News & Politics - Iraq PM: Country can manage without U.S.

Lexis · 07-14-2007, 08:35 AM

Quote:

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said Saturday that the Iraqi army and police are capable of keeping security in the country when American troops leave "any time they want," though he acknowledged the forces need further weapons and training.
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The embattled prime minister sought to show confidence at a time when congressional pressure is growing for a withdrawal and the Bush administration reported little progress had been made on the most vital of a series of political benchmarks it wants al-Maliki to carry out.

Al-Maliki said difficulty in enacting the measures was "natural" given Iraq's turmoil.

But one of his top aides, Hassan al-Suneid, rankled at the assessment, saying the U.S. was treating Iraq like "an experiment in an American laboratory." He sharply criticised the U.S. military, saying it was committing human rights violations, embarassing the Iraqi government with its tactics and cooperating with "gangs of killers" in its campaign against al-Qaida in Iraq.

Al-Suneid's comments were a rare show of frustration toward the Americans from within al-Maliki's inner circle as the prime minister struggles to overcome deep divisions between Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish members of his coalition and enact the American-drawn list of benchmarks.

Iraq PM: Country can manage without U.S. - Yahoo! News

So the US is either not needed (except for providing weapons and training) or making the problems worse and "embarrassing" the Iraqi government. So, why are we still there?

Indian Summer · 07-14-2007, 12:20 PM

Because it was never about helping Iraq, but about Bush finishing his daddy's dirty work? Sigh.

GhostWriter · 07-14-2007, 12:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Indian Summer (View Post)

Because it was never about helping Iraq, but about Bush finishing his daddy's dirty work? Sigh.

I agree, and it's sad that we're over there wasting time, money, and (more importantly) lives on a cause that doesn't exist.

jerkstore · 07-15-2007, 09:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lexis (View Post)

Iraq PM: Country can manage without U.S. - Yahoo! News

So the US is either not needed (except for providing weapons and training) or making the problems worse and "embarrassing" the Iraqi government. So, why are we still there?

OIL

UnsilentMajorty · 07-15-2007, 10:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jerkstore (View Post)

OIL

The irony is we've destroyed the infrastructure so much that none of the actual oil can be exported now. Insurgents are bombing pipe-lines and refineries as fast as workers can repair them. That is, unless the workers themselves aren't being kidnapped, tortured and beheaded on Al Jazeera...

All the ports are closed. To get oil out, you have to transpo it across land to neighboring countries who have open ports. Except that most of these shipments are either hijacked, or blown up by roadside bombs and raiding parties.

What is a double irony is that oil production and transportation (export) in the Middle East has always been very primitive and inefficient. The western world is just now realizing this because of the war. War's add more delay and problems to what was an already inefficient and archaic system to begin with.

Jacob1983 · 07-15-2007, 01:07 PM

Let's just see how things are when our guys leave Iraq. I wouldn't be surprised if they come crying and crawling for our help. Talk about being ungrateful. Our guys have been helping them build schools and hospitals though you never hear about it because it's not newsworthy and you never hear about our guys training the Iraqis to fight the insurgents or terrorists or whatever you want to call them.

Lexis · 07-15-2007, 02:11 PM

Well, I can see why the guy would be concerned about this strategy of working with Sunni groups that had previously been carrying out insurgent activities. But I think its ridiculous that these top officials are essentially saying feel free to buzz off but we're still there.

If you're interested, I'd really recommend taking a look at the Iraq Commission report, sort of an unofficial UK version of the Baker-Hamilton report. Its written in plain English and really breaks down Iraq's problems in a way that I found really interesting.The Iraq Commission

It concludes that "it is now clear that the initial, over ambitious vision of the coalition can no longer be achieved in Iraq" and that we should focus on what is possible.

Some key bits I picked out:

Quote:

• The UK should refocus its military activity,
progressively ceasing offensive military operations and
bringing to completion its programme of training and
building the capacity of the Iraqi security forces. As
Iraqi forces complete their training, and are
demonstrably capable, they will assume responsibility
for security. This handover should not be dependent
on the prevailing security situation.

I think this is a good idea - if we wait for perfection, we're gonna be there for a long, long time. Train the Iraqis, offer them support, then get out.

Quote:

Toby Dodge’s submission to the Commission identifies three
broad sets of groups deploying violence for their own endsiii.
The first are the ‘industrial-strength’ criminal gangs that
terrorise what is left of Iraq’s middle class, although there is
clear overlap between simple criminality and politically

motivated violence, especially where kidnapping is concerned.
The persistent reports that crime is as big a problem for the
citizens of Basra as Baghdad indicates that the state’s inability
to impose and guarantee order is a general problem across
large swathes of southern and central Iraq. Crime is driven by
profit and primarily non-communal. Going well beyond the
government’s inability to increase electrical output or stimulate
the job market, the continued freedom of criminal gangs to
operate is a primary concern for Iraqis.
The second type of organisation comprises the myriad groups
making up the Iraqi insurgency. The insurgency was born in a
reactive and highly localised fashion creating a number of small
fighting groups built around personal ties of trust, cemented by
family, locality or many years of friendship. Disparate groups,
formed to rid the country of coalition forces, are estimated to
comprise between 50 and 74 separate autonomous units, with
20,000–50,000 fighters in their ranksiv.

Some of the insurgent groups are drawn from the former
regime, the Ba’ath Party, the paramilitary Fedayeen and the
Republican Guard. However, some are anti-Saddam nationalist
groups with no desire to see Saddam restored but resentful of
US and Western presence; others are Islamist groups, some
members of which have been trained overseas or are foreign
nationals. Since 2005, the insurgency has to some degree
consolidated around four or five main groups: the Islamic
Army in Iraq, the Partisans of the Sunna Army, the
Mujahadeen’s Army, Muhammad’s Army and Islamic
Resistance Movement in Iraq. As the names suggest, political
violence has been increasingly justified in religious terms.

Foreign fighters, although small in number, have played a
disproportionately large role in the insurgency’s ideological
coherence. Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) aims to overthrow the Iraqi
government and establish an Islamic state in Iraq.

However, a US National Intelligence Estimate in January 2007
judged that foreign fighters are not likely to be a “major driver
of violence.”vi Most estimates number them in the hundreds,
rather than the thousands. Indeed, the brunt of Iraqi violence
appears to be driven by internal factors. Attacks on AQI by
Sunni groups have, it is claimed, demonstrated the waning
support for al Qaeda in Iraq.
The violence that erupted following the Samarra bombing saw
the insurgency combine with a third type of organisation - the
plethora of independent militias - to drive violence forward.
These militias are estimated to number between 60,000–
102,000 fighters and they have overtly organised and legitimised
themselves by reference to sectarian ideology.

Once again, we are reminded that al-Qaeda is just a piece of piece of the puzzle in this conflict. There's a whole heap of other groups that are mixed up in this.

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The scale of the humanitarian crisis in Iraq is vast. The UN
estimates around 100 people are killed every day. Two out of
five adults are traumatised. One in three is in need of
humanitarian assistance. One in six Iraqis has been displaced.
Up to 50% of the working population is unemployed. 54% live
on less than a dollar a day. Many schools have closed, and
thousands of doctors, teachers and other professionals have
been murdered or have fled the countryxxix.

Extraordinarily worrying.

Quote:

As part of their evidence to the commission, YouGov asked
the public about future policy in Iraq.

Which of these policies do you favour most now?

Britain should keep troops in Iraq as long
as is necessary to help Iraq build a peaceful democracy
15%

Britain should set a time limit within the
next 12-18 months for withdrawing all its
troops from Iraq
40%

Britain should withdraw all its troops from
Iraq as soon as possible, and certainly
within the next six months
37%

Don't know 7%

From a UK perspective, Gordon Brown is going to need to take this into account when he decides what to do.

One of the key things I liked was the idea of getting all the players (Iraq itself, UN, coalition, Iraq's neighbors) around a table and working on stability with the agreement that.

Quote:

All non-Iraqi participants in the negotiations should
commit to;
• securing a deal protecting the territorial
integrity of Iraq,
• exerting pressure on all Iraqi factions to
participate.

All participants in the process, Iraqi and international,
must commit beforehand to their opposition to al
Qaeda in Iraq. There needs to be a clear international
and national message that al Qaeda serves no Iraqi
interest.

Its long (119 pages) but its so enlightening - this whole situation can get really confusing.

**sunnykerr** · 07-16-2007, 12:56 PM

The thing, too, is that the fact that Iraq may fall apart (more I suppose since it's obvious that it's falling apart now) after a foreign troop withdawal is completely besides the point.

First of all, most countries have difficulties afte an invasion. That's just an historical fact.

Then there's the whole aspect of "they have to learn to cope on their own."

Not to mention that, in the absence of a concrete plan of action while the troops are there, their presence guarantees nothing, helps in no real way and cannot possibly do anything besides put the troops in harm's way. Now, I'm not saying soldiers aren't helping. I'm saying that the overall presence of foreign troops in Iraq has not helped the country. That's two different things.

jerkstore · 07-16-2007, 01:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jacob1983 (View Post)

Let's just see how things are when our guys leave Iraq. I wouldn't be surprised if they come crying and crawling for our help. Talk about being ungrateful. Our guys have been helping them build schools and hospitals though you never hear about it because it's not newsworthy and you never hear about our guys training the Iraqis to fight the insurgents or terrorists or whatever you want to call them.

They wouldn't have needed new schools and hospitals if we hadn't bombed the original school and hospitals to rubble in the first place.

Why should they be grateful to the people who turned their country into a war zone, destroyed the infrastructure, and caused hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths?

As for the insurgents, our troops were attacked by Iraqi policemen who we trained a few days ago. Ironic.

sportsfangirl · 07-16-2007, 03:39 PM

Sorry to be so cynical, but I'm not so sure. Iraq is in such a mess--and that's with the presence of foreign troops, nevermind without!

**sunnykerr** · 07-18-2007, 09:21 AM

Oh, Iraq is a ginormous mess right now, no doubt about that.

But I don't think the presence of foreign troops is helping that any, or controlling it any. I do think it's pissing off a lot of locals, which could actually means that it's making it worse.

Not to mention that it's not a mess that's likely to get better anytime in the foreseeable future. Pandora's box's been open. And I don't think the current American administration has any idea what to do with the results. Obviously, it's a hugely complicated scenario, so maybe no American administration could have dealt with this catastrophe any better, and it may be that no future American administration will ever find any better strategies.

So I keep coming back to the same thing. Yes, it's a mess. Yes, I kinda blame this administration for it, though I don't doubt their intentions going in weren't to have this happen. But I don't think the occupation is making it better. In fact I think it's making it worse. And, at the end of the day, it's the soldiers who are paying that price, when they really are not to blame. So I think the best thing to do would be to pull out.

But, and this is no small thing, I'm not an expert and I (hopefully) don't have all the facts. But I do hope that there's a much better reason than what we've been told for the continued presence of American troops in Iraq.

UnsilentMajorty · 07-18-2007, 10:20 AM

What we have here is a self-perpetuating cycle of violence and resentment.

The U.S. should have never invaded in the first place...

...Which, for you younger readers is the very first time in America's history that we committed an act of aggression against a sovereign nation who did NOT attack us, or anyone else...

But now that we have been there for five years, if we pull out the country very well turn into the thing the administration supposedly used as justification for the invasion in the first place: A haven for legitimate terrorists groups and anti-American factions to launch attacks against our Mid-East allies (Jordan; Israel; etc.) and the rest of the Western world too. It's the perfect Catch-22. We're damned if we do, damned if we don't.

Where there is a light at the end of the tunnel, relatively speaking, is it has been argued the current administration is going to keep the troops there until after the 2008, election. So, who(m)ever might be elected decides to pull us out the Republicans can then claim the new president (most likely a Democrat) "failed" because of the withdrawl.

The light at the end of the tunnel aspect is I believe most people (going by the mood of the country right now) will see through this and still blame George W. Bush for this whole mess. And they should. But at least, we might have our men and women home as a result.

**covington** · 07-19-2007, 10:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnsilentMajorty (View Post)

The irony is we've destroyed the infrastructure so much that none of the actual oil can be exported now. Insurgents are bombing pipe-lines and refineries as fast as workers can repair them. That is, unless the workers themselves aren't being kidnapped, tortured and beheaded on Al Jazeera...

All the ports are closed. To get oil out, you have to transpo it across land to neighboring countries who have open ports. Except that most of these shipments are either hijacked, or blown up by roadside bombs and raiding parties.

What is a double irony is that oil production and transportation (export) in the Middle East has always been very primitive and inefficient. The western world is just now realizing this because of the war. War's add more delay and problems to what was an already inefficient and archaic system to begin with.

The iraqi people are resilient. They will be fine. They are after all Babylon. Unfortunately the hanging gardens of Babylon have essentially been ruined by this ridiculous war.


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