No Escape from Baghdad: America’s Bipartisan Project in Iraq by David Wise, War on the Rocks
The United States has essentially been at war in Iraq for 24 straight years. It began with Operation Desert Shield on August 7, 1990, with the first American fatality occurring just five days later. This war extends over four presidents and 16 Congresses, dominated alternatively by both major political parties. America’s current situation in Iraq and the surrounding area – both good and bad – is truly a bipartisan project. The irrepressible optimism of Americans that the United States has the power to “fix” any situation – even in a region where the complex web of enmities is centuries old – is established dogma in and beyond both the Republican and Democratic parties. Although it runs counter to the American tradition of unilateralism, almost every crisis point on the globe that has festered for decades – and this is one – requires a regional dialogue, which will often include people we do not like…
Comments
It is great that the President has a new Iraq/Syrian IS strategy but did he think about the "unintended consequences" of what will be triggered by that strategy?
Seems that we are moving the various jihadi groups together in a unified front against no one less than the US.
So instead of dealing with just one what --are we to put boots on the ground as advisors in five different ME countries to confront the jihadi front that Obama has now created.
Some commenters here stated--stay out and let the countries involved handle the problem as it is not our problem.
#AQAP & #AQIM statement urges Mujahideen to unite, stop infighting and face the Americans together
This new US strategy is now being used by the jihadi's for even more recruiting stating--see we are taking on the Americans and only we an defeat them in the ME--and it works with the young male Muslims of today.
Mr. Wise is correct that President Bush, Vice President Cheney, and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld deserve all of the blame for starting the Iraq War and most of the blame for other mistakes. However, President Bush at least showed an open mind to adapting to events and listening to military leaders such as during the Iraqi Surge.
President Obama deserves credit for going after Osama bin Laden against advice, agreeing to a limited surge in Afghanistan, supporting (presumably) Secretary of State Clinton and Europeans in the attack on Libya, and getting Assad to give up many of his chemical weapons. However, as Mr. Wise mentioned he screwed up in Syria by not enforcing red lines and seems to be vacillating in Ukraine as well.
In today's Senate committee, General Dempsey also admitted to Senator McCain that in 2012 President Obama went against the advice of his Secretaries of State and Defense, and his CIA Director in their advice to assist and train the Free Syrian Army. General Dempsey also said his own advice was the same. President Obama chose his own path which led greatly to the rise of ISIL.
The President's refusal to acknowledge the need for boots on the ground is another mistake and those that are there will have great restrictions placed upon them. General Dempsey admitted today that he supports the President's decision for more limited air attacks but that if it should fail he would return to the President with a recommendation for other options that could include ground forces.
<blockquote>While it plays well to some crowds for certain predictable voices to say that the strategy must be to “kill them all,” many decades of Israeli policy and now the long U.S. global drone wars have shown that objective to be futile and often even counterproductive, as such force only breeds popular resentment and new recruits. Stability will only be arrived at through a regional political solution that removes the pockets of conflict exploited by extremists and eliminates the popular support on which their viability depends.</blockquote>
This is where Mr. Wise really lost me. Political solutions? He seems to imply that there <strong>is</strong> a clear cut solution in Israel, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, and the Middle East in general. If we just better understood Islam and made no attempt to kill extremists or defend our interests, everything would be peachy keen, right? General Zinni's quote from his interview points out how the State Department and USAID have not been effective and throwing more money at them seems an unlikely solution due to lack of security on the ground for diplomats and aid workers. Ask the 49 Turks taken prisoner from the Embassy in Mosul and the beheading of a Brit who went to Syria as an aid worker.
History shows that conflict, like crime, never ends. Doing nothing has never been an option in addressing either problem. Crime does not cease nor can the war on drugs. Were we to stop locking up criminals, fielding large police forces, and <strong>trying</strong> to limit the influence of drugs in crime and ruined lives, the nation would dissolve into chaos more similar to that seen in other lawless and stupefied drug-influenced nations...like Afghanistan and Pakistan. Some believe that more social services and trying to understand the criminal would suffice. That is a pipe dream as is the theory that not engaging/threatening terrorist with RPA Hellfire attacks would calm their jihadist urges and hatred of the U.S. and Israel.
Similarly, we don't have an option to stop deterring conflict. We have an obligation to place ground forces strategically in places where they can respond to and deter conflict. There are many such relatively safe places in the Middle East to include Jordan, Kuwait, Turkey, Kurdish territories of Iraq, and the Sinai. The place for U.S. ground forces is not exclusively in the United States just as we don't leave all naval ships in U.S. ports. Mr. Wise appears to be a naval proponent based on other articles he has written. Please tell us how the Navy solves the problem of ISIL. Why would an expensive, exquisite UCLASS RPA with limited endurance and high costs per flight hour enable long term daily surveillance of some place like Syria or for that matter the East or South China Sea?