Nouri who?
Post-invasion iraq - - Posted on February, 27 at 2:48 pm by Ken L
Have the yanks decided to do a Diem on poor old Nouri al-Maliki? Because it’s sure starting to look like Bush’s mob have totally abandoned all those benchmarks that were supposed to be achieved during the short period of calm delivered by Teh Surge.
Instead of focusing on political progress in Baghdad, the latest Bush Administration line is that the number of occupying troops will settle down at about 140,000 post-Surge, slightly higher than the pre-Surge level, which hardly suggests that field commanders share the rose-coloured view of progress being touted by the neo-cons and their naive disciples. Moreover, while Bush only plans to keep troops there for another 50 years, the man who could well be next president of the USA thinks troops might still be there in 100 years’ time.
It’s been a while since we’ve been reminded of the glorious flowering of Iraqi democracy under the fond tutelage of their American mentors, or of the sheer joy on the faces of Iraqi voters as they got their fingers painted purple. The rhetoric has shifted to the US successes in quelling the violence that it was responsible for unleashing in the first place. These successes have mainly been obtained by paying and arming Sunni warlords to fight terrorists instead of Americans, while paying Shiítes not to fight anyone. A strategy that depends on and encourages tribalism is hardly consistent with democratic processes so it’s understandable that Bush’s mob have gone a bit quiet on the matter.
The Turkish military incursion into Iraq has demonstrated very publicly that the yanks don’t really give a continental what the allegedly democratically-elected government of Iraq thinks about anything. It’s clear that the Turks are acting not only with the prior knowledge of the Bushistas but with their active assistance. While the Iraqi government has denounced the Turkish incursion and called for troops to withdraw immediately, the best the Bush crowd can come up with is this:
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates — who will visit Ankara later this week — said on Sunday Turkey’s campaign would not solve its problems with the rebels. Turkey should improve communication with Baghdad about the operation and other efforts against the PKK, he said.
I wonder how the Bush mob would have reacted in 2001 if people had told them invading Afghanistan would not solve their problems with al-Qaeda and they should improve their communication with Kabul instead. Not impressed I reckon, (mind you, it would have been bloody good advice).
Iraq on Tuesday condemned Turkey’s incursion into northern Iraq to fight Kurdish guerrillas in the strongest terms so far and demanded an immediate end to what it called a violation of its sovereignty.
As the occupying power, of course, the USA is responsible for protecting Iraq’s security. Giving intelligence to a neighbouring country so it can launch its military on the Kurds is a funny way of doing it. But of course the Kurds are expendable now:
Iraqi Kurdish ambitions no longer match US interests. A devastating recent essay by Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute titled “Is Iraqi Kurdistan a Good Ally?” analyzed the shifting alignments. Rubin thoroughly questioned the assumptions regarding the Iraqi Kurds’ “pro-Americanism”. He underscored that Iraqi Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani would turn out to be like former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat as a thorn in Washington’s side. Rubin alleged double-dealings by the Iraqi Kurds with Iran. He suggested the rampantly corrupt and decadent leadership in Kurdistan could only lead to a strengthening of the forces of religious conservatism and the growth of Islamist parties.
Rubin concluded, “As Turkish warplanes bomb terrorist bases in Iraqi Kurdistan, it is time for both Washington and Irbil [capital of the KRG] to reassess their policies. Washington has many cards to play. Sympathy to Kurdistan is understandable, but is increasingly based on myth. US goodwill should never be an entitlement. Barzani may remain an ally, but he has disqualified himself from any substantive partnership. It is time to take a tough-love approach to Iraqi Kurdistan. There should be no aid and no diplomatic legitimacy so long as Iraqi Kurdistan remains a PKK safe haven, sells US security to the highest bidder, and leaves democratic reform stagnant.”
Nothing like this has ever been said by a leading American analyst about the Iraqi Kurds, who were the darling of US policymakers through the past 17-year period since Saddam’s catastrophic Gulf War in 1991. Rubin sent out a deadly message - Washington has no more critical need of Iraqi Kurds.
He was spot on. The US military in Iraq has concluded that the best means of countering the Sunni insurgency is by bribing the militants. The success of the policy has sharply reduced US dependence on the Kurdish Peshmerga. As the US military works on a similar deal with the Shi’ite Sadrist militias as well, the use of Peshmerga as foot soldiers of counterinsurgency operations further diminishes.
Sucked in Kurdistan. And sucked in Nouri al-Maliki too, if you were ever silly enough to believe the guff about them supporting you while you forged a strong new democratic state (I doubt that you were). I hope you meet a kinder fate than Ngo Dinh Diem.
Posted in Post-invasion iraq |
February 27th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Sucked in Kurdistan. And sucked in Nouri al-Maliki too.
And sucked in America as well. Hardly anyone in the USA will know about any of this, or anything else for that matter, because Reporters Sans Frontiers has just issued its latest horror tale of Freedom in the Press, or lack of it, in today’s world.
The USA, the Land of the Free, just limped in at 48th place in the world for freedom of its press. A gulag of vacuum in other words, a civilian dictatorship of clamped mouths, a vacuous void of non-information, a propaganda prison of perjury. And Australia romped in at 28th, just in front of Ghana, but behind most nations we sneeringly refer to as third world, or backwoods.
Today, Americans are told nothing and know nothing. Their press freedom is nonexistant. Shackled, manacled, handcuffed, gagged, restrained, lied to, propagandised and spun out of control, America doesn’t know who or what committed 9/11, why they’re in Iraq, where it is, when they’ll be out. They can’t point to Iraq or Afghan on a map, or comprehend what the new rulers of the world are even on about. They will not see this blog while still blatting on about terrorism when it is they who are the spark who ignited the whole firestorm.
Their psychopathic president still squawks about that evil guy Warren Terra, hundreds if not thousands of times, while endless US atrocities abound in the world like Big Macs and are justified by the lockdown Patriot Act in that vast concentration camp, Stalag America.
The always bombarded Kurds and al-Maliki, by comparison, romp in closetted luxury resorts of freedom and should take a holiday to the USA to gain a true perspective.
February 27th, 2008 at 11:42 pm
It was Golda Meier, dubbed “the best man in the Israeli government” by Henry the K, who said “amerika usally forgives its enemies but always betrays it friends”. Diem, Somasa, Batista, D’Aubison, the Shah et al were entusiasticall;y supported until.. they weren’t.
February 28th, 2008 at 7:47 am
Amphibious - Australia “Our Greatest Ally” is regularly shafted too. On our first excursion in Timor, the US only helped with a so-called radio relay ship because all other US support was busy elsewhere. Also check the balances of the FTA foisted on us by our friends as a reward for our participation in every damned war the Yanks ever wanted.
The US most certainly has a lean and hungry look about it.
February 28th, 2008 at 11:45 am
It sickens me that both Bush and McCain are prepared to play with peoples lives like this. Not many of us will be around in 50 years, and certainly no one in 100 years, but what sort of world will it be over that period. This tells us a lot about the worlds immediate and long term future under the current Administration and the next Republican administration if Mc Cain makes it. The free world will not be free, there will be no regard for human rights or conventions, there will be a warmongering super power with a madman in charge (still), there will be no consultation with the rest of the world to declare war on other soverign states and they will declare any state that doesn’t support them as terrorists, giving them some legitimacy in occupation of their country. I understand that this is the case now, but to have this in the name of democracy Democracy by the World watchdog for 2 to 3 generations, boy we have something to look forward to.
One can only hope that the people of the Empire have a clear mind at the ballot box and change the administration, and god give Obama testicles to make a change.
All this makes you think who is worse, Sadam, The Taliban and Yassa or that that idiot Bush. They are certainly tarred with the same brush but Bush has more innocent blood on his hands.
Imagine Rodent being still in power and a Rodent clones ruling Australia for another term or two, we would be the same. Rodent tried the Bush cloning thing and fortunately Australians have some brains and punted the little prick.
February 28th, 2008 at 1:25 pm
Coincidentally, there was a highly pertinent blog entry a couple of days ago from a woman in Iraq:
Someone should explain to her that it’s all for her own good.