Thoughts on the Middle East, History, and Religion
Juan Cole is President of the Global Americana Institute
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki maintained Saturday that Iraq is ready to provide its own security in the cities, as US troops cease patrolling.
This despite the raft of bombings that kille about 200 people last week.
Aljazeera English has video on the lack of political progress and the failure of reconciliation in Iraq.
End/ (Not Continued)
Cont'd (click below or on "comments")
posted by Juan Cole @ 6/28/2009 01:00:00 AM
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Awards
Winner, October 5, 2007, Scott Nearing Award for Courageous Scholarship (Awarded by the Graduate Students of the Political Science Department, University of Pennsylvania).
Winner, 2005 James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism, Hunter College.
Winner, 2004 Koufax Award for Best Expert Blog
Winner, 2004 Koufax Award for Best
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6 Comments:
These bombings, and thousands more before them, were successful despite the presence of over 130 thousands US troops, have they not?So why pretend that the Americans can provide security in Iraq, and the Iraqis can't.
Even more bizarre is citing (by others not IC) attacks against US troops as proof for poor security! Isn't obvious that at least this major component of the violence will end after the Americans leave the cities?
You're wrong on this one, Juan. What's going on in Baghdad is a bombing campaign deliberately intended to derail the US withdrawal from the cities.
It'll die down, when the withdrawal is over.
ref : “Iraq is ready to provide its own security in the cities, as US troops cease patrolling.” There is little, if any evidence to support the presumption that "patrols" of U.S. troops prevent attacks, by any militant group ~ upon any other militant group ~ or against the civilian population, itself. Indeed, there is little evidence to support the presumption that the presence of U.S. troops were in any way a limit on the level of criminal activity in Iraq. Quite the contrary: the very presence or mere passing-by of U.S. military occupation forces, their diplomats, non-government personnel and even non-aligned members of its press clearly attract attackers and/or trigger booby traps. The vast majority of American ground troops' casualties do not occur from what we think of as combat, per se, but as the result of "ground-based patrols" = armored, yet essentially being "human bait" nonetheless to lure and reveal, thus, "the bad guys", for obliteration by bombardment wrought from that 3rd dimension, Air Power. Unfortunately, the resulting rubble-ization of Iraqi cities and villages has not been an effective deterrent to attacks. The most effective counter-violence tactic that the Americans have employed has been to pay off their "enemies" (virtually any and everyone else) not to attack Americans (which begs the question, Could America's finest assault troops be replaced by Iraqi accountants?) Their second most successful tactic has been to shut down all vehicular traffic, which obviously cannot be sustained for more than just a few days (this tactic is employed for "special occasions" such as elections, etc.) Their third successful tactic has been to wall-in and wall-off neighborhoods such that an aerial view of Baghdad resembles that "rat's maze" familiar to students of Experimental Psych classes; This "tactic", of course was really effective only after the ethnic cleansing programme -cum- Civil War had largely run its course. Frankly, I see no reason whatsoever to doubt that the Iraqi Occupation Army of al-Maliki would continue to be just as impotent and irrelevant as the American Occupation Army — their "Mission", whatever the hell it was, now being "Accomplished", whatever the hell that means.
What's happening is that Al-Qaeda of Mesopotamia is coming back. They were never defeated in the way advertised. They are going to come back whether the US is there or not. I say this as one few who opposed the war, and supported the surge (wasn't called that yet) to cut down the confessional violence. Al-Qaeda got caught out operating almost in the open--open to their allies and probably a lot of guys on the street. When things turned, they got hit hard because Iraqis knew who and where they were. They were taking incredible casualties to begin with, then US tactics and intelligence also improved. So Al-Qaeda was defeated as a mass supported organization. Think pre- Hamas. They're coming back as tighter, more secretive group-- think Red Brigades. Many of their people will have survived and they'll have informers among Sunni groups.
So there are lots of questions. How tired of war are the Sunni groups. They took incredible losses; it makes cold sense to ally with the US -- guns and big big bucks. Fighting the US while the Shia groups got guns and money was a losing game from the start. Aside from all the technological disadvantages. They are in a very different situation than US troops rotating in from safe havens far away. Like Kiowa or Lakota fighting the US army. Is the political system fair enough to draw them in. In any case it makes sense to collect your guns, money and political power and wait to see what happens next.
For Al Qaeda it makes sense to act now. I'd have guessed they'll partly rebuilt in tighter cells by last fall. I think their murderous terrorism and extremism will fall flat given Iraq's recent more secular history. I hope so. They need to reassert they are players as the situation shifts. Their most profound enemy is the development of a civil society.
Is it NOT funny - prof. Cole fuming non-stop about lack of freedom in Iran, but telling about USA criminal occupation as if it is comething benign, or at least neutral.
By the way, he is also blaming Iran for restricting foreign media (clearly biased), but I do not remeber when he last time mentioned jornalists MURDERED in Iraq by USA army and their lackeys.
Really, prof. Cole should try harder
Can anyone offer info on the schedule or status of the Withdrawal/SoFA referendum that was appended to get it past Sistani and thru parliament last fall-winter.
Supposedly the referendum was funded ($100M) earlier this month. A wiki article says the referendum is delayed/scheduled to appear on the national parliamentary ballot in Jan. 2010. But the footnote on that item leads to a dated 6/10/09 article in German. Something so foundational to US-Iraq policy should show up in the US press or Jazeera pretty quickly.
http://derstandard.at/fs/1244460360004/Referendum-ueber-Abkommen-mit-den-USA-im-Jaenner
Referendum über Abkommen mit den USA im Jänner
10. Juni 2009, 12:39
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