Posted on 12/13/2006 8:02:47 AM PST by veronica
I don’t know how the poet Horace managed to get an advance copy of the report of the Iraq Study Group—everyone expects leaks, but 2,000 years ahead of time?—yet he seems to have managed it: “Mountains will be in labor, the birth will be a single laughable mouse.”
James Baker is an intelligent man, so it beggars belief that he favors every one of his simultaneously obvious and unlikely recommendations. (Sample: “Syria should control its border with Iraq.” Yep, it should. And all the young men of Al Qaeda should abandon the profession of mass murder and get engineering degrees. But how should we make it happen?) So what does Mr. Baker really have in mind?
Like many elder statesman, Mr. Baker wants to do what he did before. In today’s Middle East, that means restoring the Sunni alliance against Iran. Fear of Iran, as a powerful, aggressive and radical Shia state, is already out there. Mr. Baker seems to believe it can be mobilized in three steps.
Step one is to woo Syria. Syria has made itself a partner of Iran, having alienated its other neighbors and patrons. Yet the alliance is essentially unnatural, since Syria is about three-quarters Sunni. The Assads, father and son, made a family business of selling themselves to the highest bidder. Hafez al-Assad joined the first Gulf War against Saddam Hussein. Now Bashar al-Assad has sold himself to the Iranians, but it should be possible to buy him back.
The second step in Mr. Baker’s plan is, as he said in another context, to “**** the Jews.” The self-esteem of Sunni governments requires professions of loyalty to the Palestinian cause. So Israel will be wanded at the security checkpoint, to determine how much it will throw to Hamas and Hezbollah.
Step three will involve showing that the Iranians are unreasonable. This must be the purpose of Mr. Baker’s insistence that we talk to Iran, since he surely knows that anyone, like President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who believes that he already talks to the 12th imam will not negotiate substantively even with James Baker. Once Iran stonewalls yet again, we can then turn to the Sunni world and say: We have brought your erring Syrian brother home; we have pressured your annoying Jewish neighbor; now let us link arms against the Shiite menace.
This was essentially the strategy of the United States after the Khomeini revolution, with a few blips, notably the Iran-contra back channel. What would be wrong with restoring such a plan now?
Its religious template is too sweeping. Although there is no love lost between the Shia and Sunnis, they are not monolithic masses. Instead of spending so much time on Syria, why not keep wooing Iraq’s Shiites? Most of them, far from being Iranian agents, have their own interpretation of their religion and their own ethnic identity (Arab, not Persian). Saudi Arabia’s richest oil regions are inhabited by that country’s despised Shiite minority; Bahrain, in the Persian Gulf, has a Shiite majority; why follow a strategy that pre-emptively alienates them?
More important, why abandon the region to such identity-bloc calculations? It is wrong to say that the desire for liberty is universal—or, as President Bush put it in his second inaugural, that “the call of freedom comes to every mind and every soul”—yet it is equally wrong to leave it out of account. Culture, religion and tribes are mighty things—and not just in the Middle East—but they are not the only things. Men will commit every sacrifice and atrocity to maintain their old ways, yet they also want to better themselves. The media and the Internet stimulate both desire and thought. Lebanon’s communities have been fighting each other for centuries, yet most of them came together in a national movement to throw off Syrian overlordship. Hezbollah, with its Syrian/Iranian bankroll, has rallied crowds just as large. No one said freedom is easy. James Baker wants to take freedom to the dumpster and move on.
If George W. Bush doesn’t want to adopt the Baker plan, he will have to come up with a better one of his own. If present trends continue, he too will go down in history as a laughable mouse. Pressing need (the prospect of W.M.D. in Saddam’s hands) and high goals (the call of freedom) will not redeem the bad execution of the Iraq War.
We have played the Iraq War various ways. Gen. Tommy Franks drove to Baghdad and resigned. Paul Bremer fired the Iraqi Army and called a constitutional convention. A constitution got written, and most Iraqis rallied to it, but the men of blood continued their work. Lately we have been appealing to Sunni tribal leaders—with some success, though not enough. By this ass-backward route, we have arrived at the place we were in Afghanistan on Halloween of 2001, three and a half weeks into Operation Enduring Freedom, with everyone in a tizzy and the late R.W. Apple savoring the “the ominous word ‘quagmire.’” The solution then was to stop worrying about the effects of our actions on the long-term fate of the country and to kill as many Taliban as possible. Which we did, and which led to victory. (Yes, the Taliban are still out there; no one said freedom is easy.) The solution now is to put 30,000 troops into Baghdad, without stripping Anbar, and kill the enemies of order. If the generals say they don’t need 30,000 more troops, find new generals.
Livy was another old writer—a historian, not a poet. He said that when the ancient Romans were digging the foundations of a Temple of Jupiter, they uncovered a bleeding head (commemorated in the word capitol, which comes from caput, the Latin for “head”). The state begins in violence. Free states give way to order and peace, but they too begin there.
This is not international social work, or finishing a job. Since the violent in Iraq include Al Qaeda, and terrorist wannabes, killing them is a twofer. Let the end begin.
Right on!
great article
As someone else said - whatever does not kill them, just postpones the inevitable.
Does W have the guts to do it? The media and Dims will be screaming for impeachment, and about a third of his own party, including his own father, will be disavowing the policy. The party is scared to death of 2008. They think defeat now will be forgotten by then; whereas continued quagmire will result in profound defeat.
The public has been worked into a good anti-war froth, and that is hamstringing the president. Nonetheless, one hopes he will continue to press for victory and tell Baker et al to go to Hades.
Amen!
That's a good first step.
The second is to take the war to the homelands of our enemies and the perpetuators of so much of this misery, Syria and Iran, and defeat them as well. It may not be easy, but it will be a lot easier than a defeat and rout for us!
Great ideas, too bad Jim Baker, Nancy Pelosi, NY Times/MSM and the rest will never allow it. Hell, the democrats are already negotiating with Hamas, Hizbollah, the Iranians and Syrians. Oh, you never heard that on TV? Amazing....
Congressman Billybob
Well said. The only good terrorist is a dead terrorist.
Bush has shown himself to be a weak wartime leader. He is putting WAY too much faith in his generals and not enough stock in letting results speak for themselves.
He is relying on too much opinion and not demanding enough of those around him. He has been surprisingly passive.
PING for a good answer.
2006 was supposed to be year of corner-turning, but it was the year Iraq spun out of control. It was due to the rise of the militias and the unwillingness/inability of the democratic center in Iraq to put the militias and insurgents behind it. The forces of violence still have the upper hand.
"I agree with Brookhiser that the only alternative to retreat is a military buildup to seriously root out the militias, kill Sadr, and drive al-Qaeda out."
I agree as well. What has not been grasped by most is that this is not easy to execute at all. It is precisely because it is so hard that Bush has been pummeled, by others who assume there is a better way (likely there is not) or that it is not worth it (that is wrong too, if we lose we lose a lot, if we win, we win a lot; much is at stake).
Bakes ISG report confirms one thing: The Bush policy is the worst Iraq policy - except for all the alternatives.
It solves one thing...it gives idiots like Baker and Kofi Anus, jobs. It gives the liberals all that they need....hope.
I on the other hand would give an ultimatum to Mookie al Sadr (et al), and the Prime Minister. You need to make _____ milestone by _____ date or the Unites States is going to do _____ on ______date.
For Mookie it's knock the s&!t off or you and your men are going to die. We expect you and your men to contribute to the success of the new government or we will hold you personally accountable for its failure. Right now, there is just this loosey goosey, no performance metric, situation where there are gangs of thugs creating havoc with no holding any of the parties to account
"Lincoln and Roosevelt trusted their guts when they did not get the results they were looking for. They tossed generals overboard if they didn't see facts on the ground changing.
Bush has shown himself to be a weak wartime leader. He is putting WAY too much faith in his generals and not enough stock in letting results speak for themselves."
Actually, that is a misreading of history, iMHO.
Lincoln and FDR gave authority to the military leaders and let them do their leading. WWII was won by Marshall and Eisenhower, not FDR. Lincoln made some changes, but he bit his tongue much when seeing his incompetent generals botch things. Micro-managed wars, like Vietnam - the classic case - and Korea, went much less well.
I am *glad* Bush is not an LBJ-like micro-manager. This was the right way to handle both Afghanistan and Iraq and from a military perspective, it's worked.
As for this demand for heads rolling, well, Rumsfeld is gone. I doubt it will serve much good, nor will replacing Abazaid, who is as good as it gets as a CENTCOM leader.
The real problem is that our military strategy is NOT the problem and therefore even if it were perfect, we would not win! If anything Iraq has had too much inconsistency ,due to the 1 year rotations. A serious effort to win would put the key people in country until its done. Fortunately for our troops but unfortunately for the mission, that is not how its done.
The real problem is Iraq's political fragmentation, which should have been healed via the democratic process, but which hasn't; with that has come the failure of Iraq as a whole to move away from sectarianism, corruption, militias and support for anti-Government forces.
If Iraq's democratic Government was a secure unity Government, and if the Iraq security forces had the capability, the fight would be as good as won. This has ben like nurturing a plant, but finding it trampled, eaten, and starved fo water each day. And each day trying to revive it and plant more seeds. A winning strategy and persistence is the way to go.
Baker & Co. looked in all the wrong places (Syria, Iran, etc.) for a solution. Yes, we need a regional conference and we need Iraq's neighbors to quit meddling, but more so we need to get Iraq's internal political divisions healed and the extremists bounded.
Wow. Did Baker really say that? If so, he has no business offering advice on what to do about Iraq.
I was surprised that the Iraq Study Group mentioned Israel at all. The Israelis are not a party to the Iraq war; bringing them into the calculation seems gratuitous. But it makes sense if Baker and his colleagues hate Jews.
"Just as Lincoln didn't find his Grant and Sherman right away, Bush is in need of Generals who can find the right strategy and tactics."
see my previous post ... I dont think it is new generals that we need ... unless you mean *IRAQI* generals. The weak links here is not the US DOD and our military. It's our State Dept, who has failed to get Syria and Iran 'in a box'. It's the Iraqi Govt, who cant/wont stand up to al-Sadr, which in turn has this year led to the worst violence so far, and a situation where Shiite and Sunni can now barely live together. And the last weak link is the Iraq security forces, which are more capable than ever, but are not strong enough to fight terrorism on their own.
The solution, then must be to:
- strengthen diplomacy
- strengthen the Iraqi Government
- strengthen the Iraqi security forces
Baker ISG has ideas on #3, which are already in our plans and in motion; ideas on #1, some of which wont fly; but on #2, they are silent, except for the idea of demanding milestones of progress from the Maliki Govt.
We need a strong confident Iraqi Government that can sign up to this task 100% and take Iraq to a place of better security and safety:
"And in the near term, we, with all of our coalition partners, especially Iraqi ones, need to kill al Qaeda, kill Baathists who won't give up the fight, and disarm the lawless Shia militias."
One requirement not mentioned is to put a bullet right between the eyes of al Sadar, or at least make it clear to him that it *will* happen unless he ceases and desists. But I don't think at this late date he believes we'd actually do it. So we'll have to show him.
The man is a troublemaker, but a wimp too. Where was he after Saddam killed his father and brother? Big powerful guy with the Mahdi Army and all, but when Saddam threatened him *personally*, he caved like the coward that he obviously is.
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