Iran, Iraq and the USA : A Big Question Mark?
Here is the full transcript of the discussion on “Iran urges US to withdraw from Iraq” in The World Today (Thursday, 14 September, 2006)
Reporter: Kim Landers
ELEANOR HALL: Iran and Iraq have wrapped up two days of talks aimed at developing closer ties.
The United States has frequently accused the Iranian regime of interfering in Iraqi politics and of fostering violence by allowing insurgents to cross the border.
But Iran says it’s the presence of US troops in Iraq that’s causing the instability, and there are plenty of voices in America that agree.
As Washington Correspondent Kim Landers reports.
KIM LANDERS: Iran is making it clear to Iraq that it wants to see US troops withdrawn from its neighbour.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has told the visiting Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that the way to end instability in Iraq is for US forces to withdraw.
It’s a message that’s also been relayed by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. He’s just returned from a visit to Tehran and says he was told by the leadership there that Iran would help the US leave Iraq.
Asked by reporters what that means, Kofi Annan says he hadn’t gone into details.
It’s not just leaders in the Middle East who accuse the US of causing problems in Iraq.
Former president Jimmy Carter says the presence of American forces is a key cause of the instability.
JIMMY CARTER: I respectfully disagree with what President Bush had to say. I don’t think that the safety of America depends at all on the extended presence of US troops in Iraq.
I think a lot of the disturbance on the streets of Iraq, particularly around Baghdad, is caused by the continued presence of the United States and the lack of a commitment by Washington to remove US troops at any time in the foreseeable future.
KIM LANDERS: White House spokesman Tony Snow has made it clear the US isn’t going to be pushed into a premature withdrawal.
TONY SNOW: You still have people who are determined to have this Iraqi government fail and we’re not going to let it.
KIM LANDERS: And he’s also made it clear the US doesn’t accept Kofi Annan’s message from Middle Eastern leaders that the American invasion and its aftermath have been a “real disaster”.
The rhetorical battle over Iraq shows no signs of waning.
Former US secretary of state in the Clinton administration, Madeleine Albright.
MADELEINE ALBRIGHT: The war in Iraq is going to go down in our history as the greatest disaster in American foreign policy because of the reverberations that it has in the Middle East.
We have sent the wrong message out of the war in Iraq, which is, if you don’t have nuclear weapons you get invaded. If you do have nuclear weapons, you don’t get invaded.
KIM LANDERS: Zbigniew Brzezinski who was president Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser is adamant the US must withdraw.
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: Upon our departure, the Iraqis invite all of their neighbours to a conference on stabilising Iraq.
And every single one of Iraq’s neighbours plus other Muslim countries, such as Pakistan, and Morocco, have a stake in stability in Iraq.
But they’ll not go to such a conference long as America’s occupying Iraq.
KIM LANDERS: And he says the US must accept that Iraq will try to strike up its own relations with neighbours like Iran.
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: Note where the government of Iraq at the highest level is today. It’s in Teheran visiting and negotiating with its Iranian neighbours.
That reality we have to accept, and as we’re prepared to occupy Iraq or much of the Middle East as the conflict expands for many years to come, and essentially assume the role of the colonial powers that left the region only a few decades ago.
KIM LANDERS: In the latest sign of the increasing cooperation Iran and Iraq have reached a deal to jointly develop oil fields straddling their border.
This is Kim Landers in Washington for The World Today.
13 Responses to “Iran, Iraq and the USA : A Big Question Mark?”
There’s no doubt at all that Iran wants the US out. But Iran wants us out for their own benefit, not for humanitarian reasons.
Regards,
Bookman
The Sunni governments would view this with alarm, and the Sunni revolt would intensify. The Kurds will not be happy about close ties with Iran either. I don‘t see the US going for this now for the obvious reasons but if we do leave in 2008 Iran will acquire a huge problem. They will have no problems in being more ruthless in putting down any revolt, but the reaction form the Arab world will be significant and could possibly split the two groups beyond repair. Most likely Israel would be off the Arab radar for a long time.
I’m not sure if the Kurds would mind closer Iraq-Iran ties. President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd,is VERY close with the Tehran regime, though certainly not as close as Al-Hakim of SCIRI. Of all the countries with a Kurdish minority, Iran treated them the best.
I think the breakup of the country is inevitable at this point. The questions is: how to bring this about without genocide. Kurdistan should be a separate country. Southern Iraq will be separate. And Sunni central and western Iraq should develop an economy unrelated to oil.
Nice idea, but what exactly would their economy be based on?
I have to say that Biden’s proposal is growing on me. I admit I first had a kneejerk reaction that it was a partition plan, but he has definitely thought it out in ways to avoid an outright partition and proposes a true confederation (not unlike the American confederation that preceded the formation of the US when our constitution was ratified. He claims that this can be done without throwing out the Iraqi constitution, but using it as a basis for a central govt with limited power and function, while the three factions get to control their own regions. And, he also proposes a system which would fairly divide the oil revenues (since contrary to what Elrod suggests, I don’t see any other way for the Sunnis to survive…maybe glass factories using the vast resource of sand that they would control
?)
I still don’t know if he has all the i’s dotted and t’s crossed, but it does look worthy of consideration because it’s pretty clear that we need a comprehensive strategy that addresses security through military and political means, which would then also allow for essential reconstruction.
Way to go, C Stanley! I think you are one of the few commenters here who really has an open mind – and I am including myself in the group that isn’t always open to new proposals.
Biden probably won’t go anywhere in the ’08 Presidential race- talks too much-not that much star power-but he is a fair-minded, solid guy who has really given his plan a lot of thought.
Since even Sunni/Shia marriages are breaking up, and the Kurds are already a separate sect, it just seems the logical way to go. The main problem is getting all the interested parties to accept it-as I thought I heard that a similar plan had been rejected by the Iraqi parliament, but can’t remember what the reasoning was. I think the regional powers that want a stable ME may have to pressure the Sunnis and Shia to accept a federation.
But I still think we should plan some kind of troop withdrawel once they do that as our presence is only adding to the insurgency.
I’m not ready to sign on to Biden’s proposal but I do think he’s considered a lot of the issues and has some sound rationale behind his solutions.
In the past, the Sunnis were opposed to federation, first because they thought they could find a way to resume full power like they had under Iraq…and then even when they saw that this wasn’t going to happen, then I think they became fearful that just the opposite would happen and that they’d be overrun if there wasn’t a strong central govt. So, Biden seems to be saying that they may be willing to accept this now that they see there aren’t many good options with the current configuration. And, the oil revenues are key: Biden proposes central control over them with international oversight, and guarantees to give Sunnis a share that would reflect their percentage of the population (I think he said 20%) This would be good for them because any other system is likely to leave them with no oil revenue and no economy.
Then he also covers why the Shiites and Kurds would be motivated to do this: foreign investment. Without stability, they aren’t going to get that (unless Iran is willing and able to put a large investment into it). So, the carrot for Shiites and Kurds is that even though they’d have to agree to share the pie with Sunnis, they’d get a smaller share of a larger pie (this is very significant because the difference between oil reserves that are there and the amount they can currently pump out is huge..but a very large investment, something like $30 billion, is needed to be able to get to full production capacity)
I really don’t know if the Iraqis would all buy into this plan and I think that is key. For example, if there are a significant number of Sunni/Shiite marriages that aren’t being split up, what happens to those people? And what of general mixes in the population, since the areas aren’t always clearly divided, is it really a good thing for the long term for people to migrate to separate areas?
I am open minded, or at least try to be, so I can see some good points that Biden makes. More importantly, I think it’s pretty clear that some political solution has to take place because there’s no real sign of strengthening in Maliki’s govt except the possibility of strenthening through alliance with Iran.
C Stanley,
The Sunni region is not all sand. Outer Anbar province is, but much of the Sunni region is actually quite fertile agricultural ground. It is the fertile crescent, after all. What can the Sunnis do? Well, they can become a knowledge economy, or an industrial economy. They have a fairly educated base, and they have strong trade relations with other Arab areas. I’m including Baghdad (west of Sadr City) in the new Sunnistan, mind you. Oil is a scourge on any society because it discourages the leadership from investing in wide-based infrastructure. The fewer the natural resources, the more the need to develop human capital resources.
Elrod,
All the descriptions of Anbar province that I’ve read are that it is a vast desert region with backward, feudalistic tribes. And, partition or federation plans that I’ve seen generally leave Baghdad under some kind of central or international control, so that is what I was basing my comment on. I may be wrong but that was my impression.
As far as human capital resources, I agree about the oil revenues being a spoiler in that sense (God knows that this happened in Louisiana!) I guess there would have to be incentives for modernization to prevent dependence strictly on oil, but I still have the impression that would take some time and that the Sunnis would suffer in the meantime.
C Stanley- I’ve read in several sources that thousands of ordinary middle-class Iraqis are leaving the country for Syria, because of fears for their safety. Isn’t it better to split the country if it will stop this exodus? Iraq’s borders are artificial, anyway, having been drawn up by the British in the 1920′s. I just don’t feel that they have the ability to put national pride over sectarian/religious loyalties.
As long as this civil war goes on we will be unable to help them rebuild their society. More anger and thirst for vengance will build up and more of their infrastructure will be destroyed. Their military and police still needs a lot of support, and we should be providing it, but not so that they can use the weapons and training we give them to organize death squads.
A split is almost inevitable, large numbers of people are already on the move for the sake of safety, I think more would move if US forces could provide security. . The problem with the division and oil is the Shiites having been on the bottom of the social order for so long might want it all. Elrod is right, long term for the Sunni population, no oil and being forced to develop industry and agriculture would be a blessing, but try to convince the Bathists who lived high off the oil hog of that fact. I didn’t know of the Kurdish ties to Iran, my thoughts were that the Kurds would become suspicious of Shiite intentions living next to two large and powerful Shiite states.
Kim,
I don’t disagree that the exodus is already happening and that we may have no choice but to support federalism as a way to use sectarianism as an advantage instead of an obstacle. I am just saying that I really don’t know where the Iraqi people stand on this (certainly signs that many are giving up on unified Iraq but I don’t know if that is a mandate yet), and I do think that if the critical point of no return hasn’t been reached yet, then we might not want to push it in that direction.
C Stanley- You may be right- I wonder if we’ll recognize the critical point of no return when we see it. The military has admitted that only a political solution with widespread economic development and rebuilt infrastructure will work in the long run. Maliki is reaching out to Iran and the international community to help with security and investment in their oil industry- which overall seems a positive step to me, but it seems like he’s running out of time. His authority still doesn’t seem to exist outside the Green Zone, and they seem no closer to a political solution at this time.