The problem of Iraq is of a Shakespearean dimension. The incompetent administration of flawed policies has given us an Iraq in intense civil conflict. Sunnis battle Shiites, but need to keep an eye out over their shoulders for the Kurds, and within and between them are numerous other sub-groups taking up arms against a sea of other troubles. As bad as things are now, they easily become much, much worse. Sadly, and tragically, the only thing standing between the terrible and the horrible is the United States. Withdrawal without regard to the situation we have created would be immoral. Placing ourselves in the middle of a civil war is a betrayal of the flesh and blood Bush sent there.
I have little faith that this administration will figure it out because a successful strategy requires that they recognize the need to bring the world into the discussion. Including people to whom they refuse to speak.
Compare the approach in Afghanistan with how, why, and what the U.S. did in Iraq. That difference is what has, to date, prevented the kind of regional engagement necessary to any real resolution of Bush’s Morass. When Bush finally went to Afghanistan, there was no talk of using the new regime there as a stealth virus to infect the rest of the region with democracy; Bush didn’t promise that the new Afghan state would become Israel’s best friend in the region. If he had, he would have precluded the support of Russia, Pakistan or Iran for the war and help in securing the post-war Afghanistan.
Bush positioned everything differently when he lied us into Iraq. While we were all taken with the claimed threat of WMDs, the rest of the world was listening, with increasing alarm, to the neocon promise of using the new Iraq to transform the region. If there was any way that the neocons pulling Bush’s strings could ensure that Iraq’s neighbors would not embrace the American invasion of Iraq, it was by promising that, after we finish with Iraq, we’ll be looking around for the next “success”.
This strategic blunder only deepened the tragedy caused by the arrogant, inept refusal to plan for the post-Saddam Iraq. Given the long, complex histories of the competing factions in Iraq and the neighbors in the region, it really wasn’t too difficult to imagine that, if Iraq did devolve into sectarian conflict, the sects would look to sympathetic regional states for support – and guidance. It was therefore critical that the neighbor states be engaged and supportive before the fact. Unfortunately, Bush and his neocon handlers did everything they could to ensure that the regional players would see it in their best interests to play only in the shadows. With BushCo. continuing their talk of reforming the landscape of the region, the sponsor states and groups outside Iraq have no motive to work towards a unified Iraq.
It’s not too late. What is needed now are clear signals of a changed, and chastened, American plan for Iraq. Drop the regional reformation rhetoric and work at developing a vision for a unified, if federal, plan that all of the regional states can get behind. In other words, the primary motivation of American policy should be towards stabilization, not reformation.
This requires diplomacy. Diplomacy requires actual dialogue – we need to talk, directly, with the players in Iraq and the region. We don’t need to like them, nor they us. But we need them if we want to see Iraq stabilized. We’ll need the help of the United Nations and European Union to begin the discussion towards engaging the role players in, and alongside, Iraq. Eventually, this will include the appropriate introduction of the Arab League in the discussions. The Arab League could play a crucial role in bringing the Sunnis to the table. The United States needs to give up the determination to control the outcome in favor of a mediation, which necessarily means concession and compromise.
No one can say what the answer to Iraq will be, but we can be certain that it will not include continued domination and open-ended occupation; nor will it involve leaving with washed hands. The answer is not a threat to “shape up” before we “ship out”, whether we ship out on a temporal or event timeline.
Worst of all, the answer is not going to come from this Administration. Not now, it is too late for that. Thanks to the way Bush has failed miserably in this wrong-headed invasion, the best we can hope for now is to facilitate the discussion that will lead us to a possible answer.
Unfortunately, this Administration appears to lack not only the talent for, but also the emotional capacity to embrace, the discussion.
I have little faith that this administration will figure it out because a successful strategy requires that they recognize the need to bring the world into the discussion. Including people to whom they refuse to speak.
Compare the approach in Afghanistan with how, why, and what the U.S. did in Iraq. That difference is what has, to date, prevented the kind of regional engagement necessary to any real resolution of Bush’s Morass. When Bush finally went to Afghanistan, there was no talk of using the new regime there as a stealth virus to infect the rest of the region with democracy; Bush didn’t promise that the new Afghan state would become Israel’s best friend in the region. If he had, he would have precluded the support of Russia, Pakistan or Iran for the war and help in securing the post-war Afghanistan.
Bush positioned everything differently when he lied us into Iraq. While we were all taken with the claimed threat of WMDs, the rest of the world was listening, with increasing alarm, to the neocon promise of using the new Iraq to transform the region. If there was any way that the neocons pulling Bush’s strings could ensure that Iraq’s neighbors would not embrace the American invasion of Iraq, it was by promising that, after we finish with Iraq, we’ll be looking around for the next “success”.
This strategic blunder only deepened the tragedy caused by the arrogant, inept refusal to plan for the post-Saddam Iraq. Given the long, complex histories of the competing factions in Iraq and the neighbors in the region, it really wasn’t too difficult to imagine that, if Iraq did devolve into sectarian conflict, the sects would look to sympathetic regional states for support – and guidance. It was therefore critical that the neighbor states be engaged and supportive before the fact. Unfortunately, Bush and his neocon handlers did everything they could to ensure that the regional players would see it in their best interests to play only in the shadows. With BushCo. continuing their talk of reforming the landscape of the region, the sponsor states and groups outside Iraq have no motive to work towards a unified Iraq.
It’s not too late. What is needed now are clear signals of a changed, and chastened, American plan for Iraq. Drop the regional reformation rhetoric and work at developing a vision for a unified, if federal, plan that all of the regional states can get behind. In other words, the primary motivation of American policy should be towards stabilization, not reformation.
This requires diplomacy. Diplomacy requires actual dialogue – we need to talk, directly, with the players in Iraq and the region. We don’t need to like them, nor they us. But we need them if we want to see Iraq stabilized. We’ll need the help of the United Nations and European Union to begin the discussion towards engaging the role players in, and alongside, Iraq. Eventually, this will include the appropriate introduction of the Arab League in the discussions. The Arab League could play a crucial role in bringing the Sunnis to the table. The United States needs to give up the determination to control the outcome in favor of a mediation, which necessarily means concession and compromise.
No one can say what the answer to Iraq will be, but we can be certain that it will not include continued domination and open-ended occupation; nor will it involve leaving with washed hands. The answer is not a threat to “shape up” before we “ship out”, whether we ship out on a temporal or event timeline.
Worst of all, the answer is not going to come from this Administration. Not now, it is too late for that. Thanks to the way Bush has failed miserably in this wrong-headed invasion, the best we can hope for now is to facilitate the discussion that will lead us to a possible answer.
Unfortunately, this Administration appears to lack not only the talent for, but also the emotional capacity to embrace, the discussion.
3 comments:
Alas the Arab League is something of a sham. Partition makes sense only as the recognition of what will happen anyway and probably won't preclude greater bloodshed.
A year ago I agreed with you. Now it's time to go. It is also time for war crimes prosecutions and a national truth and reconciliation tribunal.
What we did was an act of unprovoked violence, like wife beating. After something like that there is nothing the perp can do to make it better outside of sincere apology and severe atonement, and staying the fuck away from the victim forever.
High-minded policy has no use whatsoever anymore.
I understand the analogy, but with wife beating you have a single actor with full responsibility.
As a nation, we bear a responsibility for the irresponsible actions of the people we put in charge of the place.
I don't suggest anything like staying the course, however.
What is going on there is the perfect storm of four forces with sometime complementary and sometime competing imperatives: sectarian civil war, nationalistic push back against American occupation, insurgent Saddam loyalists, and opportunistic aggitators.
Rumsfeld's "new army" now lacks the fire- and man-power to control any of these singly (perhaps with the insurgency as an exception). The combined threat is more than even a willing world can adequately handle by force -- even if a forced solution could be stable, a doubtful assumption.
I cannot avoid the conclusion that pulling out will leave the "victim" wounded and bleeding by the side of the road, with no hope for life-saving treatment. That is our collective responsiblity.
But, if we can somehow repair our dialogue with the world -- the UN and EU, in particular. That can form the basis of discussions with at least some of the sectarian groups.
At the same time, if we will only talk to Iran and Syria . . . . They need to be convinced that we are more dedicated to a stable Iraq than to a democratic one, that we are abandoning (at least for this decade) any designs for a democratic revolution in the region, and that we are giving up any thoughts of permanaent occupation. This will be hard work, since nothing we have done or said supports any of these propositions and they all appear at odds with current American policy.
If we can give them their required assurances, then they can be important calming forces. At that point, bringing in the Arab League can help bring around the Sunnis.
I don't like the notion of an imposed partition -- it assumes that the only issue is sectarian, and it is not. More significantly, I don't see enough of an upside for all of the actors to a straight partition. Even more important, I think the United States now needs to offer more humility and admissions of failure of vision -- let the talks lead us to what works best.
I suspect that a form of federalism will be where the mediations lead. But that discussion puts the answer ahead of the question.
But, if we are able to convice the states influencing the factions and actors in Iraq that there are mutually-beneficial possibilities of negotiated resolutions, that could dampen the violence coming from the nationalistic and sectarian forces.
And, since they overlap, would also do much to make Iraqi participation in insurgent and in outside aggitation much less attractive.
I haven't given up hope that a solution is out there, but I remain entirely unconvinced that this current American regime lacks the equipment to understand, or discuss, the problem.
IOZ states the case harsher than I.
The problem is a forked one: convince the world we know we are culpable and willing to do what it takes to make significant amends, then convince the American people of the necessity of changing, starting now, the USA's role in the world.
I said it over at my place a while ago: we can't solve the problem of Iraq without solving the problem of America first. That might take a couple more elections.
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