Surrender & Rendition

Congressional democrats have proposed a deadline for beginning the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. President Bush and his supporters call this a policy of surrender.

"Surrender" sounds bad, especially to those who think that "winning is the only thing." But an etymological look at the word suggests that a "surrender" isn' the same thing as defeatism or cowardice.

"Surrender" comes to English from the Old French "surrendre," meaning "to give back." Tracing the etgymology further we come to the Latin "dare" "to give." From the same source we get "rendition," as in "a rendition of an old ballad," in other words, a performance given to an audience.

Thus the idea of "giving" is at the heart of "surrender." In the present case, "surrender" might be interpreted as giving Iraq back to the Iraqis, an act that the President promised to do from the start of the war. There is nothing ignoble in returning property to its rightful owners.

Of course, we may not be sure who, exactly, are the rightful owners of Iraq. But waging a war might not be the best way to find out who is.