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Freedom in Iraq will be Revolutionary to the Middle East
I’ve heard this from alot of our men in uniform. They get it. Iraq is not just about Iraq. Our fighting men and women understand the larger vision for the Middle East and how winning in Iraq is central to our security here at home.
In Iraq, a veteran Marine gunner sees a war to be won
Chief warrant officer says that the US mission in Iraq will be ‘revolutionary’ for the Middle East.
By Gordon Lubold | Staff writer of The Christian Science MonitorHABBINIYAH, IRAQ - Marine Gunner Terry Walker says the Iraq war is still America’s war to win.
As pressure builds on the Bush administration to give the war its final push, Gunner Walker is a stalwart. This 51-year-old marine, on his third tour in Iraq, is the face of members of the US military who say the job can still be done, despite the odds.
Walker, a wiry intellectual with glasses and a chirpy exuberance, joined the Corps at age 17, straight from high school in Rittman, Ohio. Now, he directs training for the Iraqi security forces at a US base in Anbar Province, driven by a personal quest to help transform the Middle East. A serious guy, he says the US war in Iraq will have a “revolutionary” impact on the region.
. . . Walker typically summons his heroes as he interrogates visitors in a Socratic style in hopes that they will come around to his way of thinking. And he’s forthright in a military where political opinions expressed publicly can be poisonous. A proud subscriber to the conservative National Review magazine for 26 years, Walker freely owns up to his “red-state” views.
“I believe that a stable, secure Iraq at peace with itself and its neighbors is critical to the security of America…. Iraqi freedom, democracy, and self-government may not necessarily look like America, but it will prove revolutionary in the Middle East,” he said in an e-mail.
To hear Walker tell it, every job he’s had in the Marines over the years seems to have been in preparation for the one he holds now. “I’ve never been in a position where I thought I was having a bigger impact.”