What can be done to end the U.S. occupation of Iraq?

Better here than anywhere else.

The most perverse conclusion I've seen among Bush supporters of late is a feeling that not all is well in Iraq that is compounded by an insistence that, to quote Mr. Sullivan's take on it, "the only way out of this mess is to stick with the man who helped make it." I expect to see this theme start to grow in popularity, though.

That, or, honestly, a huge spike in gas prices might do it.

The new government is also up against a close network of tribes and families sharing the religious belief that the Americans in Iraq are invaders and that every Muslim has a duty to fight them.

"Things have gone too far for middle ground now," said Sheik Faisal Jalab, a tribal chief from Youssifiyah. "Our religion obliges us to stand behind those defending the faith."

Jalab, who is in his late 60s and wears traditional Arab robes, speaks of his joy at Saddam's fall and his later disappointment over the behavior of U.S. troops in Iraq, especially their raids on Iraqi homes in search of insurgents.

"I know they are a superpower," he said, "but must they humiliate us like this?"

His son, Ahmed Faisal, chimed in: "How can you blame me for hating the Americans after they killed so many innocent Iraqis and forced their way into our homes?

"You cannot even blame me if I become a suicide bomber."

Attention is switching from long-term infrastructure to the immediate needs of security and stability.

Prompted by the US ambassador in Baghdad John Negroponte, the idea is to use $3.6 billion of the $18 billion approved by Congress last November to, among other things, train more Iraqi police and other forces, create more job programmes in an effort to reduce unemployment and plan for the elections in January

Iraq: Signs of Desperation has a pretty through take.

Another possible strategy is to not fuck with the plan that the experts (i.e. war strategists) develop. In other words, GWB should keep his hands out and stick to what he does best... er, well ....

Is this supposed to be reassuring? Am I supposed to be hoping for this? I think the world may owe the Iraqi resistance a much bigger debt than it realizes.

I'm asking what can be done to turn U.S. force off and bring it back home now.

I seriously just cannot envision the U.S.'s foreign policy being half as stubborn as it is now. For the Republicans, it's all about managing the situation and minimizing the fucked-up reality until after November 2.

It's going to be awhile. And yeah, the resistance is getting stronger .. but if the US forces can actually do their job without meddling by the president, they really are pretty fucking good at winning wars. When I say the resistance will wear out, I mean over a year, two, three, or more ... And they WILL continue to get stronger as long as there's all this cockiness coming from the U.S.

And just in case I haven't been clear. George Bush is not up to the job and should be removed from office.

holy 1968 batman!

(I wish they'd stop killing Iraqi civilian bystanders though.)

(I wish they'd stop killing Iraqi civilian bystanders though.)

That's what makes them "Bad Guys". They're not fighting the US troops to "Free Iraq" .. They're fighting to get control.

I think there are plenty of people in the Iraqi resistance who are fighting to get rid of U.S. troops.

Reminder: the U.S. is occupying another country, and most Iraqis want them out.

who is dave225 anyway? daveq?

Oh yeah, because if Israel does it, it'll look like a independent effort and not something backed/approved by the US, no not at all.

It'll be at least 20 years before the US can credibly militarily intervene in the Middle East, unless Iran decides to nuke somebody before then.

Have you been watching Dragnet?

Just like the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, right? More force seems to be working wonders there.

If we manage the unlikely feat of an administration change, I think Kerry's rhetoric about internationalizing the effort is the right place to start. Rhetorically. Of course, no one's going to come rushing in, but if we made clear that we weren't looking for long-term military and economic dominance of Iraq but really did just want to create as stable a situation as possible before withdrawing, then it might be easier to convince the rest of the world -- starting with the Arab League -- that it's in their best interest to help us. That wouldn't solve the problem of who's going to actually run Iraq, though, and it's possible that even the best case puts us in a Yugoslavic situation of years of regional conflict capped by uneasy (and U.N./NATO-enforced) agreements on borders and economic spoils.

But the answer is obviously not more bombing raids in Fallujah or more face-offs with al-Sadr. That way lies madness.

(and p.s. people cheering for the "insurgency", keep in mind that the Sunni militants in Fallujah are enforcing Taliban-like Shariah law, and a lot of them are former Husseinians -- not people to cheer for)

Actually, I'm not sure that staying would make much a difference anyway. We should just leave and see what happens next. How much worse could that option be?

Falluja itself, in general, is not the pro-Sadam stronghold the Bush administration makes it out to be, from what I have read.

We don't get to pick our "insurgency,"* in the sense that we don't get to pick who takes the lead in resisting occupation. The political forces that emerge in an Iraq now that Sadam Hussein is gone aren't going to look like the political parties back home. The Islamic fundamentalist groups in Falluja are still Iraqis, they are still occupied, they still have a right to resist. If they kill occupation forces, I think justice is still on their side, in that instance.

(A lot of people object to the use of the word "insurgent" because apparently it is sometimes used to mean rebellion against legitimate authority.)

*I'm not saying though that just because someone is opposed to the war, they have to "support" the armed resistance.

One thing we can be assured of if Kerry wins - the civilians running things on the ground will be orders of magnitude more competent. Because many of the ones who are there now are conservative political loyalists in their 20s with no relevant experience whatsoever. And there will be fewer ideological rules about which Iraqis we are willing to involve.

See Nixon, Richard; Kissinger, Henry; Hanoi, Christmas bombing raids of; Cambodia, invasion of; Vietnamization, failure of.

Bring back the draft and extend the militarization to everyone age eligible in the polity. That will queer everyone's theoretical view of the war quickly and make them decide what they want in terms of direction and goals from their nation.

The military and administration have been rather successful in keeping the news of the total every day engagements and casualties stifled. This is a conscious move to keep morale up, not only in the troops but at home as much as possible. GlobalSecurity has been doing a running survey and the trend has been as attacks and combat rise in Iraq, generally, the less people see of the bloody reality of it at home. There are exceptions but this is the way things are being shaped.

The more pain one receives from the Iraq front the more likely impetus for changes will accumulate. Whether such changes could be good is unknown. Iraq is broke. No one has an idea how to fix it.
I believe that people who say they do are liars.

Sure. But what's going on now isn't just resistance, it's also jockeying for power and position in whatever Iraq emerges from all this. If the concern is (as it should be) for the greater good of the people of Iraq, none of the major militant groups look like good bets. The Sunni resistance is thuggish and either actually fundamentalist or using an alliance with fundamentalists for convenience. Ditto the Madhi Army, except there's no question about their religious zealotry. Not that Allawi himself is any budding Thomas Jefferson, and I'm not sure where the best place to look for future Iraqi leadership is. But I don't think the armed resistance groups are much of a place to start.

A lot of bad bad people have come into power because of this sort of thinking.

Keep in mind that the occupation forces also are a magnet for outside terrorist groups, the sort who are at least as careless about Iraqi civilian lives as the occupying forces. (I get the impression you don't get the scale of civilian deaths in Iraq as a result of actions by the Anglo-American forces.)

xpost:

A lot of bad bad people have come into power because of this sort of thinking.

This invasion and occupation, at the highest level, is run by BAD PEOPLE.

From what I understand of the situation in Afghanistan, there is much more popular support there for a U.S. presence. The Taliban were (are) an outside power (put in place partly with western help--I know you know, just a reminder).

Shoul Israel "clean up" all the Islamic fundamentalists in the occupied territories before withdrawing? Very different situation, though in some ways I think Iraqi public sentiment toward U.S. troops in Iraq is closer to the sentiment of Palestinians toward the Israelis than of Afghans toward U.S. troops.

Staying in Iraq and killing Iraqis who don't want us there just seems reprehensible. How do you kill someone who has joined the resistance because he has seen family members killed (or totured or raped, etc.) by the coalition? You may see that as an unfortuante but necessary bit of injustice. I really can't get past the basic injustice of it.

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

"I felt like I'd been betrayed, personally," said Rodgers, 22, of Susanville, Calif. "I'd stood there, talking to him, shaking his hand, giving his kid candy. And he'd been studying our moves the whole time."

I was strongly opposed to the war but it happened, the U.S. troops are there in a situation of their own making, and I can't see how immediate withdrawal could improve things now.

*coughs* Conflating the troops with the dipshit up top who approved the action is not cool.

I will agree that there's a lot of hostility between Iraqi Kurds and Arabs.

Have seen the news today? Two Sunni clerics gunned down in shia Sadr City. If a full-blown power struggle were allowed to erupt, I think you'd see loyalties polarise pretty damn quickly, whether they be religious, tribal, political, whatever.

The strategies of persuasion are vastly different depending on which of these you're trying to influence (I guess some kind of direct action for group 1, argument& information for group 2(but does this group have any power?)

(to these Irish ears, Jonathan's last post sounds very like the kind of comments the British used to make about us to justify 30 years of army occupation of Northern Ireland)

Do we know who did it? It could be Allawi just as well as it could al-Sadr or the like. The AMS has made some fairly strong criticisms of the occupation.

The problem is that the U.S. invasion not only toppled Saddam but destroyed the entire infrastructure of civil administration. That left an enormous destabilizing vacuum, and ironically the massive presence of U.S. troops is the only reason Iraq has yet to collapse into civil war. God knows where you go from here though.

a lot of people think that it was wrong to invade Iraq, but having done that it would be wrong to know pull out when it's all gone tits up. I think it would be better for everyone if the USA cut their losses and staged a victorious unilateral withdrawal.

Inside the Bush administration policymaking apparatus, there is strong feeling that U.S. troops must leave Iraq next year. This determination is not predicated on success in implanting Iraqi democracy and internal stability. Rather, the officials are saying: Ready or not, here we go.

This prospective policy is based on Iraq's national elections in late January, but not predicated on ending the insurgency or reaching a national political settlement. Getting out of Iraq would end the neoconservative dream of building democracy in the Arab world. The United States would be content having saved the world from Saddam Hussein's quest for weapons of mass destruction.

The reality of hard decisions ahead is obscured by blather on both sides in a presidential campaign. Six weeks before the election, Bush cannot be expected to admit even the possibility of a quick withdrawal. Sen. John Kerry's political aides, still languishing in fantastic speculation about European troops to the rescue, do not even ponder a quick exit. But Kerry supporters with foreign policy experience speculate that if elected, their candidate would take the same escape route.

Whether Bush or Kerry is elected, the president or president-elect will have to sit down immediately with the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The military will tell the election winner there are insufficient U.S. forces in Iraq to wage effective war. That leaves three realistic options: Increase overall U.S. military strength to reinforce Iraq, stay with the present strength to continue the war, or get out.

Well-placed sources in the administration are confident Bush's decision will be to get out. They believe that is the recommendation of his national security team and would be the recommendation of second-term officials. An informed guess might have Condoleezza Rice as secretary of state, Paul Wolfowitz as defense secretary and Stephen Hadley as national security adviser. According to my sources, all would opt for a withdrawal.

I thought this to for about three or four months.

I don't think the New Repbulic's typical foreign policy positions qualify as liberal.

I think Hitchens has (correctly) stopped calling himself a liberal. (I think he said he wants to be considered a libertarian.)

Liberal Hawks Reconsider the Iraq War

which features a number of liberals who were hawkish on Iraq, including Paul Berman, Thomas Friedman, Christopher Hitchens, Fred Kaplan, George Packer, Kenneth M. Pollack, and Fareed Zakaria.

I fear that the people who think that the US should leave tomorrow - before any elections have even been held - are ignoring all the difficult questions. Who would we leave in charge? Allawi, the US appointed (not popularly elected by anyone) leader? How is that a just state of affairs to leave the country in? For those who insist on seeing the US presence in Iraq as intrinsically evil, wouldn't this be akin to the Nazis pulling out of France but leaving the Vichy government in control? And if we're not going to leave Allawi in charge, who are we going to leave in charge? Isn't that what elections are for? And if people don't think that elections are the right way to settle it, then what is?

There are Iraqis who object to holding elections while the country is still occupied.

If the U.S. withdrew and Allawi were left in charge, he wouldn't remain in charge for long.

(Hitchens is not a liberal.)

This is an interesting sentence. I'm curious why you think that. Is it because Allawi would voluntarily hold elections to replace himself, or would there be some type of coup, or would the situation just devolve into civil war? If it's one of the latter two options, then I'm wondering how this outcome is justifiable on humanitarian grounds.

I would consider a coup to get rid of Allawi preferable to the continuation of the occupation when most Iraqis apparently want us out their country. He obviously doesn't have much control over the country, and whatever control he does have would slip even more in the absence of the occupation forces to back him up. He would clearly be a lost cause. (Maybe there should have been an Iraqi referendum on whether the U.S. should get out of Iraq? That would not have taken as long as elections.)

There are major groups calling for a boycott on elections as long as the occupation remains in place.

The lesser of two evils, I think, is to have the election take place, and have a zillion international/UN observers there to give the whole thing an iota of credibility in the eyes of the people in the Middle East.

The self-interested argument for an ongoing Iraq presence I guess comes down to the goals of reshaping the Middle East in a more democratic, liberal mold. If Iraq budges even a little bit in that direction, it may help to loosen up some of the other autocratic regimes in the region. This in turn could help to reduce the conditions that make the area a fertile recruiting ground for apocalyptic Islamist terrorism. At the very least, it would clearly not be in Western interests to leave behind an Iraq that is going to become a stronghold for Al Qaeda.

I think we should bring back "self-determination" as an ideal for the rest of the world and lay off "democracy" for a while.

What does self-determination for Iraqis mean? Did the Shiites and Kurds have self-determination when they were being slaughtered by Saddam? Saddam is Iraqi so I guess it's fine whatever he wants to do to the people living inside the borders of "his" country - borders which incidentally were drawn up by the British and French in the early 20th century and do not correspond to any historical, cultural or nationalistic boundaries? If the US pulled out tomorrow what are the chances that Iraqis - all the people living within the borders of the country called Iraq - would end up with a regime that respected their rights?

http://www.belgraviadispatch.com/archives/001549.html

http://www.nationalreview.com/thecorner/04_09_19_corner-archive.asp#040202

If the US stays in Iraq, what are the chances that Iraqis would end up with a regime that respected their rights?

Given the patently dishonorable motivations for the invasion; given the way the U.S. has tried to prevent Iraqis from making any important decisions about their own economy; given in general how the occupation has been conducted, why should we trust the U.S. to set up fair elections?

Don't you think any crimes committed by the "coalition of the willing" against Iraqis will be judged more heavily by the Iraqis because they are crimes that have been committed by outsiders and infidels?

I've pretty much crossed over to the "we should pull out" side, myself. I bought into the "we can't leave" scenarios for a while, but now those are starting to seem hollow. At the same time, I don't think we should abandon the country. We should recognize that Iraq does need real peacekeeping and economic rebuilding, and we should put our resources at the disposal of any real international efforts along those lines (which would surface quickly if faced with the actual vacuum of an American pullout, because there are plenty of people who don't really want Iraq to fall to pieces).

The problem is, that solution would require an American leadership that was willing to give up all those neocon goals: a permanent military presence, an oil-rich mini-me.

And the name! "Active Denial System"...omg. Your George Bush joke here.

The new extra-dumb strategies will just remind Iraquis of Israels treatment of Palestinians. Analysts do see the Americans in Iraq now as just another of the problems, ie just like the insurgents in an ever-deepening multi-party civil war.

America must be held to account. The International Court of Justice. Sign up today ! The collateral damage documented by BBC but not so much by CNN in Fallujah .. staggering. No wonder Carey looks grim about job prospects.

Agent Orange, depleted uranium, .. chemical weapons, weapons of mass destruction, .. the recent bombing suggests the if-we-can't-have-it of the US-Israeli axis. When does dumb bombing become dirty bombing from an enemy with more sophisticated weaponry ? If that weaponry is too expensive then US soldiers are cannon fodder. That's there job. They should take the city using traditional soldier-on-soldier tactics. They may have to die in the protection of civilians (Iraqui civilians should after all be their paramount consideration as brave liberators anyway).

Instead of leaving the country in vacuum, they should instead install Bono as head decision maker, and provide adequate funding for rebuilding (hard to put a figure on it, but say roughly about the amount that's been spent on tearing the place apart to begin with).

Besides, the point made about self-determination is an excellent one- democracy can't be forced on the psyche of a country or region. This is an area of the world (well, roughly anyway) that was inventing mathematics and writing while the rest of us were chasing our dinners dressed in skins. Who's to say they haven't got it right?

And anyone that's over there making profits from oil/rebuilding/security contracts should be left behind. Tied up.

In theory, that sounds like a decent plan.

*

It's certainly against my personal interests to see the U.S. economy hit, but this might not be an entirely bad idea. This is pretty shrill, and I agree that there is some silliness mixed in here (G.I. Joes?), but the basic idea may not be so bad.

. . .[T]he world outside empire will be urgently called for after November -- after your emperor defies law, logic and ethics to sit again in the oval office -- to initiate or enhance already existing international campaigns of boycotts and sanctions against your industries, especially the weapons sector, and against your militaristic cultural products, such as G.I. Joe-type toys, RAMBO-like movies, your death-emanating "music," your racist video games, your health-busting sodas, cigarettes and fast "food," your genetically modified craze, your IT monopolies, etc.

The United Nations ought to be moved soon to any neutral city, perhaps Stockholm or Durban. Investments should be withdrawn from your global finance machine and reinvested in China, Brazil, South Africa, Egypt, India, just any place outside the immediate grasp of empire. Oil should be sold in a combined basket of currencies (as has been suggested by some analysts lately), where the dollar gradually loses its untouchable prominence. Governments should be most pressured to avoid buying your weapons -- perhaps they'll do well not to buy any weapons! Let those gigantic manufacturers of death go to hell to sell their firepower. Bright minds should seek education anywhere outside your borders. After all, in four years' time, Orwell would be horrified by the controls and intrusive watch mechanisms Uncle Sam will have deployed over them. It is high time for a reverse brain drain.

The world ought to exact a just, legal and morally sound punishment against you. That's how hoodwinked, obedient subjects of empires learn to question authority, to challenge arrogant xenophobia, to reject relative humanization of the rest of the world, and to jealously guard their rights in harmony with international law and universal moral principles. It is a cold shower of sorts, if you will.

Perhaps you shall need four more years of Bush to wake up and smell the injustice, to see through the dense fog that has clouded your vision and your moral compass alike. I do not say this lightly, I must add, as I can only guess in unreserved horror what price the rest of us will be made to pay for you to have this soul-searching four-year experience. It will feel like an eternity to Palestinians suffering under Israeli apartheid and colonial oppression; to Iraqis praying for your smart bombs to miss them; to Africans still struggling to escape the historic legacy of slavery manifested in AIDS, abject poverty and despondency; to Latin Americans dreaming of life without your well oiled juntas, death squads and economic mafias; to south Asians striving to escape the grinding axe of your inhumane globalization; to those Europeans who are hoping to shed their colonial heritage, to fight the reemerging national chauvinism in their midst and to promote a dialogue of civilizations; to most Americans who are losing their livelihoods, their children's education, even the remnants of their already abhorrent health services.--Omar Barghouti

i suppose my post was just reaction to the US army fallback to more trad. warfare in general, in a place they're supposed to be keeping the peace in. I guess the army is sick of Iraq, thought it'd be home a year ago, embarrassed for a number of reasons and so thought it'd fight back in Fallujah with what everybody knows it does best, ie heavy duty blasting. Presumably easier than re-building somewhere ruined and blighted by the two mostly non-surgical Gulf Wars. Why "nation-build" if Rumsfeld thunks it's too expensive/ make Iraq pay ? Why if you're really still in the middle of Gulf War II ?

(i respectfully kind'a wish to withdraw & admit to the basic futility of posts like this .. where does one start & end ?, Bush or Carey ?, when will some things change ?, since i don't know the answer to the thread title & am just complaining about how we got here, etc. etc.)

At this point, I'd still rate them higher than the chances if the US pulled out tomorrow.

...why should we trust the U.S. to set up fair elections?

I hate to repeat a Rumsfeld talking point, but in this case it bears mentioning. No election is ever perfectly fair, and I'm sure the Iraq elections will be far from perfect. However, even imperfect elections would be preferable to civil war, for obvious reasons.

Don't you think any crimes committed by the "coalition of the willing" against Iraqis will be judged more heavily by the Iraqis because they are crimes that have been committed by outsiders and infidels?

No doubt that they will be, but sometimes leaders have to take a long-term view. This can mean making unpopular decisions in the short-term.

Imperfect elections can lead to civil wars

No doubt that they will be, but sometimes leaders have to take a long-term view. This can mean making unpopular decisions in the short-term.

I think that sticking around and killing more Iraqis and committing more war crimes will have long-term consequences as well, both in Iraq and in the Arab and Muslim worlds generally.