US action in Iraq
AEIdeas
President Barack Obama took to the airwaves to make his second announcement about Iraq within a week, announcing US efforts to secure our embassy, collaborate with Iraqi security forces on ISR, and send up to 300 military advisors to Iraq to assist with training and intelligence. (Gen. Jack Keane and I called for this, and more, in a piece in the WSJ earlier this week.) Last week, the president made vague allusions to action necessary to stabilize Iraq following major incursions by ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. Since then, ISIS has continued its march, executing hundreds of Iraqis, robbing banks, stealing weapons and otherwise demonstrating the nature of the group. Iraqi forces have stepped up in limited fashion and begun to push back, but the task is likely beyond the fractured Iraqi Armed Forces alone.
But another narrative has emerged: call it the “do nothing” storyline. In this version, ISIS is still bad, but the real problem is Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki. Clearly, Maliki is no angel, and has set back sectarian reconciliation in Iraq, factionalized the Iraqi military and otherwise alienated the country’s Sunni minority. But… A few questions and points:
- Why is this the first the MSM is hearing of Maliki’s fatal flaws?
- Why the solicitude for Iraq’s Sunni all of a sudden? Where were these thoughtful Iraq analysts in 2011 when the US bailed on Iraq?
- How is suggesting that Maliki must go likely to improve his behavior?
- If the Iranians are offering free assistance to Maliki without strings attached, whom do you think he’ll turn to after begging for US assistance for months, to no avail?
- How are we likely to stabilize Iraq if we are clearly planning on bailing ASAP, leaving Iraq in status quo ante?
- Is there another strategy to oust ISIS from Iraq and defeat it in Syria? Let Iran do it? What is it? Or is ISIS really ok?
Exit question: did the United States do the right thing in leaving no troops, no intel, no cooperation, nothing behind in 2011? Or should we have made another call?
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Terms of US exit from Iraq were negotiated in the Bush Administration, as Pletka knows. Iraq no longer would give US soldiers immunity. They were a sovereign nation. Not a good place for Americans at that point.
BTW, the S&P 500 hitting all-time record highs.
Iraq and Afghanistan are not important to US prosperity. On the contrary, the $6 trillion wasted in these crapholes isa burden on productive US enterprises.
As a taxpayer, I ask that no more money be wasted in Iraq. The Iraqis say Saudi Arabia is backing ISIS. So, let Iran back Iraq.
Sadly, there may be years of self-inflicted agony ahead in Iraq.
Pletka claims she had a crystal ball, saw this coming. From what I see, we have spent trillions on the advice of our foreign policy community and ended up with worse than nothing.
Mission Accomplished.
B Cole is wrong. There were no terms of exist in the Bush period – it was Obama who negotiated terms of exit because he wanted to leave Iraq, period. He has never been interested in actually FINISHING the job – his sympathy has always been with the enemy.
Iraq and Afghanistan are important to SOLVING the Middle Eastern problem – replacing Islamo-Arab imperial states with states that respect international law is the solution long term. The US was succeeding at that in 2008 – Obama has thrown it all away.
@Mike Daly – “There were no terms of [exit] in the Bush period”.
Wrong.
Pact, Approved in Iraq, Sets Time for U.S. Pullout
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON and STEPHEN FARRELL
Published: November 16, 2008
BAGHDAD — Iraq’s cabinet on Sunday overwhelmingly approved a proposed security agreement that calls for a full withdrawal of American forces from the country by the end of 2011. The cabinet’s decision brings a final date for the departure of American troops a significant step closer after more than five and a half years of war.
[…]
The proposed agreement, which took nearly a year to negotiate with the United States, not only sets a date for American troop withdrawal, but puts new restrictions on American combat operations in Iraq starting Jan. 1 and requires an American military pullback from urban areas by June 30. Those hard dates reflect a significant concession by the departing Bush administration, which had been publicly averse to timetables.
Source:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/17/world/middleeast/17iraq.html?_r=0
Just in case the above is blocked by a paywall, here’s a source that isn’t:
“The Security Agreement also sets a date of December 31, 2011, for all U.S. forces to withdraw from Iraq. This date reflects the increasing capacity of the Iraqi Security Forces as demonstrated in operations this year throughout Iraq, as well as an improved regional atmosphere towards Iraq, an expanding Iraqi economy, and an increasingly confident Iraqi government. ”
http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/infocus/iraq/
You might object that the first source is part of the lying liberal media, but the second?
Mike Daly-
I am puzzled by your statement.
Here is the deal:
“The U.S.–Iraq Status of Forces Agreement (official name: Agreement Between the United States of America and the Republic of Iraq On the Withdrawal of United States Forces from Iraq and the Organization of Their Activities during Their Temporary Presence in Iraq) was a status of forces agreement (SOFA) between Iraq and the United States, signed by President George W. Bush in 2008. It established that U.S. combat forces would withdraw from Iraqi cities by June 30, 2009, and all U.S. forces will be completely out of Iraq by December 31, 2011.[1] ”
–30–
Okay, all US forces out of Iraq by 2011, signed by Bush. Does it get and more clear than that? That is an agreement with a sovereign nation.
I question the patriotism of anyone who wants to keep taxing productive US citizens for this farcical boondoggle called Iraq. Afghanistan is even worse.
Mike Daly, do you somehow benefit from the torrent of federal spending (and taxes) expended on “national security”?
Or, you you think partisan caterwauling is necessary in every and any circumstance, even if it means the loss of American lives and the waste of trillions of US dollars?
Setting aside all humanitarian and Islamist-terrorist concerns isn’t the next issue the southern Iraqi oil fields.
Separating them from the rest of Iraq with no-go or kill zones could be done by U.S. and other forces; all with an interest in stable, global, crude pricing. The central government would still book the revenue from secure oil sales (perhaps paying for a percentage of the military cost).
Now the Iraqis can deal with the Islamist-thugs with or without Iran’s help; the oil being secured for world consumption but benefiting Iraq (as much as politicians allow this to happen).