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Most of his reasoning is the old tired and counterintuitive dissembling of the left. A few new winners stand out however. We need to leave Iraq because:
1. By doing so, we will be able to achieve energy security. What possible set of facts supports the claim that leaving Iraq improves our energy security? That said, when Iran dominates the Shia south where the bulk of the oil is located and Iraq's only port city through which its oil can be transported, it would seem to make our energy situation exponentially more precarious.
2. What possible set of facts supports the idea that pulling out of Iraq on a timetable improves our national security. To the contrary, it provides the gift of all gifts to our existential security threat today, Iran - a country Obama does not seem to have the vision to recognize as a threat.
3. We need to send one to two combat brigades to Afghanistan. This one fails any test of logic. We have 140,000 forming providing support for 15+ combat brigades in Iraq today. 15 brgades in Iraq minus 2 brigades transferred to Afghanistan equals how many brigades left in Iraq? We know from his inability to count the number of states in the U.S. that Obama has trouble with numbers, and this is no different. Apparently his answer is 0.
4. There has been no political progress. Obama, who explictly endorsed the bench marks on video in Feb., 2007 as the measure for political progress in Iraq, has now forgotten them. And he mindnumbingly repeats the mantra that only by leaving can we force political progress in Iraq. Amb. Crocker was clear several months ago that leaving will do nothing to force political progrees but will have the opposite effect. Further, the amazing political progress in Iraq, something even the NYT has acknowledged, has only come about because we are in Iraq providing security.
5. We need to pay for Obama's new cradle to grave socialist programs. This is hardly a peace dividend. The cost to undue the harm that Obama may well do to our nation in his dealings with both Iraq and Iran portends to make the savings to be had from withdrawing now like chump change.
Showing posts with label bench marks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bench marks. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Iraq Speech Part III: Why Do We Need To Leave Iraq
Monday, June 23, 2008
Iraq, A Broken Clock & The NYT
The difference between a broken clock and the NYT agenda journalism on Iraq over the past five years has been that the broken clock has been accurate at least twice a day. That said, the quality of the NYT Iraq reporting has just met with a sudden and amazing improvement. For the first time in the past five years, the NYT manages to get two major points right about Iraq in the same article. The NYT hits the nail on the head at the beginning of their article Saturday, "Big Gains for Iraq Security, but Questions Linger:"
Violence in all of Iraq is the lowest since March 2004. The two largest cities, Baghdad and Basra, are calmer than they have been for years. The third largest, Mosul, is in the midst of a major security operation. On Thursday, Iraqi forces swept unopposed through the southern city of Amara, which has been controlled by Shiite militias. There is a sense that Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki’s government has more political traction than any of its predecessors.
And at the conclusion of their article, the NYT finishes by hitting the nail on the head a second time, discussing that the security gains are fragile and Iraq needs U.S. forces for protection against internal and external foes if it is to survive (the foes go unnamed, as apparently acknowledging the Iranian's acts of war is still a bit too much reality for NYT to take on at the moment).
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This from the NYT, following the lead paragraph quoted above:
For Hatem al-Bachary, a Basra businessman, the turnabout has been “a miracle,” the first tentative signs of a normal life.
“I don’t think the militias have disappeared, and maybe there are sleeper cells which will try to revive themselves again,” he said. “But the first time they try to come back they will have to show themselves, and the government, army and police are doing very well.”
While the increase in American troops and their support behind the scenes in the recent operations has helped tamp down the violence, there are signs that both the Iraqi security forces and the Iraqi government are making strides. There are simply more Iraqi troops for the government to deploy, partly because fewer are needed to fight the Sunni insurgents, who have defected to the Sunni Awakening movement. They are paid to keep the peace.
Pehaps the least covered aspect of the Iraq War has been the surge in Iraqi forces, both in numbers and training. We have heard of a few Iraqi units that have faded under fire, but given that we are building Iraqi forces from scratch, the degree at which they are progressing is heartening indeed. This is not just picking up the pieces of the old Soviet model, top down military that Iraq had under Sadaam. The U.S. military model is competely new to Iraq. It relies heavily on highly professional junior leaders who are expected to display judgment and initiative - and they are grown over years. Later in its article, the NYT to its credit, discusses in detail the tremendous growth in the Iraqi forces.
That said, NYT just can't untangle themselves from the far left meme that Anbar is only quiet because we have bribed the Anbar Sunnis. The Anbar Sunni Awakening started of its own accord as a push back to the animalistic brutality and draconian treatment at the hands of al Qaeda. True, thankfully, the U.S. has exploited it, but to suggest, as the NYT does, that bribery is at the heart of the pacification of Anbar is dissembling.
To continue with the NYT article:
Mr. Maliki’s moves against Shiite militias have built some trust with wary Sunnis, offering the potential for political reconciliation. High oil prices are filling Iraqi government coffers. But even these successes contain the seeds of vulnerability. The government victories in Basra, Sadr City and Amara were essentially negotiated, so the militias are lying low but undefeated and seething with resentment.
This is the NYT back in its old, highly disingenuous form. Sadr's forces resisted in Basra, supported by Iran, and they suffered exceptionally high casualties over six days of fighting before they surrendered. Much the same thing happened in Sadr City, where Sadr waved the white flag after suffering high casualties and with a full scale offensive into Sadr City literally days away. To describe these actions as simple negotiations and to call the Sadrists undefeated is ridiulous. Iran's proxy Sadr has suffered a devestating series of reverses and their popularity is at its nadir. Sadr just demobilized the Mahdi Army. Is the NYT paying any attention at all?
. . . Attacks like the bombing that killed 63 people in Baghdad’s Huriya neighborhood on Tuesday showed that opponents can continue to inflict carnage.
This too is quite troubling. That bombing was carried out by an Iranian proxy against Shi'ites. That was not an "opponent" doing the bombing, that was an act of war carried out at the behest of a foreign power that wants the U.S. out and Iraq "Lebanized." Unfortunately, the NYT studiously ignores the Iranian threat and acts of war throughout its otherwise heartening article.
Perhaps most worrisome, more than five years after the American invasion, which knocked Mr. Hussein from power but set off great chaos, Iraq still lacks the formal rules to divide the power and spoils of an oil-rich nation among ethnic, religious and tribal groups and unite them under one stable idea of Iraq. The improvements are fragile.
A year ago, there were the eighteen benchmarks that the NYT trumpeted to show that Iraq was a failed state incapable of governing itself. Today, of those benchmarks, the only substantive one remaining is the oil law. To cite to the oil law while studiously ignoring all of the other progress is both disingenuous and a red herring.
What the NYT fails to say is that no one claims that the oil wealth flowing to the central government is not being shared and shared fairly. The system is not broken because of the lack of an oil law. There is no blood being spilled over the sharing of oil wealth. As to the "5 year" remark, the NYT fails to note that democratic government in Iraq just turned two years old. The Iraqis are still arguing over the precise contours of how an oil law should be set up, true, but their time frame to get legislation in place on this issue is hardly excessive, particularly when compared to our own government's years of inability to pass laws on such things as entitlement reforms.
That said, the biggest problems the Iraqi government faces is getting basic government services out to the people. This is the non-warfare part of supporting Iraq that goes unreported in our news but that is equally as important to long term success as the security gains. The LWJ did an exceptional article on this topic several months ago that is well worth the read. In essence, the problem is not sectarianism, but a highly inefficient bureacracratic system that is riddled with far too much corruption. The Iraqi government and the U.S. are making much headway in streamlining the system and rooting out the corruption, but the challenges are immense and the clock is ticking.
. . . The most obvious but often overlooked reason for the recent military success has been an increase in the number of trained Iraqi troops.
The quality of the recruits and leadership has often been poor, even in recent months. In Baghdad’s Sadr City, one Iraqi company abandoned its position in April, forcing American and Iraqi commanders to fill the gap with hastily summoned reinforcements. In Basra, more than 1,000 recently qualified soldiers deserted rather than obey orders to fight against Mr. Sadr’s Mahdi Army. One senior Iraqi government official conceded that the deserters simply “felt that the other side was too strong.”
But sheer numbers have helped to overcome the shortcomings. After the embarrassing setback in Basra, Mr. Maliki was able to pull units from elsewhere to provide reinforcements and saturate the city with checkpoints and patrols, restoring a measure of order after years of domination by Islamist militias and oil-smuggling mafias.
This continuing Basra narrative of painting it as an Iraqi Army failure because they did not blow through unexpectedly strong resistance in six days of attacking against defenders occupying urban terrain is just utterly ridiculous. As is the NYT's continued emphasis of a few military units that did not perform to standard under fire. That was a small part of the forces sent into Basra. And some green units failing under fire is as old as the military itself. For example, the word "decimate" comes from the ancient world's finist military, the Romans, who inflicted a decimation - the ritual slaughter of every tenth soldier - upon legions or cohorts that broke under battle. Suggesting that Iraq's newly minted military is somehow weak because of the actions of a few units under combat likewise shows that, while the NYT may understand agenda journalism, their understanding of the military and history is sorely lacking.
But the government’s successes in Basra and Sadr City were not so much victories as heavy fighting followed by truces that allowed the militias to melt away with their weapons. “We may have wasted an opportunity in Basra to kill those that needed to be killed,” said one American defense official, who would speak candidly about the issue only if he was granted anonymity.
Let's see, hundreds of Sadrists killed, hundreds of criminals captured, virtually all of Iraq now under government control, the Iranians exposed, Sadr exposed, the Sadrist trend isolated in the Parliament, and the Mahdi Army demobolized. If that does not sound like victories to the NYT, they need to radically up their meds. The goal never has been complete destruction of the Sadrists, its been to split off the majority from the trained and paid Iranian proxies. With virtually all of Iraq in government hands, the ability of any militia to operate is severely circumscribed. The government does not have to destroy the militias in cataclysmic battles to win. Just as al Qaedea hemmoraged people and support as the tide turned against it, so too is that happening Sadr and his militia.
I wont' bother to fisk most of the rest. The NYT spends several paragraphs reporting quite literally the wildest speculations it can find from various individuals who state things such as that Maliki is an agent of Iran, etc. Compare that to the reporting from ABC not long ago and from the Atlantic Monthly where both describe Malik's popularity as being at its zenith across all religious and ethnic lines in Iraq. No need to discuss that, though, when you can get a money quote from someone with an axe to grind or a conpiracy theory dreamed up below their tin foil hat. But when we finally get to the end, the NYT, to their credit, hits the nail on the head a second time.
Reversible Gains
The anti-government and anti-occupation forces have also stumbled. The Islamist Sunni insurgents alienated many Iraqis with a trail of blood and bans on alcohol and smoking. And as attacks on Shiite areas by Sunni insurgents dropped, Shiites who had looked to the Mahdi Army for self-defense were less willing to put up with abuses.
. . . Despite their newfound confidence, some senior Iraqi officials close to Mr. Maliki said that without an American military safety net they are vulnerable to threats from outside and inside their borders. One important but less-noticed element of the security negotiations has been Iraq’s effort to extract an American pledge to defend the government against foreign or domestic aggression. Mr. Adeeb, the top Maliki adviser, said officials wanted the Americans to protect the Iraqi government against anything the government viewed as a threat — not just what the Americans saw as a threat.
“Our political system is weak, the terrorists and former regime members are sparing no effort to overthrow the system, and neighboring countries have their own ambitions,” Mr. Adeeb said. “Our army is not qualified to defend Iraq yet.”
Amen. Which is why a precipitous withdrawal from Iraq as Obama has articluated is just incredibly wrong-headed and comes with existential implications for all the gains made in Iraq and for the national security threats we face from the mad mullahs in Iran. When even the hyperpartisan NYT is coming around to that conclusion, one wonders if the fantasy based folks on the far left will begin to see the light. Or perhaps this is just laying the groundwork for the mother of all flip flops from Obama once he has a chance to visit Iraq and consult with our military commanders - General Pew and Admiral Rasmussen in particular.
At any rate, my hats off to the NYT. They have raised their level of reporting on Iraq to the level of a broken clock. This is a heartening development indeed.
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Pelosi Crosses The Line
The latest from the train wreck that is our House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi:
"The surge didn’t accomplish its goal. And some of the success of the surge is . . . [because of] the goodwill of the Iranians."
So the question is, is she traitorous or simply insane?
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Nancy Pelosi gave an interview with the SF Chronicle yesterday. When asked about what she observed in Iraq during her May 17 visit, she replied:
Well, the purpose of the surge was to provide a secure space, a time for the political change to occur to accomplish the reconciliation. That didn’t happen. Whatever the military success, and progress that may have been made, the surge didn’t accomplish its goal. And some of the success of the surge is that the goodwill of the Iranians-they decided in Basra when the fighting would end, they negotiated that cessation of hostilities-the Iranians.
As to reconciliation, Ms. Pelosi's narrative is ridiculous. Even our own perfidious MSM is now acknowledging both the great strides towards reconciliation that Iraq has made and the fact that the Iraqis are rallying around Maliki as a nationalist leader. Maliki is extremely popular across the spectrum of Iraq's citizens. Indeed, the only places where he is unpopular are in Tehran and, apparently, in the offices of Congressional Democrats.
As to Iran, any inference from events surrounding Basra that Iran is acting with goodwill towards the U.S. and the government of Iraq is not merely unsupported by the facts, it is a highly malignant falsehood. Iran's primary contribution to the situation in Iraq is death and mayhem. Their malign and extensive proxy war is at the heart of the need for the continuation of the surge.
Pelosi is a hyperpartisan hack. She is either wholly unable to distinguish reality or quite willing to ignore it in her all encompassing desire for political power.
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Reconciliation:
ABC News, May 28, 2008: Maliki's Midas Touch
. . . The Sunnis, Kurds and Shiites alike all eventually lauded the Basra operation as a huge success and whole-heartedly backed Maliki in his next endeavor — to revisit Mosul, and take on al Qaeda.
. . . Acutely aware of his political momentum, on May 12, Maliki, accompanied by crews from Al Iraqia TV, the official state-run media outlet — went to Mosul — and Maliki personally, and publicly, took charge of the military operations there.
He was the lead story and plastered across almost every local front page.
. . . Sadr is trying to grasp on to a sliver of political leverage, claiming to have struck the deal which brought his people their livelihoods back. While Maliki is lauding the latest in a series of successes to ensure security and a regained national unity to his country.
Certainly, it seems as though there is little Maliki can do wrong these days. With provincial elections around the corner, an Iraqi future without Maliki is almost impossible to imagine.
The Atlantic, May 13, 2008, Maliki's Southern Strategy
. . . At first, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's decision to confront Moqtada al-Sadr's Iranian-backed militas looked like a major strategic misstep. Now it appears to have transformed Iraqi politics, potentially paving the way for real reconciliation between Sunni and Shia.
. . . [T]here has also been a more lasting change: The Sadrists have been marginalized. Even the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who has been reluctant to make political interventions in recent years, pointedly condemned Sadr for refusing to disarm. Leading Sunni faction have also returned to the fold. The Kurds, who have their own problems with Sadr, are also on board. Maliki, suprisingly enough, increasingly looks like the leader of all Iraqis.
. . . Unfortunately, few Americans understand what Maliki has accomplished, and how much international assistance he needs to beat back foreign elements that aim to undermine Iraq's fragile democracy -- which is, as far as neighboring governments are concerned (particularly those that begin with an "I" and end with an "n"), a profoundly subversive influence.
USA Today, April 22, 2008, Iraq Frees Detainees
Most of those released were Sunnis who had been low-level army officials or former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party. . . .
The prisoners are being freed under an amnesty law passed by Iraq's parliament in February. More than 52,400 detainees in government custody have applied for their freedom. Of those, nearly 78%, or more than 40,000, were granted amnesty. . . .
"This is sort of a new life," Othman said. "Terrorism started and now it is ending. A new life is coming, God willing."
NYT, February 12, 2008, Making (Some) Progress In Iraq
Iraq’s Parliament has finally approved a budget, outlined the scope of provincial powers, set an Oct. 1 date for provincial elections and voted a general amnesty for detainees. All these steps are essential for national conciliation.
. . . We are, of course, cheered by the news that representatives from Iraq’s three main ethnic groups — Shiite, Sunni and Kurd — finally saw some benefit in compromise. . . .
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Iran
Washington Post, May 29, 2008, U.S. Cites Big Gains Against Al Qaeda
. . . [CIA Chief Michael]Hayden warned, however, that progress in Iraq is being undermined by increasing interference by Iran, which he accused of supplying weapons, training and financial assistance to anti-U.S. insurgents. While declining to endorse any particular strategy for dealing with Iran, he described the threat in stark terms.
"It is the policy of the Iranian government, approved at the highest levels of that government, to facilitate the killing of American and other coalition forces in Iraq. Period," he said.
Fox News, Aug. 9, 2007, Captured Video Shows Iraqi Insurgents Firing Sophisticated Iranian-Made Rockets at U.S. Positions
Dramatic video produced by Iraqi insurgents and captured in a raid earlier this week by U.S. troops clearly shows a battery of sophisticated Iranian-made rocket launchers firing on American positions east of Baghdad, Pentagon officials said Wednesday.
The video, captured during a raid on Monday by the 3rd Squadron, 1st Cavalry Regiment in northeast Nahrawan, shows insurgents setting up and carrying out an attack on Sunday, as well as an attack on July 11 that killed one soldier and wounded 15 others, officials said. The raid last month appeared to involve 34 launchers firing 107 mm Iranian-made rockets.
AFP, May 5, 2008, Iran Ex-President Under Fire For Comments On Insurgents
Ex-president [of Iran] Mohmamad Khatami was under fire from hardliners on Monday after comments interpreted as accusing Iran's clerical leaders of supporting insurgents in the Middle East.
. . . His speech has been seen by some observers as accusing the Iranian authorities of encouraging militants to destabilize the Middle East, in particular Iraq and Lebanon. . . .
Voices of Iraq, May 3, 2008, Karbala Operations Commander Accuses Iran of Disturbing the City
Karbala operations commander said on Saturday that Iranian intervention is disturbing the city's security.
He noted that huge quantities of Iranian made weapons were seized throughout different locations in the province.
"There is Iranian intervention . . . in Karbala," Major General Ra'id Shaker Jawdat said in a press conference at Karbala operations command's building, after showing a large quantity of Iranian-made weapons.
. . . "Those weapons entered Karbala to destabilize security, . . .
AEI, May 13, 2008, Speech by Col. H.R. McMaster, Advisor to Gen. Petraeus
Col H.R. McMaster: . . . When I traveled through the south on a last couple of visits, what I heard – and this is again on the point of militias being increasingly discredited, and this is from Iraqi Shiite leaders who were saying things like Iran is the true occupier of Iraq. They would say jokingly that the Iranians are now all Iraqi nationalists, which is a thinly-veiled swipe at some of the militias in some of these areas.
And so whereas before about a year ago, you wouldn’t really hear Iraqi leaders, especially in these areas in the south, offering criticism of Iran and the parties and communities within Iraq who were playing host to Iranian influence but you hear that almost all the time now among Shiite Arab leaders. And also a connection to Iran, and this again affects the militias, is becoming a liability much like being connected to Al-Qaeda was a liability for so-called resistance movements in the Sunni Arab community. These are again changes that I’ve seen in the last year.
The contradictions of Iranian policies I’ve mentioned at the beginning have been exposed and Iraqis have to deal with them now. They have to deal with them again partly because of that pressure on the political parties, who are embarrassed by the connections to Iran and what Iran is doing. So the sixth thing is, no big surprise, the exposure of Iranian activity and Iran’s true intentions. . . .
. . . In the case of what Iran is doing in Iraq, it is so damn obvious to anybody who wants to look into it, I think, that is drop the word “alleged” and say what they’re doing, which is, we know for a fact organizing and directing operations against the government of Iraq and against our forces – the government of Iraq forces and our forces – we know they have done that, certainly in the past. We know that they are supplying them with weapons and the most effective weapons that they used to attack the Iraqi people and our forces and these include the long-range high payload rockets that have been coming in from Iraq as well as the explosively formed projectile roadside bombs that come from Iran.
We know that they have trained forces in the employment of these munitions - and in pretty large numbers. We know that they were concerned that their maligned hand being obvious in Iraq would alienate their Arab neighbors so they try Arabize these efforts by using Lebanese Hezbollah for a lot of the training but it’s a pretty cosmetic shift that they’ve made in some portions of the training.
We know for a fact that they have directed assassination operations. They have a reputation of being some of the best assassins in the world. They’ve trained Iraqis to do that. They’ve trained them in skills not only for roadside bombs and in long-range rockets but also in snipers and other skills used to intimidate or kill individuals. And we know that they have been sort of backing all horses to destabilize the situation and we know that their support is continued to key Badr officials who are in influential positions who remain on the payroll of Iran and to advance the interests of Iran and, in some cases, to provide leadership for other militia organizations that are stood up.
We know that they ostensibly have supported this government but have armed, equipped and trained a militia that has been attacking the very government they ostensibly support. And this is not just something in Basra, this is last year. This is in Nasariyah, this is Samwa, this is in Diwaniyahm, this is in Amarah and it was in Karbala in August 26th and 27th of last year. And now again in Basra.
So I think it’s very obvious. Now on this specific question you have - has it increased or has it decreased? I think it’s very clear that what Iran has done over the last year is try to develop a considerable latent capability that it could turn on in short notice. And I think that it may have been that this bold and very quick action by the Prime Minister in Basra foiled what was to be perhaps a much larger and coordinated effort, maybe even coordinated with efforts in other places in the region, like what we’re seen happening right now in Lebanon.
So, anyway, I think it’s very obvious what they’re doing. I think it’s very obvious to Iraqis, it certainly is. The Iraqis I’ve spoken to are incensed about it and I think it’s no longer alleged. Yes?
Demetri Sevastopulo: If it’s been going on for so long, why is it you said earlier that the Iraqis are only recently starting to talk about Iranian involvement? Why did it not bother them before?
H.R. McMaster: Now, that’s a great point. Part of the reason is the intimidation factor. We know that Iran had really been able to establish a pretty high degree of control over some key officials, you know, provided them protection. And then also some assassination cells and elements of militia that would kill anybody who made a statement against Iranian interests. So what I think what has happened is Iran has so blatantly undermined the security situation and it’s so clear now that they want to keep Iraq as a weak, failing state, is what they would like I think, dependent on them for support that many more Iraqis now are disavowing connections to Iran and providing more space, more physical space in terms of intimidation. There’s more sort of a political space to address this issue than there had been previously.
And then also, if you remember Iran was a big supporter of the militias which before and this goes back to the effective operations against Al-Qaeda and the importance of it, those militias were justified in large measure because of the perception that they were protectors against these Takfirists and Salafi jihadistss who play with Al-Qaeda, and the Baathists, the former regime. So all these, what Iran could do was raise the specter of terrorist attacks against Shiite communities as a justification for its support in nefarious activities. Now, the contradiction of what they’ve been doing is much more obvious to many more people than it had been previously. . . .
Nancy Pelosi has slandered the incredible accomplishments of our soldiers. She owes our soldiers and our nation an apology. And she owes a special apology to the family of every soldier killed and maimed by Iran in the conduct of their proxy war. She has denigrated their sacrifice with her falsehoods in her pursuit of partisan power.
The tremendous offensiveness of Pelosi's falsehoods are bad enough. But what makes her remarks truly malignant are that those remarks are upon an issue at the heart of our national security. Indeed, on the largest national security issue we face, Iran, pretending that they are a benign and helpful entity can only serve to place our nation in ever greater danger. It prevents us from acknowledging reality and developing a plan to deal with Iran that will have the support of our nation. That is not merely inexcusable, but for the third most powerful person in our government, it is traitorous and criminal.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
More Steps Towards Reconciliation In Iraq
Iraq’s largest Sunni bloc has agreed to return to Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki’s cabinet after a boycott that lasted nearly a year, several Sunni leaders said on Thursday, citing a recently passed amnesty law and the Maliki government’s crackdown on Shiite militias as reasons for the move. . . . The official government television channel, Iraqiya, appeared to confirm the deal, following a meeting between Mr. Maliki and David Miliband, the visiting foreign secretary of Britain. Iraqiya said the prime minister “said that reconciliation has proved a success and all political blocs will return to the government.” . . . Read the entire article.
Within the past month, the NYT proclaimed Maliki's Basra offensive a disasterous, politically motivated act that had weakened his deeply sectarian government. The NYT proclaimed Sadr the victor. Sufice it to say, that narrative was exposed as a canard within days. Today, Basra is in Iraqi government control, Sadr is throwing an impotent tantrum from somewhere inside Iran, and Maliki has earned vast new respect as a national leader. And today, the NYT reports that members of Iraq's largest Sunni bloc are returning to Parliament, lured back by the willingness of Maliki to take on Sadr's militia and his amnesty to low-level Sunni prisoners.
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This from the NYT:
The Sunni leaders said they were still working out the details of their return, an indication that the deal could still fall through. But such a return would represent a major political victory for Mr. Maliki in the midst of a military operation that has at times been criticized as poorly planned and fraught with risk. The principal group his security forces have been confronting is the Mahdi Army, a powerful militia led by Moktada al-Sadr, the radical Shiite cleric. Even though Mr. Maliki’s American-backed offensive against elements of the Mahdi Army has frequently stalled and has led to bitter complaints of civilian casualties, the Sunni leaders said that the government had done enough to address their concerns that they had decided to end their boycott.
“Our conditions were very clear, and the government achieved some of them,” said Adnan al-Duleimi, the head of Tawafiq, the largest Sunni bloc in the government. Mr. Duleimi said the achievements included “the general amnesty, chasing down the militias and disbanding them and curbing the outlaws.”
The recently passed amnesty law has already led to the release of many Sunni prisoners, encouraging Sunni parties that the government is serious about enforcing it. And the attacks on Shiite militias have apparently begun to assuage longstanding complaints that only Sunni groups blamed for the insurgency have been the targets of American and Iraqi security forces.
Exactly which ministries will be given to which Sunni politicians is still under negotiation, . . .
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
"A new life is coming, God willing"
Mohammed Hussain Ghafur dabbed his watery eyes moments after his two young sons jumped into his waiting arms. In the 20 months he languished in jail without charges, this had been his dream. Read the entire article. Coming on the heels of Maliki's offensives and political moves to end the sectrarian militias, this will clearly mark a milestone in the efforts to unite Iraq. And, as Ed Morrissey remarked at Hot Air: It . . . defuses a longstanding point of friction with the Sunni tribes who have complained loudly about the imbalance in treatment for their communities by Baghdad. Their efforts to work within the political system have paid off, and their win in gaining amnesty for so many detainees will encourage them to work within the democratic system rather than conduct insurgencies against it. Read the entire post.
One of the major benchmarks was an amnesty for prisoners, mostly Sunni, held for minor crimes as part of the larger crackdown on al Qaeda and Baathist militias. This was long seen as a necessary move for reconciliation. The amnesty bill passed by the Maliki government in February is now going into effect and tens of thousands of pardons have been granted. As Farouq Ameen Othman, a Kirkuk investigative judge quoted in the article below put it: "Terrorism started and now it is ending. A new life is coming, God willing."
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This from USA Today:
His crime? Ghafur, 37, says he sold a car that was later used in a terrorist bombing. "They traced the address to me, and that was it," he said. He says he cooperated with police after he was arrested by U.S.-led coalition forces, but despite his pleas, "they never allowed me to defend myself or see a lawyer."
Ghafur was among 122 detainees released from an Iraqi-run prison in Sulaimaniyah and given their freedom at a ceremony here Monday as part of the largest wave of prisoner releases since the war began. The Iraqi government set them free to reintegrate men into society who were accused of relatively minor crimes, and ease the strains on a prison system operating well beyond its capacity.
The men marched into a courtyard at Kirkuk's police academy, each carrying a red silk rose and a shopping bag with their few possessions. Their families pelted them with candies. Children ran to greet them as old women in black abaya head scarves and with tattooed faces crooned in joy. Later, detainees, guards and tribal leaders danced to Arab and Kurdish music.
Most of those released were Sunnis who had been low-level army officials or former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party. They were among thousands of Iraqis who were arrested without charges by coalition and Iraqi forces. The discharges signal "a return to some sense of normalcy," said U.S. Army Col. David Paschal, commander of the 1st Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division, who attended the ceremony. "At some point, the fighting must stop."
The prisoners are being freed under an amnesty law passed by Iraq's parliament in February. More than 52,400 detainees in government custody have applied for their freedom. Of those, nearly 78%, or more than 40,000, were granted amnesty. More than one in five, though, were denied because they are being held for crimes not covered by the law. These include killing, kidnapping, rape, embezzling government funds, selling drugs and smuggling antiquities.
The amnesty law does not cover more than 23,000 Iraqis who are in U.S. custody. Still, Air Force Capt. Rose Richeson, spokeswoman for coalition detainee operations, says nearly 8,000 detainees held at two coalition detention centers have been released since September, an average of 52 a day. "It is reasonable to expect that rate of release will continue," she said.
. . . Before they are released, detainees must sign and swear a loyalty oath to the Iraqi government that they will "promise to maintain peace" and not attack security forces, incite sectarian strife, damage or destroy government property or kidnap hostages.
. . . To discourage newly freed men from resorting again to violence, the Iraqi government plans to pay former detainees to attend school and learn a trade. In June, Kirkuk province will start Iraq's first large-scale training program for former detainees when it aims to enroll 1,200 men in classes to learn welding, carpentry, cellphone maintenance and other skills. The province also will hire former detainees to work on road repair, trash removal and other services.
. . . Many of the detainees ignored Farouq Ameen Othman, a Kirkuk investigative judge, as he read the oath of allegiance they had just signed. They had other things on their mind.
"This is sort of a new life," Othman said. "Terrorism started and now it is ending. A new life is coming, God willing."
The release allows both Iraq and the US to focus on bigger fish — and to keep them from recruiting insurgents from the inside. Both US and Iraqi officials note the danger of leaving massive numbers of minor violators in close proximity to real hard-line extremists. The prisons become recruiting and training centers for future terrorists, especially when neither have any real prospects for a normal life in post-Saddam Iraq.
At the ceremony in Sulaimaniyah, the released prisoners danced and celebrated with their former guards and their families. If that spirit can remain and the nation’s infrastructure can be restored and modernized, Iraq can reach a real reconciliation quickly. Perhaps at some point, the US will notice this progress and recommit themselves to encouraging and protecting it.
Monday, April 7, 2008
Iraqi Progress & Blood On Iran's Hands
. . . No one can deny the dramatic improvements in security in Iraq achieved by Gen. Petraeus, the brave troops under his command, and the Iraqi Security Forces. From June 2007 through February 2008, deaths from ethno-sectarian violence in Baghdad have fallen approximately 90%. American casualties have also fallen sharply, down by 70%. Read the entire article.
Joe Lieberman and Lindsey Graham write in the WSJ today on the situation in Iraq and provide a clear statement of Iran's proxy war against the U.S., noting that the "Iranians have American blood on their hands."
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This from the Lieberman and Graham write in today's WSJ, reviewing the progress in Iraq, Iranian acts of war, and spelling out why we have an absolute necessity to succeed in Iraq:
Al Qaeda in Iraq has been swept from its former strongholds in Anbar province and Baghdad. The liberation of these areas was made possible by the surge, which empowered Iraqi Muslims to reject the Islamist extremists who had previously terrorized them into submission. Any time Muslims take up arms against Osama bin Laden, his agents and sympathizers, the world is a safer place.
In the past seven months, the other main argument offered by critics of the Petraeus strategy has also begun to collapse: namely, the alleged lack of Iraqi political progress.
Antiwar forces last September latched onto the Iraqi government's failure to pass "benchmark" legislation, relentlessly hammering Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki as hopelessly sectarian and unwilling to confront Iranian-backed Shiite militias. Here as well, however, the critics in Washington have been proven wrong.
In recent months, the Iraqi government, encouraged by our Ambassador in Iraq, Ryan Crocker, has passed benchmark legislation on such politically difficult issues as de-Baathification, amnesty, the budget and provincial elections. After boycotting the last round of elections, Sunnis now stand ready to vote by the millions in the provincial elections this autumn. The Iraqi economy is growing at a brisk 7% and inflation is down dramatically.
And, in launching the recent offensive in Basra, Mr. Maliki has demonstrated that he has the political will to take on the Shiite militias and criminal gangs, which he recently condemned as "worse than al Qaeda."
Of course, while the gains we have achieved in Iraq are meaningful and undeniable, so are the challenges ahead. Iraqi Security Forces have grown in number and shown significant improvement, but the Basra operation showed they still have a way to go. Al Qaeda has been badly weakened by the surge, but it still retains a significant foothold in the northern city of Mosul, where Iraqi and coalition forces are involved in a campaign to destroy it.
Most importantly, Iran also continues to wage a vicious and escalating proxy war against the Iraqi government and the U.S. military. The Iranians have American blood on their hands. They are responsible, through the extremist agents they have trained and equipped, for the deaths of hundreds of our men and women in uniform. Increasingly, our fight in Iraq cannot be separated from our larger struggle to prevent the emergence of an Iranian-dominated Middle East.
These continuing threats from Iran and al Qaeda underscore why we believe that decisions about the next steps in Iraq should be determined by the recommendations of Gen. Petraeus, based on conditions on the ground.
It is also why it is imperative to be cautious about the speed and scope of any troop withdrawals in the months ahead, rather than imposing a political timeline for troop withdrawal against the recommendation of our military.
Unable to make the case that the surge has failed, antiwar forces have adopted a new set of talking points, emphasizing the "costs" of our involvement in Iraq, hoping to exploit Americans' current economic anxieties.
Today's antiwar politicians have effectively turned John F. Kennedy's inaugural address on its head, urging Americans to refuse to pay any price, or bear any burden, to assure the survival of liberty. This is wrong. The fact is that America's prosperity at home and security abroad are bound together. We will not fare well in a world in which al Qaeda and Iran can claim that they have defeated us in Iraq and are ascendant.
There is no question the war in Iraq – like the Cold War, World War II and every other conflict we have fought in our history – costs money. But as great as the costs of this struggle have been, so too are the dividends to our national security from a successful outcome, with a functioning, representative Iraqi government and a stabilized Middle East. The costs of abandoning Iraq to our enemies, conversely, would be enormous, not only in dollars, but in human lives and in the security and freedom of our nation.
Indeed, had we followed the path proposed by antiwar groups and retreated in defeat, the war would have been lost, emboldening and empowering violent jihadists for generations to come.
The success we are now achieving also has consequences far beyond Iraq's borders in the larger, global struggle against Islamist extremism. Thanks to the surge, Iraq today is looking increasingly like Osama bin Laden's worst nightmare: an Arab country, in the heart of the Middle East, in which hundreds of thousands of Muslims – both Sunni and Shiite – are rising up and fighting, shoulder to shoulder with American soldiers, against al Qaeda and its hateful ideology.
It is unfortunate that so many opponents of the surge still refuse to acknowledge the gains we have achieved in Iraq. When Gen. Petraeus testifies this week, however, the American people will have a clear choice as we weigh the future of our fight there: between the general who is leading us to victory, and the critics who spent the past year predicting defeat.
Saturday, April 5, 2008
Let’s Not Confuse The Narrative With Facts
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) warned Army Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker on Thursday not to "put a shine on recent events” in Iraq when they testify before Congress next week. Read the whole story at the Politico. I love this one. This spin actually came from Sadr himself on March 21. The MSM liked it enough to pick it up and run with it, presenting it as their own sage analysis. The MSM has been playing this up for years. They found in Sadr an anti-American that they can throw their arms around and pump up as the true voice of Iraq. The fact that there is a democratically elected government reflecting the will of the people – and that Sadr neither leads it, nor holds more than 10% of the seats in the Parliament – is merely an unimportant and ancillary fact for them. Sadr’s forces got decimated by the U.S. in 2004. When 2007 rolled around and the surge began, the U.S. was explicitly targeting Sadr. He ran for Iran while his remaining militia melted away – but for those who were working directly for Iran. Sadr’s “ceasefire” merely put a spin on what was already reality. Yes, the WaPo actually printed that verdict. And others on the left have embraced and duly celebrated this alledged victory over the U.S. and its allies. I can’t wait to hear Petraeus on this one. This is actually how things are supposed to function as the Iraqi military stands up. They do not have any functioning air combat units yet. So they do the grunt work, we support from the air and provide a strategic reserve with our own grunts. Calling this weakness shows just how utterly clueless are our MSM. They really should be given at least a course on the military before they try to report on it. About 4% of the Iraqi forces in Basra deserted or underperformed. Given the great concern about infiltration of those forces with Mahdi Army members and given that the brigade with the most desertions had literally just come out of basic training, I’d say this overall is pretty good. It certainly suggests that there is much less infiltration than has been feared. Lolllllllllll . . . . this is a good one. After six days of fighting, Sadr unilaterally orders a cease fire and makes demands, Maliki accepts the cease fire, ignores the demands and continues operations in Basra. Whose face was saved again? Could it be that the Iraqis are getting pissed about Iran’s continued deadly meddling in their country and had a heart to heart talk with the Qods Force Commander? I don’t know what was said in the meeting in Tehran – and neither do those speculating in the MSM or the halls of Congress. What we do know is the end result - that Iran and its proxy Sadr seem to have gotten nothing out of this ceasefire but a chance to live to another day. Harry Reid so loves that “civil war” mantra - reality be damned. I am far more inclined to agree with Kimberly Kagan. What we just saw in Basra was not simply the government retaking its territory from criminal thugs, it was the first shots of the Second Iran Iraq War.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warns David Petraeus and Ryan Crocker not to mess with her narrative on Basra. One wonders if she is certifiable yet?
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Wow. Pelosi has her narrative and does not want to hear any dissent from these two government servants, Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, during their testimony before Congress slated for 8 and 9 April. If a Republican issued a similar warning to a witness before a hearing, we'd never hear the end of it. Anyone tired of the double standard yet?
“I hope we don’t hear any glorification of what happened in Basra,” said Pelosi, referring to a recent military offensive against Shiite militants in the city led by the Iraqi government and supported by U.S. forces.
Although powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr agreed to a ceasefire after six days of fighting, Pelosi wondered why the U.S. was caught off guard by the offensive and questioned how the ceasefire was achieved, saying the terms were "probably dictated from Iran.”
“We have to know the real ground truths of what is happening there, not put a shine on events because of a resolution that looks less violent when in fact it has been dictated by al-Sadr, who can grant or withhold that call for violence,” Pelosi said.
So let’s flush out that the likely contours of Speaker Pelosi’s narrative just a tad, since the MSM has been playing this one to the hilt for the past week, and various Democrats have been weighing in:
1. The offensive was a partisan political dispute with PM Maliki allied with the SIIC against a powerful Shia political rival.
2. Sadr is a national political figure with wide appeal.
3. The violence is down in Iraq because of Sadr’s ceasefire. Maliki’s move foolishly threatened that ceasefire. Sadr can turn on or turn off the violence in Iraq at his whim. The U.S. cannot control the violence.
4. The Iraqi military lost in the conflict Maliki started. Sadr won.
5. Calling on U.S. air power shows that the Iraqi military is weak.
6. There were mass desertions from the Iraqi forces during the fighting.
7. Sadr’s offer of a cease fire was a “face saving measure” for Maliki
8. Iran won also, as the most important power broker, able to influence Sadr.
9. And my personal favorite, from Harry Reid, is that the Basra offensive is proof that “our troops mired in an endless civil war."
Now, correct me if I am wrong, but wasn’t one of the benchmarks a requirement to disarm the militias? And do you think that maybe Maliki’s willingness to take on Sadr might not improve his standing as a nationalist leader and earn a great deal of trust among the Sunnis and Kurds? And hasn't reoncilliation been a word ever on the tip of Pelosi's forked tounge?
No matter. Let’s go down the narrative:1. The offensive was a partisan political dispute with PM Maliki allied with the SIIC against a powerful Shia political rival.
The fact that Basra is Iraq’s only port city and its economic lifeline were apparently unimportant. It appears to equally have passed by our Democratic leaders and the MSM that Basra was under the control of Sadrist criminal gangs who were running it like their own personal cash cow while using ever more violence, murder and intimidation to impose an Iranian style mini-theocracy on the city. Obviously, none of these would be reasonable justifications for an offensive to establish government control.2. Sadr is a national political figure with wide appeal.
Sadr has precious little appeal, he is a tool of Iran – and indeed, his militia is a creation of Iran on the lines of Hezbollah – and his ideology is the establishment of a Shia theocracy in Iraq along the lines of Iran. Every place his militia has held sway, they impose Islamic law to go along with their criminal enterprises and reign of thuggery. If you want to see his appeal, check on the DOD or at the Long War Journal on April 10 to see how much support there was among the 20+ million Iraqi Shia for the million man march Sadr has called to be held in Baghdad on April 9.3. The violence is down in Iraq because of Sadr’s ceasefire. Maliki’s move foolishly threatened that ceasefire. Sadr can turn on or turn off the violence in Iraq at his whim. The U.S. cannot control the violence.
Maliki’s Basra offensive led the Sadrists to rise up in all of the areas that they control. And by March 29, but for Basra, the Sadrists were defeated in each of those areas - Hillah, Kut, Karbala, Najaf, Diwaniyah, Nasiriyah, and Amarah. And the U.S. secured Baghdad’s Sadr City.
I question just how much violence Sadr can create beyond that happening right now as a result of Iran’s use of Sadr and his militia as their own private proxy forces.4. The Iraqi military lost in the conflict Maliki started. Sadr won.
Yet, when the conflict ended six days after it had begun, the Iraqi government was in control of Basra and had replaced militia control of the port with military control. Sadr’s forces were indoors as the Iraq Army marched through all of Basra, conducting raids for Mahdi Army commanders wanted for criminal activities. So explain again, how did Sadr win?5. Calling on U.S. air power was a sign of weakness of the Iraqi Army.
6. There were mass desertions from the Iraqi forces during the fighting.
7. Sadr’s offer of a cease fire was a “face saving measure” for Maliki.
8. Iran won also, as the most important power broker, able to influence Sadr.
The more telling thing is that Iran holds what may be a high degree of influence over Sadr and his militia. That is an indictment of both Iran and Sadr.
9. And my personal favorite, from Harry Reid, is that the Basra offensive is proof that “our troops mired in an endless civil war."
At any rate, so much for Pelosi and her narrative. You know, the thing of it is, after watching Pelosi in action throughout her time in the House of Representatives, I honestly believe that there is no such thing as objective reality for her. She presents as a woman so deeply invested in partisanship that, for her, spin is reality. And given the position she holds, that reality is frightening indeed.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Bad News From Iraq
Political momentum in Iraq hit a sudden roadblock on Wednesday when a feud between the largest Shiite factions led to the veto of a law that had been passed with great fanfare two weeks ago. The law had been heralded by the Bush administration as a breakthrough for national reconciliation. Read the entire article.
The Provincial Elections law, one of three major pieces of legislation passed by the Iraqi Parliament this month, was vetoed by the Presidency Council and has been sent back to Parliament for reconsideration and revision.
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The provincial elections bill, which would create moderately strong provinces, is at the center of a debate in Iraq over whether there should be a strong or weak central government. History would suggest that this is not an easy issue to resolve. In American history, we had the Articles of Confederation, creating a weak central government, that was finally replaced with our Constitution in 1788. And then we fought a civil war over much the same issue. Now its Iraq's turn, and the issue seems equally divisive. This from the NYT:
The law called for provincial elections by October, and it was hoped that it would eliminate severe electoral distortions that have left Kurds and Shiites with vastly disproportionate power over Sunni Arabs in some areas, a factor in fueling the Sunni insurgency. It would also have given Iraqis who have long complained of corrupt and feckless local leaders a chance to clean house and elect officials they believe are more accountable.
But the law was vetoed at the last minute by the three-member Iraqi presidency council, which includes President Jalal Talabani and two vice presidents. The veto came after officials in a powerful Shiite party, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, objected to provisions that they contend unlawfully strip power from Iraq’s provinces.
Politicians involved in the debate said the main objections came from Vice President Adel Abdul Mehdi, a Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council member. The bill now goes back to Parliament, where its prospects are unclear, given the acrimonious debate over the issue that led to the veto.
. . . The veto is “somewhat of a setback,” Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, acknowledged Wednesday during a hearing in Congress.
A common refrain among American combat commanders is that new local elections could help sweep out ineffective leaders while remedying deeply uneven provincial councils, a legacy partly of the Sunni Arab boycott of previous provincial elections.
. . . The Sadrists, who were furious at the veto, want to retain a strong central government that has the legal muscle to deal vigorously any province that Baghdad leaders believe is acting against the country’s best interests. They said the veto breached the historic agreement among political blocs two weeks ago that allowed the simultaneous passage of the provincial powers bill, the 2008 budget and another law granting amnesty to thousands of Sunnis and others in Iraqi jails.
“It’s a struggle of two wills,” said Nassar al-Rubaie, a legislator from the Sadr movement. “One side wants to strengthen the central government and federal authority, and the other wants to undermine it and grant the provinces greater powers.”
Friday, February 15, 2008
Iraqi Political Progress Leaves Few Places For The Left To Move The Target
No one can spend some 10 days visiting the battlefields in Iraq without seeing major progress in every area. . . . If the US provides sustained support to the Iraqi government -- in security, governance, and development -- there is now a very real chance that Iraq will emerge as a secure and stable state. Read his synopsis here, and the full report here. But our Democrats and their far left supporters are not neutral third parties. There have been some advances since President Bush sought to salvage his misadventure by sending even more troops into Iraq. Violence has declined and Al Qaeda in Iraq is said to be weaker. But Mr. Bush’s main argument for his escalation — that it would create political space for Iraqis to work together and achieve national reconciliation — has proved wrong. But poor Harry Reid couldn't even bring himself to acknowledge the security gains. With violence down near to levels not seen since the inititial invasion and with peace breaking out over much of Iraq, Reid channelled the spirit of Baghdad Bob, telling a reporter: ". . . Al Qaeda has regrouped and is able to fight a civil war in Iraq. ... The American people are losing." . . . "It's a good step for many reasons," said Falah Hassan Shanshal, who leads the parliamentary committee overseeing the legislation and is a member of the Shiite party loyal to influential cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. "First, it condemns all the crimes carried out by the Baath Party and its bloody regime. And this law will allow us to search for and detect every single person who committed a crime against Iraqis." See here. The NYT was having none of that. They were in panic and denial. In their editorial, they wrote: The Iraqi Parliament has finally done something that the Bush Administration, and many others, considered essential to political progress in Iraq: it passed a law intended to open government jobs to former members of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party. Read the article here. The NYT seemed in such a rush to condemn this law with inuendo and speculation that they were too busy to talk to the Sunni and Shia legislators involved in crafting and debating the law. But you have to love the conclusion and the note of desperation evident in it. The NYT is hanging on tooth and nail to the meme that surrendering and leaving Iraq still remains the panacea to force reconciliation, despite the passage of the reconciliation law. This is priceless, really. Even a writer of decent fiction couldn't make up stuff like this. Making (Some) Progress in Iraq Read the entire article. I have no doubt that they are not using the word "cheered" according to any known dictionary definition. I think it far more likely that the copy editor inserted that verb in the place of several explatives and a verb describing some type of sexual act.
The New York Times editorial board is in obvious distress today as it opines on "(some) progress" in Iraq. As political and military progress in Iraq is making it ever more difficult for the far left to articulate ostensible grounds for legislating defeat, the ever changing narrative is becoming comical - and the left's motives transparent.
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Iraq is far from being out of the woods, but its trajectory is clearly in the right direction. To a neutral third party looking at the progress just being announced out of Iraq, it would have to look exceptionally promising. Peace is descending on large sections of the country, al Qaeda is defeated strategically throughout much of the country, and the Iraqi government has just made some very big strides towards accomplishing those things that it needs to do to bring about reconciliation and create a functioning country. A month ago, it passed a de-Baathification law to allow low and mid-level Baath party members back into the government. Today, the Iraqi Parliament passed a law outlining the scope of provincial powers and set a date for provincial elections, passed a budget that provides for fair distribution of funds, and voted on a general amnesty for many detainees.
One such neutral third party is Anthony Cordesman of CSIS, an acerbic critic of the war whose anylases of Iraq were, until recently, permanantly linked at the bottom of the NYT opinion page. Cordesman wrote yesterday:
When the war in Iraq went bad following the Feburary 2006 al Qaeda bombing of the Samarra Mosque, the Democratic leadership adopted a strategy to completly embrace defeat as a means to discredit Bush, discredit the conservative ideology, and as a means of attaining partisan power. This was an act of cynical expediency for most. They of course can't say that, since they would be exposing themselves as "unpatriotic" for putting partisan gain over the national security and best interests of the nation during time of war. But it was fairly transparent early on - and now the transparency is taking on elements of absurdity as the justifications for legislating withdraw become ever more surreal. You can watch the evolution of their strategy through the NYT, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi:
Pre-Surge: (January)
The initial strategy was to stop the President from actually trying to win in Iraq by delegitimizing the surge. The opening salvo was fired on January 9, 2007, when the NYT attacked the President's just announced counterinsurgincy strategy as the "same old set of failed approaches and unachievable objectives," opining that what we needed was to an exit strategy out of Iraq's "brutal civil war."
The NYT also introduced the ridiculous meme Harry Reid credited to General Petraeus, that there can be "no military solution" in Iraq, therefore there is no reason for the surge. Yes, General Petraeus did say there could be "no military solution" in his confirmation hearing while discussing his proposed counterinsurgency strategy. In fact, he did so immediately before stating "Military action is necessary to help improve security." Ignoring that latter qualifier, Reid and the left used the Petraeus quote to justify their calls for surrender all the way through September.
Build-Up to the Surge (Prior to June)
By March 29, 2007 the nascent counterinsurgency operation had just begun, the full buildup was still two months away, but some real progress was being noted on the ground. The NYT was having none of that and was still trying to end the surge before any real success could be achieved, opining "Victory is no longer an option in Iraq." Clearly it wasn't an option for Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi who were doing all they could to stangle the surge in its cradle.
Harry Reid, for his part, actually surrendered on camera to al Qaeda on April 20. Fortunately, our military did not receive the surrender orders.
Not yet ready to give up on giving up - on April 26, 2007, the NYT characterized the surge as a "failed approach," ignoring all of the security gains that were by then clearly evident. Three days later, the NYT's lead was a story on the amazing security gains being brought about by the Anbar Awakening - two words that have yet to be used by the NYT editorial board to this day.
Surge Begins Full Operation (June)
By June, sectarian violence in Iraq had been brought down by two thirds from its pre-surge high in January and the Anbar Awakening was starting to spread outside of Anbar province. While Iraq had been on the brink of "civil war" prior to the surge, it was clearly far back from the brink by June.
Regardless, trying not to confuse the issue with facts, on July 8, the NYT editors wrote that Iraq was engulfed in a "raging" civil war and, because of that, "[i]t is time for the United States to leave Iraq, without any more delay than the Pentagon needs to organize an orderly exit." You have to love these folks for their utter refusal to let facts stand in the way of their narrative.
Just a little over two weeks after that editorial, two former opponents of the war, Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollock of the left of center Brookings Institution penned their now famous op-ed in the NYT, "A War We Might Just Win." Hospital beds filled that morning with Congressional Democrats and their supporters who had choked on their cornflakes while reading the newspaper over breakfast.
The Petraeus Briefing (September)
After the O'Hanlon piece was published, the NYT editorial board simply ignored Iraq until near the end of August, when a flurry of editorials appeared in advance of General Petraeus's scheduled briefing to Congress. On August 31, the NYT began hyping a GAO report that told of little progress being made by the Iraqi government towards meeting the "benchmarks" and, based on old data, only minor security gains. As the NYT opined, "Iraq’s leaders have neither the intention nor the ability to take advantage of calm, relative or otherwise." And in case you didn't get the message, NYT essentially repeated the same editorial again a few days later.
The September 9 editorial ranks as one of my favorites. The NYT turned reality on its head, claiming that Petraeus was politicaly motivated and could not be trusted. Further, the NYT claimed that Petraeus's credibility and that of his commanders in Iraq was questionable - because they disagreed with the NYT / Congressional Democrat's characterization of Iraq. It was a masterpiece of hutzpah that any connoisseur of fine bullshit has to truly appreciate.
The biggest push to end the surge came on September 11, after General Petraeus had testified before Congress and the nation on progress in Iraq. The NYT, parroting Hillary, accused General Patreus of providing "false" information, citing to "recent independent studies [that] are much more skeptical about the decrease in violence." Further, the NYT argued, "[e]ven if the so-called surge has created breathing room, Iraq’s sectarian leaders show neither the ability nor the intent to take advantage of it."
Unfortunately for the left, most people believed General Petraeus and were willing to give him time to make the surge work. Go figure. Though that didn't stop the NYT from banging the same drum several more times that month - but it was all for naught. When that didn't work, Iraq disappeared from the editorial pages and the news. The war was over - for the NYT at least.
Thankfully, there were other sources of news, otherwise everyone would have missed Osama bin Laden's State of the Jihad address in October when he came about as close to declaring a strategic defeat for al Qaeda in Iraq as we will ever see. As bin Laden characterized it, "the darkness [in Iraq] is pitch black." Perhaps General Petraeus was telling the truth after all.
The Issue of War Funding (November)
It wasn't until late November that the NYT again took up the issue of Iraq, finally conceding - very grudgingly - to the blindingly evident security gains. The NYT argued that the security gains didn't matter because the central government was not moving towards reconciliation:
Reconciliation (January - Present)
The horror of horrors struck the far left on January 13. The Iraqis passed a de-Baathification law that would allow former Baath party members to reenter government service and to collect pensions. Reconciliation - the centerpiece of the left's ostensible justifications for legislating defeat - was being taken away from them. They went into denial.
One can only imagine the wailing and gnashing of teeth. I am sure a sudden outbreak of tourettes suddenly infected the occupants of the offices of Congressional Democrats and the NYT editorial board.
The Washington Post reported on the passage of these laws. WaPo interviewed the Shia and Sunni legislators involved in the drafting, debate and voting on the law. Not surprisingly, they were all very upbeat:
Supporters of the measure say it is intended to ease the restrictions that prevented former Baathists from holding government jobs. Shanshal acknowledged that certain people joined the Baath Party not for ideological reasons but out of necessity, and for people who have not committed crimes, "it is possible for them to return to public life."
But members of the largest Sunni coalition in parliament agreed to the new measure. Adnan al-Dulaimi, the group's leader, said the legislation was fair to low-ranking former Baathists and allowed the higher-ranking Shubah members to receive pensions, "which I consider good and acceptable."
What should have been heralded as an accomplishment, however, may only serve to further reinforce the bumbling nature of President Bush’s ill-conceived adventure in Iraq. No one, it seems, has a clear sense of what the law will do. Some suggest it could actually exclude more former Baathists than it lets in — a sure-fire way to fuel political tensions rather than calm them.
. . . Administration officials continually lower the bar for Iraq. Now they admit that the law is not perfect but say it begins to set fairer standards. Iraq’s presidency council still must approve the law and could yet make improvements. Iraqis are going to have to do a lot better to make their country work. Withdrawing American troops may finally persuade them to do that.
But you can't get anymore surreal than Nancy Pelosi and her response to this de-Baathification law. She dismissed it during a CNN interview the other day on the grounds that it had occurred . . .
. . .
(wait for it)
. . .
"too late."
Yes. That's right. Reconciliation does not count in her alternate reality because it did not occur in time. The House Democrats apparently passed a double secret time limit. If only Maliki and Bush had known. Amazingly, Wolf Blitzer let her get away with that response without challenge - or at least no challenge I could hear over my laughter, but I digress.
Moments later, I did hear Ms. Pelosi justify calling the surge "a failure" when Blitzer pushed her on the issue. She did not do it by citing to any facts; rather, she just screamed twice: "Its a failure. Its a failure." There is nothing like watching Pelosi revert to the intellectual level of a 5 year old. If she had not been sitting down while saying that, I am pretty sure she would have been stomping her feet. And had Blitzer challenged her further to provide some actual factual justification for her bald assertions, there is no doubt that CNN's audience would have been treated to the sight of Pelosi putting her fingers in her ears and humming loudly.
But back to the NYT and today. One can feel the NYT is, in fact, progressing through the five stages of grief. You could feel them working through their denial earlier in response to the de-Baathification law, and now they have moved into the stages of anger and acceptance:
Good news is rare in Iraq. But after months of bitter feuding, Iraq’s Parliament has finally approved a budget, outlined the scope of provincial powers, set an Oct. 1 date for provincial elections and voted a general amnesty for detainees. All these steps are essential for national conciliation.
As always in Iraq, it is best to read the fine print. Final details of the legislation aren’t known. The country’s three-member presidency council must still sign off. And then the laws have to be implemented. . . .
We are, of course, cheered by the news that representatives from Iraq’s three main ethnic groups — Shiite, Sunni and Kurd — finally saw some benefit in compromise.
But something else of import is evinced in the NYT editorial. For the first time in over a year, the NYT didn't call for the immediate withdraw of our troops. This is huge. The NYT editorial board is off message. They have surrendered surrendering - or something like that.
I have yet to hear Pelosi and Reid - or Hillary and Obama - respond to this latest great news for Iraq and America. Given the NYT is usually on key with the far left, this might mean that Pelosi and company are about to give up the ghost on legislating defeat in Iraq. But I seriously doubt it. Stay tuned. The entertainment value of this looks like it will only continue to rise as the Democratic arguments for legislating defeat in Iraq become ever more surreal, and their motivations ever more transparent.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
What A Steaming Pile of Bull-Pelosi
PELOSI: . . . Congress has a right, the power of the purse. And I'm not a big fan of earmarks, but they do have value, if done with transparency. It may be news to the president, but when the Democrats took control of the Congress, we had -- we instituted transparency. We've cut the earmarks in half and went back to the transparency. Every person who has an earmark has to identify himself with it, affirm that he has not -- doesn't have a financial benefit to him personally, or her personally. Not a big fan of earmarks? She is number 4 on the list of House members who have put earmark requests into 2008 budget bills. Number 1 on the list is her right hand man, Jack Murtha. Between them, they lead the earmark pack, having submitted earmarks for nearly a quarter of a billion dollars of taxpayer money. She's not just a fan of earmarks, she is the Queen of earmarks. PELOSI: But this president is making that statement, in the State of the Union, a president who's signed more legislation, with more earmarks, than any president in the history of our country, didn't say "boo" until his last... I concur. That is why the Republicans are known today as the minority party. BLITZER: Why not just eliminate them all? So the reason she refuses to eliminate earmarks is because the President has written an Executive Order refusing to honor the most corrupt earmarking practice of Congress? In what universe can that be classified as either logic or an answer to Blitzer's question. Well, actually it was an answer. As shown in the links above, she is neck deep in earmarks herself and has no intention whatsoever of substanitvely addressing the earmark issue. BLITZER: So let's talk about Iraq, which is another issue high on the agenda of the American public. On the floor of the House in February, 2007, Pelosi stated she was against the surge because, she predicted, it would only escalate the violence in Iraq. She and Harry Reid were adamant that we shouldn't be fighting in the midst of a civil war. Once it became clear that our soldiers have been largely successful in bringing peace to Iraq, the words "civil war" were dropped from the Pelosi-Reid vocabulary. On December 20, 2007, Pelosi told reporters: "I think you are going to see a good deal of focus be on why it is that even when you have some military success to establish a secure time when the government can act politically, they still do not act in a way to bring reconciliation in Iraq." Now that the Iraqi government has acted to bring about reconciliation, Pelosi moves the goal posts again. BLITZER: I spoke with General David Petraeus, the U.S. military commander in Iraq. And he pointed to all the statistics showing that casualties are down; stability is coming to the Al Anbar province, elsewhere. In other words, "no" - we need to surrender and time is of the essence. What World War II has to do with this, I do not know. Hostilities in the one other insurgency we fought, the Philipines War, did not end for 14 years. There is a difference between war - fought with incredible violence by standing armies over a short period - and an insurgency where the opposing force tries to hide in the civilian population. That is a nuance Pelosi does not wish to ponder. PELOSI: . . . Certainly, we have to leave a few people there to protect our embassy, for force protection, to fight the terrorists and that. This is utter insanity. The Iraqi Defense Minister recently estimated it would take until 2012 until Iraq can achieve complete responsibility for internal security and 2018 until it could control its borders from foreign threat. The only stability that would come to Iraq if we were to leave now would be that imposed by al Qaeda in Sunni regions, by Iran in Baghdad and the Shia south, and by Turkey in the Kurdish north. It would come at the cost of countless lives and have nearly unimaginable ramifications for our foreign policy. We have nearly 150,000 soldiers in Iraq now "fighting terrorists." If she thinks that we can leave a small force in Iraq under the circumstances that would likely ensue, she's nuts. She would be inviting the massacre of our soldiers. BLITZER: Are you not worried, though, that all the gains that have been achieved over the past year might be lost? This is simply and utter and complete determination to lose in Iraq. I wish Blitzer had asked her to define "reconciliation" if she refuses to acknowledge the security gains, the number of people returning to Iraq, the real Pax Americana descending on Baghdad, the recent de-Baathification law, nor the recent law passed to allow Sunnis to collect pensions as evidence of reconciliation. So what would she accept? PELOSI: . . . But [U.S. soldiers] deserve better than a policy of a war without end, a war that could be 20 years or longer. And Secretary Gates just testified, in the last 24 hours, to Congress, that this next year in Iraq and Afghanistan is going to cost $170 billion. . . . There is no such thing as war without end. Wars end in one of three ways. You win (WWII). You convince the other side to stop fighting (WWI, Korea). You lose and leave, and to the victors go the spoils, sooner or later (Vietnam). Guess which option Pelosi is opting for.
Consider the title to be a Freudian slip. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday defended earmarks, then declared the surge in Iraq a failure and listed the justifications as to why we need to surrender immediately.
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Wolf Blitzer interviewed Speaker Pelosi on CNN today. You can find the complete transcript here. Blitzer first asked her about earmarks. Here is the exchange:
As to the claim to have cut earmarks in half, she is using some math with which I am not familiar. The numbers for 2008 show a four fold increase in earmarks over 2007.
The rules she is claiming she has put in place are the barest of reforms and, ultimately, only amount to partial transparency. They have done nothing to stem the corruption or the waste of the earmark process. Nor have those rules addressed the worst excesses. And indeed, Pelosi is balking at any bi-partisan substantive reform.
PELOSI: Well, I'm not averse to that, myself, personally. But when a president says to the Congress, I will decide every penny of spending, that's just not right. That's just not right.
PELOSI: Right.
BLITZER: The president says, quote, "The surge is working. I know some don't want to admit that and I understand, but the terrorists understand the surge is working."
Is the surge working?
PELOSI: The president is wrong in several respects. First of all, the military aspect of the surge is working. And God bless our troops. They've performed excellently. And any time they engage in battle, we want them to succeed. The president knows that. He shouldn't say we don't want admit that that military aspect of the surge is working.
PELOSI: But the purpose of the surge was to create a secure time for the government of Iraq to make the political change to bring reconciliation to Iraq. They have not done that.
BLITZER: But they've taken some steps...
BLITZER: ... on the Baathists being allowed to come back...
PELOSI: ... baby steps, very late -- . . .
Evidently, she had the Iraqi government on a double secret time limitation, whereby any reconciliation occurring after December 20, 2007 doesn't count. Pelosi does not bother to explain how the reconciliation is "too little." The Sunni's in the Iraqi government were quite happy with it.
The bottom line, of course, is the goal posts will continue to move as more success is achieved in Iraq. But under no circumstances can the surge or our efforts in Iraq be characterized as "winning" or "succeeding." This is, after all, about partisan political gain for the Democrats to, one, achieve power, and two, discredit conservatives. What is our national security mmatched up against that?
And the increased troops that they sent over for the surge -- they'll be back out by July or so. But he then said this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS, COMMANDER, MULTINATIONAL FORCES, IRAQ: We will, though, need to have some time to let things settle a bit, if you will, after we complete the withdrawal. We think it would be prudent to do some period of assessment, then, to make decisions.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: He's basically suggesting there should be a pause, this summer, to assess where it stands, so that all of the gains will not have been lost, squandered. Are you open to that?
PELOSI: We will be entering the sixth year of this war in about another month, March 19. It will be five years that we've been in this war, over a year and a half longer than we were in World War II. . . .
PELOSI: There haven't been gains, Wolf. The gains have not produced the desired effect, which is the reconciliation of Iraq. This is a failure. This is a failure.
And as to the costs to stay, they are high. But what will be the long term costs that we will pay for leaving Iraq to become an Qaeda stronghold in the Sunni area and a sattelite of Iran in the Shia south. What costs will we pay to fight what would be an explosion of terrorism? Which Middle East country or radical religious movement will be deterred by the threat of U.S. force in the future - and what costs will we pay to fend off their conventional - or nuclear - adventursim? Which country will ally themselves with the U.S. against any foe? Nobody has asked yet about the costs of surrender and withdrawal from Iraq will be, yet they quite forseeably outweigh any cost we might pay to succeed there.
In summary, Pelosi has embraced the "culture of corruption" represented by earmarks that she had promised to reform. She didn't drain the swamp; rather, she personally has jumped in for a swim with Jack Murtha. As to the Iraq War, would it be possible for Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and the anti-war crowd to be any more transparent. The games Pelosi and Reid are playing on these critical issues with the American people are a travesty, perhaps approached in scale only by MSM whose complicity is necessary for Pelosi and Reid to pursue this travesty.
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