Category: Iraq

Uh-oh:

U.S. officials say they believe the law is likely to result in more ex-Baathists returning to government and hope none will be removed. But they recognize that the outcome depends on implementation, which will be overseen largely by a seven-member commission nominated by the Iraqi cabinet and confirmed by parliament.

"Will they name people who are liberal and nonpartisan, or is it going to be perceived as in the control of the people who have an agenda to purge Sunni Arab influence?" said a senior U.S. official. "That’s the first thing people will look at."

One antidote to campaign insanity is a brief purview of what on earth has just happened to the Middle East and what that might mean for the future. If that sounds worthy, you’re wrong. Jeffrey Goldberg’s new essay is one of those big, blue-sky think-pieces whose black humor actually made me laugh out loud at several points. Here’s a flavor from a Kurdish prison in Iraq:

The interrogator asked me if I had any questions for Omar. Yes, I said: Have you been tortured in this prison?

“No,” he said.

“What would you do if you were to be released from prison right now?”

“I would get a knife and cut your head off,” he said.

At this, the interrogator smacked Omar across the face with the Koran.

Omar yelped in shock. The interrogator said: “Don’t talk that way to a guest!”

Reality is likely to make one no more pessimistic than optimistic. The region defies both responses, I think. There’s a great NPod anecdote too.

A reader writes:

Bainbridge is focused on finding a way to package the problem to help his friends at the polls. He needs to focus on a way out for us; indeed, we all do. The public debate so far is "the surge is working" vs. "the surge failed." This is infantile nonsense. There are two tracks, which must be considered independently. One is the military track. Here the military has performed consistently with plans, but at a very dramatic cost (I am talking more about treasure than blood, but the latter is not to be dismissed lightly). 

The second is the political track. This has been a disaster. The situation has gotten continuously worse through 2007 because of the political disintegration in Iraq.

The centrifugal forces are more troubling than most seem to believe.  It’s not simply Kurd v. Sunni v. Shiia. The Shiia themselves are hopelessly fragmented. The US has all but completely lost its influence within the Maliki Government (this is the reason for the steady trickle of coup rumors). Remember that Baghdad refused to go to Annapolis.  That was a calculated slap in the face to Bush, just on the point on which Baghdad thought they could most embarrass him. Just think about it–how do you manage to do this with such massive resources in cash and such a powerful military presence at your fingertips? It’s a demonstration of the unequaled incompetence of the Bush Administration. And into this vacuum of failing American power steps Iran, exercising more robust influence than ever before. And that in turn eggs the Saudis and Gulf Arabs to their undercover dealings with the Sunnis.

So the US military achieved its military objective at great cost. But political ineptitude means that the US will have frightfully little political gain from the military’s sacrifice. We are looking at a situation in which our friends are ever more eager to wish us away, and even our friends are afraid to be publicly associated with us. This is a disastrous result.

But how many analysts take the time and make the effort to look just a little deeper into the situation?  The superficiality of the coverage and debate is frightening.  Iraq is a very big deal.  The threat to us is enormous. And there are no obvious or easy solutions, none.  It will be a matter of picking the least bad of a series of horrible alternatives.  Bush is to blame, of course.  Let’s note that for the record. But let’s be focused on finding our way forward in a field of quicksand.

Bainbridge sees this rubric as a reason to be more optimistic about eventual withdrawal from Iraq. My fear that he’s wrong stems from a few factors. First, 160,000 troops is not small, in the sense of a minor military engagement. Over 100,000 troops for at least ten years is not a small war by any stretch of the imagination. Secondly, this is Iraq. It is sui generis. It has foiled and defeated everyone who has tried to govern it for more than a very short length of time. It is primarily Arab and Muslim. If you do not believe that the Arab Middle East is one of the least tractable, most mysterious, inherently ungovernable regions on the planet, then you could muster some optimism. But any purview of history will disabuse you. This is a big war, sapping and trapping us for the rest of our lives.

Megan – who’s spent some time crunching casualty numbers and debunking the Lancet study – thinks this number should be taken seriously. It’s a horrifying number.