We have given the Iraqi Army the best weapons, the best training, the only air support in Iraq – so why can’t they defeat the terrorists? The answer we are told is they need more time to train. But that seems to defy common sense. They’ve had as much time for training as the terrorists – and more of everything else.

Well, you can argue, someone is giving the terrorists rifles, machine guns, armored cars, anti-aircraft batteries, ground to air missiles and training too – but still that can’t be a fraction of what we have spent on the Iraqi Army.

You can also argue the terrorists are fanatics, more dedicated, fiercer, more willing to sacrifice – but shouldn’t Iraqi army with a modicum of dedication and a preponderance of arms be able to hold its own?

We have spent three years in Iraq looking for an ally to help us build a democracy. Instead we have found ourselves allied with a government bent on doing what governments in Iraq have done for years – punishing its enemies. The Shiites, on the bottom for so long under Saddam, are in the saddle now. The problem in Iraq isn’t training; its that the ally we imagined – we’d find yearning for democracy – doesn’t exist.

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