The Surge Is Working, Part 3,927
By Pejman Yousefzadeh Posted in Iraq | The Surge | War — Comments (9) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
A former stronghold of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, this rural and overwhelmingly Sunni area south of Baghdad on the west bank of the Tigris was once a country getaway for Saddam Hussein's cronies. His sons Uday and Qusay had a weekend house here.
After the invasion in 2003, it became a virtual no-go zone for the Iraqi police and army, which faced a resentful and embittered population uniformly hostile both to the Americans and to any security forces loyal to the Shiite-led government that had replaced "their" regime.
Jihadists flourished here, American commanders say, manufacturing car bombs and sending them up the road for the short trip into the capital.
But last year, violence fell drastically. American commanders cite three main reasons: the United States troop surge, which provided the combat power to take on the insurgents, the decision to withdraw troops from large bases far outside Iraqi towns and put them closer to the population, and the decision by local Sunnis to follow the model of the Anbar Province tribal Awakening by turning against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and cooperating with the Americans to fight it.
It is a fertile area heavily dependent on agriculture, and the Americans have sought to restore irrigation projects, injected millions of dollars in microgrants and aid projects to revitalize the economy, and used "helicopter diplomacy" to bring Shiite government officials to talk to Sunni leaders.
The American military has also created and paid for armed tribal Awakening security patrols, which include many former Sunni insurgents, to guard their own neighborhoods. They were formerly known as Concerned Local Citizens here, but were recently rebranded Sons of Iraq.
The story does point out that al Qaeda continues to be a threat in the area. This is a useful observation, as it may help remind people like Senator Obama that al Qaeda is already in Iraq and will rush to fill the void of any precipitous American departure.
« Disconnect — Comments (1) | Mullen: No Warning to Democrats on Iraq — Comments (0) »
The Surge Is Working, Part 3,927 9 Comments (0 topical, 9 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
But last year, violence fell drastically. American commanders cite three main reasons: the United States troop surge, which provided the combat power to take on the insurgents, the decision to withdraw troops from large bases far outside Iraqi towns and put them closer to the population, and the decision by local Sunnis to follow the model of the Anbar Province tribal Awakening by turning against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and cooperating with the Americans to fight it.
What those commanders failed to mention is that those Sunni sheikhs have started cooperating with us because we're giving them lots of money and weapons and have put several thousand of their fighters on our payroll:
The Calm Before the Conflagration
http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=217426
We've also given the Sunnis grants of local autonomy, which has outraged many Shiites. This is one reason that some Iraqi government officials have actually criticized the surge.
Sooner or later, reality is going to force its way into the picture--sort of like what happened after the 2006 election. Up to that point, the Bush folks swore up and down that their strategy was working and that we had enough troops in Iraq. But, the crushing defeat in the 2006 election forced even the Bush team to admit that the Rumsfeld-Casey strategy wasn't working and that we really do need more troops in Iraq.
One can only guess how many of our troops died needlessly in Iraq during the long period when we didn't have nearly enough troops there. And what did Bush do to the incompetent Gen. Casey who had been telling him we didn't need more troops in Iraq? He made him the chief of staff of the Army! He should have been forced to resign for sheer, utter incompetence.
Just to pay for this misguided, unnecessary war, we are borrowing billions of dollars per month from foreign nations. Bush has borrowed more from foreign nations in seven years than all previous presidents combined.
Finally the Bush people have started to admit that our intervention in Iraq is preventing us from doing what needs to be done in Afghanistan. I recall how many times the Bush people, including Gen. Tommy Franks himself, denied that the war in Iraq was hurting the war effort in Afghanistan. Only the truly gullible swallowed that lie. At least Adm. Mullen recently admitted that the Iraq War has caused us to do only the bare minimum in Afghanistan:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-12-11-3963072919_x.htm
Recently Admiral Fallon conceded that although conditions in Afghanistan are bad, conditions in Iraq are actually worse. Fallon acknowledged that there has been “a huge upsurge in horrible things that go on in Afghanistan,” and then he added that the violence in Afghanistan, as bad as it is, isn't as bad as what's going on in Iraq: "I look at Iraq and what I’ve been dealing with over there [Afghanistan], and there’s no comparison in the magnitude of the number of events and so forth."
If you want to read about the true state of affairs in Afghanistan, here are some links:
Testimony of Thomas Pickering on Conditions in Afghanistan
http://www.senate.gov/~foreign/testimony/2008/PickeringTestimony080131a....
Women's Lives Worse Than Ever in Afghanistan
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/womens-lives-worse-than-eve...
Insecurity Hindering Return of Afghan Refugees
http://www.afghanistannewscenter.com/news/2008/february/feb292008.html#6
Doubts Intensify Over Afghanistan's Future
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0911/p06s01-wosc.html
If we'd left Iraq alone and had focused on Afghanistan, we would have had a better chance of success in Afghanistan. It still would have been a very difficult task--just ask the British and the Soviets. But with our forces split between Iraq and Afghanistan, we're risking failure in both locations.
I predict that some day conservatives who are still defending Bush's Iraq War policy will regret having done so.
Mike Griffith
Let Freedom Ring website
http://ourworld.cs.com/mikegriffith1/id47.htm
The Unofficial RedState FAQ
“You are not only responsible for what you say, but also for what you do not say. ” - Martin Luther
So all of this demands one of the following actions be taken. NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
A) Throw Iraq under the bus. Having read your posts in the past, I know this is the option you want selected. Assumning generously that you are not a concern troll who only posts bad news to generate a certain volume of political momentum, in a specific direction, athwart the stated purpose of the website, this is basically what you are angling for.
If I'm dead-on, explain to me again why this would be a better thing than, say, the US abandonment of Cambodia in the early 1970's. Or perhas you can explain to me why you believe the Khymar ROuge was a good thing. That could really be entertaining.
B)Immediately surge about 100,000 more troops into Afghanistan. This would have some possible effect on both the battle in Afghanistan and it would dramatically improve the behavior of Pervez Mushariff.
I can really only think of one way to make those 100,000 troops appear on the battle field sans The Statue of Zeus from the Civilization video game. That would be a revivified version of Charlie Rangel's Conscription Act. Perhaps you'd like to talk us through your strategy for getting that law inacted with the current congress being what it is.
C) You're a concern troll. Your purpose in posting here is to help spread the gospel of far left political thought and pacifism. As such, you'll get no sale in these quarters, but you would get much greater respect if you represented yourself more authentically.
"I believe we must adjourn this meeting to some other place." - The last recorded words of Adam Smith.
If you would bother to check out my website, you'd see that I'm about as far from being a liberal as you can get.
Now, to your points:
"Throw Iraq under the bus"? Why would our withdrawal now constitute "throwing Iraq under the bus"? You guys just can't bring yourselves to question the assumption that Iraq would descend into chaos and anarchy if we were to leave now. There are good indicators that things would actually improve if we'd get out of the way.
One could make a good argument that Bush has already thrown Iraq under the bus and that the only way the country's going to stabliize is if we get out of the way and let the Iraqis work out their own future. There's been more death, destruction, and chaos in Iraq since we intervened than there was in the preceding thirty years.
If I'm dead-on, explain to me again why this would be a better thing than, say, the US abandonment of Cambodia in the early 1970's. Or perhas you can explain to me why you believe the Khymar Rouge was a good thing. That could really be entertaining.
What is entertaining is your downright nutty comparison of Cambodia with Iraq. There is so much historical nonsense in your comparison that it's hard to know where to start to debunk it. Are you comparing the Shiites to the Khmer Rouge? Or the Sunnis? Or both? If so, then why in the world did we topple Saddam to begin with?
And who in their right mind would say the Khmer Rouge was a good thing? It's hard to have a rational conversation with some of you folks when you have this robotic, brainwashed mindset that anyone who opposes Bush's Iraq War policy must be some kind of commie leftist who admires the Khmer Rouge.
The last time I checked, it was the Bush people who sent our troops into combat without adequate body armor, with inadequately armored vehicles, and who falsely claimed for years that we had enough troops in Iraq. How many of our soldiers died needlessly in Iraq because we didn't have enough troops there? How many of our troops died in poorly armored vehicles who might otherwise have lived? How many of our troops have needlessly died because of the bungling, brainless Rumsfeld-Casey strategy that the Bush people swore up and down was "working"--until, that is, they got their clocks cleaned in the 2006 election and decided to at least admit that we needed more troops and that the Rumsfeld-Casey strategy wasn't working?
Do you remember all the demagoguegic attacks on John McCain from blind-sheep Republicans who were "outraged" because he was quetioning the Rumsfeld-Casey strategy and daring to say we needed more troops? Do you remember how Bush apologists argued that McCain was "hurting the war effort" with his criticisms, etc., etc.
There is nothing "conservative" about Bush's Iraq War policy. It's been an idiotic, bungling failure in almost every regard. It's caused many needless deaths of our troops, not to mention the deaths of a couple hundred thousand Iraqis, and it's caused us to neglect Afghanistan.
And now the Bush folks are claiming we're seeing "success" in Iraq because we've reduced the violence in Sunni areas--yeah, by bribing and arming the Sunnis--and because we've managed to arm-twist the Shiites into taking some token, tenuous baby steps toward political reconciliation.
I repeat: One day conservatives who are defending Bush's Iraq War policy are going to regret it.
Mike Griffith
Let Freedom Ring website
http://ourworld.cs.com/mikegriffith1/id47.htm
>>>"Throw Iraq under the bus"?
Muqtada Al Sadr signed a truce. He did not except the authority of the central government on a permanent basis. He has received support from the Iranian government in the past and would receive it a lot more openly if the surge were rolled back at too rapid a pace. So yes, an immediate withdrawal from Iraq merely allows Iran to extend its theocracy.
>>>>If so, then why in the world did we topple Saddam to begin with?
In the contect of current policy decisions, who cares? What bearing does that have on what should happen next?
>>>you have this robotic, brainwashed mindset
Anyone who whines about what was decided in 2002, rather than offering any substantive improvements in 2008 will be electoral and philosophical road kill. You are the one mouthing the talking points. If I'm a robot, you are a moron. Ad hominem and Monday Morning QB play takes far less effort than actual decision analysis.
>>>>The last time I checked, it was the Bush people who sent our troops into combat without adequate body armor, with inadequately armored vehicles
The same garbage could be said about General Eisenhower's pre-planning of D-Day. Just imagine how powerful our military would be if it's acquisition workforce had a shiny crystal ball that projected future battlefield threats to perfection?
>>>>Do you remember how Bush apologists argued that McCain was "hurting the war effort" with his criticisms, etc., etc.
So that's why you seem intent on helping Barack Obama defeat John McCain in 2008? More brilliant post-hoc reasoning from your vastly informative perspective, no doubt.
>>>>I repeat: One day conservatives who are defending Bush's Iraq War policy are going to regret it.
Eek! I'm terrifed! Lot's of people who have done the proper thing have lived to regret it. Welcome to one of the fundamental conundrums of human existence in an imperfect world...
"I believe we must adjourn this meeting to some other place." - The last recorded words of Adam Smith.
Bye.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC. I've been usurped!
"But they are consistently warned by local Sunni leaders that unless jobs and government positions materialize soon, some of their people will drift back to the extremists.
“We have to be part of the government,” Mustafa Kamel, a local civilian guard leader, cautioned an American general.
“If we are not going to be part of the government, the terrorists will come back and the situation will get worse here.”
Are there any other signs of political reconciliation being made? How long can this "surge" last?
1] All i can say is that the surge is not working, 2]the us need to unify the kurds, sunni and shite, just a though on Iraq and 3] the Taliban, they killing 2 birds with one stone
Obama the empty-suited and addle-brained can't seem to grasp that Al Qaeda operates in Iraq.
McCain either can't grasp, or won't grasp, the simple fact that a small gang of Sunni murderers can not and will not take over a majority Shiite state in which not even the Sunni really support them.
So we are treated to the silly spectacle of both candidates telling lies to each other and the American people.
Al Qaeda isn't the primary problem in Iraq. It never was. McCain can harrumph all he wants about keeping American forces in Iraq to deny victory to Al Qaeda. It won't wash. They wouldn't win the country if we pulled up stakes tomorrow. It's a bad line of reasoning.
The good news for McCain is that his likely opposition is a clueless socialist who isn't smart enough to call him on this, and then make McCain explain what he actually is trying to avoid by keeping U.S. troops in Iraq until the job is done.