"I think we are winning. Okay? I think we're definitely winning. I think we've been winning for some time." - Gen. Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on the Iraq War 04/26/05
"I just wonder if they will ever tell us the truth." - Harold Casey, Louisville, KY, October 2004.
Juan Cole points to this article (America ponders cutting Iraq in three by Sarah Baxter Times of London 10/08/06) in his Informed Comment post of 10/08/06. Baxter reports that James Baker's Iraq Study Group (ISG) may recommend a loose federation of three strong regions in Iraq. This story has the feel of a "trial balloon" leak to test reaction in various quarters. The ISG report will essentially be the Establishment alternative to the Cheney-Bush stay-the-course rolling disaster. (For more on the ISG, see Bob Dreyfuss' articles A Higher Power: James Baker puts Bush's Iraq policy into rehab Washington Monthly Sept 2006 and The Fixer Meets His Match American Prospect Online 09/20/06.)
Cole explains some of the major reasons why the three-state solution (even with a loose federation) will continue the disaster:
This is a very bad idea for so many reasons it would take me forever to list them all. But here are a few:
1. no such loose federal arrangement would survive very long (remember the post-Soviet Commonwealth of Independent States?), so the plan leads to the dismemberment and partition of Iraq. This outcome is unacceptable to Turkey and Saudi Arabia and therefore will likely lead to regional wars.
2. The Sunni Arabs, the Da`wa Partyand the Sadr Movement are all against such a partition, and together they account for at least 123 members of the 275-member parliament. Some of the Shiite independents in the United Iraqi Alliance are also against it. I would say that a slight majority in parliament would fight this plan tooth and nail. The US cannot impose it by fiat.
3. The Sunni Arabs control Iraq's downstream water but have no petroleum resources. If the loose federal plan ends in partition, the situation is set up for a series of wars of the Sunni Arabs versus the Shiites, as well as of the Sunni Arabs and some Turkmen versus the Kurds. Turkey, Iran and Saudi Arabia will certainly be pulled into these wars.
It is not good for the region to have a series of wars over Iraq. It is not good for the security of the United States, since those wars will probably involve pipeline sabotage by guerrillas and will likely disrupt Middle Eastern oil flows. (Did Americans like $3.20 a gallon gasoline and $300 a month heating bills? Would they like to try $15 a gallon gasoline? What do you think would happen to the world economy?)
Finally, I just don't believe that the Arab and Muslim worlds would ever forgive the US for breaking up Iraq, and there are likely to be reprisals if it happens. (my emphasis)
We should remember, of course, that whatever prospects of a genuinely good outcome to the Iraq War disappeared long ago. Actually, they probably disappeared on the day the mass looting started in Baghdad and other cities, while Rummy response was to giggle and declare that freedom is "untidy".
On the theme of the foreign policy "wise men" to salvage something from the disaster known as the Iraq War, see also Bob Dreyfuss' Iraq's Reality Sinks In TomPaine.com 09/08/06 and his blog post November surprise? 10/07/06. I know these are several links to Dreyfuss. But he's really been on top of this aspect of the war.
If this becomes the "smart money" alternative on Iraq, then expect to see all kinds of people jump on the bandwagon as a way of being critical of the Iraq War to distance themselves from the obvious failures there while still being safely "realist" and level-headed. Also, if that's what the ISG recommends, this will probably become the conventional wisdom among our so-called "press corps" as well.
"Wars are easy to get into, but hard as hell to get out of." - George McGovern and Jim McGovern 06/06/05
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