Nation-building in Iraq: the good, the not-so-bad, and the ugly
By Thomas P.M. Barnett
ARTICLE: "Silent Districts Speak Volumes On Sunnis' Fall: Insurgents Sever Area's Access to Life Basics," by Alissa J. Rubin, New York Times, 26 March 2007, p. A1.
We all know that Kurdistan is stable and flourishing (the good). Most of us know the not-so-bad story of the Shiites:
The contrast with Shiite neighborhoods is sharp. Markets there are in full swing, community projects are under way, and while electricity is scarce throughout the city, there is less trouble finding fuel for generators in those areas. When the government cannot provide services, civilian arms of the Shiite militias step in to try to fill the gap.
The implied contrast, of course, is to the ugly, or the Sunni areas:
The city-scape of Iraq's capital tells a stark story of the toll the past four years have taken on Iraq's once powerful Sunni Arabs. Theirs is the world of ruined buildings, damaged mosques, streets pitted by mortar shells and so little electricity that many people have abandoned using refrigerators altogther.
We have successfully liberated Kurdistan, and if we weren't so bent out of shape on Iran, we could argue easily that our liberation of Shiite Iraq has also gone reasonably well. Where we failed was in Sunni Iraq, and that failure was--in many ways--preordained. Glass-half-full says we claim our victories where we find them by pulling most of our ground troops to safe Kurdistan, continue to hunt AQI (Al Qaeda in Iraq) with special ops throughout Iraq, and advise the central government on how to put down the insurgency based in Sunni areas (letting the Shiita militias do their thing as necessary). You add that up and that's not a bad showing, despite all the pointless losses on our side due to poor planning, not enough numbers and poor resourcing and execution. But we're so binary we can't accept any partial win, and we fret incessantly that Iran "wins" when it's really Riyadh that does (and stabs us in the back rhetorically at the worst moments--thank you King-I-Am!).
So we fight Iranian presence in Shiite Iraq, for all the good that will do us and for all the harm such interaction would eventually do to the mullahs back in Tehran (just watch who changes whom more, as freedom tends to infect and spread by example). And we continue to act like the insurgency is our cross to bear and ours alone (thank you again, House of Saud, for your kind words). McCain is very right in one aspect: resistance at home is all about casualties. Lower the casualties and no matter how nasty the fight, America will be happy. Meanwhile, we focus on locking in our gains and limiting our future burdens by getting the locals to share more responsibility.
I know, I know, that's too risky. But again, do you think Americans dying in Iraq is going to foment necessary change in Riyadh and Tehran, or is forcing both capitals to put up or shut up on Iraq going to move those balls forward faster? There is nothing sadder than watching a superpower make a war that's not its own become its own. We won the war in Iraq in 2003. Our ownership of the postwar mess eluded our grasp a while ago. The ISG recognized this and suggested some of the logical remedies. America, in its binary mindset, either wants the "win" or wants to admit the "loss." Neither make sense at this point. |
