The Iraq War & The Banshee’s Wail
Today’s Iraq war cold shower is brought to you by Nouri al-Maliki.
As the surge shows some signs of success in the run-up to the White House-doctored September progress report, the utter dysfunction of Al-Maliki’s government is like a banshee’s wail over the cities, villages and deserts of Iraq. And you can bet it is being heard in Teheran and Damascus.
How many times have I written that there cannot be a military solution without a political solution? Like 20 some times in recent weeks, yet despite this beyond obvious conclusion there has been no parallel effort of consequence to the surge to excise the cancer in Baghdad, and the new coalition announced with great fanfare last week is a bad joke.
Now comes Senator Carl Levin, the Michigan Democrats, who is calling for the dysfunctional Iraqi parliament to oust the dysfunctional Al-Maliki:
“I hope the parliament will vote the Maliki government out of office and will have the wisdom to replace it with a less sectarian and more unifying prime minister and government.”
The parliament, of course, is learning canoeing and beadwork at Camp Hiawatha and won’t return until about the time the progress report is given or not given in public or not in public by General David Petraeus.
More here.
3 Responses to “The Iraq War & The Banshee’s Wail”
To which I would answer, how can there be a “political” solution without a cultural solution? Getting consensus among “political” parties is relatively easy until one realizes that such parties in Iraq represent only homogeneous cultural interests. The surge was designed to enforce a pause in the conflict that would allow these political-cultural factions to agree on some basic issues. It’s apparent the cultural forces at work and deep seated sectarian animosities are too strong. Unlike Afghanistan, the factions in Iraq are all-to-willing to fight and they are not about to let us get in their way.
Yea, Entropy is right. I’ll take it a step further and say this entire thing will only resolve itself after we leave and a victor emerges from the ensuing bloodshed. Nothing is going to stop them if they haven’t been stopped these last 4 years. They won’t even take a break to allow water and electricity infrastructure to be built.
Sam,
Were I in charge now, rather than abandon Iraq completely, I would work toward a soft-partition similar to another artificial country carved by imperialist powers out of Ottoman cloth – Yugoslavia.