Informed Comment?
Juan Cole, noted intellect and history professor has 10 "Things" Congress Could Demand from Bush on Iraq. Cole says "US out now" as a simple mantra neglects to consider the full range of possible disasters that could ensue." He goes on to prattle of withdrawal creating a regional civil war and the dire global consequences of same. For example, civil war could interrupt 20 percent of oil production, which according to Cole "the poor of the world would be badly hurt, and the whole world would risk another Great Depression." (Civil wars have worked well for US corporate interests in the past, Vietnam, Korea, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Salvador, Columbia, etc.etc.etc.etc.)
Cole tells us, however, that "people who get to work on buses would feel it" (they are now dufus). If there was a depression "janitors and other workers will be the first to be fired." Not really, it's the middle and upper higher paid employees that are first cut. They'll always need someone to clean toilets and take out the garbage. During the Great Depression those who were once white collar were begging for the janitorial jobs. Cole predicts the "global south" would be stuck even longer in poverty (gasp! the US has worried & worked on Latin poverty for 2 centuries), for instance Jamaicans, who import everything, would be struck hard. Alas, tourists will pay more to drink Big Bamboo and Stingers. I don't know if Mr. Cole has ever been to the Latin and/or Caribbean third world but the bulk of the population currently live without water, electricity, sanitation, and the amenities of petro-conveniences. Most of Latin America's poor live the same, regardless of the West's economic rollercoasters. Homegrown frijoles, rice and plantains don't stop simply because gringos have an oil problem. I've no doubt what class would be "badly hurt" by a great depression.
But anyway, the synopsis of Cole's 10 point plan for Iraq would be :
1. Pull back US troops from the cities, let Iraqi police do the policing b/c the US troops are not traffic cops. We're not the world policemen? The Iraqi militant militias will be glad to hear it.
2. In Cole's "second phase of withdrawal" US troops would steadily be drawn out of Iraq. Mr. Cole would that take longer than our withdrawal from other spots, i.e. Japan, Germany, Columbia, the Philippines, etc.?
3. Give the Iraqi government "for as long as they wanted it" US air support against any rebellions. It's worked so successfully in Afghanistan and Bogata. He admits this tactic may take out a few Blackhawks occasionally but nothing is painless.
4. Large units of militiamen attempting to march from Anbar on Baghdad, e.g., would be destroyed by AC-130s and other US air weaponry suitable to this purpose. This tactic cannot prevent the current campaign of car bombings, but it can stop a full-scale Lebanon or Afghanistan-style civil war from erupting. Aren't we kind of doing that now?
5. In addition to the service of its air forces, the US would offer targeted military aid to ensure the stability of the Iraqi government ... protect key political figures from assassination ... help in preventing pipeline sabotage so as to increase Iraqi petroleum revenues and strengthen the new government. US policemen (but not called policemen) to protect corporate oil interests and puppet heads of state. Aren't we kind of doing that now?
6. In addition to the service of its air forces, the US would offer targeted military aid to ensure the stability of the Iraqi government. Once US ground troops are out, there is no reason not to let the Iraqi military just import a lot of tanks and train the new Iraqi army in using them. Protecting our puppets and building another "elite republican guard." Aren't we kind of doing that now?
7. The US should demand representative elections in Iraq if they want further help from us. Dieboldaraqi.
8. The US should demand those Baathists not guilty of crimes against humanity should be returned to the bureaucracy. A "key step in convincing the old Sunni Arab elites that they won't be screwed over in the new Iraq." No more screwed than the rest of Iraqi elite, sounds fair to me.
9. All of the reconstruction money should go directly to Iraqi firms, so as to help jump-start the economy. Especially to the joint venture firms of Halliburaq, KellogArab & BrownAli, etc. Cole seems to be doing a lot of should-ing on Iraq.
10. The US should join the regular meetings of the foreign ministers of Iraq's neighbors, with Condi Rice in attendance, along with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, employing a 6 + 2 diplomatic track to help put Iraq back on its feet through diplomacy and multilateral aid. This step will require that the Bush administration cease threatening regularly to bomb Tehran or to overthrow the governments of Syria and Iran ... The US is now a Middle Eastern Power, not just a New World one, and as such it needs to use Iraq's neighbors to calm their clients within Iraq. This goal cannot be achieved through simple intimidation, more especially since, with half of all fighting units bogged down in Iraq, the US is in no position to follow through on its threats and everyone knows it. Surely he jests. We will not be "getting out" of Iraq, unless another superpower throws us out. I lean toward thinking the posturing toward Iran is fake. Iran's ruling rightwing are buddies with our ruling rightwing (ask Carter vs Reagan). That's one reason why the US has no problem with Iraq going to Shiite. If the US decides to take its own threats seriously we have all the firepower positioned to back it up. Intimidation and force are exactly why we're now a "Middle Eastern Power."
Cole ends the dufus 10 point solution with : "Once Iraq can stand on its own feet, I am quite sure that the Grand Ayatollah in Najaf will just give a fatwa for complete US withdrawal, and the US will have to acquiesce, as it did in similar circumstances in the Philippines." How many decades were we in the Philippines before we acquiesced? My solution? Stop dicking around in other people's countries.
8 comments:
I read Cole daily. Because there is a single article that you partially disagree with is no reason to either insult him or lump him with intellectual giants such as Pat Robertson and W. Cole made VALID points in the article. To disagree with them is fine. To be mindlessly insulting and rude is Republican.
Has this become Rush/A/Blog?
Cole is a fake offering fake solutions. He insults the intelligence. If I wanted to play nice I would do a Knit/a/blog.
Sadly you seem misinformed. Cole has been one of the "good" guys from the beginning. He has frequently posted negative columns about Bushco, the Neocons, and Israel. His assessment of Iraq and the Middle East has been on the money since I started reading his blog a few years ago.He has been attacked by all sides for his honest opinions.
I did find your post about Cole to be derivative of a recent DAILYKOS post about the same article.
I would suggest you take the time and read through Coles archives found somewhere here
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jrcole/
You have much better target than Cole to post about.
The venom of this article, instead of honest questioning of some of Coles positions in the article, is very disturbing. It would make sense if Cole were continually spewing the party line, an apologist for the status quo, or disingenious in his other posts. But he is not.
We all make mistakes at some point, and this is a dark spot on an otherwise worthwhile blog.
I no longer read Cole or Kos. In this article Cole is doing nothing more than supporting what BushCo is currently doing. Stay the course until the Iraqi forces can be trained, re-arm them, protect their heads of State, etc. etc. He is neither being objective or honest with his readers. But I don't mind you being a fan of Cole, I once was.
If Cole were such a "fake" Why would he allow this post? ( This is the model of how it should be done)
Achcar on Cole Proposals for Withdrawal of US Ground Troops
' Dear Juan,
As a regular reader and occasional contributor to your blog, which I believe is doing a real service to all those concerned with the situation in Iraq, and as an activist in the antiwar movement, I feel it necessary to comment on your last piece of argumentation posted today, August 22, 2005, where you argue at length against the “US Out Now” position. I was surprised to see that, on this score, you are quite a bit softer toward the US occupation of Iraq than Andrew Bacevich, whose piece The Washington Post ran yesterday.
The core of your argument is stated from the beginning when you talk about “the lid the US military is keeping on what could be a volcano.” Using the same “lid” metaphor, I would reply that the lid that the US military is keeping on the Iraqi situation is precisely what makes the pot boil so dangerously and threaten to explode at any moment.
You add: “All it would take would be for Sunni Arab guerrillas to assassinate Grand Ayatollah Sistani. And, boom.” Agreed: that could definitely lead to a disaster. But, aside from the fact that Sistani does not rely for his protection on US or any other foreign troops, do you seriously believe for one second that, if he were assassinated, the presence of US troops would prevent the disaster? You know quite well that, not only is this last assumption highly unlikely, but it is also quite possible to make the opposite point: that such an explosion in the presence of US troops would just make things worse, by greatly increasing the number of casualties when the US military resorts to the “conventional” weapons of mass destruction that it possesses and has not hesitated to use in cases like Fallujah.
The only hope one could have of avoiding the slide into a full-blown, devastating civil war — if Sistani were to be assassinated — is if the forces involved in the political process, i.e. those not already involved in the low-intensity civil war going on in Iraq, were successful in achieving control over their constituencies after an inevitable first outburst of anger, by emphasizing that the perpetrators are either the Baathists or Zarqawi’s followers or the like, that their objective is exactly to ignite a civil war, and that the best reply to that is precisely to pay heed to Sistani’s insistence on the necessity of avoiding any kind of sectarian war.
As for the other argument that you make implicitly, namely that the presence of US troops in Iraq would prevent the shift from a local civil war to “a regional war, drawing in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Turkey,” this too is unconvincing. One could more easily argue that it is the very presence of US troops in Iraq, combined with Washington’s provocative policy toward Iran and Syria, that threatens very concretely to ignite a regional war, with all the consequences that you may imagine, including those on the price of oil, the importance of which you underline. Isn’t it already quite clear, by the way, that Washington’s saber rattling toward Teheran is responsible for a great deal of the recent hike in oil prices?
Let me now comment on the “responsible stance” that you advocate in the guise of an “exit strategy.” I’ll take up your main arguments:
1) “US ground troops should be withdrawn ASAP from urban areas as a first step. Iraqi police will just have to do the policing. We are no good at it. If local militias take over, that is the Iraqi government's problem. The prime minister will have to either compromise with the militia leaders or send in other Iraqi militias to take them on. Who runs Iraqi cities can no longer be a primary concern of the US military…”
Strange indeed! If the argument against the “Out Now” position is that the withdrawal of the troops ASAP would lead to civil war, everything in the above paragraph backfires completely.
2,3&4) US ground troops would be withdrawn, in a second phase, while US air bases would be kept and US air forces used in support of the Iraqi government: “we would replicate our tactics in Afghanistan of providing the air force for the Northern Alliance infantry and cavalry.” This, you believe, “could prevent the outbreak of fullscale war.” And than you add: “This way of proceeding, which was opened up by the Afghanistan War of 2001-2002, and which depends on smart weapons and having allies on the ground, is the major difference between today and the Vietnam era, when dumb bombs (and even carpet bombing) couldn't have been deployed effectively to ensure the enemy did not take or hold substantial territory.”
First, starting from the end, I am surprised that, whereas you stress the difference between Vietnam and Afghanistan, you don’t see the much greater one — in terms of the nature of the terrain, of the kind of war (urban vs. rural guerilla), etc. — between Afghanistan and Iraq. From the military point of view, your suggestion of a replica in Iraq of US support to the Northern Alliance troops in Afghanistan is, to be frank, quite nonsensical. The proof of the pudding is that, if anything of the kind could work in Iraq, I am sure the Pentagon would not have waited until they read your blog.
Second, have you considered that the goal of the Bush administration might precisely be to keep US air bases in Iraq for the long haul, and that arguments such as yours are very likely to be used to support this goal? Keeping in mind the nature of the dominant political forces in Iraq, and everything you yourself have written repeatedly about their Iranian connections, do you seriously believe that Iraqi majority leaders would agree to US air bases remaining in their country after the withdrawal of all ground troops? And even if we assumed that to be the case, don’t you see that this would be the best recipe for the continuation of the “insurgency” and for regional conflicts, for that matter?
7&8) “The US should demand as a quid pro quo for further help” — a. “that elections in Iraq henceforward be held on a district basis so as to ensure proper representation in parliament for the Sunni Arab provinces.” ; and b. “that the Iraqi government announce an amnesty for all former Baath Party members who cannot be proven to have committed serious crimes, including crimes against humanity. Former Baathists who have been fired from the schools and civil bureaucracy must be reinstated, and no further firings are to take place.”
First of all, let me state clearly that I am resolutely opposed to the US government demanding any quid pro quo for “help” it could offer the Iraqi authorities: this reminds me of the Godfather’s “offer you can’t refuse.” Second, the procedure of Iraqi elections is no more the business of the US than that of US elections is the business of Iraq. Third, Washington’s imposition of an amnesty for whatever Baathists, aside from its reaching the highest degree of cynicism, would be the best way to replace the frustration of the “Sunni Arab political elites” that you are keen to quench with the frustration of the overwhelming majority of the Kurdish and Shia Arab masses and political elites (except Allawi and his crowd)! Of course, Washington, with its global arrogance, sees no problem with ignoring the basic principles of peoples’ right to self-determination and non-interference of a state in the internal affairs of another — both inscribed in the UN Charter of which the US is the foremost world violator — but surely the antiwar movement shouldn't take a similar position.
For the rest, I think that Bacevich, a Vietnam veteran himself and definitely not a radical, has made very clearly the main commonsensical arguments for the call for bringing US troops home now so that I don’t need to repeat them here. I am sure, Juan, that you are genuinely seeking to elaborate a “responsible stance,” as you call it, which would be in the best interest of both the US and Iraqi peoples. I believe, however, that you are on the wrong track and hope that you will rethink your stance accordingly and join the increasing majority of both populations calling for a total and immediate withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.
With my best regards,
Gilbert Achcar '
Achcar addressed the issues honestly, intellectually and without derogatory venom.
I'm not so quick to rudely condemn someone for a single post I disagree with.
I've disagreed with Cole before and find myself short on tact these days, by choice.
What you consider my "venom" I consider simply impatience with the pseduo-left in this country.
I read Cole regularly but was disapointed by his: "Lets keep our troops in the bases and give Jaafari's quasielected government control of our air force and a shitload of tanks" solution to the Iraq quagmire. I'm not sure how "international aid" which usually translates (except when its to Israel) as userous loans is going to work under Islamic law.
If Cole cunningly succeeds in preventing "civil war" as in militias marching around and mounting conventional battles, isn't that just going to force them to conduct a "low intensity" guerilla
conflict with carbombs and suchlike that no side can win for ever?
Ian
Iraq may institute lending laws similar to Pakistan's. I believe though the Pakistan Supreme Court is still ruling and reversing, ruling and reversing on the "riba" laws. Some Islamic countries use "Murabaha contracts" i.e. the lender does a mark-up. Currently international loans to Pakistan are structured to include profits/returns. Musharraf is GOP and CIA friendly, etc.
Last week Wolfowitz committed to raise World Bank lending to Pakistan to 1.5 billion. Said Wolfie: "Noting the important governance reforms and fiscal correctives Pakistan had adopted in recent years, Wolfowitz said the country was moving in a positive direction economically. This was a moment that must be seized to address its underlying development problems."
Convenient how Musharraf came to power in that 1999 coup, just ahead of the time the US would need Pakistani support in the GWOT.
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