Break-Up of Iraq Threatens Mideast Stability
Mahmudiyah Bombing Kills, wounds Dozens
The Guardian reported Saturday on the 8 options for Iraq allegedly being considered by the Bush administration:
1. British out now. This is possible, but as the events in Amara on Friday show, will be attended by instability.
2. US and Coalition troops out now: ' "We could pull out now and leave them to their fate," a [British] Foreign Office official said. "But the place could implode." '
3. Phased withdrawal. (Can be easily derailed by events.)
4. Talk to Iran and Syria.
5. Remove Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in favor of a strongman. (Iyad Allawi, the CIA asset and former Baathist thug has been mentioned.)
6. Break-up of Iraq
7. A US retreat to super-bases.
8. One last push.
The most promising thing on the list is talking to Syria and Iran, but apparently even that would be done not by the US but indirectly. I'm not sure indirect contacts are enough. I'm sorry that a continuous and inexorable phased withdrawal of US troops is not on the list. It could be done by making a rule that once the US force level falls to level X, it cannot again exceed that number no matter what. Otherwise, I don't see anything on this list that will help the situation much less resolve it. No. 8, "one last push" is the stupidest and most dangerous tactic of all.
Liz Sly reports on how the prospect of an ethnic and religious partition of Iraq terrifies local Middle Eastern elites, who fear the consequences for other Middle Eastern countries. Ethnically diverse Syria could go in the same direction. Or south Lebanon could become a Shiite mini-state. Sly quotes Syrian President Bashar al-Asad:
' "Imagine a necklace that breaks and all the pearls fall to the ground," he told the German magazine. "Almost all countries have breaking points, and when the ethnic-religious break occurs in one country it will not fail to occur elsewhere too. It would be as it was at the end of the Soviet Union, only much worse. Large wars, small wars: No one will be able to get a grip on the consequences." '
She also quote International Crisis Group project director Joost Hiltermann,
"there is also a risk that neighboring states will seek to pursue their own agendas and turn the country into a regional battleground, said Joost Hiltermann . . . "We'll have a replay of the Iran-Iraq War between the Iranians and the Arab states over what's left of Iraq," he said. And for a part of the world whose borders were drawn less than a century ago by British and French administrators, the consequences could indeed be dire, Hiltermann warned. "Everything here is new, a century old. The system has endured, but once it comes unstuck, anything can be challenged," he said. "It's madness, but if Iraq falls apart madness will rule the day." '
If Americans think that these sorts of big changes in the Middle East will leave them unaffected, they have another think coming.
Sunni Arab guerrillas killed three Marines in al-Anbar province on Saturday, bringing the October death toll for US troops to 78.
Five cycle bombs in Mahmudiyah south of Baghdad targeted markets busy with shoppers preparing for the Festival of the Breaking of the Fast (Id al-Fitr), killing at least 20 and wounding 50. Another bomb hit a bus of shoppers returning from Baghdad, killing 4 and wounding 15.
The Mecca Declaration, a joint ruling of Shiite and Sunni clerics from Iraq, forbidding a Muslim to shed the blood of another Muslim, is in danger of going unheeded, according to close analysts of the region.
Be that as it may, the declaration is historic. According to al-Sharq al-Awsat [Ar.], it maintains that the differences between Sunnis and Shiites are a matter of personal interpretation (ta'wil), not a difference over basic principles (usul). To have such a declaration sponsored by Saudi Arabia, which adheres to the Wahhabi branch of Islam that was historically negative toward Shiites is a conceptual revolution. The statement has implications for Sunni-Shiite relations in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc.-- not just in Iraq.
Events in Iraq demonstrated that Western Powers could use the Sunni-Shiite divide to help overthrow governments, dominate major countries in the region, and even break up whole countries. The regional elites are increasingly deciding that Sunni-Shiite ecumenism is necessary to avoid more of these disasters.
Saudi investors are eyeing Iraq after the passage of an Iraqi law on foreign investments.
Digby at Hullabaloo on the relations of US soldiers with Iraqis.
Atrios on Yglesias on the illogicality of the US partitioning Iraq. Only, Muqtada al-Sadr is against partition and is a strong Iraqi nationalist albeit with a Shiite tinge.
posted by Juan Cole @ 10/22/2006 06:29:00 AM
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15 Comments:
The way Bush and Blair are conducting the war in Iraq reminds me of the way war was conducted in the Eastern front in WWII and in the Western front in WWI. It seems that after some time the leaders are unable of thinking straight and just want to "win" no matter the cost.
I am quite sure they will try the strategy #8 at least once one. More likely they will continue doing so until they cannot but give up, cut and run before a complete collapse.
"If Americans think that these sorts of big changes in the Middle East will leave them unaffected, they have another think coming."
I know you're not in the business of making predictions - unlike ignoramuses like Bush, Cheney and the Neocons for all seasons - but it would be very interesting if you could expand on this point a little bit. What could happen? What do you think is likely to happen? Or indeed perhaps invite some of your specialist colleagues and readers to go down this road a wee bit.
Many thanks.
The Baker Watch
The idea of devising specific steps that Mr. Maliki would have to take was described by senior officials who support the plan but would speak only on condition of anonymity. Their willingness to discuss a plan that has not been fully drafted appeared intended at least in part to signal renewed flexibility on the part of the administration, and perhaps also to pre-empt the recommendations of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, a commission led by James A. Baker III and charged with formulating a new strategy in Iraq. It is expected to issue recommendations late this year or early next year.
Happy days.
A blend of options #1 to #7 will probably occur, inconclusively, but buying Bush time to pass on the dilemma to a successor. His official biography will claim that it was a "victory" that the next guy botched.
Option #8 (one last push) is what the Far Right always insists was missing in Korea and Vietnam. The H Bomb or massive killings were supposed to vindicate the US and bring triumph. Now the Neocons rally for this in Iraq or Iran. Privately, they know this would be futile, but publically it is useful to discredit others.
One can already smell a "who lost Iraq?" intrigue in which the evidence and arguments will make Roswell and Elvis sightings, by comparison, seem like mathematical proofs. Lost causes engender myths even more potent than those favored by victory, since people need to save face. Iraq is an especially scarey case because, other than oil geology, there is little anyone will ever agree upon.
Most original advocates of the war have retreated into mumbling or scapegoat Rumsfeld or Bremer, neither of whom did they challenge in 2003. Ajami is an expert at doubletalk.
Prof. Lewis, don't fade away just yet. Please, get Martin K. to help you write one more book. How about "What Went Wrong: Iraq [mea culpa]" for a title?
"If Americans think that these sorts of big changes in the Middle East will leave them unaffected, they have another think coming."
golly, I laughed when I read that! If you think Americans think beyond their noses, you have another think coming!
Americans are a study in willful ignorance and willful apathy.
Yes, I do have a bad opinion of them, even as I walk among them.
The U.S. is broken up geo-typographically into Fifty States (add Territories too). You have Catholic Hispanic concentrated in some States more than another, and so as African Americans, Cubans, Amish, Mormons and others. The U.S. even had a Civil War over sectarian issues of sort.
The unifications of Iraq into one country were an artificial and faulty one in the first place. United by the Colonialists under Sykes-Picot to become Iraq out of the vast Ottoman region called Al-Sham. Under Ottoman rule the provinces in Iraq were segregated locally but remained under one Islamic, Ottoman umbrella.
There is simply too much animosity between the three warring factions in Iraq to be able to work together and rule as One Country. It is not possible. People unite because they see benefits and strength from such a union. They may unite to face common enemy or for economic reasons. None of these factors are on he ground now in Iraq or the region.
You need to read my earlier comment on a previous thread (posted under the Syrian Nationalist Party) about why Iraq will never see the light and this situation will remain at loggerhead for a long time.
What the Levant lacks is strong leader with a strong organizational and leadership skills and a strong plan that can give everyone the confidence, be independent and yet remain glued to a wider National Agenda. They need to see benefits from the plan and have confidence that the Nationalist leader is not yet another Western Imperialist stooge.
The West will most likely assassin such a leader and wipe his organization off quickly. They are only interested in having weakling, subservient leaders, each ruling his sheikhdom and signing all the proposed contracts on the dotted line, paying for it by all the country’s cash and keeping his subject in mud huts. Most importantly, be quite when none of the contract terms are delivered even when paid in full, arrest, torture, vanish any citizen that raise a voice of complaint about such a contract or performance under it.
The conflict in Iraq today, is not a conflict between Sunni, Kurds and Shia. It is a conflict between those that wants to see the Levant become another Malaysia and Singapore and those that just wanted to see it as the Hebrew Territories of Halibutonstan.
The Bush Administration is not fooling anyone in the Middle East, they not even trying anymore (that is why the youth of the region are fighting), they are working hard on fooling the football, baseball, flag and cross baring Americans at home.
...after the passage of an Iraqi law on foreign investments.
Ah ha!! The first piece has fallen into place. Has the new hydrocarbons law been passed yet?
I find myself shuddering at the prospects that breaking up Iraq has for the rest of the region.
I cannot agree that partition is inevitable as 'Syrian nationalist party' would have us believe. Partition has an ugly history (one only needs to look towards India and Pakistan; or the former Yugoslav states for recent examples).
Furthermore, in Iraq, I would argue that an overarching 'Iraqi' identity still exists that the American government overlooks when it homogenizes the population into Shi'a, Kurdish, Sunni and Turkmen. To break up the country along Shi'a, Kurdish and Sunni lines would not only have territorial implications, but on a societal level, the break-up of family loyalties would also have to occur as Iraqis historically have intermarried.
What a mess.
Researchers back Iraq toll report
Researchers have said the controversial estimate by public health experts that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died since the March 2003 US-led invasion is likely to be an accurate assessment.
Dr David Rush, a professor and epidemiologist at Tufts University in Boston, said: "Over the last 25 years, this sort of methodology has been used more and more often, especially by relief agencies in times of emergency."
The study, published earlier this month by the Lancet medical journal, employed a method known as "cluster sampling" in which data are collected through interviews with randomly selected households.
Critics, including President George Bush, have said the results are not credible, but Rush said traditional methods for determining death rates, such as counting bodies, are highly inaccurate for civilian populations in times of war.
As predicted, Weekly Standard editor and neocon stalwart Bill Kristol on Fox News Sunday sounded the trumpets for option no. 8 -- Win or get out. Surge of troops to Iraq, etc. etc.
"You have Catholic Hispanic concentrated in some States more than another, and so as African Americans, Cubans, Amish, Mormons and others."
In what states are concentrations of African American, Amish, Mormons???
And the Civil War was fought for the same reason every war is fought: control of the area and the resources.
In short, greed.
Juan is right when he says that the Mecca Declaration is revolutionary when it comes to Saudi Arabia- though evolutionary might be a better term. To say Shi'ism is a matter of ta'wil rather than usul goes against their original brand of Islam, and shows how far they've come in the last 50 years. It won't, however, have much effect on Iraq; revenge trumps theology hands down, and there's enough revenge claims now to last a while. This is civil war at its worst.
While all attention focuses on Baghdad and the south, it's Kurdistan - now quiet- that will be the test in the end. I don't see Barazani or Talabani giving up the larger Kurdistan dream, and Israel and the US will be more than glad to ignore it for the sake of bases and influence. One can hope Salah al-Din (himself a Kurd, after all) would be an image to bring the Kurds and Arabs of Iraq together, but nationalism, ethnic nationalism, trumps that. The PKK may be quieted for now, but not for long. Traditionally, Iraq, Iran, and Turkey jointly controlled the Kurds' push to a Greater Kurdistan; now, Iraq is helpless and the US protects the Kurds. At the very least you can expect that the US "mediator" in Ankara will become a permanent position. At worst, you can expect a war between Turkey and Iraq with Iran quietly helping Turkey.
Ayham al-Samarrai
Mr Cole, I wonder if you have any thoughts on the Sunni former electricity minister, Ayham al-Samarrai, charged by the anti-corruption "Public Integrity Commission" of misappropriating millions of dollars and irregularities in contracts he signed, arrested, found guilty by a court, sentenced to 2 years jail and then spirited away by the US military to "US protection" See here
Is this politicaly embarrasing to the Bush government, which is supposed to be opposed to corruption?
Option #8 (one last push) is what the Far Right always insists was missing in Korea and Vietnam. The H Bomb or massive killings were supposed to vindicate the US and bring triumph. Now the Neocons rally for this in Iraq or Iran. Privately, they know this would be futile, but publically it is useful to discredit others.
One can already smell a "who lost Iraq?" intrigue in which the evidence and arguments will make Roswell and Elvis sightings, by comparison, seem like mathematical proofs.
Uh-huh. They started hammering out the retooled Dolchstoß boilerplate excuses even before they launched the invasion. (Not that it's been that difficult; they'd already translated it from the original German back in the 1960s and substituted 'liberals' for 'Jews' when they tried to blame us for 'losing Vietnam'.)
Wow! The Guardian is way, way off.
WHAT WILL HAPPEN IN IRAQ OVER THE NEXT YEAR.
If predicting the future in Iraq were harder, perhaps I could make some money off of it. But that future is so darn easy to foresee that I don’t dare quit my day job.
CONTEXT.
Start by looking at what entity rules Iraq. The occupation army, misleadingly called the Multi-National Force-Iraq, is the de facto government of Iraq. It controls those parts of the country that are under any control, with the promising exception of Iraqi Kurdistan. It answers to the US military Commander in Iraq and the US Ambassador in Iraq. The so-called Iraqi Government lives and works under the shelter of the protection of these occupation forces. The so-called Iraqi Government exercises only nominal control over the Facilities Protection Service, the Iraqi National Police, and 2 brigades of the Iraqi Army. The rest of the Iraqi Army is under the operational control of the US commander of MNF-I.
The US Ambassador has frequently overruled decisions of the Iraqi parliament and the Iraqi Prime Minister. In addition to being the power behind the throne, the occupation army also decrees the law of the land. The Prime Minister, who has disappointed the US Congress and the US President lately for failing to show enough initiative, actually does not have the power or authority to exercise initiative.
Next, look at what it is that the occupation army hopes to achieve. President Bush says that he is hell-bent on achieving “Victory.” Although he has wisely abandoned the “National Strategy for Victory in Iraq” that was released late last year, parts of it are still operative. To him, Victory now means achieving a state:
• where Iraqis can govern themselves democratically,
• where the country can be stabilized and secured,
• where the government left in place goes after the terrorists and neutralizes the insurgency, and
• where the government is friendly to US interests.
Pragmatically, earlier this year the President has abandoned the pie-in-the-sky goals of restructuring the economy on an American model and ensuring that the Iraqi government is friendly to Israeli interests.
CHANGES COMING AFTER THE ELECTION.
The Iraq Study Group chaired by Secretary James Baker has a crucial role in the refinement and maturation of the President’s goals for Iraq. This committee will finally persuade the President, if not the Vice President, that it is not possible to neutralize the insurgency. The underlying reason is because the vast majority of Iraqis in most of the country either is part of the insurgency or is committed to supporting the insurgency due to the deaths, destruction and indignities wreaked by our soldiers, airmen and marines on their families. “Victory” in defeating the insurgency can only be accomplished by killing at least another 18 million Iraqi civilians, and that is not an option.
Once the President understands this, and he really is a smart guy and will grasp this immediately when it is presented by a trusted advisor, then he will also understand that it is not possible to leave behind a US-friendly Iraq.
The Iraq Study Group has another invaluable contribution to make. As politely as he can, Secretary Baker will explain that the Iraqi people do not believe it is the prerogative of the US President to decide whether or not the country is split up. Iraqis still resist the mindset of being a colonial subject, subject to the whims of a distant emperor.
The President will then recognize that he is powerless to dictate the form of government in Iraq. As explicated in the next installment, the breakup along ethnic lines is almost unavoidable, but this decision will be made by the Iraqis themselves. He will also come to understand that the question of whether Iraq becomes a democracy, and if so, what type of democracy, is also out of his hands.
DOWNSCOPED GOALS.
At this stage, later this year after the election, The President’s new sense of what would constitute “Victory” in Iraq will be boiled down to achievable essentials:
• Iraqis govern themselves,
• the country is stabilized and secured, and
• the government left in place goes after the terrorists.
PROGRESS TOWARD THE NEW GOALS.
General Casey and Ambassador Khalilzad are already working toward these new, revised goals. It appears that this effort has been coordinated within the Pentagon and the State Department, but not yet briefed to the White House.
On Friday, 20 October, Secretary Rumsfeld started preparing the American public for what Victory is going to look like. He admitted in a news conference that a resolution in Iraq will have to include a general amnesty for people who participated in or supported the insurgency in attacks against American forces. Last year, when the Iraqi Prime Minister proposed this, the US Congress prohibited it. Well, there won’t be any stability or security as long as the occupying power dictates – as a Dictator – that people who fought against oppression are to be treated as criminals and terrorists.
I certainly feel the same revulsion as Congress at the idea that the people who killed or injured our soldiers will get away with it. But we should have anticipated this turn of events when our war of liberation turned into a war of conquest, domination and occupation. The blame for this rests with the generals and politicians who let this happen, just as much as with the Iraqis who ended up fighting against our troops for the freedom and safety of their families.
On Saturday, 21 October, a State Department official who answers to Karen Hughes, the President’s confidant, was interviewed on al-Jazeera TV and apologized for American arrogance in Iraq. Mr. Alberto Fernandez said the US was now willing to talk to the insurgents (but not terrorists) to promote reconciliation in the country.
Last month, Ambassador Khalilzad arranged for clandestine meetings with the leaders of the insurgency in western Iraq. These secret negotiations, going on now in Amman, are figuring out the extent to which cities and communities in this Sunni region will be able to govern themselves without interference from the Shi’a and Kurd-dominated central government in Baghdad. The authentic indigenous leaders of Ramadi, Fallujah and Haditha are offering to go after the terrorists in their areas in exchange for being able to run their own local governments. They are offering to guarantee the safety of US convoys going through regions they control. They are willing to guarantee that oil pipelines and electrical infrastructure will not be damaged. All they are really asking for in return is to be left alone. These people will not instantly become our allies, but they are willing to stop attacking us if we will just show them a minimum degree of respect.
In a way, the resistance movement is offering to hand us victory in western Iraq, if we will just be humble enough to accept it.
This is not the first time that there have been secret talks to settle this part of the Iraq disaster. A year ago, General Casey met personally with the resistance leaders in Ramadi. It was pretty much the same deal that was offered: if we let the authentic leaders of these communities run their own communities, then they would stamp out the jihadist terrorists and foreign fighters. It made a lot of sense. After all, they know who the foreigners are, and who the fundamentalist terrorists are, and we don’t. It is impossible for our troops to fight this battle and win. Our troops can’t tell a terrorist from a typist. Our troops treat everyone like a terrorist, and this just increases hatred of the occupation.
Unfortunately, this deal fell through. On orders from his boss, General Abizaid, General Casey insisted that the local leaders of the Sunni communities in western Iraq must accept the rule of the central government in Baghdad. What this meant in practical terms was that, as US troops were withdrawn, they would be replaced by either Kurdish units from the Iraqi Army or Shi’a units from the Iraqi Police. Of course, the local Sunni leaders thought that these units would be even more brutal in their occupation, and might conduct genocide operations against the local population. General Abizaid refused to accept those dire predictions and wouldn’t budge. The community leaders had to reject this outrageous condition, and the deal fell through.
So what’s different now ? Well, General Abizaid has seen the start of internecine civil war and now understands that the Sunni leaders were right to reject hostile occupation by Kurds or Shi’a. He now accepts that the Sunni in western Iraq should be permitted to not only govern themselves, but also to provide for their own local security.
What is the appropriate response to this opening ? We should be putting as much reconstruction money into Iraqi hands as we can. We should be empowering these local leaders who want what’s best for their communities, because if they can create secure and stable communities in western Iraq, with or without our help, it means that we have achieved our goals there.
By June 2007, the US military will have withdrawn completely from the al-Anbar Governate, and it will be a legitimate victory. In the meantime, we will conduct an orderly handover to local militias, even conducting some joint patrols with the same units that were attacking our forces in 2006. Out of respect for their culture, we will institute mechanisms for acknowledging the harm these families and communities have suffered. We will make modest payments to compensate for these losses and find a way to show respect for the Iraqis we killed, without necessarily apologizing. And all of this will only be possible because we allowed neighboring Sunni Arab countries to play a role in deciding future strategies, instead of going it alone on everything.
VICTORY IN THE REST OF IRAQ.
I’ll save that for the next installment. The next part isn’t quite as obvious, but it depends on this first success in the Sunni al-Anbar.
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