Lullaby
Washington Post expresses wonder at the lull in violence, suggests it can’t last:
BAGHDAD, Nov. 1 — From store clerks selling cigarettes by generator power, to military commanders poring over aerial maps, Iraqis and Americans are striving to understand the sharp decrease in violence over the past several months and what it might herald for the future of Iraq.
The number of attacks against U.S. soldiers has fallen to levels not seen since before the February 2006 bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra that touched off waves of sectarian killing, according to U.S. military statistics released Thursday. The death toll for American troops in October fell to 39, the lowest level since March 2006, and the eighth-lowest total in 56 months of fighting, according to the Web site icasualties.org, which tracks military fatalities.
Noteworthy, not noted here, that a third of those were non-combat deaths.
But Iraq defies sweeping statements about safety or danger. Both Iraqis and U.S. soldiers are wrestling with a basic question: Is the declining violence a lull in the war or the beginning of a long road to peace?
“My feeling is that this decrease in the violence is temporary,” said Saleh al-Mutlak, a secular Sunni who leads the Iraqi National Dialogue Front political party. “It’s temporary because the United States cannot maintain this number of troops in the areas where they are in. And if they do so, there will be no normal life in these areas.”
And if they leave, neither will things be normal. As LTC Dale Kuehl observes, you need a political settlement.
“I have eaten dinner in several homes and even went to a wedding. None of this would have been feasible six months ago,” he said. “I hesitate to say we have turned a corner. Insurgencies tend to be fairly resilient and can come back if the underlying causes of the insurgency are not addressed in the political realm.”
Or barring that, I’d suggest, continuing improvements in the Iraqi military and police, with a relatively stable level of disagreement and genuine efforts to resolve problems in the Iraqi government.
The article doesn’t discuss the former, which reports from people like Yon, Totten and Ardolino suggest have been considerable. Nor does the article discuss any particulars of the latter, though I’d suggest the article includes numerous references to Iraq’s best hope for political resolution without actually saying as much … the fact that previously warring parties have suspended hostilities or pointed their guns in the other direction, and the people are sick of violence. None of that make Iraq a Swiss paradise, as illustrated by the article’s reference to ethnic enclaves and places where violence is up.
This and other lull articles are lullabies for war opponents who might be alarmed at the prospect of a Bush victory, and the implications that could have for their own congressional and presidential aspirations.
They purport to be progress reports, and they report that we’ve moved forward in Iraq. There’s no denying it. But rather than offering meaningful examinations of that progress and possible avenues for success, or underscoring that a failure to continue to assist Iraq is to condemn Iraq, the lull articles portray obstacles as deadends and gently insist Iraq is beyond saving. The not-so-subtle suggestion is that, in the face of numerous advances, no further advance may be contemplated.
So American sentiments of hopelessness are confirmed, and political futures that have been staked on abandonment are secure. The advocates of withdrawal have nothing to fear. It will only take an uptick in violence to confirm failure.
There are critical questions looming for American political leaders in the short term; the financing of the war and maintenance of troops levels. A year and just under three months from now remains too far away to address beyond what can be done now to set the terms for January 20, 2009, something both sides would like to do, but thus far only Bush has had any success with.
Bush and Petraeus made the qualified suggestion in September that the U.S. might not have to maintain troop levels, and some might start coming home as soon as December. Ironically, as the line from the withdrawal camp is shifting from debacle to lull-can’t-last, the means of prolonging the lull and cementing any progress is undercut by the insistence that the troops are spent. So if Bush and Petraeus say troops levels should be maintained to give Iraq more time to settle, the anti-war camp will say troop levels have to come down because the troops can’t take anymore.
It’s unclear how big a problem this will be. The military clearly has been overtaxed and should have been made larger a long time ago. Recruiting has been stepped up over the past year. But if the United States government, to include all parties and branches, wants to get out of Iraq, it should be looking at a continued acceleration of recruitment, and replacing troops as they are pulled, to give Iraq the prolonged security that will be necessary for any political settlement to develop.
After all, it would be disingenuous for a political body that remains enmired in partisan bickering to condemn other people to slaughter because their politicians have the same problem.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 1:47 pm on Friday, November 2, 2007
4 Responses to “Lullaby”
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November 2nd, 2007 at 2:31 pm
Jules,
What no one in the newsroom talks about is the Iraqi army was originially supposed to be 10 divisons and 33 Brigades…the reality is they are on track to be 13 divisions and 52 Brigades by next summer.
An extra IA division is being added up North, Basra and Baghdad. The divisions are going from 3 Brigades each to 4. Units are overmanned by 110% to allow for a generous leave package.
November 2nd, 2007 at 6:33 pm
“This and other lull articles are lullabies for war opponents who might be alarmed at the prospect of a Bush victory, and the implications that could have for their own congressional and presidential aspirations.”
You took the words right out of my mouth. Nice post!
November 2nd, 2007 at 7:41 pm
I remember reading about riots among American troops in Europe after WW2. They wanted to come home. They had defeated Hitler and as far as they were concerned it was over. But they had to stay and hundreds of thousands {if not ultimately millions} more would be deployed to maintain security and help rebuild. There was nothing quick or easy about it. Iraq will not be different in that regard.
November 2nd, 2007 at 8:28 pm
The WaPo are hardcore dead enders. This ain’t gonna be Vietnam and they can’t psychologically accept that.