This is Floyd Wynne with THE VIEW FROM HERE (10-28-04)

How important is the war in Iraq?

It has been at the center of the Presidential campaigns, and one has to wonder what Kerry would do if he is elected. He has been a dove on war....witness his criticisms of the Vietnam conflict...his vote against the Gulf War...and his early criticism of the Iraq war as the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time.

However, I will say with conviction that if we lose the war in Iraq...or fail to prosecute it to victory....America’s influence in the world will be at rock bottom.

Let’s take a look at military history since the end of World War Two. While we were all still basking in the victory of that war....a new conflict broke out in Korea. Our forces marched north to the Yalu River only to have the Chinese enter the conflict...and despite pleas from MacArthur to enlarge the campaign....President Truman declined....America had to withdraw to the 39th parallel where we are today with South Vietnam.

Then....after Presidents Kennedy and Johnson had gotten us embroiled in Vietnam.....the American public lost its will to fight...and again we did cut and run....leaving the country in the hands of the Communists.

Then there was Mogadishu where we panicked with rebels dragging some of our airmen through the streets....and again...we cut and ran.

In the last 59 years since the end of World War Two we have only the shining military examples of the Gulf War, Afghanistan....the little conflicts in Panama and Grenada.

The insurgents in Iraq are well aware of the fact that the American public.....conditioned by the television media....have a tendency to cut and run when it comes to armed conflict. Already those same forces are at work in the Iraq conflict.

If we lose here, we will no longer be a superpower...despite our strong military. The world already views us as mostly a paper tiger.

True...when we were attacked on September ll, 2001...attitudes changed, but the unified America then fell apart and is now a badly divided nation

Europe has put its house in order with the unified effort and they will have to be contended with for world domination in the future.

Our influence, if we lose in Iraq, will be in danger not only in the western hemisphere, but more so in the Pacific Rim as well as in the Middle East.

It has been reported that the insurgents forces in Iraq have been greatly augmented by other fighters..../El Quaida as well as disgruntled Iraqians. A victory here by the U.S. and the establishment of a form of democracy in the area will be a body blow to the rebel forces around the world.

We certainly cannot afford to cut and run in Iraq...or even settle for a plan that leaves the Iraqis to fight their battle against the insurgents alone.

A tremendous amount of the future of the United States in the world is at stake. We cannot afford another defeat.

This is Floyd Wynne and that’s THE VIEW FROM HERE.