Robert Koehler argues that developing a healthy fear of large-scale military intervention may be the only silver lining of the Iraq War in his column, “Iraq Syndrome:”

This won’t be Vietnam, exactly. No helicopter whisking the last remaining Americans off the roof of the embassy. A contingent of 16,000 State Department contract employees — more than 5,000 of them armed mercenaries — will be staying on, running what’s left of the American operation in Iraq.