On The Iraq "Civil War" (update): Victory or defeat? My answer is Yes

The Un-united States of Iraq:

I was reading my morning news which, of late, includes among others: The Moscow Times and Ekurd.net. *(Mainstream American news alone is for Sheep)  I found myself motivated to update a previous post.  It’s been several months since I posted my thoughts on ISIS/ISIL’s appearance (Officially) on the world stage.  I typically avoid devoting my blog posts to current events, as conjecture and opinions can get one into trouble.  It’s now 2015 and a LOT has changed in the region since, much as a result of our weakened foreign policy.

Much indeed has changed in the world as a whole: terror cells have sprouted up in every western country, of note.  The oil market is experiencing a war of its own, with powerful players being pushed to the brink.  Militarization of police forces, government attacks, conspiracy, abuse of privacy, and various other threats to the Unites States’ Constitution. 

The wireless infrastructure that we, our employers, and our financial institutions have become dependent on has proved to be unsecure.  Amazing artificial intelligence projects are now in development, including the first self-educating, self-programing robot. We are living in exciting time, a turning point in world history, like the world of the nineteen-teens, we are in relatively uncharted water! 

Many people are concerned with the instability that has been left in the wake of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the ever-present fear mongering media has many people and politicians convinced that the world is coming apart at the seams. 

Though there are always uncertainties and a single event may cause the pendulum of history to swing back at any moment, things are not nearly as bad as all that.  POTUS has declared the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan over, many are outraged but many are relieved. *(There’s always a third group that is simply indifferent out there as well, but those people probably aren’t reading this blog.)  I personally am very relieved!  This may come as a shock to some of my friends, they are probably saying to themselves right now, something to the effect of: “Just when we’re most needed, Obummer declares victory and runs away!?” or “Why did we send our men and women there to die, if we were just going to abandon the place to terrorists!?”  The reason is, not abandonment of cause but of strategy.

 To understand the Middle East, and our relationship with them, we need to, yes you guessed it, understand the history!  (*See: http://www.timemaps.com/history/iraq-1500bc)  The Middle East was the cradle of civilization, the earliest and greatest known civilizations appeared in ancient Summer and Ur.  

Google Images: Victory Stele

Great conquerors such as the Akkadians, Assyrians, Babylonians, and Persians etc. constantly vied for control of the region. The Persians lost to Alexander the Great’s Greek Army, The Greeks lost to the Romans in the west and various Sarmation tribes of horse archers in the east.  The Romans alone fought against the eastern tribes such as the Parthians, and the Sassanid Empire and their successors, The Ottoman Turks, for well over a thousand years! 

Google Images: Ottoman Iraq

 Those ancient people were dominated by empire after empire for a very long time, never experiencing a national identity.  Yet we scratch our heads when Winston Churchill’s neatly drawn map of the Post World War I Middle East seems a little dysfunctional?

Google Images: Iraq revolt of 1920 Map

The British were professionals when it came to colonization, they had it down to a science.

Google Images: Colonization

If you look at any British colony in history you will find at least one commonality: An empowered minority.  In the Americas it was the social elites, often with ties to England.  In Iraq they empowered the Sunni’s, which developed into an oil rich and Stalin like regime. The idea being, the minority would feel threatened and be self-motivated enough to fight for and maintain itself, without tying up the resources of the British Empire.

Google Images: British Iraq

  It worked well, too well in fact, but a quick glance into British history shows us when colonialism became taboo , and the United Kingdom began to allow its colonies to slip from her grasp, temporary chaos usually followed.

The region that we refer to as “The Middle East” is a massive region, with very rich and diverse cultures. The cultural differences, inherent in a history as described above, are divisive enough without religion being a factor.  Islamic fundamentalist, or as I call them, non-westernized Muslims are simply fuel to the fire.  This problem is nothing new though, anti-imperialist, post-modern society just doesn't have the stomach, or the know-how to control a people that simply DO NOT want to be together.  There is only one method of control, which effectively brings democracy and stability to such a people.  That strategy was the United States’ WWII strategy of choice, a strategy that was discussed though not implemented in Vietnam, and the strategy proposed by Gen. Patraeus’ version of the Army Counter Insurgency Manual. 

The idea is that if a foreign power, or powers invade, destroy, and occupy a belligerent nation for long enough, they will change the mindset of the up-coming generation(s) enough to allow them to self-govern, though permanent occupation is still likely. The reason the “Neo-Con” politicians were railed on for not having an exit strategy was partly because, EXIT WAS NOT PART OF THE STRATEGY! Or at least, not anytime soon. The long term occupation strategy was effective in Japan, Germany, South Korea, and etc. but the American public today will/should not support such long term commitments.  

Our strategy was not a secret government conspiracy, it just wasn't advertised. Israel among others, warned against our plans for occupation. An article came out in the New Yorker, back in 2004 by Seymour Hersh titled, “Plan B” it explained the issue quite well, the article begins:

July, 2003, two months after President Bush declared victory in Iraq, the war, far from winding down, reached a critical point. Israel, which had been among the war’s most enthusiastic supporters, began warning the Administration that the American-led occupation would face a heightened insurgency—a campaign of bombings and assassinations—later that summer. Israeli intelligence assets in Iraq were reporting that the insurgents had the support of Iranian intelligence operatives and other foreign fighters, who were crossing the unprotected border between Iran and Iraq at will. By early August, the insurgency against the occupation had exploded, with bombings in Baghdad, at the Jordanian Embassy and the United Nations headquarters, that killed forty-two people. A former Israeli intelligence officer said that Israel’s leadership had concluded by then that the United States was unwilling to confront Iran; in terms of salvaging the situation in Iraq, he said, “it doesn’t add up. It’s over. Not militarily—the United States cannot be defeated militarily in Iraq—but politically...” 

Hersh goes on to reference a statement by Ehud Barak: 

"the former Israeli Prime Minister, who supported the Bush Administration’s invasion of Iraq, took it upon himself at this point to privately warn Vice-President Dick Cheney that America had lost in Iraq; according to an American close to Barak, he said that Israel “had learned that there’s no way to win an occupation.” The only issue, Barak told Cheney, “was choosing the size of your humiliation.” 

 I’ve repeatedly used the term “Our/The Strategy”, as if there was a single agreed upon strategy that both the American politicians and military had agreed upon, that was/is not the case. Ben Franklin said: “Democracy is the absolute worst form of government, accept for all the others.” The people that make the decisions in our country have their own reasons for doing so, they may be personal or not, I don’t wish to paint with too broad of a brush, but the Human Factor is a very important one.  Agenda’s change with the wind in D.C., military leaders may be up for review or retirement, interests may be re-prioritized, and public opinion will sway in whatever direction the media wishes it to… There are many reasons why the best strategies are passed over, or altered along the way. 

        The nature of our political system makes long term commitments, of any kind, difficult. In fact the 1980's and 90's were notorious for American attack and abandon actions.  A sort of "We'll help you fight, to a certain extent, and or until we don't want to anymore" interventionist policy.  As you might guess, it didn't go over very well.  (e.g. Vietnam, Bay of Pigs, Contra, Afghanistan I, Gulf War I, Mogadishu, etc.)  Sure we knocked some heads but what did we get out of it? and at what cost?
  
       There was another strategy that was on the table at the time, which called for the creation of a three state nation of Iraq.  Someone with half a brain either by touring or reading a history book, realized that there were many different people and cultures in Iraq, and a partitioning of the state according to cultural borders, would be more a stable solution than trying to unify a nation of people that hated each other.  Unfortunately the occupation theory won out, at least the American led strategy won out, there were other nations active in the region as well.  Israel, once they realized what America was going to do, began to implement its own plans for what they believed was our inevitable failure. The Article continues:

“Israel’s immediate goal after June 30th is to build up the Kurdish commando units to balance the Shiite militias—especially those which would be hostile to the kind of order in southern Iraq that Israel would like to see,” the former senior intelligence official said. “Of course, if a fanatic Sunni Baathist militia took control—one as hostile to Israel as Saddam Hussein was—Israel would unleash the Kurds on it, too.” The Kurdish armed forces, known as the peshmerga, number an estimated seventy-five thousand troops, a total that far exceeds the known Sunni and Shiite militias.

Israel and many others, including our own pro-partition strategists, believed that Iraq would become three states sooner or later. The Kurds took advantage of the aid and solidified their position as an independent state, though not officially recognized as a nation they fought to become one, at least in operation.  They formed a provisional government and took control of their natural resources, much of which was/is still “officially” controlled by Baghdad. It’s important to remember that the Kurds are the most motivated, stable and western friendly nation in the region.  The Kurds have faced numerous attempts at genocide at the hands of the Sunni’s, including the use of WMD’s on Kurds in Halabja back in 1988.

Google images Halabja

        The Image above, which was taken after Saddam’s dirty bomb killed thousands of Kurdish men, women and children, has become an icon for Kurdish resistance and independence. The Kurd Army is making great progress, something they could not have done without U.S. involvement.  Those quick to jump on the anti-Iraq war bandwagon, are quick to forget the international threat that was destroyed during Operation Iraqi Freedom, and slow to realize the importance that invasion played in the lives of those that suffered so terribly.  Though we cannot commit American lives to die fighting all evil in the world, our operations in Iraq though not without flaw, were justified.   

          I know what you’re thinking… “But now look at it, it’s a mess!” I say yes it is, for the moment it is a tragic, terrible, but necessary and temporary mess.  The atrocities being committed in this new war in Iraq may have been averted if we had chosen “Plan B”, and pushed for international support in implementing that plan, but hind sight is 20-20 and blood would have been shed on all sides regardless.  We are late in the game, in supporting the Kurdish state but I hope we continue to do so and don't simply attack and abandon them again.

         If we recognize the Kurds as an independent state, and give them the support that they need, the entire region will stabilize itself and be much better off than it has ever been or ever would have been under foreign occupation.  So take heart America, the war is not lost, Evil will not triumph, the cause for freedom and independence continues, we just aren't leading the charge anymore.  The fate of the those people may or may not be in the strongest hands but they are certainly in the right hands and its a dark soul indeed, that can look at these final images and disagree. 

Google Images: Peshmurga