It doesn’t surprise me that many of the far left continue to describe those who are killing citizens and coalition forces in Iraq as “insurgents”.  It also doesn’t surprise me that those same leftists refer to America’s presence in Iraq as “an occupation”.  The terrorists in Iraq are clearly not insurgents and our presence in Iraq is clearly not an occupation of that nation.  I can only conclude that this terminology is just another way for the left to diminish the accomplishments made by America in Iraq and to “blame America first” for all that is wrong in the middle east, if not the rest of the world. 

Thomas L. Friedman (New York Times, December 26, 2004) has written a very thoughtful commentary on the topic.  Mr. Friedman is probably more liberal than conservative and he has spoken out frequently against the way the war in Iraq was entered and the way in which it is being prosecuted.  Still, he is has a clear vision of what the so-called “insurgents” are about and what they represent.  The title of his commentary is ‘Insurgents’ defending a nation?  No, they’re the face of evil.  I have selected a few excerpts from the commentary.

“This is a war between some people in the heart of the Arab-Muslim world who -- for the first time ever in their region -- are trying to organize an election to choose their own leaders and write their own constitution versus all the forces arrayed against them.  Do not be fooled into thinking that the Iraqi gunmen…are really defending their country and have no alternative. The Sunni-Baathist minority that ruled Iraq for so many years has been invited, indeed begged, to join in this election and to share in the design and wealth of post-Saddam Iraq.

“As the Johns Hopkins foreign policy expert Michael Mandelbaum so rightly pointed out to me, ‘These so-called insurgents in Iraq are the real fascists, the real colonialists, the real imperialists of our age." They are a tiny minority who want to rule Iraq by force and rip off its oil wealth for themselves. It's time we called them by their real names…Do not kid yourself that this is not what it is about: people who want to hold a free and fair election to determine their own future, opposed by a virulent nihilistic minority that wants to prevent that. That is all that the insurgents stand for.  Indeed, they haven't even bothered to tell us otherwise. They have counted on the fact that the Bush administration is so hated around the world that any opponents will be seen as having justice on their side. Well, they do not. They are murdering Iraqis every day for the sole purpose of preventing them from exercising that thing so many on the political left and so many Europeans have demanded for the Palestinians: the right of self-determination’.

“British prime minister, Tony Blair, said: ‘Whatever people's feelings or beliefs about the removal of Saddam Hussein and the wisdom of that, there surely is only one side to be on in what is now very clearly a battle between democracy and terror. On the one side you have people who desperately want to make the democratic process work, and want to have the same type of democratic freedoms other parts of the world enjoy, and on the other side people who are killing and intimidating and trying to destroy a better future for Iraq’.”

America’s goal in Iraq is to help its people create a government that will bring Democracy and freedom.  Our military men and women are fighting for that purpose, not to help America colonize Iraq.  They are not an occupation force.  They are a force for freedom.  Those who are killing Iraqi civilians and coalition forces are trying to prevent freedom from happening in order to preserve their own power over the Iraqi majority.  That is not insurgency; it is terrorism pure and simple.  They are the face of evil.

Leftists desperately want to see America fail in Iraq.  There motives are varied but apparently include political motivation (if the Bush Administration is successful the next election could be a reflection of the last two) and general hatred of President Bush (after all, he is a “cowboy” among the elite).  More troublesome is what may be the most significant motive behind the far left’s desire to see America fail:  The belief that America is an evil force in the world that needs to be stopped before it grows any stronger.  This motive not only overlooks all the good that is done by our nation around the world but continues to promote a socialistic/communistic agenda that is meant to overthrown America as we know it. 

For those reasons it is critical that all of us correct those on the left when they use words such as “occupation” and “insurgency”.  There is a great deal of power in the word and we cannot allow the left to go unchallenged when their rank and file uses words incorrectly.  Such wording, unchallenged could be one more step toward losing the nation many of us have tried to defend and which most of us love.