Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain

Wed, 07/29/2009 - 4:26pm

Look, I think old Obama is a pretty good president. And I've said I think Gates is the best secretary of defense ever. But I think getting all hot and bothered over the possibility of taking one more brigade out of Iraq this year overlooks two basic facts:

  • Obama has broken a campaign promise to take out a brigade a month. (I think he was right to do this, but that's neither here nor there.)
  • Right now, we have about as many troops in Iraq as on average over the last six years.

But I know, this is just today's lead...

Meanwhile, old Juan Cole, among others, says that the Iraqi interior ministry's raid on the MEK shows that pro-Iranian hardliners are getting the upper hand in the Baghdad government.

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Thomas E. Ricks | Permalink | | Comments? Login or register
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Can't let go

by JWing on Wed, 07/29/2009 - 6:37pm

The only reason why we're keeping 130,000 in Iraq is because Gen. Odierno is afraid of things reversing and to help secure the Jan. 2010 Iraqi elections. With all the new restrictions on U.S. forces however, will the U.S. even be wanted to provide real help for the vote? If not, why not draw down more now? Also, the Iraqi forces can't defend their country, but I don't see any of their neighbors invading anytime soon, and they're good enough to handle the insurgency as well, so there's another reason for pulling out troops. I think Odierno and others are just afraid to let go. Things are really not going to get qualitatively better there anytime soon, and the Iraqi government can putter along in gridlock for the foreseeable future.

Can they?

by Charlieford on Wed, 07/29/2009 - 10:40pm

It's not a rhetorical question, btw, ie, I haven't any answer to this I already think I know.

But, if the we leave, and Maliki and the Shi'a turn on the Sunnis--purging them from the police, etc., hunting them down, denying services to Sunni areas, etc.--will the Sunni insurgency flare up again?

If it does, can Maliki's govt. deal with it?

If he can't, what will Iran's move be?

If Iran moves in (in some degree), or even if Maliki just on his own does crush the Sunnis, what will Saudi Arabia et al's response be?

I realize all this is speculation, but how likely is this scenario, in whole or in part?

I also realize some would say however likely it may be, we've done our part and they need to take it from here, come hell or high water. But I'd still like to know how likely it is.

Sectarian war is over

by JWing on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 10:20am

That won't happen because the sectarian war is over. The Sunnis lost and they know it. That's why there is the Sons of Iraq. The majority of the insurgency gave up and switched sides and Maliki and the Shiites know it.

The Shiite south is actually still the poorest part of the country by far. In Anbar, the most Sunni of Iraqi provinces, the Awakening Sheikhs want to run with Maliki in the Jan. 2010 parliamentary elections. The Sunnis are also disproportionally represented in the army compared to their numbers in the population. There has been no reports of Sunnis being transferred around or kicked out. These are all examples contradicting fears that the Sunnis and Shiites will go at it after the U.S. leaves.

As far as Iran goes, they are already there. They are the 1st or 2nd largest trade partner to Iraq. They are the largest source of tourism. They provide electricity and gas to Iraq. They still have large sway over members of the Supreme Council and the Dawa party, plus friends in the Kurdish parties. They are trying to push the Shiites to run together in the United Iraqi Alliance in 2010. Plus they still fund Shiite militants who have had a little uptick in attacks on U.S. forces since April 09. In the U.S. most reporting is on their military policy of supporting the Special Groups, but Tehran's political and economic policy are much more important. They want a friendly Iraq run by Shiites so that it will never be a rival again.

Here's something on Iran's policy towards Iraq that I wrote if you're interested:
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2009/03/irans-policy-towards-iraq.html

But, if the we leave, and

by J Thomas on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 10:53am

But, if the we leave, and Maliki and the Shi'a turn on the Sunnis--purging them from the police, etc., hunting them down, denying services to Sunni areas, etc.--will the Sunni insurgency flare up again?

Sure, but they can't do much. They have no offense. All they can do is kick the iraqi army out of the areas they already control, they can't attack shia areas.

If it does, can Maliki's govt. deal with it?

No. They have no offense either. They have no airforce to bomb sunni towns, and not nearly enough artillery. Their vehicles are not very IED-resistant. All they can do is keep the sunnis out of areas they already control.

What Maliki can do is cut off food supplies and power and cut the train network etc. Wall them off.

If he can't, what will Iran's move be?

Probably nothing in particular.

what will Saudi Arabia et al's response be?

Nations to the west will likely allow lots of transport, bringing in food and weapons and such, provided somebody pays for it. Anbar etc become a separate country. Kurdistan probably becomes a new country, perhaps allied with shia or sunni iraq or maybe not. What do they really have to offer either side? They won't fight and die for either of them. They'll fight for the oil unless they can make a good deal, is there anything to trade that's worth enough to set that aside?

I can't predict beyond that because I can't predict the logistics. Will sunni iraq be a perpetual drain for saudi arabia? How long would the saudis pay for that? Who will control the northern oil? How much money will the southern oil bring in, for shias to use? How much will the shias fight among themselves? Lots of the questions are constrained by economic realities that I can't predict.

Saudis

by JWing on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 2:31pm

From what I've read, and there's very little of it in English, the Saudis got spooked when the sectarian war really took off and thought Iraq would turn into another Lebanon. They cut off a lot of funding for insurgents groups that they backed before. Nowadays they mostly give money to Sunni political parties.

Sure, and if they saw sunnis

by J Thomas on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 3:29pm

Sure, and if they saw sunnis in iraq getting starved out would they pay for food for them? Would they pay for weapons if the sunnis were getting attacked and killed?

If the saudis did pay for stuff, how long would they keep doing it? Can the sunni parts of iraq develop an economy that lets them pay for what they need? People say they don't have oil though people also say a lot of their land hasn't been explored for oil.

These are all. questions I don't have any firm answers for. There are surely people who could give more confident answers than I could, but I'm not sure how far to trust them on it either. We're talking about what people would do and could do in an unprecedented circumstance, and our best guesses might not be very good.

Sectarian politics is not everything

by JWing on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 6:17pm

The fact of the matter is no one gets their fair share in Iraq. Kurdistan has more stability and better security than the rest of Iraq yet ranks below almost all national averages in economic indicators and services.

The Shiite south is also still the poorest part of the country just like it was under Saddam.

The provincial budgets all come form the same source, oil revenue and are distributed roughly according to population. Anbar and Salahaddin are the only two majority Sunni provinces. They have the 9th and 10th largest populations in the country. In turn, they have the 7th and 10th largest capital budgets for investment respectively. It doesn't really matter because the provinces usually struggle to spend 50% of their money.

Iraq is a lot more than ethnosectarian politics.

Iraq is a lot more than

by J Thomas on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 7:12pm

Iraq is a lot more than ethnosectarian politics.

Sure. If that heats up, it might trump a lot of the rest.

If iraqis generally feel like there's more than enough oil revenue to go around, then they can continue their government that tries to split it up. If they feel like there isn't enough then there's the question who gets thrown off the bus, and the government might in reality split up. Why send in representatives to vote when they can't get anything anyway?

Then it could break down into regional war. But it's easier, safer, and more convenient to make a deal -- provided there's a deal to be made that's satisfactory to each side that might revolt.

Obviously set in your beliefs

by JWing on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 8:29pm

You obviously believe that Iraq is one step away from falling into the brink.

This year Iraq suffered through one of the worst world recessions in recent memory. Oil prices plummeted. They're going to run a $15 bil deficit this year. They had to go to the IMF and get a loan. Most if not all of the provinces are running deficits and don't have any money to pay for new projects. Has Iraq fallen apart? Are the Sunnis claiming this is happening to them because they are Sunnis and the government is run by Shiites? On the contrary, the Awakening Sheiks in Anbar want to run with Maliki in the 2010 elections and have been talking about for more than 6 months now.

If Iraq can live through a bad world recession and the resulting drop in oil prices and deficits, I don't know where your argument that Sunnis are going to go starving and everyone is going to go broke because there's not enough oil money, and that's going to lead to an unraveling stands on.

You obviously believe that

by J Thomas on Fri, 07/31/2009 - 9:41am

You obviously believe that Iraq is one step away from falling into the brink.

No, I was responding to CharlieFord's question. What can we expect if the shia government attacks the sunnis?

My thought is that neither side can attack real effectively, so militarily it would tend toward stalemate. It seems plausible that they wouldn't voluntarily join together again after an attempt at civil war by the shia government. Would one side collapse from the strain of a stalemate? It looks plausible to me that if that happened it wouldn't be the shia government. The sunnis might get help from saudi arabia or somebody else, but for how long? The shias wouldn't share oil revenue with them while attacking them. Could sunni areas develop some sort of economy before their funding ran out? If things were peaceful enough they might possibly find oil and get it developed, maybe pump it through jordan and israel....

Why would shias start up a war? I don't see any good reason for them to do that. To the extent that they already control the government and the oil and the US-trained US-supplied shia army, they might reasonably feel like they don't need to fight anybody unless somebody else refuses to accept their rule and initiates hostilities. The question was, what would happen if they did. While I can certainly figure it's plausible it won't happen, I'm not at all confident about my ability to estimate the odds, or anybody else's ability.

It's the sort of thing where after something happens you can look back and in hindsight it looks like it was inevitable. But looking forward nothing looks particularly inevitable.

If Iraq can live through a bad world recession and the resulting drop in oil prices and deficits, I don't know where your argument that Sunnis are going to go starving and everyone is going to go broke because there's not enough oil money, and that's going to lead to an unraveling stands on.

It makes sense to me that iraqis should all be pals. If they disagree and want to fight each other, and if the shia army is not good at attacking sunni strongholds, then one alternate strategy is to cut off the food shipments. Can anbar etc get by without the wheat & beans shipped from the southern port? I don't know. Maybe they'd starve if the shia government tried to starve them.

But why would they try to kill each other? Wars are chancy things, people get killed and stuff gets blown up. Surely everybody would be better off to be pals. If there's enough oil money, and they can share well enough, wouldn't they rather share the oil money and do reconstruction etc than fight and tear things up more? That sure makes sense to me and maybe it would make sense to them.

But if there isn't enough oil money to go around then it kind of makes sense to fight over it. When the alternative is everybody has enough, fighting makes a lot less sense.

The shia government army could be a trump that stops anyone else from attempting to win much by violence. With sufficient US logistics, training, "stiffening" and air support, that's certainly the case. How long will we continue to do that enough to provide that certainty?

I don't have any certainties. I can imagine things going lots of different ways. If I knew more about the details of the iraqi economy and military I'd have a better sense of what to rule out.

Raid on MEK and Iran

by arvay on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 6:34am

Why would anyone be surprised at Iran's growing influence in Iraq?

Thanks to George W. Bush, the main obstacle -- Saddam Hussein and his Baathists -- was removed, and the Iraqis elected a Shiite-led government. Say, which purple-dyed finger were they raising?

And what will we do when Iran's influence grows steadily over the years? Re-invade? Maybe the Iranians will provide military support -- weapons and "advisers" -- to combat Sunni insurgents and al Quaeda. Which would be a good thing, no?

With their vast oil reserves and potential wealth, Iraq is well-positioned to thumb its nose at the Saudis and, ultimately, us. And also to help Iran if it's targeted with more sanctions.

Yes, at great human and financial cost, we've paved the way for a new stability in the region, caused two formerly bitter enemies to embrace and possibly altered history in a fundamental way.

What are you using to base

by blue13326 on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 9:51am

What are you using to base your opinion on Obama being a good president?

He's had no foreign policy successes (and a few humiliations) and the economy has lost 3 million jobs and counting under his watch. The nosedive in his approval ratings this early in his presidency is unprecedented.

Even if you blame all this on Bush (and you likely do), what concrete positive achievements do you use to base your opinion on him?

What are you using to base

by J Thomas on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 10:55am

What are you using to base your opinion on Obama being a good president?

For myself, I remember that he isn't Bush and he isn't McCain.

And then I give a little shrug and remember that this is America, and this is as good as it gets. Bush lowered the bar so far that I'm grateful for Obama.

Time to come home.....

by Bill Keller on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 12:51pm

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/31/world/middleeast/31advtext.html

Diogenes may have an heir.

Thanks, JWing & JThomas, for responses to my questions.

by Charlieford on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 4:39pm

I realize it's all conjectural, but it's nice to have a sense for the contingencies. That was all very helpful.

I'm wondering if, with all the unraveling going on (and this doesn't seem to be the kind of problem US power can effectively address--or am I wrong?) if Mr. Ricks still thinks it's necessary to keep the US military involved? Do you think the risks of a renewed civil war are as negligible as seems to be described above? Is there any other reason we need to be there?

Possible conflicts

by JWing on Thu, 07/30/2009 - 8:34pm

Most of the conflicts in Iraq today are political. Baghdad vs. Kurds, federalists vs. centralists, etc. If there's a flare up it will probably be with Kurdish peshmerga getting into a shootout with an Iraqi army unit. Even then I don't think that would lead to war. At the worst, if the Kurds hopes for an expanded Kurdistan and autonomy on oil are squashed they will push for independence. The U.S. hasn't shown much initiative in starting talks to resolve these issues. All they're doing now is trying to keep out of the political battles and set up communications between the Iraqi units on the ground so they don't start shooting. It's helpful but not really solving anything.