Kudos to the Bush Administration

I guess I'm just feeling a little grateful that the administration is willing to concede there might be another way besides the one they've maintained all this time.

Here's something to chew on...as part of the solution, we first have to determine what we want from Iraq? Is it enough to simply pull out and tell them they're on their own or should we seek some other end game? Seriously.

 

Asshole of the year: DYE!

Let's give him a round of applause!

 

Got my vote. And anyone proud of winning an award like that deserves a good wedgie.

 

Alley, I'll weigh in, for what it's worth.
I do not believe you can walk away (gradually and or otherwise), and not expect a civil war among the Shiites and Sunnis.
Many innocents would die, making the removal of power of Hussein pointless. If that was done to stop civilians from dying, then protect the rest from the same fate. A civil war makes this a moot point.
That being said, what do you do? Do you stay around as a peace-keeping force, which would never work as the insurgency will not stop as long as there are any American forces there. Or do you pull out completely and allow the woefully prepared Iraqis do it themselves?
Also, what do we want from all of this? I never understood the obsession of instilling democracy to them. It would be like us invading the USSR in the 70's to eliminate Communism. It's what they are, it's what they will be. It's unfair for others to conform to what we think they should be. Let them be what they are, we just adapt to it. I would like to see the Iraqi people be able to exist on their own, I just don't see it happening the way this is playing out right now.

 

There is no solution that is in any way good for the United States.
There are only really bad ones and marginally less-bad ones.
I suspect the Wise Men Committee are going to come up with some phony partition scheme. The problem is that I haven't seen one yet that doesn't leave one party or the other in charge of most of the oil, which guarantees that the other two remain pissed, especially the Kurds, who actually have a real army and have their own problems with Turkey.
There's already a civil war -- 55 deaths in the last two days -- and the only difference is that our troops are in the middle. And now we're going to tell Maliki to shuffle his cabinet again. Whatever solution has to include an Iraqi government that feels free to tell us to fuck off. It's the only path to legitimacy there is.
Get the fuck out. Redeploy. Whatever you want to call it. And go to work on Afghanistan, because that's blowing up too.

 

Mark, I think that's exactly the question we have to ask. What's the result we want in Iraq and is it at all legitimately possible to achieve that goal?

 

1) There isn't one.
2) No.

 

The best we can do now is to offer some sort of a partition plan, set a timetable for pulling the bulk of our troops out, and leave a force of some number at one of the permanent bases.

As I said before the invasion began, we aren't ever leaving Iraq. We might only leave 10K, 20K troops there, but we didn't build those bases for nothing, and many will insist on some sort of permanent deterrent to Iran.

Then we'll have to answer to Turkey for directly going back on our word and helping establish a Kurdish state. But better to do that than remain targets in the midst of a civil war.

 

Wow, sure am glad you guys have control of Congress. We've been saying forever that you have no plan, I wish you'd have admitted it before the election.

 

Partition might stop the sectarian violence between Sunni and Shia, but it leaves other problems: the oil wealth previously mentioned and the Kurds vs. Turks.

But that's not all.

What about Baghdad, which has sizable amounts of all 3 populations? If the Shias hook up with Iran, Turkey invades northern Iraq, and the Sunnis sit impoverished with no oil, how does that solve anything?

And a future 20K U.S. force in Iraq would be nothing but a speed bump for the Iranians, just like our 37K on the Korean DMZ would be if Kim Jong-Il ever got jiggy.

 

Football --
I pretty much agree with all that.

I wasn't offering what I thought would be an ideal solution.

That's what I think will end up happening.

Though I will point out that Kim Jong-il hasn't run over the DMZ in Korea, yet.

I don't know what number will have to stay, but I do know we won't be leaving, ever.

And yes, the trouble with a free Kurdish state is that it instantly becomes a huge power in the Middle East, having both oil reserves and water. And Turkey ain't havin' it.

Quite the mess we've made. Many, many problems the armchair commandos never stopped to consider.

 

Quite a few people here are offering sincere thoughts, Guy, but go ahead and go after the one guy who is typically the most extreme. It's what people on both extremes do, and it doesn't get us anywhere, and is part of the problem. But anyway.