Sic Semper Tyrannis 2008

A Lot of Nothing at Annapolis

"But the two leaders sprinkled their speeches with references to diplomatic code words that point to the tough path ahead. Abbas, for instance, referred to a U.N. resolution that Palestinians believe gives them the right to return to their land in Israel, while Olmert mentioned a 2004 letter that Bush gave former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon that said that such refugee returns were unrealistic.

In his own speech, Bush sketched a much more ominous view of the region than Olmert and Abbas. "The battle is underway for the future of the Middle East, and we must not cede victory to the extremists," he said. "With their violent actions and contempt for human life, the extremists are seeking to impose a dark vision on the Palestinian people, a vision that feeds on hopelessness and despair to sow chaos in the Holy Land. If this vision prevails, the future of the region will be endless terror, endless war and endless suffering." "  WaPo

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So far, they have agreed to negotiate.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2007/11/27/ST2007112702806.html?hpid=topnews

The Syrian Opportunity

"In a move that could bolster the credibility of the Bush administration's upcoming Mideast peace talks, Syria has decided to send a representative to attend the conference this week in Annapolis, Md., the country's official news agency, Sana, reported today.

Deputy foreign minister Faysal Moqdad will attend Tuesday's talks as head of a Syrian delegation, the news agency reported. Syria decided to attend after gaining confirmation that the disputed Golan Heights, which Israel seized in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, would be on the agenda, a ranking Syrian official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the press.

"We received what we have asked for, which is the schedule, and on it is the Syrian-Israeli track," said the official. "Based on that, we decided to go.""  LA Times

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Syria has been seeking a way to talk seriously to Washington for  long time.  Israel's willingness to discuss the return of Syrian territory on the Golan Heights provides a chance to do just that.

I am still of the opinion that little will result from the Palestinian-Israeli meeting at Annapolis, but there is a real chance that the Syrian aspect of the festering mess that is the Middle East could be cleared up in the near future.

Syria is extremely uncomfortable with its hostile non-relationship with the US and would go a long way in attempting to resolve that situation.

Lebanon, the "alliance" with Iran, past support of terrorist groups, all of those things could be "in play" if the United States (and Israel) accept the concept of real reconciliation with Syria.  pl

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-mideasttalks26nov26,0,3825646.story?coll=la-home-world

How to Carve A Turkey

"“I don’t cut like a chef, I cut like a butcher,” said Ray Venezia, the meat director for the four Fairway markets, a third-generation butcher and one of the biggest turkey purveyors in New York City.

Instead of slicing the meat from the roast at the table, Mr. Venezia’s carving protocol calls for the biggest pieces, the breasts and the thighs, to be removed whole, then boned and sliced on a cutting board. “Trying to carve from the carcass is like trying to cut it off a beach ball: it’s all curved surfaces and it moves around under the knife,” he said. “Give me a flat cutting board any time.”

Roger Bassett, the owner of the Original Turkey in Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia, uses the same method for the 30 turkeys carved and served at his store every day. “Cutting a turkey the traditional way, where you leave the meat on the bird and cut down, you can’t cut across the grain,” he said. “The pieces you end up with are all stringy because the fibers are long instead of short.”

Mr. Venezia demonstrated the method to me twice last week; I then tested it on two roast chickens, and met with howling success.

It is important to start with a turkey that has rested for at least 20 minutes; 40 is even better, so that the meat has firmed enough to cut cleanly. Mr. Venezia does not use a carving fork. (“Why pierce the meat more than you have to and let the juices run out?”) Instead, he holds the bird in place with one hand and uses the other for cutting. "  NY Times

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Do I carve the bird this way?  No, but it sounds like a good idea.   We wish you all a great celebration of this festive day first celebrated at Jamestown, Virginia.  pl

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/21/dining/21carv.html?em&ex=1195880400&en=e64ed63368f4ff24&ei=5087%0A

The Lebanese "Powderkeg"

"Though most Lebanese have grown used to America's pro-Israel policy, they are now watching with anxiety as the U.S. emphasizes Hezbollah's role as a surrogate for Iran and Syria. Lebanese have little sympathy for Iran and even less for Syria, not just because of Syria's three-decade occupation of Lebanon but also because of the recent assassinations widely attributed to Syria, notably of the popular Lebanese prime minister, Rafik Hariri. Still, the Lebanese are outraged at America's use of their soil, in war and politics, as the playing field for its ongoing feuds with Iran and Syria.

On Nov. 8, Assistant Secretary of State David Welch made clear to Congress that the U.S. opposed the election of a president by any consensus that included Hezbollah. Under Lebanese law, a presidential candidate needs to win the support of two-thirds of the parliament to be elected on the first ballot, but after that, a simple majority suffices. Welch suggested that the U.S. would use its economic and political muscle to back a candidate that it considered favorable to U.S. interests. The U.S. strategy, as the Lebanese see it, is to promote a narrow, anti-Hezbollah majority on the second ballot.

Most Lebanese seem to be holding their breath, denying that civil war looms. The many private militias that were primed for battle in 1975 no longer exist, they point out. Even though Hezbollah has the strongest armed force in the country -- stronger than the Lebanese army, which mirrors the society's schisms -- it shows no sign of preparing for a putsch. Most Lebanese tell themselves the factions will remain stubborn until the last minute, then make a deal.  Viorst

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Ah, yes, the magic of "the deal."  This more or less sums up the Lebanese mind set with regard to politics, business, etc.  That, and the lesser magic of conspicuous consumption.

I do not believe that there will be another Lebanese civil war.  The Lebanese still remember the last one all too vividly for them to soon go collectively mad as they did the last time.  The Israel-Hizbullah war of 2006 refreshed that memory for them to something sticky, brown and still drying.  It will take a generation of quiet for the Lebanese to have a renewed taste for the mayhem that destroys friend and foe alike.  Maybe that was the point of the Israeli campaign?  Maybe not.

No.  No civil war.  Instead, look to see the further disintegration of civil society under the pressure of foreign political interventionism.  The Lebanese like a good conspiracy so well that they are perpetually willing to divide themselves into factions and groupings of factions allied to foreign players.  They really do not seem to know how to live without that kind of activity.

They will continue.  pl

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-viorst21nov21,0,7917308.story?coll=la-tot-opinion&track=ntothtml

Baram answers your questions

"Pat,
This is an attempt to respond to the reactions to my brief comment from a few days ago.
Best,
Amatzia

“[Ricks and DeYoung]’s article nowhere mentions the plight of the over 2 million internal refugees in Iraq”.

I agree. If both kinds of refugees, 4m of them in total, start going back home, though, I am less worried that the US commanders. They will do this only once they ascertain that security is reasonably back and that their neighbors calmed down. House ownership in Iraq is still valid and most of the refugees took with them the title deeds (Qushans, Tabus) so at least legal problems like in Kirkuk, where Saddam rounded up people and drove them out, will not represent a major issue. Judging by similar experiences in Kosovo and Serbia, the returnees also are very likely to support each other, Sunnis, Shiis, Kurds, Christians (if the latter go back at all) because they will have a common cause. And the government, frail as it is, will try to help as well. So it will not be easy, but I don’t see another humanitarian catastrophe. Incidentally, the Catholic St John's Church in Baghdad’s al-Dura neighborhood reopened a couple of days ago. This is a very positive sign of life returning to a more normal existence. However, there are around 50,000 Iraqis who will never be able to go home. These are the educated – in large part professional – Iraqis who collaborated with the US armed forces and US-sponsored contractors either as interpreters or as professional aids. Most of them are in Amman now. When they go back they will be killed by the Sunni and Shii militias. Their savings are running out. There were three attempts already on the life of a good friend of mine, an Iraqi American engineer who has spent the last four years in Basra, working with British military engineers on the barely-existing infrastructure there. He will leave with the British. He has a place to go, but those stuck in Jordan are stranded. Amatzia Baram"

Download pat_11_007_questions_ii.doc

Annapolis - Why Bother?

"The Cabinet vote took place ahead of a meeting between Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Abbas later in the day. The two men were trying to break a deadlock in preparations for the U.S.-hosted peace summit, which is expected to take place in Annapolis, Md., next week.

Israel sees the conference primarily as a ceremonial launching pad for new peace efforts, while the Palestinians want a more detailed plan for how post-conference talks will proceed.

Seeking to drum up support for the conference, Olmert is heading to Egypt on Tuesday for talks with President Hosni Mubarak, his office said. Arab League members are to decide on Friday whether they will join the gathering. High-level Arab attendance is seen as crucial to the success of nascent peace moves." Yahoo  News

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Once again, we are presented with the inability of these parties to the Palestinian-Israeli struggle to accept or even comprehend the difference in approach of the other side.

The Israelis want to see the Annapolis meeting as an event in which the Americans make the Palestinians available for a free-flowing give and take that leads to an agreement that is some sort of compromise.

The Palestinians see the process as one in which the American super-power gives its blessing to the rough outline of what a final settlement will be.

In pursuit of that vision, the Palestinians want there to be a document agreed on between them and the Israelis which gives the shape of what the final settlement will be and they want it in advance.  Anything else they see as merely another trick.

As though to make any agreement even more difficult, Olmert's government wants the Palestinians to make a public statement re-newing their previous de facto recognition of the existence of Israel.  In this new statement they want a specific acceptance of Israel's nature as a Jewish state.  This is very difficult for the Paelstinians since their aspiration for their own state is for a government that is, at least in theory, religiously neutral.

Bottom Line:  Annapolis will amount to very little.

If the parties want to move forward towards a state of existence in which everyone can live reasonably, then they must give up their maximalist positions, accept the idea of a series of truces (hudna), and engage Egypt and other regional "players" in dealing with the extremists among the Palestinians. 

Even then, progress toward any kind of real Peace will be slow.  Struggle of this sort between two peoples for the possession of a single piece of land are not solved until the fires of competitive inter-communal feeling are burned out through struggle.  My sense of this is that the two peoples have not reached that level of emotional surfeit.  pl

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071119/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_palestinians

The IAEA's real views on the Iranian Nuclear Program.

Jim Herring has written from Oklahoma to provide the following analysis and rich trove of documents concerning atomic events in Iran.  pl

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"Remember how the bush-cheney cabal was quite critical of this agreement with iran and has declared that even iran's full compliance with this agreement won't suffice.  that seems to be the reason that we have seen so much el-baradei bashing recently.

Iran IS cooperating with the iaea as requested, and the info that iran has/is providing IS consistant with the iaea findings.  in short, a positive report which also makes no mention of any nuclear weapons programs or any such stuff.

four points to keep in mind with the report:

1. IRAN IS IN COMPLIANCE WITH NPT
2. 'UNDECLARED ACTIVITIES' AND THE ADDITIONAL PROTOCOL -- the iaea has found NO EVIDENCE of a nuclear weapons program, the iaea can't say that iran's nuclear activities are exclusively peaceful since the iaea can't verify the absence of undeclared nuclear activities in iran.  the report requests that iran once again implement the additional protocol.  keep in mind:
   1. the iaea doesn't veirty the absence of undeclared nuclear activities for any nation unless they have signed and ratified the additional protocol.  according to the iaea there are currently 40 other nations for which the iaea can't similary verify the absence of undeclared nuclear activities.  i.e. egypt (which rice recently lauded as a 'model' nuclear program) have refused to even sign the additional protocol, unlike iran.
   2. iran voluntarily implemented the additional protocol by allowing more stringent inspections for 2 years during the course of the paris agreement negotiations with the eu3 (even though iran wasn't legally obligated to do so) -- and still no evidence of nuclear weapons was found in iran.  the 'stuff' the bush-cheney cabal a.k.a. admin. has given the iaea of 'secret' iranian nuclear facilities had been BOGUS [ see: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/02/25/MNGGKOAR681.DTL&feed=rss.news ].   iran has stopped providing that additional level of cooperation and stopped voluntarily implementing the additional protocol when THE EU TRIED TO CHEAT IRAN in the the paris agreement negotiations.  iran has repeatedly stated its willingness to ratify and implement the additional protocol once its nuclear rights are recognized.
   3. issues resolved -- the issue of iran's experiments with plutonium has been resolved.  this particular isn't mentioned in the nov 07 report.  but the modalities agreement of aug 07 stated that such had been resolved.
   4. outstanding issues -- traces of highly enriched uranium where were found in iran, but to date iran's statements about those 'traces' have been verified by the iaea to be accurate [ http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082201447_pf.html ]  the traces in question were attributable to contamination from imported centrifuge parts.   iran doesn't have the capacity to make highly enriched uranium, it barely manages to make low level uranium. 
   5. no suspension of enrichment.  iran's enrichment process is fully monitored by the iaea and determined fully legal on iran's part."  Jim Herring

Download IranIAEAreportNov15.pdf

http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Infcircs/2007/infcirc711.pdf

Amatzia Baram on the big question in Iraq

Pat,

Between 1920 and 1924 the Shi'is of Iraq spilled a lot of blood in fighting the British. Their leading clerics under the leadership of Grand Ayat Allah Shirazi called for jihad and even after the collapse of the armed revolt in October 1920 they continued to object ferociously to any cooperation with the Brits. They were eventually exiled to India as a result. In June 1921 the Brits brought the Sunni Emir Faisal from the Hejaz and in August they anointed him as King of Iraq. They made up their minds: they turned to the Sunni community for cooperation. The latter, albeit with some exceptions, were pragmatic enough to accept the balance of power and act accordingly.

Iraq became Sunni dominated all the way to 2003. One of the ironies of history is that in the 1930s the Shi'i religious leadership turned a number of times to the Brits to protect them against the discrimination and oppression of the Sunni-led state. In the mid-1930s they even asked the Brits to abolish the formal independent status of Iraq and re-impose a fully-fledged British Mandate. But of no avail.

At least one Shi'i leader today is warning his community that the same scenario may be repeated if the Shi'i community does not know how to work with the US. But both the Shi'i leadership and grassroots are adamant on keeping the Sunnis out in the cold. At long last the US commanders found a common language with many Sunni tribal shaykhs and warlords and support them. It is quite possible to my mind that if the Shi'i leaders, between Maliki and Sistani, don't show more flexibility and civil courage and if Muqtada does not cease his marauding mischief the Shi'is will lose Iraq again. It may not become a Sunni-led centralized state as it was before 2003, but it will descend into chaos and the Shi'i parts (and maybe Baghdad

too) will come under Iranian hegemony. This is something most Shi'i Arabs are far from enthusiastic about.

Amatzia Baram

Haifa University"

Ricks on the big question in Iraq

"Indeed, some US Army officers now talk more sympathetically about former insurgents than they do about their ostensible allies in the Shiite-led central government. "It is painful, very painful," dealing with the obstructionism of Iraqi officials, said Army Lt. Col. Mark Fetter. As for the Sunni fighters who for years bombed and shot U.S. soldiers and now want to join the police, Fetter shrugged. "They have got to eat," he said over lunch in the 1st Cavalry Division's mess hall here. "There are so many we've detained and interrogated, they did what they did for money."

The best promise for breaking the deadlock would be holding provincial elections, officers said -- though they recognize that elections could turn bloody and turbulent, undercutting the fragile stability they now see developing in Iraq.

"The tipping point that I've been looking for as an intel officer, we are there," said one Army officer here who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of his position. "The GOI [government of Iraq] and ISF [Iraqi security forces] are at the point where they can make it or break it." "  Tom Ricks and Karen de Young

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Great Minds, etc......

It sure is a shame to have wasted so much and so many getting to a situation which was always available to us in Iraq.  We, more or less, created the phenomenon of Al-Qa'ida in Iraq through our ham-handed treatment of the Sunni Arab population of the country.  We literally drove them into the arms of the takfiri jihadis. 

Now, their disgust with the fanatics and a more enlightened policy on our part have made it possible for the greater part of the Sunni Arabs to part company with our true enemies.

As Ricks writes in this article, it is now up to the Iraqi Government.  Do they want to try to re-build the kind of condominium of communities that produced mixed marriages and mixed residence or do they want to "bet the farm" on the new social order that the CPA and the Chalabi crowd (there and here) installed?

I sympathize with those like Abu Aardvark (Lynch) who would like to see a unitary state in Iraq that receives the meek submission of the various groups.   In fact, that was never going to happen in Iraq.  The state and the national identity were too tentative and fragile to survive the battering that we inflicted on it.  There is a chance now of restoring national unity on the basis of bargaining (deal-making) and power sharing across ethno-sectarian and regional lines.

If the Baghdad government seizes that chance then a new Iraq can emerge.  If the government does not, then the stage is set for a long drama of internal and external conflict.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/14/AR2007111402524.html?wpisrc=newsletter

The Big Question in Iraq

It is now clear that the tactic of weaning tribal and village support away from Sunni insurgent groups is working quite well.  With a minimum of babble about the "freedom agenda" the armed forces are going about the business of using existing local leadership and group identity to pit traditionalist and secularist Sunni potential against takfiri jihadist groups in western and central Iraq.  Money, a recognized status as part of a winning combination, a certain amount of protection from the rapacity of the Shia run police, all of those things contribute to the ability of US commanders to attract the willing cooperation of tribal sheikhs, village mukhtars and provincial politicians.  In Iraq tribal identity is so pervasive in much of the country that the influence of these networks of real or fictive kinship can not be ignored.  In some cases the Dulaimi relationships of the leaders are clearly a major factor.  Tribal groups like the Shammar, who stand outside that grouping should not be ignored either.

Diyala, Salahuddin and the area just south of Baghdad are proving to be fertile ground for application of methods of influence and control as old as the tribes themselves.  It continues to be ironic that many in the US government think that they have discovered something "new" in these methods.

In these stories from the LA Times, the process of "cat herding" is well depicted as well as the resulting generation of combat power in defense of village and small town life.  "Concerned Local Citizens" must sound amusing in Arabic.

All of this is to the good, and such developments can be seen as setting the scene for a gradual but steady withdrawal of US ground forces down to the short term residual force I have written of before.

BUT, will the government that we Americans largely created (purple thumbs and all) prove equal to the task of re-integrating all these Sunni Arab "ralliers" into the national body politic? If the government can do that, then there is likely to be a future for a united Iraq. If not, what?  An inevitable military coup?  De facto partition?  It is not yet clear what that future will be..  pl

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-tribes14nov14,0,5434110.story?coll=la-tot-world&track=ntothtml

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iraq14nov14,0,296946.story?coll=la-tot-world&track=ntothtml