Posted on 12/13/2006, 4:02:47 PM by veronica
I don’t know how the poet Horace managed to get an advance copy of the report of the Iraq Study Group—everyone expects leaks, but 2,000 years ahead of time?—yet he seems to have managed it: “Mountains will be in labor, the birth will be a single laughable mouse.”
James Baker is an intelligent man, so it beggars belief that he favors every one of his simultaneously obvious and unlikely recommendations. (Sample: “Syria should control its border with Iraq.” Yep, it should. And all the young men of Al Qaeda should abandon the profession of mass murder and get engineering degrees. But how should we make it happen?) So what does Mr. Baker really have in mind?
Like many elder statesman, Mr. Baker wants to do what he did before. In today’s Middle East, that means restoring the Sunni alliance against Iran. Fear of Iran, as a powerful, aggressive and radical Shia state, is already out there. Mr. Baker seems to believe it can be mobilized in three steps.
Step one is to woo Syria. Syria has made itself a partner of Iran, having alienated its other neighbors and patrons. Yet the alliance is essentially unnatural, since Syria is about three-quarters Sunni. The Assads, father and son, made a family business of selling themselves to the highest bidder. Hafez al-Assad joined the first Gulf War against Saddam Hussein. Now Bashar al-Assad has sold himself to the Iranians, but it should be possible to buy him back.
The second step in Mr. Baker’s plan is, as he said in another context, to “**** the Jews.” The self-esteem of Sunni governments requires professions of loyalty to the Palestinian cause. So Israel will be wanded at the security checkpoint, to determine how much it will throw to Hamas and Hezbollah.
Step three will involve showing that the Iranians are unreasonable. This must be the purpose of Mr. Baker’s insistence that we talk to Iran, since he surely knows that anyone, like President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who believes that he already talks to the 12th imam will not negotiate substantively even with James Baker. Once Iran stonewalls yet again, we can then turn to the Sunni world and say: We have brought your erring Syrian brother home; we have pressured your annoying Jewish neighbor; now let us link arms against the Shiite menace.
This was essentially the strategy of the United States after the Khomeini revolution, with a few blips, notably the Iran-contra back channel. What would be wrong with restoring such a plan now?
Its religious template is too sweeping. Although there is no love lost between the Shia and Sunnis, they are not monolithic masses. Instead of spending so much time on Syria, why not keep wooing Iraq’s Shiites? Most of them, far from being Iranian agents, have their own interpretation of their religion and their own ethnic identity (Arab, not Persian). Saudi Arabia’s richest oil regions are inhabited by that country’s despised Shiite minority; Bahrain, in the Persian Gulf, has a Shiite majority; why follow a strategy that pre-emptively alienates them?
More important, why abandon the region to such identity-bloc calculations? It is wrong to say that the desire for liberty is universal—or, as President Bush put it in his second inaugural, that “the call of freedom comes to every mind and every soul”—yet it is equally wrong to leave it out of account. Culture, religion and tribes are mighty things—and not just in the Middle East—but they are not the only things. Men will commit every sacrifice and atrocity to maintain their old ways, yet they also want to better themselves. The media and the Internet stimulate both desire and thought. Lebanon’s communities have been fighting each other for centuries, yet most of them came together in a national movement to throw off Syrian overlordship. Hezbollah, with its Syrian/Iranian bankroll, has rallied crowds just as large. No one said freedom is easy. James Baker wants to take freedom to the dumpster and move on.
If George W. Bush doesn’t want to adopt the Baker plan, he will have to come up with a better one of his own. If present trends continue, he too will go down in history as a laughable mouse. Pressing need (the prospect of W.M.D. in Saddam’s hands) and high goals (the call of freedom) will not redeem the bad execution of the Iraq War.
We have played the Iraq War various ways. Gen. Tommy Franks drove to Baghdad and resigned. Paul Bremer fired the Iraqi Army and called a constitutional convention. A constitution got written, and most Iraqis rallied to it, but the men of blood continued their work. Lately we have been appealing to Sunni tribal leaders—with some success, though not enough. By this ass-backward route, we have arrived at the place we were in Afghanistan on Halloween of 2001, three and a half weeks into Operation Enduring Freedom, with everyone in a tizzy and the late R.W. Apple savoring the “the ominous word ‘quagmire.’” The solution then was to stop worrying about the effects of our actions on the long-term fate of the country and to kill as many Taliban as possible. Which we did, and which led to victory. (Yes, the Taliban are still out there; no one said freedom is easy.) The solution now is to put 30,000 troops into Baghdad, without stripping Anbar, and kill the enemies of order. If the generals say they don’t need 30,000 more troops, find new generals.
Livy was another old writer—a historian, not a poet. He said that when the ancient Romans were digging the foundations of a Temple of Jupiter, they uncovered a bleeding head (commemorated in the word capitol, which comes from caput, the Latin for “head”). The state begins in violence. Free states give way to order and peace, but they too begin there.
This is not international social work, or finishing a job. Since the violent in Iraq include Al Qaeda, and terrorist wannabes, killing them is a twofer. Let the end begin.
"The Israelis are not a party to the Iraq war; bringing them into the calculation seems gratuitous."
seems because it is... Baker is nuts if the Govt that is messing with Iraq and Lebanon should be 'dealt' with by bribing them and giving them Golan Heights. It's utter stupidity, on the order of giving the USSR mexico to cut a deal on arms control.
"The public has been worked into a good anti-war froth, and that is hamstringing the president."
The President hamstrung himself because he could not continue selling the war to the American public. There comes a time for accountability.
Agreed.
The Administration made a great tactical error - telling the American public that this war would be fought without sacrifice. He should have called upon all of us to do our part for the war effort. Instead, he asked us to keep shopping. The VP went on talk shows to sell the now-ridiculous notion that we would be greeted as liberators. The Administration insisted that Iraq would pay for its own reconstruction.
They gambled for a quick end to the war. And they were right, when it came to the Iraqi army itself. But apparently nobody even considered that there might be an armed resistance to our occupation, and that lack of foresight has cost us dear.
His advisors failed him, and that fundamental misunderstanding is what is now hamstringing the President.
Mr. Brookhiser is correct. It's time to kill the enemies of order and show that we are the BIG dog in this fight.
Mr. Sadr should be among the first to take a dirt nap.
We can still do this, but we need to act with alacrity.
I have no expectation that this road will be taken. But it is nice to see someone articulate this POV.
There are three objectives in the current war in Iraq:
1. Bring the troops home quickly and safely.
2. Defeat the Islamic extremists.
3. Prevent casualties among innocent civilians.
Only two of these can be attained. If you prevent casualties among innocent civilians and bring home the troops quickly, you won't defeat the Islamic extremists. If you prevent casualties among innocent civilians and defeat the Islamic extremists, you won't be able to bring home the troops quickly OR safely. If you defeat the Islamic extremists and bring home the troops quickly and safely, you won't be able to prevent casualties among innocent civilians.
Personally, I'd select numbers 1 and 2. Because this is war, it (normally) goes without saying that there will be some civilian casualties. It's only our current "leadership" that wants it both ways.
The present war in Iraq does indeed resemble Vietnam -- in that the politicians are once again hamstringing the troops. I say let the warriors do battle and get out of the way!
Especially when it's so easy (and much more effective), to simply crush the Syrian tyranny.
Well, there are repentant terrorists like Wahlid Shoebat. The dual strategy of killing them as efficiently as possible, and praying for their repentance has much to commend itself.
We should have done that long ago, but I don't believe it will do much good now.
I've read multiple stories to that effect.
Last week the same author advocated Rudy G for president.
You shoulda seen the outrage expressed here.
:)
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