September 5, 2008 3:06 PM

A Truly Stupid Idea

Today's Wall Street Journal revealed that the Pentagon is considering a request from the Shiite government of Iraq to purchase 36 advanced F-16 fighter planes.

The article indicates that a prime advantage to the Pentagon is that it might allow our own Air Force to draw down its current presence. Over the past year, air power - that is bombing - has escalated rapidly to lower the deaths of American soldiers, with the obvious side effect of killing more Iraqi civilians.

Of course, the biggest beneficiaries of such a sale would be the politically well connected Lockheed Martin, which makes the fighters and Iran, the backer of the most important political parties in the governing coalition, who no doubt would love access to the details of the fighters, which are currently in the inventories of several neighboring countries.