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NEWS & LETTERS, October - November 2007
Editorial
Bush locks U.S. into long stay in Iraq
George Bush's televised speech on the evening of Sep. 13 made it plain that the U.S. will maintain a strong military presence in Iraq well into the next president's administration. The speech followed on the highly-anticipated Congressional testimony of General David Petraeus, Bush's military chief in Iraq and a strategist of counter-insurgency tactics. In his testimony, the general delivered precisely the message that the President wanted to hear: the "surge" strategy is working and further time is necessary for it to produce more results. Meanwhile, widespread frustration at the inability of Bush's Democratic Party critics to check his actions in any way is manifesting itself in events like the sizeable anti-war demonstration in Washington D.C. on Sep. 15.
All of the Democratic Party candidates for president claim to oppose the Iraq war. The reality is, however, that the disastrous war launched in 2003 has gone so badly that many in the U.S. ruling class believe that a complete withdrawal of U.S. troops would lead to a situation in which American interests in the Middle East would be seriously compromised. The major Democratic Party candidates realize this--Hillary Clinton has even expressed her opinion that Bush's strategy of arming Sunni tribes in Iraq's Anbar province has yielded results.
This situation has resulted in a kind of oppressive political stasis in which the presence of vocal yet ineffectual critics safely within the political system strengthens Bush's hand immeasurably, while perpetuating the intolerable situation serves Democratic Party electoral strategy in 2008. Further to Bush's advantage is that the nature of the war has, until recently, cushioned the administration from opponents outside the system. The U.S. commitment of a small number of troops relative to past U.S. military commitments limited those Americans directly impacted by the war to the families and loved ones of deployed soldiers--while the rest of the population was left untouched.
Now, however, the toll of dead and seriously wounded soldiers is beginning to be difficult to ignore. Additionally, the number of returned soldiers, military family members and ordinary people actively opposing the war has grown large enough that in his speech the President was forced to acknowledge--if only in passing--the strong opposition. He even attempted to appease those against the war by claiming to be committed to bringing the troops home through a gradual reduction of U.S. forces to pre-surge levels.
GRIM REALITY IN IRAQ
General Petraeus's tales of good news on the ground in Iraq are highly questionable. One of two main claims of success of the U.S. is its effort in Anbar Province. This highly dangerous strategy of assisting the so-called "Sunni Awakening," in which arms and money are being provided to tribal sheikhs who have begun fighting the hardline jihadist groups that formed in the wake of the U.S. invasion, amounts to simultaneously paying lip service to the Iraqi central government while actively aiding forces that are hostile to it. The Sunni tribal leaders of Anbar resent the dominant role of the Shi’a religious parties in the Iraqi government and the increasingly weak and divided central government for its part now fears that the U.S. is building up a counterbalancing force to itself. There is every reason to believe that this policy is setting the stage for the eventual de facto partition of Iraq into sectarian and ethnic enclaves, both large and small.
In fact, this partitioning of the country is already well underway. Formerly integrated neighborhoods of Baghdad are rapidly becoming divided on solidly sectarian lines through militia violence and intimidation. The U.S. is actually aiding and abetting this process as part of its surge strategy--its second claim to success--by identifying neighborhoods purged of members of the other sect and policed by militias as pacified areas in which violence has diminished. The U.S. military has even walled off one entire Sunni neighborhood from the rest of the city as a means of controlling access to it--literally setting into stone the sectarian division.
The increased U.S. presence in Baghdad has also served to elevate levels of violence in surrounding towns. Insurgents fleeing the crackdown there simply relocated to carry out further sectarian violence and attacks on American troops. The intra-Iraqi violence itself is taking on an increasingly savage sectarian character, as witnessed by the huge bombing in a Turcomen village called Armili in July that left hundreds dead. Another bombing of a village of Iraq's small religious minority of Yazidis near Mosul in August resulted in a similar death toll.
Simply put, it is not clear how much more success as defined by Bush and General Petraeus the Iraqi people can take.
WILL BUSH PRESS ON?
Given Bush's determination to stay the course in Iraq, conditions there will in all likelihood decline. More families will be driven from their homes, sectarian killings will continue to take place, the grievous situation of women in Iraqi society will further deteriorate, and more people will be adversely impacted by the U.S.'s counterinsurgency campaigns. The extent of Iran's involvement in Iraq is such that the risk of an incident between the two countries that escalates out of control is also present.
Bush and his war cabinet know that the war is unpopular at home, but remain stubbornly committed to pressing on with it. The leaders of the Democratic Party claim to be against the war, but are willing, for their own political reasons, to let the President have his way. Despite these facts, the clamor for change from below is becoming more and more difficult for the politicians to ignore.
Anti-war sentiment is extending far beyond the ranks of the activists and organizers who claim to lead the movement and is now in evidence among people who are no longer willing to tolerate the seemingly open-ended conflict.
A day of nationwide demonstrations against the war in Iraq has been called for Oct. 27 and there is every chance that the turnout may serve to shake the Bush administration's confidence that it can prosecute its war with no accountability whatsoever.
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