All wet on Iraq withdrawal

Re “The GOP’s Iraq cave-in fallacy,” Opinion, July 2

Max Boot says we cannot reduce troop levels and hand over power to the Iraqis because the last time we tried, violence increased. By this reasoning, we may never leave. While the Shiites and Sunnis despise each other, they despise outsiders more. The slight progress Boot points to in Anbar province was a case of working with local tribal leaders to drive out foreign Al Qaeda fighters. We can continue to do that at much lower troop levels without refereeing the many sects, tribes and clans that are apt to fight for supremacy of Iraq for many years to come.

CHRIS HARGET

Campbell, Calif.

*

Boot seems like a healthy young man who obviously is patriotic and believes in the course our government has chosen. Someone should lead him by the hand to the nearest recruiting office and sign him up.

WALT JONES

Leominster, Mass.

*

Boot has come up with the latest justification for keeping our forces in Iraq: to forestall Al Qaeda kingpins from gloating over our “defeat.” One of the many menus for withdrawal proposed by experts is to announce now that our troops will be out of Iraq (not the Middle East) in 12 to 14 months. That would not be defeat; that is coming to our senses.

Yes, Mr. Boot, bad things will happen if we withdraw. Terrible things have happened because we didn’t withdraw sooner, and because we went in the first place, the way we did. The Bush administration arrogantly disparaged Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eric Shinseki’s estimate that hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops would be required to secure Iraq. Mr. Boot, just maybe, Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and other Republicans are abandoning Bush’s folly for principled, not political, reasons.

MAITLAND B.

ALEXANDER

Moorpark