Letters to the Editor
-
No upside for McCain
Elector ally there is no upside for McCain from the war in Iraq. The best he can hope for is that things remain comparatively calm. However any mention of the war will just remind people of the needless carnage and loss of treasure it has caused. The downside is big. If things start to go south again McCain and the entire Republican Party will experience the mother of all election disasters.
-
"It you believe in fairies, clap you hands to save Tinkerbelle" ... McCain's appeal is to similar magical thinking "patriots"
they don't care about Iraq or Iraqis ... they can even "face" more American casualities ... but the prospect of America the Defeated, the Vanquished, the Thwarted, the Impotent is something they might intend to think about "tomorrow" but never today .... and tomorrow never comes ...
These are the same stiff upper lip, quivering chin patriots who insist we could'a should'a won in Vietnam if ... as I recall, the politicians hadn't tied the hands of the generals ...
Still crazy after all these years ...
Patrick Cockburn's latest dispatch (link at my name to the Independent) suggests an exhausted Iraq, only partly holding it's breath in anticipation of what come next... The importance of US troops is likely in maintaining the vast number of checkpoints from one sector to another that were set up BY US as part of the surge. In anything resembling "real life" and a real economy, such checkpoints would cripple commerce and would be hard for a civilian government to maintain... nevermind ... see also Fallujah.
The big next, of course, is the provincial elections (which Juan Cole commented on in the last couple days) ... Al-Sadr and company legitimately anticipate massive election victories country wide (unless the elections are rigged or invalidated one way or another by the SCIC who currently hold power in the south and who are unlikely to lawfully relinquish same over something as trivial as an election) ...
Al-Sadr's success at KEEPING his ceasefire has been impressive, since our press was pushing -- hard -- the idea that his forces were fragmented and, in fact, outside his control. We've done everything possible, up to and including attempted arrest and assasination, to stop Al-Sadr ... a true nationalist, apparnetly willing to work in coalition with at least some Sunnis.
Oh, the provincial elections are due, by some reports October 11 (Informed Comment 02/14/2008) ... get ready.
-
The point Obama needs to make
It is a very tricky area of politics for Obama. I think, if he is the nominee, he needs to sit with people who are good at analyzing ground war strategies in Iraq. The following points are most probably the best way to illuminate the masses:
1. US army is now engaged in a most dagerous and shortsighted game to provide political cover to the election cycle. They are creating militia counter balance that will ensure no federal democratic system would ever come to exist in Iraq, contrary to the stated goal.
2. Stoking the tibal pride and asking them to protect their communities is smart on the surface but the same forces will resist to pay taxes, join violent causes etc etc.
3. The true burden of this mess currently created will be AGAIN on the armed forces. Before draw down, lower number of troops would be dispersed potentially in a large country creating weak spots for further attack.
4. For a clean withdrawl, Iraqi troop need to protect the departing US troops. There can be no draw down if they cannot be trusted.
5. Also, a corridor towards Kuwait for safe departure needs to be protected by overwhelming force on the ground and air. Gen. Collin Powell should be part of the civilian plan as he knows this route from the first gulf war.
6. Also, tell the truth that even if violence flares up, we are not going back in. PERIOD. Inhuman... I guess so, but there are truly some problem where the solution is not sticking your millitary in the most disadvantageous position.
7. Pledge that we will spend 10% of the current war budget to fly Iraqi troops to UN, NATO and other allies for expedited training.
-
I believe the consensus "plan" is to stabilize Iraq sufficiently that our forces can withdraw behind the walls of our bases ...
providing primarily the sort of satellite and airforce coverage Mark Benjamin's article of a few days ago describes.
As far as I can tell the withdrawal of these forces (our permanent bases) is not genuinely up for discussion ... except in a "come the rapture" sort of someday possibility ...
We have nowhere else to put our bases ... Iraq "needs" our airforce ... oh, and we've invested billions in these bases already ... Afghanistan is never mentioned as a viable alternative ...
Much as I wish otherwise, we're not leaving ... we can't afford to ... we have no where else to hang our regional hat.
-
Joe, you don't base a progressive conclusion on neocon non-facts
This article is replete with the unspoken, and wrong, idea that it is the US which has the initiative in Iraq. It's not.
The surge is a joke. What huge difference could 10% more forces possibly make. Coincidentally Sunni militias discovered they could get money from the US by pretending to go after "Al Qaeda" in their areas, even if there was no such thing. They were the ones to undertake that strategy, and they will be the ones to change it when it no longer suits their purposes.
So Iraq is no longer frontpage news? That, too, will only be the case for as long as it suits tribal leaders. When they want the US public to wake up to Iraq again, they can easily make that happen, by capturing US soldiers for example, or by other means that ensure media coverage - the possibilities are legion.
From Joe Conason's article: "Many Iraqis fear that those armed groups simply await the withdrawal of American forces to resume a civil war that only seems to have paused." In short, American forces prevent civil war. A Republican talking point, totally false. Just read the polls. The vast majority of Iraqis expect things to calm down when the Americans leave.
"We cannot bring more troops home without risking a renewed conflagration because the Iraqi government has done so little with the "breathing space" bought by American lives and treasure." Another Repub talking point: the US is doing what it can, and if it doesn't work out, it must be the Iraqi's fault. But what "breathing space" are you talking about? It's a totally fictional thing, invented by the AEI if I'm not mistaken, parrotted by the media but with no basis in fact. Does the Iraqi government gain a "breathing space" when the US gives large amounts of money to its opponents, and that money is openly used to buy arms with? When the US builds blastwalls and raises checkpoints between neighborhoods? When the US pressures members of parliament, and allows US companies to bribe them, to pass a hated oil law? "Breathing space?" If you want them to breathe, is increasing the weight on them a way to get there? It doesn't even make sense.