Iraq Crisis Grows With New Threat
by Sam Dagher
Wall Street Journal
Iraq's political crisis entered its second week one step closer to the potential dissolution of the government, with a call for elections by a vital coalition partner and a suicide attack that extended the spate of violence that has followed the withdrawal of U.S. troops.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki—already battling to sustain his Shiite Muslim-dominated government in a standoff with Sunni coalition partners—faced a new threat on Monday as the party loyal to radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr called for the dissolution of Parliament and new polls.
At the center of the crisis are efforts by Sunni-dominated provinces to seek greater autonomy from the central government controlled by Mr. Maliki. Bahaa al-Aaraji, the head of the Sadrist movement's bloc in Parliament, said elections are needed because "present partners [in government] can't come up with solutions in addition to the threat of Iraq's partition."
Comments
What we call political crisis, they may call a "norming out" of affairs.
There is a reason Sultanic regimes worked in that part of the world for a long. Not saying the winds of change are not blowing, but there is a serious lack of institutional knowledge in how to make democracy work; or at least make it work in the Western definition.
They will find something that fits their view of things. There will be bumps in the road. Their bumps in the road may involve violence, but it is their process to fix. Westerners will not fix Sunni-Shia. If ever there is one, it will be a Persian-Arab fix.
However, don't hold your breath.
Come on Don, just because your average dim wit who focuses all their energy on celebrities and sports doesn't know about Iraq doesn't mean it isn't important to U.S. interests. The other half of the nation that does have a clue cares since we invested so much blood and treasure into the pipe dream of a democratic Iraq, but beyond the hurt pride issues there are important reasons to care.
If the current political crisis (and it really is a crisis) is not resolved through legal means, it is unlikely what follows will be limited to Iraq, and even kids in grade school understand that regional instability in the Middle East means more expensive oil, and less toys for Christmas.
Like it or not it is important, but there is also little we can do about it. In the future hopefully we'll listen to regional experts instead of idealists like Paul Wolfowitz who was one of the key architects of the failed strategy and famously stated there was no tension between Sunnis and Shia in Iraq.