ago, I returned from my third trip to the Middle East, once again reminding me that, in war, there are no Democrats or Republicans, just Americans.
I‘m Harold Ford Jr. and I approve this message because, this Fourth of July, I hope all of us will take a moment to remember those brave Americans fighting to make the world freer and our country safer. Let‘s work hard to bring them home soon and with honor. Make them as proud of us as we are of them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTHEWS: Congressman Ford, why not just leave it to President Bush, the commander in chief, to make these calls?
FORD: The Congress and the country are making sacrifices as well.
And, most important, our troops are.
One of the things we‘re asking the commander in chief to do—and, as you know, I‘ve been one who has supported the administration. I supported their money requests in the Congress. I supported their resolutions that have called for the authorization—or, I should say, the use of force.
What I think we need now is some idea of where we go from here, not a definitive timetable, but some map to how we can begin to not only draw down troops, but see stability won in Iraq. I‘ve not been there and don‘t have the expertise that the other guest in the studio has.
But I can tell you, after talking to troops on my third trip there, listening to leadership on the ground, things were a little less safe for those of us traveling in the region. And, frankly, I‘m a little less certain that we have as firm an idea as to how to achieve our objectives there as we did just as recently as a few months ago.
MATTHEWS: Let me go to Harold Ford, back to Congressman Ford again.
And the question that always gets asked when you push any kind of timetable or any kind of headline congressional resolution that we‘re calling on the president at least to begin to talk about a timetable, the enemy, in this case, the insurgents in Iraq, read on their local newspaper, in their local newspaper, U.S. Congress calls for deadline for U.S. involvement in Iraq. Don‘t they have a big party at that point and say, we‘ve won?
FORD: Sure, they do.
But I don‘t think we‘re asking for some definitive date here. I think what‘s being asked for is the fact that we have to try some new approaches there. Since 9/11, Congress and the American people have given the president the benefit of the doubt in just about everything he wanted to do in Iraq. We find ourselves now, with elections having passed, and frankly more car bombings, more violence, and, in a lot of ways, less stability.
Furthermore, the way that the Iraqi people really measure our progress on the ground is by the restoration of basic services, from electricity to water to sewer systems. And we still have a long, long way to go there. The only point I make—and some others in Congress may have a different point.
But the only point I make is, lay out for us, Mr. President, what the strategy is and what the road map is to achieve these things. I‘m not asking for a March ‘06 date or an October ‘06 date, as some are asking for. But give us a sense of how we can accelerate the training of the police and military forces that General Petraeus is leading there in Iraq.
Give us a sense of how likely it is that Sunnis and Shiites can get along to write a constitution that contemplates questions this day and 50 years from today. And, equally important, how is it that we can provide whatever resources may need, within reason, to help the Iraqis restore their basic services and resume a life with the basic necessities that any American and for that matter any other citizen would want for their children?
That‘s the benchmark. And, frankly, those are the goals that we need to lay out. And I hope the president will see fit to do that.
MATTHEWS: Would you accept a proposal like the colonel has just offered, whereby we don‘t say timetables; we don‘t say by March of 2006 or March—April, but what you do say is, following the election of a legitimate government, the establishment of a constitution, the inclusion within the government of sufficient Sunni representatives to make it a balanced and complete government, and following six months of relative calm, we leave?
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: I mean, I‘m not sure what else we would do. I mean, what else could we set as a goal if it weren‘t what I just went through?
FORD: Well, I think you‘re right. The colonel has done far more than the president has done up to this point, because the president hasn‘t articulated those things.
And this is not meant to be harsh or negative towards the president. This is just real. There are too many families having loved ones serving overseas right now. There‘s too many families whose loved ones are on their way back to Iraq. I just think that we owe the country and particularly those families and men and women in uniform an idea of what we‘re trying to accomplish and provide them with the resources needed.
One idea I also propose—and I would love to hear the colonel‘s thoughts on it—is perhaps we should consider sending—not my idea, but I‘ve heard some others throw the idea around as well—but consider sending some of the military and police trainees, Iraqi trainees, to other countries for training, much like big companies and medium size companies in this country do with training exercises and retreats, where they send employees off site to gain a better understanding and to gain training.
Maybe, if we did that, it would slow the process just slightly. But we would ensure we would get the kind of troop and kind of police officer, security officer that we want for that country. I just think we need some new approaches and new ideas to make this thing work. I‘m as committed as anyone to seeing us win stability in Iraq and bring our troops home.
And the two have to go hand in hand. And that‘s what I meant in my ad when I said bring them home with honor. We have to win there and we have to find a way to do it better than we‘re doing now.
MATTHEWS: When we come back, I‘m going to ask both gentlemen to explain to me how we prevent the following from happening. The minute we bring to draw down our troops over there, the enemy begin to accelerate its attacks, just like in Vietnam, making us rush out all the faster.
We‘ll be back with Colonel Hammes and U.S. Congressman Harold Ford in just a moment.
This is HARDBALL, only on MSNBC.
MATTHEWS: OK. Let me go to Congressman Ford on that.
Do you—do you fear that any kind of explicit plan for withdrawal will encourage the enemy to attack us in our withdrawal?
FORD: You know, I think the colonel said it best. And I think some other colleagues of mine in the Congress have as well.
The greatest threat we face I don‘t believe is the insurgents being more emboldened. They seem pretty emboldened now. The greatest fear or threat that we face in Iraq is if the American people lose confidence and support begin to diminish here for the efforts. And, unfortunately, I think we‘re headed down that path pretty fast right now.
I—I‘m gauging it from at home, from military families, from those who have supported this effort all along who are now wavering, not wavering in their support of the troops and wanting to win stability in Iraq, but who are questioning whether our policies and our approaches and ideas there are working.
MATTHEWS: Were we right to go to Iraq, Congressman?
FORD: That question is irrelevant. We‘re there and we now have to win.
If all of us had 20/20 vision back then about where we would be now, I doubt the president would have won authorization.
MATTHEWS: OK.
FORD: Or won the votes for authorization. But we are where we are.
MATTHEWS: OK.
FORD: And we have to win.
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