Dick Cheney & The 80 Percent Solution
In an acknowledgement of what everyone else knows — that Iraq is in civil war — there is talk of the White House endorsing a so-called “80 Percent Solution” by throwing its weight behind the Shiite majority.
As awful as abandoning the minority Sunnis in favor of the Shiites (who make up 80 percent of the Iraqi population) would be, such a solution is in keeping with an willfully arrogant administration.
Never mind that lip-locking with the Shiites would be an endorsement of further sectarian slaughter, not to mention the outrage it would provoke in the Arab world at large, where Sunnis are the majority.
It would buy the administration that most precious of commodities — time — at a crucial juncture in a three-and-a half-year-old conflict when the American public has turned against the adventure and the Iraq Study Group and other graybeards are declaring that the war cannot be won.
Not surprisingly, this scenario is being leaked by the White House itself. (Can you say trial balloon?)
Not surprisingly, the mastermind of this perverse piece of statecraft is Vice President Cheney.
And so the administration continues to cling to the threadbare notion of “victory” in Iraq.
11 Responses to “Dick Cheney & The 80 Percent Solution”
“the Shiites (who make up 80 percent of the Iraqi population)”
Uh, usually, the number cited is 60%. Did you include the Kurds? This would get you killed in Iraq…
Gray62:
The more I look into this the more the math is making me (more) wacko.
Sunnis are commonly cited as making up about 20 percent of Iraq’s population of 26 million. Implicit in the 80 percent are Shiites and everyone else, primarily Kurds.
I know that’s sloppy, but it fits conceptually insofar as the notion that White House throws its lot in with the Shiites, which means it is abandoning the Sunnis.
The Kurds, of course, are a whole different matter, but from what I have read they are not happy with this “solution” either.
Judith Yaphe, senior research fellow at National Defense University: Sunni Arabs account for only about 17 percent of the population. Shia Arabs 60 percent; Kurds — mostly Sunni — about 20 percent; and Turkmen only about three percent.
Mission accomplished. We removed a secular Sunni strongman and delivered the country to Iran. Congratulations, neocons.
Won’t Sunni countries like Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt have something to say about this?
This makes partitioning Iraq along religious lines seem like a more attrative solution.
Can you provide a source of this post. Has it been reported by Main Street media, as I have not heard a word on this anywhere?
This was the neocon strategy from the beginning. Reuel Marc Gerecht has been pushing it for a long time; he’s long claimed that disbanding the Iraqi army was a good thing because it permanently removed Sunni power.
Charles:
Several publications and blogs are reporting on it, including McClatchy Newspapers’ Walter Stroebel, who is one of the best in the biz.
TypePad will not let me roll out a long URL here, but you can go to Google News and type in keywords to get the article.
My God…look at the HEAD on that!
This doesn’t make sense-even from a neocon perspective:
It would anger moderates in Sunni countries like Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
It creates a Shiite sickle from Iran to Syria, and helps Iran in its quest to be the reigning power in the region.
It will create lasting mistrust for those who(if there still are any out there that are foolish enough) want America’s help in democratizing their countries.
It leaves open the possibility of regional war, as the other Sunni nations come to the aid of the insurgents.
It is monstrous, and makes a mockery out of every humanitarian gesture we have made in our efforts to assure minority factions of fair representation and protection of their human rights.
This could be Bush and Cheney’s version of “Peace with honor”. That Vietnam solution resulted in 10,000′s of US troop deaths and no honor. Kissinger and Nixon escalated the war to Laos and Cambodia, the results was Pol Pot and a real asian Holocaust. Maybe Kissinger is really pulling the shots with W. While Vietnam is a small SE Asian country, Iraq is in the ME with a Sunni/Shia conflict possible because of the mistakes of this utopian war.
Here’s a link to a more thoughtful analysis which gives some of the pro and con arguments. To some degree we can’t help but support the Shia since they are the elected majority. IMO though the focus should be on helping the ones who want peace and reconciliation to gain enough power to shut out the militant, Iranian leaning Shia. I don’t know if it’s possible or not (surely this has been the goal all along: are we going about it wrongly or is the thing just not possible?) But I would think that it should involve timed benchmarks for dismantling the militias with the clear message that this group (Maliki’s coalition) has our support as long as they are meeting the benchmarks. Failure to do so means that we withdraw and stop giving aid.