Hagel Opposes Troop Build-Up in Baghdad

Chuck Hagel, Republican Senator of Nebraska, is making headlines again by decrying the decision by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to extend the tour of the 172nd Stryker Combat Team and send them into Baghdad to quell the sectarian violence that is escalating daily in the capitol. (Mosul was quiet until the 172nd pulled out. As soon as they were gone, violence flared. Hence Senator McCain's analogy to a game of "Whack-a-Mole.")

Hagel denounced the decision by Rumsfeld as wrongheaded and stated his belief that there were no good options left for America in Iraq. "Where we go from here ... is a cold, hard assessment that Iraq is not going to turn out the way we were promised it would, and that's a fact, not because I say it -- that's the way it's going," he said.

This is not a new position for Hagel. No rat desserting a sinking ship, Hagel has been calling for a troop withdrawal for over a year. A Viet Nam veteran, and a purple heart recipient who still today has shrapnel in his chest, Hagel understands the nature of war and the necessity to sometimes engage militarily.

But with no good options left, Hagel called on President Bush to appoint his father, George H.W. Bush and former president Bill Clinton, who brokered the Dayton Accords, to embark on a diplomatic mission to convene a regional peace conference.

This sounds like a damn fine notion to me. Send Jimmy Carter with 'em.