Everyone else is writing about the article in the New York Times by O’Hanlon and Pollack so I might as well throw my two cents in as well.
O’Hanlon you might recall is the Brookings Fellow who advocates a “soft partition” of Iraq into Sunni, Shia, and Kurdish areas. In this scenario, our boys would be like traffic cops, herding the hundreds of thousands of refugees kicked out of their ancestoral homes and foced by this “soft partition” to move to their designated sectarian area.
Pollack is an equally blooded academic who has been a supporter of our efforts in Iraq since the beginning.
They make news today because they believe “sustainable stability” in Iraq is a possibility:
Here is the most important thing Americans need to understand: We are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms. As two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq, we were surprised by the gains we saw and the potential to produce not necessarily “victory†but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with.
Now there’s a battle cry for you: “Forward to ‘Sustainable Stability!” I actually liked the Baker-Hamilton rouser “We must find some way to Mitigate Defeat!” Has more of a ring to it, don’t you think?
If we are not going to ask men to die for victory, time to change the broken record being played by Bush and others and let the Iraqis die for it. It’s their country. Let it be their victory.
Let me re-iterate what I have said a million times here; the surge is going well. We are making excellent progress. Our men are performing brilliantly in all facets of this multi-pronged strategy – military, diplomatic, reconstruction, and political. The Iraqi army is lagging somewhat but signs of progress are there as well.
But the National Police remain a cesspool of corruption and sectarianism. Shia and Sunni death squads are still chalking up a significant body count in Baghdad – at least 20 deaths are attributed to one or the other every day. The low intensity Shia on Shia civil war in the south continues. The borders with Iran and Syria still resemble swiss cheese, thus supplying al-Qaeda with fresh cannon fodder for our boys and the Sunni insurgents with arms.
Up north, the Kurdish terrorists of the PPK are driving Ankara nuts with the danger of an invasion by the Turks growing not receding. Also in the north, the disease of suicide bombings has broken out in places like Mosul where previously, there was peace. Kirkuk could very well be the next flashpoint as that vital oil center is seeing an increase in militia attacks, sectarian murders, and the inevitable revenge killings.
(Note: I ain’t making this stuff up.)
This is the tip of the iceberg of course. So much more is going on beneath the surface in Iraq. The shattered national polity will not grow back on its own. And few are making an effort to heal the breaches in Iraqi society.
Among those who count – Prime Minister Maliki’s cabinet and the legislature – there is even less movement and desire to affect a reconcilation with the rest of the country.
We can kill al-Qaeda till the cows come home. We can arm the Sunnis to fight the terrorists (hoping to God those guns aren’t turned on us in the future) as well as defend themselves from Shia depradations. We can keep a lid on most of the death squads and militias. But the hard slogging work of actually building a country out of the mess we and the Iraqis themselves have made there is not our job. It can’t be. And until the Iraqis decide to stop killing each other and begin talking, all of our wonderful and courageous efforts in the field will be for naught.
If the best we can hope for at this point is “sustainable stability” – and I doubt that this is really possible on a nationwide scale – then it’s time to change the plan to reflect that reality. There is no military victory to be had. If Bush and the rest of you believe that, I might ask victory against who? Against what? To what end?
I wish it weren’t so. But if we are to save Iraq when the political consensus collapses in September, it’s time for Bush to get busy and deal with the Democrats – at least the ones still willing to listen. Otherwise, it will become a disaster.
1:43 pm
Amen. No doubt the US Armed Forces can clear and hold territory, but if the Iraqi Government isn’t concerned with getting competent enough to handle it, we’re stuck with territory we don’t want. The military (and hypothetically) the surge can make a good environment, but if the government don’t grow, you’ve just got a pile of compost.
1:46 pm
It’s good to hear that everything’s going well. I had no idea. Everything else I read says the exact opposite. I hope to see our progress reflected at the pumps soon.
2:49 pm
Rick,
Respect you to death but this can be won and by won I mean a self sustained Iraq that isn’t an enemy or sponsor of terrorism as the previous regime.
We are on the way there and it’s not been easy or pretty and won’t be for a long time. Vigilance.
3:34 pm
Your new approach to the Iraq War is perplexing to me Rick. And this comes from someone who greatly admires you, and your Blog.
It almost appears to me sometimes, as if most Bloggers decide to pick a position, and then defend it to the exclusion of all commonsense, evidence, etc.
There’s no “big picture” now, no evidence will hinder your position you staked out a couple weeks ago on the war!
Interesting, to say the least!
It’s taking an exceeding complex issue, and reducing it to a basic, pre-determined conclusion, and damn the facts, history, context, etc.
Interesting…
4:04 pm
O’Hanlon is the principle author of the Brookings Iraq Index report (see page 13), the last of which was issued on July 26th.
When he claims that “fatality rates are down roughly a third since the surge began” Does he:
A: Assume no one reads his own Iraq Index reports?
B: Assume no one really understands what “a third” means?
C: Doesn’t give a rats arse and is just blowing smoke up ours?
Are any of these answers good news?
4:08 pm
Dale:
Are you saying that my position has changed? Or that new information doesn’t alter my perceptions?
5:27 pm
@Mark:
Can it be won? Sure, and the path to accomplish it is pretty clear. WILL it be won? The only way to pull anything close to a successful outcome requires the Iraqi Goverment to play their part on this dance, and they just aren’t.
Should they? Obviously. Are they? Sadly, no. Will they? They haven’t yet, and its been years. I’d love for them to get their collective head out of their backside and get focused, but I can’t see any facts to suggest that’s going to happen. We will keep shooting at insurgents, terrorists, innocents, extremists, call them whatever you want—this won’t end by us fighting, but by them stopping the fight with us. The military can’t make Iraq a country, or make the government there care.
I sincerely hope you are right.
9:39 pm
[...] Rick Moran / Right Wing Nut House [...]
10:51 pm
Some left-wing bloggers have pointed out that the right-wing is only receptive to articles and viewpoints of the Left when those perspectives are in line with those of the right. Case in point, david at the snafu principle:
“In seriousness… You see, I’m more than just a little suspicious of the right wing pundits who disregard and assail everything that is “liberal” in their view, and then, all of a sudden with “one voice” seems to have found some “liberal” views (ones that seem an awful lot like conservative views!) that they like from that liberal bastion of the media, the NYTimes.”
What is it that irks the left so badly when someone who they thought was ‘on their side’ begins to admit that perhaps it is actually logically possible for Patraeus and the US Army to be able to do good in Iraq, and that success is possibly viable in the future? The leftists view such behaviour as betrayal of their cause, which by now should be familiar to most of us: the utter defeat and humiliation of the Bush administration and the defanging of the military.
That they accord more importance in establishing ideological rigidity and uniformity of views on the left than admitting that perhaps for once, they should actually be looking out for the best interests of the nation instead of haranguing any ‘defector’ as a traitor of their cause – that is alone proof of their ignorance and demagoguery.
Another defeatist wrote: “The Surge was supposed to enable the Iraqi government to function better. It hasn’t. Thus, it is an utter failure.”
The surge had less than wildly ambitious objectives, one of which has been to provide Gen. Patraeus with the manpower necessary to facilitate cooperation with the Sunni tribes, training with the Iraqi Army side-by-side, equipping their commanders with skills to lead their men, live with the Iraqi people and cultivate rapport , relations and contacts – all of which contribute to providing the right conditions for the Iraqi Army to function properly and establish security, which will in turn guarantee the right political climate for the government to work in.
It is typical of defeatists to simply assume what those objectives were, point out one or two little inconsistences (in this case, political gridlock and intransigence of Iraqi politicians) and then deem the strategy an utter failure. The war in Iraq has been complex and arduous – that we do not deny, and we can only expect the same from the years to come. If there’s anything the campaign has taught us, it is patience.
But of course, defeatists can’t wait to write any chance of success off.
7:02 am
I like it, Rick, that you resist the temptation to wishful think and deal with facts, no matter how much you wish things were otherwise. Your assessments are grounded in reality, not faint hope. This brand of straight-shooting realism keeps me tuned in as a regular reader. To me, it’s the essence of conservatism-realistically assessing people and events rather than hoping for things unseen.
3:59 pm
Dont know why it got crossed out.
The TRUE defeatists aka. the people ACTUALLY responsible for any defeat we may suffer – are those, like yourself and the President, who said they supported this war but never really took it seriously and – who said they wanted to win but objected to doing the things we needed to do to achieve victory and supported a a halfass approach that tried to fight this war on the cheap.
8:52 pm
When people are referring to anybody that thinks Iraq is a mess…as “defeatists” they are not living in reality. Even Petraeus admits he can’t solve Iraq’s problems with MILITARY ALONE! If Maliki refuses to share power with the Sunnis, there will never be peace in Iraq.Anybody want to place some bets on Maliki changing his mind? Even if the insurgency and civil war ended today, Iraq’s infrastructure would need BILLIONS just to get basic services going. Yesterday I heard on the news that corruption is RAMPANT IN IRAQ, especially in Basra, their deepwater port in the South where most of their oil is shipped out.So now the Iraqi Government is on vacation, while our troops are fighting for them in 120 degree weather. Think the Sunni dominated countries in the region (Sauds,Jordanians,Egyptians) are going to watch the Shia dominated government of Iraq put the squeeze on their Sunni brothers? Maybe no direct involvement, but plenty of weapons and cash will be flowing into Al Anbar Province. Think the Shia Arabs will sit back and let the Kurds annex oil-rich Kirkuk without a fight? Oh, I guess I’m one of those “defeatists” but I do live in the reality-based community.
2:21 pm
Sunni block just walked out of the Iraqi government. Suppose that means we need a few more months. Just a few. A couple. Three, five mabye. Six tops. I totally swear we’re almost gonna win this.
Ain’t no “surge” gonna make a legit, functioning government there.
2:25 pm
@r4d20:
Amen. If we had rolled in with the 300,000-400,000 force, put a soldier on every damn streetcorner, and let the Iraqis make their own government, we’d have been out of there by ‘05-06. AND it would have been a success.
2:18 pm
lose home in florida with credit card debt…
strenuous rehearsed anesthetize …