Al-P False Report on Sistani (Updated)

The most important Shia cleric in both Iraq and Iran is Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani. He has been very stabilizing, pro-government influence. Just within the past three months, he has given a major snub to Iran's President Ahmedinejad and thrown his support to the government in their call to disarm all militias, including Sadr's. So it was jaw dropping when al-P reported that Sistani was about to issue a fatwa calling Shia to arms against the U.S. And, indeed, it is false.

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Grand Ayatollah Sistani is of the quietist school and, in the tradition of that school, does not involve himself in politics to a significant degree. He has been a hugely stabilizing influence in Iraq. Yet false stories about Sistani make into our MSM with fair regularity.

Last year, the NYT ran an article on their front page claiming that Grand Ayatollah Sistani had scuttled plans by the government to enact legislation bringing de-Baathification to an end. This would have been a huge setback for the reconciliation process - if it were true. Within two days, Sistani's office released a statement calling the story false. NYT never printed a correction. A similar scenario played out in the days after it was falsely reported that Sistani supported the continued existence of Sadr's Mahdi Army.

And thus we come to just an incredibly outlandish Al-P story that made its way around the blogs yesterday. Al-P, citing unnamed sources, reported that Sistani was on the cusp of issuing a fatwa to give his blessing to the targeting of American soldiers in Iraq. That would be unthinkable, really. Besides being wholly out of character, there were two dead giveaways that this report was false. One was the reporters' claim that Sistani also opposed the disarming of Sadr's militia - a topic Sistani has already clearly weighed in on to the contrary. The second was that the odious Juan Cole gave his impramatur to the general belief that Sistani would take such a stand. Mr. Cole's bias has left the accuracy of his prognostications below that of a broken clock. He's not even right twice a day.

Iraqi scholar and former Iraqi government official Nibras Kazimi found the al-P's story wholly unbelievable:

If we’ve learned anything from the recent events in Basra, Sadr City and Mosul—by the way, these are Iraq’s three largest population reservoirs—it should be that the reporters and commentators who are tasked to describe Iraq to American and western audiences are at worst dishonest and duplicious, at best some string puller’s chorus of useful idiots.

It is in this vein that this AP story is released; to distract from other things that could be reported in Iraq, such as how things are dramatically improving and how this war has been decisively won.

Read the entire post. Mr. Kazimi's suspicion that this was to put a damper on too much good news coming out of Iraq would seem a stretch but for subsequent events. No sooner had he blogged this, than Sistani's office responded through the Iraqi press, denying the report. Gateway Pundit has the translation.

Update: There is an article at the Weekly Standard confirming the falsity of the AP report and further discussing how AP regularly reports Sadrist propaganda.

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Obama Disparages The Military & Gets A Pass On Iraq From Fox News

Whether to withdraw from Iraq has tremendous ramifications for our national security, given the effect such a withdrawal would have on Salafi terrorism and Khomeinist adventurism. Yet not a single Democrat has been seriously questioned on this by the MSM. The opportunity presented itself last night. After President Bush gave his State of the Union, Fox News reporter Major Garrett inteviewed Obama. A tenth grader interviewing Obama for the highschool newspaper could have done a better job.

Garrett asked Obama whether he thought that the surge had been a success, but Obama refused to characterize it as such. Obama acknowledged the security gains our soldiers have made in Iraq, but then termed what our soldiers are doing there to be an "occupation." Obama did not acknowledge any of the political progress by the Iraqi government towards reconciliation - that being the Iraqi Paliament's recent passage of the de-Baathification law and a law to allow former Baathists to collect government pensions. Instead, Obama stated that there has been insufficient political movement towards reconciliation to justify continuing our "occupation." Major Garrett let him get away with it without any followup.

As a threshold matter, calling our presence in Iraq an "occupation" is a slanderous mischaracterization. An occupation means that a hostile military force is exercising authority over enemy lands. There have been many "occupations" of foreign countries over the past century. One such was the Soviet occupation of much of Eastern Europe after WWII that only ended in the 80's when the Soviet Union imploded. And there is China's ongoing occupation of Tibet.

To characterize what we are doing in Iraq as an occupation dishonors our soldiers and their mission in Iraq. Our soldiers are fighting dying in Iraq to defeat terrorists that ultimately threaten our nation and to bring security and democracy to Iraq. We are fighting to win the peace from people who wish to turn Iraq into a medieval hell-hole and, in the case of Iran, a sattelite theocracy. We do so at the invitation of a democratically elected government. To claim otherwise is to equally slander and dishonor the millions of Iraqis that risked death by going to the polls to cast their ballots. To call our presence in Iraq an occupation is an Orwellian redefinition of the word.

There are of course, entities that do not want democracy to take hold in Iraq and who would welcome a defeat of the U.S. effort in Iraq, whether brought about on the battlefield or in Washington. It is no surprise that al Qaeda and Iran both call our presence and actions in Iraq an "occupation." Syria and al Jazzera call it that too. And now you can add Barack Obama to that list.

Garrett did not challenge Obama to explain the facts he was using to call our mission in Iraq an "occupation." That was some poor reporting. And it got worse.

Garrett did not challenge Obama on his refusal to acknowledge the reconciliation that has taken place in the Iraqi government. It was as if the recent actions of the Iraqi government were wished away because they would have conflicted with Obama's narrative. That was amazing.

But worst of all, Garrett did not ask Obama what the ramifications would be if Obama "ended the occupation" only to see our security gains lost and the reemergence in Iraq of al Qaeda on one hand and Iran on the other. That is the single most important question that needs to be asked and its answer should fully inform how we proceed in Iraq. The MSM refuses to ask that question, allowing Obama and the other Democratic nominees for President to simply ignore it while noting that an immediate withdraw from Iraq would move our soldiers out of the harm's way and stop the costs of war.

Put simply, the ramifications of allowing al Qaeda or Iran to succeed in Iraq are existential.

Salafi terrorism grew in the 1980's and 90's based on the belief among the Salafi jihadis that it was they who destroyed the Soviet Union. Futher, the jihadis believed that the West was so weak that it would, like the Soviet Union, crumble when pushed. And in accordance with that view, they attacked the West and America at the margins throughout the 1990's. The U.S. response to each provocation was seen by the jihadis as weak and ineffectual. Remember the Khobar Towers bombing, the bombing of our embassies in Africa, Blackhawk Down and the bombing of the USS Cole. The 9-11 attacks were simply the natural evolution of the jihadi paradigm.

Every indication that we have is that al Qaeda did not expect the robust response that actually occurred. As to our invasion of Iraq, historians can argue whether we should have done that until the cows come home. It has no bearing whatsoever on what we should do tommorow - which is the only question that matters.

With that in mind, it is beyond dispute that our invasion of Iraq drew in al Qaeda like moths to the flame. Defeating the U.S. in Iraq became, as bin Laden and Zawahiri both noted, al Qaeda's main effort. They fully expected the U.S. to run from Iraq as we did from Vietnam, if only they could cause sufficient mayhem.

Through the bravery of our soldiers and the brilliance of our military leadership, we have now completely turned around the situation in Iraq. Al Qaeda is largely defeated there and, at best, has few strongholds left. There will be no formal declaration of surrender, but we have had the next best thing from bin Laden himself. In his November,2007 video, bin Laden despaired of al Qaeda losses in Iraq and summed up the situation by stating that the "the darkeness" in Iraq has become "pitch black." (See also here)

Note that in May, 2007, with the Democrats attempting to short circuit the nascent surge and withdraw our troops, our nation's premier Orientalist, Professor Bernard Lewis, issued what can only be called a doomsday warning. Professor Lewis warned that if we withdrew from Iraq and al Qaeda was able to portray Iraq as a victory for jihad, the reprucussions of that for our nation, the West, and the entire Islamic world would be profound, long lasting and dire.

To leave now and allow Iraq to be reoccupied in the Sunni areas by al Qaeda and to allow Iran to create an Iraqi Hezbollah to dominate the south of Iraq would be a catastrophe. Regardless of how our Democrats would spin it to the American electorate, throughout the Muslim world, it would be portrayed as a victory delivered by the very hand of Allah in the face of certain defeat. It would be a messiancic sign of the eventual triumph of the radicalized Salafi and Khomeinist versions of Islam. That is not the politics of fear - its the acknowledgment of a deadly reality.

And as Professor Lewis implies, should the Muslim world ever come to see the U.S. as defeated in Iraq, we can expect jihadi attacks of all sorts on the West to rise exponentially. You can include in those probable jihadi attacks nuclear terrorism as the jihadists gain in strength and have access to nuclear weapons and the radioactive byproducts of the nuclear process.

If you any doubts about the ramifications of an immediate withdrawal from Iraq, watch this video of Zarqawi and ponder the question some more.



While leaving Iraq may result in short term political gain, relieve the pressure on our military and save the future costs of the war, the question must be asked, what are the long term costs for withdrawing from Iraq. The realistic answer to that is that the costs of leaving Iraq and allowing al Qaeda and Iran to declare victory would be exponentialy greater in blood and gold than the costs to stop both in Iraq over the coming years.

Major Garrett did not ask Obama that last night. Someone has to in the future if we are to have any sort of reasoned debate on this issue.

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Democrats & The Future of Iraq

The Democrats are going apoplectic. Not only does it appear that we will succeed in Iraq, but we will maintain a long term presence to provide internal and external stability. This would be fatal to all the non-principles (America is Bad, Bush is Incompetent, Partisan Political Gain, Iraq was a Mistake, Peace Through Superior Surrender-Power) that our Democrats hold dear. Poor Joe Klein at Time Magazine is even demanding we toss out the Constitution to prevent this one. And Harold Myerson, the legal scholar at the Washington Post, sees this as a nefarious plot by President Bush. Indeed, he warns "Bush's efforts to make the U.S. presence permanent would drape the necks of the Republican presidential and congressional candidates with one large, squawking albatross. " It sounds as if Republicans could be tagged with the eternal shame of success.

With the pax Americana taking hold in Iraq, with Iraqi forces increasing daily in size and effectiveness, and with the drawdown of U.S. forces having begun, it was reported yesterday that President Bush and Prime Minister Maliki had agreed to begin negotiations on the future of U.S. forces in Iraq. Basing troops long term in Iraq would be done, at the invitation of Iraq and for precisely the same reasons as justified statitoning troops in post-war Germany, Japan and Korea: to provide for the internal stability of a nascent Democracy and to protect against external threats. As to external threats to Iraq, Amir Taheri has pointed out that the countries surrounding Iraq have long been planning how to carve it up after the inevitable Democrat-led U.S. withdrawal. And as to internal stability, this from the NY Sun, quoting General Lute:

"From the Iraqi side, the interest that they tend to talk about is that a long-term relationship with us, where we are a reliable, enduring partner with Iraq, will cause different sects inside the Iraqi political structure not to have to hedge their bet in a go-it-alone-like setting, but rather they'll be able to bet on the reliable partnership of the United States," he said.

"To the extent it doesn't cause sectarian groups to have to hedge their bet independently, we're confident that this will actually contribute to reconciliation in the long run," he said.

The agreement in principle "signals that we will protect our interests in Iraq, alongside our Iraqi partners, and that we consider Iraq a key strategic partner, able to increasingly contribute to regional security," the general said.

Read the entire article. (H/T Don Surber)

A stable Iraq is the last thing radical Islamists, Middle East despots, or our Democrats want. According to Time Magazine’s Joe Klein:

The Democrats are lining up. . . . to block any Bush attempt to pass a Status of Forces Agreement treaty with Iraq. The question is, Will Bush try to bypass the Senate by making the SOFA an executive agreement with the Iraqi government? The answer is, of course he will.

. . . But any agreement that opens the door to permanent bases should require Senate approval. . . .

What an ass Joe Klein is. One, a SOFA agreement does not, itself, directly obligate us to station any troops on foreign soil. It merely sets the terms of how such soldiers will be treated in a foreign country. Moreover, SOFA agreements – which we have with virtually every country where our troops are stationed - are not and never have been treaties requiring Senate approval. The President negotiates and signs those agreements as Commander in Chief. As to the whether the Congress can dictate troop deployment once hostilities are ended, that implicates the Constitutional separation of powers between the President as Commander in Chief with day to day control of the military and the Congress whose authority is limited to budgeting and declaration of war. Apparently those nuances of Constitutional law are beyond the grasp of Mr. Klein. Just like the Second Amendment, it would seem that the Constitution need not be consulted when it conflicts with an end that the left is emotionally invested in achieving.

As to the Democrats “lining up,” well, I guess its not as if we have any vital national security interests at stake in Iraq and the Middle East:

Obama has definitively stated that he will "not maintain permanent bases in Iraq." Is it just me, or does that phrasing seem carefully worded?

You can read Hillary’s letter to the White House on the issue here. I love Hillary’s take on this. “To be clear, attempts to establish permanent bases in Iraq would damage U.S. interests in Iraq and the broader region . . .” She does not elaborate on this point, but I would love to hear her explain this in a debate. This is the logic of the far left. America can only succeed by losing. We can only achieve a lasting peace through defeat. It is nihilistic insanity.

John Edwards, though, takes the cake. In demanding a complete withdrawal from Iraq, John Edwards states that “Bush is planning to pursue a 'Korea-style' American occupation of Iraq for 10 years or more.”

How is our stationing of forces in Korea an occupation? An occupation denotes imposing military control over a region. Stationing troops in Iraq at the request of the Iraqi government would be no more of an occupation than was the stationing of our troops in Germany or Japan after their own democratic governments been formed. They are there only at the host country invitation and to provide internal and external stability. And in every foreign country that our soldiers have been so stationed, that is precisely what has occurred. If Mr. Edwards is claiming that Korea does not want our troops there, the man has no touch with reality. The last politician who planned to remove our forces from the Korean peninsula was President Carter. And it was the Koreans who went nuts.

It would seem that our Copperheads are walking ever ever further down the road of defeat in Iraq and the world at large. It is a dangerous road for them indeed.

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