How to Get out of Iraq
I repeat:
My article, "How to Get out of Iraq,", is now out in The Nation.
Here is a copy of an email I sent about the piece to a discussion list:
Just to clarify in light of . . . comments, I was not proposing an optimistic scenario, or, indeed, any scenario at all.
I was simply saying that Saudi Arabia and Iran do not have to have a proxy war in Iraq if they don't want to have one, and that it is possible for them to take the prudent steps that would forestall it.
Many commentators present the prospect of such a war as inevitable or as preventable only by a continued US military presence. The US presence, however, has made things worse every single one of the past three years, because it unwittingly removes the incentives to compromise from local Iraqi forces and helps to paralyze the neighbors from playing a prominent role. Remove the US military from the equation, I am arguing, and it is far more likely that all parties concerned will begin behaving more responsibly.
I cannot guarantee that outcome. I can say that the past 3 years do not make me sanguine that things will get better with a continued US dominance.
I also wrote to an email discussion group:
With regard to the fate of the Iraqi Kurds if the US withdraws: I don't believe that the US troops are doing the Kurds of Iraq any good. There are very few US troops in the north. Are there any at all in the KRG? There are some near Kirkuk. Some 3000 GIs were recently withdrawn from Mosul and sent to Baghdad as part of the current security plan.
The Kurdistan Regional Government is stable and relatively secure because over 60,000 well-armed and well-trained Peshmerga provide security. The Peshmerga are recognized by the Iraqi constitution as the legitimate security forces of Kurdistan, so there is no reason that the US cannot go on supplying and training them. I don't believe there is any evidence that they need US ground troops in order to survive. The Peshmerga are the best and most committed indigenous military force in Iraq and virtually the only part of the Iraqi army (where they have been detailed to it) that have consistently stood their ground in firefights.
The Kurds needed protection when Saddam was in power and had 4,000 remaining tanks with which to menace them. That situation has changed.
As for the politics of the situation, the same thing applies here as elswhere. The Kurdish political leadership under Massoud Barzani has been remarkably inflexible with regard to key demands of the Sunni Arabs, and I believe that this inflexibility derives in some large part from a conviction that US troops will protect the Kurds and so they need not negotiate with the Sunni Arabs as equals. Remove the US from the equation, and I expect everyone will be more flexible.
Labels: Iraq War
posted by Juan Cole @ 4/09/2007 12:36:00 AM
|
Facebook
13 Comments:
We have to wonder if there are other issues at work, other stakes at risk, other fears when considering the Saudi concerns about Iraq. Certainly, the religion angle is important to those in the region, with the Saudis wanting to protect their 'brothers' from a delegitimised American occupation of the neighbouring country. The continuation of the American presence is very much a dollar-driven enterprise, the contractors making unlimited amounts of money and the strength of the United States and its currency in jeopardy should their be additional signs of weakness on the military front.
The Saudis would stand to gain quite a bit from increased influence on their parts, not only being seen as the 'Big Brothers' of Islam but in terms of investment for reconstruction and reconstitution of Iraq. We all know about the Saudis' younger 'brother,' Usama bin Laden, whose family has made oodles of money through construction. Seeing that Halliburton is having problems with its 'Dick' (Cheney), it seems almost natural that the Saudis would be able to step in to assist their fellow Arabs, not only on religious terms but financially and militarily. And, is not Halliburton becoming essentially an Arab company, coincidentally enough moving to the UAE?^
Saudi preeminence would be, to the Buscists' chagrin, a great coup for the Saudis and the Arabs overall, all of whom would eventually see the fall-out from WW One coming to fruition, locking out the 'Western' powers again, perhaps once and for all. Of course, the inherent dangers include increased funding of the terrorists through reaping of profits from the Saudi-Iraq cooperation, with UbL (or his disciples) gaining from the Great Oil Dominion (GOD) and its stranglehold on the World's energy markets, something like Saddam Hussein wanted to do but in reverse. The recent 'offer' to 'Israel' about peace probably has put that constitutionless entity on notice that the Saudis will not spend their money frivolously as the Americans have. Recent obstructing of American weapons sales to Saudi Arabia provides some support for the notion that 'Israel' has some additional concerns.
* * * * * * *
Further on Pelosi, there is an article from Der Speigel by J Conason available (see below*).
It seems almost curious that whenever someone needs to be boiled in oil over some Middle Eastern discussion or dispute, the disreputable become women, in almost every case. Prior to the Operations Desert Shield/Storm, one Ambassador April Glaspie was blindsided by the Bush41s about Kuwait. Then, there was Operation Iraqi Freedom and Valerie Wilson. (Interestingly enough, it was Joe Wilson who was in the limelight for both occasions as the last man in Baghdad. "He later told the Washington Post newspaper that the message to Saddam Hussein was: "If you want to execute me, I'll bring my own [expletive] rope.""**) Now, we have Nancy Pelosi in Syria who didn't look much different in a headscarf as numerous of her (and her husband's) co-religionists, forebears, and their relatives would look on their way to some event where respect was to be shown, Mass for example. Of course, the Buscists' darling 'Socks' Wolfowitz gets a pass for his lack of savoir faire, when even the giant raise given to his wife recently wasn't enough to even buy darning thread much less some nail cippers and new socks! But, then again, he's the man with the plan, head in the clouds and doing the nornal, routine, mundane things in the dark, still having dreams of flowers and scented oils spread before him on his stroll through the Baghdad marketplaces, the consummate Platonic Guardian/Conqueror.
^ Halliburton bails out of Iraq, KBR and now America
http://www.halliburtonwatch.org/news/dubai.html
* URL: http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,476030,00.html
To Damascus with Nancy Pelosi
** http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3156166.stm
Dr. Cole, ................. you propose to fix the mess in Iraq with a grand scheme that requires the cooperation of many different nations and many different leaders and factions within Iraq. This is the same false-hope desiderata that has sucked in the Baker-Hamilton group, the neocons, and everyone else who is proposing to impose a solution on the Iraqis who consistently reject having outsiders impose anything.
There is another way. We can humbly recognize our failures and inabilities and choose to help the Iraqis themselves to secure and stabilize their communities.
Sure, you think that US designed and US controlled elections are a vehicle for discerning the will of the people, and a tool to coalesce cooperation and cohesion. Let me refer you to the recent elections in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Pick a city. Al-Faloojah is as good as any other. Empower the authentic indigenous local leaders to build up a local security force. Put those USAID billions that have been enriching US corporations and expatriates into the hands of these local leaders. Respect their dignity and rights to self determination. In 90 days you get a stabilized city.
Only then can projects for economic growth, infrastructure reconstruction, etc take root. This is a worthwhile experiment. It would be so very encouraging to produce, after all our investments and losses, the first community to benefit from our invasion and occupation.
Could you comment on this story by Steven R. Hurst please Professor Cole.
http://tinyurl.com/3dhfw4
It doesn't seem to make sense, both CBS and ABC have it on their web sites. Isn't Al-Qaida in Iraq a Sunni group? Are they attacking other Sunni's who "are banding together to expel foreign fighters" ? Isn't that what Al-Qaida in Iraq wants to do, to expel foreign fighters?
Dr. Cole:
The current state of Iraq seems to indicate that the only course to try is that which you suggest, in which an unequivocal statement of intent to withdraw is combined with negotiations among regional leaders and the Iraqi factions. What other course is there? If we remain, at best we are refereeing a civil war, and, more likely, we are stooges for the Shia extremists. (Note the pictures of the--likely Shia--Iraqi celebrating the deaths of British servicemen. The "stable area" of Iraq obviously hates the occupation as well).
And, withdrawal would allow redeployment to Afghanistan, which is on the verge of being lost. For all the ballyhoo, even network journalists there realize Karzai is simply mayor of Kabul and the country is in danger of falling again into a terrible civil war with a resurgent Taleban. We need to triple the troop presence in Afghanistan to defeat the Taleban and that can only happen with a withdrawal from Iraq.
Better to sue for a reasonable peace and then win one war that's winnable (recognizing "winnable" must have a flexible definition in the ME and South Asia), rather than losing both wars.
As Avid Student pointed out, the need is indeed for humility, not more cleverness relying on the cooperation of many. Nobody can devise a solution demanding the cooperation of everybody else, until we first humble ourselves. For one thing, only then can we be minimally sane, so that others can with some safety work with us.
We all know this is how it works in our relations with others, and among nations and other groups it's the same. And innocent blood really does inebriate those who drink it - hence the drunken stupor displayed by the Americans in this whole matter.
I think the quest for remedies that do without the Americans humbling themnselves is rooted in the realistic assessment that that will not happen. But not having an essential ingredient will not magically make it unnecessary. Just because I don't have motor oil does not mean I can therefore somehow get by with salad oil. God might work such a miracle, but hardly to enable violent people to continue comfortably in their arrogance.
The American people are fundamentally indifferent to the lives of their hundreds of thousands of victims, or to the use of torture and many other abominable acts, as has been the case for 400 years - ask the Indians, black slaves, dead Filipinos, and many others. The politicians of both parties who make their livings by calculating these things correctly have all done the same arithmetic and arrived at the same answer.
Although no one wants to hear it, the truth is that there is no solution that enables us to remain impenitent about callousness and mass murder. This is what Americans and others have correctly told the Germans and Japanese about WW2, advice that Americans now need to take ourselves. Otherwise, there are no solutions - as the proverb says, "He covers his sins shall not prosper; he who confesses and forsakes will find mercy."
No one has ever proven that wrong, and no one ever will.
Dear Mr.Cole
You wrote "Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah has credibility with Iraq’s Sunnis,
especially now that he has denounced the US occupation as illegitimate. "
This is totally wrong. Abdullah is nothing but an unelected corrupt dictator so he has no credibility at all. Sure a lot of Iraqis are against the occupation and want troops out, but that does not mean that suddenly a brutal dictator has credibility becouse he choose to say what Iraqis have been saying for years now. The day Abdullah is brave enogh to open his country for democracy and freedoms for all and give back the money he stole from the Saudies only then can he be creadible.
I fully agree with you that Bush is seeing too much when it comes to US troops leaving Iraq. Much of the violence came with this invation and it will go away when US troops leave too. Its always very important to remember that with regards to Iraq the time to use good solutions has sadly passed afew years ago, now we have less bad ones.
'''
These are practical things that can be done if people really want to.
* The centre of it all resides in shifting from military solutions to political and humanitarian solutions.
* U.S and its allies must admit that military attacks have only resulted in more violence, death, hate and destruction and not peace.
* U.S gives Iraqis a timetable for leaving Iraq within 365 days. This is what the majority of Iraqis have been asking for years and nowadays it’s even what the majority of what people in the U.S. want too.
* Until then any foreign troops are under the United Nations General Assembly rule, they represent the UN.
*
Accepting Indonesia’s offer of sending Indonesian, Malyaisan/Asian troops for peace operation mission in Iraq.
* Start a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, get help from South Africa in this issue.
* New democratic elections in 12 months.
* Iraqis rule Iraq
* Iraqis are offered the jobs in their country. Stop importing workforces from aboard when million of Iraqis are unemployed and all they want is to work. Start reconstruction!
* Political militias are forbidden.
* Foreign militias/mercenaries/private armies must leave Iraq immediately.
* When the above is put in action then the real Iraqi resistance must stop its military attacks on occupation troops and its allies. They are now on their way out of Iraq.
* Put together the original Iraqi army. It will work as a good control mechanism on the streets in Iraq. This army is the one that protected Iraq in the war against Iran. This will increase the chance to more people working together with them. This will increase the stability in the Iraq cities and clarify who still does not understand that violence against Iraqis is unacceptable.
* Under UNs Compensation Commission the US and its allies become liable under international law to pay compensation for losses and damages resulting from U.S invasion and occupation of Iraq.
* Foreign troops must be accountable under Iraqi law. The immunity that Bremer gave them is not active any longer.
* Iraq becomes a member of the ICC. Until a system is set up in Iraq this is also where Iraqis who have commited crimes against thier own Iraqi people will be put on trial.
* All contracts and laws that have come up since the invasion must be stopped; it will be the next government to in full transparency to review them.
* All “foreign advisers” that have been appointed by the occupation are to leave Iraq immediately.
* All U.S. and other foreign military bases that have been built shall all be closed in 365 days. Thereafter it shall be open for Iraqis to move into. Iraqis who lost their home in this war.
* Parties must be based on political ideologies. Not race, not religion, not which foreign country that supports you.
* The current parties that have had political or economical support from a foreign country are allowed to participate in the elections coming up in 8-12 years. This will allow “free parties” to develop and “non free parties” to come back clean!
* Since the elections are in 12 months, then the first 6 months are for parties to formulate their political programs. Then we have 5 months for these political programs to be available to the Iraqi people and let the debate start! Month 12 there is election.
* Independent election monitors from the UN or even better from Amnesty International.
* Starting up peaceful dialogues with neighbouring countries to work on the longer perspective for peace in the area.
* Opening Amnesty International offices in every city and village in Iraq. Opening offices for well established international peace organisations in every city in Iraq. Letting these hold seminars, training sessions, and workshops on topics of human rights, solving conflicts thru non violence and working on the empowerment of civil society groups that are found in Iraq and establish more.
Also start a campaign of having these seminars and training sessions in all political parties, parliament, army units, new Iraqi police stations, Iraqi schools and work places too!
*
Starting an anti corruption campaign, here I believe Finland can lend a helping hand.
* Starting democracy and human rights courses on TV, radio, newspapers and Internet. Here I suggest Switzerland to be the country to lend a hand!
All this can be accomplished and these suggestions work from grass root levels and up and that is what is needed if we want any country to succeed! Its clear from the last years military actions that change is needed, these suggestions are some steps towards that, they can develop and become even better too. We have to start somewhere...
'''
Best Regards
Nadia
Dr. Cole writes:
"The key to preventing an intensified civil war is US withdrawal from the equation so as to force the parties to an accommodation. Therefore, the United States should announce its intention to withdraw its military forces from Iraq, which will bring Sunnis to the negotiating table and put pressure on Kurds and Shiites to seek a compromise with them. But a simple US departure would not be enough; the civil war must be negotiated to a settlement, on the model of the conflicts in Northern Ireland and Lebanon.
Talks require a negotiating partner. The first step in Iraq must therefore be holding provincial elections . . . ."
No, no, no. Not convincing. This is more of the same Neo-Con Rubbish (NCR) about elections as the way out. Power in Iraq comes out of the barrels of guns, not the ballot box. What keeps Sunnis from selecting their leaders ("deciders") is the insurrection against American occupation. The occupation must be lifted before the Sunnis can sort out who is to bargain for their interests against the Shia.
I associate my comments with those of Avid Student (above).
Nadia,
many good ideas in your comments, but I must question your points on militias and a national Iraqi Army.
I am a former infantry officer. I have operated in an unstable theater, though not Iraq. Believe me, the people of Iraq - especially of the Sunni areas like Salah ad Din and al Anbar - live their lives in constant fear. They cannot give up having a militia or some other security force that exists specifically for the protection of their specific community, whether defined by clan or party or sect.
Right now, there is no possibility of creating a truly national Iraqi Army. The Army today is controlled by and sympathetic to the ambitions of Shi'a and Kurd leaders. I don't have a source for this, but I believe the people of al-Fallujah are more afraid of being occupied by a Kurdish force or a Shi'a force than by the Coalition forces.
To start the stabilization of the Sunni-majority areas, we are going to have to accept a general amnesty for insurgents. Remember how the USA got past its own Civil War.
Next, we are going to have to learn to accept and work with the militias or local security forces. These exist not only to protect the local populations from Coalition forces, and to force them out, but also to protect against Kurdish and Shi'a forces, including the official Army and National Police units.
Most of the time when you read about Iraqi Army units fighting insurgents, these are Kurdish units fighting Sunni insurgents. Most of the time when you read about Iraqi National Police units fighting insurgents, they are Shi'a units doing the fighting against the Sunnis.
USA is a signatory to the Hague and Geneva Conventions. Most of them, anyway. Through these treaties we acknowledge that Sunnis have a right to defend themselves. But even if we were to tell Sunni communities that they must accept genocide and slaughter and that their communities must accept their fate to vanish from the face of the earth, how persuasive can such an argument be ? These militias cannot be defeated militarily. We can only co-opt them.
It is crass realpolitik for me to posit the local leaders get to raise and maintain their own local security forces. And to say that we should turn responsibilities over to these forces that are actually able to root out the terrorists, which US forces are not able to do. And to suggest that US tax dollars go to support these units that were recently fighting against our troops. But guess what ? Hope is not a strategy.
Empowering the authentic indigenous local leaders to stabilize their own local communities ain't much of a strategy either, until you realize that that is the only path to stability at any level.
It stinks that we have to pay the salaries of the guys who were the insurgents just a couple of weeks earlier. But this is the only path to US success. So hold your nose.
http://www.ajr.org/Article.asp?id=4301
AJR Features
From AJR, April/May 2007
Obstructed View
Extreme danger and sky-high security costs have diminished the press corps in Iraq and severely limited access to a deepening morass. The result is a
clouded picture of perhaps today´s most important news story.
By Sherry Ricchiardi
A Really Really Smart Mouse
One of the main reasons the U.S. was defeated in the Vietnam War because the American people lost the will to continue to fight. The successful execution of Dau Tranh, or the “struggle”, led to the famous exchange between the late Colonel Harry Summers and North Vietnamese Colonel Tu:
“You know you never defeated us on the battlefield” said the American Colonel. To which the North Vietnamese Colonel replied, “That may be so, but it is also irrelevant.”[17]
Timeless Theories of War in the 21st Century
Colonel David S. Maxwell, USA
Small Wars Journal Vol 3
continues
Present and Future Found in the Roots
Today, theorists such as COL Thomas X. Hammes and William Lind describe the apparently new way of war in terms of 4th Generation Warfare. Lind and four Marine and Army officers coined the term 4th Generation Warfare in 1989 in an article in the Marine Corps Gazette in which they defined this most succinctly as idea based warfare.[6] COL Hammes has updated the theory and described it in terms of current operations in Afghanistan and Iraq and applies it to potential future conflicts around the world in his book, The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century. The underlying premise is that the U.S. military is facing new and complex threats posed by the natural evolution of the nature of war. While many characterize this “new” form of war as heavy on psychological or information warfare they also describe it in terms of a David and Goliath conflict in which a weaker combatant can use unconventional or asymmetric means to defeat a technologically and numerically superior adversary. Another way to look at this form of warfare is simply that in the 4th Generation the weak adversary does not fight fair and does not conform to the traditional rules of warfare; e.g., the principles of war. According to Lind and Hammes today’s warfare is networked, relies heavily on the indirect approach, is a highly evolved form of insurgency, and most important, is focused on influencing the enemy’s will.[7] Influencing will is the essence of today’s warfare. But is it really new?
That's the William Lind I knew in the early 70's when he was Robert Taft's Defense Policy LA..the same I guy I quote intermidably...
His view is exactly that of the Brit quoted above and has been for years now - the US has lost the war in Iraq and is fast on its way to the same fate in Afghanistan.
American private in the First Battalion, Fifth Cavalry quoted in today's NYT assessment of the "Surge"
The insurgents, they see what we’re doing and we see what they’re doing. Then we get ahead, then they figure out what we’ve done and they get ahead.
It’s like a game of cat and mouse. It’s just a really, really smart mouse.
In what way is encouraging local indigenous leaders to develop their own security forces any different from essentially creating lots of little warlords?
I'm uncertain that this would be a useful exercise.
Sometimes a top-down approach is indeed the best option, it's not always automatically wrong.
Yes, Mike, "Model Communities" does create a patchwork of islands of stability, each run by a little Napoleon. Not my first choice, if there were other choices that made communities stable enough for people to resume nearly normal lives, with access to food, water, electricity, whatever. But it is the only option that creates stability without having to employ genocide.
Eventually, these mini-me dictators will have to find ways of cooperating with the warlords of adjacent islands of stability, and of dealing with adjacent regions that have not been stabilized.
To get fuel oil delivered, and food rations, deals will be made. Tit for tat, baksheesh, realpolitik, alliances, regional alliances, and after a while - years, maybe - these islands join together under common governance. After more years, maybe the Governates of the Saddam era become self-governing, self-defending sub-states.
Don't you cry when you think about the terror and destruction the liberation has wrought ? Wouldn't you sacrifice the chance of creating an Israel-friendly national government for the possibility of letting these besieged people have one night's sleep in peace ? Me, too.
Warlords suck. But if they are the only ones who can make life tolerable, then maybe they can be tolerated for a while. Iraq was a fairly modern, secular country not that long ago. If we can help them build a foundation of stability, the Iraqis will soon get their communities on track to where they want to be.
President Bush has spent the last four years demonstrating that Iraqis reject colonial subjugation. Why not build on that lesson ?
Exotic Ho Chi Minh City, still referred to as 'Saigon' by many, has preserved its distinctly Asian feel and ancient culture, where monks pray in the numerous pagodas, temples and mosques. The capital Hanoi, is a pleasant and charming city of lakes, shaded boulevards and public parks. The old quarter, built around the Hoan Kiem Lake, is an architectural museum-piece characterised by its narrow streets. Halong Bay, with its 3000-plus islands rising from the clear, emerald waters, dotted with beaches and grottoes created by waves, is one of Vietnam's natural marvels.
Post a Comment
<< Home