Iraq gets new government as bombs kill 24
Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki vowed to rein in violence and heal Iraq’s sectarian wounds after parliament approved his national unity government on Saturday to end months of stalemate that raised fears of civil war.
Hours after bombs killed 24 people to underline the scale of his task, Maliki said restoring stability was the top priority of a coalition whose formation gave Iraq its first fully sovereign government since U.S. troops overthrew Saddam Hussein.
We’ve been hearing from the Six Months Crowd about how the situation in Iraq will turn the corner soon, that political and economic stability will arrive any day, for 3 long years now. However, nothing ever improves in Iraq, no matter what they point to as progress. Not catching Saddam, not the capture of Zarquawi’s number 2 or 3 man, not elections or a new constitution or a newly formed government. Nothing. Talk of progress in Iraq is a chimera, a mythical creature that never seems to make an appearance, always both a deceit and an illusion.
(More below the fold)
(Cross-posted in a slightly expanded form at Daily Kos and My Left Wing)
Yesterday I spoke to a young friend of my son about my views on Iraq. I told him we need to get out, or at a minimum, establish a deadline to by which we will have pulled all our troops out. His response was one I hear frequently these days: that we have an obligation to stay until we can fix the mess we created. It’s an honorable position to take. Who among us doesn’t want to set right the wrongs that we caused with our own actions?
Nonetheless, no matter how noble this sentiment, I truly believe that taking such a stance, at this point in time, is frightfully naive and fundamentally misguided. Our good intentions can do nothing to ameliorate the catastrophe we inaugurated when we invaded Iraq. And nothing we attempt now will succeed. Not after so many broken promises and outright errors of judgment, nor after so many instances of waste and corruption, and certainly not after the torture and death of so many innocents.
It is time to acknowledge a hard truth: our mission in Iraq, whatever it was or might have been, has failed. Our occupation there has not initiated a surge of democracy across the Middle East, nor has it led to cheaper oil, a lowering of tensions in the region or the suppression of terrorism. In fact, just the opposite has occurred. There are more incidents of terror now than before, less regional stability, and heightened tensions among all countries there, from Israel and the Palestinians, to Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, Turkey and Iran.
We have sacrificed lives and money and what have we accomplished other than to enrich the pockets of certain well connected Republican businessmen and lobbyists? The world despises and distrusts us, and we lack the credibility to rally international support for legitimate security concerns in Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea. We have fed the fires of Muslim hatred against our people for generations to come, and corroded the foundations of our once potent economic, political and military power.
Most of our allies have abandoned us, and we lack the strength and moral authority to attract new ones to our side. Even our most significant friend, Britain, now seriously questions the value of its “special relationship” with America, after the unmitigated bankruptcy of our “success.”
Yet none of our political leaders, from either party, with a few brave exceptions are willing to state what is now obvious to a majority of Americans; that it is time for us to leave Iraq, and succor the many wounds, both physical and spiritual, that our military misadventures there have generated. Time to reconstruct our military and heal the fractured bodies and minds of our soldiers. Time to re-focus our energy on solving the many problems we have within our own borders. Time to recover our international reputation, and our willingness to seek security not through unilateral action but as part of a multilateral alliance with other democratic nations.
None of this can be accomplished, however, so long as the Bush administration, and those in the Republican Party who would continue its failed policy of militarism and aggressive war, retain their hold on power. And the Bush regime cannot be effectively neutered until the Democratic Party unites behind the one simple message that the vast majority of Americans are waiting for them to proclaim, loudly and steadfastly, no matter what opposition they may face in the media or from the rabid war faction of the Republican Party.
The message? Merely this: It’s time to bring the troops home. Now.
Why would the situation in Iraq suddenly improve now? Are any of these various factional groups fighting to help this new government take power? If that isn’t their goal, then they aren’t going to suddenly give up fighting for their actual goals just because a new government is sworn in. It doesn’t make any sense.
None of it ever makes any sense, imo.
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I agree. We need to start redefining success in Iraq. Today they created their government. They can’t even fill their security posts. We need them to focus on the fact that we can’t be there forever. We can’t keep giving them new 6 month windows. This government needs to stand up and announcing our imminent departure should help focus their efforts.
Gov. Warner made the opposite case: that refusing to indicate we might leave actually helps the struggling government because they can argue that they will never get us to leave unless the people support the government.
I don’t know. I just don’t buy that. I think it undermines their legitimacy for people to think they are incapable of ridding Iraq of the Americans.
We just get blamed for their incompetence. We need to announce that we are pulling out and negotiate terms with this new government. If they want planes, tanks, jeeps, whatever, fine, we’ll give em to them and keep staff on to help with training and maintenence and whatnot. If they don’t want it, let them buy it from the Chinese or the French. I don’t care. Let’s just leave. Soon.
My feeling, and its one I’ve held for a long time, is that we are not in Iraq at this point to help the Iraqis (if we ever were). We are there, pure and simple, to intimidate other countries in the region and assert our dominance. Unfortuantely, things have gone so badly that even that mission has been a failure.
But to claim we need to stay to help the Iraq government get on its feet is completely disingenuous in my mind. We are a big part, indeed the biggest part, of the problem. No governemt will have true legitimacy in the eyes of Iraqis until we leave.
Yeah, I know you feel that way. And I basically agree with you. However, the government they have right now is really their only chance to avoid total chaos in the wake of our leaving (if we think it is chaotic now, we can only imagine what the vaccum of power will unleash).
One reason I’d like to announce that we’re leaving is so we can focus more on how to do it in a way that gives their government a fighting chance. I don’t care about their legitimacy. They need to be able to project force.
It’s not like there is some NVA out there waiting to swoop down on Baghdad once we’re gone. So, the government has a chance to stand up alone.
But, you’re right that we don’t seem to want them to do that because then the pressure for us to leave would become unbearable. And since we are building bases there at considerable expense, I don’t sense we want to leave in appreciable numbers any time in the next 50 years. It looks like their plan is to use Iraq as a kind air-craft carrier and they will tolerate losses and 10 billion a month in perpetuity as the cost of doing business in the middle east. It’s totally insane.
Yes, insane is the word for it.
Sorry, The Independent UK has redefined the Iraq situation. No longer just a civil war.
“Iraq is disintegrating as ethnic cleansing takes hold”
By Patrick Cockburn in Khanaqin, North-East Iraq
Didn’t take long. It’s finally being labeled for what it truly is.
The next time you talk to that kid (or anyone else) ask them if they are aware the timetable has been set. Written here, and in comments on multiple diaries, the usual response is: yes, but. . .
I think we need to ram home the point that the other fourteen nations of the Security Council, as well as the government of Iraq are basing decisions on the existing Resolutions. Iraq has met each of the deadlines, and is proceeding towards self-sufficiency in spite of the Bush administration.
“The Plan” is in place, and has been for over two years. The only ones seemingly unaware of it are those in the U.S. As Murtha has hammered since November, Iraq’s problems will be solved by the Iraqis. Another set of laws broken by this administration, which was responsible for drafting them in the first place.
Long past time to take the wider view. Daily outrage and body counts don’t get us any closer to ending the conflict.
Steve, were my exact thoughts when I first read about, and begin hearing the reports of, the so called no Puppet Government.
at least a few, CNN,NPR, etc. were putting a reality twist to the intial reports, that a couple of the cabinet posts were temp positions not yet worked out as to Who or What faction would control, one being Defense!!!!
Government{?} in name only!!