[Originally published in the Rutland Herald.]
The goal of the Bush administration for the ongoing “surge” in Iraq, as far as it can be ascertained, seems to be to bring an absence of violent, physical conflict to Iraq which would in turn permit political reconciliation.
Iraq has never been a viable country in any accepted sense of the word. It was created between 1921-1926 by the British to suit their own political needs in the area. Since then the “country” has been kept together by a succession of repressive regimes, ending with Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party rule from 1958 until our 2003 invasion.
It is likely that the “surge” currently under way will dampen the violence in Iraq. We have entered into relationships against al-Qaida with Sunnis in Anbar and Diala provinces. In return for training and financial support, the militias in those areas have joined us in the struggle with al-Qaida in Iraq. Those two provinces have become relatively peaceful.
Actually, this makes all the sense in the world since it was inevitable that Iraqis would come to view al-Qaida in Iraq as a hostile, foreign, fundamentalist organization that shares no goals with the secular Iraqi Sunnis. Incidentally, this shreds the Bush administration’s repeated assertions that if we leave before “succeeding,” Iraq will turn into a terrorist base for attacks against the U.S. That is patently untrue.
With help from those Sunnis, we apparently have narrowed al-Qaida’s options. When attacked in the past, al-Qaida would simply move to a safe area. Now when we attack them in one place with more troops, they have few if any options on places to hide. It looks as if we may be on the way to reducing al-Qaida-sponsored violence in the Sunni areas. Clearly, this is good.
However, the real problem lies with the Iraqis. It has been said over and over by every pundit and military expert in the U.S. that there will be no successful conclusion to our adventure in Iraq until the Iraqis reach peaceful agreement on sharing wealth, power and responsibility.
The Iraqis have shown no inclination to fulfill this, our goal, for them. Quite the contrary, none of the participants appears to have any desire to make a “new Iraq” work. Having had virtual autonomy since the 1991 Gulf War, the Kurds would like to be left alone in northern Iraq. They now want the oil in the north as well as Kirkuk, the largest city in the north.
The Shia, as the largest ethnic and religious component in Iraq, would like to maintain control of the southern oil fields and, in addition, control the entire country. They have absolutely no desire to share any of this with the Sunnis, under whose hostile and repressive thumb they existed for decades, or with the Kurds.
The Sunnis, having run Iraq since 1963, think they should still be in charge. They are so deluded about their past power that many of them honestly believe that they are the majority group in Iraq. Unfortunately for them, they are the smallest group in Iraq, have no oil to speak of on their own turf and are roundly despised by Kurds and Shia alike for their 40-year-long murderous rule of the country.
In short, there is no reason for any one of the three groups to want to share anything with the others. And these are the folks that the Bush administration is counting on to find a political solution to Iraq’s problems, which would enable us to withdraw from the country.
There is no viable central government in Iraq today. There is only a power void created by the disinclination of the Sunnis, Shia and Kurds to solve their political problems. In fact, the Sunnis have just withdrawn from the so-called central government, making political consensus even less likely.
We have compounded the problem by entering into local agreements supporting Sunnis against al-Qaida. Even though that may be in our best interest in the struggle with al-Qaida, it certainly will do nothing but make Iraqi political reconciliation more difficult. The Shia, who are suspicious of our ultimate intentions and probably anticipating a more open civil war, are upset that we are, in effect, training, arming and financing their Sunni enemies.
However resoundingly successful the “surge” turns out to be in terms of calming violence in Iraq, it will be meaningless in the face of the disinclination and inability of the three warring factions to reach a viable consensus.
The likelihood of an amicable solution to internal Iraqi political problems, which would enable us to declare success and withdraw under the conditions already established by the Bush administration, is infinitesimally small.
Why should the U.S. use its precious treasure to support a process that has little if any chance of success?
Haviland Smith is a retired CIA station chief who served in Lebanon and Iran and as chief of the counterterrorism staff. He lives in Williston.
Rural Ruminations 