Posted on 11/27/2006 11:42:44 AM PST by Dark Skies
We are, as the saying goes, between Iraq and a hard place. Unfortunately, events this week seem likely to drive us inexorably closer to the hard place – one that is going to be a lot worse than what we have seen in Iraq so far.
These events include a two-day trip to the woodshed in Amman, Jordan with President Bush for Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. They will be considering ways in which al-Maliki can prevent the collapse of his government and his country’s slide into full-scale civil war. Presumably, the two leaders will be factoring in the results of Vice President Cheney’s three-hour visit to Riyadh to appeal to the Saudi king, Abdullah, for help with Iraq.
Iraqi President Jalal Talabani will be meeting with his Iranian counterpart, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in Tehran to discuss bilateral relations. Presumably, among the topics for discussion will be the success Iran’s regime is having in its efforts to destroy a Free Iraq.
Finally, there will be two days of deliberations by the Iraq Study Group, co-chaired by former Secretary of State James Baker and former Rep. Lee Hamilton. This panel, which was commissioned by Congress to examine alternatives to the present approach in Iraq, is reportedly considering a proposed report drafted largely at Mr. Baker’s direction.
What all these events have in common is the notion that the “solution” to Iraq lies in a “regional” approach. The leitmotif is that U.S. unilateralism is dead, long live multilateralism. A chastened America will be brought to its senses by the collective wisdom of Jim Baker, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Kings Abdullah of Jordan and Saudi Arabia.
But what, exactly, does this regional approach portend?
Reduced to its essence, the Baker-promoted regional strategy is a euphemism for throwing Free Iraq to the wolves in its neighborhood: Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia. The vehicle for doing so will presumably be some sort of international conference attended by such powers, together with others in the region (like Jordan and Egypt), and augmented by interested parties from elsewhere – including Britain, France, Russia and China.
Unfortunately, past experience has taught that such a conclave would not be good for freedom-loving people. The Iraqis would, of course, be toast. The best they could hope for is a new autocratic ruler whose repressive behavior will enjoy the support of the tyrants next door. They will no longer have the United States to kick around, and those who foolishly stood with us for a better future will meet an unpleasant fate.
If we are lucky, the regional “process” will afford American forces a fig-leaf behind we might obscure our strategic defeat. Heliborne evacuations from the Green Zone a la the fall of Saigon three decades ago may be avoided, provided our enemies allow us to effect a dignified “strategic redeployment.” More likely, we will be bloodied on the way out by terrorists, insurgents and others intent on compounding the ignominy insofar as it will serve their larger purpose: our destruction in the world beyond Iraq, including ultimately here at home.
Among the other predictable casualties of the regional strategy will be the people of Israel. Jim Baker’s hostility towards the Jews is a matter of record and has endeared him to Israel’s foes in the region. What could be more appealing to the latter than an international conference that will simultaneously undo the experiment in freedom in Iraq and compel Israel to make further territorial concessions. Of course, these will not mitigate conflicts in Iraq and Lebanon that have nothing to do with Israel. They will, however, allow the Mideast’s only bona fide democracy, the Jewish State, to be snuffed in due course.
We are, in short, poised to stand the U.S. Marine’s motto “No better friend, no worse enemy” on its head. If the Baker regional strategy is adopted, we will prove to all the world that it is better to be America’s enemy than its friend.
If these undesirable outcomes are so predictable, why are we slouching towards the hard place of the “regional solution”?
It comes down to a lack of seriousness on the part of too many elected leaders of both parties – exhibited in a failure themselves to understand the gravity of a global war in which Iraq is but one front, and a failure to educate their constituents about the stakes associated with such a war. This superciliousness has translated into political circumstances in the United States (including delegating great responsibility to unelected and unaccountable commissions) and strategic conditions elsewhere that make diplomatic options appear more real and appealing than they are.
Of late, it has become fashionable to assess blame for failures of intelligence and policy to “groupthink.” The term describes the phenomenon whereby lots of smart people feel pressure to conform to a consensus view and, in the process, lose (or at least suppress) their willingness to observe that the emperor has no clothes.
Rarely has the pressure to go along with such groupthink been greater than is increasingly the case with respect to the idea of relying on one or the other of our foes – Iran, Syria or Saudi Arabia – to solve our problems in Iraq. And rarely has it been more important that this strategy of appeasement, and the very hard place to which it will lead us, be rejected.
What all these events have in common is the notion that the “solution” to Iraq lies in a “regional” approach."
Sure, why not. Worked great in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.
Outstanding article.
Thanks for posting.
Do nothing about these events is not a solution, you are right it was a good article. We have to be overly aggressive, we have to stay the course, and we have to deliver winable battles to devastate the enemy. Keep pressing, and soon they will whine with fatigue. These guys are not professional soldiers, they are nothing but undereducated fools toying withg other people's lives - they are vermin! Stamp them out!
This is an outstanding article.
I only agree with the liberals on one thing. If THIS is truly our end game, then, we probably shouldn't have bothered going into Iraq.
Going in was the right thing to do. It was and is in our self - interest....much more so than Vietnam (in retrospect). But, if we are just going to let the whole are go, then, we probably shouldn't have bothered.
Also, I can't help wondering, where is the commander in chief in all this? (But...you can't hardly blame him. The media has been on his ass from day one for Iraq, and the drum beat finally drove the GOP out of Congress [that plus a lot of other things]. So you can hardly blame GWB for punting on this and letting others call the shots. All things considered, I think he gave it his best shot and did some good).
That's because he's a 'realist'.
Not an 'idealist', like most of us, who think Israel should be allowed to survive.
That's the new DBM stratification.
Don't you feel like sometimes we have a ferrari in the garage that we won't unleash, so it looks like we are getting whupped by a clunker with flat tires?
I guess one thing we can learn from this is that a President can't lead and protect our interest in foreign policy if he falls apart at home domestically. If you lose your base, and it causes you to lose elections, there is no way that you can effectively lead us in foreign policy. The two reals are not easily severed.
The survivors paid, big time and for as long as they survived. No one wants to remember that, though...Hanoi Jane is really quiet about that.
No one wants to remember that, though"
Incredible, isn't it?
I guess 3 million dead doesn't make much noise after awhile. Things just sort of go silent.
What's the author mean about Baker's known dislike for Jews? Very disturbing to read this article.
I was thinking recently of our education system in this country. Through middle school, or 8th grade, we really spend more time on teaching self esteem and being "nice." And we spend time teaching kids not to be competitive- no winners or losers at earlier ages. This all has a nice sound to it but has been carried too far for when it is time to live in the real world our country is not willing to do what it takes, ie be competitive, in a war. We are too willing to fall back on being "nice." This has been festering for some time and the chickens are coming home to roost. My guess is someday the population WILL be willing to do what it takes to WIN. But that will be after an unimaginable horror.
Have to agree with Rush here....
No one is talking about winning or victory. All seem to be waiting for the Baker Commission report or talking various forms of cutting and running. All better realize that we are there to stay for the foreseeable future. Rumors that the report will suggest dialogue with Syria and Iran are depressing. To talk with Syria and Iran about resolving problems in Iraq is ludicrous - these two states are the main fomenters of the troubles in Iraq, and a free, democratic, peaceful Iraq is antithetical to their interests.
Further, the 'civil war' ... what are we supposed to do about it? Sunni killing Shiite and vice versa is an Iraqi problem. Should our guys insert themselves into the crossfire? I think not! Saddam's gone (it would be better if he had already been executed). What we must prevent is the formation of a hard-line islamic state in his absence.
Instead of mindlessly repeating the noise machines nonsense, Conservative should grow a pair and start telling them what complete idiots they are on the topic of Iraq. For example. Here is a whole bunch of data that completely refutes the noise machines propaganda on Iraq. Do you think you will EVER see any of this reported by the Junk Media? No because it does not validate their group think on Iraq they simply ignore it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_Security_Forces
http://icasualties.org/oif/
http://icasualties.org/oif/IraqiDeaths.aspx
bttt
Problem is, if we go in, and then let it all go to rot (which is essentially what the regional solution is all about), then we look weak. We aren't weak, but it hurts us to look that way. I'm also talking purely hypothetically here. IF we had known this would be the end game, THEN it would have been better not to do it. But we don't have that luxury. We have to live in the real world.
I agree entirely that the current administration showed some tremendous resolve on this front. They did the right thing. It's just that with the entire world, and half of American against them, they couldn't finish the job.
Now, we are going to have people on the rooftops of our embassy going out by helicopter and Syria and Iran are going to carve up Iraq according to their whims and factions. The only good news will be that at least a few muslims will be killing other muslims.
At the end of the day, though, cutting and running which was brought about not by GWB but by the Dems and the media and the rest of the world, will hurt us very badly.
The worldview of liberals and the educational stablishment are all-pervasive, for sure. Another factor at work here is the hatred of Christianity has grown so intense that a large percentage of America and almost all of Europe prefers Islam to Christianity and so they are fine with just inviting them in (even though liberals will get killed a lot faster than we will).
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