Reluctant Warhorses
September 11. The anniversary of a terrifying event, an eye-opener to the future.Can it be mere happenstance that on this anniversary date the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, and General David Petraeus have been scheduled to inform the American public through a public address, of the state of the 'war' in Iraq. The process requiring that they submit themselves to gruelling questioning by determinedly ardent members of the Senate and the House of Representatives as to the veracity of their statements.
The proceedings, albeit staged and much ballyhooed, are nothing if not entertaining. Posturing, declamations of patriotism and obvious factionalism being the order of the day. Senator Joseph Biden, Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee begins the questioning with piquant and knowledgeable queries. Eliciting guarded, almost evasive responses.
Senator Richard Lugar presiding, questioning General Petraeus on the ongoing sectarian violence; the phenomenon of factional, sectarian, ideological internal warfare. The appearance of failure on the part of U.S. forces. That the enforced separation of Sunni and Shi'ite through the imposition of separation barriers itself has not been as successful as the simple expedient of Sunnis fleeing Shia neighbourhoods and vice versa.
U.S. troops as referees have not met with outstanding success, he points out dryly. Nor has political diplomacy seen success in encouraging compatibility between Sunni and Shi'ite political factions. The responses drone on, as though dragged from the mouths of two men on a hot seat doing their utmost to represent themselves and their positions with the integrity expected of them.
It's more than clear that any responses coming from any direction, explaining any number of initiatives and successes or failures, represent nothing more than long-rehearsed and studied responses to anticipated questions. It's true that the responses have the ring of careful authority from those directly on the ground, but they give nothing away, and in the process seek to shelter themselves from censure.
They are, after all, pawns in this theatre of show and tell, this exhibition of detailing for elected officials whose constituents are restively angered by the fact that their domestic agendas have been high-jacked, their country has been placed in thrall to the witless ambitions of a president they have elected, while the country appears to be shrinking in international importance, and their native sons are dying for a cause not their own.
Senator Chuck Hagel characterizes the Iraqi government as severely dysfunctional, and there is no countering argument with that statement. As with Canadians having difficulty with our forces deployed in Afghanistan, Americans largely want their troops out of Iraq (moving in on four thousand dead; an average lately of 7 deaths each day).
Senator Hagel quick to affirm, as did the earlier questioners, their pride in and unwavering support for the troops. But, he said, there is nothing unpatriotic about questioning the worthiness of the U.S. government's actions. As an elected official, his duty is to those who elected him.
Both Ambassador Crocker and General Petraeus listened, as with chastened visages, writing notes, seeming to seriously absorb the bluntly critical statements issuing from an obviously aggrieved apprehension of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and its subsequent costs and failures.
The responses, painted in a blush of self-congratulatory advances in civic infrastructure and national reconciliation, while deploring the 'failures of the past' continued. The Ambassador and the General do their utmost to sound optimistic in their projections, throughout their testimony and their responses. In seeming support of the Bush administration.
Senator John Kerry opening as all the previous questioners have done, paying due respect to the sacrifices of the troops; the obligatory paean of national praise for the country's military emissaries. Again, critical analysis of the Iraqi parliament's paralysis of action, its avidly secular vision, its deleterious commitment to decision-making, lack of measurable advances.
Their obvious incapacity to reach their own benchmarks of achievement. Why, under these circumstances, should American sacrifices continue? Why indeed? This is something that none other than Osama bin Laden has himself suggested. And has offered a compromise solution: we'll stop killing you when you turn to Islam en masse. But this is an unfortunate aside, itself choreographed at an optimum moment of self-doubt for the U.S.
The description of collapse continues: the population dislocation, the belated realization that foreign-based insurgents were inimical to the interests of their local counterparts. Resulting in a measure of decrease in insurgent violence against civilians. Resulting in a few Iraqi Sunni Sheiks making a turn-about for the purpose of routing foreign-based insurgents.
And not, as declared by General Petraeus, that Iraqi Sunni tribal chiefs, once the declared enemies of the U.S., seeing fit to join forces with the American troops to rout al-Qaeda in Iraq as a recent successful embarkation related to the recent surge of thirty thousand additional U.S. troops in Iraq.
Furthermore, he pointed out, the Shia militants and the Sunni militants that U.S. troops have been charged with training would come back to haunt them as secular violence swings from one height of bloody violence to yet another. Moreover, the freshly-armed and -encouraged Sunnis would achieve the wherewithal to attack the mostly Shia-led administration.
The mantra of reconstruction and development has such an elevated, hopeful ring of authentic determination about it. The holy grail of accomplishment. Without some working semblance of rational, national conciliation in the offing, nothing can move forward. It won't be the American presence that can secure that end, but the combined determination of Kurds, Shia and Sunni Muslims.
Once the cataclysmic ethnic cleansing, brutal oppression of Iraqi minorities, targeting of mosques and civilians arrives at the point of exhausted blood-letting, perhaps. And that end will owe less, far less to the U.S. presence than to the simple facts on the ground that Iraqis of every description will simply have run through the gamut of hate and violence, thoroughly exhausting themselves, and in their collapse finally see their way through to a new vision.
Or, as can also occur, the entire country will simply implode. The simmering hatred and blood-fests will degenerate still further, although that beggars the imagination. An all-out internal civil war will ensue and those desperate Iraqis who have been unable to flee the country will fester in despair, die in agony, and to no avail. Ultimately partition will take place, and the ultimate separation of sects, ideologies and minorities will ensure a grudging peace.
Oh yes, back to the hearings. Senator Norm Coleman spoke of the long-term expectations of national reconciliation. Support of provincial reconstruction for resource support - economic redistribution and eventual U.S. troop pull-out. An optimist, obviously, and also a Republican with the Senate Foreign Relations sub-committee.
The ethno-sectarian in-fighting must translate to national political will on behalf of a currently divided country. The roaming militias like the Maadi Army must be defanged and absorbed into the national militia. Why? Because he would have it so. As who would not?
Then there was Russ Feingold, who like all his predecessor-questioners gave thanks to both for their sterling service to the country. The Afghan war was justified. The invasion of Iraq was ill-thought, a true debacle, with al-Qaeda still obviously very much in business. the U.S. presence brought al-Qaeda to Iraq, not the reverse. Hear, hear.
The U.S. should have a presence elsewhere, to defeat al-Qaeda; on the Pakistan-Afghan border. The problem of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Magreb is a huge problem. Neither the General nor the Ambassador claimed to "be in a position" to respond to the query: which would be more compelling - to confront al-Qaeda in Iraq or in Pakistan/Afghanistan...?
The consuming concern of all questioners, a reflection of the U.S. public's anguish. When will the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq significantly decline? The Republicans as unsparingly critical in their questioning and charges as the Democrats, it would appear.
Senator John McCain (Armed Services Committee) graced the proceedings with a far friendlier line of questioning. More of a leading on to administration-approved explications of the ongoing situation. The relief etched on the faces of the General and the Ambassador amply evident; their tension slightly slacked off. Their careful attention and response a visual and oral lesson in relief.
Senator Edward Kennedy, another kettle of Democratic fish pointed out the General Accounting Office's report critical of the surge; that the goals clearly had not been met. That Bush's avowal of removal of the forces if the goals set for Iraq were not met, obviously hollow.
That Nouri al-Maliki's general amnesty law for those insurgents willing to commit to unsettling al-Qaeda and working toward national reconciliation extended only thus far. Holding Petraeus's feet to the fire based on previous appraisals of the situation, as opposed to current events.
Senator John Warner, commending both stalwarts on their activities, commitment and report. Sustained political reconciliation in the face of sectarian competition is unlikely in the near future, according to an earlier prognosis by General Petraeus. So what, if anything, has changed? There is scant political will to pursue integration, community. No top-down forward momentum for political national reconciliation. Dim looking for future U.S. "success" in Iraq.
U.S. casualties always to be kept foremost in mind, when advising the president. Be cognizant of continued public stress, Warner emphasized in the most avuncular manner; sternly but with one's best interests at heart. The leading question: does commitment to the U.S. presence in Iraq keep America safer? The responses? Inconclusive. Shrug, shrug.
Senator Robert Bird pointed out the unspoken obvious, that the conference was taking place on the 6th anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. What's the connection? None. Indeed. Other than leaving the impression in the public mind of an indelible connection. Raison d'etre for U.S. invasion and current occupying entrapment.
Same old responses trotted out - principally that events in Anbar Province demonstrate the first stirrings of reconciliation. The temporary Sunni tribal ceasefire against U.S. forces to face off in tandem against the presence of al-Qaeda. The national, largely Shia-led government pledging to fund Anbar (Sunni) civil installations.
No reconciliation without political stability. And no political stability without national reconciliation. Pull out the U.S. presence. They are occupiers and popularly viewed as such, become targets by insurgents and militias representing both Shia and Sunnis.
U.S. troops have trained Iraqi military and police. U.S. funds have provided the wherewithal for reconstruction and defense. Iraq must reconcile itself to U.S. withdrawal. British forces are withdrawing, unprepared to further submit to British troop-attrition through militia targeting as occupiers.
Every country seeking to succeed, politically, economically, defensively and socially must prepare to use all the tools at their command. Iraq is no different. She has the opportunity for her political elite to draw together in defence of the national interest. The political will for equal recognition, equal distribution of assets, equal representation in the armed forces and the administration, to commit to advance key sovereign interests.
No longer to implore the United States and other western supporters to remain, but to defend and advance herself. At her own expense, aided and abetted by her direct neighbours, even with their competing interests.
Or, on the other hand, to dissolve into a failed experiment, with competing neighbours continuing to treat the country as a nominal entity whose fate may become, like Lebanon's to represent an ongoing tragedy of national failure.
It is past time for moderate Islam - hello! are you there? - to clean house and assert its humanity and honoured place in the world community.
Labels: Middle East, World Crises
posted by Pieface @ Thursday, September 13, 2007
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