Congressional Republicans, quite predictably, are now declaring “We told you so!” while insurgents storm Iraqi cities and threaten to launch an all-out civil war in a country once occupied and governed by the United States of America.

Let’s cool it a bit, ladies and gents.

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/06/john-mccain-iraq-criticize-barack-obama-107780.html?hp=t3_3

Sunni Muslims — from the very same sect that gave us Saddam Hussein — have launched full-scale attacks on key Iraq cities. They’ve taken Mosul and Tikrit and are believed to be headed toward Baghdad. The Iraqi armed forces are trying to defend the cities, but so far with little success.

The Iraqis are asking President Obama to supply air power to strike hard at the insurgents. Republicans are demanding it, too. That might be a good option for the president to employ if we can bring enough air power to bear.

Republicans opposed the president’s withdrawal from Iraq, contending that the country wasn’t yet ready to defend itself fully against terrorists and insurgents.

Thus, they’re yelling it loudly that they were right and Obama was wrong.

Sen. John McCain — who never met a war he didn’t want the United States to fight — has demanded the resignation of the president’s entire national security team, including the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Let’s look back, though.

* Was it prudent to launch a war against Iraq in the first place back in March 2003, when President Bush declared to the world that Saddam had chemical weapons and was going to develop nukes to launch against Israel? It turned out he had neither.

* Did the Republican president misread more than a decade ago the Iraqis’ ability to transition from totalitarianism to democratic rule when they had no history ever of living in freedom and liberty?

* Remember when Vice President Cheney said we’d be greeted as “liberators” and not “occupiers” when we invaded Iraq and toppled Saddam Hussein? It didn’t happen. The war continued for years afterward, costing us more than 4,000 young American lives.

* And aren’t Americans just sick and tired of war? Don’t public opinion surveys tell us over and over that we no longer have the stomach for wars with no end?

The Iraq War went bad from the get-go. President Bush made a colossal mistake in linking Saddam Hussein to the 9/11 attacks and that, I submit, is what we are reaping today.

So … the current president ought to order air strikes at the insurgents and try to put down the attacks without the use of ground forces. We’ve got plenty of ordnance we can drop on the bad guys.

As for the carping and chest-thumping on Capitol Hill, how about speaking with one voice and letting that voice belong to the commander in chief, who’s got to make the tough calls?