In Sunday's New York Times Week in Review section there was a remarkable piece by seven US soldiers completing fifteen month tours of Iraq. Entitled, The War as We Saw It, the soldiers write that they are amazed by the surrealistic nature of the current discussion of the US occupation of Iraq. Their bottomline is that wishing will not make it so, the US military is not going to "win" a counter-insurgency in Iraq. Their words...
Given the situation, it is important not to assess security from an American-centered perspective. The ability of, say, American observers to safely walk down the streets of formerly violent towns is not a resounding indicator of security. What matters is the experience of the local citizenry and the future of our counterinsurgency. When we take this view, we see that a vast majority of Iraqis feel increasingly insecure and view us as an occupation force that has failed to produce normalcy after four years and is increasingly unlikely to do so as we continue to arm each warring side.
Coupling our military strategy to an insistence that the Iraqis meet political benchmarks for reconciliation is also unhelpful. The morass in the government has fueled impatience and confusion while providing no semblance of security to average Iraqis. Leaders are far from arriving at a lasting political settlement. This should not be surprising, since a lasting political solution will not be possible while the military situation remains in constant flux.
It is hard to ignore the continued tinkering with Iraq by the US. One can hear the fingernails going down the Iraqi chalkboard as politicians, I am sure with the best of intentions, talk about carving up Iraq and soft partitions. While these and other proposals may solve the US's problem in Iraq, without some form of consensus from the Iraqis it is hard to see how our proposals could possible solve their problem. As of today, the Iraqi government of Maliki is teetering on the edge of collapse. They have alot of work to do on their part.
From invading with the former colonial occupier (UK) to proving you can only walk down streets with heavy armor (John McCain), the War in Iraq has just created another way from the US to be alienated from the world. And from the hopeful nature of what America should mean to the world.
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