Oh, Here’s Another Crisis You Might Want to Notice (3): Iraq

The "crisis" tag might be a bit surprising, given that the end-of-year media line is how swimmingly everything is going in Iraq. There has been a lot of attention to a report from Iraq Body Count putting civilian casualties in 2008 at between 8315 and 9028, a reduction of 2/3 from the death tolls in 2006 and 2007 (though, unnoted by almost all accounts, only slightly below civilian casualties for 2003 and 2004).

CNN has joined in the feel-good celebrations today with the story that US military deaths in Iraq are down from 906 to 309 this year. The news service recites the official line, ""The people of Iraq are tired of violence, and they are assisting the security forces; the government is improving its ability to govern and to apply the rule of law."

While any decrease in deaths is to be welcomed, the attachment of these figures to the emergence of Iraq under the wise occupation of the US military needs to be recognised as an ongoing public-relations gambit. We've recited the political, economic, and security complications on many occasions, so let's leave it to Juan Cole to put the case in a superb end-of-year column:



Top Ten Myths about Iraq, 2008

1. Iraqis are safer because of Bush's War. In fact, conditions of insecurity have helped created both an internal and external refugee problem:

At least 4.2 million Iraqis were displaced. These included 2.2 million who were displaced within Iraq and some 2 million refugees, mostly in Syria (around 1.4 million) and Jordan (around half a million). In the last months of the year both these neighbouring states, struggling to meet the health, education and other needs of the Iraqi refugees already present, introduced visa requirements that impeded the entry of Iraqis seeking refuge. Within Iraq, most governorates barred entry to Iraqis fleeing sectarian violence elsewhere.'

2. Large numbers of Iraqis in exile abroad have returned. In fact, no great number have returned, and more Iraqis may still be leaving to Syria than returning.

3. Iraqis are materially better off because of Bush's war. In fact, a million Iraqis are "food insecure" and another 6 million need UN food rations to survive. Oxfam estimated in summer, 2007, that 28% of Iraqi children are malnourished.

4. The Bush administration scored a major victory with its Status of Forces Agreement. In fact, The Iraqis forced on Bush an agreement that the US would withdraw combat troops from Iraqi cities by July, 2009,and would completely withdraw from the Country by the end of 2011. The Bush administration had wanted 58 long-term bases, and the authority to arrest Iraqis at will and to launch military operations unilaterally.

5. Minorities in Iraq are safer since Bush's invasion. In fact, there have in 2008 been significant attacks on and displacement of Iraqi Christians from Mosul. In early January of 2008, guerrillas bombed churches in Mosul, wounding a number of persons. More recently, some 13,000 Christians have had to flee Mosul because of violence.

6. The sole explanation for the fall in the monthly death rate for Iraqi civilians was the troop excalation or surge of 30,000 extra US troops in 2007. In fact, troop levels had been that high before without major effect. The US military did good counter-insurgency in 2007. The major reason for the fall in the death toll, however, was that the Shiites won the war for Baghdad, ethnically cleansing hundreds of thousands of Sunnis from the capital, and turning it into a city with a Shiite majority of 75 to 80 percent. (When Bush invaded, Baghdad was about 50/50 Sunni and Shiite). The high death tolls in 2006 and 2007 were a by-product of this massive ethnic cleansing campaign. Now, a Shiite militiaman in Baghdad would have to drive for a while to find a Sunni Arab to kill.

7. John McCain alleged that if the US left Iraq, it would be promptly taken over by al-Qaeda. In fact, there are few followers of Usamah Bin Laden in Iraq. The fundamentalist extremists, if that is what McCain meant, are not supported by most Sunni Arabs. They are supported by no Shiites (60% of Iraq) or Kurds (20% of Iraq), and are hated by Iran, Syria, Turkey, and Jordan, who would never allow such a takeover.

8. The Iraq War made the world safer from terrorism. In fact, Iraq has become a major training ground for extremists and is implicated in the major bombings in Madrid, London, and Glasgow.

9. Bush went to war in Iraq because he was given bad intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction capabilities. In fact, the State Department's Intelligence & Research (I & R) division cast doubt on the alarmist WMD stories that Bush/Cheney put about. The CIA refused to sign off on the inclusion of the Niger uranium lie in the State of the Union address, which made Bush source it to the British MI6 instead. The Downing Street Memo revealed that Bush fixed the intelligence around the policy. Bush sought to get up a provocation such as a false flag attack on UN planes so as to blame it on Iraq. And UN weapons inspectors in Feb.-Mar. of 2003 examined 100 of 600 suspected weapons sites and found nothing; Bush's response was to pull them out and go to war.

10. Douglas Feith and other Neoconservatives didn't really want a war with Iraq (!). Yeah, that was why they demanded war on Iraq with their 1996 white paper for Bibi Netanyahu and again in their 1998 Project for a New American Century letter to Clinton, where they explicitly called for military action. The Neoconservatives are notorious liars and by the time they get through with rewriting history, they will be a combination of Gandhi and Mother Teresa and the Iraq War will be Bill Clinton's fault. The only thing is, I think people are wise to them by now. Being a liar can actually get you somewhere. Being a notorious liar is a disadvantage if what you want to is get people to listen to you and act on your advice. I say, Never Again.

Negotiations with Syria: The Battle Begins

Unnoticed by many, a complicated dance over talks with Syria --- on a settlement with Israel, on its position vis-a-vis Lebanon, and on its relations with Iran and Hezbollah --- is beginning. For a mix of reasons, some good (finally defusing some of the tension between Tel Aviv and Damascus), some not so good (the mistaken belief that this will mean the isolation of Tehran in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf), serious talks for the first time in almost a decade appear imminent.

Still, Washington firebrands who dreamed of Syrian regime change during the Dubya Years aren't going down without a fight.

The excellent Joshua Landis has this analysis:

Syria is the Only Game in Town

Syria is the only game in town for those wishing to advance peace between Arabs and Israel. This has the Jewish right apoplectic. Danielle Pletka, who worked under John Bolton in the State Department, tries sarcasm and insults in her "The Syrian Strategy" to embarrass those who would advance this strategy.

Barry Rubin, publisher of MERIA journal and author of The Truth About Syria gathered several Washington Institute types such as Patrick Clawson and David Schenker and other likeminded policy types to tell Americans that they are foolish to negotiate with Syria and Iran. Equally foolish is to try to make peace between Arabs and Jews or to withdraw from Iraq anytime soon. Rubin knowingly asserts that Obama’s “belief, that [America] can make friends with Iran and Syria, soothe grievances that have caused Islamism and terrorism, and solve the Arab-Israeli conflict …. is a miscalculation about the Middle East.”

Americans perennially make the mistake of viewing the Middle East “in Western terms,” Rubin informs us, which leads “to frustration and even disaster.” Why? Because “You have to inspire fear in your enemies.” “Unfortunately, the change they want means wiping other states off the map.”

This “good versus evil” world view is repeated by the other participants of this round table, who seem to be nodding at each other in their desire to sound the toxin of existential extinction should the new administration lift its foot off the throat of its Arab and Persian enemies. The US’s only choice is to keep its many enemies in the region in a state of abject fear.

David Schenker explains that Bush viewed Bashar al-Assad as “basically as irredeemable.” Schenker basically agrees. He worries that ”Obama appears to believe that Syria can play a more productive role in the region.” To Schenker’s chagrin, even “Dennis Ross, himself who is being mentioned as the possible Middle East coordinator has written that Assad should be tested.” Dennis Ross is The Washington Institute’s counselor and Ziegler distinguished fellow. David Schenker is a senior fellow and director of the Program on Arab Politics at The Washington Institute.

Schenker concedes that if Syria were to flip, and cut its relations with Iran and “jettison Hizballah and Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups and move into the Western camp,” it would be a good thing. Like, Barry Rubin, Schenker clearly does not expect Syria to do any such thing. To guard against the Golan being given away for what he seems to believe will be nothing, Schenker will have to police the Obama administration and encourage it to make many up front demands for change.

He and his colleagues will work assiduously to hang all kinds of Christmas balls and bobbles on the engagement tree, such that it is hard to imagine any progress or deal being struck. In order to protect her flank from such criticism, Israel’s foreign minister Livni reassured Israelis that she would be tough and not accept a “humus” peace. She said,

“What is important to us is not a peace of opening embassies and eating Humus in Damascus, but the halting of arms smuggling through Syria to Hezbollah, their strong ties to Iran and their endless support of terrorist organizations such as Hamas,” said the foreign minister.

Olmert has defended his drive to continue negotiations:

Referring to the ongoing indirect talks, Olmert said “the talks with Syria were thorough and important. Removing Syria from the radical axis is one of Israel’s top priorities.”"Tough sacrifices will be required,” Olmert said, “but the prevention of lost lives is worth it. Syria is not interested in belonging to the axis of evil and wants to forge ties with the U.S.”

For his part, Bashar al-Assad also has demands and wants to tamp down expectations that he flip. He wants Israelis to agree on the exact 1967 Golan borders so that the two sides will not get stuck in Geneva as they did in 2000 with very different expectations about borders. Assad also told European diplomats that he isn’t responsible for restraining Hezbollah, and won’t be “Israel’s bodyguard.”

Syrian President Bashar Assad has told a number of European foreign ministers and senior diplomats this month that he would not lift a finger to restrain Hezbollah’s arming in Lebanon. “I am not Israel’s bodyguard,” he reportedly said…. On the one hand, the officials said their impression was that the Syrian president was serious about negotiations, but that Assad’s positions remained uncompromising.

The source said Assad told the Europeans that Syria was willing to take significant steps in talks with Israel only after an Israeli declaration that it would withdraw from the entire Golan Heights.

Assad refuses to make concessions before he gets guarantees about withdrawal. Israel will also refuse to make concessions until it has guarantees.