We have heard that the reduction in violence in Iraq over the last several months means we are on the road to victory. We have heard wrong! In order to gain a temporary respite from the violence that was killing about 100 Americans a month, the Bush administration has put in place a plan that is nothing short of insanity. Writing in the May/June issue of Foreign Affairs, Middle Eastern expert, Steven Simon, says American policy is stoking the forces of instability in Iraq.
There are three major forces in Iraq, all led by strongmen who have their own agenda, which may or may not include a peaceful government in that troubled nation. The Sunnis are basically what remains of the Ba’ath party that ruled Iraq under Saddam Hussein. The Shias, who were badly treated by the Sunnis and don’t trust them at all. Indeed, they hate the very ground on which Sunnis walk. The third faction is the Kurds, who have never considered themselves a part of Iraq and certainly don’t now. They want their own Kurdish nation, and believe me they intend to have it. Kurds will not be a part of Iraq in the future.
America now funds the Kurdish army called the Peshmerga. Yes they have their own army, well trained, battle tested (over the years, they periodically fought against the Saddam and the Iraqi army), and now well equipped with American arms. The Sunnis have temporarily joined the sahwa (or Awakening) to fight against al-Qaeda. The Shias get most of their funding from Iran. They are lead by the militant cleric Moktada al Sadr, who definitely has his own agenda. Sadr does not want a democratic government in Iraq. He prefers a theocracy, similar to Iran, with him at its head.
So here’s the U.S Arming anyone who will fight against al-Qaeda, mostly Sunni militia. According to retired lieutenant general William E. Odom, in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, sometime soon Sunni and Shia will go at each other and it won’t be pretty, but they will be armed with the best weapons American and Iran can provide. The General said, "Our policy allows all sides in this conflict to consolidate, rearm, and refill their financial coffers.” By the way, if you are wondering who General Odom is, he was once head of the NSA and is now a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, a high-level foreign relations think tank.
President Bush has said that our goal is to create an Iraqi state that will be an American ally in the Middle East. However, the current Iraqi government is a bit lopsided with people of the Shia persuasion. These folks have close ties to Iran. Once they are on their own (if they ever get to that point), they are almost certain not to do anything of which Iran does not approve. If Iran is our next big enemy in the Middle East, out policy is digging our own grave.
So some people say, we must stay the course in order to fight al-Qaeda. In his Senate testimony, General Odom spoke to that issue as well. He said, “The concern for a residual base for al-Qaeda if we withdraw is utter nonsense.” The Sunnis hate al-Qaeda because of the high-handed manner in which they treated Sunnis when they first came to Iraq, after the fall of Saddam. Kurds won’t allow al-Qaeda in their territory, and since Iran detests them, so do the Shiites. If we leave the Sunnis and Shiites on their own, they will soon destroy al-Qaeda. These terrorists are already on the run. Soon there will be no place remaining for them to run. Iraq is not the frontline of terrorism, as Bush and McCain have told us. The real frontline of terrorism is the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. That’s where al-Queada is and that were we should be concentrating our forces to fight them.
Right now we are experiencing as much of a victory in Iraq as we will ever get. It is time we faced up to the fact that our forces are stretched to the limit and it cannot be maintained much longer. How much more resources and, most important, how many more American lives are we going to spend trying to keep Iraqis from killing other Iraqis. We must stop dancing to the Baghdad Boogie and start playing a tune that makes sense for America.
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