Sic Semper Tyrannis

Turkey and Syria -3 June, 2013

"... the protests partially reflect "the deep ideological polarization between secular, liberal-minded Turks, and the more religious Turks." The modern Republic of Turkey was founded in 1923 by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, who instituted secular laws to replace traditional religious orders. "Secular Turks complain that the Islamist-rooted government is intolerant of criticism and the diversity of lifestyles," he says and "so far, Erdogan's robust and muscular stance vis-à-vis the demonstrators has reinforced those perceptions." Erdogan describes his AKP party as a "conservative democratic" party but some fear the AKP's conservative Islamic values are encroaching on Turkey's traditional secularism. Writing for Hurriyet Daily News, Yusuf Kanli said an "arrogant" Erdogan had taken a series of wrong steps ahead of the protests, including passing legislation that placed additional restrictions on the sale and consumption of alcohol. Erdogan had referred to "two boozers" who had introduced liberal alcohol laws, Kanli said. "That was an obvious reference to Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the diehard secular founding father of the republic, and his comrade in arms and second president Ismet Inonu," he wrote."  CNN

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Having lived and worked in Turkey when modernist secularism was in full bloom and having watched Erdogan's crypto-Islamist Sunni party seek the destruction of that tradition, I have waited for the Turkish people and the army of the republic to act.  Perhaps "now's the time, and now's the hour."  In the '70s when I lived in Turkey Erdogan would have been arrested by now for attempting to subvert the constitution of the Turkish Republic.  pl

http://www.cnn.com/2013/06/03/world/europe/turkey-conflict-explainer/

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"John McCain said on Sunday the U.S. should allow a no-fly zone over Syria and use U.S. and allied air power to establish dominance there. The U.S. should establish a safe zone for rebels fighting against Syrian President's Bashar Assad’s regime, the Arizona Republican said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” Assad is now prevailing in the battlefield against resistance troops, McCain said, warning the conflict has the potential of spreading throughout the Middle East. The U.S. and its allies, he said, should crater Syria’s runways with standoff Cruise missiles and use Patriot missiles close to the border to protect the safe zone. “We can establish that safe zone, and I’m confident that we will prevail,” McCain said. “Air superiority is a key element in any conflict with this terrain.” McCain disputed suggestions that the U.S. shouldn’t get involved in Syria, warning that the situation there has gotten progressively worse and will continue to deteriorate unless something changes. “It is in our strategic interest to see Bashar Assad go,” he said."  Politico

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Well, you read it here two years ago.  SST has maintained from the beginning of the Syria civil war that the arc of hstory did not, in fact incline toward the mish-mash of Islamists, Jihadis and inept Syrian malcontents that make up "the opposition."  Yesterday in the Washpost my old colleague Jeff White (of WINEP) and some thinly disguised Israeli analyst now resident at WINEP more less conceded the inevitability of Syrian government victory.  Now we have the spectacle of Senator McCain demanding war against the Syrian government.  Someone should explain to him that the Syrian Baath government are not the enemies of long ago against whom he and I fought.  “It is in our strategic interest to see Bashar Assad go,” he said."

Really"  Why?  pl

http://www.politico.com/blogs/politico-live/2013/06/mccain-establish-nofly-zone-in-syria-165195.html

 

UN Security Update for Iraq - 19 May,2013

Download Daily Security Update_19 May 2013

UN Security Update Iraq - 13 May, 2013

Download Daily Security Update_13 May 2013

pl

UN Daily Security Update - Iraq, 12 May, 2013

  

 

Download Daily Security Update_12 May 2013

pl

UN Daily Security Update Iraq - 6 May 2013

Download Daily Security Update_06 Mayl 2013

Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, the Sequester - Trust?

-Syria .   So now we have the emergence of supposed proof of Assad's government being in violation of the self assigned "red line" of poison gas use against the rebels. Let's see the proof.  Let's see and hear something beyond Andrea Mitchell beating her drum for war.  This is especially important on this day when the arch deceiver (or buffoon) is fawned over at his presidential library.  He still does not admit that his administration chose to believe fabricated information in the matter of Iraq's posession of nuclear weapons and poison gas. Now we have Obama and his Sancho Panza man (Biden) walking the American people toward war in Syria in pursuit of god knows what interest of the US. Don't think for a minute that a "no fly zone" over Syria is anythng but war against the Syrian government.  There would be massive movement of air assets to Turkey, Israel and Jordan.  There would be sufficient air to air combat to destroy the Syrian Air Force.  There would be Search Air Rescue operations in Syria for downed air crew.  And at the end there would be a Saudi satellite jihadi state in Syria.  We should be trusting about this?

- Iraq.  Civil War on sectarian lines has begun again in Iraq.   We were told that we had done a good thing in Iraq.  GW Bush still says we did.  What good did we do?  We replaced one dictator with someone who is rapidly becoming another.  The government of Iraq is at war with the Sunni Arab population.  Is that not clear?

- Afghanistan.  Is it not clear that our effort to transform Afghanustan has failed?  Is it not clear that we should leave as soon as possible and stop throwng good money and people after bad and foolish efforts?

-The Sequester.  In the gun fight in the senate, the Obama Administration used every trick of propaganda and tear jerking to try to get its way.  All those efforts failed, failed miserably.  Now the same techique is being used to try to influence the American people to force the Congress to adopt Obama's budget.  IMO sequester cuts are being structured to cause maximum pain and inconvenenience to the general public.  White House tours are cut.  National monuments are closed.  Air traffic controllers are laid off so as to cause delays in air traffic with travelers waiting hours in aircraft for take offs.  At the same time, major defense contracters report no change in their bottom line.  that will probably change but for now...

Should we be trusting?  pl 

Syria, the Levant, and the Real Domino Effect

*

Adam L. Silverman, PhD**

 

As the Syrian Civil War continues into its third year, there are several potential outcomes that we need to look out for and be concerned with.  These are not just limited to Syria, but to the entire Levant, and even to Iran.  So lets run the board in order:

Syria

There are really two key potential outcomes and one sequel for Syria itself: stalemate driven insurgency, the fall of the Assads leading to a Sunni majority takeover, and the withdrawl of the Alawites to Latakia.

It is, in some respects, both surprising and not surprising that the Assad government has held on for as long as it has.  In many ways the Syrian Civil War is both an Assad and Alawite existential fight. which partially explains just how hard the government has responded and how far it is willing to go to survive.  One of the two most likely outcomes to the dispute is that the government is strong enough to survive, but not strong enough to completely put down the rebellion and that the rebellion is not strong enough to overthrow the government, but just strong enough to survive.  If this happens, then we will see a classic insurgency along the lines of what the Philippines has endured with the Moros on Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago and similar to what Columbia has faced with the FARC.  In this situation Syria essentially gets carved up into two or more statelets - with government control in some areas and rebel control in others. 

The second potential outcome is that the Assad government does fall and the Sunni majority, or some faction of it takes over.  And it is this latter concept of faction that is important.  There is clearly no good cohesion among the rebel groups, both the domestic Syrian and the foreign fighters/jihadis, as well as between them.  While it may ultimately be a good thing for the region if Assad goes, it will not be a simple transition.  The various factions are likely to try to consolidate power, claim and then establish legitimacy, and will come to blows with each other over who will take control.  This possible outcome has the potential to turn into a Syrian version of the Thirty Years War, where different factions try to and/or actually seize power, seek to consolidate, face challenges to their legitimacy, and then the cycle of violent succession starts all over again.  This would, unlike the actual Thirty Years War, not end in the creation of a secular state, as the Syrian Sunni majority is conservative and devout even though it is not Salafist.  So do not expect a secular Sunni majority Syria to emerge.

In both of these two potential outcomes their is a sequel: the fallback of the Alawites, with or without the Assads, to their traditional lands in Latakia.  Latakia is the mountainous strip of Syria below Turkey on the coast of the Mediterranean.  While it is not completely fortifiable, it is certainly good ground - to paraphrase MG Buford - for digging in and trying to make a stand.  Not only would this prolong the dispute, but it would complicate Syria's claims to their portions of the recently discovered Leviathan petroleum and natural gas field in the eastern Mediterranean.

Kerry in Iraq to Press on Iran Flights to Syria - ABC News

"Kerry will tell al-Maliki, a Shiite with close ties to Iran, that Iraq cannot be part of the political discussion about Syria's future until it clamps down on the Iranian shipments, the senior official said. As Iraq approaches provincial elections next month, Kerry will also stress the importance of ensuring that all elements of society feel enfranchised, the official said. A recent decision to delay the polls in Anbar and Nineveh provinces is a "serious setback" to Iraq's democratic institutions and should be revisited, the official said."  ABC News

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Are we really this stupid?  The present Iraqi government threw us out.  Remember?  They are sitting on an ocean of oil with very high prices being paid for that oil.  They are Shia activists who now run a country in which Sunnis used to run them,  Sunnis who look similar to the rebels in Syria.

So, somebody told John Kerry that it would be a good idea to go "jawbone" Maliki about what he should do in running Iraq?

Are we really that stupid?  pl  

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/kerry-iraq-press-iran-flights-syria-18800152

 

 

"Drinking the Koolaid." W. Patrick Lang

This was written in the autumn and winter 0f 2003/2004 and published in The summer number of "Middle East Policy" after "Harper's" who had commissioned me to write the piece refused to do so.  pl

(Now, in 2013 another band of manipulators is seeking to take  the US to war in Syria.  Americans - Beware!  pl)

Download Drinking the Kool-Aid

Rice reveals that Hizbullah helps Syria

 

"U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice told the U.N. Security Council's monthly meeting on the Mideast that Hezbollah leaders are also continuing to plot new measures with Iran to keep Assad in power.       

Rice's comments — and those of Israel's U.N. Ambassador Ron Prosor — gave the clearest indication that Hezbollah, which fought a war against Israel in 2006 and is a major political and military force in Lebanon, is sending an increasing number of fighters to help the embattled Syrian regime.       

Syria's ruling Alawite minority is an offshoot of Shiite Islam and has had close ties to Iran and Hezbollah which are Shiite-dominated. Assad has long helped Iran aid Hezbollah and Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, in destabilizing Lebanon and threatening Israel's security and U.S. interests in the Middle East. "  NY Times

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This is truly comic.  Susan "Meet the Press" Rice is still riding high.

Hizbullah is a major component of a stable government in Lebanon.  It was elected to the number of seats in parliament that give it that power a number of years ago and the political science seminar crowd that makes up the US foreign policy establishment has resolutely opposed the Lebanese government ever since.  BTW, when did Hizbullah last fire rockets or anything else into Israel?  If memory serves, it was in 2006.

In Syria the US seeks regime change without UN authority.   The allies of the US in this endeavor are; Turkey (Sunni ruled), Egypt (Sunni ruled), Saudi Arabia (Sunni ruled), Qatar (Sunni ruled) Al-Qa'ida (Sunni fanatics) and NATO.

On the other side, the government of Syria (Alawi, Druze, Shia, Sunni and Christian in orientation), Iran (Shia ruled), Iraq (Shia ruled) and now apparently Hizbullah (a Shia militia)

So, the US has become the ally of Al-Qa'ida and the Wahhabi Saudis against a multi-confessional government and its Shia allies.

How clever we are!  pl

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2012/10/15/world/middleeast/ap-un-un-mideast.html?ref=world&_r=0

Michael Gordon, Andrea Mitchell and the "war" against Obama

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036789/ns/msnbc_tv-morning_joe/#49192702

 

"Morning Joe" provided a "stage" today for Michael Gordon.  He is promoting his new book on Iraq.  Gordon, along with Judy Miller, propagandized the American people on the subject of the supposed existence of Iraqi WMD.  He now claims that Obama failed to get Maliki's agreement to a residual force in Iraq because Obama insisted that the agreement had to reflect Americn priorities.  What Gordon failed to say today was that the "priority" Obama insisted on was a Status of Forces Agreement that would have protected American soldiers from arrest and trial under Iraqi law.  Andrea Mitchell joined in the Obama bashing with a gleeful grin.  pl

The fruits of the Arab Spring

Fouad Ajami  wrote "The Dream Palace of the Arabs" a couple of years back.  Bernard Lewis is the author of "What went Wrong." 

The central thesis of both books is the same.  This is the notion that Muslims generally and Arabs in particular suffer from a collective belief that the material and financial superiority of the West is unnatural, ungodly and fated to disappear with the emergence of a world wide human condition that represents the will of God.

This viewpoint is often crudely represented by the endless power point presentations sold by contracters to governments on the subject of the jihadi obsession with the establishment of a world-wide "caliphate."

The events of the past week, events stimulated by the TV trailer disgrace, tend to support Lewis and Ajami in their view. 

The reaction of the mobs across the world, even unto the Antipodes, is grossly exagerated, disproportionate and obviously fueled by a boundless hatred for America that makes a mockery of all the social science gibberish about deprivation, oppression, etc. 

Last year it was generally assumed in the West that removal of authoritarian governments in the Arab World would result in accession to power of westernized elites who hold dear the political philosophy of the post Enlightenment West.

That has not happened.  In the last century (20th) the liberals failed miserably at the polls in Iraq.  In Egypt the liberals are  a political joke and not enough of a factor to be worth discussing.  In Tunisia, possibly the most Westernised of all Arab countries, it is necessary to withdraw most of our diplomatic mission from fear of their safety.

Nevertheless, the Washington Post persists in the jacobin doctrine of the neocon "freedom agenda."  According to the Post all we have to do is "stick with" the westernized liberals and all will be well.  This is the triumph of theory over experience.

The Arab Spring has revealed that the Arab masses have a substantial inclination toward political Islamism in government.  Western media and governments, and particularly the USA helped and continue to help in the release of forces in the Arab World that consider the West to be "the other," the enemies of God, this god being the very special god of their dreams.

Is Mubarak still alive?  Did the inquisitors ever find the vast sums that the Mubaraks supposedy stole from the people with rocks in their hands outside the US Embassy in Cairo.  Perhaps we will remember the Mubaraks et al fondly in the depths of the Arab Winter.  pl

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/in-the-arab-world-why-a-movie-trailer-can-lead-to-violencewhy-cant-the-arab-world-accept-offenses-without-violence/2012/09/14/d2b65d2e-fdc8-11e1-8adc-499661afe377_story.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/washingtons-role-as-mideast-countries-struggle-for-power/2012/09/14/08343bd2-fe83-11e1-b153-218509a954e1_story.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/16/us-withdraws-diplomats-tunisia-sudan?newsfeed=true

More Jingoism at the Washington Post

"If the fighting continues to spread, important U.S. allies, including Saudi Arabia and Turkey, could be destabilized; both are indirectly backing Sunni fighters. The fragile political order in Iraq, bought with thousands of American lives, could collapse. Al-Qaeda could acquire new recruits and sanctuaries across the region. The best means of preventing this, as State Department Middle East experts have been pointing out for months, is to accelerate the downfall of the Syrian regime. There are several ways of doing that, short of direct military intervention: materiel aid to the rebels is one. Now that its refusal to take that step has led to the very consequences it warned of, the administration would be wise to reconsider. "  Washpost editorial

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The Washington Poat and New York Times fed us this kind of jingoistic nonsense before we invaded Iraq.  The claim was made that Iraq = Nazi Germany.  Today Kurdistan - Tomorrow the Sudetenland!  What rot!  and they are doing the same thing again.  In those days Judy Miller and Michael Gordon led the charge in NY but the Washington Post was not far behind.  Today ,the neocon Post editorial page apparently cannot wait for the day when American infantry will bleed and die in Syria.  The unholy trio of McCain, Graham and "Deputy Dog" Lieberman seem eager supporters of that aspiration.

The Post admits that Saudi Arabia and Turkey are material supporters of the Sunni jihadi insurgents in Syria.  Turkey and Saudi Arabia are overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim in their populations.  The Post nevertheless thinks that Turkey and Saudi Arabia will be de-stabilized if fighting continues.  Well. if that is so, let Saudi Arabia and Turkey stop supporting the insurgency.

Sunni Turkey has announced that it will give permanent sanctuary to al-Hashemi, the condemned Sunni VP of Iraq.  What a surprise! Not!  I did not think for a moment that the pious Sunni Turk, Erdogan, would deliver a kinsman of the prophet (Al Hashimi) to die on a scaffold in Baghdad at the hands of the Shia.

If there are any people left in the State Department who have a clue about the Middle East they should  all hold up their hands!   Oh!  There's one over there!  pl 

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/us-stands-by-as-syrias-violence-spreads/2012/09/10/e8c36246-fb71-11e1-b153-218509a954e1_story.html

Sunni jihadis kill ar least 75 in Iraq - Foxnews

"Insurgents killed at least 75 people in a wave of attacks against Iraqi security forces on Sunday, gunning down soldiers at an army post and bombing police recruits waiting in line to apply for jobs, officials said. The violence, which struck at least a dozen cities and wounded 285 people, highlighted militant attempts to sow havoc in the country and undermine the government. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attacks, but security forces are a frequent target of Al Qaeda's Iraq branch, which has vowed to reassert itself and take back areas it was forced from before U.S. troops withdrew from the country last year."  Foxnews

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I thank Foxnews for this item.  Fair and balanced, yup fair and balanced, I thank them.    I have been holding off in posting on the latest horrors in Iraq, but finally gave up on the rising butcher's bill.  There will probably a higher number in the end.  Anne Marie Slaughter, the Princeton professor who has declared herself a martyr to the world's chauvinism, said on the FZ follies today that "we have made a lot of progress in Afghanistan."  I guess that means that she was a player in BHO's decision to triple his bet in that sad, far off place.  Perhaps she also thinks that we made a lot of progress in Iraq?

AQ is back with a vengeance in Iraq.  They have to devote some men to the fight for Syria, but they are swimming in the sea of unhappy Sunni Arabs in Iraq.

We did that.  We, Americans, with our idiot "crusade" for democracy and our belief that elections mean something in places where compromise is as rare in the general population as it is here among hard core politicans.  We did it.  It will get worse.  pl

 

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/09/09/bombing-in-iraq-kills-seven-police-recruits-wounds-17/?test=latestnews#ixzz260NU4mgO 

 

Iran supplies Syria via Iraqi airspace. - The Pilot

 

"American senators visiting Iraq warned the Baghdad government Wednesday that it risked damaging relations with the U.S. if it is allowing Iran to fly over its airspace to deliver weapons to Syria. An Iraqi government spokesman responded by saying Iran has told Baghdad the flights to Syria are only delivering humanitarian aid. He said the onus is on the U.S. to offer up proof that Tehran is shipping weapons. Senator Joe Lieberman, an Independent from Connecticut, said Iraq's failure to stop the flights could threaten the long-term relationship with the U.S. as well as aid Iraq could receive as part of a 2008 strategic pact between the two nations. "Bottom line, this kind of problem with these Iranian overflights can make it more difficult to proceed with the Strategic Framework Agreement in the manner that the prime minister and we would like to see happen," Lieberman told reporters in Baghdad. "So I hope this is cleared up quickly." "  Pilotonline

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So, "Deputy Dog" (Jon Stewart's pet name for him) "hopes this is cleared up quickly."  Do the fabulous threesome, (McCain, Lieberman and Graham) realize how foolish they look and how much they are being mocked by Maliki and Company?  Do they?  Have they no pride?  Have they no shame?  Perhaps they are taking lessons in foreign affairs from Bibi and the other Lieberman.  That pair have done so well with their BHO relationship.

Seriously, sort of,  IMO Iraq think the idea of a long term "strategic" relationssip with the USA to be a bad joke, a joke so bad that it cries out for mockery.

They are allowing the use of their airspace for re-supply?  Wait until they figure out a way to run convoys across northern Iraq to Syria.  The Syrian jihadi guerrillas should not prove an impenetrable obstacle to that.  And... the other end of that supply line can have a branch that runs to Russia...

Meanwhile, on HC's trip to China things did not go well.  The Chinese basically told her "NO!"  We run our policy about Syria, not you.  She would have been better off if she had gone to the convention.  pl  

http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_IRAQ_US?SITE=VANOV&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-09-05-11-20-28

Is there a US policy in the Islamic World?

I think that is a valid question:

- In Egypt we support consolidation of power by an obviously Muslim Brotherhood run government.  To that end, HC and her deputy, Bill Burns,  have traveled to Cairo to threaten and cajole the Egyptian military into accepting what the Egyptians know will become an Islamist state with all that promises for women, Christians, homosexuals, etc.

- In Afghanistan we are engaged in a very long, very costly war against an Islamist guerrilla army that has the support of many in that country.  It is claimed that the Afghan soldiers and police who are killing our men are merely "disaffected." Yes, but their disaffection is largely the result of their anti-kaffir xenophobia.  We are now in the process of abandoning the failed COIN strategy in favor of a CT based strategy that I advocated three years ago, but that was then.  This is now.  The time has probaby passed.

-In Iraq, we created a government that rejected any real strategic relationship with us and now conspires with Iran to halp Iran evade the sanctions regime.  But, we still say we love them.

- In Tunisia, the Islamist element in the new government is seeking to erase French culture in the country.  We look fondly upon them.

- In Yemen we directly assist the new Yemeni government in seeking the annhilation of the small Sunni Wahhabi insurgent movement.  In so doing we align ourselves with the Sunni majority of the former PDRY against the Fiver Shia population of the North who are thought to be somehow related to Iran.  They are not.

- Iran.  Well, I won't even try to deal with that here.  We await Israel's initiative.

- Saudi Arabia.  We await their desires as well.

- Syria.  We support a Sunni Wahhabi led, financed and armed insurgency against a government that has traditionally been hostile to Islamist groups.

What's the connecting thread here?

Don't embarrass yourself by saying oil and Israel.

"It is a tale told by an ifdiot."  pl

Iraq assisting Iran in avoiding sanctions.

 
"Iraqi government officials are turning a blind eye to the large financial flows, smuggling and other trade with Iran. In some cases, they say, government officials, including some close to Mr. Maliki, are directly profiting from the activities. “Maliki’s government is right in the middle of this,” said one former senior American intelligence official who now does business in Iraq. In announcing that he was “cutting off” Elaf Islamic Bank, Mr. Obama said it had “facilitated transactions worth millions of dollars on behalf of Iranian banks that are subject to sanctions for their links to Iran’s illicit proliferation activities.” But the treatment the bank has received in Baghdad since it was named by Mr. Obama suggests that the Iraqi government is not only allowing companies and individuals to circumvent the sanctions but also not enforcing penalties for noncompliance "  NY Times

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The instances of Iraqi defiance or indifference to American "guidance" are now so numoerous as to make any pretense that Iraq is a firend and ally of the US to be a total farce maintained as a political convenience.  pl 

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/19/world/middleeast/us-says-iraqis-are-helping-iran-skirt-sanctions.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

Operation Bonehead (2) By Richard Sale, author of Clinton’s Secret Wars.

"At the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Vice President Dick Cheney, an aide to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Steve Cambone, and the American envoy to Iraq, Paul Bremer all believed that the Allied Coalition was strong enough to succeed at anything it chose to tackle. After the military victory, the initial U.S. political objective was to consolidate support for the U.S. forces and begin to resurrect a normal political environment. This would prove difficult and elusive because, as we’ve seen, Bremer had fired most of the Iraqi educated middle class and Iraqi technocrats as politically unfit: they were Baathists."  Sale

Download Operation Bonehead

Iraq "celebrates" Ramadan

"BAGHDAD - A string of bomb attacks across Iraq killed at least 50 people on Monday and wounded 144 more, police and hospital sources said, in one of the bloodiest days in the past weeks.

Violence in Iraq has eased since the height of sectarian slaughter in 2006-2007, but insurgents still carry out deadly attacks, especially around the capital, and deadly car bombs on Sunday shattered a lull in violence in the lead-up to the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which started on Saturday.

In Taji, 20 km north of Baghdad, six blasts, including a car bomb, exploded near a housing complex on Monday, killing 14 people and wounding 29, sources said. When police arrived at the scene, another blast killed 10 police officers.

Two car bombs struck near a government building in Sadr City, a poor Shi'ite neighborhood in Baghdad, and in the northern mainly Shi'ite area of Hussainiya, killing in total 16 people and wounding 73, police said.

In the northern oil city of Kirkuk, four car bombs killed four people and wounded 15 others. Explosions and gun attacks on security checkpoints in different parts of the restive eastern province of Diyala killed six people, including four soldiers and policemen, and wounded 30, police sources said."  Jpost

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Does this require comment?  I think not.   Nevertheless, what will follow our withdrawal from Afghanistan will be worse than this.  This disaster is the result of juvenile arrogance that sought to re-design a complex and ancient set of cultures.  pl

 

http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=278553

Iraq is "coming of age"

"In the run-up to the war in Iraq, neoconservative hawks in and out of the Bush administration promised that the U.S. invasion would quickly transform that country into a strong ally, a model Arab democracy and a major oil producer that would lower world prices, even while paying for its own reconstruction.

"A new regime in Iraq would serve as a dramatic and inspiring example of freedom for other nations in the region," President George W. Bush told a crowd at the American Enterprise Institute in 2003, a few weeks before he launched the attack.

Ten bloody and grueling years later, Iraq is finally emerging from its ruins and establishing itself as a geopolitical player in the Middle East -- but not the way the neocons envisioned."  Froomkin

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My correspondent writes that the final "denouement" will come when Iraq declares that Israel has no right to exist.  pl

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/14/iraq-iran-ties_n_1664728.html

Ignatius on the "Arab Spring"

"Most officials think that relations with the Arabs are gradually going to get
worse, perhaps for decades, before democracy really takes root and the Arab
public, perhaps, will be ready to accept the Jewish state. The challenge for
Israel is how to avoid inflaming Arab public opinion, a newly important factor,
while protecting the country. "  Ignatius

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Ignatius' Israeli friends are right to be fearful of revolutions that seem to unleash Islamist forces that have as their "raison d'etre" the elimination of Israel as an insult to Islam and the 'Umma.  The game has not been played out in Libya but Libya is a special case in terms of smallness of population and percentage of people educated abroad.

Al-Ahram has a story on-line that government receipts will be much smaller this year than they were under Mubarak "the terrible."  Let's see, how does that relate to all the billions that the Mubaraks stole from Egypt?  Hmmm!  That's the way to cover the government deficit!  They could torture the Mubaraks to find the people's money.

The Israelis prefer Bashar Assad?  How can that be?  Perhaps HC can fly by Tel Aviv to explain why they are wrong. 

Now Mursi has reinstated the Islamist parliament.  There must be great satisfaction in Foggy Bottom about how well things are going in Cairo. pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/david-ignatius-israels-arab-spring-problem/2012/07/05/gJQAV5JrRW_story.html

http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/3/12/47075/Business/Economy/Egyptian-state-revenues-are-overestimated,-a-blast.aspx

 

Perspective on the Threat of Terrorism by Dr. Christopher Bolan

Micah Zenko at the Council on Foreign Relations observes that based on the most recent USG official statistics on global terrorism for 2011, "the number of U.S. citizens who died in terrorist attacks [is comparable to those] crushed to death by their televisions or furniture each year."  So the inert television and chairs sitting around your house are every bit as threatening to your physical safety as the sum total of all terrorist organizations actively operating world-wide.

In confronting this objectively miniscule but emotionally-compelling threat, the USG has undertaken the most extensive reorganization and expansion of its national security apparatus since WWII; conducted massive military interventions and enormous nation-building efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq at tremendous costs in American blood and treasure; and authorized ever-more intensive assassination campaigns in Pakistan and Yemen that include American citizens as 'legitimate' targets.

The 'global war on terrorism' was a flawed strategic framework from its inception appealing primarily to the appreciable fear of the American public in the wake of the horrific attacks of 9-11 and eschewing an objective assessment of the scale and nature of the threat.  Terrorism as a tactic of the weak will always be with us.  It will never be eliminated.  This report demonstrates that this threat has clearly been reduced to a manageable level.  The Al-Qa'ida organization that attacked us on 9-11 is a shadow of what it was.  Targeted attacks on its leadership and support networks wherever they operate can most effectively and efficiently be facilitated by close cooperation with local law enforcement, intelligence, and as needed, special operations forces.

In these times of fiscal constraints and 'tough choices', U.S. citizens and taxpayers should demand a reality-based discussion of the military, security, and intelligence forces needed to defend critical American national interests here and abroad.  Our political and military leaders should lead this rational debate.  Nevertheless, many politicians, defense lobbyists, and those working in the national security and foreign policymaking apparatus (both government and civilian) will be tempted to employ hyperbolic exaggeration of the threats confronting us as a justification for continued U.S. interventions across the globe.  The rise of China as a conventional military and economic competitor and the potential for Iran to develop nuclear weapons are prime candidates to replace terrorism as the next great  security 'threat' demanding exorbitant expenditures of America's treasure and resources.  Let's at least insist on a rational and fact-based debate over these issues.

The author is a professor of national security affairs at the U.S. Army War College.  The views expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

Deepening Crisis in Iraq

 

"A series of intertwined political crises that began with accusations that Iraq's prime minister was consolidating power have escalated into calls to unseat him, and paralysed the country's government.

"The political crisis has reached its highest level since its beginning, but it is still running within the framework of the democratic game," Iraqi political analyst Ihsan al-Shammari said.

"The country is paralysed on all levels; there is a clear political paralysis paralleled by governmental negligence and a failure of the legislative authority, while the people are disappointed and afraid of the security consequences," Shammari said.

The trouble began in earnest in mid-December, when the secular Sunni-backed Iraqiya bloc began a boycott of parliament and the cabinet over what it said was Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's centralisation of power."  AFP

------------------------------

Ah, here we have the fruits of the neocon wisdom and way.  The Shia dominated government of Maliki, the former Da'wa terrorist, wishes to consolidates its grip on power at the expense of all others and if necessary by imprisoning them.  Is this a surprise to any non-neocon sentient being?

If this is Iraq, can Egypt, Yemen, Libya and Tunisia be far behind?  pl

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5g2PMubVWdRnvsqjRBG_ZGHDJRkwg?docId=CNG.ce32178bf9c9ad0ec4f0918701083c2e.181

"How Osama bin Laden is winning, even in death" Ignatius

"What we’re seeing now in Egypt is something that might be called electoral bin Ladenism. Take the group Gamaa Islamiya, which under its spiritual leader, Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, made the first unsuccessful attempt to destroy the World Trade Center in 1993. Today, the organization has formed a Salafist political party with the benign name Building and Development Party. This organization, which like al-Qaeda traces its roots to the Islamist theorist Sayyid Qutb, has 13 seats in the new Egyptian parliament.

Syria will be a test of whether this post-bin Laden Islamist movement can continue to reject violence or will instead be radicalized by the jihadist magnet that is Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The successor to bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has tried to use the anti-Assad battle to rehabilitate the al-Qaeda brand — even though it’s another fight that embodies the Muslim-on-Muslim violence that bin Laden came to abhor."  Ignatius

*******************************

"... a year of mostly nonviolent democratic revolution. But it has brought to power some Salafist and Muslim Brotherhood groups that share common theological roots with bin Laden. And the al-Qaeda goal of driving the “apostate,” pro-American President Hosni Mubarak from power has been achieved."  Ignatius

---------------------------------------

Truer words were never..., etc.  Islamic revivalism (especially in Sunni Islam) is a cyclical phenomenon.  Islam sees itself as a universal truth that should become a way of life for all.  All else is tactics.

 

A Letter From Yusuf al-Misry

"Pat,

This time it is not about Egypt, though I will get back to Egypt in the near future. It is about the GCC countries.

It is obvious that there is an unfavorable configuration developing rapidly.

The sense in the GCC Capitals is that the US may “sell” these countries in any moment. That the US is not a reliable “anchor” in the current violent storm in the region. And that the US is weak – at best – or that it will let these ruling monarchies down in any grand bargain with Iran.

Why this is a dangerous situation? Simply because it creates a psychological environment that can begets unneeded complications. The paranoia regarding the US led to the rejection of three US NGOs in the UAE, Riyadh ceasing to coordinate with its main alley regarding Egypt, the arrest of a royal Sheikh in RAK and many other incidents which reflect the general sentiment that could border panic.

A Disappointing Assessment of U.S. Investment in Iraq by Dr. Christopher Bolan



Several recent events can only reinforce the assessment that after a decade of tremendous expenditures of American blood and treasure, the U.S. strategy of military invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq was ill-conceived from the start, poorly executed throughout, and ultimately has failed to advance U.S. national interests in any meaningful way.  Let's briefly review the anticipated achievements, the key developments in U.S. strategy, and the outcomes as they are manifested today.

 

Celebrating Liberation Iraq Style

"A spate of car bombings rocked Iraq on Tuesday, the ninth anniversary of the U.S. invasion and days before the nation hosts a meeting of Arab leaders.

The violence left at least 41 people dead and 190 wounded, officials said.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the blasts that one senior Interior Ministry official described as "coordinated" and blamed on al Qaeda in Iraq.

The official, who did not want to be named because he's not authorized to speak to the media, said the attacks were meant to send a message that the militant group -- despite gains made by Iraqi security forces -- is still able to carry out daily attacks.

Attacks took place in Baghdad, Kirkuk, Karbala, Hilla, Tikrit, Baiji, Ramadi and Falluja."  CNN

--------------------------------------

No comment.  pl

 

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/03/20/world/meast/iraq-violence/index.html

Martin Dempsey on Everything

CJCS had a chat this AM with Fareed Zakariya.  How did this guy get to be Chairman?  It must be Panetta.  He must have experienced a "Road to Damascus" moment like that in which FDR decided that George Marshall would be Army Chief of Staff.  I had hardly heard of Dempsey over the years.  The view and sound of him was obscured by the dust and noise thrown up by the self promotion campaigns of people like McChrystal, Petraeus, Rodriquez and Odierno.

Wow!  He can walk and speak English properly at the same time.  He speaks in whole sentences instead of the chopped up lingo that a lot of generals use as a defence against possible future blame.  He sees the world with a remarkable depth of knowledge as a base.  He is not afraid of the Israeli/AIPAC menace.  He is properly deferential to elected government.  He isn't looking for a fight with anyone.

My!  My! Hallelujah!  Zakariya looked relieved to have an adult as interlocutor.  Thank you.  Thank you, whoever you were who chose him.  pl

http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/17/watch-gps-martin-dempsey-on-syria-iran-and-china/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Dempsey

 

Iraqi VP sees chaos ahead, or...

 "... he said he did not understand how U.S. President Barack Obama is able to characterize Iraq as a free, stable and democratic country.

"What sort of Iraq we are talking about?" he asked. "How the Americans will feel proud? How the American administration is going to justify to the taxpayer the billion of dollars that has been spent and at the end of the day the American saying, 'Sorry, we have no leverage even to put things in order in Iraq'?"

Though Iraq's instability may not affect this year's election campaign in the United States, "it is going to affect the American interest in the region, and they should be very much concern about that," al-Hashimi said. "The future of Iraq is grim."" CNN

-------------------------------

The neocons seek to spin this mess that they created into victory in Egypt, etc.  Spin away.  Spin away!  pl

http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/30/world/meast/iraq-al-hashimi/index.html?eref=igoogledmn_topstories

More "Good News" from the ME

"Iraq “cracked down harshly” on freedom of expression and assembly in 2011 by intimidating, beating and detaining activists and journalists, Human Rights Watch said Sunday in its World Report 2012.

“Iraq is quickly slipping back into authoritarianism as its security forces abuse protesters, harass journalists and torture detainees,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Despite U.S. government assurances that it helped create a stable democracy, the reality is that it left behind a budding police state.”"  washpost

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/new-human-rights-report-details-crackdowns-in-iraq/2012/01/22/gIQAfjD6HQ_story.html

---------------------------------------------

"The political wing of Egypt’s most historic Islamist party won by far the largest number of seats in the first post-revolutionary parliament, final results confirmed Saturday, and is now poised to play a dominant role in the drafting of a new constitution.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party took 47 percent of seats in the lower house of parliament, and the ultraconservative Salafist Nour Party won 25 percent of the elected seats."  Leila Fadel

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/final-results-confirms-islamists-winners-in-egypts-elections/2012/01/21/gIQAXpwbGQ_story.html?sub=AR

--------------------------------------------

 "Followers of a puritanical form of Islam will fill about a quarter of the seats in the lower house of the new Egyptian parliament on Monday, underscoring the political power being wielded by Islamists in the wake of the Arab spring.

Finding themselves badly outnumbered, some Egyptian liberals are weighing whether to align themselves with the moderate Muslim Brotherhood in hopes of preventing an all-Islamist alliance between the Brotherhood, whose Freedom and Justice Party will be the largest in the new parliament, and the ultraconservative Salafist Nour party, the second-largest."  Leila Fadel

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/salafists-to-take-a-quarter-of-egypts-lower-house/2012/01/20/gIQAcgZKGQ_story.html

 

The Iraq Lie That Needs to Die (Kill it, Kill it Quick, Before Someone Names It...)

*

Adam L. Silverman, PhD**

Even before we left Iraq earlier this month, informed observers had begun to notice the beginnings of a new lie about Iraq: that the Obama Administration, and specifically President Obama, had pulled US troops out, leaving the job undone, and therefore jeopardizing everything we had fought so hard to achieve there.  I have seen this in the press and I have heard otherwise well informed military personnel parrot it (often, for them and for obvious reasons, with a great amount of personal pain coming through).  Now I am not suprised that Ms. Rubin or Ms. Pletka have gotten this wrong, not to mention many other commenters, pundits, and even reporters.  In their cases it is appropriate to quote Upton Sinclair: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it."  Unfortunately their either misinformed or willingly misinforming understanding of what actually happened to lead the US to complete a timely withdrawl from Iraq ending Operation Iraqi Freedom/Operation New Dawn after seven years is being picked up by people who need to have a correct understanding of the situation as they attempt to reach proper understandings of various problem sets and potential problem sets that the US faces in the Middle East, Central Asia, and other parts of the world.

As I have written here at SST, as well as at Foreign Policy's Best Defense (Tom Ricks' site and, like all his guest "correspondents" have NO control over the titles to their posts...), we were leaving, and have now left, Iraq because the Iraqis told us to.  They were able to do this because we transferred sovereignty back to them at the end of 2008 when our UN authorization to occupy Iraq expired and we agreed to a security agreement with the Iraqis that would allow US personnel to remain in place, with continued and increased transfer of control back to the Government of Iraq, with a complete withdrawl to occur no later than 31 December 2011.  The reasons for this are simple to follow:

 

"What Iraq Tells Us About Ourselves" W. Patrick Lang

 

 
 

Remember this guy?  You will see him quoted (more or less) in the article which I published today in "Foreign Policy."  pat lang

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"In the four years since the United States invaded Iraq, it’s become clear that our campaign there has gone terribly awry. We invaded Iraq with too few troops; we destroyed the Iraqi civil administration and military without having a suitable instrument of government ready in the wings; we expelled from public employment anyone with a connection, no matter how tenuous, to the Baath Party—which included most people who could be described as human infrastructure for Iraq. The list of errors goes on and on. Even the vice president acknowledges that “mistakes were made” (although, presumably, not by him)."  W. Patrick Lang

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3734

"Half Devil and Half Child" ?

"Odierno’s theme with Maliki was that the United States and Iraq have come a long way — and spilled a lot of blood — and that cooperation between the two countries must continue. He warned that Iraq was in danger of becoming a country like Lebanon, where powerful neighbors wage proxy wars and exacerbate sectarian tensions. Unless Maliki pulled the country together, Iraq would be exploited by regional powers Iran, Turkey and Saudi Arabia."  Ignatius

--------------------------------

"Take up the White Man's burden--
Send forth the best ye breed--
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild--
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child."  Rudyard Kipling

--------------------------------

Yes.  Yes.  I understand that this can be read several ways.  pl

--------------------------------

Kipling is much disdained by the overly-clever and the politically correct.   Surely the world is not as he described it.  Surely?

Raymond Odierno does not know that Iraq was always inherently a country like Lebanon?

Odierno now sits in George Marshall's chair.   Is this further evidence of entropy in the universe?  It took this man years to comprehend that the insurgency in Iraq could not be defeated by night raids against Iraqi homes.  It was not such as he who befriended the "Sons of Iraq."  He merely climbed on that bandwagon when he saw that it was rolling towards success. 

They sent him to "jawbone" Maliki into "better" behavior?  Wow!  Maliki must have laughed his a-s off at that.  After all, Odierno is the man Maliki succeffully BSed for years. 

Is it not clear by now that Maliki has won in the game of Iraq?  He bided his time and built the structures of coercion needed to stage a coup against the Sunni leaders as soon as the Americans left.  Some 24/7 idiot bleated on the tube today that the Iraqis cannot stray very far from the US because they need to buy military equipment from us.  Wrong!  Have these people never heard of China, Russia, etc.?  In the Iran-Iraq War the Iraqi armed forces were largely (90%)  supplied and armed  by the Warsaw Pact countries and China.  France provided about a hundred fighter bombers that were used in maritime attacks in the Gulf.  The US "contribution" to their equipment was negligeable.  Don't bother to argue with me about this.  I was there.  Do we imagine that the memory of alternate sources of military supply has disappeared from Iraq?

The ineptitude of the US government in dealing with phenomena like Iraq continues to stupify observers. 

The attutdes described in Kipling's poem quoted above remain firmly in place in the general public and the wizards of Washington.

1-  We firmly believe that the poor benighted brown people of the world are simple folk and that inside each is an American/European waiting to be liberated so that he/she can abandon their own ways in favor of ours.  That's the "child" part.  A corollary of that notion is the belief that if "Uncle Ray" or the equivalent shows up to chide against naughtiness, all will be well.   Nuri al-Maliki is so much cleverer than Ray Odierno that the very idea amuses.

2- We are incapable of appreciating alien people on their own terms.  We are sure that their ways are the wrong ways .  We blather endlessly that "they must do it their way."  We don't believe that for a second.  What we believe is that they have to do and think our way and if they don't then they are evil and "crazy."  Mailiki is doing it his way.  We created the pre-conditions for "his way" in the destruction of the previous social order in Iraq.  Do we really imagine that Maliki and the Shia Arabs do not "know" and feel in their bones that they will return to an inferior status if the Sunni Arabs regain power?  How naive we are.

We lost our hat, a-s and overcoat in Iraq.  We gained nothing and the source of our defeat lies deep in the collective soul of the dominant culture in the United States.  pl 

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/from-iraqs-guardian-to-its-counselor/2011/12/23/gIQAtiIkHP_story.html?hpid=z5

Iraqi Demographics

Adam L. Silverman, PhD*

In the comments thread of COL Lang's recent post on Maliki's most recent activities vis a vis the US, WP asked about Iraqi demographics.  I was involved in several attempts during OIF 2008 to develop census protocals, specifically for Mada'in Qada, which, along with part of Wassit Province, was my BCT's OE (OE Striker).  What I developed borrowed from the last census Saddam's government had carried out (for familiarity) and from the UN's Food Security Survey of Iraq (they had THE BEST demographic questions).  We were never able to execute on the tasker, however, because of orders from higher (Division and Theater Command) that always took precedence.  One of the reasons my BCT's leadership was interesting in conducting a census was in support of the local qada (an agricultural district in Baghdad Province, but outside of municipal/greater Baghdad) government as under the CPA Mada'in had been put into Diyala Province (which is geographically where it belongs as part of the Diyala Watershed, but it has historically, in the modern period, been politically part of Baghdad Province).  As a result of having its political connections mucked about with, it was important to get an accurate accounting of population size so that the new qada leadership could back up their requests for funding.  Attached is the pdf of the UN's most recent Food Security Survey for Iraq and when I get the chance over the next day or so, I'll try to dig out where I've got the best estimations of the sectarian breakdown.

Download Wfp192521

UPDATE:

I came across this, which is consistent with most of the stuff I have seen over the past several years in estimating the sectarian breakdown in Iraq.  As COL Lang noted, they have not done an official count by sect in a long time (1957) even though the last official census was in 1987.  Basically none of the groups wants to change the official numbers by getting actual up to date official numbers.  

* Adam L. Silverman is the Culture and Foreign Language Advisor at the US Army War College (USAWC).  The views expressed here are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of USAWC and/or the US Army.

"Iraq's Maliki rebuffs Biden, signals move to Shiite rule" Miami Herald

"Rebuffing a plea by the Obama administration, Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki signaled Wednesday that he's ready to gradually drop his key partner party, the largely Sunni Iraqiya bloc, and move toward a government run by the country's Shiite majority at the expense of minority Sunnis and Kurds. At a news conference where he repeatedly emphasized his own powers under the Iraqi constitution and berated his coalition partners, Maliki seemed unconcerned if some Iraqiya members quit the broad coalition, and he spoke at length about the options available to him if they did. Maliki all but ignored Vice President Joe Biden's expression of U.S. support for an "inclusive partnership government," referring to the broad coalition between Maliki's State of Law bloc and Iraqiya, headed by veteran politician Ayad Allawi. "  Miami Herald

------------------------------------------

Wow!  Not even I thought Maliki would move this quickly.  IMO he aims to destroy his political opposition before effective reaction to this "putsch" takes shape.  The idea being to  create a police state before there can be real opposition.  This will either work or lead to civil war.  pl

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/12/21/2556723/iraqs-maliki-rebuffs-biden-signals.html

What's Next for Iraq? - National Security Experts 21 Dec. 2011

What's Next for Iraq? - National Security Experts.

pl

National Security Experts, 20 December, 2011

What's Next for Iraq? - National Security Experts.

National Security Experts - 19 December 2011

What's Next for Iraq? - National Security Experts.

pl

"Iraq political crisis erupts as last U.S. troops leave" Washpost

"Iraq’s political process was unraveling faster than had been anticipated Saturday, with Sunni politicians walking out of the nation’s parliament and threatening to resign from the government even before the last U.S. troops had left the country.

The crisis was triggered by reports that security forces loyal to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, are planning to arrest the country’s Sunni vice president, Tariq al-Hashimi, and charge him with terrorism.

Those reports have fueled fears among Sunni politicians that Maliki intends to further consolidate his grip on power by moving against his rivals now that U.S. troops have gone. In recent days, the homes of top Sunni politicians in the fortified Green Zone have been ringed by tanks and armored personnel carriers, and rumors are flying that arrest warrants will be issued for other Sunni leaders.

The mostly Sunni Iraqiya bloc said it had withdrawn from parliament to protest what it called Maliki’s increasingly dictatorial behavior. Sunni ministers in the coalition government will resign unless he gives them a greater say in running the government and, in particular, overseeing the country’s Shiite-dominated security forces, the bloc warned."  Washpost

-------------------------------------

Here we go...    GZC questions the notion that Maliki is an enemy of the US.  I don't.  He is an enemy of the United States.  He is merely a clever enemy who  told the gullible what they wanted to hear.  Arab politicians are good at that, even better than American politicians.

He has us out of the way now and will act against those who are potential threats to consolidation of his and Shia Arab rule in Iraq.  Does this make him a stooge of Iran?  No, he was always an ally of Iran and one of several men competing for the Mullahs' favor.

I think that there is better than a 50% chance that Iraq will descend into greater and greater levels of inter-ethno-religous violence in the coming months.  While that occurs the MSM will strain its "guts" to the maximum in trying to avoid calling this "civil war."  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/iraq-political-crisis-erupts-as-last-us-troops-leave/2011/12/17/gIQA3aor0O_story.html?hpid=z3

Chanukah in Baghdad

Adam L. Silverman, PhD*

COL Lang asked me to find a suitable Chanuka story to post here at SST to complement the Christmas stories that he and his sister post for us for the holidays.  When I came across the one below, I was pretty sure I find the right one for the SST community.  It originally appeared in the Miami Herald (but no link as I couldn't find it online) and is about a US Army JAG, the descendant of Iraqi Jews, celebrating Chanukah in the Palace in Baghdad in December 2003.  That unlikely turn of events is enough to invoke the Chanukah invocation nais gadol - a great miracle.  And that is what is at the heart of Chanuka, a minor, non-biblical holiday built around a small scale violent insurrection to retake the Jewish Temple and resanctify it: a great miracle, because the events the holiday commemorates should not have been able to happen.  So a Happy Chanukah, a Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and a Happy and Healthy New Year to all of the SST community.  And to MAJ Carr, whose piece I found at Aish.com, where they reprinted it (and hopefully he won't mind that we're putting it up here for the SST community as it really should be seen outside of just Jewish American website readers), a Happy Chanukah to you and your family as well.

Elan S. Carr's Chanukah in Baghdad

(image of then 1LT Carr lighting a Chanikiyah (Chanukah Menorah) in the Palace)

An American Jewish soldier of Iraqi descent lights the Menorah in Saddam Hussein's palace.

Banu hoshekh legharesh -- "We have come to banish darkness." Thus begins a famous Chanukah song, and no phrase better encapsulates the holiday's deeper meanings. This year, as a United States soldier serving in Iraq, I and several of my colleagues lit a Chanukah lamp and uttered those words in a place that had never before heard them: the former presidential palace of Saddam Hussein, in the capital city of a new and free Iraq.

One is hard-pressed to imagine a holiday whose themes are more resonant with the events unfolding here: A spectacular military victory, the defeat of a despot, the re-sanctification of what had been desecrated. Truly, the banishment of darkness.

Chanukah commemorates the rededication of Jerusalem's Temple in 165 BCE. Israel was then ruled by Syria's Hellenist king, Antiochus IV, a brutal megalomaniac who gave himself the title Epiphanes -- "god manifested." In a campaign of merciless persecution, he murdered members of the priesthood, outlawed Jewish rituals, and desecrated the Holy Temple.

The priestly Maccabee family led a daring revolt and defeated the Hellenist armies. After recapturing the Temple, Jewish partisans rededicated the place by kindling its sacred Menorah. To this day, Jews celebrate the relighting of that ancient Menorah, to remember the victorious freedom fighters whose courage stemmed from an abiding faith that God will cause good to triumph over evil, and light to banish even the darkest of hours.

For too many years, the people of Iraq have suffered horrors that defy imagination. Like Antiochus, Saddam thought himself to be like a god, or at least like those demigods of Mesopotamian history, Nebuchadnezzar and Hammurabi, with whom his boundless vanity inclined him regularly to equate himself. "Epiphanes" indeed -- Saddam dispensed licentious pleasure and horrible pain, life and death, with the nonchalance of one who thought himself above humanity itself.

A Confession from Brooks

"But we have this -- we're left with this thing. We basically had centuries of stasis and stability and stagnation in the Middle East, which produced terrorism, but also produced the crushing of human capital for century after century -- 9/11 happens, the Taliban is thrown out, Saddam is deposed, people are voting with purple fingers.

And now we have a moment of turmoil. We don't know this turmoil -- it could be worse, it could be better. But it's a moment of turmoil. I think the Iraq war and the deposition of Saddam Hussein was part of the things that encouraged, instigated the turmoil. It's very messy, very complicated.

But, in 100 years or in 50 years, we will look back and see where the turmoil went and maybe we will have a better sense of how the Iraqi elections, getting rid of Saddam, getting rid of the Taliban helped lead to maybe getting rid of Mubarak, Gadhafi and all the rest."  Brooks

---------------------------------------------

"I mean, let's be very blunt about it. Al-Qaida was responsible for 9/11. Iraq had nothing to do with it. Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction and no ability or capacity to deliver those weapons that were nonexistent.

JIM LEHRER: And you don't dispute that, David?

DAVID BROOKS: No. Well, we obviously thought what we thought back then.

But I always thought that the need to disrupt the Middle East was one of the reasons why it was necessary.

MARK SHIELDS: Unstated.

JIM LEHRER: Unstated.

And goodbye.

(LAUGHTER)"

-----------------------------------------------------

Laughter?  Really?  I have respected Shields and Lehrer, but that's it for me.  Only a cretin would find this funny even ironically.  Brooks is the kinder, gentler neocon on the national scene, but he is still a neocon.  His comment about the "need" above has always lain at the heart of the neocon desire to invade Iraq and reduce it to the "year zero." It never had anything to do with oil and it still has nothing to do with oil.

I hope this guy from the 3rd ID thinks this is funny.

The sadly amusing thing about the neocon present happiness at revolution across the region is that none of it has benefited Israel.  pl 

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/politics/july-dec11/shieldsbrooks_12-16.html

Iraq Analysis by Gareth Porter

"The real story behind the U.S. withdrawal is how a clever strategy of deception and diplomacy adopted by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in cooperation with Iran outmanoeuvered Bush and the U.S. military leadership and got the United States to sign the U.S.-Iraq withdrawal agreement."  Porter

---------------------------------

I agree with all of this except the role that Porter ascribes to the "US Military Leadership."  The mistake there is a common one.  In fact, the US military seeks to implement the elected government's policy.  It does not originate  policy initiatives that amount to national grand strategy.  pl

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=106244

 

 

 

 

Now Iraq awaits the Mahdi

"Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki has overseen a consolidation of military force, but the core of his government is remarkably unrepresentative: it is made up of mostly pro-Iranian Shiite Islamists. The secular Iraqiya Party, which won a plurality of votes in the March 2010 parliamentary elections, has been marginalized within the cabinet and was not represented when Mr. Maliki visited Washington on Monday.

This Shiite Islamist government bodes ill for the country’s future. And unfortunately, it is a direct product of America’s misguided thinking about Iraq since the 2003 invasion — an approach that stressed proportional sectarian representation rather than national unity and moderate Islamism."  NY Times

------------------------------------------

This Norwegian scholar has it right.  Before 2003 Iraq was basically a federation of Arabs and Kurds.  After the neocons got through with the country it was defined by Shia/Sunni/Kurdish categories.

It is significant that neither Maliki nor Talabani chose to attend the US headquarters closing although they were invited and reserved chairs were waiting for them.  pl

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/16/opinion/an-unstable-divided-land.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&src=rechp&adxnnlx=1324040403-Q1ASL+Ia4qhi3WqPLlX20A

"Duty Faithfully Performed"

“In many ways I think we can all take some satisfaction — regardless of whether you are for or against how we got into Iraq, the fact is we can take some satisfaction in the fact that we are now heading them in the right direction,” Panetta told an audience of U.S. diplomats Wednesday at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.

In the end, Panetta described the purpose of the war as an attempt to turn Iraq into a stable, self-governing democracy after decades of dictatorship under Saddam Hussein. During his trip to Afghanistan, he did not name Hussein directly and made no mention of the failed search for weapons of mass destruction, which the Bush administration had cited as justification for the 2003 invasion."  Washpost

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"I need not tell the brave survivors of so many hard-fought battles, who have remained steadfast to the last, that I have consented to the result from no distrust of them. But, feeling that valor and devotion could accomplish nothing that could compensate for the loss that must have attended the continuance of the contest, I determined to avoid the useless sacrifice of those whose past services have endeared them to their countrymen." 

"You will take with you the satisfaction that proceeds from the consciousness of duty faithfully performed; and I earnestly pray that a merciful God will extend to you his blessing and protection."   Lee

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It seems apt.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/iraq-war-draws-to-quiet-close/2011/12/14/gIQAPEjLvO_story_1.html

A Maliki Joke?

"Fundamental disputes still surround the political composition of the Iraqi state."  Maliki

Really?  You mean the part in which you have not lived up to the internal political agreement that led to your present adinistration?  pl

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"Hundreds of suspected Baathists recently were arrested; some of those detained have been released while others are awaiting trial. Those still in custody will receive due process and equitable treatment under Iraqi law. These detainees come from all over Iraq, and I refute characterizations that the detentions were a sectarian action based on political motives. These steps were taken to protect Iraq’s democracy.  Mailiki

Sure. It is just a coincidence that nearly all of these politically suppressed Iraqis are Sunni Arabs. pl

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 Iraq will not allow itself to become a source of disruption to friendly countries.  Maliki

Right.  In other words, once the Americans give up control of our air space we will not in any way participate in "aggression" against Iran.  pl

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"Iraq seeks to build a strong army and security forces that have the capacity to protect our sovereignty and interests." Maliki

Got it.  Translation - We'll be back.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/building-a-stable-iraq/2011/12/04/gIQAhoxrTO_story.html?sub=AR

The "300" in Iraq

"'There will be a U.S. military presence. The Office of Security Cooperation (OSC), operating under the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, will have several hundred military personnel, and at least an equal number or more U.S. contractors, who will work with Iraqi security forces. Ongoing negotiations with Iraq about OSC activities will determine exact staffing numbers."  Pincus

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The "300." that is what they are calling the several hundred active duty military people who will be left in Iraq.  There will be the dozen or so in the Defense Attache Office of the embassy, the US Marine security guard for the embassy, just a handfull of marines.  The largest number wil be in the security assistance office (whatever they call it).  This office will be subordinate to the theater (COCOM) commnder at USCENTCOM.  They will train Iraqis and will be altogether dependent on the Iraqis for their security.  "Stranger passing by..."  The civilians in the mission will be in the same position.

This is remarkably like the situation we left behind in VN in the spring of 1973.  The terms of the armistice in VN in '72 allowed the US to keep similar numbers in country attached to the embassy.  If memory serves there were about 2,000.  They continued training and advising the South Vietnamese forces.  The North Vietnamese Army sat out in the woods hear the Cambodian and Laotian borders.  This situation persisted for about two years until the US Congress forbade any further aid for the South Vietnamese, ever.  The North Vietnamese then attacked and captured all the major towns within a few weeks.

The Pacific Ocean was nearby in 1975.  A Non-Combatant Evacuation operation was possible.  As I have said before it is a long way to the sea from central Iraq.

Good luck to them all.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/usmilitary-presence-will-continue-in-iraq/2011/11/18/gIQAJAWBjN_story.html

Cordesman on Iraq and Afghanistan

"Yet Iraq is already a grand strategic failure. The US went to war for the wrong reasons, let Iraq slide into a half decade of civil war, and failed to build an effective democracy and base for Iraq’s economic development. Its tactical victories – if they last – did little more than put an end to a conflict it help create, and the US failed to establish anything like the strategic partnership it sought.

The US invasion did bring down a remarkably unpleasant dictatorship, but at cost of some eight years of turmoil and conflict, some 5,000 US and allied lives and 35,000 wounded, and over 100,000 Iraqi lives. The Congressional Research Service estimates that the dollar cost of the war to the US alone is over $823 billion through FY2012, and SIGIR estimates that the US and its allies will have spent some $75 billion on aid – much of it with little lasting benefit to Iraq.

The outcome in Afghanistan and Pakistan now seems unlikely to be any better. While any such judgments are subjective, the odds of meaningful strategic success have dropped from roughly even in 2009 to 4:1 to 6:1 against at the end of 2011. It is all very well for senior US officials to discuss ―fight, talk, and build,‖ and for creating a successful transition before the US and ISAF allies withdraw virtually all of their combat troops and make massive cuts in the flow of outside money to Afghanistan. The US, however, has yet to present a credible and detailed plan for transition that shows the US and its allies can achieve some form of stable, strategic outcome in Afghanistan that even approaches the outcome of the Iraq War." 

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There is war and then there is dumb war.  These have been dumb wars, poorly conceived and poorly executed.  pl

https://csis.org/files/publication/111115_Afghanistan_at_End_2011.pdf 

 

Some Overdue Thoughts on Iraq

Adam L. Silverman, PhD*

Several weeks ago, in regards to some correspondence between COL Lang and myself, he asked me to make sure I wrote some of it up for SST.  The some of it pertains to Iraq, specifically to the final, official announcement that yes, the US military will be leaving Iraq on the last day of 2011 and that is now final and non-negotiable.  I asked for a couple of weeks to address this so that the post would not become an essay length screed.  Not that some folks do not deserve to be called out for the damage they have done by committing strategic malpractice, strategic malpractice that cost a lot of good Americans, Brits, Georgians (we had a Georgian Battalion assigned to our BCT), and, of course, Iraqis their lives.  And it is in this vein, strategic malpractice, that I want to really address the soon to be reached end of the US military presense in Iraq; especially as many of the mistakes in forethought, understanding, and planning, not to mention the people responsible for them or who enabled those responsible, threaten to set us up for a rerun regarding Iran.

In April, Tom Ricks (full disclosure: I guest blog for Tom several times a year) ran a piece at his Foreign Policy site about the need to begin negotiations for keeping some US troops in Iraq after the date for withdrawl agreed to in the Security Agreement negotiated by the Bush (43) Administration in 2008.  In his post, Tom quotes Ambassador Crocker discussing how the US might negotiate some extension beyond/despite the 2008 agreement.  Several days later Tom posted my response to his post on the topic.  In it I made it clear that while we might be able to keep a small group of security force advisors in Iraq, based on an agreement that was separate from the security agreement, there was no chance for any meaningful, large scale extension.  The reasons for this are the reasons that hit us in the face over the past several months as the Obama Administration could not move the Iraqis off of the idea that US military personnel, should an extension be granted, would not receive immunity from prosecution: they do NOT want us there as they have been waiting to settle things between themselves once we leave or further consolidate power or not lose power.  

Neocon angst over Iraq

Krauthammer today bemoans BO's "failure" to pressure  Maliki into granting American troops permanent legal extraterritoriality in Iraq.  He clearly believes that Iraq was willing and eager to be a satrapy of a growing American/Israeli imperium.  That imperium has always been the desired end state envisioned in neocon efforts over the last decade.  All their protestations concerning modernity, democracy, etc. are just chaff.  These lies are and have been distractions, dust thrown in the eyes of the gullible.

The Iraqi Shia Arabs have now asserted the ownership of the country that the US neocons bestowed on them.  Proof of that ownership has been delivered in the form of effective expulsion of US forces.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/who-lost-iraq/2011/11/03/gIQAUcUqjM_story.html

The Washington Post and its "allies"

Today's Washington Post's lead editorial mourns the passing of the US/Iraqi "Strategic Alliance."  What rot!  There is no such alliance.  There never was such an alliance.  All else is neocon delusion.   The elected Iraqi gocvernment asked us to leave.  We are leaving.  The war was a stupid mistake, stupidly fought until internal  Iraqi forces were harnessed to bring the present Shia dominated Iranian inclined government to power.  Brave men and women fought, died and some will live with their mutilations forever.  The Washington Post is a miserable rag that serves egregious and foreign interests. 

Ironically, the Post did a poll on this today.  At 1000 90% of the respondents were in favor of total withdrawal by 1 January, 2012.  pl