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Tim Cavanaugh | January 13, 2005

Michael Young on Iraqi exit strategies.

Comments

|1.13.05 @ 7:47PM|#

There is only one viable exit (s)tragedy: Three nights of more Shock & Awe, Declare Victory, and get the hell out of there.

gaius marius|1.13.05 @ 8:24PM|#

mr young/mr cavanaugh -- i've come to the thirdhand armchair-analyst conclusion that we can't stop the civil war in any case.

we don't have sufficient troops to guarantee securty, we seem unwilling to put enough troops there to do the job properly, and we thereby are forced to use abhorrent tactics in counterstrike that only inflame the insurgency.

so the choice, it seems to me, is stay and wait for the civil war to erupt all around us -- or leave and let it happen. (or, possibly, with our aggravation gone, see the risk subside.)

taken with the phenomena that our continued presence seems to provoke yet more stupid and immoral ideas in the white house -- such as installing death squads or bombing campaigns against syria -- this analysis leads me to believe that we will do the least damage by removing ourselves from iraq.

can you poke convincing holes in that analysis?

|1.13.05 @ 9:28PM|#

gaius or rev. marius, whatever,
You have a firm grip on something there, as per usual. (You have checked out The Hun
"action figure"?)

My second point is I consult Justin Raimondo for exit strategies rather than Michael Young.

|1.13.05 @ 9:28PM|#

I don't see why the Iraqis should have to exit their own country.

Warren|1.13.05 @ 9:50PM|#

What rubbish. Reason should cease printing Michael Young's work.

|1.13.05 @ 10:03PM|#

"However, in the overall debate on withdrawal, Stratfor has staked out an interesting position: one that advocates taking advantage of the support the U.S. still enjoys in Iraq, and working from there."

It seems to me that the U.S. only enjoys passive support.

"That is what makes so ironic his tendency to downplay the nervous relations between Iraqi communities when considering the range of U.S. options. The fact is that most of America's adversaries (though not Abu Musab al-Zarqawi) live a contradiction when demanding an American withdrawal: Sunni Arabs, in particular, must know that if coalition soldiers depart, they would have to face on their own angry Shiites as well as Kurds hankering for independence."

There is another option that no one seems to be considering.

Sunni Arabs must know that if the coalition soldiers depart, they will have to face Shiites as well as Kurds, no doubt, but isn't this true whether or not the soon to be elected government takes root? Is it reasonable to expect Sunni Arabs to trust that their concerns will be addressed within the confines of a democracy in which they are outnumbered four to one by their potential enemies?

If the inertia to create three separate states is so great, then, rather than resisting a three state solution, perhaps we would all be better off if the United States worked to make that happen. What, exactly, is the downside of there being a Sunni Arab state in the center of Iraq? ...Please note that this is not a rhetorical question.

I know that Turkey will not appreciate having an independent Kurdistan on its border--worse things have happened. So long as Shiites are permitted to rule themselves, will they not be happy in an independent state of their own?

If we can't have a peaceful Iraq without a brutal dictator or an occupation force; indeed, if a single all encompassing democracy just won't work, then aren't multiple democracies the next best thing?

Wasn't that an important part of the solution in Yugoslavia? There are other areas in the world where people of different cultures share oil revenue.

I don't think Sunni Arabs have much to gain by driving out American troops. They will surely face the Shiites next; directly or indirectly, they may eventually have to face Iran. I don't think Sunni insurgents have much more to gain from a nominally unified and democratic Iraq--even in a democracy, eventually, they're likely to face the same threat.

Al Qaeda operatives aside, whether the insurgents on the ground have made it known or not, they look to me like they're fighting for their own country.

...Someone please explain to me why giving the predominantly Sunni portions of Iraq their own country is so much worse than the other options.

|1.13.05 @ 10:26PM|#

"What rubbish. Reason should cease printing Michael Young's work."

I often disagree with much of what Michael Young writes--that's why I always make a point to read what he's written. There are places on the web where everything is written by someone who agrees with me--I hope Hit & Run never becomes one of those places.

|1.13.05 @ 10:46PM|#

Michael is right on with two things at least. First, we here state side are running on what we get from the news feeds. I've often wondered how clearly we're seeing Iraq. Second, if we don't leave Iraq better off than it was, then this whole venture really will have been a complete waste (though I think he wrote that somewhere else).

I give Michael one huge amount of credit for staying in the ring. Bravo for that. Because he's also right -- the minute we give up the ghost on this, then there really won't be any possibility of dragging anything good out of the whole venture. We'll all be much better off if we can find a respectable resolution. And yeah I know, the answers aren't jumping out at us. Which means, the solution is to starting thinking hard.....which is what it means to stay in the ring and keep trying.

Those of you who've screamed that the US military is immoral every time a civilian is killed, I submit: morality demands that we keep trying to think up a decent resolution to this mess, by the same token and the same moral standards that you condemn innocent death (which I too would rather avoid). Otherwise the civil war will bring its own massive pile of civilian deaths.

If you now tell me "it can't be done" or "they'll kill each other anyway", you've already stopped trying. And I think many of the people who've posted around here never really tried. Success may or may not be possible, I concede -- but I don't see that we've given this our best shot yet. Nothing less than our best attempt is sufficient.

The US is guilty for invading when there were no WMD's. I contend that our guilt is doubled if we just cut and run, and a blood bath follows.

I like Ken's idea of partitioning Iraq. The Shiites may declare themselves an Iranian satelite. Fine if they want it. The Sunnis probably won't be happy unless they rule all, but too bad for that. The Kurds deserve their own country, I'd say, though Turkey and Iran both won't like it. Too bad for that again.

Okay, I went out on the limb (the right limb, I think). Let the flames decend..... :)

|1.14.05 @ 12:38AM|#

"I like Ken's idea of partitioning Iraq. The Shiites may declare themselves an Iranian satelite. Fine if they want it. The Sunnis probably won't be happy unless they rule all, but too bad for that. The Kurds deserve their own country, I'd say, though Turkey and Iran both won't like it. Too bad for that again."

I've thought that from the beginning of the whole mess. Why we care about upsetting Turkey, after they made it clear they were not on our side, is beyond me. Well, of course there would be consequences to pissing of Turkey, and I recognize that they have had and still have a special role in Western/European/Asian relations, but there comes a point where they are screwing up the most obvious solution to an incredibly difficult problem.
And considering what the Kurds have been through, I've felt that that's the only decent moral reason for the war anyone could come up with.

|1.14.05 @ 2:46AM|#

I recall someone around here saying the Sunnis and Shiites didn't want to separate. Why I don't understand, but giving the Kurds their own space seems at least a start towards the right ending.

Making the Sunnis happy will probably demand some more creative thought (and some genuine effort on our part to understand them). We also may not be entirely happy with what the Sunnis and Shiites decide to do with themselves for a gov't. If so, that may just be too bad for us.

|1.14.05 @ 3:07AM|#

Success may or may not be possible, I concede -- but I don't see that we've given this our best shot yet. Nothing less than our best attempt is sufficient.

The more we try, the more we realize we need to be trying harder, the worse off things get. When the fuck are we going to say "stop! enough!"?

I've said it before, I'll say it again. The faster we lose the better.

Why we care about upsetting Turkey, after they made it clear they were not on our side, is beyond me.

Turkey is a strongly Islamic nation living under a secularist state. Right now it's still moving down the road to westernization that has been Ataturk's legacy. Should American snub it and the EU deny it entry, I shudder to think of the possibilities of Turkey looking for new friends in Russia and Iran.

|1.14.05 @ 4:23AM|#

Pavel, we're libertarains, yes? We seem to like spending our lives doing thought experiments. "Gee, what would I do if I had the reins?" We're just having another one of those libertarian experiences here.

Do you mean a) you don't trust our gov't to do the right thing in Iraq even if it's obvious, b) that Iraq is an impossible situation even if our gov't was rational, or c) both a) and b)?

I don't trust our gov't to do the right thing (enough to about make me oppose the whole thing), and Iraq is a tough nut to crack. But I wouldn't call Iraq inherently impossible yet.

Turkey might get mad at us. We'd have to try and work on that. Everybody and their mother might get mad at us, turn around, and bow to Russia (and you?). Everybody, that is, who hasn't already done so...

Americans used to believe that determined people could do impossible things, if those things were worth doing. Call me a fool but I still think that way.

|1.14.05 @ 7:45AM|#

pragmatism: A practical, matter-of-fact way of approaching or assessing situations or of solving problems.

gaius marius|1.14.05 @ 10:08AM|#

Those of you who've screamed that the US military is immoral every time a civilian is killed, I submit: morality demands that we keep trying to think up a decent resolution to this mess, by the same token and the same moral standards that you condemn innocent death (which I too would rather avoid). Otherwise the civil war will bring its own massive pile of civilian deaths.

i deeply agree, mr pragmatist. it behooves us to to what we can, whatever it is, to make things right where we've set them wrong.

but iraq is not a simple object of analysis, where the parts can be pulled apart, solved and reconstituted as "fixed". what is at least as important as considering fruitful steps is understanding our profound limitations. had we done this from the start, i submit, we'd be culpable for far less hate and destruction.

Which means, the solution is to starting thinking hard.....which is what it means to stay in the ring and keep trying.

what i'm saying is that this is in all likelihood not a matter of thinking harder, any more than deducing trajectories within a strange attractor is such a matter. there is no silver-bullet solution to problems of irreducable complexity. i'm afraid the best we can do will be something closer to an enlightened patchwork.

part of that patchwork may well be a general withdrawal -- based on the logic i put forward above. we, imo, do not have the ability to prevent civil war if it is coming; we can at best delay it, giving both sides yet more time to arm and the idle hands in the white house more time to concoct disastrous schemes.

again, if anyone can convince me we have the ability to do otherwise, please start.

gaius marius|1.14.05 @ 10:34AM|#

"I like Ken's idea of partitioning Iraq. The Shiites may declare themselves an Iranian satelite. Fine if they want it. The Sunnis probably won't be happy unless they rule all, but too bad for that. The Kurds deserve their own country, I'd say, though Turkey and Iran both won't like it. Too bad for that again."

to those who like partitioning iraq, i submit to you that this solution is no different than recreating the balkans.

despite the reductive representation we get in the news of separate areas, iraq is "marbled" -- kurds flow into sunnis flow into shi'ites, and large territories would be violently contested for ethnic integrity and natural resources. moreover, other unconsidered divisions -- like christians -- would be left to agitate within them.

then considering the externalities -- syria would back the sunnis, iran the shia -- but no one the kurds. an independent kurdistan is all but guaranteed to be met by a turkish invasion; such a thing would again be tantamount to balkanizing eastern turkey and northern iran, and this cannot be countenanced in ankara or tehran.

the british and french are often denounced for drawing arbitrary lines in the sand in the mideast, but i think the more honest assessment is that there are no good places to draw lines. the ottoman lines were no better. i know it sounds like a simple solution to a complex problem to break up the country, but that way chaos lies, imo.

gaius marius|1.14.05 @ 11:38AM|#

and then there's all this.

|1.14.05 @ 12:23PM|#

Have any of you armchair Great Gamers even considered if a majority of Iraqis want their nation to be split up into three different countries? The Kurds might, but the Kurds might also settle for regional autonomy. I have no real idea what the non-Kurd Sunni, Shi'ite, and Christian Iraqis might want, and I don't think anyone else on this forum does either.

|1.14.05 @ 1:46PM|#

"Have any of you armchair Great Gamers even considered if a majority of Iraqis want their nation to be split up into three different countries?"

Nice tone.

I wrote, "What, exactly, is the downside of there being a Sunni Arab state in the center of Iraq? ...Please note that this is not a rhetorical question." I don't think that makes me an "armchair Great Gamer", but I do appreciate the answer.

Polling Iraqis is a tough business; I don't know what a majority of Iraqis want, but it seems pretty clear to me that a significant number of Sunni Arabs don't want to be part of a unified and democratic Iraq. I hope we find some solution that doesn't involve perpetual occupation, a reckless abandonment and civil war.

I fear that Iraq is Balkanized already. I'm becoming increasingly convinced that killing Arabs and squandering the lives of American servicemen until Sunni Arabs finally get enthusiastic about joining in a coalition with their enemies is not the answer. If there's a possibility for a Czechoslovakia like solution, then maybe we should explore it.

Having legitimately elected governments to negotiate borders, oil sharing, etc. would be a good thing.

The United States was made up of states before it united.

|1.14.05 @ 4:39PM|#

I think that what Young's think-tankers are describing is what we ARE doing:

Elections will be held...why not?

We will see what happens.

American troops will have stopped dying in their current numbers by 2006. Either they will have returned home, or they will be occupying a largely peaceful Iraq.

We don't need to URGE a partition on Iraqis...they can manage this themselves, if that is what they want.

|1.14.05 @ 4:58PM|#

"American troops will have stopped dying in their current numbers by 2006."

Didn't President Johnson say something like that in '67?

|1.14.05 @ 5:59PM|#

Didn't President Johnson say something like that in '67?

He forgot the "Mission Accomplished" banner. The countdown to peace doesn't really start until you do the banner.

|1.14.05 @ 9:01PM|#

"...but the Kurds might also settle for regional autonomy"

Yes. Historically, the Near East has been ruled in just this way. Where are the anarchists? I'd expect they see the Near East as the closest thing to heaven on earth. For the last 2000 years anyway, there hasn't really been strong central gov't in the Near East most of the time, and there have been big regions that were autonomous or semi-autonomous. Iraq was one of those regions, largely autonomous under the Ottomans.

Weak gov't had led to a law enforcement system in the Near East where, if you get caught being a bad guy, they punish you harshly way out of proportion. It's to offset the fact that there's few police, and so much less chance that you'll get caught in the first place. Not much gov't around to impose things on you.

But what the Iraqis really want I don't pretend to know either, very well.

gauis, as I said, maybe you're right and we won't be able to find a fix. I can only hope you're wrong.

Ken is right, polling them isn't easy.

Of course, 8 out of 10 people have never been surveyed. Imagine that.

|1.14.05 @ 10:46PM|#

Ball of Confusion,
Old as I am, I think I can do the comparison:
Dubya's "Mission Accomplished" banner was LBJ's "light at the end of the tunnel."

|1.15.05 @ 12:24AM|#

Didn't President Johnson say something like that in '67?

Well...if he did then he was a better prophet than most war critics have proven to be. American casualty numbers began to drop within about two years, and were negligible after a time.

|1.15.05 @ 2:03AM|#

This link

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=11805

would make you think democracy is a lost cause in Iraq. It says:

"...working conditions for Iraqi journalists have descended into a nightmare. Under the Baath regime, most Iraqi journalists worried about trouble from the state security apparatus and from Saddam's psychotic and capricious son, Odai, who ran wide swathes of the official media. Nowadays, they are subject to violence and harassment from all directions....."There are threats from three sides: the Americans might shoot you if they're ambushed; the Iraqi security forces might stop you or beat you if they suspect you're with the resistance; and the resistance might kill you if they think you're a spy."

There's basically two ways to "fix" Iraq. Either find a carrot that everybody wants a piece of, or else Ruling Class A (Sunnis) is displaced by Ruling Class B (Shiites), i.e. civil war.

Which makes me think: hold the elections, and then if there's going to be a civil war, let them go at. Take this link seriously

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=11857

where it says

"For his part, radical Iraqi Shiite leader Moqtada al-Sadr urged U.S. President George W. Bush and Iraq's neighbors Friday not to interfere with the Jan. 30 general elections. "This affair is none of your business," the young Shiite leader said..."

Avoiding civil war would be the best fix. But maybe the right fix is to simply listen to what Iraqis seem to say they want (hope it's not too contradictory), and let them have it. It may be the only way, and it may in fact save the most lives in the long run -- is that not the best ultimate moral criteria?

Do I sound like I'm vascillating? I suppose I am. But every "on the ground" report on Iraq I've seen, sounds like the links above.

|1.17.05 @ 3:26AM|#

Exit Strategy ??

You wouldn�t need one; if you had listened to the rest of the world to start with...you shouldn�t have been there in the first place.

pretty simple really.. the US broke it.. now you have to fix it.

|1.18.05 @ 3:22AM|#

Given the latest squawk over military intelligence-gathering in Iran, and the instability of Iraq, I find the link below to have more prescient information. If the election in Iraq fails, look to see this as policy:


http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FI21Ak02.html

Sept 21 2004

|1.18.05 @ 3:23AM|#

Too little, too late.