McCaffrey: Iraq Gov't Dysfunctional
Support for al-Maliki Eroding
Now that Senator John McCain has retired the Straight Talk Express, retired general Barry McCaffrey, a veteran of the Gulf War, has taken up the mantle. McCaffrey has recently carried out a study of the situation in Iraq. Highlights (not in original order):
"We’re in trouble."
"The Iraqi government in power is dysfunctional."
"There is essentially no province in Iraq where the central government holds sway."
"Iraq’s neighbors are bearing no good will toward a favorable outcome in Iraq."
" . . . collectively the American people have said that the conduct of the war has been so incompetent that we’ve come to disbelieve the administration has the ability to carry this off."
"The next president, unless the situation in Iraq is dramatically turned around, is pulling the plug."
Gee, I guess Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are in pretty good company after all. It is Dick Cheney who is living in fantasyland.
In contrast, it seems clear that former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld routinely sent spokesmen out to lie to us about cases like that of Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman. Lynch says she was no Rambo, and that Tillman was killed by 'friendly fire' was covered up.
USA Today reports that support for the al-Maliki government in parliament is eroding. He hasn't been able to push key legislation through parliament, and appears indecisive. (I think the problems are structural, not inherent in al-Maliki's personality. He seems pretty decisive to me. But he heads what is essentially a minority government, since his United Iraqi Alliance only has about 85 members in the 275-member parliament after recent defections. He can only survive by depending heavily on the Kurdistan Alliance, a bloc deeply committed to a weak federal government. He doesn't have much of an army of his own, and cannot independently do much about the guerrilla war. It is not clear who could do better.
Kim Gamel of AP writes about the new "dump truck bomb" tactics of the Sunni Arab guerrillas in Iraq.
The LA Times reports a major split in the Iraqi Baath Party. The Baath is more important as a component of the guerrilla war than is usually admitted by the US press and by the Bush administration. Al-Hayat reported this winter that actually the Baath has split into 4 parties, with Izzat Ibrahim al-Duri leading the most influential one.
The US is pursuing indirect diplomacy with Iran on a range of issues now, Warren Strobel and Nancy Youssef report.
Reuters reports political violence in Iraq for Monday.
Regional players don't want the US to depart Iraq.
Tomdispatch considers the Virginia Tech murder spree in a global context, with former State Department official John Brown writing on 'the Cho in the White House.'
Labels: Iraq War
posted by Juan Cole @ 4/25/2007 12:30:00 AM
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7 Comments:
Obvious comparisons of the Pentagon's portrayal of Lynch can be made with the hyping of Woody Harelson's "hero" character in "Wag the Dog".
"Iraq’s neighbors are bearing no good will toward a favorable outcome in Iraq."
On this I think it depends on what he means by favorable outcome. The neighbors are probably more eager than the US to end the civil war and to hold the country together.
I consider that a favorable outcome and the neighbors have an immense amount of good will towards that.
The neighbors don't really care if the US gets to use Iraq as a bulwark to contain Iran and in the future project military power in the region.
If "favorable outcome" means US bases, yeah, the neighbors have no good will towards that - even US allies (as they become former allies) if the cost of the bases is breaking up the country.
I can't help passing along a brilliant idea from the Daily Kos. The author claims that he has discovered "the soft underbelly" of the Bush military system in Blackwater. I think he may be right.
Take a look at http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/3/31/91222/2016
I like the thought: "And what will Bush say -- that democrats refuse to support our 'contractors'?"
I hope you run with this!
Jay Mulberry
Prof. Cole, you could say that John McCain's Straight Talk Express has turned out to be merely the local Toonerville Trolley, going back and forth from Point A to Point B--even when it no longer has any passengers.
I had been debating, for almost four years now, on whether or not I should make public detailed remarks regarding the holes in the Bush strategery for Iraq - particularly because there are certain unavoidable tactical loopholes that insurgents can exploit to tear apart the military's ability to sustain its presence in the midst of the political turmoil let loose by the Bushiite's incompetence in dealing with the anticipated fallout of the 2003 regime change.
In particular, I had decided not to point out how insurgents could readily evolve their attack plans to employ diversionary tactics coupled with a series of linear and progressive suicide bomb attacks... I have seen such operations in Hizbollah's propaganda videos, and it was only a matter of time before the Sunni insurgency in Iraq gathered the manpower, equipment and expertise to carry out such multiple attacks on a single target - designed to batter the stationary target’s defenses in quick succession in order to have maximum loss of life at the protected core of such a structure.
The Time report on Tuesday's bombing of the Airborne paratroopers' base suggests that the Sunni insurgency has, indeed, evolved to this level of planning and execution of multiple attacks. I have, accordingly, decided to air my illustration of the same.
Those who have studied recent insurgency campaigns know all too well that the availability of cheap munitions coupled with a deep reserve of local volunteers has made the occupation and administration of hostile territories an almost impossible task. There are many important lessons to be gleamed from Israel's occupation and withdrawal from South Lebanon, and the Sunni insurgents seem to be catching on to that playbook with a tenacity that is familiar to many observers.
Without giving out too much new information, I can only point out that irrespective of the wonder weapons and new tactics the Bushiites might employ in Iraq to impress the American audience, these weapons systems and tactics are all too easy to observe, shadow, probe and decimate once they hit the ground in Iraq.
There are no wonder weapons or magical tactics that can single-handedly crush the insurgency. The military can not win this war in Iraq without a political settlement in that country - and that is where the Bush administration has failed, miserably.
Juan,
Apropos of your McCain reference you should listen to the archive (available tomorrow)of Robert Siegel's "All Things Considered" interview with William Kristol about McCain from today, April 25. In it Kristol made a very revealing slip of the tongue. He said our next president needed to be a "wartime president" because of the "wars" (followed by an embarassed laugh) he would have to prosecute. Kristol and other Likudniks will certainly get us into a war with Iran if they have the chance. I've blogged on this at http://pseudoconservativewatch.blogspot.com/
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
Good-Bye Mr. Wolfowitz
Now that Members of European Parliament (MEPs) have vote 332-251 asking Mr. Wolfowitz to resign, it will be hard for him to stay at his job, so his resignation should be imminent.
In my view giving his girl friend a huge pay raise is favortism and not a crime. But what Mr. Wolfowitz will not be able to get away from is that he is the main architect of Iraq war, he tried to push it on President Bush Sr. but without success. Eight years later a new and inexperienced President Bush became the new tenant in the White House and this time Mr. Wofowitz was able to not only push the Iraq war on him but also leave it in his lap while he himself pursued greener pastures elsewhere.
Media reports suggest that Mr. Wolfowitz carries US & Israeli passports, only history will judge as to whose interests he was serving in pushing this war? One thing is certain that his disastrous policy is responsible for the killing of 3,000 US soldiers and injuring and maiming another 25,000, death of over 100,000 innocent Iraqis and the complete destruction of Iraq.
It remains to be scene if (along with others), history will judge him as a war criminal!
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