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Monday, August 07, 2006

Iraq & The Middle East

It all came together for me as I watched a video of 100,000 Iraqis clogging a broad avenue in central Baghdad in support of Hezbollah.

It was incredible enough that that many people, a goodly number of them armed to the teeth, could "peacefully" assemble with nary a bombing or shooting in a city where open warfare has become such a part of the urban fabric that the U.S. is being forced to double its troop presence.

I also understood clearly for the first time a larger implication of George Bush's Mess in Mesopotamia:
The president told us that the war in Iraq would help stabilize the Middle East and be a catalyst for the spread of democracy there.

But with the Israeli-Hezbollah war still escalating three weeks on, the consequences of the backdraft from an Iraq where militias and terrorists (underwritten by Iran and Syria) pretty much have free rein is a radical Islamist's wet dream.

And terrifying, because the prosect of a Middle East further destabilized by the Iraq war is no longer an op-ed abstraction.
I want to be absolutely clear that I support Israel in its efforts to contain if not destroy Hezbollah.
But I also think that a ceasefire that Secretary of State Rice insisted must not be a status quo ante (a return to the original positions of the combatants before the onset of hositilities) was unattainable, and a White House that has given Israel carte blanche to bomb Lebanon back to the Stone Age cannot be taken seriously as a third-party broker.

There has to first be a ceasefire and then efforts to craft a more permanent solution, and the U.S. has acknowledged this in retreating from its tough talk. This retreat -- in the form of a joint ceasefire resolution with its soulmate (sic) France -- also is an acknowledgement of how weakened the U.S. has become as an actor on the world stage.
A NO-WIN SITUATION
Secretary of State Rumsfeld had been reluctant to disclose the number of American troops being transferred into Baghdad in what can only be seen as a last-ditch effort to seize control of the capital from sectarian militias.

That number is 14,000, or double the 7,000 troops now patroling the city.

The U.S. finds itself in a no-win situation in every respect:
It cannot begin substantial troop withdrawals from Iraq with Baghdad in chaos although withdrawals have become a political necessity for a beleaguered White House looking over its shoulder at mid-term elections that draw ever closer.

The centerpiece of the U.S. withdrawal plan is training up Iraqi forces to the point where they can control the city and other hot spots. The Iraqis have failed to do so.

This has forced U.S. commanders to increase the troop commitment in the capital -- and face the probability of significant casualities because its troops are unsuited for close-quarters combat and 14,000 are not nearly enough.
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1 comment:

  1. OutOfContext9:30 PM

    Iraq the Model had sobering post today. Another grim inside look at ground-level life in Baghdad. It sobering because usually those guys try and be a little more positive,or at least constructive, about the future. Stay away from the comment page, though.

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