Post by Kurt NicklasLooking at how things are going in Iraq, there is strong reason to
question the narrative that the "surge worked."
No, actually there isn't.
From: http://scotterb.wordpress.com/2008/08/18/credit-iran-not-the-surge/
American officials have been stun by the demands from the Iraqi
government of Nouri al-Maliki to have a timetable for withdrawal of
American forces from Iraq, and his refusal to go along with a long
term American presence. The working assumption by the US was that the
Iraqi government would need and want American support, even if they
couldn’t appear too eager. Not only would this assure the Iraqi
government could have a strong force to counter resistance, but
American money would continue to flow into Iraq, helping enrich a lot
of people with close ties to the government.
However, the US is not popular amongst the Iraqi people, and often
tries to overtly impact Iraqi politics. Maliki himself is in power
because the US did not want al-Jaafari, his predecessor, to keep that
role, even though he was chosen by the victors in Iraq’s elections.
For months there was a lack of a clear government as the Iraqis and
the US tussled over the issue, with Maliki finally chosen as a
compromise. Think of the message this sends Maliki: if you want to
stay Prime Minister, you shouldn’t do things that make it difficult
for us to pursue our goals in Iraq. Maliki could take this two ways —
either to say, “gee, America has the power and can use it, I’ll watch
myself,” or “as long as the US is here, I’m vulnerable.”
Apparently he’s taken the latter approach, and is presenting himself
as an anti-occupation nationalist who is willing to tell the Americans
to go home, and even be seen as embracing Barack Obama’s Iraq plan.
American officials seem to think he may be overestimating his power,
but recognize that within the Iraqi government he has created a pretty
strong power base. He won’t be as easy to remove as Jaafari was, if
the Americans were to try. Moreover, strategically the US is no longer
in a position to make such demands. One of the key reasons may be
Iran.
A lot of people credited the “surge” with making life in Iraq better
in 2007. Yet the primary reason things got better were: a) the US
stopped fighting the Sunni insurgents and instead made peace with them
to narrow the focus to al qaeda; and b) Moqtada al Sadr refused to
directly confront the US and Iraqi forces, and instead appeared to
acquiesce to Maliki in Basra. The only thing can explain “b” is that
Iran is the puppetmaster here. al-Sadr has spent a lot of time in
Iran, and the Iranians probably are his insurance against being
eliminated as a political force.
Consider the following scenario. It’s well known that Iraqi Shi’ites
and the government have not been overly happy with US policy towards
the Sunni tribes. They have not disarmed them, and in some cases have
given them arms and aid in order to ‘fight al qaeda.’ Al qaeda,
however, is not a strong force in Iraq. It came after the US invasion,
has always been rather small, and overly brutal. The Sunnis tolerated
them as long as the fight was against the US and the Shi’ites, but
when the US stopped trying to defeat Sunni insurgents, they found it
useful to help the US against al qaeda; al qaeda was unpopular anyway.
They also saw that the US meant business when it was telling the
Shi’ite government that it had to share oil revenues with the Sunnis
and bring Sunni militias into the Iraqi military.
The Iraqi government hated these developments. They’d been held down
by the Sunni minority for so long, and it now appeared that the US was
helping the Sunni tribes remain well armed and outside the reach of
Iraq’s central government (most Sunni areas are controlled by Sunni
tribal forces), and were now siding with the Sunnis over fights about
Iraq’s economy and political settlement. There is a lot of corruption
in Iraq, and government officials knew that opening this to the Sunnis
would not only threaten revenue sources, but could open a path for
Sunnis to grab a chunk of power.
What if the Iranians came to the rescue? What if they told Maliki “you
don’t need the Americans, we’ll make sure you have the capacity to
secure the region. We’ll make sure that al Sadr is not a thorn in your
side, and help your government gain control of the Shi’ite regions in
Iraq. The price is that you do not allow the Americans to use Iraq as
a permanent base, and instead you demand they leave relatively
quickly.”
Maliki’s calculation would be simple. The US is disliked by the Iraq
people, the American public is divided by the war, and for the most
part wants the US out of Iraq, and America is pressuring the
government to help their Sunni rivals. Moreover, Americans are
complaining about Iraq oil revenues and budget surpluses. How much
more can the US really do for Maliki? It might even force him out like
it did Jaafari, or weaken him politically by making him look like a
lackey for the West. But Iran is next door, fellow Shi’ites, and
despite the Arab-Persian rivalry, Iran housed and helped most of the
Iraqi parties in government during Saddam’s rule. Iran is their
natural partner. Iran will be there and can provide more than the
Americans can. Most importantly, Iraq knows that despite Iran’s power,
Iraq has partners in the Arab world that can help assure that Iran
cannot dominate Iraq. The US has shown a desire to try to get the
results it wants in Iraq, from election systems, to particular laws
(’benchmarks’) and naming the Prime Minister.
So while McCain and Bush take credit for the ’surge,’ Iraq is quickly
trying to get the US to leave, and appears to have a closer
relationship with ever with Iran, a country which continues to thumb
its nose at the West on nuclear research.
It would all be rather comical, just how much the US spent in order to
lose so much in Iraq. The US lost prestige, is no longer feared, is
finding Afghanistan in disintegration, has massive budget deficits, a
weakened economy, is divided politically, and appears almost a paper
tiger, unable to finish the two wars it started. The irony of ironies
is that even in Iraq, where they are trying to claim some success
(though that’s a dubious argument even if their premise that the surge
worked were true), it may really be that the country’s arch-rival Iran
has benefited most from US policies. Not just Iran, but the hardliners
in Iran have gained the most! Meanwhile, Islamic extremism has been on
the rise, and terrorist groups relatively ignored.
However the deaths are real. There are numerous orphans, widows, and
destroyed families and villages in Iraq, where children will never
have a normal life, having been surrounded by war and violence, and
people will be scared physically and spiritually for decades. There
are American families who have lost loved ones, divorces caused by the
psychological toll of numerous deployments and the horror of war, and
veterans who also will never live a normal life due to what they
experienced. All this because policy makers engaged in hubris,
overestimated the benefits of military power, and underestimated the
heavy price it would cost.