Dan wrote:
I don't see it as that black and white. Our presence helped fuel the
insurgence. The stupidity of the initial policy gave it a chance to
flourish and grow. But, I don't see our leaving as ending it.
You're right it isn't as cut and dried as I made it sound.
At the present time, the US is the controlling force in Iraq. It does
have trouble suppressing the insurgency, no doubt, but it prevents other
forces from being dominant. The present goals of the US, getting the
Iraq armed
forces trained to the point where they can at least hold their own with
militias and insurgents and to nudge the political factions into a
coalition
government.
Yes, we've heard that mantra for quite a while now and it becomes less and
less convincing. If we can't train an appreciable force after being there
three years, how long is it going to take?
Everyone seems to agree that Al Qaida is provoking the sectarian
violence, and that they consider the U.S., not Iraq, their enemy.
AQ certainly considers the US an enemy. But, they also see moderate Arab
governments as enemies, or at least pawns of the US. They are not
inherently opposed to the people of Iraq, but they are inherently
opposed to Iraq developing into a moderate Arab state, such as Jordan.
Do you believe that they will be able to recruit as easily once we leave?
Do you think that they will become the dominant force? Do you think that
they will attract as much financial support once we are gone?
If that happens, and the parliament actually runs the company, then Bush
would have succeeded in Iraq.
If he is forced by congress and public pressure to withdraw, he'll get the
credit? In any case who cares who gets the credit?
Tom Friedman had two very good columns on Iraq in the last couple of
weeks. Unfortunately, he's now premium content at the NY Times, so I
can't quote
him exactly. In one of his columns he looks at three possible outcomes
in Iraq.
First, he states that there is still some chance that a coalition
government will form, and the Iraqi troops will be well trained enough
to be the
strongest force in Iraq...at least enough to hold their own against
insurgents and militias. This is the best possible outcome.
Second, if we withdraw, and the outcome is civil strife/civil war, the
middle outcome would be seen. It would be a mitigated disaster, if you
would. The Iranian influence on the Shiites would be tempered by that
natural Persian/Arab distrust (which goes back centuries). The influence
on/acceptability by the Sunni's by AQ would lesson, without the US to
hold up as occupiers. The conflict would be bloody, with significant
human
rights violations by the militia common place (e.g. death squads, mass
killings of civilians), but it would probably not draw in other nations.
The third alternative is that we sit there and "babysit" the
disintegration for years to come. We'll always hope that things will
get better, but we'll still be identified as the one to make them worse.
Obviously, this analysis tends to lead one to conclude that we can't just
stay in Iraq. Yet, it isn't a call for a quick, immediate withdrawal.
Rather, it seems to call for a transition from the US being the
controlling force to Iraqi forces controlling Iraq. Ideally, of course,
it would be the forces belonging to the elected central government.
More realistically,
both militia power and the power of elected representatives would need
to be considered in Iraq. That is probably the best case scenario we
can now hope for. Worst case is a civil war that turns very ugly,
drawing neighboring
countries into the fight. I do not think the Sunni governments around
Iraq would stand by and let Sunni civilians be killed by the tens of
thousands, for example.
One final point: it appears that we finally have competent people on the
ground in Iraq. Training the Iraqi military and having an ambassador who
actually understands the region are gigantic steps over our initial
foolishness. If we implemented the present strategy, if Bush used the
post war plan developed by the State Department from the very beginning,
it is
probable that things would be significantly better than they are now.
Indeed, history may show that Bush succeeded, through his arrogance, in
snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
I think what we've got now _is_ civil war, that our pressence exacerbates
the situation and that, as Buckley puts it "One can't doubt that the
American objective in Iraq has failed."
http://www.nationalreview.com/buckley/buckley200602241451.asp
or
http://tinyurl.com/pt4oe
--
Doug
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